“I do. I absolutely do. I just get annoyed when people ask me if I’m a dead guy.”
“Drystan. You are a dead guy,” Damian pointed out.
“Damn it, you know what I mean,” Drystan snapped. “Anyone mind if we talk about work instead of the specific dead guy I’m named for?”
“I really hate when he’s cranky,” Zane remarked.
“Don’t we all,” Damian intoned. Drystan rolled his blue eyes heavenward and was grateful the dragons finally focused on their fair so he could get back to his office sometime that day. He could almost feel the pile of crap he had to do on his desk growing.
Chapter 25
“Yo, RK, you have messages,” Kyle, his office manager called out as soon as he stepped into the large headquarters of the Order of the Fallen Knights.
“Hand them over; are Vann and Roman around?” Drystan asked when he reached Kyle’s massive desk.
“In their office,” Kyle replied.
“Good, anything urgent?”
“Oh come on, everything around here is urgent.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Drystan said as he headed toward the area of the workplace that housed the office shared by his Venerable Knights and behind it his own space.
“Vann. Roman. My office,” Drystan ordered as he passed them on the way to his door.
“Oh fuck, he’s in a mood,” Vann commented.
“I hate when he’s in a mood,” Roman groused.
“Would you idiots just get in here?”
“You fight with Chrys or something?” Roman asked.
“No big deal, he just wants me to give him my DNA.”
“The fuck?” Vann asked.
“Not the whole ‘you’re the emperor’ shit again?” Roman asked.
Drystan dropped into his chair. “You guessed it.”
“Tell them you’ll give it to them when Damian finally hits puberty,” Vann said.
“You’re hilarious, anyone ever tell you that?” Roman asked.
“I do hate to brag, but—”
“Bullshit,” Drystan began. “Anyway, we need to get up to speed on everything for tomorrow. Are we ready?”
“Of course, we’ll all three be at the training center this week so it’ll be hectic around here without us, but we can get caught up over the weekend when we start alternating at the center,” Roman said.
“You’ve looked over everything and you’re sure we’re good with only adding five new fallen knights?” Drystan asked.
“Yeah, I think we’ll be all right with that number. Unless we get a couple of overachievers,” Roman replied.
“Still hoping for someone to test high enough to be a Venerable Knight?”
“It’s been six and a half centuries; why hasn’t anyone been able to achieve our rank? It’s insane,” Vann griped.
“Stop bitching; there’s only one of me,” Drystan replied.
“We might get a Juris Knight…things would be tight with only five if we do,” Roman added.
“Juris tests are almost as hard as Venerable; we only get one every decade or so. Except for a century ago when we got two in one class,” Drystan pointed out.
“The good news is Juris Knight Mitchell and Juris Knight Pierson still hate each other’s ever-loving guts,” Vann said.
“It doesn’t help that as the people responsible for overseeing cases and representing individuals, they are often pitted against one another. We’ll be lucky if they don’t figure out a way to kill each other one day,” Drystan remarked.
Vann laughed. “If Juris Knights carried weapons, we’d definitely have more to be worried about there.”
“So, back to our new class. Odd number so the first one resurrected gets the single?” Roman asked.
“That’s the way it’s worked in the past; I see no reason to change it,” Drystan said. “You have the training manuals updated?”
“Yeah, I expanded the section on sentinels and included our two new Council elven tribes—assuming, of course, the Acwellan and Cwylld got approved earlier,” Vann replied.
Drystan nodded. “They did.”
“Chand going to resurrect them first thing in the morning?”
“As far as I know, yes. I believe his plan was to finish in enough time to attend tomorrow’s session in the Assembly Hall,” Drystan revealed.
“All broken up you don’t have to go for the next three days, aren’t you?” Roman asked.
“Devastated,” Drystan deadpanned.
“I bet Chand forgets to set his alarm and doesn’t have them all rezzed before we get there,” Roman said.
“Sucker bet. He’s an even worse workaholic than the three of us and let’s be honest—we have no lives,” Vann commented.
“We’re dead. How can we have lives?” Roman asked.
“You have a life, or have you stopped chasing everything that moves?” Drystan asked.
“Believe it or not, sex has become boring.”
“Wouldn’t know,” Vann retorted.
“Me neither,” Drystan added.
“I don’t get how the three of us were rezzed by the same people right after each other and yet you two have virtually no sex drive and are seemingly immune to the charms of both men and women while I’m the opposite,” Roman said. It wasn’t the first time the conversation had come up, and Drystan doubted it would be the last.
“I think you just got all of ours in addition to your own. Seriously, you have fucked your way through about a million people,” Vann responded.
“My theory has always been the same. The spell for fallen knights was doctored from the premise of sentinels, they seem to have a complete lack of sexuality which is very close to Vann and me,” Drystan replied and then turned to Roman. “You were the last of us rezzed; there must have been a change in wording or even the way it was enunciated or something that made you and the ones who followed slightly different.”
