“Master Jesper’s secret mission,” he replied.
“Yes. Feel free to continue riding Fyrian until you two get used to each other. I’m sure she’ll tell you when she’s had enough.”
With a nod, he turned Fyrian around and headed for the south side of the mountain, the location of the cadets’ dorms and warriors’ accommodation. She landed in a clearing of Boreal lime trees, whose canopies formed a partial arch. A light breeze blew the floral, honeyed scent of lime blossoms, reminding me of the orange trees at the palace.
Niger slid off Fyrian’s back and down her foreleg. The moment his feet hit the ground, he transformed back into himself. Warmth filled my chest. It was a strange thing to admit, but I’d missed the large, wild-haired version of my friend.
I slid down, clicked my fingers, and Master Jesper’s enchantment canceled with the reappearance of my floppy, blond hair.
Niger’s brows rose. “I thought you would transform back into yourself.”
I glanced down at my slender, male form. “I did.”
“No. The Princess.”
Warmth spread up my neck to my cheeks. “Right. Well, that can be fixed.” Keeping my gaze on his eyes, I clicked my fingers. “Thunderbird.”
A slow grin formed on his face. “You look even more beautiful in the moonlight.”
I dipped my head. “You don’t have to say that.”
“It is the truth.” He placed a warm hand on my cheek.
My throat dried, and I peeped up into his smiling, obsidian eyes. “Thank you.”
“If you kissed me now, you would find my response more pleasing than the last.”
A laugh huffed out of my throat. “Really?”
“Indeed,” he said, voice low.
My heart pounded so hard, it made my ribcage vibrate. He could probably hear it with his enhanced ogre hearing. It wasn’t aching from the damsel denial, so I raised my chin and said in my haughtiest voice, “You can kiss me, for a change.”
He wrapped his arm around my waist, drew me close, and pressed his lips onto mine.
My eyelids fluttered shut, and I inhaled the earthy scent of thunderstorms and danger. His beard was softer than I had imagined, like silken strands against my skin. Niger’s heart beat just as fast as mine, and I relaxed into the kiss. If he was as nervous as me, then he wasn’t a rogue like Father who had a way with women. He wrapped his other arm around my waist and drew back. “Was that all right?”
I pressed my lips together and gave him an eager nod.
“Good. Because I intend to—”
A loud tweeting made him jolt. A bluebird landed on his head and gave him a sharp peck on the skull. She flew up into a branch before he could raise a hand in defense. “Little rogue!”
“Mother!” I snapped.
“M-Mother?” Niger spun and stared up into the branches, his arms shielding his face. “Where is she?”
“Biding her time until you expose your eyes.” I stamped my foot. “Why are you spying on me and attacking my friends?”
Footsteps thudded from somewhere behind a lime tree, and she stepped out, clad in her blue Fairy Fighting Force uniform. She glared at Niger, her face hard. “Leave.”
He turned to me, head tilted in silent question.
I raised a shoulder. “Take Fyrian and go. I’ll be fine. Sorry about her.”
“I meant no offense.” Niger gave her a gallant bow before jogging over to where Fyrian lay on the other side of the clearing.
“You half-ogres never do,” she snapped.
We both waited for Niger to leave, glaring into each other’s eyes. It was just a kiss. At my instigation. He hadn’t been taking advantage of me or anything. Why was she acting like I’d been carried away by alchemists?
As soon as Fyrian took to the skies, she asked, “What’s going on between you and that boy?”
“What are you talking about?” I replied.
“That half-ogre, Niger. There is no future in it apart from an early grave.”
I clenched my teeth. Everybody knew quarter-ogre females were not compatible with half-ogre males. There were laws in place protecting witches from the advances of those with a stronger ogre heritage. As most witches were one-quarter ogre or less, they were unsuitable for carrying their children. Their resulting offspring feed too heavily from the mother and leave them dead, emaciated husks.
“We’re just friends,” I replied. “And it was just a kiss.”
