Soul of Smoke

by Caitlyn McFarland

  “A vee is a group of ten to fifteen dragons raised and trained together from childhood. It’s our basic military unit.” Concern for Rhys must have been overriding whatever it was that had brought Cadoc to her bedside in the first place, because he stood. “We’re all just over there.” He pointed to the archway from which he’d retrieved Ashem. “Feel free to look around. There’s rather a steep step out front, though. Mind you don’t fall.”

  With a wink, he disappeared into the other room.

  Kai threw off the blankets and scooted ungracefully from the mattress. She half-heartedly rolled her bedding, stacking it sort of haphazardly out of the way. She might have considered doing a better job—Juli would certainly have—but her head still hurt and she hadn’t eaten in who knew how long, so she did what she could and made her shaky way out through the larger opening. She had to figure out where she was.

  The short, wide tunnel led from the sleeping room into a vast cavern with a ceiling that arched at least a hundred feet overhead. Kai gaped at the stalactites, the white lights of the ceiling so distant they looked like stars. The floor, smooth as glass, glittered with their reflection. She slid one bare foot across the mirror-like stone and whispered, “How?”

  Across the cavern, the floor roughened into something more like a natural cave, sloping upward to a huge cave mouth that yawned into the sky.

  She stood, hugging herself, and walked toward the light that spilled from the opening. Despite everything, she couldn’t help but eye the walls of the cavern. The stone looked nice and strong, broken up with just enough cracks and little ledges to make climbing a challenge.

  “Yeah, Monahan. Now would be a great time for a climb.” She shook her head and scrambled up the incline, where the floor went from glass-like to normal stone. Outside, the sun so brilliant it momentarily washed out her vision. The air changed from pleasantly warm to biting cold as if she’d walked through a wall, and Kai stifled a squeak of surprise.

  Her eyes adjusted, color slowly leeching into the haze of white. Her mouth fell open. She’d suspected the cave was underground. She hadn’t expected this.

  A large, flat ledge about fifty feet wide extended out about thirty feet before disappearing into nothingness. Kai walked to the edge.

  They were underground...and several hundred feet up a mountain. A sheer cliff face dropped over a hundred feet straight down before hitting a more gradual slope populated with pine and aspen. Mountains stretched away in front of her into the misty blue distance, snowy peaks rising and falling like frozen ocean waves in the endless wilderness.

  She had no idea where she was.

  Kai shivered beneath the cloudless dome of sky, then leaned over the edge again, assessing. A climb would be possible, but dangerous. She might have considered it, but without gear, there was just no way.

  She had been kidnapped by dragons, and she was stuck.

  Chapter Four

  Fords of the River

  Rhys burned, fire licking the inside of his skin with tongues of icy flame. His bones cracked and sizzled. There was nothing but the black, frozen fire. Time didn’t exist, only dark and pain and cold.

  Something pricked his arm. Warmth. Blessed heat. It seeped through his veins and into his shoulder. The soul-searing cold began to melt. The blackness drew back from his mind, coherent thought unfurling like wings.

  He woke with a gasp, bursting through the last frozen crust of unconsciousness. Rhys shot up, his last memory of battle, of Kavar sinking long, yellow teeth into his shoulder, of thinking he was dead.

  The movement sent pain crackling through him, making his eyes water. Through the blur of unshed tears, he saw a small, stone room. A fire. A bed. His friends.

  They’d made it to the waystation.

  Ashem scowled above him, a syringe in his hand. “Lay down.”

  Rhys complied, dizzy. “What happened?”

  Ashem tugged at the bandage on his shoulder and Rhys bit his tongue, stifling a groan. Across the room, Cadoc was leaning against a wall, glaring. The others were in various states of sitting or standing around the crowded space, watching him.

  Deryn leaned over him. “You sundering scalebrain! You used it on me! If Kavar hasn’t killed you, be sundering sure I’m about to finish the job!”

  Despite his exhaustion, Rhys gave her a patronizing grin. “I have to protect my beloved baby sister.”

  Deryn slapped him across the face.

  Rhys grunted in shock.

