Of Dragon Warrens and Other Traps

by Shannon McGee

  Copyright © 2018 Shannon McGee

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Cover Art and Map © 2018 Sandara Tang

  Formatting and Editing by Polgarus Studio

  First Printing, 2018

  ISBN: 0999470825

  ISBN-13: 978-0999470824

  This book is for anyone conquering their own dragons.

  (This book is for everyone.)

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  About the Author

  Thwack.

  The iron head of my ax made a satisfying sound as it sliced into the pine bough I was cutting. With a grunt, I tugged the ax, trying to free it, but it refused to budge. Glaring resentfully, I used a foot to hold the log in place, then I braced myself and yanked at the handle until the head came loose. I swung it again.

  Crack!

  My second swing split the wood in half, and the pieces tumbled softly to either side of the stump that I was cutting against. Stooping, I tossed them onto the pile of kindling which had already been cut. I sniffed and wiped my nose. There was only a small stack of uncut wood left. When I was through it, I could go lie down inside my tent.

  It was just after the time of The Hunter’s Moon, the month when the days in the mountains turned crisp and the nights were cold. Everyone from my village would be preparing for the winter, in their own ways. Some would be chopping their own extra stores of wood; some of them would be hunting and drying the meat of what they caught. Others would be bringing in the last harvests of the year. It was a busy time for my people…

  But I was no longer with my people.

  Instead, I was riding among a band of mercenaries called Twelfth Company. Twelfth Company did not work during the winter months. They traveled to the guild barracks in Forklahke, a city which lay south of Nophgrin. Still, even for those of their profession, firewood was needed; a morning where tea could be made without having to scrounge around for kindling was coveted.

  I propped up another piece of wood on the stump.

  Growing up on a farm as I had, I was used to chopping wood, and I could work at it for a few hours without tiring. It was also not a chore that was much sought after among the mercenaries, so I never had to fight for it, and that was a relief. I’d chiefly taken on the task as it gave me an excuse to be on my own, something I desperately wanted these days.

  Our flight from Nophgrin had been so abrupt and our pace so blistering that, up until recently, I’d had little time to think of ought else but staying upright in my saddle. As the weeks had gone on our progress had slowed. Only now, farther away than I had ever been from my village, was I realizing how little I could recall of the morning I left home. The details, and even the bulk of what had taken place between the mercenaries, my brother, and a gryphon seemed to have all but faded from my mind.

  I knew how I had gotten to the clearing in the woods. I could remember the smell of the bluebells which had been growing thickly across the ground. I even knew I had fallen among them— when it was all over, I had found stains from the fall on my skirt. I’d thrown out that dress the first week on the road. The streaks of green refused to come out, and I could not stand to see them.

  The thing was, everything between hitting the ground and then Michael’s capture was a hazy blur. If it weren’t for the ugly twin scars on my forearms—the only remaining marks from where my brother had cut me, in order to tempt a gryphon into devouring me, I would have thought I had dreamed the entire ordeal.

  Belinda, the company healer, had used her magic to speed up the mending of those wounds. I was grateful to her for that. Without the cuts to pain me I could forget so much faster. Now that I had time to think about it, I found that I wanted to forget. It was easier not to remember that the person I’d loved and trusted above all others had betrayed me so deeply. I half wished that I could forget everything about my life in Nophgrin, and not just that last awful morning.

  As it was, every time I thought I was getting my footing in this new life, something would set me back—even as recently as this morning. Afua and Cassandra had been discussing plans for when they reached the barracks, and all Cassandra had done was mention in passing was that it was already two weeks into the month of The Mourning Moon—the last month before the winter solstice. But that off-handed comment lodged in my heart like a stone.

  My mother’s birthday was a week ago, and worse than just not being there for it, I had forgotten the day entirely. I had been so caught up with the daily doldrums of being on the road, and trying to get my bearings… I had forgotten.

  “How could I have been so selfish?” I whispered, not for the first time that day.

  I swung the ax again, but this time I missed the log entirely. The ax head buried into the stump, and the log fell dully to its side.

  My tears came in waves then, increasing every time that sentence cycled through my head. I was selfish. My mother had given me the family savings to assure I had a safe journey, and I couldn’t even remember her birthday! I was so self-involved that I hadn’t even noticed when my brother began changing into someone totally dissimilar from the person I had grown up beside. If I had only noticed, perhaps things would have turned out differently.

  As I worked the ax head back out of the stump, I counted the things I had lost, like a mantra. I missed hugging my mother, and my father. I missed the brother I had known, my best friend, and my dogs. I missed sleeping in a home with a fire, and a hot meal every day. I missed the stupid sheep and I missed the gossiping townspeople who sat around the steamy washing pool at the center of town. Even if they probably all hated me now.

  Chopping wood devolved into mostly snuffling and rubbing my nose on my sleeve. When I did make the attempt to continue working, I had to pause after every other swing to clear my eyes enough to see the next piece of wood.