She stepped forward, placing both hands on my shoulders. “You might not think it, but you are a quarter-low fairy.”
I bristled. “And I’m a quarter-high fairy, human, and ogre.”
“Need I remind you that we mate for life?” When I didn’t respond, she gave me a gentle shake. “Ogres don’t. Neither do humans nor high fairies. You can’t risk your future hoping you’ll take after one of the other species. The last thing you need is to be stuck with a worthless half-ogre who treats you little better than a caged bird.”
Heart twisting, I jerked my head to the side and swallowed hard. “You managed to get away from Father.”
“Our mating bond only broke when Cendrilla cursed me. You might not be so lucky.”
My head dipped. Father had mentioned something about Aunt Cendrilla accidentally cursing Mother into becoming a half-ogre for three years. “I… won’t let anything untoward happen with Niger.”
She wrapped her arms around my shoulders and hugged me tight, engulfing me in her wildflower scent. “Don’t lose your head over an ogre. They’re not worth it.”
Although I nodded and hummed my agreement, it was only to appease her. Niger was nothing like Father, and I wouldn’t let go of our friendship.
Chapter 16
The next morning, Fyrian woke me before dawn for the mystery mission Master Jesper wanted Stafford and me to perform. I washed and dressed in semi-darkness, not daring to give anyone, dragon or ogre, an indication that I would be sneaking out. I didn’t bother to knock on Stafford’s door, as he would already be at the laboratory, having spent a refreshing night under the elixir of sweet dreams.
As I snuck through the hallways, Mother’s words reverberated through my mind. She had no way of knowing I could mate for life, and she was comparing my compatibility with Niger with that of a witch. Most witches were three-quarters human, but I wasn’t. What if my fairy sides balanced out his ogre sides?
I opened the nearest door and stepped out into a darkened terrace. Last night, I’d been too mortified by her interference to think up those arguments, but the next time she confronted me about Niger, I would be ready.
By the time I reached the laboratory, Stafford sat on his cot fully dressed, wolfing down a bowl of porridge.
Master Jesper pushed a steaming portion into my hands. “Eat. You will need your strength to complete this mission.”
I pulled the spoon out and blew on its contents. “What are we doing?”
“Pisces Pila needs magic to expand to the required size and to maintain a breathable environment. You two are going to get me that magic.”
“Ummm…” I shoved the spoon into my mouth. “How?”
“There is a limitless repository of magical power beneath our very feet.”
I glanced down at my boots. “The mountain?”
“The sleeping dragons,” said Stafford.
I lowered myself onto the cot next to him and shuffled a few inches away. Although I felt only friendship toward Stafford, sitting so close now felt awkward. Master Jesper had obviously been telling Father tales about a budding romance between myself and Stafford, based on his lack of knowledge about ogre courtship.
I drew back, giving him my most skeptical look. “I thought you’d have had enough of sleeping dragons for the next few years.”
“They weren’t so bad,” he replied.
“That’s because you didn’t have them threatening to burn you if you didn’t find the eggs.”
“I don’t intend for you to awaken them,” said Master Jesper. “We j
ust need you to steal from them.”
An image popped into my head of sneaking past that purple dragon and getting caught in her amber-eyed glower before she engulfed me in her flames for disturbing her slumber.
“They aren’t going to wake for a year,” said Fyrian. “At least not the group you saw around the Great Lake.”
I huffed. “That isn’t even remotely reassuring.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.” She yawned into our bond. “Let me know when you need directions.”
I turned to Master Jesper. “What are we stealing?”
“Frozen flames.” The troll placed two pouches on the table. “Fill these until they glow silver.”
“What?”
“You know,” said Stafford. “Silver dragons, like the one General Thornicroft rides, make both hot and cold flames. Frozen flames are the only type that hold magic, and they power loads of things around Mount Fornax.”
I nodded. That hadn’t entirely been unfamiliar. I’m sure Ivan had mentioned it once.
