Corpses littered the throne room. More ghouls and bugs had fallen than men, but the scourge had bodies to spare. This attack had only one objective: to extract Osric.
Talia said nothing, and Holt took his cue from her. And, if Holt was honest with himself, he didn’t feel like talking either. He would have to retell what had befallen him earlier that day. Have to tell her of Osric’s – the real Osric’s – plea for forgiveness; that some vestige of her uncle remained. At least they could at last put the puzzle pieces together, although Holt still could not figure out one thing.
Why was the Sovereign doing all of this? Why take control of the scourge? Speaking through Osric, the dragon had announced that “the scourge would fulfill its purpose.” What purpose could that possibly be? It almost sounded as though the scourge had been created like a common utensil.
Turning his attention back to his immediate situation, Holt knelt and wiped his sword on a dead guard’s cloak. Sheathing his sword, he went to meet Ash and they touched brows. He wrapped an arm around Ash’s neck. A soothing heat passed over the bond.
“We should have known Talia’s uncle was false.”
That took Holt aback. “How could we? I never thought to reach out and see if he had a bond… but nor did I sense any magical presence about him at all. Did you?”
“No.”
“Then how could we have known? Talia and Pyra noticed nothing. Rake can hide his core, and this Sovereign seems more than powerful enough to do so.”
“Nothing in his voice spoke of treachery. He spoke with conviction, with a truth. His heart beat steady.”
“Sovereign seems to think what he’s doing is right. He spoke to me. And if he’s the one controlling Osric, then it may never have really been Osric speaking.”
“Sovereign spoke to me too.”
Holt dropped his voice. “What did he say?”
“That I shouldn’t rely on you for strength… that I shouldn’t weaken myself to serve you… that you’ll cause me pain in the end.”
Holt wrapped his other arm around Ash and pressed his head harder against the white scales. “That sounds like a mouthful.”
“I wanted to tell him he was wrong, but it was so… so hard to speak against him.”
“He’s extremely powerful.”
“And,” Ash carried on, a low rumble awakening in his throat, “he said he would help me break our bond, once we were finished with you.”
“He does realize we talk to each other?”
“I found it hard to speak back,” Ash said again. “But I could think of you and showed him what you meant to me, and that’s when he said he’d let you live in his new world if I joined him. The only way you would live.”
“Your magic counters his forces. Of course he’d want you on his side.” Ash lowered his head and twisted away.
“What’s the matter?”
“When he asked me again, after threatening you… I didn’t know what to say.”
Holt tried to pull Ash closer, but the dragon squirmed away.
“If… if it was the only way to save you—”
“It won’t come to that,” Holt said. “We won’t let it.”
Ash growled but said nothing. Holt let the matter slide. Truth was, he felt as powerless against Sovereign as he had been as a pot boy facing Ysera.
“You’re wounded,” Holt said, noticing the bleeding cut on Ash’s side.
“It’s nothing.”
Holt checked it anyway and decided it was minor enough to shrug off. Bits of glass had also lodged into Ash’s thick scales, likely from when he’d scrambled through the shattered window.
He had just finished picking the glass out when some of the nobles cautiously returned to the throne room. Many retched at the sight of the dead or it might have been the smell. Though Holt’s senses were sharper now, he’d grown used to inhaling that death stink of the scourge and the coppery tang of blood. Amazing how fast he had become accustomed to such things.
The plump figure of Ealdor Harroway caught his eye. He was making straight for Talia, the Twinblades moving to flank him like loyal hounds. Pyra snarled and bared her teeth at the man. He gulped, raised both palms and stopped dead in his tracks.
Talia gave him a scathing look, up and down, before allowing him to approach.
Holt hurried over too. He had his own grievances to settle. “Speak,” Talia said.
When Harroway at last managed to form words, they were half choked. “I did not know. I swear—”
“Know of what?” Talia said. “That you betrayed my father? That you unwittingly allowed the kingdom to come to the brink of destruction? You’re either as duplicitous as my uncle or you’re a fool, Harroway. Decide.”
“Then I am a fool.”
Talia shook her head, unable to even look at him anymore. “Did you not for one moment suspect?”
“I was blind. Blinded by my frustration with your father’s pointless war, his placating of your Order – the realm was suffering for his ego. I… I thought it for the best when he fell in the battle…” He trailed off meekly but rallied to say, “But I would never knowingly weaken this kingdom with an incursion brewing, especially so close after the war. No one in their right mind would.”
“What about your men using dragon blood?” Holt asked. “What?” Talia said hoarsely.
“Dragon blood,” Holt said, “Eadwald here drank some before he tried to knock me out. Just like the Wyrm Cloaks.”
Pyra’s snarl deepened and she dragged a single talon along the stone floor, causing an awful screech. Harroway shuddered, perhaps from realizing he had been caught on some other charge, perhaps from Pyra’s talon.
“The king, ah that is to say your uncle, told us it was a potent elixir he’d discovered the recipe for on his travels beyond the Jade Jungle.”
Talia took a step closer. “Stop lying or I swear, oath or no, I’ll burn off your tongue.”
“That is the truth. It’s what he told us. I saw it as a way we could prove the Order was no longer necessary. I was blinded again but I… well I did wonder as to the nature of—”
“How much of it is left?” Talia cut over him. She directed her question to the Twinblades.
The brothers had remained so still throughout the exchange, Holt wondered if they weren’t entirely human themselves. They glanced to each other at Talia’s question then back to her.
