Page 85 of The Forsaken Heir

AURELIUS

“ A few hundred. That’s our best estimate at this time,” Octavius said.

Leaning back in my chair, I heaved a sigh. Another member of the war council voiced my frustration.

“A few hundred fighters? That’s all?” he asked. “I thought we could muster at least a thousand.”

Octavius spread his hands in surrender. “We’ve put out the call, but that’s all I can say for sure.”

“We have far more men of fighting age than a few hundred.” Benedictus pounded his fist on the table. “Where are the rest?”

“Some are ineligible,” I said.

“ Ineligible ? What do you mean?” Benedictus looked as though I’d told him the sky was green.

I did my best to keep my voice even and calm.

“Because many of the dragon shifter households have no children. You might be aware of that fact, Lord Beatrix, since your son”—I waved to Vincent, who sat in the corner with Rasp, as they’d arrived too late to get good seats—“was the last dragon born. My father and I have given orders that no household with less than one man will be called up for battle.”

Benedictus sputtered, glancing around as if looking for help from any of the other attendees. None—not even his own contingent of loyal friends—spoke up.

Finally, he said, “Your Highness, we are in a grave situation. All available fighters must be brought to the battlefield should it come to that. You have to see that?—”

“What I see ,” I said, finally losing my temper, “is that our race is on the verge of extinction. Our numbers have been dwindling for centuries. Neither my father nor I want to go down in history as the men who damned our entire race all because we didn’t want to lose a fight.”

Benedictus, too enraged to control himself, rose from his seat, his face red with anger. “If this does go to active fighting and war, and we lose?—”

“Then we lose,” I said, letting the words echo around the room before continuing on in a more resigned voice.

“We lose. Perhaps we can reconstitute our numbers afterward. In a few centuries, if we are lucky, we might turn things around and regain our footing. I am a realist, Benedictus,” I said, glaring at the nobleman.

“Pragmatic to a fault, some might say. We will fight. I will fight. Your son will fight. All who are able to go to battle will fight, and we will lay our blood and tears on the field of battle. We will rain down fire and claw and fang upon our enemies, and we will not stop until all is lost. There will be no retreat, and I will do it happily for my people and my kingdom, but I will not shatter entire families and mates simply to have more cannon fodder.” I pointed at the report in front of Octavius.

“The men on that list are our best fighters. They know what they are doing. Undertrained and underprepared men will be of no use to us in battle. There will be no further discussion on this.”

Benedictus opened and closed his mouth several times, like a fish trying to breathe out of water. Without making a sound, he nodded once, a bitter but resigned look on his face.

“As you command, Your Highness,” he said, sitting back down.

Slowly—somewhat hesitantly—the conversations restarted, going into other needs for the coming fight.

While they discussed, argued, and orchestrated among themselves, I glanced out the window at the sunny day outside.

My own thoughts went down a dark path, though, opposing the bright light beyond the window.

The back-and-forth with Benedictus had reminded me exactly how close dragons were from vanishing from the world.

I still had faith that we could find a way out of this without an apocalyptic outcome, but the threat of destruction grew nearer with each passing day.

Whatever happened would most likely come to a head two weeks from now when the Hikshil met with Bastien.

“Highness?” Titus said, snapping me out of my internal thoughts.

I turned away from the window. “I’m sorry? Yes?”

“Apologies. Did you hear the question Lord Silvanus asked?”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t.”

The large man sat across from me, his bald head gleamed, and his thick graying beard twitched as he smiled.

“I was asking what the plans are for after the war. For good or ill, we need to make preparations,” the man said.

“True,” Benedictus said, having regained his composure.

“It’s as you say, Prince Aurelius, should we lose, then the remaining dragons must have somewhere to retreat to.

Does anyone here believe Bastien Laurent will stomach any of our kind to remain anywhere near the Pacific Northwest?

He’d want us at least a thousand miles away. ”

There were grumbles of agreement around the table.

The truth of the matter was that Bastien had proven himself to be fully unhinged and maniacal.

None of us believed that he’d be content with a small-scale victory.

He’d want the whole thing. He’d want us pushed off the entire continent if he could.

He and his parents had always been greedy and power hungry.

It was part of how they’d garnered as much support among their kind.

Wolves had no royalty, only noble houses.

