“Don’t forget it.”
Although Fenni couldn’t understand their mind-melding, he laughed harder, guessing what Riona’s snort had meant.
Kierion loosed another arrow, hitting the next target. He wasn’t an arrow flinger. His skill was with a blade, but that was less useful on dragonback. He had no choice but to learn archery. His next arrow went wide.
No matter how many arrows he fired, though, the fragments of glass glistening green with piaua juice were still bright in his mind. Kierion sighed, his shoulders slumping.
“Hey, why are you so glum?” asked Fenni. “Was it the news of that dark dragon? Or seeing Seppi?”
“No, it’s not the dark dragon, although that’s bad enough. I messed up badly today. I smashed the last vial of piaua juice. Now, Seppi’s wound isn’t healed. If it wasn’t for me, he’d be back in the saddle, fighting fit.”
Fenni sucked his breath through his teeth in a hiss. “Oh, that’s bad.”
“I know. I’m not a tree speaker, so I can’t get more juice, but there’s got to be something I can do to fix it. Something I could do to make up for it.”
“Don’t worry,” said Fenni. “We’ll think of something. We’ve always gotten you out of every scrape before.”
He was right. In all the long years they’d known each other, Fenni had often helped him out of trouble. Only recently, he’d saved his hide from tharuk tusks—yet again.
“What’s that?” Fenni called, pointing toward the western summits of Dragon’s Teeth. An orange smudge crested the mountains.
“Looks like Maazini.” Kierion melded with Riona, “Is that Maazini flying erratically over those peaks?”
Riona replied, “Yes, it’s Maazini. His mind is tortured with the screams of a dark dragon.”
They sped toward the orange dragon, who was swooping, thrashing his claws.
Images cascaded through Kierion’s mind. His ears rang with tortured screams. His head pounded, fit to split. A dark beast loomed in his mind, with roiling flame spouting from its maw. The black dragon, wings licking with green mage flame, plunged down into Great Spanglewood Forest. Even though they were only Maazini’s memories passed via Riona, the scent of burning wings made Kierion’s stomach roil. Gods, how awful.
“Riona, can you try and soothe him?”
“Of course. I am already. It’s helping.” Riona headed out toward the clearing by the lake where they’d breakfasted that morning. “I’ve asked them to land so we can talk.”
Had it only been an hour or two since he’d been thinking of nothing but Adelina? So much had happened since then. He’d ruined the hold’s most precious healing supply, and they’d discovered a new threat looming over Dragons’ Realm.
Fenni’s hands tightened around Kierion’s waist as Riona descended.
Below them, Maazini landed, furling his wings, his feet crunching in the snow. He sunk to his haunches, obviously exhausted. Tomaaz was hunched over him, arms around his neck, crooning to Maazini.
Kierion’s heart lurched. Gods, Tomaaz had only just rescued Maazini from Death Valley and Commander Zens’ enslavement. What Commander Zens had wanted with the dragon, Kierion didn’t know. Speculation was rife at Dragons’ Hold. Perhaps the Council of the Twelve Dragon Masters knew something…
Riona landed with a grunt in the clearing. Kierion slipped off her back and strode over to Tomaaz. “What can we do to help?”
Tomaaz, lying against Maazini’s orange scales, turned his head. “He’s all right. He’s settling now. At least that horrible screaming has stopped. It was like my head was on fire, burning with pain. It must’ve been worse for him.”
Kierion patted Maazini’s neck. “Poor boy.”
Tomaaz shook his head. “The dark dragon had strange yellow beams that shot from its eyes—like the sun’s rays.”
Kierion had never heard of anything like it. “Seppi and Septimor were attacked too.”
Maazini growled.
“I don’t think there’s anything that can fight that beast.” Tomaaz’s face was haggard. “With flames like that, and a mind that drives any dragon or rider crazy, what can we do?” Tomaaz barked a harsh laugh. “Attack it from behind while it’s not looking?”
Kierion pursed his lips. Actually, that might not be a bad idea.
“Kierion, what are you thinking now?” Riona’s tone was full of warning. She flicked her tail, showering him with a flurry of snow.
Kierion just stared at her tail.
