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She turned and pinned Connor with a glare that had his mouth snapping shut. She smiled. “That’s what I thought.”

As she turned back to Alpha and Billy, she heard Reginald mutter, “And just who put her in charge of the whole bloody world?”

“Everyone who wets themselves over the dragons,” she said, smirking to herself.

Billy chuckled.

~*~

Amelia and her mother had spent an anxious few weeks awaiting word from the North, fearing the worst. Tessa had kept them informed since her arrival in Aeretoll, and the silence spoke of nothing good. Finally, though, a letter had arrived on the leg of a wind-rumpled falcon, and more had followed hence, from both Tessa and Oliver.

In them, the cousins told a wild story of a Midwinter Festival that had become a massacre, and the finding of three dragons – three cold-drakes. Of a desperate trip home for Oliver and his king, and of a terrifying siege of the palace at Aeres by the Sels.

“The fucking Sels were at Aeres?!” Amelia had exclaimed when she got to that part.

Normally, Katherine would have scolded her for her language, but in that instance, she’d only snatched the paper away, eyes growing wider and wider as she scanned Tessa’s neat script. “Gods,” she’d murmured. “And they let Tessa fight?”

“Mother, you let me fight.”

“That’s different! Tessa’s a lady!”

Amelia had lifted a single brow.

“Oh, you know what I mean.” Katherine had stood, pacing the width of the salon as she finished the rest of the letter, shaking her head and murmuring to herself over Tessa’s very un-Tessa-like exploits.

Amelia hadn’t truly agreed, though, on any of it being out of character. Yes, her sister was outwardly softer, quieter, and certainly more proper than she was herself. But Katherine had never been privy to those summer afternoons spent exploring Drakewell’s ponds, and forests, and caves; hadn’t seen Tessa pick herself up, wipe a smudge of dirt from her cheek, and set her little jaw at a stubborn angle. Hadn’t seen Tessa step forward as the only one brave enough to handle the five-foot snake they’d found in an abandoned hunter’s cabin.

That was the thing: John and Amelia had always been the brave-seeming ones…but Tessa and Oliver were Drakes, too; their fire was of the banked kind, waiting for a good stirring to roar to life.

Oliver’s letters in the coming weeks had been a bit more dry and practical, but even so, Tessa could feel his enchantment with Aeretoll – and King Erik – shine through. He loved it there, despite the cold, despite the rebuilding efforts post-siege. He spoke with a hopeful tone she’d never heard from him before, and that warmed her cold, dark heart.

He was the one who’d sent all the detailed schematics for the dragon harnesses and bridles. His own was a bit pieced together, he said, but Erik had insisted on a new one, as well as a newer, more modern suit of mail and armor for Oliver. I’m keeping the helm, though, Oliver wrote. It’s quite dashing.

It had hit her then: Oliver was going to war. Sweet, bookish Ollie whose ailments had always kept him from living up to his father’s standards, was to have his own armor. And Tessa had swung a sword.

All told, sending Tessa north to seal a military alliance had worked – but not in the way any of them had expected.

The correspondence was helpful, and Amelia was hopeful that a formal agreement of aid could soon be drafted – but her main focus, now, had to be on her own lands, her own people, her own role in the war.

“All right, m’lady, I’d say that’ll do for ye, what do you think?” Billy announced at last.

The sun hung weak and watery at its midpoint, offering little warmth. Reginald had wrapped himself in his cloak and leaned against the trunk of a bare-limbed tree, napping. Liam had grown bored of the harness-fitting and gone scampering off to lie at the edge of the ornamental koi pond and wiggle his fingertips in the cold water, laughing as the sluggish fish came to nip at him; Connor had followed him, a dark shape crouched on the flags.

Some generals, Amelia thought – not without a measure of affection.

She turned her attention to Alpha, and Billy’s handiwork.

“We’ve got the rings, here,” he said, stepping up to point things out, “that wee Oliver described, for your own harness to attach to. And here we have your main stirrups for riding” – fixed against the wide, smooth saddle flap, rather than dangling from straps as on her horse’s saddle – “and the ones below, on the girth, for mounting. Then we have the breastplate, which runs here, and here. I didn’t add a crupper – didn’t really fancy trying to run one around his tail.”

She smiled. “No, I imagine not. The breastplate should be enough.”

“Right. And here’s the bridle – no bit, of course, but a hackamore, and these chains here, those are quite smart, to allow your beastie to open his jaws and blast fire at anyone who needs a good roasting.” He grinned at that, and Amelia felt her own smile widen. “Your reins go through these little rings, banded onto his neck. Don’t want them flapping about and getting lost, I reckon.”

“No, Oliver said this was the traditional way to do it.”

He nodded, stepped back, lifted his cap and scratched at his scalp. “So. What do you think?” He sounded both proud and nervous at once.

“I think it’s beautiful.” She stepped forward to run a hand along the smooth, dark brown leather of the saddle and all its straps. It was fine-grain, buffed to a high polish, and smelled pleasingly of saddle soap and beeswax. “I always did love a good saddle.”