“Jae?” Beckah was looking at me with an unhappy quirk to her mouth. “I’m sorry you got stuck with me, instead of going to the party.”
It wasn’t hard to smile at her. “No, it’s not that. I just always end up wondering how I’ll ever fit in with people like that. It was . . . kind of a fluke that I even ended up being a dragonrider at all.”
“Well, do you like it?” she asked me frankly.
“Like what?”
“Being a dragonrider?” she asked again.
I nodded. Just thinking about it made my heart beat faster. “Yeah. I love it.”
She shrugged a little. “Then nothing else matters. Who cares about fitting in with them? If it’s something you really care about, then it shouldn’t matter what anyone else thinks.”
She sat back on her heels right across from me, looking me up and down with her intelligent green eyes. She was pretty sharp, for a kid. I had to give her credit for that. She really was a lot smarter than me, which was kind of scary.
“I guess you’re right.” I looked back down at the floor and the dancing couples far below. Maybe I’d never be one of them, but Beckah was right. Compared to the other places I could have ended up, this was a pretty great one to be in.
fourteen
“Let’s dance,” Beckah demanded as she stood, dusting off the front of her blue dress.
I stared up at her, and started trying to think of a good excuse not to. “I already told you I don’t know how.”
“And I said I would teach you, so come on!” She was relentless, and grabbed my arm to pull me back up. She took my hands and showed me how to stand so I was holding her. I did my best not to touch her any more than was absolutely necessary, but my face started to get hot right away. I wanted to pull away. I could just imagine Sile walking in just in time to see me dancing with his daughter.
“Daddy showed me how. Look, like this.” She coached me through a few wobbly dance steps with a big grin on her face.
After a few minutes of stepping on her feet, shuffling around, and feeling like an idiot, I was beginning to realize that I was a terrible dancer. But she didn’t seem to mind, and so neither did I. She laughed, twirled, and refused to let me give up, even when I stepped on her toes. As long as she was having fun, that was all that mattered to me.
“You have to practice, Jae,” she told me. I could tell she was teasing me a little. “You can’t step on anyone’s shoes next year. What if you squash some princess’s toes?”
I smirked, and just rolled my eyes at her. “Right, because all the noble ladies will be lining up to dance with a halfbreed.”
She flashed me a punishing look, and got a thoughtful twinkle in her eyes. “I’ll dance with you. I’ll be fifteen next year, so I can come to the party, too. Daddy won’t be able to just dump me on some nanny—no offense.”
“None taken. But for what it’s worth, this is a lot more fun than serving drinks.” I twirled her again. I could tell that was her favorite, and I liked it because it meant I didn’t have to move around much.
Beckah’s cheeks got a little red, and she stuck her tongue out at me. When she stopped twirling, she let go of my hand and stood there for a moment. It got really awkward. She was just looking at me with this weird expression, nibbling on her bottom lip. It made me nervous.
“We should go back, huh?” she mumbled.
I was starting to think that was good idea. “Yeah, probably.”
She led the way back out of the storage room, down the stairs, and into the hallways of Duke Brinton’s estate. I still couldn’t figure out where we were, or which way we were supposed to be going, but I trusted her. She held my hand tightly, her small fingers laced through mine. It made me feel strange, no matter how hard I tried to ignore it. I wasn’t sure if I liked it, or if it just made me really nervous.
We were as fast as shadows as we crept through the house. We slipped from room to room, taking the shortcuts through empty servant tunnels. We hid from passing maids and butlers by ducking into dark corners whenever we heard footsteps or voices coming too close.
It felt like we were getting close when we came to a dimly lit hallway that was very close to the ballroom where the party was still going strong. I could hear the music clearly, even feel it vibrating the floor under my feet. I could smell the food, the perfume of the flowers, and see the bright golden light gleaming far away down the hall. Voices echoed toward us, but it wasn’t the sounds of laughter and excited conversation I’d expected to hear.
