Chapter Forty-Two
Vil
It wasn’t until the fourth stop that things changed. We’d picked up two followers, one each from the second and third villages, but that was it. All the others had been hostile, having been turned against us by Adamantine and other members of the Nine.
Now, when our quartet landed in Riggi, I was prepared for more of the same scorn and bitter distaste. Instead, I was greeted with suspicious neutrality by the village head. Not elder, as had been the case in the first three places we’d visited. He was younger.
“You’re Anvil,” Coel said, approaching in human form as we waited in the center of the cluster of buildings that formed the town.
“I am,” I replied before introducing Vanessa.
“A human?” Coel asked, perplexed.
“Yes. With the soul of a dragon.”
“How can you be so sure?”
I tried not to sigh. While curiosity and disbelief were mixed in his tone, it was all spread over an underlay of scorn.
We must find a way to stop this disdain for humans. They are different, yes, but we interact so rarely. Why should we hate them so?
“Two ways,” I explained. “First, I can feel it in my soul. In a way that no other woman has ever made me yearn for them. It is impossible to explain to any who have not found their soulmate. But I need her on a level so basic I am incomplete without her.”
Coel just looked at me, his gray eyes waiting for further explanation.
He didn’t argue with me nor wave my words aside. He was neutral.
“Secondly,” I said, “is that we flew to the top of Mount Drakonus and took the Test before the God-King. We are here with his blessing to sit on the Iron Throne.”
Coel glanced between Vanessa and me several times. Then he frowned.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I’m afraid he gave you bad directions then, Prince Anvil. This is Riggi. The Iron Fortress is that way,” he said, pointing. “Almost eight hours flight. You’re lost.”
I laughed, which only deepened the frown on his face.
“Sorry,” I said. “But you confuse me. I’m not looking for the throne. I know where it sits. Just as I know who sits on it.”
“Do you not sit on it?” Coel asked.
“By rights, I should,” I said. “But Adamantine, head of the Nine, has started a war to try to oust me so that he may call himself head of the Iron Clan.”
There was a grumble from the crowd, but none of them leaped to show me support. I hadn’t expected them to, but it would have been nice if a cry had gone up and the village had pledged its support to me.
“Ah,” Coel said as the noise died down. “That explains why someone of royal blood has visited Riggi. You’re looking for support.”
“Yes,” I said, deciding not to sugarcoat it. “Adamantine has hired mercenaries to hold the Fortress hostage, where many of our supporters reside. Without help, I cannot free them and deal with the man who has tried to kill me several times.”
Coel considered my words. He was a slow, patient man, which was odd for someone no more than ten or twelve years my senior. It showed he was a competent leader, however, and I respected that.
“Walk with me,” he said at last.
I shifted into my human form, and with Vanessa by my side, we slowly walked through the village. Cruce and the others stayed behind to wait for us.
“Riggi is not as small as the outlier villages,” Coel said, speaking proudly of his people, “but neither are we one of the major cities. A hundred and thirteen dragons of all ages reside here. That’s it.”
I nodded. Solde had a population of forty or so. Riggi was nearly triple the size, but it still paled in size—for a dragon city, at least—to the five or six hundred who lived in other major cities or the nearly one thousand who called the Iron Fortress and its immediate surroundings home.
“We guard the border of the Iron Clan, and we have for nearly two thousand years since we were little more than an outpost. We skirmish with the storm dragons regularly. Our patrols harass theirs, and vice versa. Very rarely does anyone actually get seriously hurt, and even rarer is there a death. It’s a set way of life.
The young know what to expect as they age, and so we carry on. ”
“I understand.”
“Do you?” he asked. “What you ask of us, to support you, would require us to abandon that way of life. If we help you retake the throne, many will die, I imagine. There’s no foreseeable way to keep that fight bloodless.”
I thought, perhaps, that if everyone supported the true prince, we could arrive with an army of overwhelming numbers, forcing peace. But I knew it was unlikely to go that way. Nothing ever worked out that smoothly.
“Yes,” I said bluntly. “That’s what I’m asking. Which is why I’ll be at the front. The first to take blood and the first to shed it. Adamantine is not fit to lead the Iron Clan. He will bring it to ruin.”
“Adamantine has long been the head of the Nine,” Coel said.
“And the Nine have been good to us. They resolve problems. They go to the Stormies when they cause too much trouble and settle things down. The Nine can be relied upon. The Throne may as well not exist to us, and vice versa. So you understand it’s unlikely your words will summon much support among the people of Riggi. ”
I kept a sigh off my lips. “Perhaps you’re right. Perhaps I ask too much of you. But I would be a poor prince, a poor leader, if I didn’t at least attempt to do what I believe is necessary for the betterment of my people.”
Coel didn’t seem swayed, and I resigned myself to yet another failed attempt at drumming up support.
“Very well,” I said, extending a hand. “Thank you for at least listening.”
Coel reached out to take my hand.
“Incoming!” Cruce bellowed from back in the square.
I looked up at the sky just in time to see a full squadron of dragons diving down on us from up high. The one in the lead, a smaller dragon with a broken horn on her head, was immediately recognizable.