“It was Evolene,” said Fyrian. “That time King Magnar made you two give him a tour.”
“Oh, yes.”
Back then, I hadn’t liked her very much. An image popped into my head. It was of Evolene sitting forlorn on a stool, in a dank cell several feet beneath the sea bed. Right now, she was probably shivering on the cold floor, thinking she deserved her fate for all the crimes she’d committed under her father’s coercion.
I shoveled spoonfuls of porridge into my mouth, trying to fill the empty space in my heart with something warm.
Master Jesper reached into the pocket of its cloak and pulled out two transparent discs. “Put these on your head if the heat becomes overpowering. It will keep you cool.”
“What are they?”
“Breathing parasols. They will use a small amount of your magic to create a cool, breathable environment.”
“How can something on your head help you breathe?” asked Stafford. “Does it form a bubble?”
Master Jesper rubbed a wrinkled hand over its mouth. “Not quite.”
A tremor of apprehension rumbled through my stomach. If the troll didn’t want to talk about its breathing parasols, there had to be something wrong with them. “Then how does it work?”
“Like a jellyfish, it has tentacles. They burrow through your nostrils to provide your lungs with much-needed, cool air. Take one. It may mean the difference between success or failure.”
I grimaced. Or life and death. “Right.” I took one with my free hand and slipped it into my pocket. “Thanks. Hopefully, we won’t need them.”
Once we’d finished our breakfast, we entered the mountain via the terrace at the side of the building and walked through the darkened hallways. At this time of the morning, the gaslights were turned low in anticipation of dawn sunlight providing illumination through the windows. We strode toward the nearest staircase under Fyrian’s directions, making the minimum of sounds with the soles of our boots enchanted for silence.
“Do we go all the way down?” I asked.
“Keep going until you reach the hatch.”
“All right.” We descended another ten flights before the staircase ended and we found a square carved into the floor. “Is this it?”
“Stamp on it.”
I followed her instructions. As soon as I stepped back, the square shimmered away, and a pole rose out through the hole in the ground. “What now?”
“What do you think? You slide down.”
“All right. Just checking.” I nudged Stafford, pointed at the pole, and mimed sliding down.
He gave me a thumbs up.
Keeping my feet firmly on the sandstone floor, I wrapped my hands around the pole and tucked my elbows comfortably into the sides of its metal. A quick glance down into the fathom’s depths made a myriad of knots form in my stomach. I sucked in a breath through my teeth and snapped my head up.
“Go on,” Stafford whispered.
I shot him a glare. If he was that excited to slide down, he should have volunteered to go first. My right leg wrapped around the cool metal, followed by my left. I squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for the swoosh.
Nothing happened.
I cracked an eye open and met Stafford’s gaze.
He tilted his head to the side, peering at me like I was an idiot. “You’re holding on too tight. Loosen your grip a little.”
“Oh.” I relaxed my fingers. “Like th—”
I dropped like an anchor through the air, my legs clinging onto the pole like it was the only thing keeping me from turning into Alba sauce. My stomach, along with my frantic heart, rose up my gullet as I picked up speed.
This was scarier than riding a rapier red. Scarier than sliding down that chute.
“Scarier than the time I broke my wingbone?” asked Fyrian.
I clenched my teeth. “No.”
“Then take a deep breath, calm down, and enjoy the slide. All the groomers love going down the pole.”
“Easy for you to say.”
She let out a smoky harrumph and retreated from our bond.
After a few more seconds of continuous falling, my stomach unknotted, releasing a flock of excited dragon moths. Sliding down the pole reminded me of swooping down on Fyrian’s back, but without the friendly bondmate who knew what she was doing. I closed my eyes and exhaled. The pole wasn’t going anywhere. Neither was time, as the drop seemed to have no end.
After what felt like a lifetime of sliding through increasingly cooler air, my feet hit the ground. I straightened, stepped back, and raised my flaming fist for illumination.