“Chand would probably agree with you; there were four people summoning us from the dead. The cadence or even the emotion behind the words can change the outcome of such a powerful spell,” Vann said.
“So, they made a couple of mistakes and then on the third one they finally got it right?” Roman asked with a grin.
“Hey, fuck you. If we are all set, I want to get through some of the shit on my desk before I head out for the night,” Drystan retorted and managed to shoo his Venerable Knights out of his office.
* * *
Drystan had planned on going straight home to his condo so he could continue working but for some reason, he found his feet leading him to the Draconis Museum. It was a stunning building, three stories of nearly all glass and as one would expect, heavily decorated with dragons in the wide rainbow of colors that were possible to shift into.
The Council comprised of more than one beast once thought fabled but Drystan had always been partial to dragons—despite or maybe because he was named for one of the two most revered dragons of all time. Drystan trailed past the section dedicated to the current Emperor Chrysander and the royal family which consisted of his twin and their adopted brother Zane. They were close friends, so he wouldn’t learn anything he didn’t already know from looking at their area of the museum.
Emperor Drystan and Emperor Conley had preceded Chrysander, so their exhibit was next to his. He knew from his previous visits, there were no images of them. They’d either never sat for a portrait or their Imperial Duke and his treacherous cronies had destroyed them. In fact, there wasn’t much left of the fabled men at all.
Shifters and sorcerers both believed in the practice of burning their dead. It had grown out of a desire not to see any of their bodies desecrated by humans. With advances in science, it was even more important now. No one in the Council wanted to be unwitting guinea pigs or have their DNA harvested. Since the bodies of the emperors would have been destroyed in a fire, all their valuables would have been removed beforehand.
And that was where the story from the servant claiming their bodies were stolen
had been able to gain ground. The former emperor’s swords, rings of rank, and even their mating bands had never been found. Their crowns, however, had been located and as Drystan stared at them through the glass of the display he marveled as he always did when he ventured here at how plain they were.
Of course they were gold, it was after all the color of emperors and supposedly the color of Emperor Conley’s dragon. But there were no jewels inlaid in the metal, and the ornamentation was simple. For some reason, he liked knowing his namesake had been humble enough to wear something so unassuming. Everyone knew the dragons had no money at the time, but these crowns were older than the people that had worn them and the story went the more expensive coronets had been sold off to fund what was now Draconis Enterprises.
Next to the headwear was an artist rendering of the infamous golden dragon of Emperor Conley. The beast was so important it had become the emblem of the company run by the dragons. Just behind it on their logo was the matte black one that represented Emperor Drystan. Chrysander had not only seen to it all the people responsible for their deaths had paid with their lives, he continued to ensure no one forgot these two men had lived.
Drystan wondered what the hell he was doing here. There was no way he had any connection to these two long-dead dragons. He’d never had a mate, and goodness knew there was nothing more he wanted in the world. Lonely was a word he was well-acquainted with and he hated it. He despised the ever-present feeling of being alone, of being detached from the world around him, and sometimes he was unable to connect with any other emotion besides it.
There was another significant difference between Emperor Drystan and himself. The man had apparently loved to rule his dragons and Drystan the fallen knight led his people because it was what he was expected to do. After a while, it had become second nature to oversee his people because he loved his work and the men and women who reported to him, but he sometimes became overwhelmed by the responsibilities of his presiding over it all. Which led him to shame—how could he not be anything but grateful he was alive when he shouldn’t be? Whatever or whoever he’d been before, he’d died and the sorcerers of the early Council had given him a second chance.
His phone buzzed at his hip and the interruption was welcome. Especially when he grabbed the device, looked at the screen, and saw who it was.
“Hey, kid,” he said when he hit accept.
“Hey, Dad, what’s up?” Trystan asked.
“Not much, you?”
“I wrote like three chapters of my book today, but I still feel like I need more information to complete the damn thing,” Trystan replied.
“It’s a history book on sentinels. You live with two of them including your own. Grill them.”
“I have. I do. But there are still a lot of questions even they can’t answer.”
“Well if I see any around, I’ll be sure and have them call you,” Drystan said as he headed for the entrance of the museum. He didn’t even know why he’d come here in the first place.
“Funny, since I’ve met every sentinel not at the compound.”
“Write a letter to Chand and tell him to release all the sentinels.”
“Supposedly he talked to his elder council and they aren’t really interested in the plight of the sentinels.”
“Sounds like you need a Plan B.”
“Yeah, Gavrael and Gedeon are going to see what they can come up with,” Trystan confided.
“Between all you crazy D’Vaires you’ll figure out something.”
“That’s what Blodwen said,” Trystan replied, referring to his mate.
“How is our favorite necromancer?”
“She’s fantastic. She says hi and she wants to know when you are coming over to visit.”
