The Dragonprince's Heir

by Aaron Pogue

  I prayed my father's thoughts were not so dark, but he was muttering names I did not know. "Jemminor and Sherrim. Kyle, Bron, and Cooper." Tears stained his worn face. I looked away.

  "Sachaerrich," he said softly, speaking to me now. "It was the jewel of Terrailles. I'd heard the Isle was protected."

  "Well. The wizards kept the City safe. Perhaps your friends went there."

  "Would Timmon have even let them in? He made Terrailles his country home, and then he let it burn."

  I winced at the animal rage that shaded his voice. "He didn't have your powers—"

  "No? Hah. He was the king! He had regiments and wizards to command, and do you know what he did with them? He brought them to the Tower. He sat in useless siege outside my walls while his subjects died in dragon fire."

  "It's done," I said, soothing. "It's done, and the dragons are all dead."

  He laughed again. "Asleep, perhaps. We killed them by the thousands, and we put them to retreat, but there are still enough of them to scour the world."

  "Even so, that war is over now. All we need is Mother's freedom. We can go home and let the world recover from the past. Let other men fight dragons for a time."

  I watched his eyes and saw the fury fade. At last he nodded. "You're a fine young man." He squeezed my hand. "Let's find Isabelle and Caleb and go home."

  He closed his eyes and breathed. Concentration creased his brow, and after a moment he nodded. "Seven leagues at a step," he breathed. Darkness swallowed me again, but on the edge of thought just as the wash of motion hit me, I heard his curse.

  And instead of easy motion, we seemed to slam against a wall. The darkness ripped away around us, and as soon as light returned my father let go my hand.

  "What's happening?" I cried.

  He shouted, "Still enough of them to scour the world! And this one found me traveling." Before I could ask what it meant, he snapped his head around, staring into the night's darkness. Then he hit me, open palm slamming hard against my shoulder so I stumbled half a pace before I tripped and fell. His bare feet slapped against the cobblestones as he ran the other way. I heard four paces, five, and I was staring after him when fire rolled across the ground where we had been.

  So bright it hurt my eyes, the line of fire scythed away in a living stream, chasing Father's footsteps. It should not have baffled me, not after all the years of training, but the dragons were gone. The dragons were gone. For four full heartbeats I sat there frozen, staring, and then the flame winked out.

  Purple afterimage seared my eyes, but in the sudden silence, understanding dawned. There was a dragon here! Somewhere between Sachaerrich and the capitol. And though I'd never faced one in the open, though Mother had never sent me on patrol, still my training was the same as everyone else's. We would not suffer a dragon to live. Not one. The sword was in my hand, and the beast was on the ground. I never even stopped to think. I charged.

  Somewhere, Father shouted, "Taryn, no!"

  At the same time, a voice like crackling coals exploded in my mind. Is this the Dragonprince? At last we meet. I am the new lord of Terrailles.

  My father's voice came in answer, also in my mind. "You? You're just a whelp. I took Pazyarev in my hand."

  A fossil too long buried in the ground. There is more to power than age and gold.

  While Father held the beast's attention, I'd regained my sight, and now I crept toward the crouching dragon. It was the tired, dusty green of summer leaves and forty hands at its shoulder. Not quite an Elder, then, but an adult kill to be prized. I licked my lips, readied my sword, and leaped.

  I caught the base of the dragon's wing in my left hand. The scales were harder than I'd imagined, smooth and sharp as iron plates, and the ridged edges nearly tore open my palm. Still, I held on. My momentum slammed me hard against the dragon's ribs, then I kicked away and twisted against my painful grip. I raised the sword, and on the counterswing I drove it home.

  With all my weight behind it, in the softer scales beneath the wing, the point found purchase. It split the scale. It slipped between two ribs and halfway to the hilt.

  The dragon screamed, its bellow striking like a physical blow, but I ignored it. The monster's counterstrike was coming—probably the tail—but I was ready. I'd imagined this a thousand times. I switched my grip, both hands around the blond sword's hilt, then raised my feet against the dragon's side to kick away.

