Fire The Blood: Dragon Mage Series Book III (10 page)

I do. 
She
answered just for him. 
We travel to Seatown.  I have had enough of dragons
to last me a lifetime.

He laughed even as she
launched them to the sky.  Then whatever answer he would have given was lost on
the winds.  A moment later, she felt a tentative brush across her senses.

Can you hear me this way?
 
She smiled at the feeling of his voice in her head.

I can.

Why Seatown?  I have
heard the borders are closed to all who do not come with an invitation of its
lord.  Not to mention that its water borders are protected by sea creatures,
and any who attempt to make the journey never return.

I have an invitation.

From who?

The sea creature who
protects the island, of course.

She felt Braedon's
questions in the air around them and his surprise. 
I don't suppose you want
to explain that?

Her laughter spilled into
his head and turned into a weird chuffing of the dragon on the wind around
them.

Why does that sound not
fill me with happiness?

You will like Seatown,
fire mage.  It is the only place I know where mage kind use their powers
openly.  The evils of the Blood Rights never reached there.  My brother saw to
that.

Your brother!
 

She laughed again. 
You
were in my head; did you not discover all my secrets?

There was another long
pause. 
Remind me to pay better attention the next time I walk that path
with you. I remember many things, but no brother.

Her thoughts turned sad. 
Understandable, I suppose.  I only ever met him in dreams. 
Then she
shook it off. 
He is wind talked like Lady Melisande.

Seatown? And wind
talked? 
She could feel his consternation grow. 
Your
brother is Lord Theron of Seatown?

You know him?

She felt Braedon’s sigh
before his voice turned dry. 
We've met.

And?
 
She knew from his tone there was more to the story.

And I almost killed him
with an arrow once.

Oh, well. 
Asha
turned back to her flying, not sure how to answer. 
Maybe he won't remember
that.

Right.
Braedon answered, but his voice said quite clearly that he did not care one way
or another. 
Your brother knew your situation?

The words lacked any
softer feeling or the humor she was used to from her mate.  She sighed,
thinking of the narrow and dark road they had all been forced to traverse. 
I
did not let him see the worst of it.

If he is wind talked, how
did you manage that?
  He clearly was set to blame Theron for
not coming for her, but he did not know the whole story, not really.

She sighed again.
There
is much still to tell you. Many things were revealed in the dream walks I had
with my mother and Theron, many things you still need to know that will be
explained presently.

There was a noticeable
pause between her words and his answer, and she could feel him very carefully
thinking over his options. 
I will wait to hear it all
, he finally said.

Asha breathed out her
relief, turning her senses back to the flight ahead of them.  She ignored the stray
thought from Braedon knowing that he had not meant for her to hear.

I will wait to hear, but
if he left her there, I will see he shares at least some of her pain.

Braedon did not realize
he had fallen asleep until he jerked awake, his mate’s laughter floating
through his mind. 
I did not realize I wore you out to such an extent.

Braedon grunted and
shifted a bit on his seat between her claws. 
How about, from now on, I ride
above rather than below?

Sorry.  I did not think
of anything but leaving quickly. 
He could feel she was
indeed contrite, not having thought of letting him mount her in comfort.

Where are we?

We have traveled past the
north gate and are nearly to the human settlements.  I see their fires in the
distance.

Yes.
He thought back to her grimly. 
They do like their fire.

They both fell into their
own thoughts for a bit.  Braedon thought of Riva.  He felt a caress in his mind
a second before she spoke again. 
Riva is true mate to Furee? 
It came
across as more statement then query.

So it seems. 
She
must have heard what he did not say because he felt her questions in his head.

You do not approve of
him? It seemed you trusted him above the others.

Braedon sighed. 
I
would not have left her there if I did not trust Furee.  But I do not see how
it will work for them.  His appearance is everything  she fears.

Because she was in the
bonfire.

Yes. 
He
felt a moment of vertigo as she reached for something in her mind he could not
see. 
Asha? 

Then they were free
falling from the sky and Braedon felt his stomach drop with the altitude. 
Asha?!

She spoke, and the feel
of her in his head was different, as if she was many voices.  The feeling of
falling was eclipsed by the fear for his mate when he heard that voice, and as
fast as they were falling that was saying something. 
Riva has always been
strong.  Called by her gift, she forgets her fear.  She will be called to him
as he is to her.  She will not be able to distance herself forever.  There are
many paths ahead for her, but this I can tell you.  She will always go where
her healer’s heart leads, and Furee has more need of it than most.