Patting Maazini’s foreleg, he said, “Take care of yourselves today. It’d pay to report to Lars. I have some urgent training.”
Kierion leaped into the saddle, but this time, behind Fenni. “Fenni, strap yourself in. Riona, please let Linaia and Adelina know we need them, urgently.”
“Why am I up front?” Fenni shook his head, groaning. “I know that look. You have another crazy idea, haven’t you?”
If it could help, maybe it wasn’t that crazy.
Secrets
“Roberto,” Ezaara melded. “Roberto, don’t shut me out. Not now, when you need me.”
Roberto had to. He couldn’t let her into his mind to see the turmoil: fists on young skin; boots in the ribs; blood on his sister’s face; his mother, broken in a heap on the ground.
Bile rose in Roberto’s throat. He swallowed it. “You.” His voice was a harsh whisper echoing through the cavern.
The monster before him raised another trembling hand. “Son?” Amato croaked.
“You forfeited the right to be my father.” Beside Roberto, Ezaara cringed at the harshness in his voice. Gods, oh gods. He’d thought his father was dead. The Naobian Council had searched the lake and never found any sign of Matotoi or Amato.
Ezaara elbowed him in the ribs.
He blocked her out, keeping himself safe behind the wall he’d erected. The wall she’d broken through just moons ago, with her honesty, naivety and beauty.
“You used to look like her,” croaked the skeletal man, shuffling forward. “Like your mother. But now…” He faltered and stopped just beyond the shaft of daylight, staring at Roberto. “But now… now you look like me.”
Ice shot through Roberto’s veins. “You?” Roberto sneered. “I am not like you.”
There it was: his deepest fear laid bare.
After the terrible things Zens had made him do, he’d spent years proving to the world—and himself—that he wasn’t his father. Roberto wanted to lash out and strike Amato—to drive his sword through his father’s throat. Oh gods, he didn’t even have a weapon with him. Did wanting one make him as much of a monster as his father? His hands shook. Cool pebbles of sweat broke out on his forehead.
“You need me now, more than ever,” Ezaara hissed in Roberto’s ear. “You can’t be the only strong one, always there for me. Let me be here for you, now.” She grabbed Roberto’s hand and squeezed it. Hard.
Reluctantly, he let down his walls.
“So, this is the monster that ruined your family.”
He swallowed, his mind too numb to reply.
“I believe you’re Amato.” Ezaara’s word echoed off the cavern’s stone walls.
The dragon, Matotoi—now only a pale faded version of the healthy green he’d once been—nudged Amato’s back. A quick bob of the head was the only sign Roberto’s father gave that he’d heard Ezaara. His eyes didn’t leave Roberto’s face. The hunger in his gaze set Roberto’s cheek twitching. His father looked desperate, a starving, destitute man outside a bakery window.
Ezaara tried again. “How long have you been here?”
“Don’t know,” Pa croaked, eyes still on Roberto. “How long has it been, my boy, since I killed your mother?”
Roberto broke his silence. “I’m not your boy.”
“Son.” Amato sprang, his wiry legs propelling him across the shaft of sunlight. Dropping to his knees, he grasped Roberto’s arm with clammy hands. “Please, Son. Please. It was Zens’ fault. He made me do it.”
“You killed her, all ri
ght. She suffered long moons in living torture before she died. But you did her a favor shoving her off your dragon—it was better than living another day with you.”
“He drove me to everything. With his methimium crystal, he turned me. It wasn’t in my nature. None of it was.” Amato sobbed. “Please, you have to believe me.”
Roberto raised an eyebrow, appraising the worm that had robbed him of his innocence, given him into slavery and corrupted him. It had been a long hard crawl back to decency. “I have to do nothing of the sort.” He shook Amato off his arm.
“Out of the goodness of your heart, I beg you, please take me with you.” Amato’s words croaked out between sobs.
“Goodness? You think there’s goodness in my heart? After the way you treated me?” There was goodness in his heart, but not for Amato. The only thing he had left for his father was a black rotten canker that was rising up his gorge and threatening to choke him. And it was getting worse by the heartbeat. Roberto tugged Ezaara’s hand. “Come on, let’s go.” He turned his back on Amato.
