The Flames of Dragons

by Josh VanBrakle

  Minawë thought for a moment. Then her expression brightened. “What about Serona?”

  “Serona?” Iren asked. “It’s torn apart.”

  “Don’t you remember? Mother mentioned it before she fought Melwar. She said she’d been there and stopped the fires. The land will grow again. The Maantecs can move there. If they want to return to Shikari, they can use the western ocean. That’s how they traveled in ancient times.”

  Iren put a hand to his chin. It could work.

  From across the field came the sound of sniffling. Iren hadn’t realized Daichi was within earshot. “Daichi, are you all right?” he asked.

  The samurai turned around. He was choked up, but even at this distance Iren could see the man’s wishful smile. “Serona,” Daichi said. “I’ve dreamed about it for so long. Is it really possible we could return?”

  Iren nodded. “It is,” he said, “and as the Maantec emperor, I’d be happy to lead you there.”

  EPILOGUE

  Twelve years later

  “My liege, this is not the sort of establishment a king should enter.”

  King Dirio Cyneric of Lodia had to agree with his bodyguard. The building before him was a dismal heap. Even calling it a building was a compliment. It only had walls up to about four feet. Above that they changed to an open reed mesh and a straw roof.

  Ostensibly the mesh’s purpose was so patrons could smell the salty tang of the bay not twenty feet from the restaurant. In reality, Dirio suspected it was so the stench of sweat and alcohol inside could blow away in the sea breeze.

  On any other day Dirio would have avoided the restaurant even at noontime, let alone late in the evening like it was now. Today though, he had no choice but to come here. Rumor had it this was the place where the man Dirio needed to find was most likely to be.

  Dirio grasped the rusty handle and pulled open the door. He coughed the moment he did. He’d been wrong. The mesh’s purpose clearly wasn’t to get rid of the smell.

  Suppressing the urge to gag, Dirio entered the restaurant. The place was body-to-body. Dirio’s two guards took up positions in front of and behind him. Even with their armor and swords, they had a hard time pushing through the throng.

  There was one exception to the press of humanity. In the back corner sat a family of three, and everyone in the building gave them a wide berth.

  It wasn’t the family itself that caused the other patrons to avoid them. It was the man standing, arms crossed, in front of their table. He wore armor of layered steel, and on his back he carried a seven-foot sword. Its pommel was an inch away from the ceiling; the man must have needed to duck to fit through the doorway.

  Dirio’s guards walked up to the man, and as they did the man’s left hand reached up and rubbed his shoulder. It wasn’t an aggressive move, but it was still an obvious signal. The man could draw that massive sword whenever he wanted, and nothing would get in his way if he did.

  Fortunately, that wouldn’t be necessary. “Good evening,” Dirio said. “I’d like to speak with your lord, if you please.”

  From behind the armored swordsman came the sound of hammers bashing on the table. Wham! Wham! Crack!

  The hammers stopped. A girl’s head popped out around the swordsman’s waist. She looked about eight. Her hair was dark brown and uncombed, and her emerald eyes were wide with curiosity. “Who is it, Mr. Daichi?”

  Was it Dirio’s imagination, or did the intimidating warrior smile just a hair? “Some guests, Princess,” the man said. “Exalted Emperor, I’m sorry to interrupt—”

  “You follow everything I say to the letter, Daichi, except that,” a male voice said from behind the bodyguard. “You don’t need to call me that, especially in public.”

  Dirio laughed. “If you wanted to travel incognito, Iren, you should have chosen a subtler guard.”

  “Address his—”

  “It’s all right,” the voice behind the bodyguard interrupted. “This man’s a friend and an equal. Let him by. There’s plenty of room, and there are more than enough crabs.”

  Daichi stepped aside, and Dirio at last saw the object of his search. Emperor Iren Saitosan and Queen Minawë sat at a corner booth with a steamer bucket of crabs between them. The detritus of a dozen of the crustraceans lay strewn about. Bits of shell speckled both rulers.

  Dirio slid in next to Minawë and across from Iren. “I’m glad I tracked you down,” Dirio said.

  Iren passed a wooden mallet across the table to Dirio. “Dig in,” he said. “This is the best place in Ceere. It was legendary even before I left Haldessa.”

