A Shade of Dragon (15 page)

T
he dawning sun
was only just beginning to singe away the morning mist when we arrived at the other portal. Michelle slid from my back with a grin of elation. “I cannot believe I just saw the entire country in, what, a few hours?” She roamed the perimeter of the portal buried deep in an old well and inspected it. Unlike Nell, she was not filled with awe and terror at the sight of the thing. She seemed almost bored by it, and flicked some pebbles through the gate, unknowingly sending them into the ogres’ country.

“So, where are we?” Michelle asked me, as I pulled on a pair of pants.

I glanced over my shoulder at her. “This is a gate into another world,” I explained, trying to be patient. “It is the residence of ogres. We will remain quiet while on their territory, and we will move into another country beyond this, in which dwell the dragon people. It will likely be very cold, but you are dressed appropriately.”

Even as I was saying this, Michelle tied her coat around her waist. “We should have packed some more clothes for me, don’t you think?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow.

But I shook my head. “Ideally, you will be returned to your home within the day. I made a promise to a—a friend—that I would bring you on this trip. I promised to show you my home country and allow you to meet my people. But then you will return home, and your life will resume as usual. One outfit will suffice.”

Michelle puckered her lips slightly and rolled her eyes. “Okay, okay. Fine.”

“Take my hand,” I instructed her.

She did so, and strangely, right before we jumped together, she gave it a little squeeze. There was no time to react—we were already in mid-air. A moment later, we were passing through the space between the worlds, and landed on our knees in the sand of a beach.

“Holy crap!” Michelle whooped, clambering to her feet and jumping up and down like a child. “Let’s do that again!”

Glaring, I gripped her arm and forced her to stop jumping up and down. “Quiet!”

Over her shoulder loomed a gate of gray stones. A row of decapitated human heads on spikes lined the top. Blood had oozed and congealed onto the stones long ago. Some of the heads were skulls, picked clean and bleached in the sun. Some of them were fresh. Michelle followed my eyes and pursed her lips at the gruesome sight.

A long, sandy beach stretched out in front of us, and we had begun to walk away from the ogres’ fortress when the mirror in my satchel suddenly filled with an unearthly light. Gasping, I dropped the bag and pulled its flap open, extracting the glass from within. That throb of light was an alert that someone with a sliver of the mirror had activated it with their breath, their blood, their sweat, or their tears. I would be able to see Penelope, if only for a moment.

“What are you doing?” Michelle murmured behind me.

“Shhh.” The light faded away, and in its place, I saw Nell in all her glory, her beautiful dark hair disheveled from gods only knew what, her eyes puffy and pink, her clothing replaced with a gown in a style familiar to me: she’d been dressed in the garments of the royal family. She was likely wearing a dress which belonged to one of my sisters, or to my mother. “Penelope?” I called into the glass, forgetting to be quiet. “Penelope, where are you?” I tried to enunciate, knowing that she would only be able to read my lips in order to discern what I was saying.

Her lips moved quickly. I couldn’t decipher a single word of it.

“What the hell is Nell doing in your mirror?” Michelle asked.

It looked like Nell was thinking the exact reverse, as her eyes fell on Michelle and went blank.

Just then, the ornate wooden door behind her swung open and the frame filled with a shadow. Nell dropped the shard of the mirror and swung on her feet, so that I could see a full view of the intruder.

It was Lethe Eraeus, the grandson of now deceased Emperor Bram Eraeus, who had ruled during the brief period of ice dragon reign more than half a century ago. I recognized him because it was my duty to recognize him. Although the ice kingdom had fallen and been relegated to a narrow, inhospitable space at the very tip of The Hearthlands, our peace had been wary and forced.

Lethe was svelte, so there was an androgynous quality to his neck, shoulders, and chest. He had a complexion as white as porcelain, a shock of black hair which fell over his forehead and hid his ears, and ice-blue eyes, fairer even than his scaled hide in dragon form. I had suspected that it was he who had come through the other gate, but now I knew for certain.

“What are you doing?” I read his lips.

His fingers closed over the pendant, blinding my view of the room, and then the fingers opened again, holding the pendant very close to his face. I will admit that he was a handsome sort, in a sly and haughty way. He had a narrow, slightly upturned nose and thin lips. I saw them moving but could not read them; his eyebrows knotted and he cursed and ranted, that was all I could ascertain. Then, in the next instant, the entire room vaulted by in the mirror—and then a blinding white light filled the glass.