Moments later, Stafford landed. He let go of the pole and flopped onto his back, cheeks red. “That was amazing. I’d go again if we weren’t in a hurry!”
Warmth spread through my insides. This was the first time he had looked happy since Evolene’s arrest. I offered him my outstretched arm. “Come on, we have a mission to complete.”
We stood in a hallway, closed off by a wall of sandstone on one side of the pole. The other led into the darkness.
“Which way?” asked Stafford.
“Down here, I suppose. Fyrian will correct us if we’re going wrong.” I gave her a mental prod.
“What?” she asked.
“Are we going the right way?”
“Sorry. I was napping. Keep going until you reach an opening. There’ll be a few dim lights in a moment.”
We strode down the hallway at a brisk pace. It was Stafford’s turn to light the way with his hands, so I clenched mine into fists and focussed on keeping up with his longer strides.
He cleared his throat. “Can we trust that witch?”
“Roseate? My gut says no, but Master Jesper’s spell said she was telling the truth.”
“I can’t believe Evolene is under the sea.”
“Try not to think of it that way,” I murmured. “She’s underground. The seafloor is solid rock, just like the lowest levels of the Magical Militia and Mount Fornax. Water couldn’t reach her through all that stone.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
I squared my shoulders. “We’ll save her. Everything’s in place. We have a route out of Mount Fornax, strong warriors to distract the witches, a way into the prison that won’t trigger the wards, and an avatar to feed to the wards before Saturn’s day.”
“The only thing we haven’t worked out is where she’s going,” said Stafford.
“L-let’s talk about that later. Maybe Niger’s got a few ideas.” I set my fist alight and raised it.
“Sure.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets.
Dim light flickering overhead reminded me that Fyrian had said gaslights illuminated the entrance to the sleeping dragons’ lair. Up ahead stood an archway large enough to accommodate a full-sized ogre. By the time we reached it, enough light shone down on us that we no longer needed our flames.
We stepped through, and the temperature doubled. I caught sight of what looked like a dragon-sized King hornets’ ne
st and froze.
“What’s wrong?” asked Stafford. His voice echoed about two seconds later.
“Look!”
“The cocoon?”
I squinted. The exterior reminded me of fabric rather than the wood pulp covering of a hornets’ nest. “Oh. I didn’t know the cocooning chamber was all the way down here.”
“It’s best to keep them out of the way, so no one trips over them,” said Fyrian.
We walked around the cocoon, past another four times its size, and past one the size of a rapier red. To our left was the wall. It was hard to tell how deep the room stretched on the other side, but the delay of our echoes indicated that it was huge. The next cocoon we found was a foot shorter. I stopped and peered down, my heart thrumming with excitement. This contained a dragon master like Phoenix.
“What do they do with the little ones?” I asked.
“Once a month, the grooms and witches move the man-sized cocoons into quarters of their own.”
“Like Master Fosco’s?”
“Yes,” she replied. “But without all the artwork.”
We continued past the small cocoon and walked a straight path alongside the wall. Up ahead was another opening, presumably containing the sleeping dragons.
WHOOOO!
The sound made the lining of my stomach reverberate, and I tripped over my own feet. “What was that?”
Stafford grabbed my arm. “I don’t know.”
“Keep going!” hissed Fyrian. “It’s just the beefstake whales.”
I reared back. “What are whales doing in Mount Fornax?”
“Where do you think they get all the fish? The Cursed Sea?”
“Actually, I did.”
“Does Fyrian know what’s going on?” asked Stafford.
She gave me a longer explanation to pass onto Stafford of how the ponds and lakes in Mount Fornax were used to farm food for the warriors. According to a history class Fyrian once overheard, Aunt Cendrilla had ordered the trolls from Tundra to transport icebergs to form Mount Fornax’s major bodies of water.
We reached the end of the cocooning chamber and passed through the archway which led to another room about the same size. Smoky heat, hotter than the midday sun seeped through my clothing, and I jerked back into the cocooning chamber.
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