Page 19 of Court of Embers (Dragonesse #2)
Chapter
Ten
W e left the lake, flying idly after Cai, with no real destination in mind. The cairns for the dead were to be built by the Jade Leaves, and the desecrated forest had been cleansed. Now we just had to wait for Tyria.
Perhaps they would let us use their library , I mused to Rhylan, stretched out over the saddle with one hand on his neck, looking down at the forest below.
Sylvaene Eyrie sprouted from the center, dwarfing the trees that were massive in their own right, but it was still an impressive sight.
We could search for information on Ustrael and her worshippers .
Maybe . Rhylan sounded doubtful. That sort of thing is normally kept under lock and key. But it’s worth a try.
He banked, gliding back towards Sylvaene, and I felt a little better for having something to do.
But as we approached the eyrie, something enormous uncurled from the mammoth branches, and I realized that some of the dense canopy was not leaves, but a dragon.
Caru, the Ascendant of Sylvaene, raised his head above the treetop. His scales were as gnarled as bark, leaf-frilled antlers sprouting from his skull, shoulders, and spine, and eyes the perfect shade of spring gazed at us.
Rhylan flew over him, ducking his head with acknowledgement, while I tried not to gape at the vastness of the Ascendant’s body coiled around the branches.
“Come in,” Caru rumbled, tapping root-like claws on the uppermost balcony. “My daughter awaits you.”
So soon? I thought to Rhylan, gripping tightly as he circled towards the balcony.
Having Cai on our side—well, on Kirana’s side—had made me entirely sure Tyria would come soon after, but I’d expected a longer consideration, and possibly a very grudging one.
Cai , Rhylan said. If he mate bonds with Kirana…
Ah . Yes, of course. As soon as he’d learned she was alive, and as well as she could be, given the circumstances, he’d want to go to her.
And once in proximity to each other, the bond could happen at any time.
Having her eldest son bonded to a draga of the Obsidian Flames gave Tyria a powerful tie to Rhylan’s House.
If she threw her lot in with us, eventually a child of her line might rise to become the dragon of Jhazra Eyrie, or their children might bring new blood to Sylvaene.
With Cai determined to come with us, Tyria would be throwing away a massive opportunity if she balked at joining our Court now. And, with as much effort as she’d put into tending Sylvaene, I now knew she wouldn’t risk the loss of such opportunities.
That’s good , I said fervently, as Rhylan landed on the balcony. Instead of doors, a wide archway of woven wisteria branches led to the interior of the tree, soft, sheer curtains hung to block the view inside.
I dismounted, and Rhylan shifted, taking a stack of clean clothes that had been thoughtfully left on the balcony for him. As he pulled his clothes on, I ran my fingers through my windblown hair, hoping to appear more presentable and Dragonesse-like.
We entered together, and instead of the usual Eyrie-Master accommodations, we found a room not entirely dissimilar to our war-planning corner in the Jhazra library.
It clearly functioned as Tyria’s office, with a map-inlaid table set in the center of the room, and a desk piled with sorted correspondences pushed against the branch-and-vine wall.
An enormous bubble-glass lamp hung suspended overhead, the light crystals gleaming through delicate shades of chalcedony and pale amber.
Tyria herself, draped in a comfortable linen dress, stood before the map table, her arms crossed as she scowled down at it. She gestured, and there was the creaking groan of wood all around us.
The branches of the wall separated, and Caru stepped through, much smaller than he had been mere minutes ago. He shook his frilled head, seating himself in a cat-like manner on the other side of the table, to all appearances a tree that had come to life in dragon shape.
“We will join your Court,” Tyria said abruptly. “I see no other path forward.”
Wordless explosions of relief echoed from my head to Rhylan’s. We had the Jade Leaves. That made four Houses for our Court.
Five , Rhylan said. Forget the posturing, the Mourning Fangs are with us.
Maristela has influence over Gaelin, and you wounded her Ascendant , I reminded him.
Gaelin loathes Chantrelle and Elinor. He won’t back them if they’re calling Judgments on allies during an Interregnum.
I most sincerely doubted that, but I also hoped I was wrong.
“Thank you,” I said aloud to Tyria. “We won’t let you down.”
A faint half-smile crossed her face. “No, you won’t, because this is the only chance you get. I’ve forgiven your childish plans, but I haven’t forgotten. Do things right, and all will be well. But I do not want to see another childish farce like that.”
