Scorch Dragons

by Amie Kaufman

  Anders had a better chance to study the rest of the Dragonmeet now than he’d had the day before—they were as mixed as the people of Holbard, their clothes practical and comfortable, brightly colored in most cases. Whereas the wolves of Ulfar all wore uniforms, if these people hadn’t been sitting around a table together, Anders never would have known there was anything to connect them. They lacked a sense of . . . pack.

  The two youngest looked no older than the final-year students at Ulfar, and they wore slightly friendlier expressions than the others. Anders also saw the man who looked like Ellukka again—he had a heavyset, broad-shouldered build with suntanned skin and a wheat-blond braid, and he was frowning. And beside him was the man who had been most suspicious of him the day before, hard eyes unfriendly beneath unruly black eyebrows, mouth hidden by a bushy beard. He was almost as big as his companion, and even more intimidating.

  “Good morning,” Leif said, and Anders stopped inspecting the others, turning his attention to the man who led them. “Anders, Lisabet, we all met briefly yesterday, but once again, these are the members of the Dragonmeet. We are chosen by election. We come together from all over Vallen to discuss the issues most important to dragons, and to decide what action, if any, we should take. I am the Drekleid, the leader of the Dragonmeet, but we are all equals here. I lead the discussion, but I do not make our decisions.”

  Anders nodded, fighting the urge to glance at Rayna or Lisabet, or even at Ellukka, who stood beside Rayna as if she were facing the Dragonmeet as well. He thought perhaps Leif was letting him know, with his quiet words, that Anders needed to find a way to appeal to all twenty-five people sitting in front of him, not just their leader.

  “Thank you for letting us stay,” he said, and Rayna eased a little closer, pressing her shoulder against his encouragingly—reminding him he wasn’t alone.

  “That’s not decided yet,” growled the man with the bushy beard.

  Leif replied as if he hadn’t spoken. “As you can imagine, we have many questions for you.”

  Anders’s heart was thumping. How was he supposed to answer the dragons’ questions—which would certainly be about the wolves—without being the traitor his friends and classmates already thought he was? It was one thing to hope he could find a home here in Drekhelm. It was another to cause harm or hurt to those back at Ulfar.

  And what would happen if he couldn’t? What exactly had the nurse in the infirmary meant when he’d talked about extracting answers?

  Lisabet spoke beside him, her voice quiet, and he knew she had the same fear in her mind as he did. “We’ll try and answer.”

  “The first,” Leif said, “is how you found us. We have gone to great lengths to conceal Drekhelm—we were forced to move after the last great battle ten years ago, and we do not wish to do so again.”

  That, Anders thought he could answer, because there was a good chance the dragons would guess anyway. “We used Fylkir’s chalice,” he said, and a murmur went through some of the adults sitting up at the table.

  “An artifact?” an older woman with a thin face asked. “How does it work?”

  “You fill it with water,” he explained. “And then float a special needle in it. It acts like a compass, only it points to the largest gathering of dragons in Vallen.”

  “And why have you wolves never used this to attack us before?” Bushy Beard demanded.

  “We thought it was broken,” said Lisabet. “It was just a week ago that anyone began to suspect that if you took it all the way out of the city, away from the people in Holbard who might have traces of dragon blood, and used it at the equinox, when the magical essence in nature is strongest and when the dragons come together in greatest numbers to celebrate, it might work one more time. And it did.”

  “And we stole it,” Anders concluded. “To try and find my sister.”

  There was another round of rumbling from the adults, most of whom, Anders knew from the day before, still didn’t believe Rayna could be his sister, since he was a wolf and she was a dragon.

  The man with the blond braid who might be Ellukka’s father leaned forward. “And where is the chalice now?” he asked.

  Anders and Lisabet exchanged a look—the dragons really weren’t going to like this answer.

  “We dropped it,” Anders said. “When Rayna and Ellukka and Mikkel found us on the mountainside. We think our class was tracking us, so they probably found it.”

  “So you left a trail,” Bushy Beard said, lifting a finger to point at them. “You showed them the way to attack us!”

