I gave a sharp, hollow laugh. “The king’s nephew? Even if he forgave me for deceiving him, never. But if I do have a highborn-enough father, I may not end up in a field.”
*And if that father is the Dragonmaster, then the Council of Elder Dragons will demand that you stay at the Kyer.* Mettalise nodded gravely. *Not even Dragonsridge will protest if all the dragons make a claim on you.*
“Exactly.” I tapped the pocket with the letters. “So I need proof.”
Suddenly Mettalise burst back into her wiggly self. *After you get your proof, you can kill Thorkel! That will make everyone happy. Surely King Irian will accept a war hero as a niece.*
I laughed, this time for real. Leave it to a dragon to simplify things.
Mettalise dangled her harness at me, giddy. It took only minutes to strap it on her, we’d practiced so much, and yet another minute to become airborne.
No one questioned us as we left the Kyer. All the new Dragon Mages went flying frequently, practicing. Still, Mettalise went to the clouds as soon as possible, flying high, freezing me half to death. Occasionally we dipped low to check the landmarks outlined in Thorkel’s directions.
Half a day after leaving, at twilight, Mettalise’s wingbeats slowed. *Look. Refugees.*
*This far from the fighting?* I rubbed my arms and legs to not-numb as she banked to get closer for my weak human eyesight. Finally, I spotted a cluster of tents in a valley. *Do you think it’s Stoneyfield? Orrik told me that Merram had evacuated them.*
We flew closer. She took care to hide herself with a mountain or tall tree—dragons trained for concealment from a young age, out of concern for the puny humans they terrified. She landed on a cliff.
The County of Tworivers banner flapped on the outskirts of the camp.
“Merram did evacuate them,” I murmured. As the sun set, figures brought in laundry, tended fires. “I suspect he gave them the tents, too. Maybe food.”
This close to the Kyer, nestled in the mountains, the war would have to become dire to threaten them again. Had Merram always been this kind of person? Or had Krysta’s letters changed him?
*I don’t understand why Merram avoids seeing you when he cares about your life so much. It must be a human thing.* Mettalise’s voice came lightly in the midst of my thickening emotion. *Shall we say hello? You could stay with your foster mother tonight… Lily?*
Longing and fear clashed in my heart. I missed Lily. Terribly. She’d always kept herself one step away from being a real mother, but that didn’t change the affection we’d shared. For ten years, she taught me so much. She’d listened to my problems and given me what she could. Not once did she seem to regret the task she’d taken on… until the end.
“We could fly a little farther tonight,” I said.
*Adara.*
“She wouldn’t look at me,” I said. I turned my back on the camp. Mettalise watched me with a frown. “The entire village gathered to throw me out, and she never looked at me. Could you blame her?” I cut Mettalise off before my dragon could take the question literally. “A single tantrum took away everything she had.”
Mettalise did the draconian version of hmph, fluttering my hair and clothing with sulfuric breath. *And because you destroyed her home of sticks, Merram found you and decided to save her from marauding Carthesians.*
Sometimes I didn’t appreciate my dragon’s perspective. “I’m not ready. We can go after Thorkel.”
The sun setting behind her turned her silver scales rose. *We may not come back this way.*
“Please don’t tell me you expect me to join Thorkel.” She didn’t, I knew she didn’t, but I didn’t want to state the alternatives. “I said, let’s go. North.”
Mettalise positioned herself so I could climb on. She lowered the emotional block entirely and I fought a physical urge to brush my arms as if I could wipe away her disapproval. I refused to raise my own block and made a point of fastening the ties with fervor. Mettalise jumped, jolting my spine, and her first few wing beats were a bit more energetic than normal.
We entered the clouds, the clammy moisture clinging like Mettalise’s mood. Within moments of cloudbreak, I was shivering again. Next time I needed to go on a long journey with a high-flying dragon, I needed to wear a cloak. Not even the beauty of the stars appearing in the night sky distracted me from the cold.
*You want Shamino to accept you,* Mettalise said. *He can’t do that if you’re not around. Neither can those commoners.*
I stayed silent. She could sense my feelings.