  It didn't work. The sword slipped, its sharp edge carving flesh and scales so I slipped half a pace before my feet were set. Then thick black blood like boiled tar washed along the blade and down my arms. I kicked but barely caught the creature's belly before the sword pulled free.

  I tumbled head-first toward the hard ground. And then the tail struck, picking me out of the air. I sensed it coming and tried to twist away, so the armored point missed me, but the tail's weight hit me hard enough to crack my ribs. It flung me twenty paces through the air. I landed hard and rolled, too shocked to feel the pain. I'd lost track of my position, but years of practice sparked an instinct, and I swung the sword just as the tail stabbed again.

  Mine was a wild slash, but it connected. The sword's hilt jerked in my grasp as the sharp edge tore flesh. The dragon screamed. I grinned in victory. But then the creature pounced more quickly than I could have imagined. It flashed across the distance in an instant and slammed me down beneath a taloned claw.

  It could have speared me, could have killed me with that blow, but it held me like a cat trapping a mouse beneath its paw. I struggled to rise, to push up against the claw, but I might as well have tried to move the Tower.

  I fell back. It didn't matter. Father was still free. The Dragonprince who had slain his thousands. He would save me.

  But then, he had not yet attacked. Not that I could see. I thought perhaps I'd misjudged his intent before. Perhaps I'd gotten it backward. He hadn't meant to distract the beast for my killing blow; he'd wanted me to distract it for his. In that, at least, I was succeeding.

  The dragon leaned down over me and growled within my mind, Who is this you've brought me? He tastes strange.

  "If you would speak of me, speak to me!" I shouted, trying to hold the creature's attention. "I am the one who's spilled your blood."

  And how did you do that? You are not one of his little broodlords. You are not even a drake. What are you, little human?

  "I am the Dragonprince's heir!" I shouted back. "I was raised within the walls of his stronghold. I cut my teeth on the fangs of your brothers. Their captured hoards became my toys."

  Hot, acrid breath washed over me in two sharp puffs, and I realized the monster was laughing at me. Where are you, Dragonprince? I want you to be here when I devour this squealing hatchling.

  "You really do not know?" I asked. "You do not know his power? He's killed your kind in their thousands. When he's done it will be but chance if anything is left of you at all."

  The dragon's laughter crashed inside my head with painful scorn. His broodlings are asleep or dead, his drakes within a lair too far to give him any comfort. He's nothing but a body here, hidden from the moon, and will I fear him while I have you at my mercy?

  I almost answered back with loud contempt, but I hesitated. Why hadn't my father attacked? Could he really be afraid to face a lone dragon? Caleb had once explained the five measures of a dragon's power, and I'd heard rumors that Father's bond had made him like them. The Tower was his lair, the residents his brood, the treasure in its vaults his stolen hoard.

  A groan escaped my lips. He'd told me, hadn't he? In the shepherd's cellar. He had no powers. The thing that had thrown the fiery spear in the garden wasn't him. The thing that had hurled us across a thousand miles had been...a monster. It had been the madness in control.

  I groaned again, and the dragon laughed into the night. What had I done? There was no clever plan at all. My father had truly meant me to stay down. This man who'd killed the dragons in their thousands, who'd felled Pazyarev's brood at one dark stroke...he needed
everything he could muster now just to kill this one.

  He could have killed it anyway. I had no doubt. With a rusty knife and a wisp of power, Father could have killed a single dragon. But not while I was pinned beneath its claw. He couldn't kill it and protect me. I tried to conceal the dreadful understanding, but it hit me all at once, and the dragon roared its victory.

  Then the beast struck. I had expected the carving talons, the flashing teeth, perhaps even a blast of searing fire, but the dragon only pressed. It might have been difficult to even see the motion, but the mighty claw above me shoved down against my breastbone until it creaked. The weight was like an anvil on my chest. Like a landslide. Like a mountain pressing down.

  My ribs felt close to shattering. My gut burned cold. The pain rolled out in waves—ever sharper, hotter, faster as the pressure kept increasing—and finally I could not stop my tongue. I screamed. I screamed with all the air left in my aching lungs.

