The Princess's Dragon (16 page)

“It is almost the end of second meal! We will be left to fight with the commoners for the scraps of third meal because of you. Move it, let’s go.” The guard shoved her along the tunnels until they reached another cavern, this one nearly as large as the Royal Cavern and lit, as all the tunnels and caverns were, by soft, glowing globes that clustered on the ceiling.

Sondra witnessed the largest concentration of dragons yet in the dining cavern—they pushed and shoved and snarled and growled at each other as they gnawed away at unidentifiable meat. In the far corner another tunnel, guarded by dragons that actually wore metal armor, led away into a heated cavern that the guard referred to as the kitchen. The guards needed the armor, she clarified, because many a starving dragon tried to raid the kitchens for more food.

The dragons ate in three meal times. The best and most plentiful food came at first meal, reserved for those arrogant claw-lickers lounging in the Royal Cavern. The soldiers, guards, and craftsdragons ate at second meal, and the leftover scraps tossed out to the common dragons, those who were the least powerful and least skilled of the dragons, made up the third meal. Sondra realized why they looked so malnourished. So many dragons in one place must strain the food supply tremendously.

They reached the servers, dragons that guarded the meat troughs and doled out the food to those that came forward and identified themselves. These 92

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dragons also wore custom-fitted armor, and Sondra wondered who made it for them. Was there a metal smith in the city? Not a very skilled one, she could see; the craftsmanship appeared poor and the metal pocked and pitted, but she supposed it proved effective enough against another dragon. Perhaps the mere sight of it discouraged any attempt at stealing food, especially on the part of already weak and starving dragons.

The guard identified herself and explained Sondra’s presence and one of the servers slapped a hunk of meat into her claws. Sondra looked down and nearly screamed in horror. She held a human thigh, torn and roasted. She struggled not to vomit in front of the watching dragons and it took every ounce of self-control to casually offer the grisly meal to the guard, claiming that in all the excitement, she didn’t have much of an appetite. The guard glanced at her curiously but gladly accepted the gory limb, and Sondra turned away while she gobbled it down.

It took several more moments for Sondra to swallow her gorge, and she tried not to spend those minutes looking too closely at the meat being consumed around her. There were people being slaughtered to feed these horrible dragons. She wanted to race out of that dining hall, find any that yet lived, and free them, but she knew that would serve no purpose. Obviously, the people of Fomoral gave more than gold in tribute to their brutal neighbors.

In that instant, Sondra hated the queens and their horrific city with a passion and wished only to escape it with her sanity intact. She turned her eyes to the cavern itself, wondering how deep within the cliffs she now stood and how she could escape without detection. She tried not to let the hopelessness of her situation distress her. After all, she had stalled the queens of the Circle; now she just needed to ditch her guard and find a way out of this nightmarish place.

The guard finished her meal, licking her chops with her obscene, gray, forked tongue and then motioned for Sondra to follow her. They moved through the dining hall, passing the emaciated dragons lining up for third meal and out into the tunnels again. Sondra finally took a deep breath, trying to purge the stench of burnt flesh from her lungs. For once, her normally voracious draconic appetite didn’t bother her. She wasn’t certain she would ever be hungry again.

She followed her hated guard through the tunnels and into another series of caverns. Here, dragons curled up in groups or singly in small caves. The guard explained that, as she was an “honored guest” of the queens—this said with

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a smirk—she would get her own room tonight. Sondra suspected that if the initiation went as planned she would no longer be an honored anything and would find herself crammed into a room with a bunch of bony, hungry dragons.

That is, if the queens didn’t sense the truth and simply kill her outright.

The guard left her, but Sondra didn’t take heart in her chances of escape.

