Abolisher [Drothiker #2]

4.

Azryle Wintershade felt the tug again.

It was strong enough that a wave of dizziness rushed through his mind, blinding him for a moment. He staggered a step back, and fell down on the bed, steeling himself.

And then it was gone.

Azryle blinked tightly and lifted to his feet, an intense irritation gripping him. He ignored it.

"It's getting worse every passing day." Ferouzeh lounged in a settee beside the bed, all dressed up for the night. Her crimson dress clung to her lithe body like second skin—leaving her legs and arms bare, despite the chill season.

Azryle didn't reply as he sized himself up in the mirror one last time. White shirt fitted his arms, tight enough that the cloth might tear if he so much as tried to flex his biceps. No room to stash weapons—not anywhere on his torso anyway. He did have daggers hidden at his hip, his thighs, in his boots, and one he'd managed to hide beneath the sleeve at his forearm.

He frowned as he did the last button at his chest—leaving the top two undone. "You couldn't find a fitting shirt?"

"It is fitting, you bastard." He watched in mirror as Ferouzeh's burgundy-painted lips formed a lazy smirk. "Our mark happens to have a taste for fashion." She sighed. "We've been on hunt for this one piece of information for a year, now, Az, I don't want to risk it because you've only ever worn fighting leathers, and that grey undershirt of yours." She rolled her hazel eyes. "Burn that Abyss-damned shirt and Ianov will have less burden."

Azryle tutted. "And more pollution." He turned, all ready, and Ferouzeh lifted to her feet. He said, "If we find nothing tonight, then what? We will have nowhere else to go."

"There's always somewhere to go." She headed for the bedroom door.

Inn's lights in her silken hair shifted like an obsidian waterfall catching sunlight as she looked over her shoulder.

"If there are questions, answers are meant to be found. And if finding them takes time ... we're immortals, Az, time is all we have."

The music in the club was blaring—deafening to Azryle's heightened ripper hearing.

Myriad lights bounced on and off everyone dancing on the platform, which was sprawled across the vast room, flashing all kinds of colors. The scent of joy was strong enough that Azryle found his own mood unclenching, his heart—which once had been as unfaltering as ticks of a functioning clock—began beating with the rhythm of the boisterous music.

This feeling would never not be strange—of a free, untamed heart. Leashed no more.

Well, not to Felset.

This is yours alone, someone had once told him. Yours to give, yours to command. And this is where the strength lies, Ryle.

He was beginning to forget her voice, her fragile face. But he still remembered how her touch had felt, how his skin had felt lively and ... breathing every time hers had been in contact. Her words had been foreign, then—unnecessary, strange. But now, as he let himself feel each thrust of his heart, echoing through his entire body ...