  Dirio looked from the hammer to Iren. “I’m not hungry.”

  “You don’t eat crabs to get full,” Iren replied. “You eat them for the experience. That’s why you come to a place like this.” He paused, and a wry smile blossomed on his lips. “More important, they keep Kaede busy. If her hands are tearing up crabs, then they aren’t getting her into trouble.”

  The Lodian king eyed the eight-year-old girl sitting next to Iren. She didn’t have a mallet, but that wasn’t stopping her. She pulled apart her crab with reckless abandon, and she was even more shell-covered than her parents. Dirio spied several pieces wedged in her hair.

  “She reminds me of her grandmother,” Dirio laughed. “I’m surprised you didn’t name her Rondel.”

  Iren shrugged. “I wanted to, but Minawë liked Kaede better. It suits her. In Maantec, it means ‘maple.’”

  “Something about it sounded right,” Minawë said.

  “In any case, giving her the name of the Maantecs’ greatest traitor would have made for a rough life,” Iren added. “We had to bury Rondel in the Kodamas’ graveyard just so we wouldn’t have to worry about Maantecs desecrating it.”

  “Something tells me she’d be happier there anyway,” Dirio said.

  Minawë nodded. “I like to think so.”

  Iren, Minawë, and Kaede started on another round of crabs, and for a while they ate in silence. Dirio watched them, a lump forming in his throat. He knew what he needed to say. These were his friends. He could tell them anything. Why was he hesitating?

  Maybe he could ease his way into it. “This is the first time you’ve returned to Lodia since you defeated Melwar,” he said. “I wish I could have seen you sooner.”

  Iren sucked the meat out of a claw. “Well, there’s a lot to do. Serona might not be bursting with flames anymore, but nothing’s grown there for a thousand years. Just getting the basics going has taken most of my time. There’s also the matter of Shikari. The people there didn’t see my Dragoon transformation, so they weren’t as keen to accept me as Maantec emperor.”

  “I take it that means you still can’t use magic.”

  “Nope. Neither can Minawë. Apart from Shikari it hasn’t been an issue. Down there though, it took Daichi and three thousand soldiers to restore order.”

  “It came in handy that the Sky Dragon Sword accepted him,” Minawë put in.

  “When he helped me after the battle with Melwar, I had a feeling Ariok would take a liking to him,” Iren said. “He’s been a fine choice to put in charge of Shikari.”

  Dirio looked at the bodyguard. The back of the man’s neck was red, though with pride or embarrassment Dirio couldn’t be sure.

  “Is he the only Dragon Knight left?” Dirio asked Iren.

  “The only one who can use magic. The Liryometa’s hidden for now. To be honest, I hope it can stay that way.”

  “That sounds like a poor choice,” Dirio said. “Considering how powerful Rondel was, a Storm Dragon Knight would have been a big help in retaking Shikari.”

  Iren shook his head. “I’ve spent enough time with Divinion to change how I see the dragons. They aren’t weapons. They’re living, thinking creatures like us. This will sound strange, but after we quelled the unrest in Shikari, I spent some time in Melwar’s archives. The ancient Maantecs had far more knowledge than I ever imagined. I thought I might discover a way to free the dragons.”

 
Dirio rocked back in the booth. “After the destruction Feng and Shadeen caused? Are you crazy?”

  “I don’t want to free their magic, just them. Divinion often cast aside his power and adopted the form of an old man when I talked to him. I can still talk to him when I meditate, and Minawë can do the same with Dendryl. They think it might be possible.”

  “What else are you learning from Melwar’s archives?” Dirio asked. “Are you seeking another way to regain your magic?”

  Iren blushed. “I looked for information about that a little, but in truth I don’t really care about it anymore. We have bigger challenges. Chief among them is Melwar’s curse on the Kodamas. I cured Minawë of it, so I’m sure there’s a way to reverse it for the rest of her people too.”

  “We’re getting close on that one,” Minawë said with a grin. “A few more years, and you’ll have Kodamas as well as Maantecs visiting you on trade missions.”

  Dirio returned the queen’s expression. “I look forward to it. So is that why you’ve returned to Lodia? For a trade mission?”