  “No!” Anders and Lisabet replied in unison. “Of course not!”

  “Father,” protested Ellukka from one side, in unexpected defense, but the big man with the blond braid shook his head at her, and she fell silent.

  Leif lifted one hand to still the murmurs that were starting again. “If I were going to leave a trail for attackers,” he said mildly, “I’m not sure I’d leave it for an army of twelve-year-olds, and luckily for us, that is what we got.”

  “This time,” said a pallid, silver-haired woman farther up the table, her expression grim.

  “What will the wolves do?” Leif asked Anders and Lisabet. “Will they be readying themselves for war?”

  Anders was torn—how did he answer that? The truth was, he and Lisabet knew that Sigrid was doing exactly that. They’d overheard her talking about her animosity toward the dragons in her study, the need to find them. But if he admitted that, would the dragons just attack the wolves before the wolves could make the first move?

  Lisabet answered quietly. “They don’t know enough about you. It’s easy to believe stories—you believe them about us, I can tell. And there have been fires and kidnappings in Holbard. Our class came to rescue us, not to fight. But like you said, we’re twelve. The leaders of the wolves don’t discuss their plans with us.”

  Her voice was calm and even. However upset she was about losing the only home she’d ever known, she was doing a good job now of explaining why they should be allowed to stay at Drekhelm.

  Finally, one of the two youngest members of the Dragonmeet spoke, the girl. She had light-brown skin and curly blond hair tamed into a messy bun. Her mouth and her round cheeks looked as though they were made for smiling, which made it hard to be afraid of her. “It was only ten years ago, the last great battle,” she said. “Don’t the wolves remember how things were before it?”

  “I don’t,” Lisabet replied. “We were only two years old when it happened. But the way I hear it, things weren’t easy between dragons and wolves even then.”

  “This is true,” Leif allowed.

  Bushy Beard dismissed Lisabet’s words with a flick of his fingers. “Can we get to the point? They’ve proven they’re willing to attack us. They’ve proven they want a war.”

  “No,” Anders insisted. They had to make the dragons see that the wolves weren’t all bad, they weren’t what the dragons thought of them. “We only came for my sister.”

  “If she’s that,” Bushy Beard scoffed.

  “I believe she is,” Leif said quietly.

  Rayna slipped her hand into his, squeezing tightly, but the Drekleid didn’t seem inclined to say any more, at least for now.

  Ellukka’s father spoke again. “Torsten”—that must be Bushy Beard’s name, Anders realized—“is not talking about the arrival of these children’s classmates. He is talking about the theft. Anders, Lisabet—the wolves who you say came to rescue you stole artifacts from us. One of them was the Snowstone.”

  Every face up and down the table was grave now. During the battle, Anders had seen his friends Mateo and Jai disappear into the depths of Drekhelm’s caves, and when the pack had retreated, each of the two wolves had been carrying something in their mouths. Had one of those somethings been this Snowstone? The name sounded familiar, but Anders couldn’t place it.

  “What does the Snowstone do?” he asked.

  “In the right hands, it can alter the weather,” Leif said gravely.<
br />
  Anders’s heart thumped. He had heard of it before. He’d seen it in the Skraboks—the records of artifacts—mentioned beside the plate that brought rain. “It makes the weather cold,” he said.

  “Yes,” Leif said. “It can cause blizzards, bring hail and snow. In the hands of the wolves, if they can make it work, it could bring cold to Drekhelm. To all of Vallen. That is why we have always kept it safe here. The Fyrstulf can take away the heat we need to transform, and weaken us until we are easily defeated.”

  As if the Snowstone were already at work, Anders felt a chill go through him. Sigrid was easily ruthless enough to drive the dragons from Drekhelm, or from Vallen altogether. By now she’d know they had her daughter, and she would be more furious still. It was one thing to convince the dragons they weren’t bad purely because they were wolves, it was another to convince anyone—including himself—that Sigrid wasn’t a danger to the dragons.

