Dragonsbane (Book 3) (33 page)

The warriors went around the circle, each one offering up his memories of the battle. They showed him everything: the shattering of their dragonsbane weapons, the deaths of their comrades … the bleeding, mangled bodies of the ones they loved. Orange-blue fire burst all around them, adding to their panic.

He felt their fear, their anguish — felt how those unfamiliar edges dragged across their hearts. And slowly, he understood.

For all their strength and chasing monsters about, the wildmen had never warred with a human enemy. They had never known what it meant to fight in a real battle. Through their eyes, Titus was the Man of Wolves — a wicked, grinning nightmare shrouded by a cruel, impenetrable cloak.

The wildmen were like children: terrified of something they didn’t understand, haunted by an enemy they had no idea how to defeat. To them, the battle was hopeless. Each of their visions ended with a crushing blackness — a hood that shuttered their flame. But Kael was determined to bring their fires back. 

They needed to see what he saw — they needed a new vision.

So he gave them one.

Their fists would shatter Titus’s walls. Their strength would fill its cracks like ice and stretch until they crumbled. They would peel back the iron shell of his army and batter the soft flesh beneath. They would break the steely points off its teeth. Their hands would wrench the monsters apart by their jaws. And at last, they would crush Titus, himself.

No, they would
stomp
him — they would drive his body so deeply into the rock that not even the wynns would be able to dig him up. They would own the mountain’s top once more, and it would never again be taken from them.

He knew the moment the warriors started to believe because they added themselves to his vision. They charged through the walls and set upon Titus’s army, fighting through Kael’s imagination. When he was convinced that he had them blazing once more, he let them go.

They leapt around each other; they howled and beat their chests.

“We’re going to stomp him!” Griffith bellowed over the others’ cries. “We’re going to crush the Man of Wolves!”

Their fires were there, but the flames glowed weakly. The warriors needed more than kindling to stay bright. They needed a fierce wind that would stoke them to a roar, as the storm gales had done to Daybreak. They needed to taste the blood of the Man of Wolves — they needed to know that he could be beaten.

“Come with me,” Kael said.

And the warriors followed.

*******

Earl Titus’s fort leered at them from the slopes above Tinnark. It was nearly complete. Another week or two, and it likely would’ve been finished. But Kael wasn’t going to let that happen.

His army was spotted the moment they left the trees. The Earl’s men shouted in warning and began to scurry along the ramparts; the arms of their catapults disappeared as they bent dangerously beneath the wall. A moment later, something small shot into the air.

It was a stocky clay jar — one of the same vessels Kael had seen in the Earl’s camp. There was a rag hanging from its mouth and its tail was ablaze. Kael hurled a rock at it before it could travel too far, exploding it in the air.

“That’s where the Man of Wolves’ fire comes from,” Kael called as the orange-blue flames rain
ed down upon the field between them. “It’s weak while it’s in the air. Knock it down!”

When the next catapult swung, the warriors answered with their own barrage. They ran as they threw — exploding the Earl’s fire and gaining on his fort. Their hands and eyes moved so quickly that they began to strike before the jars could clear the wall. Screams pierced the air as the soldiers’ own fire devoured them.

The wildmen charged up the hill in a single unbroken line. They stepped easily around spear points, ducked beneath a hail of arrows. A cry ripped from Kael’s throat as the first of the wildmen reached the gates. He heard the wood crack beneath the thrusts of their hands — saw it tremble, shudder.

Then finally, it gave way.

“Stomp them!” Griffith roared as he charged inside. “Peel their armor back — crush their flesh!”

The warriors did exactly that: they did everything Kael had showed them. They destroyed the Earl’s men, smashed his catapults, flattened his walls — and then they turned their eyes upon the tower.

Their hands slammed into its sides together. Half of them pushed from the ground, and the other from the ramparts. One, two, three times, they struck. And on the fourth, it toppled.

