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It was a test. Perhaps one of the greatest tests of my life.

Where Sekh had tested my capacity to hold blood and power, Durandal tested my capacity to give from my own reserves. My willingness to endure the pain of being drained in order to wield him at his full strength. As any two-edged sword, his blade cut both ways. He would eagerly decimate my enemies—but only if I was willing to feel the pain of his blade myself first.

And as an ancient legendary Aima come back to life, his thirst after a millennium was immense.

Other queens long ago had tried to wield him. Their failures burned and then sputtered in his veins, not able to sustain the never-ending fire inside him.

:He burns like a forge,: Rik said in our bond, showing me how he used to work metal. Heating a sword until it glowed cherry red and then shoving it into a barrel where it hissed and steamed. :Your blood is the fuel to heat his blade hot enough to quench and renew his hardness. Just like a physical sword.:

After lying in wait for so long, Durandal’s forge was nearly cold, using my blood to slowly stoke his flames once more. Rik didn’t need to warn me that heating a piece of metal to such a critical temperature was risky and dangerous. If I failed to endure Durandal to the hardening stage, I would lose not only a powerful, ancient Blood but also all my reserves we’d worked so hard to stabilize last night.

Durandal’s forge heated, red-hot and brutal. His lungs pumped like bellows with each swallow. Heat crackled from his mouth, up my arm and spreading through my body. Cutting like a million tiny knives as he pulled swallow after swallow from me.

Trust. In myself. My own strength. My own reserves. Unflinching. The pain would pass. But only when he quenched his red-hot blade and hardened the steel once more.

My fangs throbbed, forcing me to open my mouth, though air only intensified the urge to sink them deep.

“Shara…” Rik warned.

“No.”

“At least allow the general to feed you.”

“No. Not this first time. It’s important. I must do it alone. It’s not as bad. As Huitzilopochtli. Yet.” I squeezed my eyes shut, forcing myself to endure. My words a promise to myself, as much as to reassure Rik. “He will pay me back in kind. Almost there.”

Sekh’s bond roared with the might of his stone sphinx. “If you die, there’s no pay back possible.”

He feared me dying again, especially so soon. I understood. Goddess knows I didn’t want to die either. She wouldn’t have sent me a Blood who would kill me. “I won’t die. But if I do, I will resurrect myself.”

Though all my instincts demanded relief. I must feed. I must strike. My fingertips burned, my skin tightening. All my organs felt shriveled. Desiccated. A mummy drained dry, buried in a tomb in the bowels of a pyramid millennia ago.

Plunging himself into the quench, Durandal flung himself back. Away. Shuddering as if Isis’ pyramid toppled over to crush him.

Immediately, I smelled Rik’s blood. He wrapped his forearm around my mouth, pressing the bite to my mouth. Even though he poured into me, it took all my will not to sink my aching fangs into him.

Gasping for air, Durandal spoke, Guillaume translating for me even as he drew my nails into his side. “So very strong. Wield me, Shara Isador. Now I am Durandal de Isador.”

Sekh flooded my system too, swinging the precarious tipping slide of my reserves back toward balance rather than deficit. I already felt better, though my veins still felt shriveled and tight, my core hollow.

Though for all his feeding, Durandal thrashed and groaned, in just as much agony as me, I feared. My cobra queen venom would act quickly, but I didn’t think poison was causing his pain, especially since he’d been Called to be my Blood. It was the sheer weight of power in my blood. Which was why queens couldn’t feed long from me. Their own magical systems couldn’t carry the load.

Durandal drank even more of my blood than Leonie, who was the only sibling able to absorb so much of my blood. Though it’d taken decades of torture and starvation to carve enough channels in her system to hold it.

He crawled to me, his eyes burning as brightly as Excalibur’s blade. Offering me his throat, he whispered hoarsely, “Quaeso.”

A single word with so much emotion blazing in his eyes. Please take me. Forgive me for causing you pain. Cut through with fierce joy at being allowed to serve again.

I didn’t give him respite, or wait for Guillaume to use a blade, waiting only for Rik to drop his arm. I sank my aching fangs deep into Durandal’s throat. Not punishment for draining me—but the best possible reward I could give him for answering my Call.

His eyes flared and rolled back in his head. He convulsed against my knees, his body sagging heavier on my lap. He curled an arm around my neck, pulling himself up, close, pressing us together as much as possible.

His blood unsheathed like a glistening, perfect crystalline sword, sliding through me silently but oh so deadly.

Ringing steel echoed in his bond. His sword falling again and again. Crashing through shields. Cutting through bone. Knocking down walls. Riding to war once more. Always. Trumpeting the coming of his queen, calling forth her greatest armies.

Not Charlemagne’s. Hers. Queen Aude, daughter of Dea Hludana, the Frankish goddess of war. Wiped from human history, just like Charlemagne’s troops destroyed the Irminsul as they spread Christianity through the land.

Rebellion and warfare brewed in Durandal’s blood, making him the kind of warrior who’d take on a Roman legion singlehandedly. Refusing to bow. Refusing to lay down his arms. Even if it meant his annihilation—because he was taking as many enemies with him as possible. He did not offer his throat for just anyone, even to live and ride as a Blood once more. His beast was no horse but a giant elephant with long curving tusks. I saw him charging through troops, slinging horses and men aside like they were toys.