by Mary Auclair
He stared at her for a long time, then glanced away at the desert through the long window. She waited, knowing she should give him the time to decide for himself. When he looked back at her, hurt and guilt were etched on his face.
“My family was on the wrong side of that war,” Fedryc whispered, as if he was afraid that if he spoke any louder, she might get up and leave. “My great-grandfather swore an allegiance to them. I found the original papers in my father’s office, in a hidden compartment. Maybe that is why Aymond allowed the humans to live like they do in Aalstad. Maybe my own father was one of them.”
There was such loathing in Fedryc’s voice, such self-hatred, that Marielle’s heart broke. She reached for his cheek, carefully touching his hot skin to turn his face to her.
“Your family’s sins are not your own.” She put as much conviction as she felt into her words and saw Fedryc’s frown soften. “And you are not your father. No one can hold his wrongdoing against you.”
“You are wrong.” Fedryc shook his head. “They can, and they will. But most importantly, this means that my father might have been closer to his killer than we thought.”
“Who?” Marielle sat up straighter. She frowned, because she had no idea who could be close enough to kill Lord Aymond.
“That is the big mystery.” Fedryc clicked his lips in a frustrated sound. “Isobel is the only one who was close enough to Aymond and had the money and power to get her hands on Venemum Ardere.”
Marielle let that sink in for a while. Then she inhaled, but couldn’t shake the feeling they were both missing something. “You think Isobel killed Aymond and started a conspiracy to steal the throne of Aalstad from you?”
“I would have said yes if I hadn’t seen her reaction to Asha’s death.” Fedryc shook his head, and Marielle could almost feel the frustration coming out of his skin. “I don’t think it’s her. I don’t think she has the mind of a killer.”
Marielle agreed. Isobel Haal was haughty and condescending, but she wasn’t a killer. “There is no one else.”
Fedryc took Marielle’s hand in his own and turned her palm up, then traced it with his finger. “I know.” He exhaled forcefully. “There is something I’m missing. Something I just don’t understand.”
Marielle nodded. She couldn’t help him, she knew nothing of the Draekon world, of this castle and its inhabitants. “There was someone else. Someone close to Lord Aymond. Maybe Lord Aymond had a lover or someone else he was close to. Another High Lord, perhaps.” She closed her hand around his. “You will find this person, and then you’ll have your killer.”
“I had Henron collect testimony from all the servants, to see if they have something to say. We’re searching every room as well.” Fedryc pursed his lips in a doubtful expression. “I doubt we’ll find anything there. This won’t be easy.”
“Easy was never part of the equation.”
Fedryc looked at her and the corners of his mouth curved up. Some of the sadness and guilt left his eyes as he looked at her.
“You are a fantastic woman.”
He bent down and pressed his mouth on hers. As soon as his skin came in contact with her, Marielle opened her mouth and slid her tongue out. She wanted his taste on her, needed it.
She moved and placed her hands on Fedryc’s chest, then gently pushed him down onto the mattress. Fedryc sat up as she straddled him, his hands on her relentlessly. They drank each other’s presence, got lost in each other’s touch like it could ward off the dangers around. Like it could lessen the hurt they both harbored.
Then Fedryc pushed her gently away. “There is a safety concern I need to take care of.” He shook his head. “It seems Lord Anion hasn’t taken my rejection as well as he should have. The fool thinks he can twist my arm into surrendering Silva to him.”
Marielle snorted with disgust at the mention of the Draekon man. “That one won’t change his mind,” she warned him. “He won’t back down until he has what he thinks belongs to him.”
“If he won’t listen to reason then it’ll have to be a show of force.” Fedryc’s voice was heavy with anger. “The law is clear on this. Until Silva turns twenty-one, it is my privilege to accept or deny a mating claim.”
Marielle watched as Fedryc left, and once she was alone, she clutched her chest.
A feeling of dread descended upon her as the large figure of Nyra flew out over the desert landscape. Fedryc was flying into danger, and she only wished she could help him.
