Page 8 of Heart of Chaos (Chaosborn #1)

Chapter eight

Arik

“I’ve been flying for nearly twelve hours without food or rest,” I said, shutting Einar’s door behind me and leaning against it with crossed arms. “What?”

“Always such a pleasure, Arik,” Einar drawled, not bothering to look up as he shuffled through the papers on his enormous wooden desk. “Tell me, why did it take you four times as long and twice as much gold to return from Dragejakt with a single candidate?”

I clenched my jaw, trying to decide what to tell him. The image of Eisa dripping blood into the snow outside the iron doors had sent Baldur nearly into a frenzy. It had taken every ounce of willpower to rein him in, and I worried what he might do to Einar if I told the truth.

I won’t lose control, Baldur grumbled.

You almost did , I replied. We can’t afford for you to get us exiled to the odemarksdyr for killing Einar if he tries to take her.

Let him try.

“Arik?” Einar snapped, looking up with narrowed eyes.

“We found one last candidate. A woman.”

“A woman?” Einar raised a brow at me as he sat behind his desk, his fingers steepled. “And this woman was important enough that your dragon kept you out searching for weeks past the time Ragnar called you all back?”

“With so few Chaosborn, I thought—“

“You are not here to think,” Einar snapped. “You are here to follow orders.”

“She burns blue.”

Einar blinked, a victorious glint entering his eyes. “Fine. Sit. Tell me about this blue.”

“She was an indenture.” I didn’t sit, careful to maintain my mask of unbothered disinterest. It was a mask I had perfected with my father, and one I relied on to get through these meetings with Einar. “I had to buy out her contract.”

“Another indenture,” Einar muttered in annoyance. I knew he preferred it when Dragejakt yielded lordlings for him to train, as most already had at least some skill with a sword. Not that it was enough to save them from the odemarksdyr if they didn’t end up bonding. “And do you have this contract?”

“I burned it.”

“You burned it,” Einar repeated icily.

“She had the right to choose—“

“She had no rights,” Einar snapped. “As Chaosborn, her life belongs to the crown.”

He leaned back in his wooden chair, the boards creaking beneath his weight. Einar was all muscle, and years behind a desk hadn’t been enough to erase two centuries of training. The only real signs of his age were the lines in his tanned face and the fact that he was completely bald, despite the thick graying beard he wore down to his sternum. “Sit down. Is she healthy at least? Fit to be one of us?”

I hesitated, deciding to tell a half-truth. “She has some family sickness. I don’t know if she’ll survive the Rifting.”

Liar , Baldur growled in my head.

It’s not a lie, I reminded him. You’re the one who’s convinced, not me.

“Of fucking course,” Einar snarled, as if the fact that Dragejakt had yielded such poor results was my own personal failing. “I’ll have Ragnar evaluate her. He needs his mate’s bonded to be strong. Healthy.”

Ragnar will get nowhere near her, Baldur growled.

“Ragnar is not the only male dragon waiting for their mate,” I pointed out calmly, ignoring Baldur’s temper.

Einar glanced at me, his eyes slitting from a watery blue to a slitted black. “I don’t need to remind you that Ragnar has waited far longer than Baldur.”

I clenched my jaw, trying not to imagine the pale, delicate woman subjected to Einar’s passions. I took a breath, willing Elysia and all the gods to grant me calm.

“Baldur will have as much choice as Ragnar in the matter.”

Einar laughed. “Yes, I’m sure that’s why you spent every last second hunting her down . ”

“Baldur is Drakonungr.”

“And I am Dragehersker , since you seem to forget,“ Einar snapped. “Your dragon may outrank mine, but don’t think that your birth or rank gives you any power here, Prince . Your father appointed me to lead the drage decades before you took your first flight. Now sit down !”

I sat, eyebrows raised as I propped my booted feet on Einar’s desk. It took everything in me to appear relaxed and restrain Baldur from burning the old man to a crisp.

It would be quick. We could say it was an accident.

