by Jaye McKenna
“You might want to stop by your room for a book,” Ambris added as they went inside.
Tristin followed Ambris in and stopped in his own rooms for the book Prince Jaire had brought for him only yesterday morning. The prince’s thoughtfulness had touched Tristin’s heart; Jaire had found a book on plants and flowers he thought Tristin might enjoy in Altan’s library. He’d taken the trouble to have the castle scribes copy the text and the drawings so Tristin wouldn’t have to worry about the book having absorbed any disturbing emotional resonances from its previous owners.
In Prince Mikhyal’s room, Tristin settled himself in the armchair drawn up beside the bed and opened the book.
“We meet again.” The voice was male, familiar, and pleasant. Tristin started, eyes going straight to Prince Mikhyal, but the prince’s eyes were closed, his dark lashes a shocking contrast to his pale skin.
Tristin set his book down and glanced about the room. A glimmer of light at the foot of the bed caught his attention, and he rubbed his eyes, certain he was seeing things again.
There, curled up next to Prince Mikhyal’s feet, was the little silver dragon he’d imagined a few days ago. It got to its feet and stretched, arching its back like a cat. Its jaws opened wide in a yawn, pink forked tongue curling. It turned around several times, like a dog, before settling itself, this time facing Tristin.
“You’re not a hallucination,” Tristin blurted out before he could stop himself.
“What a coincidence,” the dragon said tartly. “Neither are you.” It lifted one sharp, black claw, licked it, and dragged it through long, flowing whiskers.
“I suppose I shall have to tell Ilya I’m seeing things that aren’t there again,” he murmured. “It seems to be the only thing I’m good at, just lately.”
The dragon finished grooming itself and crossed its little front feet neatly. It looked exactly like Tristin’s memory of it: a slender, sinuous thing with a long snout, impressive whiskers, and far too many teeth. Now that he looked more closely, in addition to its fluffy eyebrows and flowing mane, Tristin noted a pair of delicate wings folded against its back, a small, white tuft at the end of its tail, and just a hint of white fuzz at the tips of its little pointed ears.
Glittering black eyes, bright with intelligence, caught Tristin’s gaze and held it. “Or perhaps you’re rather good at seeing things that are here. I don’t suppose I could persuade you to tell me where here is.” The dragon sounded a bit mournful, and when Tristin didn’t answer, it let out a heavy sigh and rested its chin between its front feet, much like his uncle’s hounds did when they were begging for a bit of meat. “It would save us both a lot of time and aggravation.”
“Don’t… don’t you know?”
“Humans,” it muttered, making the word sound like an insult. “If I knew, there would be no point in asking, would there?”
“I… suppose not.” Tristin glanced at Prince Mikhyal to make certain he was still asleep. It wouldn’t do to have the prince wake up and catch him talking to himself. He’d been looking forward to meeting someone who didn’t have any preconceived ideas about his sanity, but the prince wasn’t even awake yet, and he was already off to an unfortunate start.
“You’re at Dragonwatch,” Tristin said in a low voice, “in the kingdom of Altan. If you’re looking for the castle, it’s just down the mountain. It’s not far. Well. I mean, it’s probably not far for you, assuming those wings of yours are actually functional and not just decorative.” No point in being polite to a hallucination. Besides, if he offended it, perhaps it would go away. It was a tactic that had rarely worked in the past, but one could always hope.
The dragon laid its ears back and regarded him with a level stare before saying very softly, “Decorative?”
Tristin shrugged, but didn’t offer an apology. “You’re rather prickly for a hallucination. Or… perhaps not. I’m usually too drug-mazed to recall the details of these sorts of encounters.”
“Prickly,” it mused. “Let me show you prickly.” It flashed him a wide grin, displaying a glittering array of needle-sharp, crystal-clear teeth.
“Charming,” Tristin commented, certain he’d never held a conversation this long — or this coherent — with any of his hallucinations. “I suppose next you’ll be threatening me.”
“Not much point. You don’t look bright enough to take heed.”
Tristin frowned, perplexed. His hallucinatory visitors didn’t usually insult him.
