Chapter 20
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SIRRUS
“What did they say?”
Idroal smirked. “My lords, I am tempted to hold the message hostage in favor of recounting why this room smells of male and female arousal.”
I crossed my arms and gave them a pointed look. “Careful.”
“I am always careful, my lord. The Elders are displeased by your detour. They demand you come to Doro Eche and make your report to them immediately. As soon as you are able to fly.” They looked at Endre with that last sentence.
Endre sat on one of the couches and spread his arms along the back, the picture of ease. I knew better. We were all ready to snap. As it was, I must see to my needs if I wasn’t going to fly to Lena’s rooms and give her what we all wanted.
And he had once again used his power. I felt exhaustion even if he didn’t acknowledge it.
“What a shame I am feeling so poorly,” Endre drawled. “I feel I must recover a while longer before I am to make such a treacherous and draining trip.”
Zovai smothered a laugh. Barely. The flight from here to Doro Eche was one of the easiest on the continent. But I didn’t want to go back to the capital any more than my brothers did. Not while Lena’s scent still clung to the air around us like it needed to remind us she was there.
“Is that what you wish me to convey?”
“Try not to make it sound that smug,” Zovai said. “But yes.”
Endre sighed, and I recognized the set of his shoulders. “Tell them that two flights across the continent and a battle are taxing the limits they’ve imposed on my power. If they insist I be at their beck and call at a moment’s notice, then they must lift that restriction. Until then, I will do what my body and power will allow.”
It was an effort to keep the grim smile off my face. Traitor’s marks could never be removed. The shimmering scar that graced Endre’s chest would never lessen and never fade. But the decrees binding him? Those could be dissolved in an instant by the dragon who created them or one who was more powerful. Much like the binding I set for Soza and Yrre. The magic could be dissolved, but the marks and clipped wings would remain.
I wouldn’t remove the magic, but it was possible. The only dragons who could remove the bind on Endre’s power were the Elders themselves.
They promised they would, after a century of punishment.
It had now been three.
Endre had more grace and patience than I ever could. I would have burned myself alive in an attempt to get free a long time ago had I been bound like him. And both Zovai and I would never be able to make up for the fact that he took the punishment for the three of us. Spared us that pain.
We kept our power low out of respect.
“I will relay it,” Idroal said, bowing. Then they paused. “May I speak freely?”
I laughed. “Do you ever do anything else?”
Everyone laughed with me. It broke the tension just enough, and Zovai sat down. “Go ahead.”
Idroal paused, staring into the flames for long moments. I knew better than to interrupt their thoughts. “What you are experiencing was once not so uncommon,” they finally said. “In spite of what Soza attempted, do not hold yourself back for fear of appearance or disapproval. Not that you would,” they smiled sadly.
It was easy to forget Idroal’s age. They were older than the three of us, and had chosen Skalisméra as their home, though they would be welcome in the highest reaches and towers of Doro Eche. They preferred it here, and even the Elders did not dispute it.
“What do you mean?” Zovai leaned forward. “Which part of this?”
“The truth of our past has long since disappeared,” they said. “You know it as well as I. But there are those of us who believe it is no accident we are born with two forms. Nor is it an accident that the scraps we have of before the Fall there is only evidence of the winged one.”
My eyebrows rose, and I glanced at the others. They looked as cautious as I did. It wasn’t hard to see there were gaps in the knowledge of dragons and their path through this world. But to tug at the fraying threads was a different thing entirely.
“And what do you believe?” I asked.
Their eyes flicked to mine, worried.
Z’s power swirled through the room. “We will not repeat this conversation to the Elders, nor to anyone who means you harm, Idroal.”
“I believe these forms were adopted after the Fall. A way not only to blend in and not terrify the humans, but also to ensure our own survival. United we succeed, divided we fall.”
The old saying was long out of date, though we still held to it. I doubted very much the Elders still regarded the phrase with any respect. But true unity between the two species? If that were the case, the world would be very different.
Endre shook his head, following the same line of thought. “There are no hybrids,” he said, staring at the flames as if he would find the truth in them. “If there were, surely we would know.”
“There are no hybrids in the traditional sense no,” Idroal said. “But that is because the offspring are either fully dragon or fully mortal. Not because there were no unions. There were other signs that could easily be ignored. Or hidden.”
We’d all been alive before the war that split the world apart. But even in those hazy memories, I did not remember seeing humans and dragons together. Not in that way. Not in anything more than an occasional tryst.
Zovai asked the question ringing in my mind. “Was this common? I do not remember it.”
“Common? No. But it was possible. It naturally ceased during and after the war.”
I made my way to the couch and sat, basking in the heat of the fire. It could be a little hotter. I pushed my power toward it and urged it to burn brighter. No dragon would ever say no to more heat.
Silence filled with nothing but the crackling of flame stretched out. I shook my head. “Why are you telling us this, Idroal?”
It was then they shook their head. “I cannot speak more.”
A sinking feeling clung to me and dragged its claws down the inside of my chest. “I assume we cannot dissolve that restriction?”
“You cannot.”
Which meant that the Elders themselves had placed the binding command. “Is it why you choose to live here and not the capital?”
They inclined their head. “One of many reasons. I genuinely prefer to be here, near the sea, away from the politics of Doro Eche. But I also enjoy not being monitored so closely.” They paused. “Think about what I’ve said. That’s all I can ask.”
“We will,” Endre promised.
I certainly would. The three of us had known Idroal our entire lives, and they were a friend. But they’d also been alive a long time and knew the consequences of navigating this world. If they sought to tell us something which had been silenced, even indirectly, it was an incredible risk. That they were willing to do it told us of its importance.
They bowed again. “I take my leave.”
We waited until the door had closed behind them, and Z was up on his feet. Moving. There was no chance he could stay still. “I don’t understand. Why tell us this now? Why try?”
Endre snorted. “Because we’ve never had a human here before?”
We hadn’t. But not only a human. A human who called to us. I very nearly lost control when she walked in wearing those shining scraps of nothing. My dragon roared in my head.
My instincts rose, hearing sharpening along with my eyesight. The scent of the fire and my brothers, but that still-lingering trace of grace and beauty. The beautiful human with hair made of fire. Breakable, but it was all right. I would be careful.
“Sirrus,” Endre called, snapping me back from the edge. He looked pointedly at me. “That’s why Idroal is telling us. Because she makes us respond like that.”
“We need to decide,” I finally said. “What to do with her. Not the Elders. Us. Because the longer she is here and unchecked, the harder it will be to resist. And I am with you, Endre. I don’t want…” I trailed off, unable to voice the words, because I truly didn’t know what they were. “If we’re not sure.”
“Even if we are sure,” Endre said. “The Elders could decide differently.”
“I’m sure,” Zovai said. “If about nothing else, then what I have said since that first moment. I will not see her die. And I will not send her back. Not to him. Not to that life.”
Endre smiled faintly. “It’s almost the same, isn’t it?”
“What?” I asked.
“Standing in front of someone because we know it’s right. Knowing it might cost us everything. Willing to blacken one’s own soul to accomplish it. It feels the same.”
The pit in my stomach grew. “So you want to end her life?”
He snarled, the reaction soothing my dread. “I didn’t say that. I said it feels the same.” He stood and walked toward his rooms.
“Do you regret it?” I’d never asked the question. Neither Zovai nor I ever had, and Z whipped his head toward mine.
We didn’t ask because we didn’t want to cause our brother more pain, but I couldn’t hold it back now, because I knew how he felt would inform this choice.
He stopped, shoulders tight, and turned his head back. “Not for one second.”