As the light faded, it appeared that my mirror had broken, for many fragmented reflections of the palace room which held Nell were thrown back at me. I saw her in disjointed frames rush to the shattered pendant and collapse, touching some pieces… and then the light faded entirely away, and I knew that it was the last time I would see her in the magical mirror. Lethe had shattered her pendant—and my only visual connection to my mate.

G
rimacing
, I braced my hands on my thighs and stood, collecting the mirror from the sand and inserting it again into my satchel. There was one bright side to this development. I had seen the room surrounding Nell, and even if she was moved to another room, I knew that her current location was within the castle walls themselves. They were certain to be heavily guarded by ice dragons now, but it was still a thousand times better than discovering that she was deep in the dungeons, or worse. The pendant had not, at least, been activated by her blood.

“What—what the hell was that?” Michelle shrilled behind me.

“I said to keep quiet,” I reminded her grimly. “Let’s go. We must ride again—this place you must go is an island.” I transformed, slid the satchel around my neck, and prompted Michelle to climb onto my back. Again, she rode with all the natural grace and instinct of a woman who was already part-dragon. Of course, it didn’t matter; perhaps she’d make an ideal mate for a member of my cabinet. I carried her across the ogres’ sea, and The Hearthlands stretched into view within minutes.

The difference was immediately obvious. Where it had once been a lush island of rolling hills and verdant valleys, it was now blanketed in snow and a constant barrage of blue chunks of ice. We landed, and I transformed into my human form quickly. A dragon would be much easier for any skyward troopers to spot. I dressed quickly, paying no mind to Michelle as anything but a traveling companion. A forced traveling companion.

“It won’t be terribly far,” I informed her. “Please jacket yourself. We must walk if we are to see the entrance to the shelter. It’s hidden. I don’t know if I need to tell you this again, but please, please, Michelle, stay quiet and do not make sudden movements if another dragon or human approaches us or appears in the distance.”

“Uh, yes, I can do that,” Michelle muttered, rolling her eyes.

I grimaced. The women of The Hearthlands were not nearly as proud and vain as she. For that matter, neither were the men. “Let’s walk, then.”

W
e reached
the entrance to the shelter within ten minutes. It was near the border of the island, and it had been built into the ground. Now they had dropped their leaves and formed icicles, but I still recognized those slender, white-barked trees. “Here,” I told Michelle, advancing on the shelter and finding that its door was blanketed in snow.

I dug for a minute or two, fresh snow pelting my face and forming in the hole I was trying to make, and then my fingers grazed a sheet of pure ice and I roared with frustration. No one would be inside. They would all be dead. Why else had no one contacted me? And now I had finally arrived at the shelter, and its door was sealed in several inches of ice. I did not even have a blade to pierce it.

Michelle stepped forward and jammed her high-heeled boot into the sheet, splintering the ice with one long crack down its center.

“You… you did it,” I murmured, prying up the sheet, now able to wedge my fingers into the crack for leverage.

“Don’t sound so surprised,” Michelle muttered, but I hardly noted her comment. The brass ring of the shelter door was exposed, and I gripped and pulled. The unbroken ice over the rest of the door cracked and fell away as I lifted it and revealed the dark earthen stairwell beyond, unlit by any torches. This was standard procedure for wartime. There would be no light until we reached its interior cavern.

“Come on,” I coaxed Michelle, turning to reach for her; her willingness to be helpful prompted me to remember the scared, lonely little girl within her soul. Perhaps I should have handled her more gently.

She flashed her eyes at my extended hand, then into the corridor, then grasped my hand and flounced along behind me.

“So what’s the deal?” she asked. “Is Nell, like, kidnapped?”

I exhaled. “Yes.”

“Auuugh.” Although Michelle resisted my hand, as if she had momentarily stopped on a stair, I pulled and she continued trundling along. “That just figures. Everybody has to love Penelope. Everybody has to fawn all over Penelope. Now she’s been kidnapped? Gag me.”

At this, I dropped her hand and turned savagely; Michelle came up short with a little gasp. Her eyes flew wide and she stared at me until I offered her my hand again. I had to. We were on uneven ground, and her shoes were so impractical.

“So, you must be really into her, I guess,” Michelle went on.

“Yes. I am.”