Howls and whistles filled the air as the warriors roared over their victory. They leapt around each other and beat their chests. It was only when his throat began to burn that Kael realized he’d joined their cries. It was only when he felt the bruises on his chest that he realized he was pounding right along with them.

A tiny voice in the back of his head warned him that he probably looked ridiculous. It shrilled that he was behaving like a wildman, that he ought to calm himself. But Kael didn’t listen.

He howled all the louder. He pounded his chest even harder. And the warriors’ song drowned out that little voice.

Chapter 30

Happy News

“You, Sir Wright, are in very big trouble,” Kyleigh said when he stepped inside the forge.

Kael was well aware of this. Gwen had made it abundantly clear when she’d ripped the hospital door off its hinges and flung it at him. She likely would’ve beaten him to death with one of his bedposts, had Griffith not stepped in.

“Don’t you see what this means, sister?”

“It means you’ve disobeyed me,” she’d snarled. “I told you to leave that fort alone. Had we not attacked, the Man of Wolves —”

“He would’ve come after us anyways!” Griffith cried.

“Well, he certainly will now. There’s no doubt he’ll call his monsters down upon us again — on our craftsmen, on those children from downmountain. How do you plan to protect them, Griffith?”

The edge in her voice had drained all the red from her brother’s face, but his chin stuck out stubbornly. “Kael will know how to protect them. He knows how to fight the Man of Wolves. You’ve seen what he —”

“
Kael
.” She’d hardly glanced at him as she spat his name — as if he wasn’t even worth the trouble to scold. “All Kael’s proved today is that he’s a fool as well as a weakling.”

“He’s stronger than you think — he’s strong enough to lead us!” Griffith cried. He’d glared at her back as she marched away, and the blue marble rolled madly between his fingers. “Don’t worry, Kael. I’ll think of something. I’ll prove you’re ready.”

And before Kael had a chance to get a word in edge-wise, Griffith had stalked from the hospital.

By that point, Baird had begun to complain loudly about all of the noise — and warned that if he didn’t have some peace, he’d be forced to do something
drastic
. So rather than have to find out what that might be, Kael had hung the broken door back into place and jogged straight for the forge.

He didn’t know what Gwen planned to do with him … but he knew there was safety in numbers. “She thinks I forced them into it,” Kael muttered as he paced. “She said I
entranced them with my Wright visions
.”

Kyleigh raised her brows. “Well, did you?”

“Of course not. I only wanted to see how Titus beat them. Then the things they showed me were so … horrible. They were so badly broken. I could
feel
they’d given up, and they had no reason to!” He pinched the arch of his nose, trying to hold his frustration back. “I just — I wanted them to see what I could see. I wanted them to know what they’re capable of.”

“Frustrating, isn’t it?” Kyleigh muttered.

He didn’t think that was entirely fair. “I never would’ve known what I was had it not been for the wildmen. It was like trying to look at a map through a pinhole! And I don’t think — oh, give that here.”

He grabbed the axe and shaft she’d been trying to fit and pushed them together. The metal swirled into the wood as he twisted it, sealing them tighter than any blacksmith could’ve possibly done.
When he was finished, he held the axe aloft. It looked exactly like Gwen’s axe, except it had two heads — and it was made of steel.

“The end of an era,” Kyleigh said with a sigh. “The wildmen will have to learn to be something other than dragonslayers.”

Kael had doubted before. But after seeing the warriors’ confusion for himself, he was starting to believe. “It’s really true then, isn’t it? They’ve done nothing but chase monsters through the mountains for centuries on end.”

She nodded. “One of the old Kings sent their ancestors into the Valley long ago. He swore that if they could drive the monsters out, they could keep the land for themselves. That’s why they call their leaders
Thanes
.”

Kael supposed it made sense. “But they never finished their task, did they?”

Kyleigh shook her head. “The dragonslayers chased the monsters straight up the Unforgivable Mountains and to the very top, where they planned to shove them off into the northern seas. But the monsters put up a desperate fight — and as the battle raged on, the eternal winter slowly warped them both. The monsters became the wynns, and the dragonslayers became wildmen.

