Dragonwatch

by Jaye McKenna

The relative quiet of the forest and the cool breeze on Mikhyal’s face were a relief after the two-day panic that had ensued when Queen Icera had made known her intention to accompany her husband and son to the betrothal ceremony.

  Preparations for the journey to Altan had become rather fraught at that point, with the queen insisting she would need far more than two days to prepare, and the king telling her he would depart on time, with or without her.

  They were several hours out from the summer palace when Wytch King Drannik pulled his black gelding up near Shirra, Mikhyal’s bay mare, and said, “Drop back with me. We need to talk.”

  At forty-eight, Drannik cut an impressive figure, especially armed and on horseback. Like many men of the north, he was tall and powerfully built. Though twenty years younger, Mikhyal could have been Drannik’s brother, with his broad shoulders and black hair. The only real difference was their eyes. While Drannik’s were an impenetrable black, Mikhyal’s eyes were the same as his mother’s: a pale, icy blue.

  “Your mother is convinced poor Prince Jaire has landed himself in the middle of a scandal,” Drannik said as they waited by the side of the road for the rest of the party to pass by.

  “Well, it was rather short notice,” Mikhyal observed. “Every betrothal ceremony I’ve attended has been announced at least a season in advance. They’ve given us, what, four weeks?”

  “Ai, something like,” Drannik said. “She’s working herself into a froth of disapproval over his imagined expectant wife-to-be. I’m rather looking forward to seeing her face when she learns that Prince Jaire’s intended is a young man.”

  Mikhyal smothered a laugh. “She’ll never forgive you if she finds out you knew.”

  “Won’t be the first time,” Drannik muttered. “Perhaps the gossip will keep her too occupied to wonder.”

  The last of the guardsmen but for the rear scouts had passed, and Drannik urged his horse back onto the road. Mikhyal guided Shirra after him. As he drew up beside his father, Drannik said, “The reason for such haste is that the betrothal ceremony is merely an excuse to bring the Wytch Kings of the north together for negotiations.”

  “If you’re intending to involve Rhiva in something that requires negotiations,” Mikhyal said with a faint frown, “wouldn’t you have been better off having Shaine accompany you? He won’t thank you for excluding him.”

  “I don’t want Shaine involved in this,” Drannik said grimly. “And nor will you, once I’ve explained. The messenger who brought the invitation was none other than Altan’s Royal Wytch Master Ilya.”

  “Oh?” Mikhyal pursed his lips; Senn’s information had been correct. “What warranted a visit from the Wytch Master?”

  “The necessity for secrecy. Ilya said the Council attempted to force Garrik to step down in favor of an unknown cousin, using his own brother as leverage. Prince Jaire was kidnapped and held hostage, apparently at the Council’s order.”

  “I see.” Mikhyal barely managed to keep his alarm off of his face. Council interference in the governing of the kingdoms of Skanda was a major bone of contention between Mikhyal’s father and brother. Since the accident and his dramatic change in personality, Shaine would support the Council’s actions unquestioningly, whereas Drannik… should Drannik’s views ever become common knowledge, Mikhyal could see the Wytch Council moving to hurry along Shaine’s ascension to the throne. “Has the situation been resolved?”

  “For the moment. With one Wytch Master dead, and another collared and chained in Altan’s dungeon. Garrik expects Council retaliation, and from what Ilya said, it sounds as if he welcomes it. He requests our aid in the defense of his kingdom. He and Wytch King Ord of Irilan have invited us to a meeting of the northern kingdoms to discuss an alliance that could see the entire north break with the Council. Edrun of Miraen has been invited, too.”

  Mikhyal’s gut clenched. “Who else knows of this?”

  “No one but you and I,” Drannik said softly, sharp black eyes holding Mikhyal’s gaze. “And I plan to keep it that way. If an agreement can be reached and we do break with the Council, my choice of heir will no longer be subject to Council approval, and you, not Shaine, will be Wytch King of Rhiva after me. Shaine will not take such news well.”