*Yes, there’s the chance that they reject you. That they run you out of camp. But choosing to run first guarantees you will never be able to experience forgiveness.*
*Are you done?*
*Flying.*
We flew in silence until Mettalise decided my body couldn’t take the cold any longer. The next morning, she acted chipper, but I sensed grumpiness underneath. Eventually, being Mettalise, she let it go. My dragon didn’t do grumpy very well.
It took two more days of flying. I kept myself emotionally numb and physically alert. I squished every thought of Stoneyfield, or the Kyer, or Shamino. By the time we saw the tiny mountain sketched in Thorkel’s directions, I wanted to shout in relief. Yes, we were walking into a trap, but it was a nice, distracting trap.
Blessed rain, I’m thinking like Mettalise.
The profile of a mountain became actual trees and rock. On the low peak sat a large structure, and Mettalise scanned the forests leading up to it.
*If there are dragons, I don’t see them,* Mettalise said.
*Can you sense any?* I asked.
*I can only sense dragons I know,* Mettalise said. At my surprise, she explained. *I only have telepathic connections with those I grew up with. If I see a strange dragon, I can create a connection, but otherwise the enemy is invisible. That’s how they ambushed that Flight weeks ago.*
She circled some more. Not only did we see no dragons, we only saw one place for a single dragon to land. The clearing did have marks of large, heaving things having flattened the grass, but the clearing was many dragon-lengths away from the mansion. If Thorkel attacked me while I was in there, Mettalise would have to burn down the nearby forest to get to me.
*I’m a fool to have brought us here,* I said as she hovered.
*Meh. You had my support.* She lighted on the ground. I dismounted. *Be careful. I only get one human, you know.*
I nodded and started down the suggestion of a path through the pine forest.
Chapter Thirty-Four
By air, the structure on the mountain’s peak looked like some noble’s summer retreat. Up close, it was clear the noble had died long ago and his descendants did not love mountains. So many sections of roof had collapsed that the second floor couldn’t possibly be livable. Paint flecked everywhere, revealing wood that had rotted as the seasons changed. Closed shutters hung askew, slats missing. Shutterless windows on the second floor winked with jagged, broken glass; long ago, someone had taken the precious panes out of the first-story windows.
Yet the mansion still carried an aura of pride. It could be glorious again with attention. The house didn’t list, meaning the main supports still stood strong, and the first floor seemed to be whole. The view, if trees were cleared away, would be breathtaking.
For long moments, I stood in front of the large front door. It, too, seemed old, but by no means weak. I summoned courage and used the brass knocker.
A man with blue and purple etches on his cheeks opened the door so quickly he had to have been waiting on the other side. He wore a sandy, knee-length robe over a black shirt and breeches. A sword hung from his hip. He broke into a smile, his teeth gleaming white in his dark face.
“Adara! Welcome!” he cried in thickly accented Dragerian. He waved me inside, and I caught the glint of a ring. “Come in, come in!”
He led me down a dim hallway smelling of must and, faintly, desert spice. Cobwebs draped from the ceiling and dust coated the floor. He creaked open a do
or to an expansive room.
The mansion changed entirely.
At least ten men in Carthesian garb looked up from tables scattered around the spotless room. Sunlight filtered through a hole in the ceiling, making the air glitter and hilts glint. Most men sported tattoos. Every man wore a ring. I sent Mettalise a quick description of what I saw.
“Go away! Out, out!” my escort said to the men. He followed with something else in Carthesian, and the men abandoned card games and Stones boards. Most of them exited through the farthest of four doors. Unlike the door I had come through, none of theirs creaked. Locks clicked in the silence that followed.
My Carthesian headed to a polished side table laden with fruits, cheeses, and breads. “Hungry from flight?”
“Um… water?” I preferred the hostile men.
“Yes! We have water.” He brought me a chilled glass and a plate piled with food. I set the food on top of someone’s Stones board on the nearest table.
The Carthesian noticed how I had freed one hand. He laughed and tapped his head. “Ahhh, smart girl!”
