Curran was almost to me.
“Trust me,” I called out. “I’ve got this.”
I would catch hell for this later. I dissolved the ward and held out my left hand. “Lead the way.”
The warrior took my fingers in his, pressing the stone against my hand.
Curran was almost to us. He jumped, covering the last twenty feet.
The world turned white and then my stomach tried to go one way while most of me went the other. The white light faded. My body clenched. I spun around and vomited onto the rocky ground. Awesome entrance. So regal and impressive.
I straightened. We stood on a stone bridge spanning a deep gorge. In front of us a castle rose. Built with dark stone, it didn’t have the elaborate spires and ornamental work of Victorian English palaces or German gingerbread castles. No, this was an Anglo-Norman square stone keep, with thick walls and a forest of massive towers scratching at the sky. To the left, a mountain ridge curved down and away into the mists. To the right, a deep wide valley stretched, bordered at the horizon by more mountains. Far in the distance, at the foot of that other mountain ridge, a lake caught the sun and glistened. The air smelled like pines. A cold draft slid against my skin and I shivered.
In his realm, you are a ghost . . . Well, this ghost should’ve brought a sweater.
“This way,” the warrior told me.
I sheathed Sarrat. We walked down the stone bridge to the massive gates. I couldn’t see the sun, but the sky was light.
“How long have you served Neig?” I asked.
“Forever.”
“What about your family? Did you leave anyone behind?”
No answer.
“Do you remember where you used to live? Was it here in Georgia? Was it in Ireland?”
No answer.
We reached the gates.
“Are you sure you don’t remember your family? You must’ve come from somewhere. What was your mother’s name?”
No answer.
The gates swung open and we walked into the courtyard. A second pair of gates creaked open at our approach. The soldier halted and pointed at the gateway. I was meant to keep going on my own.
I marched through the doors and into a throne room, lit by glass globes dripping from the walls. The floor glistered. At first glance it looked like glass, but no, it was gold. Melted down and allowed to cool into a perfectly smooth surface that gleamed with a mirror sheen. A man-made stream wound its way through the floor in a gentle curve, only a couple of inches deep. Gems lined the creek bed, gleaming in the water: red rubies, green emeralds, blue sapphires, purple amethysts, light-green peridots . . . A fortune in precious jewels, cast there like sea glass at the bottom of a fish tank.
A throne dominated the far wall, carved from the bones of some enormous creature into the shape of a dragon in profile. A red gem the size of a grapefruit sat in the dragon’s eye socket. It felt warm and suffused with magic, as if it were somehow alive. I brushed it with my magic and it sparked off my power. Wow. It was condensed magic, so potent it felt like a tiny sun.
The anchor. The arrogant bastard had his anchor right there, just past his front door.
Neig waited for me on the throne, dressed in full regalia, his fur cape draped over his armor, the golden torque bright. To his left, a long table offered a feast. Roasted meat, golden bread, fruit, wine. The aroma made my mouth water.
“Should’ve colored the water in your stream red,” I told him.
“A river of blood?” he said. His voice enveloped me, deep and vibrating with power.
“It would be more honest.”
“But you wouldn’t be able to see the beauty of the jewels.” He indicated the table with a sweep of his hand. “Please. Sate your hunger.”
Nice try. I did my Erra sneer. “Really?”
Neig smiled, betraying a hint of sharp teeth. The table vanished. Okay then.
He stepped off the throne and approached me. I’d clocked him at about six-six, six-seven before. I was off by about half a foot. He towered over me.
“I wish to give you a tour of my domain.”
“Oh goody.”
We strolled out of the throne room into a hallway of enormous arched windows.
“Are you a man or a dragon?” I asked him.
“I’m both.”
“But what were you born as?”
“It was a long time ago. I do not remember. Some of us were born with talons, others with hands, but we are all Dragon.”
“What are Dragon?”
“An ancient race. We were here when humans crawled out of the mud. We watched you try to walk upright and bang rocks against each other, trying to make claws and teeth.”
Yeah, right. “You’re not that old.”
He grinned again. Tiny streaks of smoke escaped his mouth. Awesome. If I got too cold, I could ask him to breathe on me.
“Why do you want to conquer?” I asked.
“Why would I not?”
“You brought me here to convince me to join you. So far, you’re doing a terrible job of it.”
“You’re an interesting creature, Daughter of Nimrod.”
“The name is Kate Lennart. I’m not defined by being my father’s daughter.”
“But you’re defined by your husband’s name.”
“I chose that name. I decided I wanted it.”
His thick eyebrows came together.
“If you’re not going to answer any questions, this will be a very one-sided conversation,” I told him.
“Very well. I will answer your question. I want to conquer because it pleases me. I like to rule, I like to own, and I like to be acknowledged as the supreme power.”
“Your conquest will cost hundreds of thousands of lives. Millions.”
“Human lives.”
“Yes.”
“There are always more humans,” he said. “There is never a shortage.”