The dragon got to its feet, stretched again, then hopped lightly up on the window sill and gazed out over the mountains. “The Iceshards or the Dragon’s Spine? If memory serves, Altan borders both, though these look a bit high and sharp to be the Dragon’s Spine.”
“The Iceshards,” Tristin said.
“But Altan, not Rhiva. Interesting.” The little dragon turned to face him and sat neatly on its haunches, tufted tail curling around its dainty, clawed feet. “Well, then. What shall I call you? Human seems a bit too general, if the parade in and out of here is any indication of how many of you there are wandering about. Have you a name that distinguishes you from the rest of them?”
“Tristin,” he said promptly. “Prince Tristin of… well. Of the new flower bed, I suppose. There was some talk of me being king at one point, but that appears to be off the table for good.” Tristin paused for a moment, then added hastily, “Not that I’m complaining, what with all the bloodshed that would have ensued… and the fact that I’m completely unsuited to be…” He trailed off as he remembered his manners. “And you are…?”
“You may call me Dirit.”
“Dirit. That’s a rather odd name.” Tristin cocked his head as he studied the creature in the light. “Doesn’t fit you at all. More the sort of thing you’d call one of those brightly colored songbirds. Or perhaps a type of shrew. Or one of those little hopping insects with the lacy—”
“Insects?” Dirit’s tail lashed back and forth, and its eyebrow tufts drew together in a scowl.
“Father?” The voice came from the bed, and Tristin looked down to see Prince Mikhyal’s eyes fluttering open. Before he could come up with something helpful and reassuring to say, Dirit hopped down off the window sill and onto the bed. The little dragon marched up the prince’s body, stood upon his chest, and stared down at him.
The prince’s pale blue eyes widened as they fixed on Dirit. “No… you can’t be real…” Prince Mikhyal’s voice broke, his words ending on a low, choking sob.
Tristin leapt to his feet, but before he could call for anyone, the prince’s eyes rolled back in his head and his body went limp.
“Well.” Dirit turned to Tristin, whiskers twitching with something that looked perilously close to amusement. “That went better than expected.”
* * *
Mikhyal was on his knees surrounded by a bloody fog. The screams of the dying sliced through him like razor-edged steel, and a cold far deeper than the bite of a winter wind out of the Iceshards froze him from the marrow out.
The murderous dragon-creature followed him into his dreams. Its black eyes fixed on him in a mocking stare, and its needle-sharp teeth dripped blood. Seeking to escape the nightmare, Mikhyal struggled to wake, only to find the thing had followed him.
With a sob, he fled back into the icy darkness.
“Mikhyal? Prince Mikhyal, can you open your eyes?”
The voice wasn’t at all familiar, and with vague memories of a battle flashing through his mind, Mikhyal’s first instinct was to feign sleep.
“It’s all right,” the voice soothed. “You’re safe. You’ve been brought to Altan for healing. I’m Ambris, and you’ve been in my care ever since you arrived.”
Mikhyal forced his eyes open to find himself staring into a pair of kind, pale gold eyes set into a thin face framed by short, golden-blond hair.
Blood-drenched images of the ambush filled his mind: armed men charging across the clearing, more emerging from the trees; his father, sword in hand, mouth set in a grim li
ne as he fought to protect his queen and his men.
“My… my father…” Mikhyal struggled to sit, but a firm hand on his shoulder pushed him back down.
“Your father is quite safe,” Ambris said matter-of-factly. “As is your mother. You saved their lives. Saved all of them.”
“Where…” He glanced around, taking in the unfamiliar furnishings. “Where am I?”
“You’re at Dragonwatch, a little way up the mountain from Castle Altan. You’ve been suffering from mythe-shock, but I think you’re going to be all right now.”
“Mythe-shock? But…” Mikhyal blinked at Ambris, trying to understand what could have happened to bring him here. He remembered the ambush and being certain he was about to die… then Rhu had been there, and after that, the fog. When it lifted, a dragon-like creature with gleaming black eyes and teeth like little glass needles had been staring at him…
But no… that part couldn’t have been real. In his illness, his mind had woven nightmares from threads of memory drenched in the lurid shades of fever dreams.
