Red Dragon (Fire and Fang #2)

Chapter 1

With a grand flourish, the chamberlain swept open the double doors to the royal suite, revealing a spacious receiving room, office, library, and bedroom.

All signs of rubble were gone, the damaged marble tiles had been replaced, and vibrant new rugs delineated seating areas.

The glass in the previously shattered windows sparkled.

Even the furnishings had been painstakingly plucked and swept clean, leaving nothing to indicate that two chandeliers and half the ceiling had come down during the invasion.

“Your team has done good work.” Princess Syla Moonmark, her portable writing desk clutched to her chest, half-penned letters filling it, pushed her spectacles up on her nose. She lamented that she hadn’t yet had time to find her optometrist to have lenses of the proper power made.

Was he even alive? So many Garden Kingdom subjects had perished when the dragon riders had sabotaged the sky shielder and attacked Castle Island.

“Thank you, Your Highness.” Bald, plump, and enthusiastic about his work, the chamberlain bowed to her, then straightened and raised his eyebrows. “Or should I say Your Majesty?”

“I… don’t think so.” Syla winced at the reminder that her mother and four older siblings were gone, not lost by chance during the attack but because they’d been targeted by the ruthless riders.

Only luck—and her aversion to family dinners at the castle—had kept her from the same fate.

“I understand there’s a lot of… debate on the proper succession.

Or rather debate on whether the proper succession will be followed.

Nobody has planned a coronation or even spoken of it to me.

From what I’ve gathered, the only ones who want a politically naive healer to assume rule over the castle and kingdom are those who long for someone else to take responsibility for cleaning up all the messes. ”

“That’s most people in life, Your Highness. You must assert yourself. Ensure everyone knows that you’ve the ability to serve, the same as your father and then your mother did.”

“People have rightfully pointed out my lack of experience with governing.”

“As a healer, you’ve certainly had experience dealing with contentious and unpleasant patients. It’s the same here.” The chamberlain waved airily.

“My bodyguard, who’s nearing retirement age and has a lot of chronic ailments that he brings up frequently, is possibly contentious.” Syla smiled over her shoulder to where Sergeant Fel—shaven-headed, tall, and muscled—loomed in the hallway a few feet away, watching her back. “Definitely surly.”

“Sergeant Fel, yes. We’ve met.” The chamberlain pursed his lips.

“I’m at retirement age,” Fel rumbled in his bass voice, “not near it.”

“And yet here you are.” Syla smiled sadly at him.

“Many aren’t here.” He shrugged.

“Yes.” Syla blinked a few times to keep her emotions from flowing to the surface. Again.

“Will you go in, Your Highness?” the chamberlain asked. “See if the suite meets with your approval.”

“My?” Syla touched her chest.

Why would she have to approve of how her mother’s suite looked? Oh, she would like to see order restored to the entire castle, but the entire city needed cleaning and repairs. With Mother gone… Well, there was no need to prioritize this.

“Of course, Your Highness. I trust you’ll want to move in as soon as possible.”

“Move in?” Syla mouthed.

To her mother’s suite? Her mother hadn’t been dead a full two weeks.

Syla couldn’t move in to her suite. It was presumptuous.

She wasn’t even sure… She sighed. Yes, she was sure her mother had passed.

The identities of the bodies that had been extensively burned by dragon fire had eventually been confirmed.

Aside from aunts, uncles, and cousins, Syla was alone, her future daunting.

She’d succeeded in retrieving the sky shielder from nearby Harvest Island and restoring magical protection to the heavily populated capital, but now Harvest Island was in danger, with dragons hunting prey in the forests and stormers stealing crops from the fields.

Ships filled with refugees were arriving in Sky Torn Harbor every day.

“Yes, Your Highness,” the chamberlain said.

“Moving into the suite will not only be more comfortable and proper for you, but it’ll help establish in people’s minds that you are the legitimate heir.

We don’t want one of your cousins—especially not that conniving gossip Relvin—or any of the military officers taking over.

Did you know that they tried to install martial law while you were gone? ”

“I did.”

“And did you know that Relvin is having royal wine and candies delivered to every wealthy merchant, minor lord, and landowner who might help persuade the people that he should be the next ruler? Why, oh, why have you invited your relatives to the castle for a meeting? It’ll simply give him a chance to snoop. ”

“Chamberlain Julan, I do appreciate your work here, but I can’t presume to take up residence in the royal suite.”