Beckah stopped so suddenly I crashed into her back. Her eyes got wide.
Then I heard it, too. It was Sile’s voice. He was shouting at the top of his lungs, and it sounded like he was arguing with someone.
Beckah just stood there frozen with her eyes as big as saucers. I reacted in an instant, and grabbed her by the back of her dress to pull her into the shadows to hide. We stood stock still as the voices came closer. I held my breath, keeping a firm grip on Beckah with an arm around her waist to keep her from slipping into view.
Five people passed us. Four men all dressed in black, their faces covered with masks painted white with two red lines over the eyes. Sile was in the middle of them, and they were shoving him along with his hands tied behind his back. One of them was holding the point of a long black dagger against his side.
“You cowards,” Sile was growling at them. “You really think killing me is going to make any difference? What that madman has done won’t be absolved with my death! It will tear this kingdom apart!”
The masked men didn’t answer. They just kept shoving him onward, jabbing at him threateningly with that dagger.
“You can take me all the way to Halfax and it will make no difference!” He continued to fight against them, struggling to get free. “Don’t you get it?! This is what happens to those who tamper with gods!”
Beckah flinched against me. I could feel her shaking with panic. I slapped a hand over her mouth to hold her back before she could move or make any noise. If they found us, then they might kill us, too. She let out a faint, muffled whimper against my palm.
The five men disappeared into the dark, never stopping once. They didn’t see us. Once I was sure they were out of earshot, I let Beckah go. She jerked away from me violently, and started to sprint after them. I ran after her.
“What are you doing?!” I whispered as I snatched her by the wrist, forcing her to stop.
“They’re going to kill my daddy! Didn’t you hear? We have to do something!” She looked back at me with a furious, pleading expression. There were tears running down her cheeks. “Help me, Jae. Please!”
“We can’t just go after them, not by ourselves! Look at us, Beckah, we can’t fight men like that! We have to find some of the other officers. Come on!” I started to pull her in the opposite direction, back toward the party. She didn’t fight me, but I could hear her sobbing. If we could find another officer—someone trained to handle this kind of thing—then maybe we could stop those men before they did something terrible to Sile.
“W-who were they, Jae? Who were those men?” Beckah cried as I pulled her along after me, sprinting for the ballroom.
I didn’t know. I’d never seen anyone wear masks like that before. My head was swirling with confusion and terror as we ran toward burning light that poured into the hallway. It felt like we were running toward the gates of heaven in some kind of nightmare. No matter how hard I pumped my legs, it still felt like I was moving in slow motion.
When we finally got to the doorway of the ballroom, the roar of the crowd and the surge of the music stopped me dead. I was dazed, panicked, and searching for someone I knew. But I didn’t see a single familiar face in the crowd. There were hundreds of people all around, and none of them even looked my way.
“Jae, we have to hurry!” Beckah pleaded.
I clenched my teeth and nodded. There wasn’t time to stand here and wait for someone to notice us. I went up to the first officer I could find, and started tugging on his sleeve. “S
ir, excuse me! I have an emergency!”
The officer glared down at me, brushing me away angrily. “My wine cup is fine, boy. Move along.” He didn’t look back down at me again.
I tried other officers, and one after another, but they all ignored me in pretty much the same way. Not one would even give me a second look. They couldn’t be bothered to step away from their conversations with the ladies, or their cups filled with Brinton’s precious wine. Beckah was sobbing hysterically, and I was beginning to get frustrated.
In a moment of desperation and pure stupidity, I spotted Academy Commander Rayken standing with his wife and a few other noblemen, and marched right up to him. I pulled on his sleeve like I had the others, but this time I shouted at the top of my lungs. “Commander Rayken! Someone has kidnapped Lieutenant Derrick!”
The people around us went silent for a moment, turning stare down at me. It must have scared Beckah, because she pressed herself up against my back, and squeezed my hand even harder. I could feel her trembling.