“Lucky girl.”

“I’m sure a woman such as yourself will not struggle to find a mate of her own.”

“Mating isn’t the hard part,” she said. “It’s love that doesn’t come naturally to men.”

At this, I bristled, but we had reached the final set of stairs, and I could not lose myself in a disagreement with this girl.

The torches were aflame, and splashed the interior cavern with their warm light. Oh, what relief washed over me in that moment; the room was filled with fire dragons of all ages, all in human form. Men, older women, and children, maybe even hundreds of them. I rushed forward, forgetting to drop Michelle’s hand, and scanned every face for any member of the royal family.

“Khem!” I gripped the shoulders of a member of my court. Khem had unruly auburn hair, bright green eyes, and an exceptional talent with matters of mathematics and physics. He could fix anything which adhered to non-magical laws. “It’s such a relief to see you.” I hugged him tightly. “What happened? Is my father—Is my mother—Is everyone all right?”

“Theon,” Khem replied just as heartily. “It was the ice dragons, not three weeks ago, who sprang a surprise attack on the palace. The guards had been compromised—we do not yet understand how—and by morning, the townspeople awoke to find their family overthrown and new guards patrolling the street.” Khem shook his head at the memory, wild-eyed. “We… and some others… were able to escape. Some are imprisoned in the city. And some…” Khem pursed his lips and shook his head. He took a deep breath, exhaled, and regained composure. “Some are dead. But your mother—”

Khem turned to scan the crowd of refugees, and his eyes froze on Michelle. He began to utter a low, nonsensical string of vowel sounds.

I punched his shoulder. “Khem. My mother?”

“She’s in the kitchens. My name is Khem, fair maiden.”

Michelle bit the tip of her tongue and grinned, eyes shimmering the way I only saw them do when she was receiving male attention. In truth, it saddened me to think that she never experienced happiness through any other means.

Khem frowned and slanted his eyes toward me. “Did you find a mate back on Earth?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered shortly. “But this is not her. This is Michelle, a visitor from Earth who will return shortly. My chosen mate was kidnapped at a portal and imprisoned in the palace. It was this which alerted me to the uprising. I have come to secure her, first and foremost, from their clutches.”

“Shortly?” Michelle pouted off to my right.

“My lady,” Khem interjected, stepping forward and scooping her arm from me. I had forgotten I was holding her hand. “Might I provide you with a tour of the facilities?”

I rolled my eyes and allowed them to go; it would be easier to get things done if someone else preoccupied Michelle. I strode toward the kitchens, bypassing shouts and hands from townspeople rejoicing at my return. People had died. People were imprisoned. Nell was one of them. And the kingdom had been lost. I had a lot on my mind.

The kitchens were a series of rooms which began even lower, in an icy den where food was packed and frozen, then ascended by pulley to be thawed, and finally advanced to become what I was just seeing now: breakfast. I passed several broiling vats of oil and spices, mysterious lumps floating in the juice. Cooks were elbow to elbow, working hard to deliver the soup before it cooled. I spotted Mother quickly; she was wearing bedclothes. That confirmed Khem’s account of the insurgency. Mother would never be publicly seen in bedclothes if she hadn’t been dropped into an emergency. In that way, she was much like both Penelope and Michelle.

“Mother,” I greeted her, gripping her shoulders from behind.

She whirled, eyes wide, and screamed with joy, throwing her arms around my neck. My mother had always been a woman of integrity, a true queen. “Oh, Theon, I didn’t know if I’d ever see you again,” she gasped, pulling away. Her face was much like my own face, stern, but her golden eyes were softer and brighter than mine could ever be. She was a beautiful woman. “Where have you been? It’s been almost three weeks—”

“I went in secret to Earth. I found myself a mate there, but she was kidnapped by Lethe, the grandson of the rebel; this alerted me to the conditions here. I’ve seen her imprisoned in the castle and have come to retrieve her, and return her, before we retake this country.”

“Perhaps she is with your father,” Mother said, her eyes tilting away from mine, though she let not a single teardrop spill. “Perhaps they may keep each other safe.” She sniffed. “Retake the country, you said? Theon—you weren’t there. They didn’t kidnap and murder indiscriminately. They took our strongest out from under us—and now use your father to weaken our spirits. Somehow, they’ve plunged our beautiful country into this blasted eternal winter now—as if killing so many of our daughters wasn’t enough…”

“Did you think telling me that was going to discourage me?”