“Thorkel,” I said. I needed this over before my practiced numbness was destroyed by nerves. “He did send the notes?”
“Bah, Dragerians too impatient. No sense of hospitality.”
“I’m not here to visit,” I said, though I felt a touch of guilt at rejecting him. I shook it off. “I’m here for the truth.”
The man wrinkled a nose. “Truth. Is a creature of many faces. Like this. Who am I? I am pappa to my boy. I am no-good camel racer to my mama. A supply person to my king—who I get right now, grumpy girl.” He moved toward a door on the right and waved a ringed hand in the air. “I hope you like truth.”
I set the full glass of water on the table next to the food. The Carthesian had made me off-balance with his friendly talk. Soon, I’d see the face of the man who had invaded my kingdom, destroyed my village, and killed my dragons.
Who had given me the key to my Gift. The sapphire hung heavy against my chest.
A door opened.
A tanned Dragerian in Carthesian clothing entered. Thorkel was shorter than I. His brown, thinning hair was half gone, but what remained curled at the edges. I guessed him about forty. Black, squinty eyes. He saw me, and he smiled.
My smile.
Chapter Thirty-Five
“First One, no,” I said, my voice barely louder than a breath.
His smile grew and I trembled to see my smile on that man. “At long last. I am pleased you inherited my curiosity and thirst for truth. But beauty, that you got from Krysta. You are her made anew.”
“You—you’re Thorkel,” I said. I leaned against the table for support, and it ground against the wooden floor. “I thought Merram was my father—”
“He claimed you?” My smile on Thorkel’s face twisted into rage.
“No. But…” Merram looked nothing like me, and here was Thorkel with my smile and the curl to my hair. Yet Mother’s letters had been so full of love—
“Ah.” Thorkel’s rage vanished. “A leader of magic and men gives you a home. Naturally you’d assume kinship, and it is easiest for him to keep you ignorant.”
“He knows,” I said, stating the obvious.
Thorkel ambled to the opposite end of the table I leaned on. He lifted a stone from an abandoned game and placed it on the board. “Merram is a master of deceit. For example, did you know you’re a pureblood?”
“What?”
“I was a viscount before Drageria’s and my… misunderstanding. Krysta, the only heir to the Marquis of Clearspring. Your grandfather, I believe, is still alive. Think on that. Merram kept title and family from you. That is the man you follow.”
My face prickled with dizziness. Mother—a marquess. This entire time, I could have been a lady—I could have had a family.
I could have been known as the daughter of Drageria’s greatest enemy.
“The question now becomes, what will you do with this knowledge?” Thorkel moved another piece, playing against himself. “Merram deceived you. He stole my Krysta, and then he let her die alone in filth. He ignored you until you proved useful. You are a tool to him, nothing more. Is that the man you choose to serve?”
He smiled my smile again, tipped the board, and all the pieces clattered to the floor. “Or, do you choose your father, the King of Carthesia—making you a princess—and help me shape a new Drageria?”
My head swam. “I can’t join you.”
“Do not respond out of reflex. Think!” He skirted the table and came closer, stopping in a shard of sparkling sunlight. “When a lord doesn’t take care of his commoners, they leave for a better lord. Drageria is broken. You can heal it. Imagine a Drageria without nobles and commoners but instead with opportunity. In Carthesia, families with magic marry those without.”
“Carthesia has tribes that kill each other,” I said.
“Not anymore.”
I hesitated. The First One’s Record said He gave magic to men so they could protect those without the Gift… but Drageria’s nobles exploited the commoners. Even the Kyer didn’t treat its commoners as full equals, and it ignored the peasants outside its mountains.
“Halfbloods should not exist, not because they are murdered, but because they are impossible. There should not be two bloods.” Thorkel made a fist. “A blue mage should be valued for her beauty, intelligence, and power—not enshrouded by lies because she has been denied the advantages of others. A kingdom so flawed begs to be rebuilt.”
In so many ways, he was right. I had rejoiced to see Stoneyfield cared for, living in tents and hidden in mountains. Meanwhile the Count of Tworivers likely played the Game in Dragonsridge, rewarded for his birth.
