It is unwise to favor one god above another. Better to shun them all than show favoritism amongst a jealous, prodigious pantheon.
—Major Rorilee’s Guide to Appeasing the Gods, Second Edition
Holding two daggers, I stand beside Xaden as the soldier backs away, joining what looks to be at least a couple dozen of his colleagues on horseback, all carrying swords at their left hips and daggers sheathed along their right arms.
Five others retreat from our squadmates’ beds in the same manner, and everyone who isn’t posted on third watch rises, weapons in hand. Looks like they sent an entire platoon to greet us, and they’re all wearing varying degrees of the same bloodthirsty smile.
“Two full companies of cavalry lurk in the hills,” Tairn tells me, and I chance a quick look around the field, spotting several pairs of golden eyes low among the tall trees.
“I would like to try an Unnbrish horse,” Andarna muses.
“No,” Tairn and I answer simultaneously.
Andarna sighs down the bond. “One day I’m going to stop asking nicely.”
“You should take your fire-breathers and depart our isle,” the soldier warns as the others fall into line ahead of the mounted cavalry.
“Two companies in the hills,” I whisper to Xaden, careful to move my mouth as little as possible.
“Soon,” Xaden tells the soldier and brushes the back of his hand against mine.
They’re all so…similar. Every soldier in front of us, regardless of sex, stands roughly the same height—within a few inches of six feet tall, with the same muscular build and closely cropped hair. And all wear the same emblem on their leathers, though I’m guessing the different insignia at the bases of their necks denote rank.
“You speak the common language?” Dain reaches my right with Mira, and our squad faces down their platoon, keeping a civil ten feet of distance between our forces.
“My knowledge of your tongue is why I was selected to command this mission,” their leader replies without taking his eyes off Xaden.
“Love wasting my time,” Dain mutters, then shoves the small booklet I recognize as the language compendium for Unnbriel into the chest pocket of his flight jacket.
The blond, sharp-jawed soldier directly ahead of me gives me a once-over, his gaze catching on the daggers in my hands and the others at my thighs.
“We officially request an audience with your queen.” Xaden steps forward, his hand still wrapped around my dagger.
“Denied,” the captain answers. “She does not meet with those unworthy of her presence, and given how easy it was to walk up to your encampment, the chances of your worth”—his gaze skims over the line of us, and he scoffs after a quick appraisal of my stature—“are minimal.”
Fuck him.
Branches sway as the dragons and gryphons walk out of the trees around us, loosely surrounding the platoon.
“We made it easy, Captain.” I cock my head to the side and flip my dagger to pinch its tip as Tairn growls at my back, low and mean. Just the way I like him. “Rest assured, we can make it difficult, too.”
To their credit, the platoon doesn’t sprint away screaming, but a dark stain spreads down the green leather pants of the blond soldier who stares past me with wide eyes. He definitely would have been a runner after Parapet.
“Don’t worry,” I say with a quick smile. “It’s not an uncommon reaction.” But it does cause my heart to sink slightly. “They’ve never seen dragons.”
“My family isn’t on this isle,” Andarna notes, frustration surging down the bond and pouring over me like a thousand pinpricks.
I roll my shoulders, trying to shake it off. The last thing we need is a dead soldier and a blown alliance. “And please be careful with your feelings. I can’t shield here.”
The soldier drags his gaze back to mine and narrows his eyes, saying something I don’t fully understand, but I definitely pick up weak and smallest. I flip my dagger again and catch it by the hilt.
“He doesn’t think you’re…” Dain shakes his head. “You know what? Never mind.” He lifts his middle finger to the soldier.
“Burning us will not grant you an audience with our queen.” The captain raises his chin.
“No, but defeating your best in combat earns us entrance to court at the defeated opponent’s rank,” Xaden says, cocking his head as a smirk plays across his mouth.
The smile fades from the captain’s face. “You know our laws.”
“She does.” Xaden gestures toward me. “And I’m with her. Seeing as I’ve already had my blade at your throat, I guess that means we should move up to someone with a higher skill set.”
The captain slowly turns, his gaze sweeping high above our heads, and Tairn snarls. “The fire-breathers stay.”
