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Wars, it seemed, took a long time to clean up. It was almost dawn before I got a chance to sit down beside a friendly fire.
First, I’d had to speak to the living leaders of Ko’Torenth – my people now. To the soldiers, my orders were simple. Gather the wounded. Bury the dead. Pack up your gear and march back through the Door of Heavens. Simple, but not quick. It had taken them all night to square things up and line up in front of the Doorway.
After an hour of testing, Bataar and I had tuned it to Kav’ai again, and he’d gone through ahead of me to round up enough Kav’ai to be sure my orders were obeyed on the other side. There, the orders were just as simple: go home.
I’d deal with them all when this was done. We’d sort out Ko’Torenth and mete out justice after peace was wrought here.
Apeq, I gave to the Dominar. She said she had a use for him, and I certainly did not. Besides, even with my mimic gone I was worried about what my inner voice was pushing me to do. Revenge was a terrible thing – as bad for the person getting it as the person they were making pay. I was worried about what I might do if I kept Apeq. And I certainly couldn’t set him free. The way Raolcan’s eyes had glowed when the Dominar had Apeq tied behind her saddle made me feel confident that Apeq wasn’t getting an easy way out.
We will give him to Haz’drazen, Raolcan said in my mind. She has been asking to be given one of the troublemakers who want to see the downfall of dragons. She would like to ask some questions.
That didn’t sound so bad.
Her questions can be ... uncomfortable.
Like, “How often do you bathe?” kind of uncomfortable?
Like, ‘Do you prefer to be set on fire with orange or red flames?’ kind of uncomfortable.
He was probably joking. I’d heard he was a real prankster.
The golems had been another problem. Without souls powering them, it was impossible to clear them from the fields and roads and city unless dragons lifted them one at a time and flew them to the nearby mountains.
The Dominar’s forces had taken over that task, and Saboraak’s wing of dragons had wanted to help. I’d ordered them not to.
“You’re with me now,” I told Nostar. “And I say that you’ve earned your rest. Besides, I need to go to Ko’Torenth soon after we finish here, and Saboraak is too tired to even fly. She needs the deep sleep of dragons.”
They’d chosen a place away from the battlefield and I’d joined them for long enough to stroke my exhausted dragon’s snout.
“You’ve done well,” I told her. “You’re the best dragon a man could hope to meet. You know that, right?”
She snorted, a flickering flame barely visible. Her eyes were already closing as her wing of dragons closed in around her, laying their heavy heads on each other’s backs and slumping into the relief of slumber.
“Sleep well, Saboraak. You’ve earned it. Dream of Drazenlofts and golden eggs.”
Golden?
Well, I didn’t know what color they would be.
I felt traces of a dragon laugh as she drifted off into sleep.
I’d gone to find Gran after that, setting out on foot across the muddy plains until I found the row of golems I’d frozen in a long corridor and at the end of the corridor, the broken shell of the old woman who’d given her last day and last hours to a man she’d never known for the sake of a people she loved. She deserved to be honored and I would make sure she was. There would be a statue. Maybe more than one. But for now, there was respect to be shown.
I was still looking around trying to figure out what to do next when Hubric and Kyrowat dropped down from the sky, alighting nearby. I wiped tears away hastily. Blinking up at a silent Hubric when he clapped me on the shoulder and handed me the other end of a litter he’d made with a blanket and a pair of saplings.
Stef nodded from beside him – but they were both silent as we gathered Gran up and flew her to where our friends had gathered.
We found our friends beside a fire. Lee, his face tear-streaked and an air of mourning surrounding him like a cloud stood beside a carefully built pyre.
“She fell in the battle after you were stabbed by Eventen,” Lee said, his voice heavy with tears. “She was the best of us. Better than me. Better than you.”
No argument from me. Lenora was better than I would ever be.
Together, we gently laid Gran out beside her.
And then Stef said something about Gran until she broke down in tears and Lee said something about Lenora until he was too choked up. The pair of them leaned on each other, two lost ships in a storm.
We stood around our precious dead for long minutes and I was sure that everyone’s minds were as full of memories as mine was. My strongest memory of Lenora was of her wiping the grime from her forehead as she stood firm and strong as an oak helping women and children flee to safety from Estabis. She had saved thousands of lives by her levelheaded courage and determination.
“She was better than me,” a slightly muffled voice said as two more figures joined us. There were tears in the Dominar’s voice as she continued. “She was a good friend. Brave and strong.”
“A good Dragon Rider,” her husband, Leng Shardson agreed. “Adventurous and brave like the Greens should be.”
After long moments of silence together, Kyrowat shuffled forward with another Purple – the Dominar’s dragon Raolcan – and Lenora’s Green Lypukrm. Together they blew a white-hot flame, lighting their pyre.
“This isn’t how I thought this story would end,” Zyla said sadly as she hugged my side. She’d been oddly quiet all night. Subdued. “Why is victory so bitter?”
“Evil always steals and destroys because it cannot give or build,” the Dominar said, her face pointed toward her dragon as if she were listening to him as she spoke. “So that even when peace is restored and salvation won, there’s a hollowness to the victory because you know the great cost. And you wonder if anything can ever be worth it.”
“How do you know if it is?” Zyla asked.
I thought that perhaps behind the mask the Dominar was smiling when she said, “You make it worth it. You keep building and giving and loving and hoping. Pour so much back into the world that the wounds can heal, and the scars be strong.”
Zyla hugged me tighter, as if she was trying to pour all of that into me in that one moment.
“I was planning to have an official meeting with you, Ko’roi,” the Dominar said eventually. “I was planning to call in the scribes and make it official – peace between our two nations.”
“Well, why can’t you do that?” I asked. Hubric coughed loudly. Flushing, I added a hasty, “With respect, Dominar.”
I could have sworn she was laughing a little under that mask when she said.
“We’re all too tired, Ko’roi. I have a broken city to attend, to rebuild, to comfort. There are many dead whose loved ones need my help. What I propose is this: in one month’s time I will visit you formally with my court in Ko’Koren. We can sign a treaty then in the presence of what I’ll assume will be your new government and until then, we’ll shake on it. No more fighting. Peace between us.”
I stretched out my hand. “Deal.”
There was a gruff voice in my mind as we shook hands.
And consider yourself lucky that she’s so lenient about your disrespect, boy.
That was Raolcan. I could see he was as personable as ever. I could have sworn that I heard Kyrowat laughing at us in my mind.
“So,” Hubric said. “That’s victory, then. Who would have thought things would go so far, hey boy? Oh, don’t try to hug me goodbye. I’m coming with you. We need to talk about spy networks. Don’t give me that look. There’s one in Ko’Koren – even if you never found it.”
“Is all the magic gone from the world?” Zyla asked me, leaning her head against my shoulder.
It wasn’t all gone – or at least, I didn’t think it all was. I’d only taken the magic from the land close to Questan and Woelran. But restoring magic to the world would be someone else’s task. I had my own responsibilities.
I leaned down and kissed Zyla as thoroughly as I knew how before replying, “You tell me.”
This was victory.
Victory was the color of sunrise, the color of the blood of my friends, the color of Zyla’s face when I whispered to her that maybe marriage wasn’t the craziest idea in the world.
Victory was red as the blood I’d shed to keep the peace until the day I died.