  “That’s right,” Iren said. “I was thinking about how before Amroth, the previous Lodian kings maintained peace in the country through trade. The Maantecs have a lot to answer for, and we won’t heal the rifts between Maantecs, Kodamas, and humans any time soon. If we’re lucky, it will be the work of decades. More likely it will take centuries, and I’m sure there will be some among each race who will fight the change. Even so, I think trade between our peoples is the first step to overcoming that resistance. Minawë and I have come up with an agreement that will govern trade between Maantecs and Kodamas. Now I want to go further. It’s my hope that people in Shikari will soon be able to bring their goods up Raa’s west coast and trade with Serona, Ziorsecth, and Lodia without braving the eastern ocean’s storms.” He gestured to his bodyguard. “When I told Daichi my plan, he asked to come along when we visited Lodia. I could hardly refuse.”

  “You’re like your father in one way at least,” Dirio said. “You’re ambitious. But if you wanted to set up relations with Lodia, why did you come to this dive? Why didn’t you come to Haldessa to see me?”

  “We were going to,” Minawë said, looking askance at her husband. “Iren insisted we come here first.”

  “For the food,” Kaede interjected as she slurped down a piece of fin meat.

  Iren gave his daughter a loving smile. “All right, the food was part of it. But what really motivated me was that I wanted to see what condition Ceere was in. Amroth used it as a staging area for his army, and Melwar’s forces made landfall here. Between the two, I feared it might not have recovered. Now that I’m here, I see my fear was misplaced. This place looks better than it did when I lived in Haldessa.”

  “You can thank Elyssa for that,” Dirio said. “When Shadeen destroyed Kataile, the citizens decided to move here instead. They and the Ceere survivors kept Elyssa as mayor, and it was the best decision they could have made. She’s a better administrator than I could ever be.”

  “It’s good that so many of her people came to Tropos to attend Balear’s funeral,” Iren put in. “It saved them all.”

  “Still, for Kataile to be so destroyed they couldn’t even rebuild, it’s terrible,” Minawë said. “Did anything escape Shadeen’s blast?”

  Dirio nodded. “Actually, that’s part of the reason I came to find you. I have something for you, Iren.” He motioned for one of his bodyguards to approach. From the guard’s pack, Dirio withdrew a scroll. He put out his hand to give it to Iren, but when the emperor reached for it, Dirio pulled it back.

  “Clean up first,” Dirio said.

  Iren’s brow furrowed. “What? Oh, right.” He wiped his hands on a napkin and showed them to Dirio. “Good enough?”

  “I swear, emperor or not, you’re still the same.”

  “I tell him that at every opportunity,” Minawë said with a wink.

  Iren reddened. He pulled the scroll from Dirio’s hand and buried himself in it. “So what is this?” he asked.

  “Elyssa gave me that at Balear’s funeral. She’d meant to give it to him, but, well, other circumstances interfered. It’s a letter Balio wrote after he abandoned Tropos. It was for his son. Balio was illiterate, so he asked Elyssa to record what he said. When I read it, I knew I should give it to you.”

  Iren’s eyes reached the bottom of the scroll. His head whipped up. “Is this for real?”

  “Elyssa penned it herself. I have no reason to doubt it.”

  Minawë raised her green eyebrows. “What’s it say?”

  Iren handed her the scroll. “I never would have guessed,” she said when she finished reading, “but now that I’ve seen this, it makes sense. You two were so alike.”

  “Are you joking?” Iren asked. “We couldn’t have been more different. That guy was a troublemaker.”

  “Point proved,” Minawë laughed.

  Iren’s ears reddened again. Dirio joined Minawë in her laughter.

  “So Balear and I were cousins?” Iren asked when the fit subsided.

  “Balio’s sister was your mother, Carita. After she was murdered, Balio couldn’t forgive the town that had abandoned her. Carita’s death broke him, but even in despair, he never forgot his son.”

  Iren stared at the scroll in Minawë’s hands. The crabs sat in the steamer pot, forgotten.

  “There’s something else,” Dirio said. “If it were just that scroll, I might have waited, but there’s a bigger issue that demanded I speak with you. Had you not been in Lodia, I would have risked a journey to Serona to find you.”

  That peaked Iren’s interest. He sat back in the booth and folded his arms. “What could be that important?”

