CHAPTER FIVE #2
“I know it’s what you were doing,” I snarled, refusing to let the scream that clawed at my throat escape. I grasped at my fury like a drowning woman, wanting to feel anything but that pull, that need. So I swerved into rage, and immersed myself in something close to desire, and just as hot.
“This is going about as well as I expected,” Taenya said to no one. Rather, she said it to her dragon, who nodded her head in agreement.
“Any suggestions?” she asked. Cassyrra stood, and shook her wings. Stretched out, they blocked the stars. She was huge. I had nothing to compare her to, and I’d seen elephants but, Cassyrra dwarfed them.
A low thrumming vibrated the air, so deep it rumbled in my bones.
Along her entire body, a gorgeous, filigreed scrollwork lit up in tones of amethyst and teal to cast a soft glow upon us.
Along with the vibrations of her humming, the glow carried a sensation of motherly calm.
One who chided her children for squabbling, but in a loving manner.
It was strange to feel it from a creature I would have thought more likely to eat me than show tender affection for me.
I didn’t realize how tightly I’d held my shoulders until they relaxed under the dragon’s soothing vibrations. Didn’t seem to have the same effect on Fraser.
“There is nothing you can say that will convince me to listen to either of you.” Fraser spoke calmly, as if to a small child. “You should probably leave.”
Silence dragged, and the tension bounced between the three of us, drawing tighter. Fraser’s men stepped back, sensing danger and wisely avoiding the crossfire of two mages and their captain.
Cassyrra stretched her long neck to the sky and loosed a low, crooning trill.
Not loud, but powerful. Like with the humming vibrations, it brought that sense of motherliness, but now tinged with irritation, as if it frustrated her that we were still arguing.
Her voice rolled out over the field and dropped over the cliff, echoes bouncing back up before fading.
An eerie ripple passed over us all. Not numin, not a spell, but a magical energy nonetheless, leaving a sense of tightness, desperation even, but whose I couldn’t tell.
“Your beloved hippocamps will die if you don’t help us.”
Taenya’s words dropped into the brittle silence like rocks onto thin glass, scattering tiny tinkling shards into the night and cutting us loose from our stiff stalemate. Fraser paled, and real fear washed over his features, making them go slack.
Why would he look like that?. “Beloved hippocamps?” I snorted, couldn’t stop myself. “That’s impossible.” I wanted to say more but couldn’t; I was too shocked. It couldn’t be true.
Fraser protecting hippocamps? No.
No!
He was catching and selling them. They were nothing but a money stream to him. I’d seen the proof. Gordon had helped me find it, and even Fraser’s closest friend was shocked to discover the plot.
“Things aren’t always what they seem, Ozora.” Fraser’s tone was wry, as if he’d heard my inner thoughts.
There was real pain in his aquamarine eyes, nothing of his former scorn. Something in Taenya’s words had cracked him open. It was as if I could see into him, see his true self. What his ripped-open gaze revealed stabbed me with sudden doubt.
But it only lasted for half a heartbeat. I probably didn’t even see it.
No. Impossible! Indignant and ashamed, I looked away, unable to bear that rawness in him. Looking away, I could deny it had ever been.
The moment passed.
He cleared his throat and straightened, tugging his leather vest and settling his sword hilt while he said, “But you never could hear that you might be wrong.” That accusatory tone was back, and his deep indigo brows lowered. The vulnerable Fraser of a moment ago was gone.
“No. Look.” Weariness laced with sadness filled Taenya’s voice and crumpled her. She scrubbed her face with both hands as if she could erase her words. Dropping them, she tried again.
“We both know Prince Bartholomew Pulcheria was a worthless, lecherous fool. I knew it then, but he was mostly harmless, and his death just seemed so senseless. When you took over the town, well, Dad, Dylan, and I got ideas. I... I was an idiot. We all were.” It sounded like Taenya’s teeth barely moved, as if it was as much of an apology as she could muster.
“I can’t convince you. I know that. I’m not even going to try. I’m just asking that you listen to the one who can.” She sounded desperate. The dark circles under her eyes further revealed her exhaustion, but she would not let Fraser walk away.
Why not? It would’ve been much easier. The dragon could’ve easily picked another apprentice, and let this unwilling one sail off. I never was very good at keeping my mouth shut, so words swiftly followed thought.
“Who?” It came out with a burst of laughter I couldn’t hold back. “If a dragon swooping to his rescue isn’t enough, let him walk away.” Turned out, it wasn’t Cassyrra at all who insisted that the three of us be cast together.
“I’d tell you, but you’d never believe me,” Taenya said. “She’s the one who told us your hippocamps are in danger, but you should really hear it from her.”