Crown of Dragons

by Nina Walker

  I want to rip away from Silas and demand justice. Instead, I blink back hot tears and smile through the pain. Maybe I will look like the picture of happiness instead of rage. If the members of court suspect my true feelings, they don’t dare show it.

  Either that or they don’t care. And why would they? Arranged marriages happen all the time in Drakenon. I’m no different. And I’ll be queen, the second highest position in the kingdom. Nobody will have an ounce of pity for me. But just because the position is ranked so high, doesn’t mean anything to me. I see the way Queen Brysta acts and her complete lack of power. She’s caged just as I am—just as I’ll always be.

  A clang reverberates throughout the dining hall. The massive oak doors burst open. Everyone turns toward the noise, guards and warriors unsheathing their swords. A man stumbles into the room, his dark hair ruffled, his eyes wild and afraid.

  “Father?” I gasp, breaking free of Silas and rushing toward him. “Are you all right?”

  Dirt stains his rumpled clothing, and it’s as if he sees right through me, right through all of us. He can’t focus on one person or one thing. Has he been struck mad?

  I reach him, my hands gripping his. They are ice cold. “What’s wrong, Father?” He does not hear me.

  My mother pushes her way to us, her dress billowing out behind her. “What happened?” Her voice cracks. There’s shrillness there, a fear in her voice I’ve never heard before.

  He shakes his head over and over, as if a demon has possessed him. “There was a spell,” he finally speaks, his voice garbled and frantic. “There was a spell. She’s not safe. She’s not safe. She will die!”

  “Who’s not safe, Father?” I beg him, pulling him closer. My mother is right there with me, urging him to relax. His wayward gaze finally locks on mine. His pupils are blown, black covering the entire iris. But he must see me because his face crumples and he breaks into gasping sobs. I squeeze his hands tighter. I’m so shocked I don’t even move. I have no words. I’ve never seen my father cry. Not once.

  “You,” he says. “You’re not safe!”

  Me? That can’t be right. “I’m right here,” I say, bringing his hands to my face. “See? I’m fine.”

  “No! No! No!”

  “What are you saying?” my mother pleads. “Calm down and explain yourself.”

  We’re both holding him now, and I’m filled with hardened terror. The spectators surround us, the royals at the front of the pack. But nobody knows how to make this behavior stop or what to do with a man who’s lost his mind. He has been a respected member of court for years. He is known for his level head and calm demeanor. This isn’t like him.

  He coughs and blood spurts from his mouth, black as tar. It sprinkles across my face and down my bodice. “Father!” I scream, my voice sounding far away––not my own.

  His eyes begin to shift again, the earlier presence of madness before he could speak sweeping over. Finally, they land on me. Fear takes hold between its clawed talons.

  “You’re going to die!” He grinds out before his eyes roll back and he collapses to the floor.

  11

  Hazel

  No. This can’t be happening. I’m losing my mind. I must be, because this kind of thing only exists in storybooks and make-believe. Dragons aren’t real. They’re just not! My body is alive with tingling horror, and my injured elbows are screaming out in protest, and my pounding heart is about to escape through my chest… and I can’t do this, I can’t do this, I can’t do this.

  I press my palms tight against my eyes and stand on legs of elastic. Little gasping breaths slip from my lips, one following the next and the next. They’re supposed to be slow and steady, supposed to calm me down, to shore me up, but my lungs aren’t cooperating.

  It’s okay. I’ll open my eyes, and that dragon, or whatever it was, will be gone. It will all be a figment of an overactive and over-caffeinated imagination. That’s all. I remove one hand and start with the left eye, slowly opening it.

  Bad idea.

  The dragon is still there. It’s at least twice my height, towering over me and seething hot air out of its gruesome mouth. Its eyes are like a blue ocean rimmed in blood, its body like tar, its scales like that of a venomous snake. It sits on hind legs, outstretched claws as long and thick as scythes. The creature stands, growing even more massive, and I scream.