  Every dragon—including Rayna—would be in danger from the Snowstone. Her hand was warm in his, her presence beside him giving him strength as he answered these questions. He couldn’t bear to think of her in danger again.

  No wonder the dragons looked grim. With Professor Ennar back in Holbard, Sigrid would know where to find Drekhelm. She would know where to aim that cold, and where to attack.

  “We have nowhere to go if the wolves drive us out of Vallen,” said Torsten quietly. “No other country would welcome us, even if we survived the trip. There isn’t a place in the world that isn’t claimed by some kind of elemental as their territory.”

  “We’re not going anywhere,” Leif said, but he didn’t sound as firm as usual.

  And Anders didn’t feel so certain either.

  Chapter Three

  THE DRAGONMEET SEEMED ALMOST TO FORGET for a time that Anders, Lisabet, Rayna, and Ellukka were standing in front of them. The members broke off into quiet conversations, many of them arguing with one another. Anders was pretty sure he and Lisabet were both thinking the same thing—that Sigrid was bound to use the Snowstone if she thought it would give her an advantage against the dragons, but that saying as much would probably only provoke a fight sooner. So he stayed quiet, and she did too. For now, they just needed to be allowed to stay here. To find a way to keep the three of them—he, Lisabet, and Rayna—safe. Then he’d figure out his next steps.

  It was Torsten who turned his attention back to them first, frowning at them over his bushy beard. “Who will you fight for, when the time comes?” He was looking at Anders. “Your icefire stopped their ice spears as well as our flame. You could be the deciding factor.”

  Every pair of eyes in the room turned to focus on Anders, and Leif held up his hands. “He is a child,” he protested. “Children will not be fighting at all.”

  “If it comes to it, every one of us will defend ourselves,” Torsten replied. “And we’ve seen what he can do.”

  “He’s right,” said a man with a long nose and neatly combed white hair, a few seats along. “Are we just going to keep them here in our midst, when he could attack us at any moment?”

  “Are we just going to throw them out to roam the mountains?” another asked. “At least we know where they are here. We should lock them up.”

  There was a flurry of argument, voices rising over one another, and finally Leif was reduced to thumping on the table for silence. “Anders,” he said. “Do you plan to use the icefire to attack us?”

  “As if he’d tell us if he was,” a woman snorted.

  Anders cleared his throat, nervous. “I don’t even know how I made it,” he admitted. “I’ve never even been able to make an ice spear before. Everyone at Ulfar knew I was hopeless.”

  Beside him Lisabet was nodding, and though he’d always winced at his own ineptitude before, now he was grateful for the confirmation. Rayna squeezed his hand a second time, and he knew she was holding herself back from the reply she always gave when he said he was hopeless at anything—a vehement denial, and quick, fierce support. But for once it was better that she let them believe it, and she clearly knew that.

  “I was desperate when I threw the icefire,” he went on, thinking of the instant in the middle of battle that he’d thrown the silver flame. Icefire, a thing of legend, meant to be impossible. “I don’t know how to do it again. And I don’t plan to do it again.”

  He could tell that at least half the Dragonmeet didn’t believe him, and all of them were studying him closely. Except for Ellukka’s father, who pointed at Rayna. “What about you?” he asked. “If you really are his sister, can’t you do it?”

  Rayna shook her head. “I can’t even breathe a spark, Valerius,” she said. “Leif’s been trying to teach me.”

  Lisabet turned to look at her. “Maybe you will be able to do it too,” she mused. “If you can’t make flame, and Anders can’t make ice, perhaps both of you are made to throw icefire instead.”

  “Perhaps you can both learn in time,” Leif said. “We must try to teach you.”

  “So you want them to stay?” Torsten asked, throwing up his hands as if Leif simply couldn’t be reasoned with.

  “We cannot throw them out,” Leif said simply. “They will be attacked if they return to the wolves, and they will die on their own. And they cannot be prisoners here forever. That is not who we are.”

  Anders was pretty sure it was who some of them were, and a moment later, the hubbub around the table confirmed it.

