Page 3 of To Touch A Silent Fury (The Bride of Eavenfold #1)

Lang

T he tiny hull rocked beneath my feet just as I lunged forwards, thrusting my sword out in a jab. Foxlin hopped to the side, avoiding my strike but staggering in his own boat.

I stumbled forwards, my feet spread across the narrow gunwale, using the momentum to hack down near his right shoulder.

He blocked it, just barely, and our wooden swords glanced off each other.

I was in trouble; I’d needed the blow to balance myself, and now it was hopeless.

Foxlin swatted my sword away, and my feet lost their purchase.

A second from defeat, I leapt into his boat to save myself from falling into the murky canal.

Foxlin laughed, relaxing his sword arm. He always laughed with his whole body, his wide shoulders shuddering forwards, and I saw the glint of an advantage.

He pivoted, ready to push me into the drink.

Another advantage: the man was all brawn, and my narrower frame was built for speed.

He should have capitalised when he had the chance and stabbed me in the side .

His hands pushed in the same moment that I regained my balance, and I ducked. His hands met nothing but the air above, and I pushed myself upwards, clocking his chin and sending him backwards. In one moment, I whirled and shoved, pushing him straight off his own vessel.

The surprise on his face was priceless as he fell back, his arms outstretched. He plunged into the canal. It was the middle of Longdawn, and the canals had not warmed a fucking jot.

I winced as I watched him fully submerge and then come up spluttering.

“What is that, now?” he asked, coughing up brown water. His hand reached up to push the water off his face and back from his short red curls.

“I believe that’s four to one,” I said, jumping back onto the much steadier jetty before reaching to pull him out.

My own hair, straight and dark, fell over my eye as he grabbed my arm, and I heaved him up. He lay on the jetty like a bloated ruswhale, breathing hard. “I really thought I had you that time. You over-extended.”

“I thought you had me, too,” I admitted, with a narrow-lipped smile. “What did you learn?”

He pushed himself up and shivered. “To stop agreeing to your stupid ideas. We’ve been fighting on the gondolas for a week now. I’m a laughing stock.”

“Balance is important. We need to be able to fight everywhere. What good will we be if we can only duel in the comfort of an arena?”

“What’s next?” Foxlin said, his wyvern-amber eyes still merry despite the cold, the gold of them making his complexion appear warmer than it was. I could not claim the same, my hair and eyes made me look like I lived in a crypt in Domin. “You going to make us fight on dragonback?”

I grimaced, shrugging off my outer coat and passing it to him .

“I can’t take your coat, you idiot. You’re the bloody prince, someone will think I stole it,” he said.

“Give it back to me later, then,” I said. “I’d rather you not die from my stupid ideas.”

Foxlin stared at me as he pulled it on. “That’s it, isn’t it. All this balance stuff. Fighting on the walls last week, fighting on the boats this week. You think you might have to fight on dragonback one day?”

“It’s best to be ready for anything.”

“But we have all the dragons. Your father saw to that, and his before him.”

I shook my head. “Not all of them.”

“Amune is a myth, Skirmtold doesn’t leave Skinreach, and no one has seen Vellintris in a span or more.”

“Still, there is value in knowing how to fight every battle, whether it happens or not.”

Foxlin groaned, coughing up some more water. “Tell that to my guts when this canal soup makes its home there tomorrow.”

Incoming .

The voice inside my head made me swivel to see someone approaching at speed. One of my father’s messenger boys.

I replied to Chaethor in my mind. One of these days, I’ll sense them before you do.

I wish you luck with that endeavour.

She had no faith in me whatsoever.

Did you watch that whole thing? I asked her.

Unfortunately, she replied. You shouldn’t let your confidence cloud your judgement.

Thank you for that assessment.

And you feinted to the left again, she scolded.

I rolled my eyes as the boy reached me.

He bobbed a hasty bow. “My prince, the king desires your presence. ”

I raised an eyebrow. “And where is the king?”

“The war room, Your Highness.”

I nodded, flicking a silver coin into the boy’s waiting hands as I turned to Foxlin. “Duty calls.”

“What do you think it’s about?”

“Five gold says he’s going to berate me about something.”

Foxlin grinned, holding his hands up. “I won’t take that bet.”

I sighed and patted his shoulder before heading back through the winding streets and bridges of Droundhaven.