“Please,” Amato called. “You’re my only hope. I can’t hold my breath long enough to swim out any more. Please, let a rope down through the hole and pull me out of this miserable hell.”
“Roberto, look,” Ezaara melded.
“No. That louse ruined my life.” Roberto pulled Ezaara back through the chamber the way they’d come.
“Take me with you.” Amato’s plaintive cry echoed off the cavern walls.
Roberto strode toward the lake, dragging Ezaara with him. He had to get out of here, get that man out of his head.
“Roberto! You’re squeezing my hand so hard you’re hurting me.”
“Oh, sorry.” He released her hand but kept walking. He had to get out of here before he exploded. Before he went back to pummel that frail wretch. Before he did something that he’d forever hate himself for.
Matotoi keened, his wail making goosebumps ripple down Roberto’s back.
“Oh, Roberto! This is awful,” Ezaara melded.
“He’s awful. He killed my mother and beat my littling sister black and blue. You know that.”
“No, I meant this.” Ezaara shared her memory of Amato stepping into the sunlight, stretching his arm high toward the hole in the cavern’s rocky ceiling. “Please, let a rope down through the shaft…” his father said. A puckered scar ran across his father’s back under his shoulder blade. “That. That scar’s what I mean.”
“I don’t care if he’s got old injuries or whether he’s been hurt. He killed villagers in Naobia. He betrayed us to—”
Ezaara shared another memory. It was Roberto, lying on her bed, unconscious. Marlies made a deep incision into the skin under his shoulder blade. He felt tears on Ezaara’s cheeks, tasted their salt as she squeezed the edges of the wound. A fat yellow crystal slithered out onto his back. “What if your father had a crystal from Zens, just like you did?” she asked. “What did he call it, methimium?”
By the holy dragon gods, no.
Even though he’d loved her, Roberto had come close to killing Ezaara, goaded by the dark shadows and whispering voices in his mind. His feet became leaden and he slumped against the slick stone wall.
When Ezaara and Marlies had drugged him and removed his implant, he’d wondered whether Amato had been driven to his actions through Zens’ yellow crystals.
He folded his arms, staring down at Ezaara’s earnest face, illuminated by the pale light of the glowworms. Nearby, the lake lapped at the rock, beckoning him to escape from this nightmare. “I don’t care. He still did what he did”
Ezaara folded her arms. Thrust her chin out. “And I don’t care. You did what you did.”
“I felt terrible about what I did. My father’s a monster with no conscience.”
“We can’t change the past, but we can change the future.” She stalked off, away from the entrance, deeper into the cavern.
“Hey, where are you going?”
“If you leave your father here and he dies, that bitter hate inside you will grow until it consumes you. We’re starting our life’s journey together. I don’t want to live with a man who’ll end up hating himself.”
“I don’t hate myself. I hate him.”
“It’s the same thing, Roberto.” Ezaara’s quiet footsteps were drowned out by Roberto’s thudding heart.
§
Ezaara sighed as the Naobian coast came into view. Thank the Egg, they were nearly at their holiday cottage. Roberto had been silent and tense the entire trip back from Crystal Lake. What had been a short trip there had turned into an extended nightmare on the return flight. Matotoi, a pale skeletal thing, had needed a light scarf across his eyes—it’d been so long since he’d flown in daylight. Or flown anywhere. His wings were weak, so they’d had to land regularly to give him enough rest between short bursts of flight.
And although Ezaara had offered to take Amato on Zaarusha to spare Roberto the pain of traveling with his father, Roberto had insisted the danger of him attacking her was too great. So Amato’s scrawny form was hunched in front of Roberto, his arms flung around Erob’s neck. His eyes were closed, and there was a trace of a smile on his face.
“Is he asleep?” she asked.
“No. He says sun’s too strong for his eyes.”
“Poor man.”
“Don’t poor man him again, Ezaara. He was a terrible tyrant.”
She understood. She really did. Agony laced Roberto’s words. His memories still roiled inside him. Blood. Pain. Beatings. Amato had enjoyed inflicting pain, reveled in it.
