Dragon Kin: Jae & Fendellen

by Audrey Faye

  Her kin blinked. ::Queens apologize?::

  When they were wrong, which happened often enough. ::We are kin first.::

  Fendellen paused as her own words landed. It felt right to say them, but they were a shocking violation of her most foundational promises. A queen’s obligations came before everything. Before life. Before friends. Before self.

  Royal responsibility—and royal isolation.

  And yet, the star had given her a kin.

  She felt her tail stirring, mirroring the unease inside her.

  Jae reached out a hand, soothing, even in her own discomfort. ::Do you need anything? Food or water?::

  ::No. And if I did, I’m quite capable of fetching it myself.:: Fendellen knew she sounded cranky, but allowing others to serve her had always been one of the sorest points of her destiny.

  An amused snort. ::I know that, but you’re kind of big, and it’s crowded in here, and if you knock something over and wake up the babies, Kis will have both our heads.::

  Fendellen’s eyes closed in bemused shame. Jae hadn’t been trying to serve a dragon queen. She’d been trying to keep the two of them out of trouble.

  A hand settled on her nose, warm and a little shaky. ::I think maybe you don’t want me to treat you differently.::

  Fendellen leaned into the tentative touch. ::An excellent diagnosis, young healer.::

  Two arms, sneaking in to wrap around her neck. ::I can do that. I don’t really know how to treat a queen anyhow. I will just treat you as my friend.::

  One day, that would no longer be possible. One day, the promises running in her blood would need to take precedence. But for now, it suited an apprentice queen just fine. ::I would like that very much.::

  Fendellen closed her eyes and sent a brief and heartfelt apology skyward.

  One she hoped might be overheard by a star.

  Chapter 18

  Jae managed to peel her eyes open, although they felt like they had ended up under a snowbank overnight. The smells were worth it, though. Fresh bread, and warm cider, and the comforting whiff of oatmeal that said some things didn’t change, no matter how far you wandered from home.

  A big nose gently nudged her back and helped her sit up. ::Tired?::

  She shouldn’t be. Healers often went days without true sleep. Jae squinted. She’d gone to sleep by her patient, but she was waking up curled against her dragon. However, Eleret was clearly doing much better this morning, scrambling over to a bowl of milk curds with as much speed as her two nestling friends.

  Irin, who was holding the bowl, looked over at Jae and nodded. A motion of both reassurance and dismissal. She wasn’t needed.

  She exhaled a long, slow sigh of relief. Young ones mended very quickly once they got past the worst of things. Eleret was holding her wing gingerly, but she ate with relish, and anything too terribly painful would be putting her off her food.

  They could apply more salve to her wing later—or let it ache a little, as a reminder of why hatchlings shouldn’t undo window latches and fly out into unfriendly skies.

  Jae was quite sure there would be new latches, and far more hatchling-proof ones, before sundown arrived. She stretched her arms over her head, working out the cricks that came from using a dragon as a pillow. Then she sensed Fendellen’s careful attention behind her.

  Jae turned, smiling at the ice-blue face that was becoming so familiar. ::What troubles you this morning?::

  Her dragon’s belly rumbled loudly.

  All the heads in the rondo turned—and that’s when Jae remembered. The conversation in the night. The one that had made everything make sense, all the strange looks and moments of everyday deference.

  A rondo full of people who would be happy to fetch breakfast for a queen—and weren’t sure if they should.

  That was easily solved. Jae climbed to her feet. “Will you toast some cheese on bread for me?” Trift did that for Alonia, and it was delicious.

  “No.” Kis snorted from the corner. “There are only two dragons with permission to breathe fire in the village, and missy there is not one of them.”

  Jae hid a smile as her dragon offered up an exaggerated sulk. She remembered all of the conversation now, including the part where she’d promised to treat her dragon as a friend, not a queen. Clearly Kis kept a similar kind of promise, although his treatment of Fendellen tended a little more toward fondly annoyed guardian.

  ::She needs that too,:: said a deep voice in her head.

  Jae swallowed as she gathered thick slices of bread and tasty cheese. Old warriors might be better at such steadiness.