We passed from the hallway into a massive room. Shelves lined the fifty-foot walls. Books filled the shelves, thousands and thousands of books: some bound in leather, some hidden in scroll tubes, papyrus, clay tablets, Chinese bamboo books, long strips of animal hide sheltered by wooden covers . . . Above it all, a skylight spilled a stream of sunlight into the middle of the room, never touching the precious volumes. My father would kill himself out of jealousy.
“Have you read any of these?”
“Yes.”
“Were they written by humans?”
“Most of them.”
“Then you saw into their minds. You know that each human is unique. Once you kill one, there will never be another one exactly like it.”
Neig stepped to the shelf and pulled out a heavy tome, bound in leather and inlaid with gold. The writing on the cover resembled Ashuri script, but the ancient Hebrews wrote on scrolls, not in bound books. Neig stepped to the window. It swung open in front of him and he tossed the book outside.
“Wait!” I lunged for the window and saw the book plunge down and disappear into mists somewhere far below.
“Fifty humans wrote that book,” Neig said, and indicated the library with a sweep of his hand. “Is my collection any less magnificent?”
I sighed.
“Why do you care?” he asked. “You are more powerful than them. You are faster, stronger, better in every way. I watched you kill. You enjoy it.”
“I kill to protect myself and others. I don’t begin violence, I respond to it.”
“Why not kill for pleasure?”
“Because I find pleasure in other ways. When I see people prospering and enjoying their lives, it makes me happy.”
He puzzled over me and resumed his walk. I followed him.
“Why?” he asked.
“Because when people prosper, the world is safer. There are pleasures
in the world that you have never dreamed of. Why do you read books?”
“To understand those I wish to subjugate.”
“Bullshit. You’re stuck here, in a place where time has no meaning, with nothing to do. You read because you are bored.”
He laughed. Every hair on the back of my neck stood on end. The sharp, cold punch of alarm hit me low in the gut. Note to self: avoid laughing dragons.
“If you conquer everyone, life will be boring and empty of all meaning. There will be no more books to read or fun conversations to be had.”
“It will take some time to conquer the world. In the meantime, I will be greatly entertained.”
“Have you tried actually walking around among people?”
We passed out of the library into another large room. Heaps of gold leaned against the walls. Coins, nuggets, jewelry. He was showing me his hoard. How predictable.
“I have, when I was young,” he said. “I lived with humans for half a century. I’ve learned that you are weak, stupid, and easily cowed. Given the chance, you would rather fight each other than unite against a threat. I’ve never seen creatures who hate themselves so much.”
“Then you’re in for a surprise,” I said.
“The twisted furry things you fought and killed,” he said. “My slave-hounds.”
“The yeddimur.”
“Each started its life as a human babe. Each inhaled the fumes of my venom. Now they are beasts, primitive and filthy. They know nothing except rage and hunger. They eat their own. That is the true nature of humanity. I simply brought it to the surface.”
Ahead, double doors opened before us.
“Let me show you my power,” he said.
We walked through the door onto a balcony. The valley below spread before us, covered in odd blue vegetation. I squinted.
He passed me a spyglass. I looked through it.
Warriors. They stood packed next to each other like sardines. Miles and miles of warriors standing completely still.
Oh God.
“My army,” he said. “In my domain, there is no time, no hunger, and no thirst, unless I will it to be. Here I rule uncontested.”
They stood in squares, two, four, six, twenty men per row. Twenty by twenty equaled four hundred. How many squares? One, two, three . . .
“They sleep until I call them. They’ve waited for thousands of your years, but for them it is a blink.”
. . . Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three . . .
“Their muscles are trained; their skills are sharp. They live to battle in my name.”
. . . Thirty-four . . . I stopped. We didn’t have enough people. Even if the Conclave put every fighter they had on the field, we wouldn’t have enough.
I swung the spyglass left, toward some dark-brown stains, and saw corrals filled with yeddimur, curled into swarms, piled onto each other. A horde waiting to be unleashed.
“How do I know it’s not an illusion?”
“I have no need to lie,” he said. “What would be the point? It would be a short-lived deception. Whether you agree to my terms or you don’t, I will still field my army. I require sustenance to remain in your world, and I am ready for battle. You will see the size of my force when I unleash it. Nothing would stop you from turning on me if I lied.”
Thousands and thousands and thousands of troops. Nausea squirmed through me. Atlanta was doomed. “You cook people and devour their bones.”
“Yes. It is faster and more efficient than devouring them whole. Eventually I’ll consume enough and will no longer require it.”
“How many people will die to reach that eventually?”
“There will be enough left,” he said.
He stepped closer to me. His fingers rested on my shoulders.
“You hate your father,” he said. “Everyone knows it. People whisper of it.”
“I also love my father.”
“Families are complicated. I loved my father, but I killed him and took his land. I’m giving you the chance to do the same. I need a guide to your world. You can be my queen. You are brimming with magic. I can taste it.”
He leaned down next to me. The smoke from his mouth brushed my cheek. My skin crawled.
“Our children would be powerful beyond measure. They would be kings and queens.”
“I’m married, and I already have a child.”