Sgaeyl lunges from the left and snaps her teeth close enough to a soldier that the woman’s hair blows sideways as she gasps.
“She said to get fucked,” Xaden replies to their captain.
The captain glances toward Sgaeyl without making eye contact. “Only half may come. Choose wisely. Final and only offer.”
Xaden nods, then turns toward us and hands Garrick his sword. “Who do you want to take?” he asks me.
“Me?” I blink.
“Your mission,” he replies.
Fuck. I draw a deep breath and look past Dain to Mira. “Xaden to challenge. Aaric to speak for Navarre. Cat for Poromiel…” My throat constricts, realizing I’m down to two.
Mira nods. “Solid choices. Stop stalling.”
“Dain and me.” Which leaves our second-strongest fighter behind as well as my sister.
“Aetos?” Garrick asks.
“Do not question command,” Xaden warns in a tone that stiffens Garrick’s back.
“Captain said he was selected for the mission because he speaks our language, so we can’t assume it’s common,” I explain. “I can pick up a few words here and there, but I spent my time learning Hedotic and Dain took the rest.”
Garrick’s jaw ticks, but he nods once.
“Let me guess. I’m to stay here,” Andarna snipes.
“You’re learning,” Tairn replies.
I lift my gaze to Mira’s and find no judgment waiting there. “If we’re not back by nightfall, burn the place to the ground.”
• • •
Eistol, the capital of Unnbriel, is less than a twenty-minute flight inland, but it takes two hours for the cavalry to wind their way through the steep terrain and over the ridgeline to the heavily fortified city.
The city itself makes me second-guess bringing Tairn. Eistol dominates the countryside, consuming the tallest hill for miles. It’s built in a series of terraced circles in various shades of stone, but the roofs of its structures are a uniform pale blue color. Each terrace is surrounded by a wall thick enough to sustain Tairn’s weight, and the bottom one supports a dozen manned cross-bolts. The eight above hold decreasing but proportionate numbers, and unlike Deverelli, these swing in multiple directions.
This place is constructed to fight dragons, whether or not they’ve actually been here.
“I don’t like you being this close to those bolts,” I say along the bond, noting the platoon of cavalry as they ride single file through raised metal gates inside each ring. One order, and the city would be impossible to breach on foot…or escape.
“I don’t like your selection in mates, yet here we are,” Tairn responds as we approach the city from hundreds of feet above, leading the formation as a storm rolls in from the west.
“Third ring,” I remind him as we soar over the fifth.
“I was there. I remember,” he replies, tucking his wings and diving toward the third-highest ring in the city.
The belt of my saddle presses into my thighs as we dive, and I wait for the snap of wings I know is coming…but it doesn’t.
“Tairn?” People run in the streets, ducking into the structures that line the rapidly approaching walls. If he doesn’t slow soon, we’ll take out the masonry. “Tairn!”
He sighs, then flares his wings and pumps once, jarring me in a bone-rattling shift of momentum before landing lengthwise on the wall of the third ring. Rock crumbles beneath his talons, and he lowers his head at the cross-bolt stationed less than a dozen feet away.
Two of the soldiers manning the station back up, but the third bravely stands partially hidden within the wooden base of the launching unit, one hand poised on the lever mechanism while the other slowly cranks the wooden wheel that pivots the weapon at us.
I undo the belt of my saddle and quickly rise for a better vantage point, dagger already in hand.
Shadow falls over us a second before Sgaeyl lands on the opposite side of the cross-bolt, and the soldier’s head jerks in her direction as she growls low in her throat, her nostrils flaring.
The soldier lifts both hands from the weapon.
I leave everything strapped to Tairn’s saddle except the weapons I carry, then move toward his shoulder, only pausing to be sure Cath, Kira, and Molvic have landed behind me.
“Watch where you dismount or you’ll embarrass us both,” Tairn warns, and my stomach lurches as I glance down. If I nudge even a few feet to the right, I’ll fall off the edge of the fifty-foot wall.
“Noted.” I aim inward and slide, landing on the wall between his first and second talon.
By the time Xaden and I reach them, all three soldiers have backed themselves into the cross-bolt turret. I open my mouth to assure them we only mean harm if they do, but a wooden door in the stone ground is pushed open on Xaden’s left, and the cavalry captain’s head pops through.