  The day was bright, even under the thinning covering of leaves, and there was almost no wind to add bite or noise to the day. Still, in my state, I didn’t notice Aella when she first came upon me. When I did finally see her, I thought she had probably been there for some time. Embarrassment coupled with my grief at the thought that she had found me sobbing like a tiny babe, away from her mother for the first time.

  Aella was perhaps the largest reason why Twelfth Company had agreed to save me in the first place. Mercenaries weren’t generally in the business of heroic rescues—a fact which a few of the men and women of the company had made sure to mention within earshot of me the last few weeks. But Aella was the commander’s daughter, and she and I had developed a friendship, of sorts, when Twelfth Company was working in my village.

  We had almost had more than a friendship. She had tried to kiss me, and I had admittedly been becoming open to the idea that I wanted her to make the attempt again. She had taken me off guard like no one I had ever met. She had made my hear
t race, and time seemed to stop when I was with her. And she had liked me too. She had thought I was interesting.

  I didn’t know how Aella felt about me now though. All of that had been before I was forced to flee my neighbors, the ones who had gone crazy with fear and anger and lumped me in with the crimes of my twin. The same brother who had tried to kill me, in an attempt at completing a ritual that would bind a gryphon to him as a familiar. The same brother who had burned as I fled south.

  Something fizzed in my wrists. Under both scars, something buzzed like an angry hornet nest. Anger bloomed in me, overshadowing my sorrow. I hated this. I hated that I had turned to such a blubbering mess in the past few weeks. If I could not get ahold of myself, it seemed all too likely that Aella and the rest of Twelfth Company would come to regret bringing me along.

  I took a stuttering breath, forcing those thoughts away. I wanted to shove them somewhere deep. Somewhere they couldn’t hurt me. When Aella came forward I was scrubbing my eyes with the hand not gripping the ax handle, trying for some semblance of composure.

  Gently, she took the ax from me. She used it to strike the stump, the head biting far deeper than when I had struck it. Then she took me by my shoulders, so I had to face her.

  “You’ve got to do something about this, Taryn,” she said.

  My own ire with myself made me shorter than I normally would have been with her. “I’m doing my best. If you don’t want to see this, then don’t come looking for me.”

  She glared at me, giving me a little shake, her own curls bouncing with the movement. “Don’t be daft. We share a tent. You think I don’t know how often you wake in the night?”

  I yanked away from her as my tears ran harder. I used the palms of my hands to try and wipe them away. She sighed and dug into her cloak pocket, producing a much stained, but clean, handkerchief. She thrust it at me, and I buried my face in it.

  “I’m not trying to be mean. I just mean…closing yourself off and crying isn’t doing something.”

  “I—”

  But before I could think of a suitably scathing response, something crashed through the bushes behind me. Judging by Aella’s wide-eyed expression, it wasn’t just a large rabbit. She reached for the short-handled battle-ax at her hip, unbuckling it and pulling it slightly from its holster. Taking my cue from her, I tugged my own ax free of the stump. It took a moment. Despite the ease with which she had lodged it there, it was in deep. When I had freed it, I turned to face whomever had burst in on us…and my heart stalled.

  The trees surrounding the clearing were old growth, close together and thick, but still I couldn’t believe I had been so deep in my own misery that I had missed him. Sitting astride a stocky gray mountain pony that looked much like my own Hale, was Benjamin, the stepfather of a friend of mine from Nophgrin. Or at least, Beth had been a friend. Since my brother had done his best to force Twelfth Company out of town by framing them for her assault, I wasn’t sure how she or either of her parents felt about me.

  Benjamin looked haggard. His eyes were sunken, and his sandy brown hair was coming loose from its braid. His trousers and boots were stained with mud. Grease was smeared down the front of his cream tunic, as though he had been eating in the saddle. When he bared his teeth, in an unsightly grin of triumph, my eyes jumped from that grin to his hands. They were clutching a spear—pointed at me.

  “Benjamin?” My voice rasped as it came out, still thick with tears, and now surprise. “What…what are you doing here?”

  “I’ve come to bring you home.” His eyes flicked briefly to Aella before coming back to me. “Stand aside, mercenary.”

  A small thrill shot through my chest at the words. Home? I could go home? I could see my parents again?

  Aella, ignoring his command, moved more solidly between the two of us. That brief pause in the conversation gave me enough time to get a grip on myself. My parents knew where I was going. If I was forgiven for Michael’s crimes, why not send a letter? Why not come themselves? Why had he ridden so hard that his mount was streaked in sweat, and why had he not put his spear away?

  “Did you plan to take her home by horse or by hobble?” Aella asked. My stomach roiled and I glanced back at Benjamin. I wasn’t just on some trip out into the forest. There was a reason we had ridden so hard in the beginning of our journey. I couldn’t go home. Ever.