“Keep him. Keep your husband as a plaything.” His deep voice rolled over my skin. “I will help you kill your father. We will rule the world together.”
“And what happens to Atlanta?”
He touched my hair. “The city is yours to do with as you wish. A wedding gift, if you like. I only require the slaves.”
“The slaves?”
“The humans. We can bargain, if you want. How many do you wish to keep? I will give you the pretty ones.”
“Ugh. You’re really inhuman.”
“Riches, power, the pleasure of conquest, pleasures of the flesh, pleasures of the mind. What is it you want, Kate Lennart?”
“To cut off your head.”
He laughed again. His hands flexed on my shoulders as if his fingers had talons. “I will give you three days to decide. Three days of peace and contemplation. After three days, with the first magic wave that arrives, I come to conquer.”
He had enough troops to attack the city from multiple fronts. We had no walls, no fortifications to stop him, and not enough soldiers to respond to simultaneous assaults. We’d be fighting everywhere, and I’d be crisscrossing Atlanta like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to put out the fires. I had to define the rules of this engagement before he tried to do it.
“Meet me in three days on the ruins of my father’s castle.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“Show me the entirety of your army. Let me behold it. I’ll give you my answer then.”
“Agreed,” he promised, his voice rolling through the vastness of his castle. Smoke escaped his mouth.
“That’s my cue to leave.”
“Stay with me for a while longer. I’ll show you more of my wonders.”
“I’ve seen enough.”
“But you haven’t seen me.”
He stepped aside and slid the fur cape off his shoulders. His armor clattered to the floor. He stood before me naked, big, muscular, and with a champion-sized hard-on.
Really? What was the thinking here? I know you loathe me, because I’m an inhuman mass murderer, but behold my giant erection. That will make you betray everything you stand for.
I crossed my arms on my chest. “Is this supposed to convince me?”
“No,” he said. “This is.”
He ran and took a dive off the balcony. Midway down the catastrophic drop, his body tore. A colossal shape clawed itself free, obsidian black, with a terrifying reptilian head on a long neck and two wings that snapped open. My heart hammered in my chest while every instinct screamed at me to run and hide and hope he wouldn’t find me.
He was bigger than Aspid. His wingspan dwarfed the largest airplanes I’d seen.
The dragon swooped, banked, and dived under the balcony. A moment and his head reared above the rail, two fiery eyes staring straight at me. He rose into the air, climbing straight up, his gaze fixed on me. It took every ounce of my will to stay where I was.
His mouth opened, revealing nightmarish fangs.
In his realm, you are a ghost . . .
Fire burst out of his mouth in a blazing torrent and washed over me. The flames blinded me, passing over my body but doing no damage.
I waited until he was done. When the flames fell, I stood exactly where I’d been before, my arms still crossed on my chest.
The dragon’s eyes studied me, and for the first time I saw a hint of uncertainty in their depths.
I forced myse
lf to shrug and reached for home in my mind.
The world went white. I landed on the grass, blinked, and saw my father, his face twisted with fury.
“SHARRIM! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?”
* * *
• • •
EVERYTHING HURT. THE pain wasn’t acute, just thorough. Every cell in my body throbbed.
“ARE YOU HARD OF HEARING, SHARRIM? ANSWER ME! SHARRIM?”
It dawned on me that he expected me to make some sort of sound. “No.”
“DO YOU POSSESS THE GIFT OF SPEECH? DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE WORDS I UTTER?”
“Yes.” I sat up. I was sitting in the clearing outside our backyard. Curran, Hugh, and Elara were standing only a few yards away. They looked like they were screaming, but for some reason I couldn’t hear them.
“REPEAT BACK TO ME WHAT I SAID ABOUT NEIG’S REALM.”
“You forbade me to go,” I intoned.
“AND WHAT DID YOU DO?”
“I went.”
“SO, YOU DELIBERATELY DISOBEYED ME.”
“Yes, Mufasa.”
“DO I LOOK LIKE I AM IN THE MOOD FOR JOKES?” my father thundered.
When not sure what to say, stall for time. I had a role to play in this drama, and I had to think of exactly how to play it to push my dad over the edge. That is, assuming my aunt didn’t chicken out.
“I GAVE YOU A CLEAR SET OF INSTRUCTIONS. MORE, I EXPLAINED WHY CAUTION WAS NECESSARY.”
Curran took a running start and jumped. An invisible wall pulsed with bright crimson, and he bounced back.
“Did you set a blood ward around us, so you could scream at me uninterrupted?”
“YES!”
Of course he did. “Carry on then.”
I lay flat on the grass. It was nice and soft. Come on, Rose of Tigris. Don’t leave me hanging. If Erra didn’t show up, I’d have to rethink my strategy fast.
He bent over me. “You went into the dragon’s den. You could’ve died.”
Ah. That’s why the freak-out. “I’m alive. You’re still with us, Father. Don’t be so dramatic.”
“I WAS WORRIED ABOUT YOU, YOU FOOLISH CHILD!”
“You were worried about your own survival.”
Magic Triumphs Page 30