"Whatever that
means!" He was yelling into the wind and clutching her diamond-hard
talons.  He had fired up in reaction to his fear, but the whoosh of the wind on
the way down was snuffing his flame as fast as he could make it.  "Asha!"

They had reached the top
of the tallest trees when Asha seemed to return.  He felt her confusion, and
then they were crashing through the highest branches before she leveled herself
out and managed to keep them from splattering ignobly against the forest
floor.  Braedon felt his heart racing as they finally bumped and tumbled their
way to the ground.  With a final thud, they landed.  Asha had twisted enough
that she was on the bottom, but for Braedon that she took most of the impact was
not actually reassuring.  He could feel that she was unharmed and embarrassed,
of all things.

"What, the hell, was
that
?" he asked, laying flat against her crystal scales.  Her
talons had nearly crushed him in her effort to protect him.

He felt her power build
around him and rolled to his back as soon as she had shifted to her mage form. 
"I think I reached for my first vision."

He was lying on his back
beside her, trying to catch his breath.  At the awe coating her words, he
turned to his side.  Resting his hand on his head, he looked her over. 
"What do you mean, first vision?  I thought you had those all the
time."

"I have dream
visions that I can barely control and some that come over me without my call. 
This was different.  I was thinking of Riva and her future with Furee, and I actually
went into the weave."  She turned to her side and looked at him, her eyes
big in her pale face.  "I saw all the possibilities, and if I had wanted
to I could have gone further and seen the connections through the different
decisions."  He saw the tears fall from her eyes before she closed them
tight.  "I am a true dragon seer," she finished with a pain-filled
whisper, "like my mother before me."

He pushed her hair back
with his free hand and studied her.  He wasn’t sure what she was actually
feeling.  There seemed to be a barrage of deep emotions crashing down on her,
and he could not see through the melee.  "What does this mean?"

She breathed in deeply
and opened her eyes.  The cold was coating her pupils, and then as fast as
that, they fired hot.  "It means I am more dangerous and in more danger
then I have ever been.  If my father finds out, he will stop at nothing to get
me back or kill me."  Asha had gone distant for a moment, but then she was
back.  She pursed her lips and almost smiled at him in apology.  "And it
means that until I have a handle on what I am doing and how I am doing it, we
should probably stay out of the sky."

Braedon breathed out a
relieved breath and wiped away the tears that had fallen down her cheek. 
"Thank the light for small favors."  He grumbled it for her benefit
and watched as she attempted a full smile for him.  He leaned down and kissed her
briefly then looked her over carefully.  For the first time he made a conscious
effort to get into her head and see what she was really feeling.  There were
almost too many conflicting feelings to sort, and that told him enough to lean
down and kiss her again.  "So we walk.  Any idea where we are now?"

Her eyes rounded, and she
cleared her throat very prettily.  "Um, you don't recognize it?"

Braedon raised a brow,
looking around them at the surrounding forest of green trees.  He turned a
sardonic gaze her way.  "I was a little distracted by my imminent death on
the flight down to look for landmarks.  You?"

She shrugged and sat up,
looking around while he rolled to his feet.  "We were heading south from
the Northgate.  Since Seaport is off the coast of the southern shores, we
should be able to continue south until we can find your landmarks."

"Agreed."  He
gave her a hand up, and they both looked around at the deep forest surrounding
them.  Braedon breathed in the familiar scents he had grown up with.  He
studied the trees, and then the ground carefully.  He almost smiled at the
familiar feel of the forest.  Despite the lack of magic around them, it was
good to be in familiar territory.  Then he took a step and winced at the sound
of new leather not yet broken in creaking when he moved.  "I may have to
do my hunting naked until I can find some decent gear."

He caught Asha looking
him over, and then she cleared her throat as her cheeks turned pink while she
looked away.  "Well, if that's what you need to do," she mumbled, a
hidden smile forming on her lips as he watched.

Braedon chuckled and then
caught her hand and headed south, pulling her along with him.  "Come,
mate.  My land may not have the magic of Dracon, but it has its own beauty.  I
would show it to you."  He smiled back at her, and the grin was a touch
wicked.  "You can get me out of my leathers after we make camp for the
night."

***

Asha did not know what to
expect from the human world she had heard so little about; rarely had her
vision walking showed her the human places.  It took her awhile to get used to
the air around her, so used to Dracon’s magic soaked winds.  But she had known
not to expect it, and gradually she adjusted to the differences and was able to
see the simple beauty of the human places.  Hearing so much of the damage the
Blood Mage had caused on this side of the Northgate, she was pleasantly
surprised by the range of life that filled the forests.  She could hear all
manner of creatures skittering through the greenery, probably trying to escape
the Huntsman and his dragon mate, she thought with a shake of her head, as they
made steady progress through the isolated forests.