  And Father answered. "No!"

  He stepped out of the night, almost above me. The little flames he'd worn like a coronet were gone, and he was still unarmed. Still barefoot. Still meek.

  I felt a pang of desperate hope. Despite what I had guessed, I watched for the killing strike. I waited for the Dragonprince's show of power. But then he glanced at me, and there was no power in his eyes. No dark anticipation. No confidence at all. Only fear—deep-down, gut wrenching, spineless fear. For me.

  And in his eyes I saw the terrible agony of knowing—knowing—how easily he could destroy this creature. He would have to do it, for my sake. And it would cost him the sanity he'd only just regained. Had it been for something like this that he'd surrendered once before?

  I promised myself I would not cry out again. I would give him time to find some other plan, or at least to find his inner strength.

  Hissing its grim malice, the dragon pressed anew.

  I grunted before I could clench my jaw. My hands made fists and my eyes rolled back at the crushing pain, but I held strong.

  Then, never relenting, the dragon curled its talons toward my shoulders. I didn't move, I didn't speak, but Father cried, "No! Leave him."

  The dragon lifted up its other claw. Would you take his place?

  "Don't." I had to force the word. "He'll kill us both!"

  My father turned to me with desperate pleading in his eyes. He had no plan at all. "You are my son."

  The dragon chuckled. Oh, precious.

  Father met its eyes. "If you will let him go."

  I swear by all the blood of all my brothers. I swear by Chaos night and silver moon. Lie down, and he shall be well.

  I tried to object again, but the dragon pressed all air out of my lungs. Still I shook my head, but Father met my gaze with tears in his eyes. I tried to mouth the words, to ask him what advice might Caleb give? This was the enemy. This was the very Chaos we despised. No compromise. No understandings. Someone might die—we all might die—but this was our war.

  The words rang clear as crystal in my head, and I tried to will them to him, to say them with my eyes. Perhaps he caught some edge of it, because I saw him blink. I saw him back away a pace and set his shoulders.

  The dragon saw it, too, and sighed inside my mind. Very well, we'll have a little fun.

  Then it squeezed, and sharp-edged talons cut through to my collarbone. I found one breath that blazed like fire, and despite all my resolve, I screamed. I screamed with every muscle in my body at the pain—so much pain—and after half a heartbeat, with regret at what I'd done.

  I couldn't see my father anymore. That was some mercy. But pinned on my back and staring up at the sky, I saw what happened. He exploded in a crimson conflagration. Flames like a living bonfire flared into a tower twenty paces tall.

  An instant later, the earth roiled beneath me and stabbed up around me, a dozen rocky spires bursting from the ground to pry the mighty claw open. The dragon cried its own pain as the spires pierced its flesh, then it pulled away and set me free.

  I tried to scramble up, to go to Father's aid, but the rocky spires bent like vines and folded into a solid shell above me. Moments later, fire roared around the edges as the dragon tried to scorch me where I stood. The stone shield held, though popped and cracked beneath the heat.

  There were still gaps around the edges, between the bases of the spires. Barely wider than my palm and not as tall, it was still room enough for me to see the fight. The night was bright as day beneath the bonfire pillar, and as I squinted toward the fire, my father's shape resolved into a shadow silhouette. He stepped out from the heart of the blaze like he was on a country stroll.

  The dragon roared ten paces away and turned to run. The huge wings slammed their thunder at the ground, and it gained some height. I thought perhaps it would escape.

  Then Father spoke within my mind, his voice too like the dragon's. "You dare to hurt my child?"

  My eyes were on the fleeing beast, and I saw something like a stone rise up beneath it, half a pace above the ground. Then it shot upward like a crossbow bolt with a crack like summer lighting.

  The dragon screamed and fell out of the sky.

  I shouted, "Father, here! Let me out."

  He met my eyes between the gaps of stone, and whatever reigned behind his eyes made him show his teeth. The shadows poured toward him as they'd done at Gath.

  "Father, please!" I cried, but he only turned away.