But the gibbering man she’d seen in the cave had not been the same Amato as the one in Roberto’s memories, just as Roberto was not the same as when he’d been drugged to train with Commander Zens. They both had blood on their hands. Roberto had redeemed himself. Amato had not. But that didn’t mean that he couldn’t. If Roberto had left Amato in that cave today, he wouldn’t have forgiven himself. Zaarusha banked, heading over the verdigris copper-shingled roofs of Naobia, toward their little cottage by the shore. The faint tang of smoke hung in the air. The Queen landed on the beach, a flurry of sand swirling in the draft from her wingbeats. “Stop fretting, Ezaara. Roberto will be all right. It’ll take time, but he’ll get there.”
Roberto’s stormy eyes flashed and his jaw was clenched as Erob landed near them.
“I hope so.”
Ezaara slid out of the saddle, gathered her belongings from the saddlebags, and trudged up the beach to the cottage. Better to give father and son some space. She didn’t need to watch out for Roberto. Amato was in no shape to attack, and Roberto could defend himself.
Tough grasses and hardy beach daisies peppered the path through the yard. At the threshold of the cottage, she paused. The door was slightly ajar. Had Roberto forgotten to lock it?
No, she’d locked the door. She remembered turning the key. Cautiously, Ezaara pushed the door open.
Holy dragon gods.
Food was mashed across the walls. The comfy sofa had been slashed and stuffing strewn over the floor. Drawers were overturned, and crockery smashed.
Heart pounding, Ezaara dropped her belongings on the doorstep, and drew her sword. She tiptoed through the living room, over the debris and pushed the bedroom door open.
The curtains around the fourposter bed had been ripped down. The bedding was shredded and her clothing flung about the room. The bedside table was still standing, but the top was empty.
No. Anakisha’s heart-shaped crystal necklace, the dream-catcher, was gone. And so was Anakisha’s ring—the key to the realm gates.
“It’s only me.” Light footsteps echoed on the floorboards as Roberto checked the rest of the cottage. “No one’s here.”
“The ring, Roberto…”
“Gods, not the ring, too,” he said, coming through the doorway and enveloping her in his arms. “We’ll find it. We’ll hunt down whoever stole it.”
It was too much. After everything that’d happened today—Simeon, A
mato, and now, this. “Why?”
“Because you’re Queen’s Rider.”
“Can’t we ever have peace? Time for us?” Her breath shuddered out of her.
His warmth wrapped around her, his sathir enveloping her completely. Roberto’s only answer was a sigh.
Hours later, after they’d salvaged whatever wasn’t broken and burned and disposed of the rest, Ezaara and Roberto went outside to Amato, asleep under Matotoi’s wing. The moon lit a trail of shimmering silver on the sea.
“Erob and I caught them some fish.” Zaarusha was settled on her haunches nearby, watching them. “You’ve had a tough day.”
Erob dropped to the sand. “Would a short flight in the moonlight help?”
“I’ll guard the prisoners.” Zaarusha snarled. “I’m not letting them get away. Even though they’re broken, Amato and Matotoi must still be tried at Dragons’ Hold for Amato’s crimes. Take some time to recover.”
Roberto turned to Ezaara. “Just a short flight?”.
Ezaara nodded and clambered up into Erob’s saddle. With Roberto’s warmth at her back and his arms around her, they ascended into the night to the swish of Erob’s wingbeats and the muted hiss of the tide washing against the sand.
Roberto’s voice rumbled through his chest, against her back. “It’s amazing to think that all that sand was made from those rocky cliffs. That the water beating relentlessly against those cliffs has worn them down into something as minuscule as sand. You know, Ezaara, when I was a littling and things were hard, I’d come to this beach and remind myself that I wasn’t sand. I refused to let my father beat me down into sand.” His arms tightened around her waist. “We’re young. Strong. We can let the sea rage at our feet without crumbling into sand. Together, we can do this.”
“Together, yes.” Because by now, alone, she’d be falling apart. She leaned back into him.
Roberto lifted her hair and kissed the side of her neck. “Together,” he murmured.
Ezaara sighed, gazing at the white-tipped tide below.
Erob flew along the beach, riding the warm thermal currents.
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