“Gwen’s people have wasted ages fighting an ancient battle,” Kyleigh said with a sigh. “The wynns lure them out of their castle, and the wildmen chase the wynns to the cliffs above the northern seas. Back and forth they’ve gone for generations, neither side ever gaining much ground over the other. The wynns won’t leave and the wildmen won’t give in. Their children grow up knowing that they’ll likely die at each others’ hands.”

Kael groaned as he sank to the ground. “How am I ever going to convince her to go to war? How
do
you convince somebody with mules for forefathers?” An idea came to him suddenly. “Am I allowed to caddoc Gwen?”

“Oh, Kael — you don’t want to do that. Not if she’s really sworn to salt your heart and eat it.”

He was certain she’d only been joking about that … well, he was
half
-certain. Still, he didn’t see another way around it. “If I beat her in front of all the wildmen, she’ll
have
to listen to me. She’s probably going to attack me anyways, so I might as well get her first.”

Kyleigh gave him a serious look. “Speaking as somebody who’s had many fond battles with Gwen over the years, let me offer you a warning: there
is
an end to her goodwill. She’s spitting mad right now, and if you push her any closer to the brink, she’ll kill you.”

Kael didn’t understand. “I thought the two of you were just friends who sort of hated each other. Has she really tried to kill you?”

Kyleigh was silent for a long moment. “Do you remember the day you found me in the woods and my head was all bashed in?”

His gut twisted into a knot. “Don’t tell me …”

“I never saw it coming,” she said with a sigh. “One moment I was soaring over the battlefield, leading the wynns into her flank. And the next,” she slapped her hands together, “Gwen had knocked me out of the sky. She jumped from one of the castle towers and clubbed me over the head with that blasted great axe of hers. Then she rode me into the ground.

“I managed to escape, of course. I still don’t think she realizes just how badly I was wounded. I don’t think she ever
meant
to kill me. Part of me likes to think that she regrets it …” Kyleigh smiled hard. “But the other part isn’t entirely sure.”

Mercy’s sake. He’d always wondered how Kyleigh had gotten wounded. He’d imagined a dozen different ways it might’ve happened — but none had involved a wildwoman leaping from a castle.

“The Gwen you know might be sagging a bit at the breeches. But if you prod her, you’ll regret it. Look …” Kyleigh tugged hard on the end of her pony’s tail, and the blaze of her eyes went dark. “I know what to do with Gwen.”

“Really? What?”

She shook her head. Her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes as she said: “Don’t worry about it, whisperer. Just leave it to me.”

*******

Nothing he said could convince Kyleigh to tell him what she had planned. So when evening fell, he followed her rather grumpily to dinner.

“Hmm, quail stew. Ah!” Baird spat the broth back into his bowl and waved a hand over his tongue. “Oh, it’s hot!”

“Well, what’d you expect? It’s been bubbling in a cauldron for hours,” Kael said impatiently. Then he turned back to Kyleigh. “Are you going to fight her?”

“No, I’m not going to fight her.”

“You are though, aren’t you? You’re just going to say it was
mischief
, or something.”

An amused half smile bent her lips, but she didn’t reply.

Kael knew he wasn’t going to get it out of her, no matter how he tried. So he busied himself by glancing around the room for trouble. “Where’s Griffith?”

“He said he had chills,” Baird mumbled from around a mouthful of stew. Sweat beaded furiously over his bandages as he forced it down his knobby throat. “Gah! Oh, that’s hot! Young Griffith said he had the shivers, so I put him in one of the cots.”

Kael sighed. Gwen was probably going to blame him for that, as well.

Kyleigh tapped him on the shoulder, interrupting his thoughts. “I just realized that I never thanked you for the gifts.”

“And you’ll never have to,” he said firmly.

“But I want to. Thank you for the bed, and the trousers.”

He glanced down absently. “They seem to fit well.”