  I take off, running back down the side of the building toward the street, my feet slamming against the pavement. I’m not fast enough. Part of my brain is reminding me it’s a spirit which means it’s already dead. It can’t hurt me. But the other part of me is stuck on the whole “run for your life” option. Because what if it can hurt me? I comb through my recent memory as my breath pumps in and out and legs push forward.

  Did the dragon physically knock me over at first or did I fall from shock and fear? I don’t know. But I don’t want to wait around and find out.

  I probably look like a raving lunatic running down this street but I don’t care. There are a few living people, several more dead ones, all with startled expressions locked on me as I sprint down the sidewalk. My necklace bounces against my neck. It’s there, but it doesn’t seem to be doing its job well enough.

  Harmony. She’ll know what to do. She’ll be able to help.

  A car screeches to a stop just up ahead—a black shiny one that sends my nerves into an all-out frenzy. Dean tears himself from the driver’s side and rushes toward me. His black hair flops in front of one eye, giving him a rare frazzled look. His jaw is tense and his mouth is set in a line.

  “What did you see?” he demands.

  When I move to get past him, he grabs my elbow. I screech in protest but he hangs on.

  “Tell me, Hazel,” he presses. “What spooked you? What’s there?”

  I shake my head. No way I’m telling him anything.

  “I have to go!” I try to push past him but his grip is iron tight.

  He tugs me toward his car and throws open the passenger side. “Get in. We need to talk.”

  “No. I need to find Harmony. I need—”

  “Absolutely not! You can’t tell her and risk exposure! I’m still not sure if she can be trusted.”

  I’ve been looking past him, toward the Flowering Chakra and my getaway plan. But his final words shake me from that haze and I whip around. What is he talking about? Harmony already knows all about my gift. He’s obviously aware of that. Of course, she’s trustworthy.

  “Seriously, get in.” His eyes bore into mine, more intense than I’ve ever seen them before, and the fire dancing around his pupils has returned. A sharp breath catches in my throat. So it was real… It’s so small, it’s almost unnoticeable. But I do notice and it both chills and burns me. It’s wild and unnatural and I should run far, far away.

  But I get in the car.

  Twenty minutes later, after a silent car ride and a chance for my nerves to settle, Dean parks us in the middle of nowhere. There are fat pines and about a million trees alive with the colors of autumn, but that’s it. We’re alone out here. My nervous energy comes racing back. Katherine is dead and now there’s another missing girl to think about. I shouldn’t be so careless.

  “Are you going to murder me out here or something, because I’m pretty sure a bunch of people saw me get into this car so it’s not like you’ll get way with it,” I ramble, my words may sound like a joke, but I’m only half-kidding. I don’t really know Dean.

  “Come on,” Dean orders before stepping out of the vehicle and slamming his door.

  I slip my phone from my pocket and check it, planning to send a message to Cora and Macy with my whereabouts, in case Dean really is a crazy murderer. It’s a no-go. I don’t have any service. Fantastic. But hey, at least the location services are on so if the cops need to search for me they’ll have a place to start.

  I huff out a breath, trying to keep calm, and open my door.

  “What did you see?” Dean asks again. His voice crawls through the clearing, an
d I glance back to the empty stretch of one-lane highway.

  When I don’t immediately answer, he stomps around the side of the car to stand toe-to-toe with me. He’s so close I can smell the campfire and spicy aroma that is distinctly his and distinctly intoxicating. His eyes bore into mine, coal black and no longer dancing with flames. My prickly nerves relax a fraction, and I remind myself that no, he didn’t bring me out here to murder me––he brought me out here because he wants to know what I saw.

  And I want to know what he’s hiding.

  “Why should I tell you?” I ask, genuinely curious. Because what good does it do me to tell him what I saw? “Are you going to help me or something?”

  And do I even need help? Hazel, you saw a dragon. You clearly need help.

  He rocks back on his heels instead of answering my question. “You’re a medium, right? So you see the spirit realm?”