She had no idea where in the cliffs she lay or how to find an exit. Even if she could somehow move without detection, she didn’t think she could fly past the guards she felt certain patrolled the outer cliffs and the skies over Fomoral. If she were caught trying to escape, the queens would definitely rip into her mind without the ceremony they obviously planned tomorrow. Sondra allowed the hopelessness to swamp her for a moment as she laid her head down in sadness and despair. She didn’t know if she dozed or not but suddenly the soft blue glow from the tunnel globes disappeared and Sondra’s little cave plunged into darkness. She sat up and could barely make out the form of another dragon, one much larger than herself.

“Guard your thoughts, stranger. The queen’s spies are everywhere.” The other dragon waved a claw and a tiny blue globe burst into light, illuminating them both where they crouched in the cave. Sondra immediately recognized the female from the dragon nursery. She wasn’t a dragon one easily forgot.

“Wh—what are you doing here? I apologized for frightening the little ones; I swear that I meant them no harm!” Sondra didn’t know what to make of the other dragon; her expression, difficult enough to read on a dragon, appeared even more inscrutable than other dragons.

“You could not have harmed them had you tried, small dragon. I would have destroyed you in a flash. That is not why I am here. I wish to ask you a question.”

Sondra felt a little put out by the arrogant claims of the other female.

Perhaps she wouldn’t find Sondra so easy to destroy if she knew she was a storm dragon.

“I do know that you are a storm dragon.” The red dragon smirked, revealing long, glittering fangs. “You really should learn not to telegraph your thoughts, especially here where even the walls listen.”

“Fine. You still haven’t asked me your question.”

“True, and I have little enough time. Why are you really here, storm dragon? Did you actually come to join the city?” Sondra decided she had little enough to lose at this point in revealing at 94

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least some of the truth. “I grew lost and blundered into one of the guards. They brought me here.”

“So you are not here willingly? You do not truly wish to join the Kin?”

“Honestly, no. But I see little hope in escaping.”

“There is no escape from the city.”

“Well, that makes me feel so much better! Now if you’re done ruining my night I would like to sleep again, please.”

“Listen to me! There is no escape but there is another option. Are you willing to take a risk; are you willing to do something dangerous to gain your freedom?”

“Is this a trap? How do I know that this isn’t a test and that you were not sent by the queens to ascertain my loyalty?” The red dragon nearly growled in frustration. “Look at me, storm; can you see their taint in my aura?”

“No, but maybe because you serve them willingly.”

“Fool! Nobody serves them willingly! If they cannot control you, they destroy you. The only reason I yet live, despite the fact that they have not been able to breach my mental defenses is because they control me in another manner.”

“The guards?”

“Of course not; they are no threat to me. I speak of the hatchlings. The queens threaten to kill them if I leave.”

“How horrible! Why would they do such a thing? Why wouldn’t they just kill you then?”

“The hatchlings are not all prime bloodline and you have seen that we already have an overcrowding problem. The queens have tried to eliminate those that don’t show enough promise already, but I have managed to stall them. They keep me alive because I do possess an excellent bloodline. I am their favorite breeder.”

“Then those babies …”

“Some of them are mine, yes, but all of the clutches are reared together and the best and brightest hatchlings are selected and taken to the queens for initiation. The rest are taken to the kitchen.” The red dragon snarled as flames licked across her body in rage. Sondra stepped back, frightened by the unexpected reaction and more repelled by the confession than by her macabre meal earlier.

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“They eat their own young …”

“Good, I am glad to see that the idea horrifies you, that the perversions of the queens bother you as well, storm. Perhaps you will find my proposal more palatable then.

“I don’t understand; are you the only one that can resist them? Are there no others strong enough to fight them?”

“There is the fire god, but he cares nothing for us ordinary dragons.”

“The fire god?”

“Tolmac, the fire god that lives in the mountains to the North. Once, he destroyed this entire city and nearly killed the queens, but he never finished the job and left us to their mercy instead, him and all the other gods that came to this world with him.”

Sondra struggled to remain upright, completely stunned by the other dragon’s words. Tolmac, the fire god? What could she possibly mean? “What other gods? What are you talking about?” Sondra could barely shield her roiling thoughts.