“It’s Mel!” I shouted, shifting into my dragon form in the blink of an eye and extending a wing to cover Vanessa as the last senior member of the Nine flung a gob of molten iron at us.
Behind her came eleven mercenaries, dragons whom I did not recognize from all manner of clans.
“They must’ve gotten word about what we’re doing!” Cruce shouted as fire erupted throughout the village.
“Get out of the village!” I bellowed at him and our other supporters. “Lead them away so that innocents don’t get caught up in the fight.”
“Kill them all!” Mel shrieked from above. “None who are disloyal shall be allowed to survive. Riggi has harbored these traitors. They shall pay!”
I exchanged a glance of horror with Coel. They were going to torch the entire place. Women and children alike.
“Bastards,” I snarled, glaring at Coel. “Protect my mate.”
Then I leaped into the sky, dodging a fire dragon and raking my claws across the back of a water dragon, tearing apart the muscles that controlled his wings.
“Mel!” I bellowed over the cacophony of the surprise attack.
A storm dragon opened its mouth, and a bolt of lightning slammed into my right forepaw. Scales curled and fell away, and my body twitched slightly from the impact, but I carried on, slamming into the smaller dragon mid-air.
She screeched and tried to suck in power for another blast of lightning. I tore her throat out and pushed her free. The blue-scaled body crashed through the roof of a building below, scattering a family.
Around us, other dragons were rising into the sky to defend their homes. Or tried to, at least. Several of them were cut down by attacking dragons before they could do much more than get aloft.
Cruce came screaming out of nowhere, twisting and whirling, an iron dragon firmly on his tail. I banked hard and dove after my friend. He must have made the move on purpose because he spread his wings and stopped fleeing, instead coasting as if unaware of his tail.
The other iron dragon did the same, preparing to drop on him from above.
“Break!” I bellowed a split instant before slamming into the back of the dragon.
Unlike the two of them, I was still going full speed. The impact tossed the dragon hard against the ground, and my body hit it hard from behind. Claws scraped and tore scales free, and the iron dragon screeched in pain before I lifted into the air again, leaving it weak and hurt.
Two younger dragons pounced on it. Too small to be of use in the air, they attacked like wolves at a buffalo, nipping at it from two directions, one attacking as a feint while the other darted in and tore scales and flesh free.
The dragon ceased its movements in moments, and the youngins cried out in victory.
A gray form plunged from the sky to my side, landing amid a scatter of cries as village members recognized one of their own.
The piercing screech of Mel’s battle cry told me who had been behind the death. I located her in the sky and went for her.
“Murderer!” I roared.
Mel saw me coming and flapped her wings hard, gaining elevation. She moved swiftly and was faster than I was. I, on the other hand, was bigger, stronger, and had more endurance. If I could catch her, it was over. But I had to catch her first.
We dove and banked, circling one another while the battle raged below us. I longed to know how it was going, to know that Vanessa was safe, but I couldn’t stop my pursuit of Mel. She’d ordered the slaughter of the village and was, other than Adamantine, the most senior remaining member of the Nine.
Her death would shake his confidence and the loyalty of many of his supporters as they realized I was slowly stripping away those who aided him. Their fear would assure them that they, in turn, would be next.
Slowly but surely, I was gaining on Mel.
Dragon fights were tiring things. A slow, lazy flight through the air didn’t use much energy.
The sort of wheeling and banking and vying for height took much more effort.
She knew it, too, which was why, when I got too close, she abruptly flipped over and tried to land on my back.
Which was exactly what I had been waiting for. I’d seen Mel fight before, and she used the tactic repeatedly with larger foes. It often worked because they weren’t ready for her to move that fast, and she could rip at their wings and send them plunging to the ground before they could react.
But it was a fatal move when the other party was not only ready but expecting and hoping for it.
As she flipped over from her position above me, I dipped one wing. The effect rolled me over fast. Instead of being presented with my vulnerable backside, my longer and stronger legs shot out, piercing her chest and ripping it to shreds before her claws could gouge my scales.
Mel shrieked in pain, and I clamped my teeth on her snout. I whipped my neck away sharply, and much of her scales and flesh came with it, leaving her with a perma-sneer.
We were falling now, locked together as we plunged downward.
“This is better than you deserve,” I growled and spun away, sending her into a tailspin.
She didn’t recover before her body hit a solid rock formation. Her neck whipsawed around, smashing her skull against the rock and leaving a bloody mark. She didn’t move as a younger dragon in human form came up and drove his sword through both her eyes.
Mel didn’t move anymore.
The mercs had relied on surprise, but once the village got organized, the fight was over swiftly. None escaped.
I reconvened with Coel in the center of town, where Vanessa, unharmed, rushed out to envelop me in a hug.
Coel, his eyes hard as steel, walked up to me and extended his hand. “We are yours, my prince,” he said, his voice cold.
“I’m sorry it had to happen this way,” I said.
“Me, too,” Coel said as a wounded female limped her way to his side, leaning on him for support. I saw the look of concern flash in his eyes and knew she had to be his mate. “I will send word. Other villages will know of what the Nine tried to do here today.”
I nodded. I would have my army.