Furee Born: The Dragon Mage Series Book IV (5 page)

I am not on fire.  I will
not burn.  I am not on fire.  I will not burn.
 
As long as she kept her eyes closed, she could
almost make
herself believe it.

Isolation Mountain had
been the stronghold of the House of Earth leaders for thousands of years.  Home
for the last ten decades of the dragon seer Laksee, many had traveled here in
their time, enjoying both the peace and wisdom of that fine lady.  From the
outside, it held much the same beauty and majesty of Eben’s Forsaken Mountain; almost
as tall on the far side of Dracon, it was surrounded by water on three sides,
and like all things dragon, it seemed to embrace the natural world rather than
detract from it, but that was where the similarities ended.  It had all been a
lie.  Because once you left the surface behind and delved into the black caves
and lower reaches, you found decay, death, and a coating of evil that seemed to
permeate everything.  This was the place where Graedon had conducted a great
many of his twisted experiments.  Where Asha had been tortured and held captive
against her mother Laksee’s good behavior, and it was the place Laksee was
ultimately killed by her captor.  Riva hated coming here.  The mountain was
broken, she could feel it; she just couldn’t do anything to heal it.  As a
healer, there was no worse feeling than that.

When it was discovered
that Lord Graedon had been pursuing dark arts, and his many crimes had been
uncovered, it was Aarion of the dragon knights and former royal son of House of
Earth who swore to make things right.  He took his place as leader of the House
that he had forsaken when he joined the knights, and with the help of his
fellow knights of the Light, for the last two years, they had been moving
systematically through the catacombs and dark levels to eradicate all things
unnatural.  As many creatures twisted and dark put together from a mishmash of
the dead and black magic, there always seemed to be more to fight.  After two
years, Aarion had seen more darkness than even a knight of the Light could see
without it changing him, and he had been unable to locate the damaged and sick
Lord Graedon.

Riva had met him many
times over the last few years, and each time they met, she sensed a darkness
growing inside him.  He placed so much of Lord Graedon’s crimes on his own conscience,
bearing the burden for his house that no one else would.  It seemed with every
unholy creature he killed, every crime he uprooted from the labyrinth of death
beneath Isolation, the weight he accepted grew.  The question of whether he
could carry such weight without it burying him was always at the forefront of
Riva’s mind each time she saw him.

Laying across a bed of
silks that appeared to be as garish and as forgotten as the rest of the castle,
Aarion lay in a fever.  His liquid gold hair had lost much of its luster to
illness, and the shimmering gold of his skin appeared dull and pallid. 
Normally a tall intense dragon, his brown eyes were always too full of power
and will to ever be considered ordinary, until today.  He lay naked across the
dusty sheets with only a corner of the old worn silk covering his lower body. 
It did not take Riva more than one look to see there was more going on than the
terrible gaping wounds across his abdomen and mangled chest.

“Has he healed at all?” she
asked, having a hard time believing it could have been worse than this.

“No, that is why we
called for a healer.”  A dragon that she had just met for the first time,
Icarus, spoke from the shadows.  His voice held a bite of cold wind to it that
had a shiver going down her arms.  Even in the shadows, his snow-white hair and
ice-blue eyes seemed to glow coolly.  Tall and fit, he was like most of the
dragon knights but with a lithe quickness few could match.  He had a long bow
and quivers against his back, and his leathers had more in common with the
forest craft of her brother’s huntsman than the dragon knights’ usual black leathers. 
Never the less, he was one of them, just as the black-eyed warrior, Datulos, was
who stood beside him, with the many elaborate markings across his flesh and the
screaming red hair.