  “You thought you could just get away with it?” He was speaking to me over Aella’s shoulder, voice barely above a hiss. Perhaps he knew that if he was too loud he would bring the whole company down on his head. He must have been watching us to know I was out here alone. The thought sent another bolt of fear through me. “You thought if you ran far enough away you wouldn’t be caught and brought to the flame’s justice?”

  “I didn’t…”

  “You didn’t think maybe Beth’s father would want justice for both people responsible for her injuries?”

  I brought the ax up across my chest, trying to keep his words from striking my heart. “I’m not—”

  “Do you have any idea what she went through? Did you even care if it meant your brother could get what he wanted?”

  “That’s enough,” Aella said sharply.

  “I’ll say when it’s enough!” he bellowed back, and then he looked startled as though he hadn’t intended to yell. He glanced around nervously before looking back at me. There was a pleading note in his voice when he spoke again. “You know what you did was wrong, girl. Own up to it. Pay your debt or the village won’t be cleansed of it. Beth will have to keep facing the ill luck you brought upon her, long after you find some new life for yourself. You know that.”

  He was speaking of the mountain belief that bad luck, whether from illness or crime, could spread if it wasn’t burned away. Fire was the justice of the sun god, Artuos, known to us as Hearth Father, and to others as The Burning One. His justice was absolute.

  My throat tightened painfully. “Benjamin, I didn’t,” I said. “Please, you have to believe me. I didn’t help Michael. I never would. Not like that.”

  His gaze hardened. “Selfish girl. Fine. The hard way. Lads!”

  From behind him two more men entered the clearing, also on pony-back. I had been too focused on Benjamin to notice them, but Aella didn’t look surprised.

  It made sense, when I thought about it, that he wouldn’t have come alone. He had not brought Nophgrin’s guardsman William, or my best friend’s father, Anwar—both of whom were skilled trackers—instead Corey was the first to break through the cover of the trees. He was the pig farmer’s son and Beth’s beau, and he was looking as oily as ever. It didn’t surprise me that the expression on his face belied cruel pleasure at being called upon to deal with me “the hard way.”

  What did shock me was that the second person to join us was Martin, the eldest son of my old neighbor. We had never been close, but nor had we ever been at odds, not in such a way that I ever would have expected him to be here. Martin was ordinarily a well-kempt young man, but he had managed to keep his appearance only a little tidier than the other two. His spectacles were clearly smudged and speckled even from this distance.

  The last time I had seen the two younger men together they had been part of the mob that had carried off Michael. Now they were both armed with spears like Benjamin. They had hard expressions on their faces, and ropes looped around their saddle horns. I swallowed hard.

  “We know everything, Taryn,” Martin said, adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses. Like Benjamin, his tone was almost cajoling, as though I was a child caught in an obvious lie. “You set up the outing we all went on. It was the night before Beth woke and named Michael as her attacker, right? You knew it was only a matter of time before Michael was revealed, and so you organized the bonfire. One where we somehow managed to end up beside a dangerous gryphon den. The same place where the very next day Michael was apprehended participating in a blood magic ritual. At which you were also in attendance. Would’ve been convenient if he had a few more bodies to work with
, huh? Maybe if you had been successful, he wouldn’t have been caught.”

  Horrified, I gaped at them. Was this what people really thought? “No!” I protested. “I didn’t know it was there any more than the rest of you! Nai suggested the spot, and Aella suggested the outing to begin with. I would never have knowingly put you in danger!”

  Corey smirked. “Not exactly a believable tale, Taryn. Sorry.” He was dismounting, grabbing up his loop of rope. I backed away as Martin and Benjamin followed suit.

  Aella glanced back at me, her eyes brimming with the same fervor I had seen in them before we went after Michael—fighting excited her. Well, it terrified me. I shook my head, trying to dislodge the helpless feeling stuck in my throat. The light in her eyes dimmed as she took in my terrified expression.

  Briskly she unclipped the horn that she and most of the company wore on their belt and tossed it to me. It landed in the dirt at my feet with a dull ‘thut.’ Still clutching the wood-cutting ax, I stared at the horn and then at her.

  She sighed. “Get that in your mouth and blow. Keep blowing until help comes. Or until—”

  My former neighbors rushed us as one. For a few seconds I was frozen, completely awe struck as Aella held off all three of them at once.

  Three full-grown men against only one mostly grown girl was not fair, but she was up to the challenge. The loose sleeves of her tunic fell back to reveal forearm muscles that flexed under the strain of her first block. Her entire body moved, snakelike to avoid the other two incoming attacks. When she had gotten clear, she paused long enough to shake out the arm that had held her ax, then she began her own attack.

  She didn’t hack with her weapon; she seemed to be trying her best to use it more as a shield and a way to keep them at a distance. However, that courtesy did not extend so far as to keep her from bruising anyone who got in range of her heavy boots.

  Her foot snapped out and connected with Martin’s knee, and she danced backward as he swung wildly at her. Martin’s erratic attack cut off a thrust from Corey. They cursed at one another, taking precious seconds to get out of each other’s way.