  Kellan held out her hands to take the sandwiches. “Fendellen can’t toast them, but Kis might, if we ask him nicely.” She fluttered her eyelashes at the old yellow dragon. “He has the finest aim in all the world.”

  Kis snorted. “You’ve been spending too much time with Alonia, I see.”

  Alonia was what Gran would have called a flirt—but the curvy blonde elf was also kindness personified. Jae held out two more sandwiches toward Kis. “They’re my favorite, and I think there are three littles who could have a bite as well.” She shot a look at three eager scaled faces. “A small bite.” Curds weren’t all that different from cheese, and they would enjoy the treat.

  Irin handed her a pair of oversized metal forks. “Use these and hold a plate under the sandwiches or we’ll have grease on the floor and hatchlings trying to lick the dirt.”

  A little dirt had never hurt anyone, but Jae had no intention of letting any yummy cheese drippings go to waste. She carefully threaded two sandwiches on each fork, and Kellan joined her with a fully loaded roasting fork in each hand as well. Apparently demand for toasted sandwiches was high. They held them out at arms’ length, which was when Jae realized she was about to be on the business end of a blast of dragon fire.

  Fendellen’s laughter bubbled into her mind. ::Have no worries, sweet one. His aim is far better than mine.::

  She didn’t have any longer to worry as a stream of flame danced under the sandwiches and ended in a cast-iron skillet that Irin held out like he caught dragon fire every day of the week. Jae stared, and then caught herself as Karis and Sapphire hastily swung plates under the dripping cheese.

  Laughter and more than one slightly burnt finger later, the sandwiches had been distributed, and Jae leaned back against her dragon. She broke her cheesy melted goodness in two and held out half.

  ::You eat it. Kellan has stew for me.::

  Jae lifted her head and studied her dragon. There was more behind those words than generosity or an honest preference for stew.

  A nose nuzzled her cheek. ::There is. I told you who I am last night. There is also something you need to know about who we are together. We’ll go for a visit after you eat so that you can hear a story.::

  Jae thought about that for a moment. There couldn’t possibly be anything as life-altering as discovering the dragon who had rescued you from freezing to death was apprentice dragon royalty. And she liked stories. She took a big bite of her sandwich, which was absolutely delicious—and almost cool enough not to burn her tongue. “All right. Who are we going to visit?”

  Silence landed in the rondo, and Jae realized she’d spoken out loud. She swallowed quickly, and turned. Everyone watched the two of them, even the babies, who couldn’t possibly know why everyone was staring. Or maybe they did. Jae realized she knew very little about what it meant to be a dragon queen.

  “Good.” Kis’s rumble was audible, and approving. “You told her.”

  “I told her I will be queen.” Fendellen’s tone was one Jae had never heard. Commanding. Regal. “It is for Elhen to tell her the rest.”

  Jae spun around again, her head dizzy. “We’re going to visit the dragon queen? Now?”

  Fendellen snorted, amused. “Yes. In her cave. But eat your sandwich first, or she’ll finish it for you. She’s rather fond of toasted cheese.”

  Jae blinked. And swallowed. She might be able to treat one dragon queen as a
friend. She was absolutely certain that number didn’t extend to two.

  Chapter 19

  Jae could feel her legs trying to turn to water. Somewhere on the way up to the cave, they had realized she was on her way to see royalty. Real royalty, not the friendly apprentice kind. There was a world of difference between Mellie and Gran, and just as much between Fendellen and the old and powerful dragon she had met briefly on the cliffs.

  She stepped into the cave, holding tight to a wrapped packet of bread and cheese. The toasting forks were in her pocket. Apparently Fendellen hadn’t exaggerated the queen’s fondness for the tasty snack.

  Two dragons greeted them, shoulder to shoulder, and then separated on some unseen command to create a narrow entry into the cave.

  Fendellen bowed her head, first right and then left. “Ciara. Jarden.”