He lectures the soldiers, but the only word I pick out is audience. Then he beckons us toward the darkness with a motion of his hand. “Follow me.”
Xaden walks in first, and I follow down the stone staircase. Natural light illuminates our path through small slits in the stonework, and we pass two doorways as we wind our way to the ground floor.
“They’re inside the walls, too,” I tell Tairn. Dad either left that part out or never saw the inner workings of the defenses. My bet is on the second.
“Smart,” Tairn acknowledges.
The officer pushes open the door at the base of the steps, and Xaden and I walk into a shaded alleyway between stone buildings maybe a foot wider than Xaden’s shoulders. The pommels of his swords come within inches of scraping rock. “We could learn a few things from this construction. One soldier could hold off dozens.”
We reach the end of the alley and walk into the open cobblestone street. It looks to be thirty feet wide and, if Dad’s records are correct, is part of the residential district, but there’s nothing homey about the leather-clad soldiers lining the street, only a few of whom wear the muted green leathers. Soldiers in pale blue wear metal greaves along their legs. But the ones in silver stand in front of the next gate, swords drawn, the metal of their armored chest plates catching the morning light.
At least the portcullis hasn’t been lowered.
“Wait here.” The captain walks us into the middle, then leaves when one of the soldiers in blue shouts something from the left.
Xaden and I move to stand back to back.
“There’re two dozen of them and only the both of us,” I whisper, my gaze jumping from soldier to soldier, noting they have two stationed in front of every door.
Sgaeyl growls from above.
“Four,” Xaden reminds me quietly, brushing his pinkie against mine. “And I’m really missing that bond right now.”
“Me too.” I keep my hands close to my blades without giving the guards reason to strike, fighting the fear that threatens to slow my judgment as the sky darkens with heavy clouds.
The guards at my right split, and the captain walks through, followed by Aaric, Dain, and Cat.
“Welcoming bunch,” Cat notes when they reach us.
“This way,” the captain orders, then strides toward the silver-wearing soldiers blocking the next gate.
“Stay close and don’t get yourself killed,” Xaden says to Aaric as we follow the cavalry officer. The soldiers walking on both sides of us alternate between watching us and glancing upward, as though Tairn and Sgaeyl might decide they’ve had enough of the wall.
The soldiers begin to argue as we approach the gate, but I only pick out danger and holy.
“They want the challenge held in this…station,” Dain interprets from behind me as Sgaeyl and Tairn walk the wall above us, keeping pace. “They don’t want us any closer to their primary temple.”
“It’s not their temple we’re interested in,” Cat mutters beside him.
The captain must win the argument because the guards part to allow us through. I glance at their chest plates and find the etched symbol of two crossed swords gripped in the center by a claw—the emblem of Dunne.
“It’s similar to ours,” I tell Tairn as we cross under the thick gate. “They have a claw in her symbol, suggesting a common origin.”
“Focus now, analyze later,” he demands as we enter the next section.
There are no residences here, only two sectors of terraced seating built into the walls on both sides, leaving an open plaza in front of the largest temple I’ve ever seen. It’s easily the height of Tairn. The long, gabled roof is tiled in the same pale blue as the rest of the city, and the six wide pillars holding the front are all gray granite. The polished stones shimmer in the light, making them appear almost silver, and each has been carved with a different symbol. Sword. Shield. Fire. Water. Claw. My eyebrows rise when my gaze reaches the final pillar on the right. Book.
All tools of warfare.
Beside that pillar is a sculpted tribute to the goddess, a sparkling gray effigy of her likeness that reaches the lowest line of the roof. She holds a sword pointed in our direction in her left hand and a shield protecting the right edge of her temple in the other. Her long hair is braided down one side of her torso, and she’s dressed in long, belted robes with an armored chest plate.
“Wow,” Cat whispers as the uniformed guards filter in behind us, taking positions along the sides of the plaza as we move toward the darker stones between the terraced seats.
Blue-robed attendants rise on the temple steps, and my footsteps falter.
Every single one of them has silver hair.
Not gray.
Not white.
Silver.
