Chapter Thirteen

The Dragon

Leah woke in the middle of the night. Sweating, she plucked at her nightgown’s neckline, trying to cool herself. Did she have a fever? But she didn’t feel ill, only hot like—

Gideon.

Her veins throbbed, and she knew he needed her. Had the dragon hurt him? Sharp anxiety sent her scrambling out of bed. The faint glow from the hypocaust guided her down the hall to the stairs.

Once she gained the second floor, she threaded her way to the corner alcove. Silvery moonlight bounced off the Four Worlds mirror as she squirmed underneath.

Fear for Gideon’s safety spurred her to attempt the ladder climb in the dark. Her foot slipped once, but she hauled herself over the lip of rock.

Breath laboring, she unbarred the door. Heat rolled over her when it swung open.

“Gideon?”

In the dark, she saw the great diamond eyes first, then the gleam of black scales. Even with its wings folded, it filled the fifteen-foot window.

“Where’s Gideon?” she asked.

The dragon tilted its wedge-shaped head and opened its jaws, as if trying to speak. Wet steam bathed her face.

Madness overcame her. “Where’s Gideon?” She stabbed a finger at his empty bed. “Gideon. Where is he? If you’ve hurt him, I’ll kill you,” she vowed.

The huge beast ducked its head as if chastened. One corner of her mind wondered why it hadn’t scorched her already, but she kept on. “You should be ashamed of yourself.” She dashed away tears.

The dragon moaned.

Staring into its eyes, Leah had the strangest conviction that it wanted something from her beyond bones to crunch.

“What is it?” she asked in a more reasonable voice. “Is something wrong with Gideon? Do you need my help?”

In answer, it touched the base of its long neck with one front claw.

Incredulity filled Leah. “You want me to ride on your back?”

The dragon stared at her with unblinking eyes, but Leah felt a pulse of heat that seemed to mean yes.

Gideon needed her. As if in a dream, she set her hand on the dragon’s side. Up close she could see that its scales were overlapping triangles. They felt hard and slippery, but her bare feet found enough friction to ascend its leg to the shoulder. She swung one leg over the knobby ridge of its spine, then adjusted her nightgown in a vain effort to get more comfortable. A dragon wasn’t at all like a mule.

The dragon shifted under her like an earthquake, turning in the cramped room. Leah slipped—

The dragon stopped.

She righted herself, but her perch felt precarious.

The dragon plucked the sheet off Gideon’s bed and handed it to her. Or perhaps it merely snagged its claw—

Disturbed by its un-beast-like behavior, Leah twisted the sheet into a rope. The dragon waited as she looped it around its neck and knotted the ends around her waist.

She cleared her throat. “I’m ready.”

With an agile twist, the dragon flung itself off the window ledge. Leah screamed as the ground rushed up—

Then its membranous wings snapped open, and their fall became a glide. Three wingbeats took them high into the night sky. The stars shone crisp and cold.

Frigid air whistled past Leah’s face, contrasting with the dragon’s tremendous heat.

The dragon banked left, and Leah smiled with delight. Did Gideon do this every night? Ride the dragon?

Except no one had ridden the dragon during its attacks on Duke Ruben’s castle walls.

Shivering, she remembered her purpose. “Take me to Gideon,” she shouted into the wind.

She couldn’t be sure the dragon understood, but its wings beat harder, carving a path through the night. They passed first over Thunderhead’s lower slopes, then the red glow at his peak.

In the dark, Leah lost her bearings. She knew only that they flew for a long time—her thighs and bottom chafed—before the dragon skimmed over a valley.

Leah peered down. “Is Gideon down there? I can’t see.”

The dragon arched its neck, rib cage expanding, and spat out a fireball.

Leah recoiled, almost losing her seat. In the fading glow, she glimpsed a sleeping army.

She swallowed. No mere raiding party: over a hundred men slept on the valley floor. Only why hadn’t they pitched tents or at least removed their armor? And had those been fallen horses?

“Again,” Leah said hoarsely. “Show me again.”

Circling around, the dragon coughed out another fireball. Leah gasped.

The army wasn’t asleep; it was dead. Every man and beast, dead.

“No.” Leah denied her eyes. “Put me down.” Tears welled as she pounded on the dragon’s black hide. Had it shown her this to brag? How could she have forgotten, even for a second, that the dragon destroyed? “Put me down!”

A pulse of sullen heat. No.

Desperate, Leah slid off its back.

The ground lay farther below than she’d thought, twenty feet instead of ten. She had a moment of terror, of plummeting, and then the dragon’s claw snagged the back of her nightdress. The material ripped free, but her momentum slowed enough that she only hit the ground bruisingly hard instead of breaking both legs.

Leah scrambled up and ran toward the fallen army. A gust of wind and the flapping of wings told her the dragon had landed, but she refused to look back or acknowledge the pain in her bare feet from the rough ground.

The first man she found lay sprawled on his back. He wore a blue tabard with red crossed swords like the ones on Sabra’s dress. Smoking Cone’s sigil. His eyes bulged, and spittle had dried around his mouth. Not only dead, but cold. So was the second man.

“Hello? Can anyone hear me?” she called.

The dragon moaned.

She ignored the mournful sound, wading deeper into the ranks of the dead, shaking shoulders, prodding cold flesh, but they were all dead. Murdered by the dragon.

Except the bodies weren’t burned. How—?

The next corpse lay facedown. Carefully, Leah rolled him over and saw another distorted face, as if he’d choked on a piece of meat. But a whole army couldn’t choke to death. And where were the flies?

