Chapter 29
Before Syla reached the top of the shaft, her muscles quivering from the effort of pulling herself up on such a long climb, she could see flames above, as well as stars in the night sky.
The beam the chain and pulley were attached to had survived the destruction, but the building as a whole might not have.
Smoke wafted across the shaft, blocking the view of the stars.
Despite her firm assertion that nobody would shoot her, Syla told Wreylith no fewer than ten times that she was coming and to make sure soldiers didn’t fire at her or anyone in her party.
Something stirred in the smoke, and Syla flinched. An enemy? No, a scaled red underbelly came into view, talons wrapping around the beam. Wreylith’s great head lowered so she could peer into the shaft.
Queen Syla comes, she boomed to all around, from the soggy depths of the destroyed mine, having vanquished her enemies, ready to lead her people again.
Have I mentioned that dragons tend toward the dramatic? Syla asked.
And that you appreciate my many excellent qualities, yes.
That is true. I also appreciate that I don’t see any archers.
They have backed away from the shaft, per my command, but many are here watching, quite curious, and a wagon carrying the island lord has arrived.
Good. Syla knew Oyenar would be relieved to see his wife and also hoped he could give them all a ride back. Well, maybe not all of them.
She didn’t know what she would do with Vorik. Letting him sneak away to rejoin his people would be ideal, but she could already tell that the blazing flames lit the area as if it were noon on a sunny day. Sneaking anywhere would be difficult.
“Your Majesty?” came an uncertain voice that she didn’t recognize.
Arms shaking, Syla pulled her head even with the top of the hole. Two soldiers with their bows on their backs reached down and helped her out.
“Thank you,” she said with great sincerity.
Even though her new strength had helped her immensely—before, she would have struggled to climb even five feet up a rope—that had been an arduous way to depart a mine. But she couldn’t complain. She’d escaped when many others hadn’t.
As the soldiers helped her out of the shaft, Tibby and Fel reached the top.
More men crept into the remains of the building.
As she’d guessed, only one wall and a few support posts and beams remained.
Outside, fires had scorched the earth and burned the other building completely, while flames danced in the forest all around.
Before, the lake hadn’t been visible, but enough trees had burned—or been knocked down by dragon ire—that Syla could see it and gape.
The water line had dropped, though not as dramatically as she’d expected from her experience below, and the lake swirled, pulling everything toward the newly drilled hole.
The boats… She didn’t even see the boats.
Had they been sucked down to the bottom?
The hole wouldn’t have been wide enough to draw them in, but Syla hadn’t envisioned the water having such power as it emptied out of the lake.
Had the people on those boats been pulled under too?
Unable to escape? Even though Wreylith had reported that stormers had taken over the vessels, maybe killing the fishermen they’d caught on board, she hoped everyone had been able to swim away.
So many had already died. She hadn’t wanted this.
And the memories of people horribly dismembered by the explosives would haunt her. Everything about this night would.
One of the soldiers cursed. “Is that Captain Vorik?”
“Yes, but don’t shoot.” Syla lifted a hand.
Armed men were already surging toward the shaft.
“He’s carrying Lady Abrya,” Syla added, giving a more compelling reason for everyone to hold their fire.
“Stand down, men!” came a call from the road. Lord Oyenar strode toward them. He must have heard Syla’s words because he switched to a dead run.
Vorik, face red from the effort of climbing with the weight of an extra person, pushed Abrya out ahead of him. Warily, he followed and stood beside Syla.
“Don’t shoot,” she said again. “He’s…”
She looked at Vorik, as always, groping for an explanation for him.
He raised his eyebrows. Probably curious as to how he would be classified.
“My prisoner,” she finished with an apologetic shrug.
As long as they didn’t kill him, she could make sure he had a way to escape later. Not that he necessarily needed her to arrange anything for that.
Vorik smiled sadly but with acceptance. “I believe it is my turn to be the captive.”
“Yeah.”
Oyenar pushed soldiers back so he could embrace his wife.
She’d recovered enough to wrap her arms around him and fall into his embrace.
Her injuries aside, it looked romantic. Syla wished she could fall into Vorik’s embrace, but dozens of eyes were watching.
Maybe hundreds. Oyenar had sent wave after wave of troops up here, and he’d been right to do so.
More stormers than she’d expected had arrived to be a part of this.