“What did your source tell you?” Fedryc turned from Nyra to look at Henron while the dragoness huffed with impatience. “How many are we talking about?”
“No more than a hundred, but the report wasn’t clear,” Henron answered, his face grim and his neck strained with tension. “They were expelled from Virhot and seek asylum in Aalstad, but the journey through the desert is too long for them. They’ll die if we don’t bring them back.”
“We don’t have a choice then. I’m not leaving a hundred people with women and children to die of exposure in my land.”
“This could be a trap. Lord Anion is stupid enough to try and attack you out in the open.”
“Let him try.” Fedryc stared at his friend, who returned his gaze steadily. They understood each other. Nyra was several times more powerful than Lord Anion’s gray dragon, but with the looming threat of the Knat-Kanassis, they would have to tread carefully. “Nyra will reduce them all to ashes.”
“You shouldn’t fly too far ahead of the transport.” Henron shook his head as he glanced up at Nyra. “The Knat-Kanassis could be behind this. I wouldn’t put it past Lord Anion to be a member of the order.”
Fedryc cursed loudly in Delradon then shot a glance at Nyra, who stood on her hind legs, staring down at Fedryc and Henron with fury in her eyes. The dozen guards Henron had selected to assist with the refugees lifted wary eyes to the red dragoness, tension running in the air as they breathed fast.
They were afraid of her, and that wasn’t a good thing. Not when she was their shield, their best attack, defense and everything in between. If there was even the tiniest chance they would run away from her in a battle, then Fedryc had lost his kingdom before the first blow.
His people needed to trust Nyra just as much as his enemies needed to fear her.
“Settle down,” Fedryc whispered harshly to Nyra, who exposed sharp fangs to him before dropping down on all four legs. “You’re unnerving the troops. They can’t be scared of you. They need to be confident you’ll protect them, not burn them to a crisp.”
Nyra stared at him, her foul temper exuding from her scales like the dust rising from the desert sand. Her sapphire blue eyes were set on him with a sentient distress, and Fedryc understood. The dragoness was as scared as he was. The fate of the entire kingdom rested on the strength she would project to their enemies. The lives of all the dragoness held dear hung in the balance.
“I know,” Fedryc spoke to Nyra again, but softer this time. “I need you to stand by me, like always. But it’s not just you and me now. Marielle needs us both.”
Nyra’s too blue eyes held Fedryc’s until she bristled, a wholly female pride gesture, then the dragoness opened her wings wide, shielding all the men in her shadow, and screeched up to the bright desert sky. The message was as clear as a dragon could convey. She was their protector, their guardian, and they could rely on her savagery to shield them from harm.
His men’s reaction was immediate. They cheered and hooted, holding their swords high above their heads, their faces fierce and confident.
“Thank you.” Fedryc patted Nyra’s broad chest, then climbed atop her neck into the saddle under the constant cheer of his men.
Fedryc lifted his dragon blade above his head. His men fell silent as they looked up at their High Lord with expectant faces.
“Today, we will show those who would bully us that we will stand for Aalstad.”
His men shouted their approval before stepping into the large hover transport that would take them all the
way to the border. Then, when the last one was in the transport, Fedryc took to the sky with Nyra and flew toward the border of his kingdom with Virhot.
Nyra flew fast, and they left the transport far behind as she made her way over the dry wasteland that constituted the northern border of Aalstad.
“Here.” Fedryc spoke to Nyra. “This is it.”
As Nyra made her way down, Fedryc stared at the scene awaiting him. Nyra landed close by, and her silence through the bond said more than any words he could speak. He dismounted and moved slowly at first, then faster as he approached the figures lying on the ground.
In the distance, the humming of the hover transport reached his sensitive hearing but he didn’t turn to see it coming.
So many. The figures lying on the desert sand were so numerous, his mind rebelled against the very idea of such a horror.
Finally Fedryc stood over the dead body of a woman of about thirty, orange eyes already clouding over as she looked straight up at the blazing sun. He blinked as his brain unlocked and he understood what he was seeing.