Academy Commander Rayken looked at me like he’d just found a stain on his shirt. He scowled, and didn’t say a word. He didn’t have to; I could tell he was waiting for me to explain myself.
“I saw it myself, sir. Four men in white masks took him just a moment ago. He was yelling, but no one else could hear.” I started to get nervous. Maybe going up to Commander Rayken like that had been a huge mistake. He could still kick me out of the academy if he wanted to, and he was probably the last person in the world who would believe a word I said.
He just scowled at me even harder, like I was wasting his time, and rolled his eyes. “What you’re describing is the king’s private guard, and as you can see, there are none of them present because they only accompany the king himself when he travels. You’re mistaken. Lieutenant Derrick is here, somewhere in the ballroom. I saw him not an hour ago.” He growled down at me, making me back up a few feet. “Go back to your duties, fledgling, before I lose my patience.”
My heart sank to the soles of my boots. I wasn’t going to get any help from these people. They didn’t believe me, just like before when Sile’s saddle had been tampered with. Once again, it was up to me to do something to save Lieutenant Derrick.
So I made another desperate, stupid decision that was probably going to end up costing me more than I wanted to lose.
fifteen
“Beckah, you have to take me up to the roof. You know how to get there, don’t you?” I turned to face her as soon as we got out of the ballroom.
She hesitated, looking at me with wide eyes filled with tears. I could see the fear on her face. Her chin was trembling when she finally nodded. “I-I think so. But why?”
I wasn’t sure exactly what was going on with Sile, but it just had to be something bad for these guys to come after him twice. After what happened with the saddle, I couldn’t afford to take this lightly. Lives were at stake. And just like last time, no one else believed me. So if I didn’t do something, Sile might die.
I was just one fledgling with no real training, so it was going to take something pretty radical to make any difference at all. Fortunately, radical was my middle name. Or at least, it was about to be.
“I’m going to save your dad, Beckah. Don’t worry.” I tried to reassure her. “So let’s go, and hurry!”
Beckah led the way through the duke’s mansion at a sprint, and I actually had a hard time keeping up with her this time. She was faster than she looked, and I was out of breath as we went up staircase after staircase, climbing the levels of the estate toward the roof. We dashed past maids and servants, who stopped to stare or yelled at us to slow down.
A few things started to look familiar as we came close to the suite we were supposed to be staying in for the night. I recognized a big oil painting and a small orange tree growing out of a big porcelain pot right outside the door of our room as we ran past. It gave me a sick feeling to think of what was going to happen when the other officers, especially Commander Rayken, figured out Sile and I were missing. I could probably kiss the academy goodbye. So much for my bright new future.
“Jae?” Someone shouted my name and I screeched to a halt to see who it was. My heart was hammering in my chest, and I half hoped it would be Sile. Even if he was furious with me for leaving the room with his daughter, I’d just be so relieved that he was okay.
But it wasn’t Sile.
Felix was leaning out of a doorway back down the hall, and his face was smeared with something red. I couldn’t tell what it was until he started walking toward me. It looked like lipstick. His hair was all messed up, too.
“What’re you doing?” He frowned at me suspiciously. “I thought Sile said you weren’t supposed to be out here? He’s gonna chew your head off if he catches you.” He was one to be talking. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a noble girl in a party dress run out of the room he’d been in.
“Jae!” Beckah whimpered impatiently. We really didn’t have time for this.
“I can’t explain it to you now. Sile is in trouble again, and I have to go,” I told him.
“Wait, what?” Felix looked stunned. “Go where? What’s going on, Jae?”
“I can’t, Felix. I’m sorry. There’s no time.” I shook my head, and turned to start running again.
I got about three feet away before I suddenly came to a jerking, choking stop. Felix had me by the back of my cape so that the chain drew up tight around my neck. He started dragging me back toward him, and when I saw his face again, he looked furious.
“Let me go!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. “Sile is going to die if you don’t let me go!”