“I don’t want to lose you, too! Altair . . .” Her eyes clouded with tears at the mention of my younger brother, and she could not bear to go on. “He became swarmed with them—and we were separated in the street—I think—I think they—I saw such blood flowing in the gutter.”

I tried to embrace her, to comfort her, but she fought me off as if accepting comfort was confessing that it had happened.

“It’s too soon!” she went on. “We must stay . . . and make a plan—”

“On what rations?” She knew it as well as I; in this climate, there would be no growth of plants, no running water, and without those things, no beasts to hunt. The shelter was meant to be temporary. “You’re not thinking rationally. And I understand. But the numbers don’t support that conclusion. We cannot wait another day. How long will you have left at this rate? A week? Maybe two?”

Mother nodded. “It’s true,” she breathed. She dropped her head and allowed more tears to fall. It must have been hard for her, to contemplate sending one of her own back into the fray. Her favorite son, some said. “Will you tell me you love me before you go, at least?”

I grabbed her chin and pulled her eyes to mine. “Look at me, Mother,” I commanded. “Of course. I love you.” I dropped a peck on her damp cheek. “I will say it again before I go.” I turned toward the crowded cavern and then hesitated, looking back. “Is there a list of the declared missing and dead?” I wondered.

Mother shook her head and closed her eyes. “It all happened so quickly,” she whispered.

“I know. And it will be quickly undone. I love you.” I kissed her cheek again. “Do you happen to have a pen?” Of all the people in this shelter, she was the most likely to have one.

She nodded and pulled it from her apron.

“Thank you.” I took it and waved goodbye, receding into the crowd.

“I’ll see you soon,” she called at my departing back.

I would need to find Michelle next, and return her to the Earth dimension—but it would take another ten to twelve hours to return, at that rate, and the thought of all that could happen in twelve hours… Maybe Michelle would be willing to stay at the shelter? For just a day or two?

I circled the cavern twice and was unable to find Michelle, but there were many off-shooting rooms to this system, and as thronged as it was, being unable to find someone was normal, not a cause for alarm.

I located a flat surface and settled, digging through my satchel and extracting the “love letter” Pythia had given me: the scroll of yellowed paper, blank.

Bracing over the sheet, I wrote,
I’m coming.
Although it felt like it wasn’t enough, it also felt like it was all I needed to say. I braced over the sheet again to ask her what she could tell me—landmarks, eavesdropping, weapons—but was interrupted by a hand slithering around the back of my neck and tousling my hair.

Shaking off the assault, I whirled on a giddy and quite self-satisfied Michelle. “You may not like me, but I certainly can get you all riled up.”

“I am not ‘riled up,’” I informed her tersely. “In fact, it is time for me to be returning you, my lady.”

Michelle’s jaw dropped. “You can’t just tell me what to do.” One manicured hand framed each hip. “You might be a dragon prince, but I’m not a dragon, and it kind of looks like you’ve been dethroned.”

For the first time in my life, I fantasized about grabbing a woman in an infuriated manner. Why did she have to say such ignorant things? Could she not respect a mourning period for the fallen empire, for lost companions? Her own friend, Nell, possibly?

At the livid expression on my face, Michelle beamed. “Finally, he notices me. Look, Theon, I really like this place. I mean, what was I going to do last night? Andrew Hardy, Netflix and chill? And instead… I’m in another world, and there are dragons, and there’s a war, and my best friend has been kidnapped! Of course I want to stay.”

“She’s not your best friend,” I reminded her.

“She was,” Michelle countered. “I’m not completely useless, you know. I can help you. I helped you already, didn’t I? I was the one who broke the ice on the door, wasn’t I?” She moved closer, eyes beseeching. I could see how she always got her way. She could appear quite vulnerable—if she tried. “I want to go with you. I want to go to the city. And you can’t tell me no.”

“Oh? And why is that?”

“Because you’re an honorable man, silly.”

I was taken aback. I’d been expecting her to say,
Because no one tells me no.
“An honorable man would not allow you to follow him into danger.”

“An honorable man accepts free will. You have to let me come with you. And if you do, I’ll return quietly to Earth and never mention this to another soul.” A wicked smile leaked over her lips. This was the Michelle I’d been anticipating all along. “But if you don’t—”