  “I’m glad you’re alive.” There were suppressed tears in Deryn’s voice as she leaned close and pressed her fingers to his good shoulder. She blinked rapidly and moved away, scooting to a cushion near the wall, straightening her injured leg.

  Embarrassed and fuming, Rhys touched his cheek. If Deryn’s leg was that close to healed, he had been unconscious for most of the day. “What happened?” he repeated, voice hard.

  Ashem’s scowl deepened. “My brother happened. You were lucky. He’d already used most of his venom.”

  Griffith regarded Rhys with eyes like still, green pools from where he and Ffion sat on a stone bench. “You were in the fords of the river, boyo, and we almost didn’t get you back. What were you thinking?”

  Rhys raised his right hand to his face. His shoulder hurt. His right arm felt as heavy and numb as stone. His voice came out a grunt. “He was going after Deryn.”

  Deryn leaned over and picked up a second cushion. Cadoc helped her prop up her leg. “If you hadn’t stopped me, I could have transformed and saved myself,” she snapped. “Ashem’s spent all day trying to keep you alive.”

  “It took longer than I thought to create the anti-venom. This place has limited resources.” Ashem prodded the healing skin of Rhys’s abdomen with two fingers. “Did that hurt?”

  Rhys shook his head. The motion set the room spinning.

  “Good.”

  “How about this, you wind-for-brains moron?” Cadoc punched him hard on his unbandaged left side.

  “Uffern dân, Cadoc!” Rhys gasped. He rubbed his ribs, remembering to use his left hand.

  Cadoc was unrepentant. “You should’ve left it to us. I’ve spent my life watching your back. Iain died saving you. Don’t demean our sacrifices with your stupidity.”

  Rhys clenched his jaw against angry words and the pang of grief at Iain’s loss, still fresh. Ten years might be a long time for humans, but for a dragon, it was nothing.

  “Sundering idiot.” Ashem’s voice came out as a growl. “I told you it was too dangerous for both you and Deryn to be out.” He opened his mouth, and then closed it, balling his hands into fists tight enough that veins stood out on his forearms. He looked like he wanted to throttle something. Or someone. “I told you.”

  Rhys closed his eyes. “Seren didn’t foresee any problems.”

  As Seeress, Rhys’s other sister, Seren, wasn’t supposed to have allegiances, especially not to family—meaning Rhys shouldn’t have been asking her personal questions about her visions at all.

  “Seren? Her visions are so twisted up in symbols we’d hardly know if she had.” Cadoc’s guitar bonged as he collapsed against the wall, and he cradled it to his chest, looking for damage. “You’re lucky Kai was there.”

  “The human girl? She lived, didn’t she?” Rhys had only woken long enough to see her inexplicably there, Kavar bending toward her, jaws wide.

  “She stabbed Kavar.” Ffion leaned forward, her elbows on the closed book in her lap. “She saved your life and almost got eaten for her trouble.”

  Rhys put a hand to his face. “I know. I saw her with the sword.”

  “It’s my fault,” Ashem said, his voice gruff. “They might not have seen us if it weren’t for the fire. I never should have allowed it.”

  The others exchanged looks. The fire had been allowed because the �
�mission” was nothing but a glorified holiday: secret and safe. This part of the world was well outside Owain’s territory. None of them had been cautious. But no matter what they said, Ashem would blame himself.

  Rhys shifted. “It’s my fault Deryn was there. I should have made her stay in Eryri.”

  “Like sundering hell,” Deryn snapped.

  “It happened.” Ffion’s ice-blue gaze zipped from Rhys to Deryn to Ashem. “It’s over. Now we need to worry about getting home without getting killed.”

  Rhys looked around again, and his fingers tightened in the blankets. “Where are Evan and Morwenna?”

  “I sent them back to Eryri. Our communicators are still in the meadow, so we have no way of contacting anyone. They’ll bring the Invisible.”

  “We’re going to stay here until they can make the entire trip there and back? It’s five thousand miles each way. That will take at least ten days.” Rhys gave his head a small shake then clenched his jaw against the protest the movement elicited from his torn shoulder. “We should try to get back.”

  Ashem’s brows drew together. “It isn’t safe.”

