Page 11 of Dragon Fight (The Dragon Queen #2)

11

W hen we arrived at the fort, Brom and Draven were nowhere in sight, the only sign of them their horses drinking water from an old pool. Rainwater had filled the bricked up circle, and though the water looked far too green and mossy for me to want to taste, the horses didn’t seem to mind. As we walked under a crumbling archway, we found them. Draven had scaled one of the walls and was walking along the top of it, and Brom was climbing to join him up there, the two of them recalling childhood memories.

“Remember when we set up camp here?” Draven asked Brom, an almost boyish enthusiasm in his manner right now.

“I remember you stealing that velvet cloak that had been in my mother’s family for generations,” Brom replied, picking his way closer to the prince. He hauled himself up on the lintel, then took a seat there.

“I needed a badge of my royal office as king of this fort,” Draven said with a smile, sitting down beside him.

“She nearly cried when she saw the state of it. They’d kept it safe since one of the Glaines was queen of Nevermere.” Brom glanced at Draven. “Your great, great grandmother or something.”

“I’m sure my ancestress wouldn’t have minded.” Draven sucked in a deep breath. “I forgot about the way this place smells.”

“Like rotting seaweed?” Ged asked with an eye roll.

“Like freedom. The air is crisp, clean, brought in from the northern pole with still a hint of ice in it.”

“I can feel that in my bones,” Soren said, then moved over to pull me close. “I’ll just have to snuggle up to Pippin to keep warm.”

“Now there’s an idea,” Flynn said with a rakish grin. He flicked open one of the lower toggles of my jacket, sliding his ice cold hands against my ribs, forcing a squeak out of me. “So warm…”

“Two can play at that game,” I said, shoving one hand down the front of his pants.

“Oh yes, Pippin…” he moaned, but that quickly turned to a yelp. “Gods above, woman! Your hands are like ice. I can feel my balls crawling right up into my…”

His complaints no longer registered as I looked over his shoulder and caught Draven watching us. All of his former hauteur was back again and then some, turning his eyes to ice chips. He shook his head slowly, as if irritated we were intruding on this space sacred to he and Brom’s childhood when a roar alerted us to a dragon’s presence. Darkspire landed moments later just beyond the ruins.

“Back again, boy?” Draven called out to him. “I know Glimmer’s not much of a queen, but chasing after any is good practice for when Zafira’s new queen is laid.” Darkspire just rumbled at that, then took several ponderous steps forward. The dragon’s focus wasn’t on his master. His head was pointed in my direction and his poison-green eyes burned into mine as he approached.

“Now lad,” Soren said, stepping in front of me and holding his arms out wide. “All is well. All is well.” He shot Draven a quick look. “You’ve got control of your dragon, Draven?”

“Prince Draven.” His Highness’ voice was crisp and resonant with a tone of imperious command. “And of course I have. ‘Spire is just… curious about something.”

The dragon paced forward slowly, giving us plenty of time to move. When I did I glanced down to be sure of my footing. A circular pattern of cobblestones made up the ancient fort’s floor. When I looked a second time I noticed it. At the centre was a domed rock, with lines dividing it into quarters. Lines that would shift, widen with the right stimulus, just as it had at the ruin Flynn had taken me to. This wasn’t the time to do this. I knew that we needn’t share any of our secrets with Draven, that it certainly wasn’t wise to do so, but I stepped forward anyway, into Darkspire’s path.

My men cried out, but the dragon stopped.

I had never felt as small as I did at that moment, with the massive creature looming over me. He slowly lifted his foreleg and when he did, I mimicked his movement with my hand.

I heard a humming inside my head as Darkspire moved with careful precision, lowering just one curved claw down to my hand and pricking the pad of my finger. There was a bright burst of pain and then the humming grew louder. It felt like the ground shook as I took one step then another, closer to the centre stone of the circle of cobblestones, people calling out things, something, as I let my hand fall. A drop of blood formed on the fingertip and dripped down to splatter against the stone.

Just as before, the stone separated somehow and, just as before, a small stand emerged. On it, a shining egg of moonstone.

Claim it. Glimmer’s command was clear in my head, and with it came another female voice, one I recognised as Tanis. They both told me what to do, over and over, until my hand wrapped around the stone.

She stood before a wing of dragons, but I got the feeling that none of these beasts were under her control. The woman was clad only in a wispy shift dress. And on her head? She wore a crown of bones, each one wired together with frightening precision. She held a ceremonial knife in one hand and with the other hand she extended just one finger. The knife point was pressed to her fingertip, just as Darkspire’s claw had done to mine, and blood welled forth. The dragons all hummed together in chorus as she pressed it to the stone. As the stand emerged, their song grew louder, filling the air, vibrating through the woman, urging her forward when the egg was revealed. She placed her bloody fingers upon it, just as I had, and we heard Tanis speak.

