Chapter 31
Lorien
“Gods, what the hell have you been eating, Dain,” I groaned, struggling under the weight of my brother.
His massive frame was an asset in a fight, but draped over my shoulders now, his feet slipping out from under him?
Not so much. “This way.” He immediately started to veer towards the wall. “No, idiot–”
“You’re… idiot,” Dain slurred.
“Good to see you don’t lose that sunny disposition when you drink, brother, but unless you want to spend the rest of the night with your face pressed into the wall, its this way. Kael!”
“What?”
That sloppy smile, the way his head spun around made clear that while he wasn’t as drunk as Dain, I was still on my own.
With a lurch, I staggered forward, carrying my own weight and most of Dain’s, right up until the point when we dropped down onto a nearby bench.
As I sucked in a breath, someone approached.
“A couple of bottles of water–” I started to say, assuming it was a barmaid.
“And more beer!” Kael plucked an empty tankard up off the table and thrust it in her direction.
Make that his.
Looked like we weren’t the only rider who’d decided to hit the taverns. The lieutenant came to stand at the front of our table. Not sure why he always looked at us like we were a lump of dog turd on his shoe, but that was his expression right now.
I could eat him. ‘Fang’s voice inside my head had me smiling. I like Viridian and that would make him sad, but I’d eat his rider for you.
No need, brother, I replied.
“Hey.” Kael squinted hard, then peered at Lance. “You’re not a barmaid.”
“And with the state you’re in, you’re not going to be ready to fly out in the morning to search for Fern,” he replied.
As if to confirm the lieutenant’s poor opinion of us, Dain slumped forward, the sound of his snores filling the room.
“I’m fine to fly…” Kael said, trying to put the tankard back down again, but it dropped and veered before smashing against the tabletop. Lance’s eyes narrowed further, which forced me to pipe up.
“We’ll be there when Fern needs us.” I held his gaze steadily. “Just like we were today. Where were you, lieutenant?”
The red spots that formed in Lance’s cheeks? Yeah, they were everything I needed. His jaw muscles worked right before he shot me a terse nod.
“I’ll be there, bright and early tomorrow morning, ready to fly out,” he replied stiffly.
“On what dragon?” Kael said, looking at me, then the two of us burst out laughing. Even Dain lifted his head for a second, looked around blindly then slumped back on the table, which just made us laugh harder.
Lance apparently couldn’t take a joke. He just stared at us stonily, waiting for us to stop, which took Kael far longer than me. He kept on snorting, repeating what he said to himself, then started sniggering again, but finally the need for more beer stopped him.
“Drink…” Kael tossed the remains of the general’s purse on the desk. “Need a–”
“Big glass of water.” I was the most sober, so I rose to my feet. “I’m getting one for those two. Should I get another?”
Lance didn’t want to say yes. I could see it in the set of his shoulders, the way his forehead was creased, but people surprised me all the time and he did just then, nodding finally.
Leaving my brothers with the lieutenant felt like a risk, but it didn’t stand up to scrutiny.
What could he do? With no dragon, he was just another man and I’d had plenty of experience with them.
I grabbed some drinks from the bar, asking the man serving to splash a bit of beer in Kael’s water.
It’d have him drinking it down without thought, hopefully saving him from a killer headache tomorrow.
I placed the mugs on the table, pushing one towards Dain, but my brother was deep in sleep.
Lance shot me a nod of thanks, drinking down a mouthful, before turning to the table.
“Viridian will be back, perhaps with Auren and Fern with him,” Lance said.
That had me straightening up and the mocking smile fading from Kael’s face.
“If he doesn’t return with them, he’ll help me find them.
” His mug was set on the table. “When I do, I’ll do whatever it takes to ensure the aberration of today is never repeated. ”
For a moment, I thought he saw it. The fact that there was no way for Fern and Auren to remain in Wyrmpeak, not the way things stood currently. Male dragons stopping themselves from trying to impress a female?
Pointless, ‘Fang informed me. She belongs to us.
They don’t know that, though, I replied. All they see is a young female. Pretty? Was that a word dragons used to describe females?
