Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
The heart is your greatest strength or weakness. You choose.
-Humaning for Beginners: A Dragon’s Tale of Human Management
DAY FOUR
Iworked alongside my army through the day and night, dismantling the cruel ingenuity of traps laced throughout the outer defenses of the forest surrounding my palace.
Some bore my father’s dark craftsmanship: pendulum blades swinging silently from trees, pits lined with poisoned spikes and jagged steel snares hidden beneath leaves, ready to tear flesh from bone if triggered.
Though I approached those with patience, using a twig to activate the spring mechanism, then carefully bending the teeth outward so no one would stumble into them later.
Lorik added an extra layer of evil, employing holograms cast by well-planted projectors to mimic safe paths, intending to lure even the most experienced warrior into a fatal misstep.
Those, Taron found, after he found me. I was gone so long, he came looking.
Nyla’s cruelty was subtler, but no less deadly. Nets that constricted like a living thing.
Commander Granger crouched over each, calculating the weight and pressure of the tripwires, then slowly disarming or rerouting them.
Every snap, hiss and glimmer of malicious intent felt personal. Most were designed to inflict maximum pain before death, but all were a message: We’re here, and we’re not going away without a fight.
When we finally returned to the palace, dirt-streaked and exhausted, Taron headed for my bedroom, but I headed toward the kitchen, needing a break from his presence.
Cowardly? Maybe. But deciding what snack to devour for breakfast was infinitely easier than facing the man whose scent lingered on my sheets.
He must have agreed, because he didn’t protest the separation.
Councilwoman Bauer caught up to me along the way. “Majesty, a formal challenge for your crown has been issued.”
Because of course it had. “Who issued it?”
“That, I don’t know. The message was passed with me, and I raced off to find you before hearing the name. My apologies.”
Wasn’t like it mattered. Whoever it was, the end would be the same. “Sound the trumpets,” I ordered, biting back a sigh. “The battle begins in an hour.” Better to handle this particular disruption swiftly.
“I’ll alert the masses, Your Majesty.” She almost sounded proud.
I strode off to prepare. Adelaide stood in the armory when I arrived, already selecting my favorite weapons. She didn’t say a word, just handed me my dual flame-forged blades, and an axe wielded by King Cedric in his prime.
“How’d you know?” I asked.
She shook her head at me as if disappointed. “Please. I've seen this storm brewing for days.”
And really, we’d been down this road before. The day I’d killed my father, I fielded twelve different challenges, one after the other.
My sister held up a vial of black liquid, shaking it. “Gelu root tea?”
The calming tonic used by berserkers to circumvent rage. I eyed it, then shook my head. “Nein. I’ll keep the edge. Might need it.”
She popped the cork and knocked back the contents herself. “The challenge was inevitable as soon as you declared your romantic interest in the professor. That means babies and dynasty.”
None of my sisters had any desire to serve as ruler of Ashmorra, but my child might. A possibility I’d never even considered. Wait, was I considering…
“I declared nothing,” I muttered, sheathing a blade. “And I’m not planning a future with him. I’m fighting it!”
Adelaide’s sidelong glance spoke volumes. “Have you seen the way you look at each other? Because I have.”
I groaned, dragging a hand down my face. “In my defense, he’s gorgeous.” And strong. And funny. And comforting. “Where is he?”
“Wandering the palace. He’s found half of our secret passages already. And he’s slipped his guard three times.”
Typical. Longing welled up from a hidden spring, nearly drowning me at the thought of exchanging vows with Taron, making him mine for all of eternity. So what? “Leave him be,” I said, with another sigh. “He’s safer out of sight. This battle is going to get messy.”
A flash of concern passed over Adelaide’s face, and she gave me a hug. “Don’t die, sister. I couldn’t bear it.”
“I never lose,” I told her, hugging her back. “Except when I lose.”
I made my way to the nearest balcony. Unleashing my smokewings, I soared toward the heart of Ashmorra, where the ancient coliseum waited.
Cut into volcanic stone and rimmed with iron teeth, the arena was one of the first structures built in this new land beyond the traveling stones.
Massive statues of the past dragons of renown lined the upper walls, looming over the spectators.
Smoke from lit braziers curled into the air.
Tiered stands filled rapidly, the roar of the crowd already beginning to rise. This wasn’t just a spectacle. It was politics, ritual and law.