  “A vote,” Ellukka’s father, Valerius, suggested, his voice rising over the others. “We have spoken enough, let us put it to a vote.”

  There was a general rumble of agreement up and down the table, and Anders felt like his knees were going to give out. This vote was not going to go their way. No matter what Leif said, it was clear nearly all the Dragonmeet mistrusted them.

  “All those who—” Valerius began, clearly intending on holding the vote then and there, but Leif cut him off.

  “I invoke—” he began loudly.

  “Raise your hand, all those—” Valerius tried again.

  “Valerius, no,” Leif snapped, finally raising his voice properly. He lowered it again, to speak over the shocked silence up and down the table. “By the power invested in me by the vote of my people, as Drekleid and as head of the Finskól, I declare the wolves Anders and Lisabet Finskólars. I extend to them all the protections of the Finskól.”

  The table exploded.

  “What’s the Finskól?” Anders whispered to Rayna as the members of the Dragonmeet shouted at one another.

  “It’s a special school for gifted students,” she whispered back. “The Drekleid runs it and chooses the students. If you’re in his school, they’re not allowed to throw you out or lock you up.”

  “Leif,” protested Valerius. “They’re wolves, you can’t possibly think—”

  “They’re not just wolves, they’re the wolves who led their pack to find us,” Torsten pointed out, and plenty of others raised their voices to agree.

  “Finskólars?” said the young woman with the messy blond bun. She and the young man beside her were the only two who seemed likely to vote with Leif.

  “You and Mylestom have recently graduated,” Leif said, nodding to the pair. “Anders and Lisabet will take the places you have vacated. The decision is mine alone, and it has been made.”

  Ellukka’s father tried again. “Leif, the Finskól is an honor for dragons alone.”

  “Actually,” said Ellukka, speaking up again from her spot by Rayna’s side, “it’s an honor for whomever Leif chooses.”

  “That’s enough, Ellukka,” he snapped, and she shot him a defiant glare.

  “Your daughter is correct, Valerius,” Leif said. “And today, I am choosing Anders and Lisabet.”

  “At least we’ll know where they are,” said the young man called Mylestom. He had short, dark-brown hair where the young woman beside him had messy blond curls, darker brown skin than hers, and a serious expression to match her smile. He studied the two wolves through wir
e-rimmed glasses.

  “At least we’ll know where they are?” Valerius repeated. “We don’t even know what they are.”

  Torsten thumped the table in agreement with one of his big fists, drawing more murmurs. In some ways, the Dragonmeet reminded Anders of the flocks of birds he’d seen down by the docks—when one made a noise, all the others joined in with raucous agreement.

  “Besides, you would agree,” the woman next to Torsten said to Mylestom. “You were his student until last year.”

  “And he taught me how to think for myself,” Mylestom shot back. “Saphira and I ask more questions and have more open minds than any of you, and that’s exactly what the Dragonmeet needs. It’s why we were elected—the younger dragons see it, even if you don’t.”

  “Perhaps,” said Leif, cutting across what was setting out to be a pretty magnificent argument, “we can conclude this conversation at another time. We have further matters to discuss. Anders, Lisabet, Rayna, please do not depart Drekhelm without permission. There are no lessons today, as we prepare for tonight’s equinox celebrations. I will expect you in class tomorrow morning.”

  Just the day before, Anders had stood here believing those very equinox celebrations would include the sacrifice of his sister’s life. That she and the other kidnapping victims from Holbard were part of some terrible dragon ritual. Now he knew it was simply a party, and that the kidnappings were only to rescue those children who would die if they weren’t helped to make their transformation into dragons.

  So, said the little voice in his head, that’s one problem out of about nine hundred and seventy-three solved, at this rate we’ll be safe in no time. He shushed the voice as Leif dismissed them.

  Nobody spoke until they had closed the doors behind them and were out in the hallway.

  “Well,” said Ellukka. “Not exiled or locked up. That went better than expected.”

  “What?” Anders said, turning to face her. “You thought they were going to—”