“It’s not a bad idea,” came a new voice from the hallway.

Aunt Tibby approached, a textbook under one arm and wearing an apron so full of tools that it was a wonder she didn’t clank with each step. Bespectacled and graying, she shared Syla’s determination to restore full protection to the Kingdom.

“My room is fine,” Syla said.

“Your Highness,” the chamberlain said, “there’s a giant hole that a dragon ripped through the roof when it kidnapped you.”

“Yes, but—”

“When the workmen attempted to clear the rubble pile from in front of the door, more of the roof collapsed.”

“With a few slight renovations and some tidying, it’ll be fine,” Syla said.

“It’s raining on your bed as you speak,” Tibby said. “I checked there for you first.”

“I’ve been in the library writing letters to all the island lords to assure them that we’re working on our mutual problem and…

Well, I can’t go into much detail in them in case they’re intercepted.

The dragon riders are very actively patrolling the unprotected seas between our islands and attacking our ships. ”

“You should have cut Captain Vorik’s throat when you had a chance,” Tibby said.

Hearing his name brought to mind the steamy night that Syla had spent in a cave with him, being brought to the greatest heights of ecstasy she’d ever known.

All she said was, “I didn’t have a knife the last time I saw him.”

“You should have given his location to me,” Fel said. “I always have a knife, one that would delight in severing that man’s arteries.”

“Was its potential delight in that ability listed as a product feature when you purchased the blade?” Syla asked.

“It was implied.”

Syla shook her head. “Captain Vorik isn’t the problem.”

Three sets of eyebrows flew up. Even the chamberlain, who’d presumably never met the powerful dragon rider, clutched his chest in disbelief.

“He’s not in charge,” Syla said. “He’s a military man following orders.”

Unfortunately. If only she could have truly seduced Vorik and lured him over to their side.

Instead, all she’d managed was to buy a few hours of time by rendering him unconscious, thanks to the stormers’ lack of knowledge about Candles of Serenity.

In the end, that few hours had been enough.

Her team had gotten away with the sky shielder.

Had Vorik forgiven her for that? Since he’d been ordered to seduce her, her actions had seemed fair, but she had no way of knowing if he held a grudge.

“He fights with the power of a dragon, if not a god.” Fel rubbed the back of one of his sore knees, no doubt remembering Vorik kicking him there. “That he’s available to take orders and work against our people is egregious.”

“We need to negotiate with the tribal leaders of the stormer people, not their captains or even their generals,” Syla said.

“Negotiate?” Fel asked as all three sets of eyebrows rose again.

Tibby eyed the lap desk that Syla carried. “You didn’t send letters to them, did you?”

“To a couple of their chiefs, yes. And I also sent a messenger to try to find the leaders of the Freeborn Faction, but I have no idea where to look for them. Even the well-established stormer tribes are hard to pin down since they move from cave camp to cave camp throughout the year to hunt and forage.”

“When they’re not attacking our respectable, established, and civilized kingdom,” the chamberlain murmured.

After spending time with Vorik, who’d nearly fallen over in delight at the opportunity to pick and eat blackberries, Syla had a better understanding now of what drove the stormers, that the climate across the world had grown harsher, making it difficult to find food to feed their people.

The mad storm god’s creations—dragons, wyverns, gargoyles, cloud strikers, and other deadly predators—had always made it challenging to survive outside of the shields, but the stormers had previously been willing to endure those threats to keep their freedom.

It was the famines that motivated their choices now.

A part of her could sympathize, but a bigger part of her didn’t understand why they’d chosen war—to attack and kill her people—rather than negotiating for protection within the shields or maybe trading for food.

The stormers were choosing to be difficult, and she doubted anything would come of the letters she’d sent.

“Any update on the sky shielder repairs?” Syla asked Tibby, both because it was of paramount importance to the kingdom and to turn the topic from Vorik—and her relationship with him.

Though she hadn’t told Fel or Tibby that she’d spent a very active night with Vorik in that cave, she suspected her aunt knew. Maybe they both knew.

“Yes.” Tibby’s grimace didn’t suggest it would be a good update, but it must have had some importance because she waved at the chamberlain in a silent request for privacy.