Beautiful, ‘Fang corrected. Shines as bright as the sun. Glorious as a mound of freshly minted coins. Would Auren like a massive pile of gold? Gods, my dragon’s mind moved as fast as his body did when flying through the sky. That stupid man gave you money. He must have more. You could steal them–
Let’s make sure that’s what Auren wants before we commit grand larceny, I said.
“Won’t need to do that.” Kael peered at Lance owlishly as he raised his mug.
“That plump little arse will be sitting in my saddle going forward.” His hands moved as he placed an imaginary Fern on his lap, which had the lieutenant frowning.
“No need to learn how to ride when I’ll take her everywhere she wants to go. ”
“Before or after she slaps you stupid?”
I didn’t usually mouth off like that to my brothers when others were around. Probably because Lance sprayed a mouthful of water across the table, right as Kael growled at me. Apparently it broke the tension, because after Lance mopped up the mess, he turned to the two of us.
“Seems like we all want the same thing here. I don’t like you.”
Kael’s eyes narrowed. “And I think you’re a stuck up prick with a stick jammed so far up his arse its a wonder you can sit down.”
“Right, well, after today…” Lance glanced at me then Dain. “I’m willing to do whatever it takes to keep Fern safe, and if that’s forming a temporary alliance....”
Leaving the keep and doing a tour of some of the local taverns, I expected a lot of things, but not the lieutenant sliding his hand across the table for us to take. For a moment I just stared, right as Kael snorted rudely.
“Why the hell would we need an alliance with the likes of you?” he said, but before Lance could answer, I cut in.
“Someone we can trust…” I glanced at the other man. “Well, sort of. An officer can go places a cadet can’t. Pretty sure the general wants to put our dragons down like dogs. Getting us information on what’s being discussed behind closed doors, that’d be useful.”
“What the hell can the general do to our beasts?” Kael scoffed. “One spray of Slate’s breath and he’d have the flesh melting from the bones of all those Royal Riders’ mounts in seconds.”
The tension around Lance’s mouth made clear I was onto something. His teeth ground together, but with conscious effort he relaxed his jaw.
“Well in the spirit of friendship, I’ll say this.” A nod my way. “Lorien has it right.”
“Yes…” I hissed.
“The general is not pleased by the idea of your dragons potentially becoming Auren’s mates.” With a shake of his head, Lance forged on. “You’re right, Kael. Your dragons are formidable, which makes them dangerous.”
“Damn right–”
“Shut up, Kael.” I stared at Lance. Living on the streets, you didn’t last long without the ability to take the temperature of the room.
Back when we were thieving boys, surviving by our wits, meant being aware of when people got distracted.
Now? Our fortunes had changed for the better, but that meant we had more to lose. “What do you mean, Lance?”
He blinked at me using his name for once, not his title, but then leaned forward.
“The meeting was about what happened, what to do better next time, but... Nevermere stays independent from the continent due to the presence of dragons. Wild dragon queens like Auren are a problem for the general. Most of his life the only dragon queen they had access to was the human queen’s.
Who she bred with, who her mates were, it was already decided before she was born. ”
“And now they’re not.” I stared at the table, putting two and two together. “He’s worried about managing Auren, because right now any of the corp dragons could mate with her.” My eyes met his. “Including ours.”
“What happens when the biggest, most powerful dragons in Nevermere mate with one of the queens?” the lieutenant asked, but my mind was already skipping ahead.
“He can’t control the queen, nor our dragons or…
” I swallowed hard. “Or her offspring.” The toffs of Blackreach were stupid, venal, spoiled creatures, so it was always hard for me to understand why they got to make the big decisions that affected all of us poor people.
The general? He wasn’t stupid or spoiled and that made him all the more dangerous.
I spat a glob of spittle into my hand and then slapped the palm against Lance’s. “You’ve got a deal, Lieutenant.”
“What?” Kael swayed backwards with a frown. “I’m not–”
“Shake the man’s hand, brother.” At my growl, his brows drew deeper as I grabbed Dain’s hand and made his commitment for him.
“If you really want Fern in the saddle before you, that’s what you need to do.
” I admit, I held my breath, right up until the point he did as he was told.
Kael was such an obstinate prick, it’d be just like him to refuse on principal.
“So why the hell would you bring that news to us, Lance? Seems to me that all you have to do is sit pretty and wait for the corp to hand deliver Fern to you.”
The lieutenant straightened up then.