  Dirio swallowed hard. “Just as Elyssa has spent the past twelve years rebuilding Ceere, I’ve been doing the same to Haldessa. Six months ago a team of workers found a vault in the castle. It had been buried in rubble since Amroth destroyed the place. When the men opened the vault, they found a hoard of old documents.”

  “How come they weren’t destroyed by Amroth’s flames?” Iren asked.

  “The vault was protected by a long corridor of stone. Like your room in the Tower of Divinion, it avoided the fires. If King Azuluu had been in that vault when Amroth attacked, he likely would have survived.”

  “But what’s so important for us about these documents?” Minawë asked. “Do they date back to the Kodama-Maantec War or something?”

  Dirio shook his head. “Nothing like that. There are a few older pieces, but for the most part the vault was a legal repository. It stored proclamations set down by the kings. I wanted to know more about how my predecessors governed, so I’ve been reading them. Most are legal nonsense. A few weeks ago, though, I came across one that could change Lodia forever. If it’s released to the public, it would throw us back into civil war.”

  Minawë’s eyes widened. “What do you mean?” she asked. “How can a document do that?”

  “Because it proves Amroth Angustion never should have been king of Lodia.”

  “No arguments there,” Iren replied.

  Dirio shook his head. “That isn’t what I mean. I mean he had no legal right to take the throne.”

  “When the king dies, his first legitimate son replaces him,” Iren said. “If there’s no legitimate son, his chief advisor becomes king. That’s how succession works. Amroth was Azuluu’s chief advisor. What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal is that Azuluu had a legitimate son.”

  Iren scoffed. “You’re from Veliaf, so I understand if you aren’t familiar with Azuluu’s reputation. I lived in Haldessa while he was in charge. That guy had plenty of children, but none of them were legitimate. If he’d sired one, we all would have known it.”

  “That’s the trouble,” Dirio said. “He didn’t sire one. He adopted one.”

  The color drained from Iren’s face. “Wait a minute. Are you telling me . . .”

  Dirio motioned to his bodyguard again. The man retrieved a folded
parchment from his pack and handed it to Dirio. “Only my advisors and I have seen this,” Dirio said. He held out the document to Iren. “You’ll understand why when you read it.”

  Iren’s hands trembled as he took the parchment. “This is . . .”

  “Your adoption certificate,” Dirio finished. “When Amroth brought you to Haldessa as an infant, he convinced King Azuluu to adopt you as his son. That way Amroth could keep an eye on you without being directly involved with you.”

  “Azuluu was no father to me,” Iren spat. “He hated me. He made me live in the Tower of Divinion. He couldn’t say my name. He even ordered my execution.”

  “How he treated you is irrelevant. The point is that after he discovered you were a Left, he never officially disowned you. When he died, you were technically still his legitimate son.”

  Iren put his hand to his head. “Which means that when Amroth took over the throne, he had no authority to do it. I was first in line.”

  “Moreover,” Dirio added, “it means that when Amroth died, the mayors had no authority to form a council according to the Succession Law. You were alive, and therefore the one who should have become king.”

  Dirio fell silent to let his words sink in. He had ruled Lodia for over a decade, but that didn’t mean anything. There were still parts of the country, especially Orcsthia, that resented his rise to power. They had never forgiven eastern Lodia for what had happened to their army at Kataile. If word got out that Dirio didn’t have authority to rule, it would mean insurrection. The rebels wouldn’t necessarily want Iren Saitosan in charge, but they would use him as a banner cry in their war efforts.

  “Is this why you were so intent on finding me?” Iren whispered. “Because you wanted me to become king of Lodia?”

  “It’s your right as Azuluu’s son,” Dirio said. “More important, it’s the only way to preserve peace in this country.”

  Iren pulled in a long breath. He held it a moment, then exhaled. He stared at the parchment in his hands.

  “I know this is sudden,” Dirio said, “but think of the possibilities. You’re the Maantec emperor. You’re married to the Kodaman queen.” He inclined his head at Minawë, who had her eyes locked on her husband. “If you become king of Lodia, the pair of you will have united the northern lands. We’ll have peace between humans, Kodamas, and Maantecs. Our empire will reach from one ocean to the next.”