Chapter 5
Lorien
“Gods…!”
I was drowning again. I blinked, blinked, staring up at the water’s surface, struggling to swim higher and suck in a glorious lungful of air, when a hand was thrust towards me, hauling me out.
Only for me to land with a thud on a cave floor.
What?
I’ve always hated Drathnor’s cave. It was bad enough I nearly drowned once, but going through that again for a stupid dare?
I’d rather prove my worth with my fists.
But as I looked around me, I knew I wouldn’t need them.
Instead of the lake my father had tossed me in, I was in a dark hole with something glowing very bright in the centre.
Treasure?
I scrambled to my feet. Adding a dragon’s hoard to the gold in my jacket would make up for all the living nightmares in the world, yet as I drew closer, I saw Dain was already there.
He didn’t just walk through the world looking like some fae lord of old. The girls sighed at his long white hair, the fact he was tall enough to be a man grown, not thirteen, but he had to gods touched as well. Those dark eyes of his were almost milky as he stared at the bright blue light.
Which might not be such a good idea.
Rings of crackling lightning spun around and around, and if that wasn’t enough to make clear you shouldn’t touch, I saw what it was protecting.
“Dragon eggs…”
Kael said that at the same moment I thought it, the two of us lunging forward.
As far as we knew, all the dragon eggs in the entire country were farmed by the king and queen in the capital.
Only their precious Royal Riders had a chance to bond with a dragonling, not the likes of us. So how the hell did these end up here?
“Dain!” we both shouted, but not in time to stop him from plunging his hands into the halo of light.
The resulting explosion would’ve thrown us against the wall if we weren’t already diving forward.
Hands outthrust to soften our fall ended up having an entirely different purpose.
As a sharp ringing sound started up in my ears, I spun around and saw the ball of light explode out and then the eggs drop down.
Forcing each one of us to scramble to catch them.
I didn’t care about my nightmare, the Executioner, anything as I stared at the egg in my arms. The Duke himself could come strolling in, ready to lop off my head, and I’d still be gazing down at the silver scaled shell, because I couldn’t miss this.
My heart thudded fast, far too fast, and then there was a crack, because another heart was beating in time with mine, right before the shell broke open.
Was this what love was?
I knew that the bond between me and my brothers was, but that was all the experience I had.
Nothing my parents or my blood siblings had ever done convinced me that they cared even a little.
But this? A baby dragon sat in the crook of my arm, staring right back.
I could get lost in the silver depths of his eyes, trying to count every shade from now until I died, because I was filled with this incredible sense of wellbeing.
Better than a tankard of ale. Better than a bowl of hot lentil soup on a cold winter’s day. Just… better.
“And who are you, pretty?” He leaned into my finger, crooning as I stroked it down his head to his spine. “Aren’t you just—”
“Perfect.” I’d seen Dain mad, madder, grumpy and then madder again, but never like this. Any other time and I’d be mocking him mercilessly for that wide-eyed, gormless stare, but I knew instinctively I looked the exact same. “He’s perfect.”
I’d live and die for this dragonling, I knew that right now. Not from dreams of becoming a dragon rider for the king, but for him. Whatever it took to keep him happy and healthy…
And that’s when my stomach turned inside out, aching with hunger.
Being a street rat, I knew the feeling well, but this was on entirely a different level. I was forced to take shallow breaths, hoping to ride the wave out. But another came and another as Kael barked, “Food! We need food.”
And where the hell were we going to get that here? I patted my pockets, feeling the gold and cursing that for being completely useless. There were no street vendors down in Drathnor’s cave. Then I found the bread I’d stashed from Peggy’s.
“Here!”
I broke it up into three with a shaking hand and then tossed a chunk to each of my brothers. My dragon opened his mouth wide, looking like a baby bird, if an extremely fierce one. He made a desperate creeling sound, right up until I popped a small piece into his jaws.
Only for him to spit it out.
Like new mothers the world over, I stared at the dragon in disbelief. His desperate sounds, the intense feeling of hunger spiked higher.
“Meat…” Dain gasped. “He needs meat.”
“And where are we supposed to find that down here?” I asked, glancing around wildly. “Pretty sure the abattoir isn’t a cave over.”
“Need to go back,” Kael groaned. “Find meat and…”
Right as we formulated a plan, the gods sent a gift from the heavens. A leather pouch landed on the ground before us. Whether it was my nose or my dragon’s, I smelled the savoury scent of jerky, and went scrambling across the floor to grab it.
Only for the Executioner to drop down beside it.
I shrank back, putting my body between the dragon and him.
“You kill me…” My tongue tripped over my words. “The dragon will feed well, and then he’ll grow big and strong and find you and tear your head off.”
“Can’t have that, can we?”
I watched him crouch down, unable to believe my eyes, before he handed me a piece of dried meat.
The dragonling bobbed and creeled, desperate for it, but I was scared it was too hard and dry for his little gullet.
Chewing it up and then spitting it into his mouth, I’d seen birds do the same, so as the assassin passed more jerky around, that’s what I did.
My dragon gobbled that down and then opened his mouth for more.
Chew and spit, chew and spit, we all worked to do the same thing until finally the dragons went quiet.
The little beast crawled up my chest and slipped into my shirt, nestling against my ribs.
“You’ve come for me.” Kael sounded grim, even as he held his dragon tight.
“Leave my friends.” I wanted to correct him, claim the bond of brother, when Dain shot me a dark look.
Kael was distancing himself from us to avoid the Executioner’s ire being directed at us as well.
“Leave the dragons and you can kill me, take my head to the Duke.”
“And why would I do that?”
We all stared blankly. The three of us had done everything we could to stay out of the Duke’s executioner’s way since the moment we banded together. Those dark eyes seemed almost amused as he looked us over.
“I won’t become one of his riders.” Kael held the dragon closer to his chest. “I won’t.”
“Your father’s a cunt.” The Executioner’s blunt statement had us all staring. “Don’t do a thing he says unless I’m forced to.” His blunt fingers scratched at his greying beard. “Just make it look like I do.”
“What…?”
We all knew the story of Kael’s mother. I knew my brother was seeing those events all over again as he stared at his mother’s killer.
“Elsie has been after me to find you.” Kael’s mouth fell open at the Executioner’s words. “Every time I come to town, she tells me to scour the streets and find her son.”
“My mother…” Kael’s mouth worked like mine had when I was finally hauled out of the lake my father had tossed me into, but it wasn’t air he was sucking in, but hope.
“Is living very comfortably at an estate at the border of Harlston, so do you want to come to see her or not?”