A massacre. This was a massacre.
At his back, the hover transport landed a good distance from the group of bodies. Fedryc didn’t turn to see them descend from the transport in silence, but the sound of their boots made it clear his men saw what he was seeing, and couldn’t find the strength to speak.
Fedryc walked around the rows of bodies—men, women and children—lined up in a neat order in groups of ten, side by side. Dead; all were dead.
A quick glance told Fedryc that Henron had descended from the transport and was standing by his side in silence.
“Your source, they told you what we’d find here?” Fedryc spoke to Henron but didn’t take his eyes from the rows of bodies. Mixed blood children were flanked by adults either Delradon or human.
“No.” Henron’s voice was low, like he didn’t want to speak louder so close to the dead. “Only that Lord Anion of Virhot had a message for you, and that it would be delivered at the border by people who belonged in Aalstad.”
“This was Lord Anion’s doing?” A darkness bloomed in Fedryc as he walked past another row of victims. Twin girls lay side by side, their faces peaceful and innocent, even in death.
This was an abomination beyond words, beyond what he had previously thought the Lord of Virhot capable of doing.
“It’s the only explanation I can think of.” Henron walked along another row, his face closed off as he inspected the dead but his eyes gleaming with an anger that bordered on fury. “We both misjudged him. He’s more vicious than we thought.”
Fedryc stopped as his eyes latched on to something red on the skin of an old Delradon woman lying next to a teenage boy. He walked up to the old woman, then delicately pulled the fabric from her shoulder, revealing a dark red mark.
“Sordied sangui, mors abomina.” Henron’s face grew slack and white as he locked gazes with Fedryc. “He is Knat-Kanassis, then.”
“And his message to me was clear.” Fedryc shook his head as his anger boiled over and spilled, threatening to wash away his sanity. “Marielle and any heirs I might have will be targeted by the order.” He got back to his feet and looked behind Henron to the dozen guards who stood, slack-faced and shocked at what they saw.
In the distance, a dragon’s roar traveled over the wind and Henron stood up straighter, his face turned to the source of the sound. A cloud passed over his old friend’s eyes and his expression became sharp, like he could hear something else, something Fedryc couldn’t pinpoint. Some longing, perhaps.
I’m so sorry, my friend. This just wasn’t meant to be.
Henron listened as the dragon roared, lost in the distance but still there. His friend’s face was a mask of longing and resolve. This was Henron’s deepest wound and the only thing he could never have. A Draekon without a dragon. A man forever with half a heart.
“Lord Anion’s dragon, perhaps. He’s not as far away as we thought.” Fedryc glanced at Nyra, at her great red form. “Nyra can beat Anion’s gray dragon.”
“No, that isn’t Lord Anion’s gray dragon,” Henron answered, his face still turned to the wind, to that beast in the distance. “That is something else. Don’t you hear it? It’s something the likes of which I’ve never heard before. Something…”
Henron didn’t finish his thought and kept looking into the distance. Fedryc watched his friend, unease growing in his mind.
But he didn’t have time to play games. His Draekarra’s life hung in the balance.
“The dragon is not important.” His harsh tone got Henron to look away from where the dragon’s roar was coming from and gradually, Henron’s eyes lost their strange cloudiness. “What matters is that an entire kingdom is now in the hands of a Knat-Kanassis acolyte, and we have no idea what their strength is, or even if there are more.”
“We can’t avoid it anymore.” Henron nodded, and he was Henron again. “If the Knat-Kanassis have taken an entire kingdom, you know what this means.”
Fedryc nodded. “This means war.” He swallowed as he stared down at the people who had been sacrificed to send him a message. His veins burned with frozen rage. “But to win this war, we need allies. Aalstad can’t stand alone.”
“But who?”
This was the question, wasn’t it? Who would stand with Aalstad against the greatest threat this Earth had ever seen?