I will not give my father a reason to hang me for treason, I growled, forcing him to settle between my ribs. It would leave Edvard to rule unchecked, and you know he’ll be far worse.

Then we could do what we should have done twenty years ago and invoke my claim on the title.

Not yet.

Einar frowned at my dirty boots as he threw the candidate profiles at me. “All that searching and yet only twelve this Dragejakt.” Einar gave me a look that was half calculating, half contempt. “You didn’t look hard enough.”

“We searched everywhere. I’ve read the histories. Fewer and fewer Chaosborn are found each Dragejakt. Our numbers are less than half what they were the last time we had a blue in our midst, and the odemarksdyr are becoming bolder with their attacks.”

“And yet it took you weeks to track down a single slave girl.”

I gritted my teeth against the injustice of this accusation. “There are at least a hundred Chaosborn living in this mountain who might yet bond a dragon.”

“And too many who will not,” Einar argued, pinning me with an impatient glare. “If they didn’t bond by their second Rifting, they’re unlikely to do so now.”

“If we begin holding Dragejakt more than once a decade—“

“I didn’t ask you here to lecture me on your ideas on modernization, “ Einar drawled, spitting the word as if it left a foul taste in his mouth.

“Without something changing, there’s no way we’ll ever be able to reestablish the outposts. Frostvier, Kaldvik, Myrkheim—all have been unmanned for centuries. The odemarksdyr have likely overrun the Peripheries and grow in strength.”

“Enough!” Einar snapped, face turning crimson. “We will continue to do as the drage have always done. Tradition exists for a reason. We will trust the Norns and the gods to provide, and you will search harder next Dragejakt. If you don’t like it, you’re free to challenge Ragnar in open combat.”

I sat unmoving, jaw clenched as I resisted rolling my eyes. Einar would run the drage into the ground and let the odemarksdyr take Stalheim before he agreed to break tradition or trust anything other than fate with the kingdom’s future.

And he knew I wouldn’t challenge him. Not without the strength of a mate bond to guarantee the outcome. Baldur could beat him easily, but while the dragon’s yielded to a simple hierarchy of strength, the drage were ultimately human.

They yielded to power, which I didn’t yet have.

“I thought so,” Einar jeered, stilling back and waving to the door. “Go. Prepare them. I want all twelve bonding.”

I nodded and stood, trying not to look as furious as I felt.

“And Arik.”

I paused and turned, hating the oily tone in Einar’s voice.

“In case I wasn’t clear, the girl is mine. There will be consequences if I find out you’re playing favorites.”

I clenched my jaw so tightly I thought I might crack a molar, but I managed not to respond as I strode from Einar’s office. My only sign of frustration was when I slammed the door hard enough to crack its stone casing.

You let him get to you , Baldur chided.

I know.

What will you do?

Follow orders.

Baldur huffed in annoyance in my chest. It would be so much more satisfying to burn him alive.

I laughed despite myself. Not all problems can be solved with fire, unfortunately.

Such a human notion , Baldur grumbled. What about Eisa?

What about her?

You should tell her. That she’ll have to choose.

That conversation will go over well.

I didn’t think a dragon could roll its eyes, but Baldur gave it a mighty internal effort. You could try to be a bit more charming.

Baldur, I sighed, pausing in my trek down the winding spiral inside the smokestack.

You are a better man than Einar. She should choose us.

It’s not like I have much time to win her over. And I can’t keep Einar from her.

Baldur rumbled angrily. We could handle Einar. Tonight, if you wish.

No. I shook my head. Baldur was stronger than Ragnar, but the political consequences would be unpleasant, to say the least. We need to wait until Eisa bonds. Do everything by the book.

Baldur huffed his annoyance at human bureaucracy and settled into the pocket of my mind he liked to curl up in after a long day.

I was a selfish bastard for not telling her. For taking away yet another of Eisa’s choices. But I wouldn’t let Einar destroy her.

I’d make sure she survived the Rifting and became strong enough to rip out Einar’s throat herself if she wanted.