The houses, canal bridges, and cobbles of the Sightlands’ capital were all made of the same firm white rock, some greyed by weathering and dirt, some polished and gleaming silver in the sun.

Beams of dark wood framed the doorways and balconies, and everywhere there was a pleasant bubbling of noise.

Boatmen warned of a low bridge, hawkers yelled about their wares, fishermen touted their catches, and women hummed as they hung their clothes.

But the noise I liked the most came from the skies above.

The Vidarium was a league from the city’s northwestern wall, and its wyverns constantly flew overhead.

Chaethor’s voice slid into my ear, gravelly and deep. I’ll take that bet.

What do you know? I asked.

Little, she said. But I think there is more to this than meets the eye. I can feel something coming. Something bad.

She knew Braxthorn’s temperament as well as I did. She sat in my head during every meeting, every chastisement. If she thought this was something else, she must have a good reason for it.

I crossed the Bridge of Echoes, one of the oldest in the city but far from the grandest, keeping my head down. And what use does a dragon have for gold?

Little, again, she admitted. But it is pretty, and I like pretty things .

I laughed, making a passing couple stare at me. Stupidly, I returned the look, and they recognised me instantly. I returned my gaze to the cobbles and walked faster, ignoring the woman’s pointed finger.

Longdawn cast heavy shadows in the mid-morning, the flowers in the pots sprouting a hint of new life from the dead soil. The cold air cut through me without my coat, but my tunic was heavy enough and the warmth of the sparring filled my veins.

I enjoyed the fresh air and the freedom.

My father didn’t like it when I roamed the city alone, but it was the only way to have a semblance of normality.

If I wore my furs instead of my regalia and kept my head firmly down, most of the city folk didn’t look at me twice.

Sent out with a bodyguard or four, and it was all banners, babies, and hushed prayers to Edrin.

The castle’s main tower rose beyond the huge obscuring walls, its magnitude a quiet threat to all who looked upon it.

A narrow central cylinder rose above the wider main tower, its flat roof a common landing spot for Chaethor.

Behind the walls, the castle’s hulking base hid, squared with a number of smaller towers at irregular heights.

I approached the drawbridge as a wyvern’s cry sounded from above; it was different from the playful calls of the others, more angry and disgruntled.

I searched for it in the skies, finding them quickly, a pair of wyverns caught in a tussle.

One in a shade of olive green, and the other a deep yellow.

Both medium-sized, likely adults and bonded to riders.

They swirled before diving on one another, calling to each other like the gulls spiralling far below them.

It didn’t look serious. Perhaps its riders had disagreed the night before over cards or a woman.

The formation of the bond between wyvern and man was no different to that of mine with Chaethor.

It occurred between the creature and its early caregiver, usually at some point in the first two years.

The success rate of young wyverns bonding with our chosen riders was impressive, and a closely guarded secret.

The Vidarium kept the Sightlands the feared force it was.

No other state claimed one bonded wyvern rider, let alone two hundred.

But the true might of the Sightlands was not its wyverns; it was Kallamont and Chaethor.

If the wyverns were the backbone of the Sightlands’ army, the dragons must be its heart.

I nodded to the guards on either side of the war room. They opened the doors as I took a deep breath and rolled my shoulders back, rearranging my features into something less readable. Here we go again.

I walked in, gait as taut as a sheaf in Heape.

The king stood over the great table, its top carved with a wooden map of the lands. His fingers rested at spindly angles; his coat swamping him as the candlelight cast his gaunt cheeks in hollow relief.

Beside him was the only man more emaciated than him in Droundhaven—his Moontouched advisor and second cousin, Millisen.

Three spans Braxthorn’s elder, Millisen was only one further span from eighty dry years.

With his grey and white colouring as a member of the Brotherhood, Millisen had seemed ancient to me even when I was a boy.

My family had formed their order, and yet I found the Brothers to be creepy at best.

“Son,” King Braxthorn said, with hundreds of calculations in every flick of his unnaturally blue eyes. “Where is your coat?”

“Lost it in a fight,” I replied. Technically, it was the truth .

He assessed me with little warmth. “Come, we have work to discuss.”

I stepped over to the table, nodding to Millisen. “Where’s Banrillen?”

My father tapped a city on his coveted map. “I sent him to Sellador with a squad from the Vidarium earlier this morning.”

“If my brother is the best diplomat we have, we’re in trouble,” I said.