“Try to relax,” Ambris said. “Wytch Master Ilya will be here later, and he will explain everything. For now, it’s enough for you to know that you and your family are safe. Your father will be arriving in a few days.”
But Mikhyal couldn’t relax. Not until he knew how much of the nightmare was real. “You said I saved them… but… how? We were attacked on the road… there were far too many…”
“Ah. Well. It appears that your Wytch power may have awakened. That is why you were brought here to Dragonwatch instead of taken home to Rhiva.”
“Wytch power? But… I don’t… I don’t have any Wytch power…”
“Master Ilya can explain it far better than I can. He will come and see you later.”
“But I need to know what happened,” Mikhyal insisted. “The guardsmen who escorted us… how many dead? How many injured?”
“There were no deaths,” Ambris said. “Not among your folk, at least. The worst of the injuries were seen to by Ilya and one of his assistants.”
Ambris took a wooden cup from the bedside table and held it out to Mikhyal. “Drink this.” He used the same tone of voice Rhiva’s healers did, full of confidence that in the sickroom, at least, he was in charge, regardless of his patient’s social standing.
The bone-deep cold still lingered, and Mikhyal shivered as he hauled himself up to sitting and accepted the cup. The liquid inside was thick and had a floral scent. “What is this?”
“Anzaria,” Ambris said as he settled a dark blue knitted blanket over Mikhyal’s shoulders.
“Anzaria?” He couldn’t imagine why Ambris thought he needed that. Anzaria was used to shut down a Wytch’s access to the mythe. But Mikhyal couldn’t touch the mythe; if he could, he’d be the heir, not Shaine.
“Ilya thought it safer to keep you drugged until he’s had a chance to examine you properly and decide what to do with you. There are some… ah… uncertainties as to what, exactly, your condition is.”
Ambris was clearly not going to explain. Mikhyal raised the cup to his lips and drank down the contents. It was warm and sweet, and tasted much like it smelled, like wildflowers and honey. He handed the empty cup back to Ambris and settled back against the pillows. Something knocked against his leg as he shifted position, and he looked down to see a sheathed longsword lying next to him. It looked vaguely familiar.
“Why is this here?” he asked.
“That is one of the uncertainties,” Ambris said. “Master Ilya will explain—”
“Later, I know.” Mikhyal sighed and resigned himself to waiting. “Well, if you cannot tell me what’s happened to me, perhaps you can tell me what happened to my men. How is it that healers from Altan saw to their injuries when the ambush occurred within the borders of Rhiva?”
“You have Prince Jaire to thank for that,” Ambris said, sinking down in the armchair next to the bed.
“Prince Jaire? How?”
“He sensed something stirring in the mythe, all the way across Irilan and Miraen to Rhiva. He’s the one who led Master Ilya and Kian to your side. Like Prince Jaire and Master Ilya, Kian is a dragon shifter. The three of them flew out to find the source of the disturbance. What they found was the aftermath of a battle. A few of your men were injured, and you were deep in mythe-shock. They did what they could to aid your party, and then strapped you to Kian’s back and brought you here, so Master Ilya could oversee your recovery.”
“Strapped me to… I came here on dragonback?” Mikhyal searched his mind, but he had no memory of such a thing. Was he truly conscious, or was this, too, part of the nightmare?
As if reading his thoughts, Ambris said quietly, “You were in no state to remember. You were so deeply unconscious, we feared for your life at first.”
“But… but… dragons? I thought Wytch Master Ilya and Wytch King Garrik were the only ones.”
“Ah. Well.” Ambris cleared his throat, and his expression became guarded. “That, too, is something to be discussed at another time. After your recovery.”
“But—”
“Your Highness, I’ve probably already said more than I ought, and I’d really rather not have to deal with the Wytch King when he’s in a temper. I fear your questions will have to wait. You are still recovering, and rest is more important than anything else at the moment.”
The determined set to Ambris’s jaw told Mikhyal further argument would be futile. “And you are the healer.”
“Exactly so. Mythe-shock is no laughing matter. It very nearly killed you.”