  “To say the least,” Mikhyal murmured. “Do you really think it will be that easy? The Council will not stand for it. An alliance of this nature can only lead us into a war we cannot win. Even combining their strength, the northern kingdoms do not have the resources to support a protracted military venture.”

  “So I told Master Ilya. He said Altan possesses knowledge that could change that, and Garrik asks only that we hear him out.”

  “He must be confident, indeed, to even suggest such a meeting. What sort of knowledge have they unearthed?”

  “That, I cannot say.”

  “I suppose we will find out soon enough.”

  “That is exactly what Ilya said.” Drannik gave his son another grim smile as he urged his mount forward.

  * * *

  Tristin felt sick. This was only his third lesson with Wytch Master Ilya, but the first two had gone badly enough that he’d been dreading it all morning.

  “What is the most important thing for you to remember?” Ilya’s voice was cool and steady, nothing like Mordax’s sharp tones, which had become more clipped with Tristin’s every failure.

  Tristin swallowed. “That we start fresh every day. That I must not think about yesterday or the day before, but only of this moment. I must see this as my very first lesson.” Beginner’s mind. That was what Master Ilya wanted, and that was what Tristin must strive for.

  “You must also make the attempt to actually change your mindset, rather than simply parroting back the words you think I want to hear,” Ilya said drily.

  “Sorry, Master Ilya. I’ll try.”

  “Close your eyes, then.”

  Tristin closed his eyes and reminded himself yet again that Mordax, Royal Wytch Master of Ysdrach, was dead. Enraged and wholly dragon at the time, Tristin had dragged him from the top of the watchtower and thrown him to his death after he’d threatened Prince Jaire.

  Ilya’s soft voice broke into the memory, reminding Tristin that he needed to focus. “There, in the darkness of your mind, in the same place you focus on when you shift, is your center.”

  Tristin focused inward and willed himself to relax and sink back into the darkness. There it was, the blazing core of fire and fury deep inside him, where the heart of his dragon self lived. Ilya said it was a conduit leading straight to the raw mythe, the place from which he drew the power he needed to build the patterns that allowed him to shift.

  In theory, he ought to be able to use that energy to build any pattern he was capable of using, but Tristin had yet to break his instinctive ability to shift into steps he could apply to learning other patterns.

  He wished Prince Vayne was able to burn the patterns for shielding into his mythe-shadow as easily as he had done the patterns for shifting.

  “Finding my center isn’t the problem,” Tristin said with a grimace. “It’s the same place I go when I shift. The problem is knowing what to do once I get there. I keep wanting to shift, and there doesn’t seem to be room for anything else.”

  “I’ll show you the pattern,” Ilya said. “Relax and watch. You should see it hovering in front of you, like a snowflake made of light and shadow.”

  Tristin attempted to relax, but the tension across his shoulders wouldn’t ease. The dull headache arising from his constant awareness of the low-level empathic resonances increased in intensity, making it difficult to concentrate.

  He managed to still his mind enough to see the pattern hanging in the air before him. Ilya’s description was accurate — it looked like an intricate snowflake made of light and dark. He might have thought it beautiful once, before Mordax had turned the patterns he couldn’t seem to learn into symbols of failure and pain.

  Focus, boy!

  Mordax’s voice lashed at him from across
the years, and Tristin hunched over, tensed for the blow he could never perform well enough to avoid.

  Ilya’s calm instructions were drowned out by the vivid memories: the barrage of insults, the riding crop coming down sharply across his upper back, and Mordax’s demands that he stop being lazy and try harder.

  Do you want to spend the rest of your life in torment? How will you manage if you cannot bear to walk across any ground where others have trod? You cannot. Focus! Focus! Focus!

  Each one of those last three words was punctuated with a sharp blow across the shoulders. Tristin whimpered with each one, clamping his lips together to minimize the sounds of his distress. Crying out would only enrage Mordax and make his punishment that much worse—

  “Tristin? Tristin, it’s me, Ilya. It’s all right. Come on. Come back from wherever you’ve gone. You’re safe.”

  Ilya’s words penetrated the haze of fear and pain, and Tristin blinked, surprised to find his eyes full of tears.