  Dragons guarding the gates. Jae gulped. Someone very important lived inside. Fendellen nudged her back, none too gently, and she made her way between the two dragons. She didn’t gulp when she arrived in the cavern proper. She couldn’t. She was too busy gaping at all the shiny treasures. There were goblets and shiny rocks and paintings and fabrics in colors her fingers itched to touch.

  “Elhen.” Fendellen’s voice was quiet, but easily heard in the cave. “We greet you.”

  “Welcome.” The queen’s reply was warm and inviting. “Do come in.” She looked straight at Jae. “I’ve had them bring some pillows and a blanket for you, youngling, but please speak up if you’re cold.”

  The cave was as warm as the nursery. “I’m fine, thank you.” Jae tried not to gape at the beautiful things everywhere her eye could see. She yanked her eyes back to the queen. “I’m very sorry. There’s just so much to look at.”

  Elhen inclined her head regally. “It is never wrong to appreciate a dragon’s treasure. You are welcome to look more closely after I have told you of the prophecy.”

  Jae blinked. She had come to hear a story. Prophecy sounded far scarier. Her belly tightened, and she began to regret the second cheese sandwich.

  She let Fendellen’s nose push her over to a small pile of pillows in beautiful, rich colors. On any other day, she would have been enchanted. On this one, she just felt small and scared.

  The queen studied her intently as Fendellen settled at her side. “I shall begin so that you do not let fear drain you any further.”

  Jae winced. She’d hoped her feelings weren’t quite so obvious.

  “These are the words that have been told, passed down from queen to queen, beginning with Lovissa, the great warrior dragon. She is the grandmother of my grandmother, twenty-five generations past. This is the story that has been passed from Lovissa to me.”

  Jae recognized a skilled storyteller when she heard one. Elhen would have been welcomed in any hamlet in the mountains. In human form, anyhow. She winced again and focused on the words of the old queen. The one whose scales somehow shone as bright as treasure even in the dim light of the cave.

  Her words, however, were not shiny. They spoke of battles, fierce and gruesome, and dragonkind at the very brink, of dragonkiller arrows and scaled warriors lost forever to magics and treachery.

  She gulped. Her own ears weren’t pointed, but she counted elves amongst her new friends.

  ::As do we, sweet one.:: Fendellen’s whisper soothed her some, but it couldn’t take away the anguish of imagining so many dragons dead.

  Elhen paused, studying her with eyes that had seen both far and deep for longer than Jae could imagine. “It did not end the way the dragons of old feared,” the queen said quietly. “We do not know the full story of how they were saved, for that has been lost in the fires of time. But the wisdom of the queens has passed on this much.”

  Jae felt the old dragon’s power gathering.

  “There will be five,” Elhen intoned. “Five dragons and their kin who will come to save the dragons of old. They will be marked by the Dragon Star, who will place a light just above their eyes.”

  She turned the full force of her gaze on Jae. “It is a mark that will be visible only to the eyes of a queen.”

  Jae felt her insides turn to springmelt—and then to vapor.

  She felt her dragon stir beside her.

  Elhen’s chastening gaze turned to Fendellen. “Respect her strength. She grows in knowledge and she arrived wise, and she has strength that even you don’t understand yet. Do not shield her when it is not necessary.”

  Fendellen’s movements ceased.

  Jae tried to meet the queen’s eyes. She cleared her throat, and then cleared it again when no words came out. “Am I marked?” She turned to her dragon and stared at Fendellen’s forehead. “Is she?”

  “Yes.” A single word that reverberated through the entire cave.

  “What does that even mean?”

  It took Jae a moment to realize the harsh whisper had been hers.

  ::We don’t know,:: Fendellen said gently. ::We know only that we will be called, and we must do our very best to be ready.::

  It felt like the night of snowstorms and demon dragons again. Entirely unreal.

  “It’s very real.” Elhen spoke briskly. “You are the fourth pair to be marked.”

  There were others. Somehow that gave Jae’s chest just enough space to breathe.

  The queen’s crisp nod reminded her of Gran. “You know them. Sapphire and Lotus were first, and if you feel ill equipped for this job, imagine young Sapphire, sitting high in a tree with a screeching hatchling in her lap.”