“The gods the humans worship—Aquea, Vivacel, Morbidon, Zephrona, Terroc, and Tolmac. Tolmac brought them all to this world when he opened a portal. He takes the form of a black dragon, enormous, larger than any of the queens. When they realized that he was a child of Cindara they immediately attempted to capture him, but they weren’t strong enough. So they sent us to him instead.”

“A child of Cindara … the Dragon Goddess?” Sondra barely released the thought to the other dragon before another question occurred to her. “What do you mean they sent you to him instead?”

“The breeders, the best that the city had to offer, they sent us to him one by one and he spurned us all. I was the last that they sent. I went by order of the queens but I really wanted to plead for him to help us, to beg him to free us. I thought I could seduce him, and I nearly succeeded, but I made a foolish mistake and he pushed me away, he wouldn’t trust me after that, nor would he listen to my pleas. He forced me from his lair.” Sondra fought a spurt of jealousy, so ridiculous in her current circumstance, but the thought that Tolmac turned away offers from this gorgeous dragon made her seriously doubt he would ever choose her as a mate. Of all the things she’d just heard, that Tolmac was the fire god and knew the other five gods of the human pantheon, including Vivacel and Morbidon, Ariva’s own gods, the 96

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thought of this red dragon mating with Tolmac bothered Sondra the most.

Sondra remained silent, absorbing everything she’d learned, and the red dragon continued.

“I lost hope, fearing that I and the other dragons must live like this forever.

Then I saw you today and I recognized what you were, though I suspect even the queens don’t know about you yet and that can work to our advantage.”

“What do you mean? Why is seeing me so important? What can I do against a city full of dragons?”

“That is just it; you needn’t fight a city full of dragons. You have seen the gray sickness in the dragon’s aura. Not everyone here suffers from it, but those that don’t are not permitted near the queens. Only those firmly controlled by the queens may approach them; even I cannot go near them. However, whenever a new dragon is initiated into the Kin, they come into close contact with the queens. There hasn’t been a new initiate in generations. Now here you are, and better yet, you control skyfire. You can kill them and once they are dead, those they control will be free.”

“Wait a minute, are you asking me to fight three dragons at once? What about their followers—before I kill them, won’t they attack me as soon as I strike out at the queens?”

“I have planned a coup for over a hundred rotas. I have brought many dragons over to my side, earning their loyalty the way the queens have never had to. I—and my associates—will charge the first-tier dragons and the guards when you begin your attack. We will keep them occupied while you eliminate the queens. They are old and weak and they haven’t personally fought a battle in over a thousand rotas.”

“But I don’t think I can kill one dragon, much less three!”

“What choice do you have? Do you value your freedom at all, or are you just another coward? If they succeed in initiating you, you will have to kill many dragons and other creatures; they will relish in your power and your abilities. They might even grant you a first-tier position and your own hoard of gold. Is that what you prefer to freedom and the call of the open lands beyond this city?”

Sondra remembered the roasted human thigh, the starving dragons, the oppressed Fomoralians, and the gamboling baby dragons in the nursery.

Suddenly she knew what she had to do. She could never live in a place like this; never endure day after day of life in this sick society. She once compared

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the dragon city to her own kingdom, but now she knew better. The Circle mimicked human society but perverted everything good and right in human social intercourse. It must be destroyed, and these dragons set free to make their way in life, as they were intended to, not as mock humans lusting for power and prestige.

“I cannot promise that I will succeed, but I will die trying to kill those queens. I accept your proposal. But I have my own request.” The red dragon nearly shook with excitement and anticipation, eager to rush off and inform her companions that the time for revolution neared.

“Anything! You can take the gold, the hoards. We don’t care, we just want our freedom.”

“I don’t want the gold. I want any humans still alive and trapped in this city freed and I want the Kingdom of Fomoral released from the oppression of any and all dragons.”

The red dragon paused, startled by the request. “Why? What do you care about humans?”