  “Deep breaths,” Ilya said gently. “That’s it, slow and easy.”

  Tristin struggled to do as he was told. His chest felt tight, every breath a hard-won victory. When he was able to speak, he raised his eyes to meet Ilya’s. “S-sorry, M-Master Ilya,” he stammered. “I… c-can’t help it. Every t-time…”

  “Mordax again, was it?”

  “Ai, Master.” Tristin shivered, aware suddenly of the cold sweat trickling down his back.

  “I think, perhaps, it is too soon for us to be attempting this,” Ilya said slowly. “You need more time to recover. I know you’re eating well, and you’ve even put on a bit of weight since you left your bed, but the memories are still very close to the surface and very raw.”

  Tristin said nothing. The Wytch Master was right; his memories of Mordax were still far too vivid to make this anything more than a futile, painful exercise.

  “There is no reason for us to rush this,” Ilya said.

  “No reason but my own comfort.” The bitterness in Tristin’s voice made the Wytch Master wince. “I don’t suppose… Master, I’ve kept my promise for three days now. I haven’t shifted once, though I’ve been sorely tempted. Might I shift? Just until sunset… just to have a bit of peace?”

  Ilya frowned. “Your work in the garden hasn’t helped?”

  “It helps in the sense that I now have something to occupy my time,” Tristin told him. “But I’m not strong enough yet to work for very long. I know you hoped that doing something I enjoy might distract me, but… the noise seeps into my mind wherever I stand, and I am aware of it no matter what I’m doing. When I am dragon, I cannot feel the resonances of all those lives and deaths. I can fly into the mountains and find places where no one has stood. There, I can shift into human form, and I can be at peace for a time. Please, Master Ilya. I promise you, I am not giving up, and I will not lose myself to the beast.” He stared down at his arms, and turned them to display his scars. “If I wanted to be finished, there are far easier ways to do it than risk the lives of those who have cared for me by becoming a rogue dragon.”

  Ilya looked down at the scars on Tristin’s arms, then raised his eyes to study Tristin’s face for a long time before finally giving him a single, sharp nod. “Very well, Tristin. Go and be dragon. Be at peace for a time. But if you do not return by sunset, I will come and fetch you myself.”

  Tristin smiled, the first real smile he’d given anyone in three days. “Thank you,” he whispered. “I will return. I promise.” This time, at least. If things didn’t improve soon, though, he might just choose to fly far, far away, and seek out a place devoid of history and memory, a place where simply existing wouldn’t hurt so much.

  Chapter Two

  “At this rate, Prince Jaire will be betrothed, married, and a father several times over before we ever reach Altan,” Rhu grumbled to Mikhyal as they followed the carriage at a sedate pace that wouldn’t upset the ladies’ digestion.

  “Ai, I’d forgotten how much I hate traveling with Mother’s entourage.” Though the ladies rode in a closed carriage to protect them from the damp forest air, Mikhyal still kept his voice low enough not to carry. “We could have traveled this distance in a day or so if we didn’t have to keep to the pace of the carriage.”

  They were five days out from the palace, and even though he’d at first appreciated the slow pace, he was now more than ready to be finished with the journey. The ladies tired easily, forcing the party to stop in the late afternoon, and though they rose at a reasonable time in the morning, it was usually several hours of primping and powdering before they were ready to resume the journey.

  A shout from up ahead had Mikhyal and Rhu exchanging an anxious glance. A moment later, the distinctive sound of steel ringing against steel reached them, followed by the king’s voice barking orders.

  “Stay here, Your Highness,” Rhu ordered, and urged her mount toward the front of the line, where the king rode.

  Mikhyal stared after her for only a few moments before touching his heels to Shirra’s flanks. The mare surged forward. When he reached the carriage, which had stopped at the first sign of trouble, he dismounted and tethered her to the door.

  The dark curtains at the carriage window parted, and his mother’s face appeared, shockingly pale against her brightly painted lips. Her blue eyes were wide as she stared at her son.

  “Stay here!” Mikhyal shouted through the glass.

  The queen nodded once and let the curtain fall closed.