  I nod once. I thought we’d already established this. I thought he knew that about me all along. This situation is getting weirder by the second.

  “Who’s your father?” he asks sharply.

  The question is so unexpected, it’s like a slap to the face. Not that I care about the “sperm donor” but because I don’t like to think about the missing part of my life too much. I look away into the distant trees and frown. “I don’t see how that has anything to do with you.”

  “It has everything to do with me,” he barks out.

  I whip around on him, both intrigued and annoyed. “Why? Why is the identity of my father any of your business? What could it possibly have to do with you?”

  More importantly, what isn’t he telling me?

  His jaw is tight but once again, he doesn’t answer my question or react to my anger with anything other than his own calculated hatred. I can see it in his eyes, see how much he despises me. And now it might have something to do with the “sperm donor”? Dean’s not the only one who can ask questions here. He’s left me confused and it’s a tangled feeling I need to unravel.

  I fold my arms over my chest, widening my stance. The earthy smell of the autumn forest brushes past us on the wind, whipping my hair behind me. “I don’t know who my father is, okay? He was a one-night stand and my mom never got his name.” I narrow my eyes on Dean. “Why do you want to know about him?”

  His gaze is hooded and he thinks for a minute. “Who’s your mother?”

  I scoff. “You’re going to dodge my questions but keep asking more of your own? No, I don’t think so.”

  Apparently, he doesn’t care what I have to say. “Where does she live?” he continues, his expression intense. “What does she do for a living? Is she… normal?”

  I roll my eyes. This is getting ridiculous. “She’s an ER nurse in Ohio and she’s a wonderful person and perfectly normal except for her terrible taste in men. Okay? The end.” I lean against the car before shifting closer to him. “The way I see it, if you want answers from me, I should be able to get answers from you.”

  He raises an eyebrow. “When you see the spirit realm, what does it look like?”

  Okay, maybe not.

  I exhale and rub the goosebumps on my arms. It’s colder now than it was earlier, and it was chilly before. More shivers run over my skin and I rub at my arms even harder. I really don’t want to answer, to play victim to his interrogation or whatever this is but I find myself spilling the truth anyway, “I see spirits. Usually the people who have recently died. They don’t talk but they show me images from their lives. It usually doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

  “That’s it? Just people?”

  I pause. That was it. Until today.

  “Did you see something that wasn’t human today?” he presses, guessing—or maybe it’s not a guess. Maybe he knows. Maybe it’s part of his secret. Nervous energy spreads through me at the thought.

  Somehow he’s even closer now, and he slowly reaches out and grips me above my wrists. He runs his hands delicately up my arms, warming me up. I hold my breath, the nerves now firing like crazy. His hands are so hot and wonderfully smooth and they remind me of warm summer days and of a time before things got complicated.

  I nod once.

  “Was it an animal?” He’s inches from me now. So close that I can see flecks of gold in his eyes, can smell the spearmint on his breath.

  Should I tell him? I don’t want to tell him and I do want to tell him at the same time. Before I can catch myself, I’m speaking, “I guess you could say that,” I whisper.

  His eyebrows furrow together. “Did it show you anything? Any images?” I notice that he doesn’t acknowledge what it was, only speaks as if he already knows. But surely, if I said, Dragon, he’d laugh at me.

  “Hazel.” He shifts closer. “Did it show you images?”

  I blink and nod.

  “It’s okay to tell me.”

  “It was black… the creature,” I say, my voice low. “It showed me a castle and several people but it focused on one girl in particular. I think she might be in trouble. I think it wanted me to help her.”

  “What did she look like?”

  “She had two colored eyes. One blue. One brown.”

  He cusses and rears back, ripping the moment in two. “Khali.”

  I’m stunned. “Who’s Khali?”

  He shakes his head. “I have to go. Do you have a driver’s license?”

  I look around, confused. What just happened? “Yes… go where?”

  He reaches into his pocket and pulls out his keys. Frantic, he removes the black key fob and presses it firmly into my palm. “Drive yourself back to the shop,” he demands, his words quick and decisive. “I’ll pick up the key from Harmony later.”

