Chapter 42
Chapter 42
T he dragons lift their heads, and it isn’t lost on me that they now consider me with expressions ranging from relieved to fearful.
They have given me the ability to constantly access my power and I could just as easily use it against them.
Cailey, on the other hand, is beaming, her pale cheeks glowing. And moments later, Blackbird slinks from the forest on the other side of the clearing, taking wary glances at the dragons before he prowls toward me and plonks himself down at my back.
His casual response to my power seems to break the tension.
Cailey hurries toward me, Graviter’s steely gaze becomes calm, and the other dragons begin murmuring among themselves.
Torva edges toward me first, her emerald eyes soft in the moonlight. “We left our posts so we could be here. We need to return to the other dragons and help the humans. But I hope you understand, we will return here soon. War is coming, and we need your help.”
“War may already be here!” the alarmed cry comes unexpectedly from Cailey, who has pulled up sharply only a few paces away from me and has spun toward the forest in the east.
My focus snaps to the sky, my senses taking in so much more now that my power is constant.
A thunderbird soars toward us, its amethyst-colored lightning sizzling through the air around it. It’s a mighty beast with inky-black feathers and a dark-purple beak. It isn’t approaching quietly, beating its wings and sending multiple cracks of thunder echoing across the clearing.
“That’s Concord,” I whisper, my eyes wide. “She belongs to the Fae Queen’s Champion, Elowynn.”
Even from a distance, I can see that Elowynn isn’t the one riding her. The woman on Concord’s back has a more petite frame and golden hair, distinctly different from Elowynn’s nearly black tresses.
“She isn’t alone,” Cailey murmurs.
Two more flying creatures appear behind her, but they aren’t thunderbirds.
Dragons as big as Vargo spear through the air after Concord, and for a moment, I think they’re chasing her until I realize that they’re maintaining a formation at her back that allows them to flank her.
“Are they escorting her?”
“We’ll find out soon enough,” Graviter growls before he swings to his family. “Dragons! I will guard this plain. The rest of you, back to your posts.”
I’m forced to crouch low so I’m not knocked from my feet by the force of the wind as all of the dragons except for Graviter take off at once.
I’m aware of the Blackbird gripping the ground with his claws, digging in while Cailey is buffeted across the ground and against Blackbird’s side.
Within seconds, the dragons have risen into the air and taken up a formation that allows them to circle the clearing before heading back past the oncoming trio. Several of them take their time circling again, a show of force that the fae rider won’t miss.
I cast an urgent glance at Erik, but he is already stepping back into the shadows of the forest. Galeia will be on edge, and it’s incredibly important that she doesn’t react badly to the rising tension.
By clearing the ground, the dragons have allowed Concord to land, along with the two dragons who were following her, while Graviter moves off to my right like a guard.
One of the incoming dragons has a single rider, while the other has two.
I recognize the two human women who leap off the back of the second dragon—Mother Solas and her granddaughter, Rachel—but not the woman who jumps from the back of the first dragon.
Cailey’s murmur sounds at my shoulder. “That is Catalina Shield. She is the champion of the human Queen, who is now the younger woman, Rachel Solas.”
Erik told me what happened back at the city. Mother Solas and Rachel didn’t treat him like an enemy, but they have new responsibilities now. Rachel will now bear the weight of an entire human population on her shoulders.
Catalina surges ahead first. She has dark-brown hair, consistent with most of the humans I’ve met, light-brown skin, and a birthmark across her left cheek and jaw. Her armor appears to be made from leather, but she’s wearing a black metal glove on her right hand. I consider it with some wariness, since it looks like the type of glove Thaden designed for the humans.
She quickly reaches Concord and shouts a command up to the fae woman who has remained on Concord’s back. “Get down on the ground. Slowly!”
I recognize the fae as Dusana. She was the one who attacked me in the mountains before Elowynn escorted me to the fae castle.
My sister told me it was Dusana who delivered the message to her at Thaden’s village. That message had no real substance but contained a clear threat: If I want my brother to live, I will do whatever Queen Karasi asks.
Now, it seems Dusana is finally here to tell me what that is.
But the dynamic between her and Catalina tells me that Dusana is certainly not in control of this situation.
She slides from Concord’s back without waiting for the bird to extend her wing, wobbling during her landing and taking a long minute to right herself.
“Walk!” Catalina orders her, at which Dusana stumbles toward me.
“Stop,” Catalina barks. “Down on your knees. Keep your hands where we can see them.”
Again, Dusana obeys.
When I first encountered Dusana, she was wearing raven-black armor and carrying multiple concealed weapons. She held her head high. Now she’s dressed in an old, stained tunic and tattered pants. Her hair is matted, and her cheeks look gaunt.
She shivers in the wind, and her eyes are hollow when she looks up at me.
I take a closer look at Concord, unhappy to make out missing feathers around her neck and red marks on her exposed skin. She was either beaten or chained. She sinks to the ground, her head low.
I may not be friends with any fae, let alone Concord’s rider, Elowynn, but Concord chose to help me at a time when I desperately needed it.