“At least one crate,” Eadwulf said. “Enough for one company,” said Eadwald.
Harroway fell to his knees before Talia. “We will destroy them. We’ll throw them into the lake or burn them – yes, burn them. Please, Honored Rider, Princess—”
Talia raised a fist wreathed in fire. There was a manic glint in her eye, and again Holt wondered whether she would take his head then and there. Also, again, he heard that part of himself that felt it justified. He and Talia had lost so much. Why should this fat noble escape pain?
“Call me by my name,” Talia said. “I cannot be half a rider and half a princess at once. As for the blood, as much as it sickens me to say so, you will not destroy it. This city will be attacked within days. Your men will need it.” Her voice was grim.
Holt glanced to Pyra, sure the dragon would not abide this. Her fury was contained for now, although the air became sweltering as her aura flared.
Harroway’s head and hair was slick with sweat. “Forgive me.”
“I don’t think I can, but my uncle was right on this much, by law I am no longer your princess, only a dragon rider. It’s not up to me to decide your fate.” She lowered her fist and the fire on it and her eyes went out. “Do your duty, Master of War. Defend this city and you’ll earn a shred of redemption.” She backed away and Harroway got unsteadily to his feet.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me,” she said with disgust. “Go and prepare for the siege.” “We’d welcome your counsel, as a dragon rider.”
“If you’re willing to listen to a green girl who has not survived her first incursion? I know your feelings on the Order are not—”
“I’d be grateful for your input,” Harroway interrupted. “In my hopes to prove a human army alone can defeat the swarm… I never accounted for such a swarm to be so well controlled, with our western forces absent and without a monarch—”
“It’s a time for generals,” Talia said. “Leofric would have relied on others to prepare the city.”
“We were all relying on Osric, but a monarch is more than the person. With the throne empty, and with no clear successor, I fear for the stability of Feorlen. Order defeats chaos—” Harroway pursed his lips and glanced to his plush shoes. He breathed heavily and looked back up with a determined frown. “And laws… can be changed, Talia.”
She looked away. Her face could have been cold stone.
Onlookers had gathered by now, lurking behind the columns or by what remained of the seating in the galleries. Many seemed to be holding their breath. Harroway had all but offered Talia the throne.
“I’ll inspect the western isles soon,” she said. “First I must make sure the dragons are fed and have strength for the fight to come.”
Harroway took the evasion well. He inclined his head – not so low as to be a bow – and repeated this for Holt. “I would of course value your own input, Honored Rider.”
“I thought I was banished. A chaos bringer worthy only of the dungeons?”
As Harroway blustered on, Holt ignored him and paid closer attention to the gathered courtiers. Most of them had bayed for his blood within this very hour. Had Osric not been unmasked, Holt would have been thrown in a cell or forced to fight his way out and flee.
He’d long dreamed of being a dragon rider; in none of them had he been beaten, stripped of his name, and cursed for his service. In none of them had he cradled his dying father and been unable to summon the power to help.
“It’s not my role,” Holt said, cutting over Harroway. The ealdor gulped. His mustache quivered. Holt gave him a mocking smile. “I could arrange
you a feast, but not a battle. And there are more important things for me to do in this city than listen to your two-faced lies.”
Time to go. He had to retrieve his father. And there were too many people on the quarantine isle who needed his help. He was just about to climb up onto Ash’s back when Talia called,
“You can’t go back.”
He ignored her, got onto Ash then felt a strong hand around his ankle.
He twisted around, finding Talia. “You can’t,” she said softly.
“I found my father.” His voice cracked. “I couldn’t save him.”
Talia appeared to feel the blow as much as he had. Her grip on him fell slack, and for a moment she had nothing but pity in her eyes.
“But I can save others,” Holt insisted. “There are thousands there.”
Talia’s grip on his ankle returned with renewed force. She gave him a look which offered no rebuke, a commanding look. “There are hundreds of thousands in the whole city. I’m sorry but I need you and Ash to be fighting fit when the swarm comes.”
“Talia—”
“You can’t save them all, Holt. That’s lesson one, remember.”
“I’m not in the damned Order,” Holt said, finding it harder than ever not to scream. Talia of all people should understand this. “I haven’t sworn your oath or learned your lessons.”
“One day, you will,” Talia said. “And you’ll have to follow orders. Even ones you don’t like. Get used to it.”
The strangest thing about her words was the numbness he felt upon hearing them. Had he been waiting, perhaps hoping, for such a reason to stop? He was exhausted—not just physically, but in every other way. His mote channels ached as if his muscles needed a hot bath. His willpower had been drained more and more with each terrible revelation, each awful thing.
Talia softened. “You may collect your father’s body but do no more.
We’ll give him a proper burial. We never had the chance with Brode…”
Holt slumped, feeling all the breath and fight leave him. She was right. Maybe, just maybe, Brode’s wish for him to think before leaping had finally sunk in. He and Ash weren’t strong enough. Not yet.
“I know we can’t save them all,” he said. “But I wish we could.”
Talia couldn’t quite meet his gaze but released his ankle. “Cleanse and Forge once you return,” she instructed. “Night and day until the battle. Your body will manage the lack of sleep for now.”
Holt nodded again, yearning to be alone. Just he and Ash. The two of them took in the metallic scent of blood in the air, listening closely to the wind’s ringing as it blew through the shattered window. They shared their thoughts, their senses blending together. They flew out through the window, over the bodies of stingers and carriers, over garden hedgerows, turned southeast, and headed toward the grim quarantine isle where smoke still billowed.
