Chapter 21
Lord Tallin? What could he possibly want at this time of night?
Without warning, the tent becomes darker, tighter, as if a great beast has somehow crept inside unnoticed. Soren hasn’t moved, and yet his presence expands; his shadow lengthens. When he speaks, the fabric of the walls trembles.
“And does Lord Tallin say what he means by insulting our queen by coming at such an hour?”
Boyd flashes his teeth, a gesture I take for agreement. “He does not, Your Majesty.”
Soren rises, a smell of smoke and destruction trailing after him.
“Wait,” I say, reaching up for his hand. His eyes are slitted when he glances down at me.
This makes no sense. Surely, Lord Tallin isn’t foolish enough to announce his intent to see me and then try to harm me in Soren’s own camp?
“Is he alone?” I ask Boyd.
“He is, my queen.”
“Don’t leaders usually travel with their wingmates?”
The guard shifts on his feet. “They do.”
I glance up at Soren. “What harm is there in hearing what he has to say?”
The slitted eyes narrow on me. “You heard Seltzen.”
“I did.” The wyvern all but said he wanted to win me for his leader.
“Then why should I allow him in your presence?” Soren growls.
“I suppose you shouldn’t, but…” I release his hand, thinking back to the thinly-veiled desperation clouding the wyverns’ faces when I offered to draw for them. “I sense the wyverns are in greater need than even your own people.”
“The wyverns aren’t my concern.”
It’s my turn to give him a narrowed look. “If they are thirsty, then they are my concern.”
Soren heaves a breath out of his nostrils, the force of it enough to whip my hair back from my face. Such a thing doesn’t make any sense, and yet neither does the great, winged shadow his human form throws upon the walls.
“Perhaps you could stay here and let me handle Tallin as I see fit,” he says.
My mouth firms. Are we ever to be done with this nonsense? “Perhaps I could, but a queen is equal to her king, is she not?”
It’s a gamble, and I know it. Tilly said Marta was equal to her husband; I have no idea if that principle extends to the monarchy in dragon culture. Besides, according to human law, I’m not even queen yet. But the jewel resting against my throat says otherwise in Tirenth, doesn’t it?
I hope so.
After a moment, Soren releases a long-suffering rumble.
“If he touches you, I’ll kill him,” the Dragon King says. “I will not be stopped this time.”
I suppose that’s the best compromise I can hope for. “I understand.”
Though obviously still dissatisfied, Soren turns to Boyd.
“Call your flight,” he says, and the term puzzles me until Boyd leaves and returns with Fuller and Yarl, all their faces as severe as their king’s.
Even with Soren so near, I feel surprising comfort from both their presence and their clear displeasure at Lord Tallin’s ill-timed visit.
I may be curious about why he’s come, but I don’t forget that the last time I saw the wyvern leader, he referred to me as a pet.
Ty and Rally slip inside soon after with a robed, hooded figure between them, one who is left to stand alone as the king’s wingmates back out of the tent. The instant they’re gone, the figure falls to his knees.
“Your Majesties,” he whispers.
I sit in stunned silence. The face is still concealed, but the voice, without a doubt, belongs to Lord Tallin.
And he’s kneeling like a conquered king.
Soren, still standing a little in front of me, rolls his neck to the side, and the shadows on the wall quiver, like an animal’s hackles rising in warning.
“Tell me, Lord Tallin,” he drawls, “what crisis is worth your life?” The lanterns’ flames hiss and snap at his words.
Lord Tallin lifts his hand, and my guards lunge forward as if he suddenly unsheathed a sword. But the wyvern ruler is only pushing the hood back from his face, revealing downcast eyes.
“We are in a drought,” he says.
Snorts of derision answer him from all around as my guards sink back into their positions.
“Quiet,” Soren says, and they sober. Lord Tallin he fixes with an inscrutable look. “Perhaps you are unaware that we are all in a drought.”
Lord Tallin shifts on his knees. “Tirenth has received more rain these past months than our territory. Even Nialan’s streams run dry. What water is left is strictly rationed.”
Nialan—the term is yet another I’m unfamiliar with. I’d be irritated if we weren’t in the middle of such a strange meeting.
Lord Tallin’s eyes lift briefly to find mine. “And Tirenth now has a water drawer. The first to have been heard of in decades.”
I begin to respond, but then I notice the spines rippling down Soren’s bare back, the curves lengthening his gleaming horns.
Oh no.
“And you thought to win her,” Soren says, darkness deepening his voice till it thrums against my eardrums. “Didn’t you, Tallin?”
The wyvern must not answer fast enough, for in a blink, Soren is before him, fisting the wyvern’s hair in his hand.
“You want me to pity your kind,” Soren says, and he wrenches Tallin’s head back till the latter winces. “Well, I did. I spared their leader when you insulted her before. Now you come here, at night, after sending that wyrm to challenge me for her? For my crown jewel?”
Crown jewel? Does he mean…me?
“Tell me why I should let you walk out of here alive,” the king says, jerking Tallin’s head back till I flinch myself.
Tallin’s face twists with pain. “I was told your most gracious queen offered to draw water for us.”
For whatever reason, this seems to enrage Soren even further. Scales race down the sharp lines of his shoulder blades and plummet down the middle of his back. “So you insult her, you try to take her, and now you think to infringe upon her generosity?”
An offer made is hardly infringing, I think to say, but the oddness of this whole encounter seems to have locked my voice up tight. Is Soren too angry to see what I do, or does he simply not care?
The Tallin I met when I arrived at the palace looked me over like a prize pig. He offered me a king’s ransom as if he could buy my favors. He insulted me. He was arrogant and crude, yet I see none of that now. I see only fear.
Is he truly that skilled a performer?
“Why have you come without your wingmates?”
The question leaves my lips so quietly that I fear no one heard. I almost repeat myself until Soren gives Tallin’s head a shake.
“Answer her,” the king hisses.
The wyvern blinks up at the tent ceiling as if to clear his vision. He wets his lips.
“Because coming here could get them killed.”
My puzzled glance meets Soren’s menacing one. His eyes dart toward Tallin and back to me.
Ask him, the look says. I nod.
“By whom, Lord Tallin?”
His chest shudders with the breath he draws to brace himself.
“By the true wyvern leader,” he says.