My boots struck the turf blood-stained from battles past. Dust kicked up. Across from me, my challenger arrived, seasoned and strong. And familiar. “Franz,” I gasped out.
Torment and determination wracked his features. “I’m sorry, Lys, but I have a family now, and I fear you are leading us into a war with shifters we cannot win. Not when your firebrand is human, and your father can’t be killed by your hand.”
As I reeled, I felt the professor’s nearness. My gaze swept the crowd until I found him. He wasn’t seated. He stood with Adelaide and my other sisters near the railing, his arms crossed, his jaw tight, and tension rolling off him like smoke waves.
When our gazes intertwined, something inside me faltered, but the dragon did not.
BURN HIM!
I ground my teeth and looked away.
The trumpet blared, and the arena hushed. Councilwoman Bauer approached the edge of the royal dais at the top of the stands.
“Dragons of Ashmorra, ancient blood of flame and scale, we gather today in the sacred coliseum to witness challenge by combat. Our Queen, Olyssa Drachenveil, Daughter of the Storm, Empress of Smoke and Starlight, has held her crown through blood, flame, and fury. Yet, as our laws decree, no ruler is above question. No throne sits unshaken when strength is doubted. Our Warden of Ashkeepers has come forward, invoking the Rite of Reclamation. By blood, blade, and fire, they seek to prove her unworthy. Should Queen Olyssa fall, her challenger shall take her crown. Should she prevail, her claim is renewed. Forged anew before the watchful scrutiny of our great army.”
Aggression charged the atmosphere.
“Let this battle be clean,” the councilwoman called. “Let it be true. And let the fire favor the worthy.” She edged back, expression grave, and lifted her arms high. “Let the Rite begin.”
A deafening cheer tore through the coliseum. The scent of molten steel and scorched stone filled the air. I stepped forward, blades gleaming, muscles coiled and ready. The blood in my veins pulsed with rhythm, with purpose. With sorrow.
Franz charged, no theatrics, just brute force.
A mountain of a man wielding a war-hammer nearly as long as my body, his every step thudding like a drumbeat of doom.
A less experienced fighter would have tried to block him.
I ducked under his swing and dove between his legs, flaring my smokewings.
The shimmering appendages whipped out and slashed the insides of his thighs, overextending the joints and snatching his control.
He screamed, suddenly off balance and vulnerable.
I spun on my heel and struck low, both of my blades targeting the tiny seams in his armor at his already injured hips.
Except I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
If I crossed this line now, there would be no return.
Not for me or the queen I was trying to be.
Rather than slicing through tendon and artery with surgical precision, I hopped back.
“Let’s end this here and now,” I pleaded. “You’ve spent too many years with the scribes, away from battle. You cannot beat me. Withdraw your challenge and live for your family.”
“If I must die to embolden others to take the crown, then I do so gladly. For my family,” he roared, springing to his feet and swinging his hammer again, wild and high.
I whooshed behind him. A swift stab to the back of the knee sent him crashing down. I swooped closer and removed his head.
With hot tears streaming down my cheeks, I plunged my hand into his chest cavity and ripped out his heart. The final step to killing a berserker for good. The organ’s glow faded to nothing. The fight wasn’t over until an opponent withdrew or died.
“Our queen has won,” Bauer called, and cheers rang out.
But as soon as those cheers faded, a familiar voice sounded. “I challenge you to the death, Queen Olyssa.”
A woman jumped from the stands to land in the arena. As Franz had predicted, he had emboldened others. This challenger was Marlene, who once had a higher position under my father’s rule. Commander Hoffmann demoted her for sabotaging fellow soldiers.
Lean as a whipcord and twice as deadly, she launched herself midair with a grace she’d learned after centuries of battlefield mastery.
She wielded twin curved daggers in a blur of motion, every angle designed either to bleed me out or bait me into a fatal parry.
Flames licked her irises, a sign she neared full berserkerage.
“No offense, Lys, but the Drachenveils have brought us nothing but trouble. It’s time for blood that doesn’t burn everything it touches to rule. New blood.”
We clashed, steel on steel, footwork razor-tight.
Her skill surpassed Franz’s by far, her style fluid and serpentine.
She landed a cut across my cheek and gouged my shoulder, but they didn’t land by accident.
I let her do it, seeing her next step before she made it.
She thought she had me, that I would launch into the air to avoid acquiring another wound.