Thorkel assassinated the former Dragonmaster, I reminded myself. Against his idyllic words I pictured my dragons bleeding all over the Infirmary floor. “Drageria’s not perfect, but I cannot kill to make it so.”
He raised an eyebrow. “So you are saying that you will refuse to spill blood against me? For if you return to Merram, you will be killing. My men. My dragons. Will you kill to keep Drageria, as you say, less than perfect?”
I looked away. Plaster flaked on the walls, though desert scenes had been hung to hide the decay. The desert, where I would have flown with Mettalise, not because I wanted to fight but because I saw it as the only way to escape heartbreak.
“You need not spill blood,” Thorkel whispered. He slid out of the light, closer to me. “All change brings violence, but I can be the destroyer. Let me shed the blood, for my life is already tainted. When I am done, you can be the healer of a new world.”
Healer. Shamino streaked with blood, his hand on a dragon. Shamino refusing tears so not to upset his patients. Shamino half-dead from draining his Gift to lethal levels. “A healer never wants death.”
“False. Dragerian healers pick and choose death,” Thorkel said in a hard voice. “Had Krysta been allowed a healer when she was ill, you would still have a mother.”
I wished he was touching me, like a Jeweltongue, because his words echoed the thought I’d had a million times. Is this the vision? That I follow Thorkel into battle… against my own people?
“Do not let Krysta’s death be meaningless,” Thorkel urged. He held out a hand. “Join me.”
Join me.
A haze seemed to clear in my mind and a new sense of calm settled over me. I looked Thorkel in the eye. “Tell me this. Why did Mother choose to die as a peasant? Why didn’t she join you in Carthesia?”
Why did she write six years of letters to Merram?
Sadness blanketed Thorkel’s face as he spread his hands. On every finger on his right, ruby rings glittered with magic. “The desert is no place for a delicate flower.”
Wrong answer. Merram had deceived me, but Thorkel was trying the same. I’d watched my mother survive blistering heat and freezing cold. She’d gone without food. She’d lived in isolation. She’d lived in heartbreak. Yet always, always, she smiled for her daughter and fac
ed the days with determination.
*Mettalise, I’m about to upset Thorkel.* No answer. In fact… Emotions as strong as my shock at Thorkel’s identity broke through partial blocks. Mettalise should have reacted.
I readied my Gift for a shield. “Thank you for the truth, Thorkel, but I do not want war.”
“You are choosing a life of hatred! Either you continue on as a false halfblood, or you become known as the traitor’s daughter. You cannot wish to return to that.”
“May we next meet in peace,” I said. Thorkel grabbed my shoulder as I passed. I dared to pull away. As I began the twenty or so paces to the door, I formed a clumsy shield of air behind me. My blood pounded in my ears so loudly I feared I wouldn’t be able to hear a spell.
“You are like Krysta.” Thorkel sounded on the verge of tears. Angry ones. “Krysta’s ideals destroyed her. Adara, don’t make me destroy you.”
I desperately tried to strengthen the shield, but growing panic made it difficult. “You don’t have to do anything to me. It’s a choice.”
He did not speak. The invisible shield behind me shuddered, shattered. Cards fluttered like birds through the room at the blast of air from the destroyed spell. I sucked in what Gift I could as I spun around.
Thorkel laughed. It was not my laugh. My skin crawled at the sound. A red, swirling globe formed next to his head.
“Thorkel,” I said, trying my best to stay calm. I threaded my Gift through the sapphire and renewed my shield, visible but strong fire this time. “You’re a red. I’m a blue.”
“You’re a child. Lower your defenses, and I promise no harm will come to you.”
“You’re not helping me like you,” I said. I edged backward. *Mettalise!*
No answer from my dragon.
“First lesson, daughter. Attacks don’t always come from the front.”
The globe stayed by his head as another spell formed behind me. I didn’t react in time. Even as I pivoted the shield, something struck me and I lost hold of the magic. Red sparks filled my vision.
Blue Fire Page 23