“Give her my love. It’ll be a few weeks probably, kiddo—we’re raising five new knights tomorrow.”
“Oh shit, I forgot that was this week. Good luck.”
“You always forget shit like that.”
“I’m the worst fallen knight ever.”
“I’m pretty sure the honor goes to Kyle, and you aren’t even close to being the worst. And you’re only half fallen knight anyway, so don’t beat yourself up over the fact that you prefer history to crime fighting,” Drystan said.
“It’s a lot easier to do that here.”
“I know, which is why I suggested you go to D’Vaire in the first place. Of course, if I’d known your mate lived there, I wouldn’t have asked you. I would have just packed your bag and shoved you out the door.”
Trystan laughed. “Right? Who knew she was here waiting for me to get my face out of a book?”
“How many times did I tell you when you were growing up to do just that?”
“Close to never. You knew I enjoyed it.”
“I obviously failed you as a parent.”
Again, Trystan’s laugh filtered through the phone. “Fishing for compliments?”
“Of course.”
“Oh Father, you are the bestest dad on the planet. I get up every morning and praise Fate I was born to you and not some lesser dad.”
“Shut up, Trystan.”
“Love you, Dad.”
“Love you, kiddo. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“If you can.”
“You betcha,” Drystan replied and they said their good-byes. Stuffing his phone back into its holster on his belt, Drystan finally made it to the large building where he lived. It was part of the Council Headquarters complex and was for leaders like himself. Right now, he just wanted to get inside his condo and have a damn beer. The night was likely going to be a long one, and he already knew the next day would probably be hectic. He needed to clear his head of all this dragon shit and focus on the only thing he knew: how to be the Reverent Knight.
Chapter 26
Chander Daray rolled to the left and gave his pillow a punch. He had done something he rarely did. Shutting his spellbooks, he’d purposely set out to get a good night’s rest. Once a year, he forced himself to sleep because he knew in the early morning hours he would be using a great deal of power to add newly fallen knights to Drystan’s army.
This time it was different, and that was because of the large skull-covered box in his living room. At dawn, he would summon forth Reverent Knight Conley Gylde, and no one’s life would ever be the same. Drystan would finally have his mate, and Chander was thrilled at the prospect. What chilled his blood was what would happen when the pair mixed blood and remembered their previous lives.
While he knew it was only guesswork as to whether sealing a matebond of two resurrected ones would give them back their past, he knew damn well he wasn’t lucky enough they would not. It was quite a love story according to the few servants who had survived long enough to tell it, and Chander was happy to return that to Drystan and Conley.
It was the part about Chander being the sole person responsible for their separation he preferred to forget and wished he could erase. He knew sleep wasn’t going to come, so he left his bed and padded down the hall toward the living room. Once Conley’s box was in view, Chander grabbed a seat on the couch. He’d forgotten his glasses in his bedroom, so his vision was blurry but he didn’t need to see the blasted thing. It was etched in his memory.
“What are you doing up?” Baxter said from the hallway and Chander nearly screamed. The fright caused his heart to beat so fast, his chest tightened. The discomfort was becoming more frequent in his life but he was still a young necromancer; there was no need to run to a doctor or druid.
“Fucking sentinels, moving without making a sound.”
“Sorry, did I scare you?”
“You think?”
Baxter dropped down onto the sofa next to Chander. “Worried about tomorrow?”
“Yeah, there’s a good chance in a few days, weeks, months—however long it takes them to decide to seal their bond—they’ll both hate me.”
“A second chance at life. At love. Seems kind of shitty to hate someone for that.”
&n
bsp; “Perhaps if they weren’t separated for nearly six and a half centuries I would agree with you.”
“You’ve always blamed yourself, but all four of you made the decision to put Conley in stasis.”
“At my suggestion. What the fuck was I thinking?” Chander asked. “Do you realize they could have me arrested? Even killed?”
“Drystan wouldn’t do that to you. You’ve been friends forever, and he’s alive because of you.”
“It was Drystan’s idea, you know. So, the guy who suggested it as a punishment is going to find out I did that very thing to him.”
Baxter gave him a considering look. “You’re more worried about losing his friendship.”
“Yes, I am. We’ve been friends for over six hundred years. He’s a good person. He’s also been a very dedicated Reverent Knight. He deserved better than having Conley in a box for centuries. I’m a horrible person,” Chander said and tried to run his hand through his hair but his hand snagged on a frizzy snarl of curls. He dropped his arm back to his lap.
“No, you did everything you could to reunite them including giving up the Council you once led.”
“It was better to have a shifter at the head when we invited them all to join anyway. It made the transition smoother, and Chrys has done an amazing job.”
“I won’t disagree, but you didn’t have to do what you did. You had no way of knowing when the four of you decided to separate them, Egidius would turn out to be such an asshole.”
“He really was a shithead. He never cared that there was a person in there,” Chander said pointing to Conley’s box.
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