That being said, the Laurents were almost de facto royalty with the amount of sway they held.

“As I said, I’m a realist,” I said. “That doesn’t mean I’m a pessimist. I still think we can win this and survive. If things go badly, we’ll retreat south. We can get out of the area quickly if need be. We have one thing going for us that the wolves don’t. We can fly.”

That eased some of the tension in the room as everyone chuckled.

I waved a hand. “Everyone dismissed. We can talk more later.”

The men and women rose and began to trickle out. Rasp and Vince stayed put, both of them looking uncomfortable and anxious. I waited until everyone had departed to speak.

“What’s wrong with you two?” I said.

Rasp gave a derisive snort. “This is all our fault.”

“Yeah,” Vince muttered. “We did this.”

“No, you didn’t,” I said.

“ What ?” Rasp said, twisting his face into a confused scowl. “I’m not sure if you noticed, but none of this would have happened if we hadn’t kidnapped Elle. This all started with that. We were dumbasses, and now we’ve ruined everything.”

“Total dumbasses,” Vince agreed. “We thought we were going to make things great, and we totally messed up.”

“Stop,” I said, my tone firm but friendly. “After seeing the kind of person Bastien is? This was coming no matter what. You guys didn’t start anything that wasn’t already coming. In fact, you may have helped us.”

This time it was Vince’s turn to give me a quizzical look. “How’d you figure that?”

“It forced Bastien to move quicker. His hatred of his sister caused him to lash out sooner than he would have.”

Vince and Rasp shared a look, I wasn’t sure they believed what I was saying, even if I did.

They would need more convincing. Maybe I could figure out a way to really prove to them that Bastien had been planning something like this for years.

Before I could focus on that, though, I needed to see Elle.

I’d been so busy that I hadn’t seen or spoken to her even once today.

“Go on,” I said. “Go relax or something, and stop beating yourselves up over this.”

Rasp and Vince stood, both looking like they wanted to keep arguing that they were the ones who’d ruined everything, but thankfully, they departed without any more grumbling.

Based on how hard Elle had been training the last few days, I assumed she would be outside with Delphine. My suspicion was correct, and as I stepped out one of the side doors of the mansion, I spotted the two women at the edge of the forest on a grassy flat area.

This was the first time I’d really gotten a chance to see what they were doing. Elle was actually pretty impressive. She’d shown what she could do in the fight at her apartment and that night in the conservatory, but she’d clearly learned even more.

As I strolled down the hill toward them, Delphine shifted to her wolf form, leaped high in the air, jaws open, ready to snap closed on Elle’s throat. At the last possible second, Elle twisted and kicked Delphine in the stomach. The blow sent the woman tumbling back, and she shifted back.

“How’d that look?” Elle asked me as she bent over to catch her breath.

I helped Delphine to her feet. “Really good, actually. Your reflexes are pretty damn fast.”

Delphine brushed grass from her pants and glanced between Elle and me. She let out a little exasperated sigh. “You know what? I need to head back up to the castle. I totally forgot I needed to get one of the maids to change the sheets on our beds.”

Elle frowned. “Do you have to do that now?”

“Yep.” Delphine gestured toward me. “See if the prince here can, uh, assist you. I’m sure he’s great at…uhm, physical things.”

Biting my tongue to stifle a snort, I watched the older woman trudge up to the castle. When I turned back, Elle’s cheeks were red.

“This whole thing has changed that lady,” Elle said. “She would never have said something like that before.”

“Well?” I said, stepping forward, and rolling my sleeves up. “Might as well see how much you’ve learned. Can’t disappoint Lady Delphine, can we?”

Elle sighed and straightened up, giving me a cocky grin. “Oh, really? You think you want a piece of me?”

I untucked my shirt to make it easier to maneuver. “I think so. I’ll even take it easy on you. I won’t shift. Just human on human. How about that?”

She narrowed her eyes. “How generous of you. Let’s go then,” she said, waving me on.

I tracked my gaze down her body and smirked. “Sure you don’t want a second to finish catching your breath?”

In answer, she lunged forward and tried to grab my wrist, possibly to put me into some sort of lock. I backed away quickly, my feet skidding across the grass. She was fast.

“Almost had you.” She grinned and feinted a kick at my legs, but used the distraction to land a quick punch to my ribs.