  Rhys pushed himself higher, sweat popping out across his brow as he ignored the screaming pain of his injuries. “If Kavar went back to Owain, his vee probably followed. We may be hiding from nothing.”

  Ashem’s brows contracted further and he crossed his arms in front of his chest. He drew breath to speak.

  “Will Kavar go back and steal our packs?” Ffion’s light voice cut off whatever Ashem was about to say. She ran her fingers along the wide, delicately worked cuff around her right bicep. Griffith had given it to her at their pledging ceremony, and she always toyed with the diamond-studded coils when she was troubled. “I had records in mine I’d rather not lose.”

  Ashem shook his head. “The barrier is still intact over that meadow. Kavar could find the place again, but I doubt he’ll bother. The others aren’t Azhdahā.”

  “Not many of us are, chief,” Cadoc commented drily.

  Ashem shrugged. To Rhys, the gesture implied both Ashem’s apathy and the innate superiority of his clan.

  But Ashem was right. Each of the ten remaining dragon clans had their own magic, and he and Kavar were the only Azhdahā left. Anyone else who tried to locate the barrier would fly right over the place. Their eyes would see it, but their minds wouldn’t perceive it, as if it didn’t exist.

  “Well. Good. Perhaps Griffith and I can fly over and pick up my pack on the way home.” Ffion settled back against Griffith and opened her book. Cadoc produced a reed pipe from somewhere, raised it to his lips, and began an absurdly jolly tune. It was so at odds with the tense atmosphere that Rhys smiled.

  A face intruded in his mind. A girl. Pretty, but not beautiful. Pale skin, ink-black hair, and eyes like a green sea. After so long in Eryri—the isolated archipelago of mountainous islands in the South Pacific that he and nearly two thousand other dragons called home—it had been almost shocking to see a person he didn’t recognize on sight.

  Shocking, and fascinating.

  He touched the bandage on his shoulder. Never in ten thousand years would he have thought he’d owe his life to a human. ”What happened to the girl? You never said.”

  Cadoc’s gaze cut to Ashem. The tune turned even more absurdly merry.

  “She’s here.” Ashem’s voice was a flat counterpoint to the song.

  “What?” Rhys shot up. He gritted his teeth against a hot, rending pain in his shoulder. Warmth oozed beneath the bandage, red blossoming on its white surface. He must look pathetic. “Sunder it. Why did you bring her here? And how long will I be like this?”

  “About a week. Stop moving.” Ashem examined the bandage, his tone long-suffering. “I’ll have to change it again.”

  “Ashem, the girl.”

  Ashem’s lip curled. “You’d prefer I left her to Kavar?”

  “Of course not.” Rhys would have shrugged away if he thought he could manage without looking weaker.

  “She saved your life and Deryn’s. She probably saved the world.” Ashem glared at Cadoc, whose song had morphed to an aggressively cheerful dancing reel.

  Rhys had barely seen the girl, but for some reason, knowing she was there made him glance around again, as if he might have missed her presence in the room. “Where is she?” He cleared his throat. “How is she?”

  Ashem shrugged and made an indifferent gesture toward the heavy brown and gold curtain that hung over the door to the small room. “Cadoc ap Brychan I swear on the blood of the Ancients that I will grind that pipe into powder and make you eat it!”

  Cadoc grinned and stuffed the pipe back into his pocket. “All things considered, I think she’s done beautifully. I, for one, plan to delight in her company for as long as she’s here.” He flopped down onto an old wooden chair next to the bench and strummed a chord on his guitar. He chuckled at the expression on Ashem’s face as he plucked a somber ballad. “There’s no life without music, chief.”

  Ashem didn’t stop glaring at Cadoc. “We will be here until Rhys is well. The quarters are confined, so try not to tempt me to kill you.”

  “I’m well enough,” Rhys protested. “If I can’t fly myself, I can ride on someone’s back. Kavar has gone, so the others have, too. Let’s get back to Eryri while we can.”

  “Don’t push me, Rhys.” Ashem spoke directly into his head. This, along with the ability to create barriers, was the magic of the Azhdahā. Though all dragons could communicate mind-to-mind in dragon form, only Ashem and Kavar could do so as humans.