Datulos noticed he had
her attention and he smiled, a touch wicked and with a whole lot of heat.  Riva
looked away from the blatant smile with a blush and a shiver that Furee
definitely noticed because he growled low in his throat and stepped up close
behind her.  When she turned to look, his eyes were smoldering down to ash that
she could almost see falling in their depths, and they were locked on Datulos
with intent to harm.  Riva opened her mouth to say something but was distracted
by the lick of flames that accompanied the heat of Furee’s chest hitting her
back.  Once again she found herself wrapped up in flaming hair and the power of
a fire dragon.  But this time she had been looking right at it when it touched
her so unexpectedly and she could not help the spike of fear.  She sucked in a
loud breath rather than scream, and it took her a moment to calm her nerves
enough to speak.

“Furee,” she said mildly
enough when she could catch her breath and calm her kneejerk fears.

Finally looking away from
Datulos who was looking wickedly pleased for some reason, Furee looked down and
caught her look.  He must have seen more than she wanted him to because the
lick of his power disappeared abruptly, but the warmth of his hand settled over
her arm and squeezed in apology.  With an effort, he let her go and backed up, giving
her room to heal, though he was careful to stay between her and the two dragons
in the corner.  Riva heard the conversation around her with only half an ear
already moving to Aarion, her thoughts on what she would find.

“Why did Balin not bring
Shehar?” Icarus asked, sounding like he was attempting to divert Furee’s attention
more than anything else.

There was a tense moment
before Furee spoke, the feel of the room changing enough that Riva turned away
from her patient to look at her mate.  “When he stopped to get Shehar at House
of Air, he found that they had also been attacked,” Furee said, his eyes now on
the white-haired Icarus.  “Lord Topa was injured enough to need her so they
were forced to come for the Lady Riva.”

Riva did not understand
the sudden drop in temperature, or the rise in tension until Icarus spoke
again.

“My father is one of the
oldest among us,” Icarus spoke grimly and the bite of cold wind increased until
Riva was rubbing her arms from the cold.  “He should not need a healer whatever
his injuries.”

Furee motioned to
Aarion.  “And this is not the same?”

Icarus stood quickly from
the wall without another word and glided out of the room.  In any other man, it
might have been a stomp, but he moved too gracefully for that.  It seemed his
feet barely touched the floor.

Furee moved his eyes to
Datulos.  “Go with him.  Watch his back.”

Datulos looked from his
friend’s departing back to Furee, and then with one last look at Riva, he
smiled like he knew a secret and followed.  “Always.”  He did stomp out, making
Riva realize just how big he really was.  Not Lux big, but still he topped her
by a good foot.  She was pretty sure the sword she now saw strapped to his back
was longer than she was.  “I’ll send Balin and Adair back to help guard Aarion
and your pretty healer.”  Then he was out the door and gone.  Furee turned back
to her and she turned back to Aarion before Furee could catch her watching the
other dragons leave.

Putting off the first
touch because she knew what she would find was cowardice, so she took a deep
breath and stopped stalling.  Laying her hand on Aarion’s forehead, she closed
her eyes and wasting not a moment more pushed her power deep.

The poison she had
expected was present but in small enough quantities that it took her a moment
to find it and only because she was looking for it.  She pulled the small slug
of wrongness away from where it clung to the backside of Aarion’s heart and
examined it.  It struggled seeking the dark places to hide and work its evil. 
She could feel a malevolence to it that she had only ever felt once before.  It
was not the poison itself she was feeling, but the intentions of the man who
made it.  Poison like many things that were meant to kill always carried, for
her at least, a taste of the maker.  In this instance, she could tell two
things; one was that the poison had not been made with dragons in mind.  A
human would have died instantly and painfully, but Aarion would eventually
fight this one off himself.  If not for the wound, he would have already done so,
but the damage was too much along with the poison to battle it off with typical
dragon ease.  Seeing what she needed to see, Riva dropped the poison and
watched it burrow back into the dark.  Then with a thought, she sent a healing
light like a flash fire rolling through Aarion, making him jackknife with a
roar off the bed.  Her healing light eradicated the poison in a flash and burst
light into all his dark places, removing the darkness that weighed him down. 
It was more than she was asked to do, but she didn’t care; grabbing what was
left of her reserves, she settled into her healer trance and worked from the
inside out, healing the rest of Aarion’s wounds.