Chapter 16
Marielle woke alone again. Fedryc hadn’t spent an entire night with her since Lord Aymond’s Mourning.
She pulled the covers over her body until they were up to her neck, but still the cold crept inside her body, bit by bit. The desert outside was breathtaking but all Marielle could see was Devan’s face as she had last seen it.
Am I ever going to see him again?
It had been a week since Asha had been found dead in her room. Two weeks since Fedryc had found Devan at Ignio Marula’s tavern, only to lose him again. Her eyes went to the Draekar bracelet at her wrist and her throat closed.
Doubt filled her mind and she traced the delicate lines of the flames carved out of Nyra’s scale. Loneliness was eating at her and her worries had long since reached an unbearable level.
All her instincts were screaming at her to run, to go to the capital and dig out Ignio Marula from whatever hole he was hiding in, then leave without looking over her shoulder. But she couldn’t leave.
Not anymore. Not when the thought of leaving was beginning to feel like cutting the oxygen out of the air. Like something that would be a life without life inside it.
Darkness bloomed around the edges of Marielle’s mind as despair took hold of her. She was useless, helpless against enemies so much bigger than herself. She couldn’t even help Fedryc, couldn’t do anything else but wait.
And waiting was making her slowly go crazy.
Marielle got to her feet, leaving the covers behind. The sharp morning air made her skin prickle with goosebumps but she didn’t care. She had to get up, had to do something, anything.
She reached inside the large dresser for another precious dress. Fedryc had ordered a full wardrobe for her, and she had more gowns than she ever thought a woman could need. Her fingers traced over a bright red one, the same color as the Draekar bracelet on her wrist, a shade darker than her hair. She pulled it out and slid it over her body, then looked at herself in the large mirror adorning the back of the wall.
She swallowed as emotions filled her chest. She barely recognized the stranger looking back at her.
Her lips were still red and a tad swollen from Fedryc’s ardent lovemaking the night before, and her eyes glittered with something she was too scared to name, something that had deserted her the moment she became an orphan and the sole provider of her baby brother. The dress she wore set off her pale skin and highlighted the flaming red of her hair. Her cheeks were pink and had lost the hollow, gray tint of starvation that had plagued her life for so long.
She turned away from the mirror and walked into the main livi
ng area, then stopped. On the low table surrounded by pillows was a small, plain wooden box. Marielle approached it slowly, then lifted the light object, studying it for markings. Nothing was written anywhere on its surface, and after hesitating for only a moment, she opened it.
She screamed and the box crashed to the floor, scattering the shock of short red hair inside, and a bloodied chunk of flesh rolled away, shocking and repulsive on the stone floor.
The next second, the door to the apartments opened to make way for a worried-faced Silva.
“Marielle, are you all right?”
Silva walked into the room in a flurry of golden silk but Marielle didn’t look away from the head-full of red hair in the box, and the piece of flesh covered in blood.
“Oh my Gods!” Silva stopped at Marielle’s right, slightly in front of her, and covered her mouth when her eyes fell on the contents of the box. “Guards! Guards!”
“No!” Marielle turned to Silva with a fierce scowl on her face and it surprised the girl enough to silence her. “Don’t call the guards.”
But it was too late. The guards perpetually at her door entered, and Marielle positioned herself in front of the box and its contents, hiding it behind the large panels of her dress. The first guard’s orange eyes scanned the room for signs of danger, his hand resting on the hilt of his short sword.
He was on high alert, as always. Tension was running high among the guards of the household, and this one was no exception.
“Lady Marielle,” the guard finally said as he brought confused eyes to her. “What happened?”
“Nothing. A large spider entered through the window, and I was scared silly.” Marielle did her best to smile like the idiot this guard would surely think she was, and was rewarded with a sigh from the man that was filled with both exasperation and amusement.
“Do you need me to take care of it?”
His eyes scanned the floor, and Marielle quickly answered, “No need. I stepped on it just as Lady Silva called for you.”
With one last suspicious look around the room, the guard finally nodded and left, closing the door behind him.