“I shall do my best to follow your orders then, Master Ambris. It wouldn’t do for you to have to give my father an unfavorable report, now, would it?”
“No, it would not.” Ambris’s lips twitched. “I appreciate you saving me the trouble of issuing the threat myself.”
“What do your orders say about how long I must lie abed?”
Ambris considered that for a moment. “You may get up tomorrow, I think. But only for a short time, and only if you can manage to eat something today.”
“That sounds more than fair. Since I appear to be at your mercy, I shall endeavor to do my best to please you.”
“If only all my patients were so accommodating.” Ambris smiled as he got to his feet. “I’ll go and speak with Mistress Alys about putting together a tray for you. Soup to start with, but if you’re feeling up to it, you can try a bit of bread for your dinner tonight.”
Mikhyal’s stomach growled at the thought of food, and Ambris’s smile widened. “Perhaps I’ll send along some bread, after all.”
When Ambris had gone, Mikhyal pulled the blanket tighter about his shoulders and surveyed his surroundings. The room was simply furnished, but comfortable, with stone walls and a polished wooden floor. The weapon rack hanging on the wall opposite his bed held his own sword, which reminded him of the one lying on the bed next to him. Mikhyal lifted it and studied the hilt, trying to think where he’d seen the thing before.
“About time you woke up,” said a male voice that sounded as if it came from both everywhere and nowhere.
Mikhyal’s gaze went first to the closed door, then traveled around the room, seeking the speaker.
“Four days, it’s been,” the voice continued, “with no one to talk to except that half-mad fellow down the hall, and he’s written me off as one of his hallucinations.” The long pause that followed was punctuated by a pained sniff. “Hallucination, indeed.”
A flash of silver near the end of his bed caught his eye. He blinked, and there, curled up in a patch of sunlight near his feet, lay the dragon-like creature of his nightmares. About the size of a small house cat, it wasn’t nearly as big as it had been in his dreams, but Mikhyal’s heart still stuttered, and a wave of cold dread crashed through him. He threw the covers back and scrambled out of bed, still gripping the sword.
“Do calm down, Your Highness.” Unblinking black eyes regarded him with an expression that looked very much like disapp
roval. “And get yourself back into bed before you fall over. Do I look big enough to eat you?”
“Y-you ate at least a d-dozen armed men the other day. I’m n-not sure size has much to d-do with it.”
“Ah. That.” The little dragon sounded almost regretful. “I’d rather hoped you hadn’t seen that. Pity.”
“What…” Mikhyal’s throat went dry. “What do you want?” he whispered.
“I want you to get back into bed. And then I shall answer all the questions the healer would not.”
Mikhyal considered that. If the creature meant him harm, it could easily have killed him while he’d lain here, helpless. Not taking his eyes off of it, he moved cautiously to the bed and slowly got in, still gripping the hilt of the sword tightly.
Once he was settled as far away from the creature as he could get without falling off the bed, the dragon sat up on its haunches and cocked its head, regarding him from gleaming black eyes. “It’s time we were properly introduced. I am called Dirit, and I am bound to protect you and your line, Prince Mikhyal of Rhiva.”
“Me and my line?” Mikhyal’s voice cracked. “You want the heir, then, not me. I’m nobody.” He stared down at his hands. “Nobody important, anyway.”
“You are most important to me,” Dirit said matter-of-factly. “You are my bond-mate.” The dragon’s eyes fixed pointedly on the sword Mikhyal still clutched.
Mikhyal stared down at the blade. “This?” He dropped it down on the bed. “What has the sword to do with anything?”
“It’s very simple, really. I am bonded to the sword, as are you. That makes you my bond-mate.”
“Bonded?” A ripple of unease went through Mikhyal. As a child, he’d heard fantastic tales of swords that could form bonds with men, but he’d never seen anything to make him think those stories could have any basis in fact. “Are you telling me this is one of those mythe-blades?”
The little dragon’s tiny forked tongue flicked out for just a moment. “Is that some sort of trick question?”
“But I… I thought… but those are just stories, aren’t they? I mean, I just… I picked this up on the battlefield after I lost my own. It belonged to one of the bandits. Wouldn’t you have been bonded to him?”