“We’ve brought you to Asha Silverspun, as you demanded,” Catalina snaps at Dusana. “Now speak your message.”
“No,” I say before Dusana can open her mouth. “Do not speak.”
Not yet.
Catalina blinks at me. I’ve surprised her, but she will rally soon enough.
“Cailey,” I say, quickly drawing the star to me.
“Yes, Asha?”
“Will you bring some water from the stream?”
Cailey doesn’t question me. “I can do that.”
She darts away toward the edge of the forest.
Then I incline my head toward Blackbird. “Concord must be thirsty, too. Blackbird, can you show her to the stream?”
Blackbird makes a growling sound in his throat before edging toward Concord. I learned early on that fae thunderbirds understand speech, even if they can’t speak back. Only the Dusk fae have the power to commune with them fully, reading their minds and speaking silently with them.
Dusana is a Dusk fae.
It means she doesn’t control sunlight or wind or other elements that could kill a person, but she could silently command Concord to lash out…
I watch her carefully while Blackbird moves toward Concord. The female thunderbird glances at Dusana before she turns her attention to Blackbird, blinking slowly at him.
His half-bird, half-wolf form is a lot to take in, but Concord doesn’t startle.
When he veers toward the forest, looking back at her, she follows him without hesitation.
“Was that a test?” Dusana asks, her voice raspy and more subdued than I’ve ever heard it.
“Maybe.” My focus is now on Catalina, whose darkening features tell me she isn’t in the mood to be patient.
In contrast, Mother Solas and Rachel have stayed well away from me. Probably something to do with the golden band clearly visible on my palm. Rachel was young when Malak died, but Mother Solas lived through his reign. She saw firsthand what an angry Blacksmith is capable of doing.
“Explain to me why you’re here,” I say.
Dusana heaves out a weary breath. “I bring a message?—”
“Not you,” I say to Dusana before I turn back to Catalina. “ You .”
Catalina gives me a once-over before she seems to rethink her position. Her focus flashes briefly to the sky, where Vargo coasts through the air. Erik told me she’s Vargo’s rider. He also told me she’s willing to do anything for her people.
I need to know if that will make her reckless.
My brother’s life may turn on her choices.
“Late yesterday, the fae started withdrawing their forces from the western border,” she says. “That continued today. All of the fae are falling back. Then, this fae arrives, claiming to have a message, but she will only deliver it to you. I knew where you were because of the dragons.”
My forehead creases. “Queen Karasi is withdrawing her troops? But she has nowhere to go. She can’t go north. The Einherjar and Valkyries would stop her.”
Catalina nods. “And she can’t go farther south because the blight has now spread across the way and blocked the pass. Even if it hadn’t, she wouldn’t be foolish enough to head into the deep south, where the dark elves would make a feast of her.”
“Then where is she going?”
Dusana speaks up. “East.”
Impossible . I keep my expression blank. “The darkness is in the east.”
“She doesn’t care,” Dusana snarls. “She would rather march us back into darkness than watch us starve to death.”
I hear the lie in her voice. I saw for myself that Queen Karasi has plenty of food. At least for herself and her chosen favorites.
I slowly sink to my knees, putting myself at eye level with Dusana before I rest my hands on my thighs, turning my left hand palm up.
“Do you see my hammer?” I ask Dusana.
Her focus flickers to it before she nods.
“My hammer refuses to kill.” I watch the cogs turn in her mind before I continue. “But my medallion has no such limitations.”
I have no proof of my claim. I haven’t tested it. But it’s a certainty I feel with every beat of my heart.
“I can force you to speak the truth,” I say.
The corners of her mouth turn down before her lips draw back, revealing her gritted teeth. “Then do it!”
I stay where I am for now. “Deliver your message.”
She stares defiantly back at me. “Queen Karasi does not wish to go to war with the humans and their dragons. She offers an alternative resolution to the conflict.”
“What alternative?”
“A fight to the death,” Dusana replies. “Between the fae champion and the human champion. The winner takes all for their Queen.”
I process this for a moment, aware of the way Catalina—as well as Mother Solas and Rachel—are casting glances at each other. They’re clearly thinking it through.
But Dusana herself is peering at me, which tells me it’s my reaction that matters to her.
“Anything else?” I ask, keeping my expression blank.
“As a show of faith, Karasi has withdrawn her army from the western border to give the humans time to prepare. At dawn in three days’ time, Queen Karasi will assemble her army on the eastern plain. Either the human champion will meet her champion in a fight to the death, or the fae army will push west and kill every human in its path.”
Catalina murmurs beneath her breath, “A single death or outright war.”
“It won’t be that simple,” I say.
Catalina is so caught up in what this proposal means for herself and her people—and why wouldn’t she be, since they are her largest concern?—that she has missed the obvious.
“Dusana of the Dusk,” I say to the fae, “why did you bring this message to me ?”
Her eyes are dull, not a hint of malice, as she says, “Because your brother’s life depends on it.”