Her eyes stung. The wind had shifted, bringing the smell of sulfur. She coughed, and foul air bit her throat.

Horror rose inside Leah as she remembered a childhood tale of how Poison Cloud got his name. The Volcano Lord had breathed out a low-hanging fog that poisoned all animals in its path.

It had slain an army, and it would kill her, too, if she didn’t find clean air, fast.

Shielding her nose and mouth with her arm, Leah ran toward the dragon. It rose to meet her, diamond eyes shining. But she must’ve hit a pocket of bad air, because even through her sleeve her next breath felt like inhaling fire.

Coughing, she fell to her knees and found herself staring into the dead face of a young boy—

The dragon snatched her up in its claw and launched into the air.

Leah kept coughing for long minutes afterward. The dragon crooned in sympathy but didn’t seem affected. Finally, when her spasms stopped, the dragon placed her on its shoulder.

With shaking hands, she regained her seat and clutched the sheet still tied about its neck.

“Maybe you didn’t kill the army,” she rasped, “but it’s still your fault.”

The dragon had stirred the Volcano Lords into belching out ash, spoiling the harvest. Smoking Cone’s army had probably been sent to plunder its neighbor’s grain stores. Then Poison Cloud’s duke had persuaded his Volcano Lord to strike back…

Leah shuddered. She closed her eyes, no longer enchanted by the dragon’s speed.

She assumed they were returning to Thunderhead’s valley until they flew over an unfamiliar town. Was it taking her to Gideon?

What seemed hours later—her thighs were screaming—she spied torches. She could make out a castle wall and the keep rising behind it. Men-at-arms patrolled the walls and battlements.

A vast rumble vibrated through the air. Leah’s hot blood surged. Isaiah.

The dragon blasted out a column of fire, illuminating the sky. The wall boiled with sudden activity. Messengers were sent to rouse Duke Ruben and those not on duty. Swords were drawn, crossbows cranked. Men with shovels stood by tubs of sand, ready to put out fires.

Ignoring the castle, the dragon descended toward the inner bailey. At its scent, livestock neighed, baaed, and squealed in fright. Dogs raced madly around. The din worsened when the dragon fireballed a haystack.

The stone buildings wouldn’t burn, but Grumbling Man spawned so few firewasps that grass had been allowed to grow in the bailey. It would catch fire and burn other things: thatch, wagons, doors. People. Like her mother.

“Stop!” Leah cried.

They winged upward, but her sigh of relief strangled when the dragon attacked the battlements. She sensed grim purpose, as if it were performing an unpleasant duty.

Arrows flew through the air. She ducked, but they all clattered off the dragon’s scales or missed.

“Distract him! Aim for the eyes!” Captain Brahim bellowed.

The dragon began a smooth, shallow dive through a hail of crossbow bolts. One bounced off its nose, and she felt a pulse of annoyance.

The men on the wall broke and ran. Leah turned her face away, but instead of raking them with its deadly flame, the dragon streaked toward a lone man.

The duke.

“No.” Leah pounded on the dragon’s neck. “You can’t!” Her feelings for her father were confused—fear, respect, the desire to please—but even if she’d hated him, the dragon’s intention would have horrified her. If the duke died, Isaiah would erupt.

For the first time she sensed words in the dragon’s hot pulses. He must be punished.

At the last second, Captain Brahim knocked the duke aside. The dragon snatched him up instead, then dropped him in irritation. Leah glimpsed the captain’s white face as he clung to a merlon on the castle wall, his legs dangling, and then they wheeled around in a great circle.

She had to stop the dragon from killing her father.

Heart in her throat, Leah swung both legs to one side. The dragon’s spine pressed into her stomach, and the wind whipped her hair into her eyes. She avoided looking down and lowered herself toward its wing joint, hoping to hinder its flight. But she slipped on the slick black scales—

A scream ripped out of her throat. The dragon twisted in midair, slinging her sideways. Leah hooked an elbow and one foot over its spinal ridge and stopped a few feet short of the base of its tail.

The dragon clawed at its own tail, unable to reach her.

A fall from this height would break every bone in her body. She closed her eyes against a surge of vertigo. Cold sweat broke out on her back. Ashes.

The dragon’s tail was thicker than her waist at the base but narrowed to a slender tip ten feet out. If she slid down it, would she be close enough to the ground?

Leah glanced down, then closed her eyes. No.

Nevertheless, she began to inch downward.

Its tail lashed under her. She slid three feet—and then the dragon plucked her off and cradled her to its chest. Leah shuddered in gratitude, unmindful of its bruising grip.

The dragon set her back on its shoulder.

“There it is!” a man shouted from the castle wall.

“It has a rider!” another yelled.

Leah winced. Would the duke recognize his bastard daughter?

“Now!” Captain Brahim yelled.

Thrum. A giant crossbow fired at them.

The dragon dipped, and a bolt the size of a spear hissed overhead. Ashes.

Shrieking in anger, the dragon turned to fight. It coughed out a fireball, scattering the men on the wall. But the fireball also highlighted their location.

Thrum. Thrum. Two bolts launched almost simultaneously from different directions.

The dragon twisted. Leah clung to the sheet, screaming as her body was flung to one side.

The first bolt missed.

The dragon could have evaded the second by performing one of its writhing, whiplash maneuvers, but Leah would’ve fallen. Instead the dragon’s muscles tensed just before a ten-foot arrow punched through the delicate membrane of its wing.

The dragon bellowed in pain and bobbled but didn’t fall from the sky.

They winged away into the darkness. Droplets of orange lava blood spattered the ground below, setting fires wherever they touched.