  I gape at him. “What? Where could you possibly go all the way out here?”

  But he doesn’t answer me, doesn’t even seem to care that he brought me out here in the first place. He takes off running into the forest of all places. There’s nothing out here but trees. Where could he possibly be going? Any traces of the man are gone within seconds and I’m still standing here, still bracing myself against the cold and the sudden loss of his heat.

  12

  Khali

  The court physician leans over my father one last time; the wrinkles around his eyes deepen in examination. He stands to offer his conclusion. “Lord Paul Elliot has been hexed.”

  Mother gasps, and dread spreads through me like boiling liquid. I was worried it might be something like this. I don’t know too much about magic, but I know if he’s been hexed, it probably was done by a dangerous hand. He’s lucky to be alive, to have made it back to us, but I don’t know how much time he has left. Tears spring to my eyes and I grasp his feverish hand.

  I can’t lose you too, Dad. I plead to his sleeping body and to the Gods, wherever they may be. Please, don’t die.

  “Are you certain?” King Titus stands back from us, keeping his distance. A crease forms between his bushy eyebrows, but something else flickers in his gaze too: something suspiciously like acceptance. He must have been worrying about the same thing. Did he know this was going to happen?

  “There is no other explanation for the way his symptoms are presenting,” the physician says. “This isn’t an illness. This is dark magic.”

  I place my hand on my father’s sleeping back, rubbing small circles as I hold back tears. He’s warm again. Sweat beads his ashen skin and wets his white linen shirt. He rolls over, mumbling incoherently, and the black stubble on his chin brushes against my hand. Since his arrival in the banquet hall and subsequent collapse, he hasn’t woken. Not once. It’s been four days, and Mother and I have stayed by his side, alternating shifts when one of us grows too tired. His temperature has spiked and plummeted a dozen times. He is going to waste away in front of our eyes.

  “Who would hex him?” My mind races through the possibilities but I don’t know where to start. Witchcraft is a forbidden art in Drakenon and punishable by death. As far as I know, the craft has been eradicated from our kingdom. We have drago
n shifters and elemental magic but nothing like witchcraft. That is an entirely different beast that was slain long ago when the Brightcasters took the throne, saving us all from those who’d want us dead.

  Oftentimes, our dragon ancestors were slain as ritual sacrifices for magical purposes. The idea of it sends a terrified shiver down my spine. The Brightcasters may have their own levels of evil, but at least they’re nothing like the Occultists, who worship demons.

  “Could he have left the Drakenon border?” the physician asks, his eyes bouncing from each of us in the room.

  “He travels around the kingdom,” Mom says defensively. She’s even more of a mess than I am. “He is exposed to all sorts of people, but he isn’t foolish enough to leave the borders.”

  The physician nods sympathetically but I catch a twinge of guilt from King Titus. His eyes are shifty, like he can’t look at any one of us for long. It’s his biggest tell. I’ve known these people for as long as I can remember and I know when they’re hiding something. And he’s definitely hiding something important.

  “Did you send him beyond the borders?” The accusation leaves my lips before I can think it through.

  “Khali!” Mother chastises, but her eyes tell a different story. She wants answers as much as I do.

  “Of course not,” King Titus says automatically.

  I don’t believe him but I hold my tongue.

  Nobody leaves the borders unless in exile or to spy. We obviously aren’t privy to who the King’s spies are, lest they be compromised. Drakenon sits on the eastern edge of a larger, very contentious continent called Eridas. The other kingdoms consist of witches, fae, elves, mages and all manner of wiley beasts. They constantly vie for power over each other; bloodshed and broken treaties and entire family lines murdered are the norm. But not the dragon clans. Our borders have been warded by elemental magic for three centuries and only those with dragon lineage can enter. We keep to ourselves, protected from outside invaders. It’s inside the border that we have to worry about threats, but the clans have been at peace for one hundred years under the Brightcaster’s reign.