“Understood,” Rhylan said, nodding to her with respect.
“Especially you.” Tyria sliced a narrow look in his direction.
“I understand that you may be, ah…rusty on social etiquette after your ordeals, Sera, but you were trained by the Drakkon himself, Rhylan. Not to mention the upstanding dragonbloods your parents were. I would never permit such behavior from my own sons.”
We silently took the rebuke, as we deserved it.
“But it’s over and done with.” Tyria sighed heavily. “You’re bonded now, and Nasir would have chosen the two of you. Would that he’d had the presence of mind to simply tell us that you were alive, and had you both bonded in a proper ceremony. So much could’ve been avoided.”
Something inside me sat upright at the mention of my father’s name. “Did my father ever tell you anything about his plans?”
Tyria glanced at me, then looked out the window, frowning.
“No. No, I served as his advisor many times, but Nasir was…difficult to fathom at times. The gods know it’s like that sometimes, when a mate bond is broken.
Of course, the elders of the Houses could see what he intended in becoming Rhylan’s Preceptor—anyone with eyes knew that he was to be tapped as Nasir’s heir. But I had assumed, like everyone else…”
“That he planned on bonding me to Yura,” Rhylan said with a tight smile, the cinders in his eyes barely banked.
“Yes. It was the only thing that made sense, but when Aerona mentioned it to him, Nasir…went mad. That’s all I can call it,” Tyria said, her frown deepening.
“He lost his damn mind, right then and there. Aerona and I fled his presence, but he destroyed half a floor of Koressis. It was another week before I heard from him, and he carried right on as though it had never happened. But that’s the trouble in dealing with a bond-broken dragon, I suppose. They seem fine, until they’re not.”
“It wasn’t because he’s bond-broken,” I said quietly. “He knew that—”
“You’re about to tell me once more that Yura is a flesh-eater, and a follower of Ustrael.” Tyria gazed at me levelly.
“Yes.” I held my head up, looking her directly in the eye.
“Well, consider it heard. Proof or not, I believe, because Caru does.” Tyria gestured to her Ascendant, who looked up from the map he’d been studying to gaze at us.
“I have consulted the wind, and searched around the bodies of the fallen,” he said, and even in this smaller form, his voice rumbled and echoed like a falling tree.
“And they carry a scent that sends fear and rage through my bones. Spawn of the Other, the Unspeakable One, the Outsider. Those creatures had the touch of Ustrael upon them.”
To my surprise, my shoulders slumped with relief, my breath leaving my lungs in a rush. Until it had been confirmed by another Ascendant, one who had directly nosed around in their ashes, I hadn’t been really, truly sure that we were chasing the right thing.
And just as quickly, my sure relief became dread, because I would’ve much preferred that my sister be a singularly mad draga than in direct collaboration with Ustrael or her spawn.
“To be clear, the touch of—the Outsider, or of the Primoris?” I asked him.
Caru tipped his head, nostrils flaring. “There is no difference. The Primoris are called Ustrael’s children, but they are much like smaller pieces of her.
She laid her eggs in the earth, but when the Father and Mother destroyed her, creating the World Scar, she lost pieces of herself in her death throes, torn apart as she was.
One of those pieces reeks much the same as a Primoris egg.
But whereas a newly-hatched Primoris will be weak and stupid with hunger, a piece of Ustrael will retain… some of her aspect.”
A chill ran down my spine at the thought of a small piece of the Other, containing the actual presence of Ustrael, being present in Akalla.
We had not seen a hint of Larivor or Naimah in ten thousand years.
Why should we be cursed with the presence of the Outsider, when we couldn’t even have the touch of the Dyad?
I closed my eyes. There was no point lamenting the lack of the gods now. We’d have to handle this with our own claws and teeth.
“So Us—the Outsider is present in some form, whether through a piece of her own body, or a Primoris egg. Though that seems less likely,” I murmured. “If there were a hatched Primoris, there’d be a swath of destruction no one could miss.”
“I, too, believe we are dealing with a piece of her,” Tyria said in steely tones. “The awakening of Vhaiothez was…loud, by all accounts. Unmistakable. An entire eyrie was lost. Yura, whatever she’s doing, is moving in subtle ways.”
“ If it’s Yura alone.” Rhylan sat down, looking up at Tyria. “When was the last time you saw Aerona?”