For the balance to be restored, the queen must rise . I whispered the words along with her, hearing my dragon repeat them inside my mind. Tanis’ voice joined ours, speaking the sentence over and over.

“What the hell is going on?”

The harsh question broke through the vision. I blinked, losing the images in my mind, coming back to the here and now to find Draven standing over me. Frowning, he stared into my eyes, then at the egg, then back and forth again before reaching out to—

“No!”

I knocked his hand away. And his look of surprise at my action was quickly replaced by one of rage. His eyes flashed brilliant blue, his lips pulled back in a snarl as he stepped towards me…

Only to be met by the wall of Brom’s body.

“What the hell have the four of you been playing at?” Draven demanded of his wing commander. “What is…?”

But as he asked the question, the egg receded back into the alcove, as the rest of our dragons landed around us. And to make matters worse, Darkspire came to stand behind my back, looming over me and looking down at his rider in a move that was like a blow to Draven. He took a step back, then another, staring at each of us with an expression of horror mixed with fear, like it was the first time he’d ever seen any of us and he didn’t like what he saw. He shook his head and seemed to come back to himself.

“What was that?” Draven demanded, jabbing a finger at the centre of the cobblestones.

“Draven—” Brom started to say.

“As your prince, tell me what that was.”

The rest of the wing damned themselves further in coming to my side, not his, and in not answering his question. But the lack of response wasn’t due to insubordination. None of us knew how to answer him.

“Your Highness,” Brom said in a very controlled voice. “What you saw is a very recent phenomenon, and right now you know as much as we do. Pippin’s blood… activates something in the old ruins. It’s only happened here, today, and before that in one other place, but not one of us knows why.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me?”

That seemed to be what was at the centre of Draven’s outrage, the idea that he had been kept in the dark.

“And what would you have done with that information?” Flynn snapped. “Gone running to your blasted mother, only for Raina to drag Pippin from her bed and… what? Make good on killing her and Glimmer?”

A squawk let me know my dragon had heard this. Her sound of indignation was the only warning I got as she launched herself off Obsidian to land heavily on my shoulder, my knees locking to absorb the blow. Glimmer bristled from her position closer to the prince, staring him down in a battle of wills.

“And what will you do?” Draven asked Flynn, though his eyes remained on my dragon. “Use this display of chicanery to validate your ‘alternate’ candidate for the throne? If your father trotted her out to the local ruins, then got her to put on a display, you’d have the common folk behind her, making Pippin the perfect Skanian puppet.”

He finally shifted his attention fully onto Flynn.

“And you’d plunge the country into civil war.”

“That’s what you lot have never fucking understood.” Flynn stepped closer until he was almost nose to nose with the prince. “You were born in the cesspit of Nithian intrigues and you’ve learned to play that game, but some of us stepped away from that shit the moment we could, never wanting to play again.” He looked over his shoulder at me. “Pippin, do you want to become queen of Nevermere?”

Yes , Glimmer replied.

But I said, “Gods, no.” And both of us were honest about our intentions. I shook my head, thinking of the king and queen the last time I’d seen them, in the ballroom on the celebrations for King Magnus’ birthday, and how Queen Raina had been working so hard to hold onto power with her machinations. “I’ve never wanted that, not even when I could do so legitimately by marrying you.”

Draven visibly flinched, taking my words as an insult, and his scowl deepened.

“Well, then, it appears the two of us were very lucky to avoid a fate worse than death,” he replied, acidly. “But, make no mistake, the moment the other dukes catch word of this, you’ll have no choice. The ridiculous imbalance of power that my mother and uncle have created means that the dukes are hungrier than ever for what scraps of power they can acquire. And you are their best bet. You’ll have your choice of husband—” Draven’s eyes flicked across to the other men before returning to me, and he sniffed in derision, “or perhaps husbands—but you’ll be locked down, caged, like the goose that lays the golden eggs.”

The prince shook his head, looking around at the ruins with an air of regret in his eyes as if he was contemplating what my future would be. Then, as was usual for the mercurial prince, his mood changed and he looked back at us all, his gaze hardening.

“Let's get back. The dragon has had her time practising flying and I'm in no mood to revisit old times.” When he glanced at Brom, real hurt showed in his eyes. “Especially when they’re gone and will never be repeated.”

Having returned to his customary demeanour of a prince to the manner born, Draven didn’t wait for a response. He turned on his heel and walked over to his stallion, throwing himself back up into the saddle before kicking the horse into a canter. Darkspire took to the air to follow him.

“Well,” Ged said, breaking the silence. “What the hell was that?”