  “We’re exposed here, Commander. I’d rather make a break for Eryri while the coast is clear.” Rhys held Ashem’s gaze. Though Rhys couldn’t actually send the thought, Ashem would be able to “hear” it.

  Ashem ignored him. “About the human girl.”

  Cadoc perked up.

  Ashem noticed and sent his gaze skyward with a sigh. “She’s here because she saved Rhys and Deryn. Don’t tell her anything.” He hesitated then spoke again. “The unheartsworn males should see if she can be sworn.” He paused. “Well, Cadoc and I.” He looked like he’d rather cut off his own wings. “Not Rhys. Once we’ve made sure she can’t be heartsworn, we’ll take her home.”

  Rhys gave Ashem an incredulous look. “Do you think it’s wise for any of us to bring a Wingless mate back home to Eryri?”

  Ashem shrugged. “We’re at war, and heartswearing means extra magic and extra strength. The whining of a few discontented idiots hardly matters if I’m better able to do my job.”

  Cadoc gave a dramatic sigh. “Alas, the fair raven is not for me. I’ve made direct skin contact twice and nothing happened.”

  Deryn snorted. “The fair raven? Do you write your horrid poetry beforehand or does garbage spew from you as you speak?”

  Cadoc winked. “I write it down, love. I’d hate to deprive the world of my words when I’m gone. Anyway, looks like you’re her only shot, Commander.”

  Ashem’s face soured.

  Griffith cleared his throat. “There’s also the matter of food,” he rumbled.

  Rhys’s own empty stomach roiled, and he realized that he was starving. “Another reason to leave here,” he thought at Ashem.

  Ashem threw up his hands. “Fine. Ffion, Griffith, you two range out about a hundred miles and see if any other dragons are in the area. If Demba and the others are gone, we’ll fly for Eryri. However, in the very likely case that we will be staying here until help comes, we need food. Deryn, your leg should be healed tomorrow. We’ve got food for two or three days. You and Cadoc find something that will last the rest of the time we’re here. Cadoc or I can take the human girl home after that.”

  “If she isn’t heartsworn to you, chief,” Cadoc added. “In that case, I’ve already volunteered to take her back. But you never know. It could be lov
e.”

  Rhys stifled a laugh. Ashem spoke through gritted teeth. “Everyone be back by sunset on the second day.” He jerked his head at Cadoc. “Take your musical twiddlings and go sit the first watch.”

  “Anything to please you, Commander.” Cadoc swept a bow to the room and left. Ffion went back to her book. Griffith, Deryn and Ashem sat around, speaking softly.

  Rhys’s thoughts lingered on the human girl. Human mates weren’t uncommon, but Rhys would rather declare himself Unsworn than be bound to one. Yes, the Council—a governing body of dragons comprised of two representatives from each clan, plus two Wingless—would fly into a rage if Rhys turned up with a Wingless mate. But aside from that, humans were too changeable, too unpredictable, too apt to betray.

  His mother had been human.

  His lip curled. Thrusting thoughts of her into the deep recesses of his mind, Rhys settled deeper into his pillow. The babble of his friends washed over him. Kai would only be around a day or two, no more than an eye blink. Staying away would be no challenge at all.

  Chapter Five

  If You Need a Little Warming

  Kai returned to the sleeping room only to find it empty. Voices came from beyond the stone archway, but they weren’t talking loud enough for her to hear much. Not that she’d understand the language if she could.

  Kai grasped a carabiner, rubbing one thumb across the smooth metal bar. She looked around the empty room again, as if she might find someone to talk to. But she was alone.

  Shrugging off the sudden, overwhelming feeling of isolation, Kai walked back out to the main cavern, hoping Cadoc, who was at least friendly, might emerge soon.

  She examined the cavern wall. Reaching up, she slid each of her hands into crevices in the stone. As soon as her palms came into contact with the cool rock, her shoulders unknotted. Her headache dulled. She exhaled. As easy as breathing, she lifted her foot to a little outcrop and pulled herself up.

  Someone laughed, warm and rich. Kai sprang away from the wall. Cadoc stood behind her, guitar over one shoulder. “What are you doing?”