  Another ball of stone rose up to hover just beneath his hand. He flicked it like a feather, and it was gone. Another crack of thunder and another scream from the dragon.

  "You dare to strike at what is mine?" Father raged.

  Another shot, and this one only drew a whimper from the beast. The dragon tried to run again but couldn't even gain its feet.

  "You dare?"

  The dragon flopped pathetically on the ground, keening like a cyclone, and Father struck at it again and again and again.

  The dragon took a long time to die.

  16. Walls of Light and Stone

  Outside my earthen cage, one vicious monster tore apart another. Perhaps I cried. Perhaps I groaned in grief as much as pain. One thought kept ringing over and over in my mind.

  This is not my father. This is not my father! Something else is in control. It isn't him. Every time the dying dragon whimpered, I squeezed my eyes and whispered, "It's not him."

  But there was little comfort in the thought. It had been my father. I'd had him back. After a lifetime without him, I'd had him back. And now he was gone again.

  No. Worse than gone. Now he was a monster. I'd watched his self-control go up in flames. I'd cried, and that had been the spark that lit the fire.

  He had protected me. He'd sacrificed himself to save my life, no less than if he'd lain down beneath the dragon's claw. And now he was a wildfire. Now he was ablaze with rage and power.

  And he knew about Mother.

  I remembered what he'd shouted at the dragon. You dare to strike what is mine? Even now the dragon gave a dying wail. How long would that vengeful fury keep King Timmon alive to suffer? How much of Father's humanity would survive it? I remembered Laelia's warning. I remembered Father's bleak intent for the weapon he had made me. It had a job to do.

  The sword had fallen from my hand when the dragon's claw first hit me. Now I scrabbled in the dark, praying it was trapped with me in this little cage, and breathed a sigh of thanks when my questing fingers found its hilt.

  As I had expected, the strange blond blade cut through the woven stone like it was paper. I carved a gap that I could wriggle through and climbed out into the night. The fire still raged above me, a huge tower of curling, hungry flames, dense as stone and dark as blood. It hissed and roared and screamed, and it cast a mad dance of light and shadow across the plains.

  There was no wild grassfire, because this pillar burned too hot. Everything within a pace of it was seared to a black glaze, consumed within an instant. The scar it left would be a perfect circle...like the one he'd left at Gath. I s
wallowed hard and turned toward the dragon's corpse.

  Father stood not a pace away from me. The pillar's fire reflected in his manic eyes.

  He smiled at me. "We have another lord to kill."

  I shook my head. "You've killed enough for now. Let's find somewhere to rest."

  "The night does not need rest."

  I sighed. "But I do, Father. I nearly died tonight. Please, take me home."

  "There is no home while tyrants reign. That's the one thing I never understood. What good to kill a thousand dragons if a man can still abduct a righteous woman from her home."

  "She chose to go—" I tried to say, but he shook his head and cut me off.

  "You are not a murderer," I cried. "I don't care what power you had to use, you are still a hero! You are a good man. And I need you." I had to gasp for breath. "I need you! Please, just take me home."

  For a long time, he stared into my eyes. I held his gaze and prayed, searching for some spark of humanity. I only saw the fire. But then he reached out his arms and smiled kindly.

  "Take my hand, and I will take you home."

  I hesitated, but what was there to do? He nodded his encouragement. I braced myself and took his hand.

  I'd half expected it but still was not prepared for the pain. Something in the borrowed power seared my soul like my father's quiet concentration hadn't done. It burned like liquid iron in my veins, and I felt a mad sense of motion. Then the darkness burst into a blinding flash right in front of me—a wall of snow-white light and heat. The same unstoppable black force drove me against the wall of light, but the light flared brighter, hotter, and yielded not a pace.

  Then the darkness and the light alike were gone, replaced with the ordinary murk of natural night. An inhuman scream filled the air. I swayed and almost lost my feet. On the edge of falling, instinct made me raise a hand to catch myself on the wall before me, where the blazing, painful light had been. I tried to stop myself, tried to recoil, but my fingertips touched cool, rough stone. I blinked.