He had raged that the pilot turn and have the dragon kill the squire, but the man confessed he barely knew the means for controlling the beast, let alone any sort of clever maneuvers. Syrik had told him their only purpose was to get Vannek out of the city safely and rendezvous with Chargan’s army. Syrik was gone now, but the pilot meant to follow his last orders, and no amount of threatening would get him to change course. The coward was determined to take Vannek to safety. The general debated holding a knife to him and forcing him down, and then he looked below and saw the Dendressi sweeping through the city with their ally, fire. He’d have never guessed that they would destroy their city rather than give it over.
Alantris was lost to him. And so was Syrik.
Tears flowed, but the rage plugged Vannek’s throat. He shook but made no sound.
As they climbed into the cool night sky, the tears streamed away, and he gripped tight to the saddle as he turned, watching the ever smaller figures lit by fire. His ear throbbed, as if someone struck him over and over again in the side of the head. It didn’t matter.
If he’d had just a little longer, he could have ruled that city properly. The failure wasn’t his, but his stupid brother’s. It was the fault of Chargan, for if he had come to the city, no amount of fae cleverness could have toppled them.
He tried to tell himself that he was weak for feeling this way, that Syrik had probably been a toy of Chargan’s. But, he didn’t believe it. Syrik had always liked him. Vannek. Even as all other allegiances became those of station and power, the mage’s affection had been true. It had been tempered by lust, a lust that should have shamed him, but it had been real. Syrik was the closest thing to a friend that Vannek had known. In the future there might be other advisors, and other mages, but there could be no other whose bond stretched so far back in time.
A warrior, his father had taught him, must practice making his heart a stone.
This grew easier over the course of their flight, for it felt as though that transformation was underway already. All feeling seemed to leach out. The problem was that all care leached away with it.
It took long hours before they saw Chargan’s encampment, in a little east-west valley in the very southern section of The Fragments, fairly close to the border with Erymyr itself.
It seemed a smaller army than he’d supposed. Perhaps that was because there were few campfires. Under the starlight he guessed there could only be a few thousand men at most.
“Did you see that, General?”
The reedy-voiced pilot had said very little over their journey, but there was a note of caution as they circled down and he pointed.
“What is it?” Vannek’s voice was gruff, dry. He realized how very thirsty he was.
“Those hills are moving.”
Vannek started to say that the mage was an idiot, but then he, too, saw that one of the many similarly sized hills on the landscape crept slowly forward. Even as he peered the hill drew to a stop and he wondered if he’d imagined it.
They flew on toward a cluster of tents. Below lay the prostrate forms of seven dragons. Seven. With those beasts they could have held Alantris for the ages!
Guards ran up the moment they approached the ground, and stood warily at attention as Vannek dropped from the saddle; they appeared unsure whether he was friend or enemy.
The pilot’s voice cracked as he barked at them behind her. “At attention for General Vannek!”
The delivery might have been less than desired, but the reaction was pleasing. The five guards formed themselves into a long line, spears upright at their shoulders. Vannek strode past them without meeting their eyes. He realized he ought to praise the pilot, but he hated the pilot almost as much as he hated the dragon and the guards and the camp. He wished all of them were gone, that he himself was far away from all this nonsense. He would very much like to be somewhere where he didn’t have to gird for more battles and shout more orders and sit down across from his odious brother and listen to more of his grandiose schemes.
Somewhere with Syrik.
But it was with Chargan that he found himself. Chargan, who ushered him into a tent after Vannek had gruffly accepted a healer’s care and refused the offer of a bath. His brother pointed him to a cushioned chair under the high canvas ceiling, where a pretty Dendressi slave presented a platter with wine and bread and various cheeses and dried fruits.
Chargan didn’t look as ridiculous as he probably should have. He wore soldier’s gear from the Blue Fire clan. Fit and stocky, his beard closely trimmed, he even looked a soldier, although he’d left off his breastplate. He bade the servants leave and sat down on a matched chair across from Vannek, the table with refreshments between them. A perfumed lamp stood on a camp table to their right, and an actual bed, with a frame and mattress and sheets, sat tucked in a corner to the left. From its size, Vannek strongly expected Chargan did not sleep alone, and wondered if the Dendressi woman would be there tonight.
“You should be careful whom you go to bed with. You might not make it to morning.”
“You sound terrible.” Chargan handed over the wine. “And you look terrible. Is that any way to greet me?”
The wine was strong and cool and it felt good on his throat. The sharp taste was like a kick to his senses. He wiped his mouth with the back of a hand and set down the goblet with a clunk. “How do you think I should greet you?”
“You should be impressed at my speed. Did you see how far I’ve come? How close I am to the heart of the Drendressi holdings? Did you see my dragons?”
“You haven’t asked what I’m doing here.”
Chargan pushed dirt out from beneath his fingernails and flicked it onto the rug.
Vannek suddenly noticed his brother traveled not just with a bed, but with an actual rug. The front legs of his chair were even standing on it.
“I judge by your quiet that it’s very bad news. Were you deposed? Which of our petty little kings did it?”
“The Dendressi did it.”
Chargan’s eyes flipped up at him. “Are you saying that the city has fallen to the fae?”
“Yes.”
Chargan took a long, slow breath, glared at her, then let out a disgusted sigh. “I suppose it won’t matter in a few more days. There can’t be more than a handful of soldiers left within Darassus. There’s also the new group of mages, but I don’t think they can move mountains like I can.” Chargan smiled.
Had he taken leave of his senses? “You’re still going through with it? If we turn back now, we can surprise the Dendressi—”
“No!” Chargan smashed a fist into his palm. “I will destroy Darassus!” He leaned forward, eyes gleaming. “I’ve built monsters of titanic power. Our army may be small, but with my creatures, Darassus will fall before us! I’ve fashioned great magics that will not only see us through the shifts between, but most of the way through the realm itself, without detection.”
“For what?” she demanded. “The invasion has failed, unless you turn back now. Use your … spells of transport to take us back to Alantris! We could take it back and hold it.”
Chargan’s lips curled. “I’ve been very patient with you, and your limitations. And your failures. Whereas I have nothing but success behind me. You were once a useful ally to me but…” He snapped his fingers. “What are you now? I assume your own forces are dead or dying in Alantris. What do you have to bring me? Is it strength in arms? Because there are many warriors at my call who are stronger than you, and at least as skilled. Is it loyalty? I have thousands who would lay down their life on my order. Tell me, brother”—he said this last with a sneer—“are you of such use to me that I should tolerate your insults?”
Vannek felt his own face flush, knew his jaw tightened, and for some reason that made his bandaged ear throb. But all anger swiftly drained away as would water from a bucket full of holes. Why should he care when it was so patently obvious that nothing here was very important? He sank back in his chair. “You might as well just kill me,” he said wearily.
He stared at a sagging spot in the canvas ceiling.
Chargan was quiet for a long time, and then broke into a low chuckle. At first it sounded forced, but after he reached across the table to slap Vannek’s knee and he flinched, the mirth sounded genuine.
“I wouldn’t kill you!” he said. “You’re the only one left who’s not afraid of me! Grandfather always said you needed a trusted few who knew you from when you were human. You and me, we have to stick together. Because we’re going to rule as gods!”