Oyenar—and, whether Syla had wanted it or not, she and Aunt Tibby—had delivered the devastating defeat that he’d wanted.
“Your Majesty.” Oyenar kept a grip on his wife’s hand as he faced Syla. “Your weapons platform has been loaded onto one of our ships, the Fanged Whale. May I request that you use it to help drive off any stormer vessels or dragons remaining in the area?” He looked up.
Only one dragon was in the sky above the barrier, a familiar green-scaled one. Agrevlari. Good. That would make it easier for Vorik to escape.
“Yes, but…” Syla remembered Vorik’s warning and grimaced.
“I need to depart as soon as possible. I’ve received intelligence that, in my absence, someone from the Fograth family has taken over the castle and talked several islands’ worth of ships into arriving in the harbor at Castle Island to support them.
” Realizing someone might wonder where she’d gotten such intelligence, especially with Vorik standing next to her, she waved up to Wreylith, doubting the dragon would mind receiving credit.
As Wreylith swished her tail, saying nothing to belie her, Syla watched Oyenar’s face, wondering if he’d known. Might he also have been invited to send ships? But surprise lifted his eyebrows.
“I’d heard inklings of Lord Favrik Fograth’s ambition, and of his sons openly considering opposing your rule, but I’ve been busy here lately. For all I know, there’s a message on my desk requesting my help.”
“I think,” Abrya murmured, “we should support Queen Syla rather than opposing her.”
Oyenar opened his mouth but paused.
Abrya added, “I insist.”
“Yes, my love.” Oyenar bowed ruefully at her, then faced Syla again. “Perhaps, the Fanged Whale could carry you back to Castle Island, and you could fire at any lingering stormer ships and dragons on the way.”
“I…” Syla glanced at Wreylith. She could get back more quickly on the dragon’s back, but what would she do with Vorik?
If she left him here, someone might kill him.
At least a dozen nocked bows were pointed at his chest right now, despite her assertion that he was to be her prisoner.
If she took him to Castle Island, and nobody recognized her rule or obeyed her orders, he might be killed there too. They both might be.
“I’ll send a suitable escort with the Fanged Whale with orders to support you once you arrive.” Oyenar nodded to his wife, and she nodded back.
Given how many of his ships had been lost to the stormers, Syla doubted the escort would be enough to stand against all the vessels and allies the Fograths had gathered, but it would be something. Maybe between his fleet and Wreylith, it would be enough.
“I accept your offer, Lord Oyenar,” Syla said. “Thank you.”
Movement in the shaft made Vorik draw his sword and Syla spin to look. She grimaced with guilt. She should have realized others would make it to the chains and climb up after them.
As the archers aimed their bows, she lifted a hand. “Lord Oyenar, there are stormers as well as Kingdom troops down there that may have survived. After all that’s happened, we shouldn’t kill anyone else. Please let them out.”
She watched Oyenar, who scowled at the word stormers, and Abrya’s eyes were more vengeful than compassionate after what she’d endured.
Testing her power more than she should have, given what was going on back on Castle Island, Syla said, “I insist they be allowed to live.”
Oyenar’s jaw tightened, but he nodded. “Very well. We’ll take the stormers prisoner.” His face lightened as a new idea seemed to come to him. “We can keep them to barter with them in future negotiations. The stormers may also have some of our people.”
Syla had envisioned taking anyone who crawled out of the flooded mine to an infirmary, not a prison, but the archers allowed Vorik to help a stormer out of the hole, so she didn’t argue.
The next survivor wore a Kingdom uniform, and she decided there might be some hope if their peoples had allowed each other to crawl away from certain death without fighting.
In total, only five people came up, and Syla shook her head with bleakness. Vorik’s face was also bleak as he watched the shaft, then peered down into it.
So desolate was his expression that it made her wonder at the root of it. He’d lost men down there—friends, surely—but that had been going on all week. Was it just now all catching up with him? Or…
She rocked back with realization.
“Was your brother down there?” she asked softly.
Vorik sighed. “I fought him before coming to find you. He…” He looked toward Tibby.
“The ceiling collapsed on him. Both of us. I clawed my way out, but he’d been injured.
” He winced. “I injured him.” The stab to the gut he pantomimed suggested a wound that might have been deadly even if the recipient hadn’t been buried afterward.
“I’m sure he was dead before I left to find you. ”