"We must be well
north for such abundant game.  There are too many hungry people closer to the
human settlements for such abundance to thrive."

"What of your home? 
Is it like this?"

"Very nearly
identical," he said, slipping through some dappled shade and holding
branches back for her passage.  She knew the sound of his leathers squeaking
still bothered him because every now and then he would sigh when a movement was
particularly loud.  She should probably feel guilty for burning his own
clothes, but his reactions were funny, and she was having a hard time biting
back her laughs when he sighed so forlornly.  At least it was a distraction
from the endless walking.  "We are nomadic.  We live where the game takes
us, selling our skins and the meat we don't eat to the villages we pass.  So we
could very well end up in this particular forest before long, if we ever figure
out exactly where here is."

"If you think it
would help, we could try flying one more time to get somewhere you do
recognize," she suggested helpfully, at the same time dreading his
answer.  On one hand her feet would thank her, on the other she was not at all
sure how she had ended up in the dream weave in the first place, so stopping
herself from doing the same again would be problematic at best.  "Or I
could fly up on my own and scout out some landmarks to help us along."

He did not even attempt
to pretend to think about that.  Instead, he snorted and pulled her along. 
"We'll get somewhere soon enough without announcing our presence with
another crash out of the sky."

Asha narrowed her eyes on
his broad leather-covered back.  "You don't have to sound quite so condescending,
Huntsman."

He turned, clearly
surprised to study her belligerent face.  Then he cracked a smile.  "Feet
bothering you, lady dragon?"

She narrowed her eyes
further and stomped around him without another word.  "If you think I
cannot endure whatever you dish out, fire mage, you do not know me at
all."  Then she stomped through the brush, making sure the branches
snapped back on purpose.  Unfortunately for her, the Huntsman was fast on his
feet and knew the forest much better than she did, and it missed him when he
jumped lithely to the side with an annoying chuckle.

"If it makes you
feel any better, we will be setting up camp before we lose the light.  Since we
left without anything, we will be roughing it even more than I am used
to."  She could feel his eyes on her back as he kept pace with her
easily.  "I don't suppose you have that dragon power where you can produce
a feast with a thought?  Or dream up a bed?"

Asha stopped and
considered his words, even as he bumped into her back.  "I believe that
only the truly ancient dragons can dragon dream things into being, but if I am
as Shehar said, an ice dragon, with great magic, I might be able to do
something."  She pursed her lips and looked over her shoulder at him. 
"I can try, though I can promise nothing.  In any case, tonight I will
dream walk and visit my brother.  Once he knows we are on the way, he will come
for us."

"Wonderful.  Lord
Theron of Seatown coming to our rescue."  His dry sarcasm was not lost on
her, but she decided to ignore it and moved away.  Working her way through the
underbrush had looked so much easier when he had done it.  At least as a dragon
or mage, neither of them had to worry about animals or bug bites.  And the cold
did not touch either of them, so they were better off than most would have
been.

"You don't have to
sound like that," she muttered.  "He is my brother."

Before he could speak she
froze, lifting her eyes to the brush above them as she strained to hear what
had caught her attention.

What is it?
 
Braedon too had stopped, making no sound at the back of her.

I heard something.

What?
 
He did not question her senses or berate her for stating the obvious; he just
waited for her to figure it out.

It was the creeping
darkness at her mind’s edge that clued her into the danger headed their way. 
Something
is coming. 
Then she was once again swept into the weave of things to come,
her mind twisting and turning as she lost all connection to the body she had
left behind.  She had to trust that her mate would keep her safe.

This time she kept enough
awareness to pull herself out of it quickly as soon as she discovered the
danger. 

She was still collapsed
in Braedon's arms and had the feeling from the way he was breathing and holding
her so close in his arms that she had been out longer than she thought.  She
had no time to reassure him.  They had little enough time as it was. 
My father
is coming, and he is not alone.

Dragons?
 
He did not panic; he did not seem to react at all while she was ready to
hyperventilate.  Braedon did lift his head so that he could see her face.  He
did not stand or release her from his arms, and she was not steady enough for
that yet regardless.  Strangely, his calm produced the same in her, and she was
able to give him coherent thoughts despite the fist of fear that had her by the
throat.

Monsters,
she
did her best to send him pictures of the terrors coming their way, and he must
have received them because he grunted, his face showing his disgust.  He was
not wrong.  Her father cared nothing for the natural order of things, and his
creatures were abominations made of the blackest blood magic and dead things. 
He
comes for me.  He knows that I am dragon true.