That definitely got his attention. Felix let me go right away, and just stood there, staring at me like I was out of my mind. “What are you talking about?”
I stumbled when he released my cape, and started taking steps back away from him. “I saw it, Felix. Four men in white masks kidnapped him from the ball. She saw it, too. This isn’t a joke.” I glared at him, and tried to look as confident as I could despite the fact that I was terrified about what I was about to do. “I tried telling Commander Rayken and the others, but they don’t believe me—just like you didn’t believe me last time. So it’s up to me again. I’m going to save him, even if I have to do it alone.”
I regretted bringing up the saddle incident, especially since Felix was my friend. I knew it’d probably make him angry, but I wanted him to take me seriously. I didn’t stick around after that, just in case he tried to stop me. I ran back toward Beckah, who stood there waiting for me before she started sprinting down the hall again.
We took off into the duke’s estate, and it wasn’t until we were climbing another steep, spiraling staircase that I realized we weren’t alone. Felix was right behind me. He wouldn’t look right at me, even when I almost tripped over my own feet in surprise.
“What are you doing?” I gasped, trying to talk as I panted for breath.
Then Felix shot me a punishing glare, like I should have known better than to think he wouldn’t believe me this time. “You really think I’m going to let you do something this stupid by yourself?”
I was about to say yes. Actually I’d expected him to laugh at me as I ran off to ruin my career and probably get myself killed in the process. But I couldn’t catch my breath long enough to say anything else. Good thing Sile had been making us run all those laps, or I would have passed out.
Beckah led the way through the mansion, up to the top of one of the towering spires that had a cone-shaped roof. It was a watchtower with a huge lantern in the top to light the grounds below, like some kind of a really tall, skinny lighthouse. But there weren’t any guards watching it tonight because of the party. In fact, when we finally made it to the landing at the top of the stairs, the door was locked with a big iron padlock. Beckah pulled on it, clawed at it, and finally let out a little scream of panic when it wouldn’t budge.
“Oh would you just move?” Felix grumbled, shoving her out of the way so ha
rd she bounced off my chest and almost fell down the stairs. Lucky for her, I was quick to catch her by the shoulders.
Felix pulled what looked like a small metal hairpin out of his pocket, and started poking it into the keyhole. It only took him a few minutes to pick the lock. When it sprang free, he pushed the wooden door open for us to go up into the chamber above.
The room at the top of the tower was round with open stone windows all the way around. We had an excellent view of how high up we were—which was really, really high. So high that it made my head swim at first, even though I had gotten pretty used to flying with Mavrik. The night air blew through the open arched windows, and since the lantern in the center wasn’t lit, you could see thousands of stars glittering overhead.
“What now?” Felix came to stand beside me with his arms folded.
I started walking toward one of the windows. “Just a crazy idea,” I told him as I leaned out, looking at the ten-storey drop below.
It was pretty crazy to think that Mavrik would ever hear me, even way up here. I didn’t even know where he was. And yet it had always seemed like he could understand it when I spoke to him, so it was worth a try. I had a strange feeling in my chest, like a hard knot of heat that tingled and made me shiver. I guessed it was just fear, or just a wild sense of desperation.
I took a deep breath, and climbed out onto the ledge. The wind whipped in my hair, and tugged at my cape. Every time my boots slipped a little, my heart jumped into my throat.
“Jaevid?!” Felix was yelling at me. “Are you nuts? Get down from there!”
Beckah was yelling at me too, but I tuned them both out. I closed my eyes, and let my mind go quiet for a moment. I felt a strange sensation in my chest, like pressure, and a tingling of heat in the back of my mind. Then it was my turn to yell, and I screamed as loudly as I could. “Mavrik! I need you!”
At first, nothing happened. I started to feel like a real idiot, standing out there on that ledge, yelling for a dragon that couldn’t hear me. Minutes went by, and I started to give up.
Fledgling (The Dragonrider Chronicles) Page 12