  Jae had heard that story. Apparently with rather a large omission.

  “Your kin asked that you not be told until she deemed you ready.”

  Elhen’s words held no opinion, no censure, but Jae heard some anyhow. That straightened her spine. “I thought her a demon when we first met. I wouldn’t have believed this.”

  Something in the queen’s eyes softened. “Your loyalty is noted, youngling.”

  Jae swallowed. “There are others?”

  “Lily and Oceana.” Fendellen sounded amused. “Lily had to wade through a swamp to get to her dragon. I should perhaps not have been surprised to find you in foul weather.”

  Two who were her friends. Jae felt her chest growing tight again.

  “Three.” Fendellen’s nose settled against her shoulder. “Alonia and Trift as well.”

  The kind elf and her laughing dragon. Something caught in Jae’s heart. Three of her friends—and not the fourth. She turned to the old queen, the question spurting out before she could catch its tail. “Not Kellan?”

  A long pause, one that seemed somehow full of aching. “Young Kellan has not been marked.”

  That wasn’t fair. Jae had been in the village only a few days and she already knew Kellan was the very best of them.

  “We don’t know how the Dragon Star chooses, or why.” Elhen was back to sounding regal. “We know only that it does.”

  Jae felt her head swirling like the winds caught in a tight valley. She had been chosen for a task so huge, it might as well be moving mountains with a spoon. Her. A girl from a remote village with wings and some small healing skill.

  And a dragon queen as her kin.

  Jae gulped. The star had chosen Fendellen. She was just a small weed plucked up along with a useful plant.

  ::I am not at all sure of that,:: said a quietly regal voice inside her head. The queen gave Fendellen a look that brooked no disobedience. “I would talk to your kin for a moment alone. You may go outside on the cliffs and help Ciara toast my cheese sandwiches.”

  Jae tried to straighten because as fierce as that look was, she wasn’t sure her dragon would go unless her kin looked a lot less like a leaf about to blow off a tree. She set back her shoulders and spread her wings a little to show the tiny beads she hadn’t been able to work up the will to take off.

  Elhen glanced at her, and Jae was quite sure she saw approval in the old, dark eyes.

  “Go,” said the queen to the dragon hovering at her shoulder. “She will d
o you proud, this day and many others. And I’m far too old to eat a human without getting terrible indigestion.”

  Whatever had made Jae’s spine stiffen promptly melted.

  But it was too late. Fendellen had already left the cave.

  The queen studied Jae again. ::I’m sorry, youngling. You would think that at my age, I would have learned not to make inappropriate jokes. Dragons have not eaten humans in my lifetime, or in those of any of my grandmothers of memory. The tales sometimes say otherwise, but those are the ramblings of humans who would rather believe in evil dragons than in far more ordinary dangers.::

  Jae swallowed hard. There were plenty of ordinary dangers in the high mountains.

  ::There are. You have grown up used to risk. I believe that will serve you well.::

  It was good to know she had some small skills that might be useful. ::If the star wanted a healer, it would have been far smarter to pick my gran.::

  ::The star has not picked our obviously best and brightest.:: The queen paused. ::And yet over time, I have begun to have more faith in its choices.::

  Jae wasn’t at all sure she agreed, but her bones were too soft to argue with a queen and a star both.

  ::Stories need time to settle, and you will take yours.:: Elhen regarded her silently for a moment. ::I kept you here to offer you two things. One is a gift. The other is a word of advice about that dragon of yours.::

  Jae sat up straighter. There was an odd sharpness in the queen’s words.

  ::It is not sharpness,:: the queen said quietly. ::It is fear, and perhaps regret. Do you know what it is that Fendellen fears most deeply?::

  Jae opened her mouth and then closed it again. She took her time, making a tea with all the bits and pieces she had gathered since the night a demon dragon had plucked her out of a storm. ::She fears to be alone.::

  ::Yes.:: Clear, proud eyes—and ineffable sadness. ::She fears to be like me.::

  Jae gaped.

  ::The walk of a queen is a challenging one. I have chosen to do it alone, separated, as did the one who was queen before me.::