  Mikhyal hurried forward on foot. He was already winded when the trees thinned abruptly. The melee appeared to be contained in a large clearing up ahead. Keeping to the cover of the forest, Mikhyal circled the open space until he caught sight of his father engaged in combat with a scruffy-looking man in worn, dirty leather armor.

  Drannik appeared to be holding his own, but the king wore only a breastplate for protection. Mikhyal drew his sword and rushed to Drannik’s defense. Before he could reach his father’s side, a huge man stepped out from the cover of the forest, sword raised to strike. With only a moment to react, Mikhyal brought his blade up to parry a powerful stroke that might well have split him in two. The force of the blow sent a numbing shock from shoulder to fingertips. Mikhyal’s fingers spasmed, and before he could regain his grip, his opponent twisted his own blade to wrench the hilt from Mikhyal’s hand. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his sword go sailing into the underbrush.

  His focus narrowed, and his senses sharpened as he reached for his dagger. Not fast enough. The sword was arcing around to slash his belly open.

  Time froze. Mikhyal braced himself for agony, certain a killing blow was coming. In the next moment, a streak of green and grey flashed past. One of Rhiva’s soldiers barreled into the man from the side, knocking him off of his feet. Mikhyal caught a glimpse of Rhu’s black braids flying past before his attacker fell heavily to the forest floor, blood streaming from his cut throat. Rhu paused long enough to give Mikhyal a nod before springing back into the fray.

  Mikhyal stared down at the dagger in his hand. He needed a better weapon, something with more reach. He turned toward the underbrush where his sword had disappeared. A glint of bright steel on the ground at his feet stopped him. His sword? No… this was the blade that had nearly killed him: a longsword that looked oddly familiar. Mikhyal bent to pick it up.

  The moment his fingers closed on the grip, a tingling shock went up his arm, and a great ringing sound resonated through his whole body, rattling his very bones and shaking him to the core. The world went white, and a loud buzzing filled both his ears and his mind.

  When his vision cleared, the fighting was still raging around him in the clearing. Before he could dive into the chaos, all was covered in a whirling storm of mist and light, full of claws and teeth. Mikhyal caught brief flashes of teeth rending and blood spattering. Screams rang in his ears, and a terrible feeling of pressure began to build in his head.

  The realization that someone must be weaving the mythe froze him. The only mythe-wea
vers in the royal party were his parents, and neither one of them was capable of anything like this.

  Before he could make himself move, the storm was over, though the horror remained. The light-suffused mist lifted, and Mikhyal’s gorge rose as he took in the blood-soaked grass and the gleaming piles of white bone that had once been men.

  On top of the still form of a dead horse reclined a shimmering, silver creature about the size of a small house cat. It looked vaguely dragon-like, with four clawed feet and a long, tufted tail. A white mane started at the top of its head, and flowed down its back. Thick white whiskers drooped around its mouth, and tufts of shaggy white eyebrow fur twitched above its eyes.

  The creature surveyed the carnage with a satisfied nod, then raised its head and grinned, displaying a fearsome array of sharp, glittering teeth. Eyes like shiny black beads fixed on Mikhyal, and one shaggy eyebrow lifted.

  Mikhyal swept his gaze around the clearing, seeking his father. All around him, the men of the King’s Guard were staring at the carnage, eyes wide with shock. He didn’t see his father among them, but before he could call out to anyone, a wave of darkness crashed over him, and he knew no more.

  * * *

  Tristin sat on a stone bench in the courtyard, soaking up the sun. The bench was a new fixture, carved by the royal stonemason out of freshly quarried stone. It had been placed beside the raised flower bed he was in the process of building, so he’d have somewhere to sit when he tired. Somewhere not pulsing with the lingering resonances of his ancestors and those who’d served them.

  The building of the flower bed was a slow process. The thick, flat pieces of stone he was using for the walls that would contain the dirt were located behind the herb garden, and Tristin was not strong enough to carry more than one at a time. Kian and Ambris, his healers, had agreed that the exercise would help speed his recovery, so he’d resigned himself to having to carry the materials he needed all the way from the herb garden to the courtyard.