“They do. Remarkably so. Which makes what I’m about to do all the more difficult.”

Kael didn’t have a chance to reply — he didn’t even have a moment to fully grasp her words. All at once, a familiar icy-wet slap to the face blurred his vision. He wiped the moisture from his eyes and saw the empty cup in Kyleigh’s hand. He saw it, but his mind struggled to grasp it.

The empty cup was in
Kyleigh’s hand.

Kyleigh’s
.

The wildmen shoved him off the bench and into the middle of the room. Had it not been for their urging, he didn’t think he could have made it there himself. Black clouds filled his chest. Their fumes made his head light while the rest of his limbs sagged as if they belonged to a giant.

He didn’t hear what Kyleigh said to Gwen. He didn’t know what joke she made that had the wildmen laughing while Gwen’s face burned red. When Kyleigh turned around, the sound of her bare feet scraping the floor was the only sound he heard; hers were the only eyes he saw. And he could think of only one word to say:  

“No.”

She raised her fists. “Hand-to-hand combat, and no shortcuts — you can’t put me to sleep.” She smiled hard. “We fight until one of us is knocked out.”

“Kyleigh, no. I’m not —”

Her fist collided with his jaw. Every thread of her impossible strength, every cord of iron-bending muscle charged hot behind her blow. His head snapped back, but he stayed on his feet.

He felt the familiar looseness in his limbs as the warrior edge of his mind tried to take over. His eyes wanted to search her stance for weakness, but he forced them to stay still. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

More blows came, but he hardly felt them. He tried to understand the confusion of being struck so hard by someone he loved. He tried to separate the sudden fury in Kyleigh’s eyes from the warmth he was certain was still there.

And while his mind struggled to make sense of what was happening, his warrior edge protected him. It grew stronger and more insistent with every blow. He fought to hold onto his reason, but it was becoming more difficult to push the numbness back.

“I’m not going to hit you.” The words felt strange on his lips. Perhaps it had something to do with the wet warmth that trickled down his chin. “I’ll stand here all night if I have to.”

The fire in her eyes swelled as she circled him. “Then I’ll beat you again tomorrow night,” she whispered. “And the night after that. And while you stand there with your arms crossed, Titus will rule the mountains. This is what Gwen wants — it’s the only way to convince her that you’re strong. You’ve got to defeat the one beast in the mountains she never could.” Her fist slammed into his nose. “You’ve got to beat
me
.”

Hot blood rushed down his face like a cleansing fire, driving out his confusion. The blaze in Kyleigh’s eyes assured him: she was strong, she was ready. She could shoulder his blows. If this was what had to be done, then he would do it. He would break his heart once more if it meant some greater good might rise from the pieces.

With that thought, the warrior in him took over completely — its roar rattled the insides of his ears. The black clouds gave way to its fury and a cool wind filled his lungs. The earth dissolved beneath his feet until the only thing left was Kyleigh.

Then Kael struck back.

He clipped her chin, but she darted away. He ducked beneath her next swing and tried to kick her feet out from under her, but she leapt. He had to roll to miss the fall of her heel — a blow that splintered the wood where his head had been only moments before.

Her movements were all there — they were branded into his memory from the hours he’d spent fighting her aboard
Anchorgloam
. Each tilt of her chin and dart of her eyes had meaning. He read them and reacted quickly. The patterns of her steps were the words of a familiar song: he knew which line came next. He followed the verses patiently and tried to leap ahead.

But she was ready for him.

Her elbow came down into his palm. He twisted, but she was gone — popped out of his grasp and already circling at his back. A blow aimed for his head was only a feint. He realized this when he heard the thud of her fist striking his middle. It wouldn’t happen again. He stored that verse alongside a hundred others and waited for the next.

Slowly, he became aware of the drumbeats that’d joined their song. The pounding of the wildmen’s fists upon the table boomed beneath the noise of their fight. It thrummed in the silence between blows; it drowned out the grunts and desperate shuffling of their feet.