Sometime later, she fell
back into her own body and opened her eyes with great weariness.  She knew she
would find Aarion awake and she looked over to find him completely healed, his
brown eyes shining with a restored vitality, no longer looking so ordinary and
out of place in the stunning beauty of his face.  Better than that, he looked
weightless and filled with the light of his purpose.

Riva smiled at him
knowing it had been worth the price she was about to pay and then promptly
passed out.

Furee caught his mate
before she could hit the floor or bounce her head off the side of the four-poster
bed.  When he felt her steady breath and the warmth of her skin, only then did
he relax enough to look at the other dragons in the room.  “She sleeps, but she
will be fine.”

Aarion breathed easier,
and with some surprise, he jumped out of the bed and looked over his now fully
healed skin.  He had lost the sickly tinge to his skin and once again shone
like new coins, his hair the silk of molten gold, every muscle in his body
perfectly defined and without a mark.  He stood naked, smiling for the first
time Furee could remember since he discovered what Graedon had done to the
honor of his house.  Furee grunted under the full force of that smile, suddenly
glad Riva was sleeping through the unveiling.

Aarion looked at his
hands as if he had never seen them before.  “What did she do to me?” his
whisper was awe filled, his eyes going back to the sleeping mage in Furee’s
arms and softening.  “She did more than heal me,” he muttered his eyes clear.

Furee had to agree that there
was something different about him, but he said nothing, just held his mate
closer unaware that his flame hair stretched and swirled around her, cocooning
her and protecting her.  Aarion saw it and blinked, stepping back.  “I mean no
harm, Furee.  She has helped me more than I thought possible.”

“Your light is brighter,”
Adair said from the doorway next to Balin where the two of them had stood
watching.

Everyone looked at him
but it was Aarion who spoke.  “What do you mean?”

The young dragon
shrugged.  “Your light is shining brighter.”  He turned to look at Furee and
Balin.  “Can’t you see it?”

“You can see his light?”
Balin asked quietly, sharing a quick look with Furee.

“Can’t you?”

“Is it just Aarion’s
light or can you see everyone’s?”

Adair blinked, suddenly
looking uneasy.  “I can see everyone’s.  Can’t you?  I thought all the dragon
knights could see it.”

That caught Furee’s
attention. “Does that mean you did not see the lights until after you pledged
to the knights.”

“Of course,” he looked
from one to the other.  “Does that mean no one else can see it?”

Balin shrugged.  “I have
only heard of one other knight of the Light that could see a dragon’s aura and
he had begun life as a healer.”

“Who is it?” Adair asked,
blinking at that information.

“Was,” Furee said
gruffly.  “He died long ago in the old battles.  He was the last of Eben
Kinkaid’s brothers to fall or so the tales tell.”

“It’s a good thing,”
Aarion said finally and Adair lost some of his tension.  Then Aarion tilted his
head.  “You say my light is brighter?  What did it look like before?”  But he
asked sadly like he already knew.

Adair looked suddenly
uncomfortable.  “In the last two years, I have noticed it dimming.  I was going
to say something but I thought all the knights could see it.”  He shrugged.  “It’s
brighter now than almost all the dragon knights, and was always brighter than
most of Dracon even at its dimmest, but not as bright as the Lady Riva or the
sisters of House of Fire and Water.”

More than one of the
dragons listening blinked at this infuse of information.  They were all silent
for a moment absorbing it, then Aarion finally spoke, slapping the young dragon
on the back with a camaraderie they had not seen him display in years.  “How
about you let your fellow knights know if anybody’s light looks different in
any way.”  Then he paused, something obviously occurring to him.  “Just out of
curiosity, who has the brightest and who has the dimmest?  I mean of the dragon
knights.”

“Well,” Adair cleared his
throat, “you had the dimmest, and I would have said Furee,” the dragon looked
decidedly uncomfortable and shot a glance at Furee and Riva and quickly away, “but
he’s getting brighter all the time, so I would say Datulos.”