Chapter 42
Arla knew two things.
Firstly, the library at Claret Hall needed expanding if the piles of books stacked up to waist height around Jaz’s desk meant anything. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, he was keeping something from her.
It had taken all of ten minutes for her to abandon giving Hyacinth a tour of Claret Hall and pass her into the capable hands of Sebastian, who had been all too eager to help. She made a beeline for the library and found Jaz with his head in a book.
‘Wondered how long it’d take you,’ he said without looking up as she strode across the room.
Arla pulled a chair out opposite him, collapsing into it like the weight of the world was pressing her down. Perhaps it was.
‘Tell me.’
Jaz huffed a laugh, a slight glimmer of amusement in his eyes as he sat back in his chair and looked at her. He was silent for a few moments, twisting the gold rings on his fingers as, she imagined, he weighed up whether she was worthy of knowing anything at all.
‘What do you know of Damon, Dragonhart?’ His voice was low. Deep. Knowing.
Thara was unnaturally quiet on the bond. She was listening. Waiting.
‘That the disgraced god acted through him. That he was hungry for power. That he killed himself after causing a war between gods.’
Jaz listened, his gaze on his hands and those gods-damned rings he fiddled with. ‘Very good. And what do you know of the magic Damon wielded?’
There was a pulse of something from Thara.
‘Admittedly not much,’ Arla said, bringing her legs up to rest her feet on the table and earning a scalding glance from Jaz.
Here, in the library, away from everybody else, he didn’t look at her with his usual distrust. This was something deeper.
Not distrust but resignation. As if he knew that, ultimately, it all came down to her.
‘Damon drew magic from the mages in unnatural ways – forbidden ways. I thought Elrod might not be aware of the method until—’
Understanding dawned on her like a flame catching light. ‘Until the unkillable soldiers began attacking Flambriar.’
He nodded slowly, his eyes wide and his gaze fixed on his hands, a grim line making up the structure of his mouth.
‘If Elrod has created these soldiers, he’s done so using methods not seen since Damon was corrupted. It’s dangerous stuff, Arla, forbidden stuff. If he’s able to create an army from it, you have no hope of stopping him so long as he has mage blood.’
He had stores and stores of it. She’d seen it, that locked door in Larkire Palace behind which she’d believed were housing the most priceless of jewels.
‘He has blood, but exactly how much, I’m not sure. He was taking the mages for maybe four years… How much blood is needed to create an army?’
Jaz frowned, the action igniting a churning feeling in Arla’s stomach. ‘A lot. If he’s replacing the soldiers we cut down, then his supplies will be dwindling.’
That was something, at least.
‘Why doesn’t he just send the entire army here? Why only a handful at a time?’
Jaz glanced up at her again.
‘I don’t believe he knows where Flambriar is.
I believe these are scouting groups tasked with finding our location and reporting back.
We’re lucky we’re finding and killing them before they can return to Larkire to give our location away, but how can we be certain we’ve caught them all?
Elrod wouldn’t send an army out into the cold hostility of these mountains unless he was sure we’re here. We have some time, but not much.’
A sinking feeling flowed through Arla’s body and still Thara stayed deadly silent on the bond.
‘This has gone so far beyond what we thought when Cyrus sent me to the border,’ she said quietly, remembering the day he’d told her she would be locating missing supplies.
‘The kingdoms were falling because the gods were unhappy with the way Elrod was treating the mages. They’re going to continue falling until we stop him, aren’t they? ’
Resignation lined the soft angles of Jaz’s face when he finally met her gaze and held it.
‘I’m afraid so. But it’s you who has to stop it. The fates chose you.’
Arla closed her eyes. ‘But how?’
‘That brooch you wear on your cloak. You haven’t taken it off since you were given it. Why?’
It was true. Since a stranger had given Arla that brooch in Vorstrum she had kept it on her, always pinned to her cloak or shirt or tucked away in the pocket of her trousers.
Once upon a time, she had hated the sight of the dragonhart symbol.
Had believed it all to be nonsense – a resurgence of the old gods and religions she had never believed in.
But there was a sentience in the brooch, she was sure of it. It brought her comfort. She needed only run her fingers across the gold and a semblance of peace would come over her.
And…
‘Yes?’ Jaz urged.
‘I … I think it saved my life. Twice.’
She didn’t think anything. She knew it.
‘Go on.’
Thara was still disturbingly silent on the bond.
‘Back at Larkire, the day I got stabbed, Hark and I were overwhelmed on the battlements. There was no way we could have survived taking on so many soldiers and yet … something happened when I touched the brooch. It was like a surge of power through my blood, and everyone threatening us dropped dead.’
It had felt like much more than a surge of power. It had felt like the making and breaking of worlds in her blood. As if the stars would bend to her will if she asked them to. It was a pure and ancient power.
‘And the second time?’ Jaz asked, now scrawling away on a piece of parchment.
‘The second time, the priest soldiers of Malarye were trying to kill me.’
Thara grumbled then, and Arla was just glad to feel her presence.
‘They were firing arrows, and they hit Thara, and all I could think was that we were going to die … and then I touched the brooch, and the same thing happened again, only this time a wave rose from the sea and protected us.’
‘Interesting,’ Jaz affirmed, laying down his quill. ‘Do you know what they used to say about the dragonhart symbol, Arla?’
She shook her head.
‘They say it helped you communicate with the dragons.’
She had heard that. Memories of a campfire and a cold night sleeping on a forest floor by the bloodstone close to the northern border. Hark had told her the very same thing.
‘But I communicate with Thara all the time. I don’t need the brooch for that, do I?’
Jaz laughed then; a sound Arla had never heard him make before.
‘No. As a dragonhart, you do not need a symbol to speak with the creatures the very gods created to protect you. But as a dragonhart, you will need the symbol to access the magic you once had.’
Every part of her went silent. The bond between her and Thara felt suddenly far away, and it made Arla shiver.
Her mouth was dry when she managed to spit out, ‘I’ve never had magic.’
Jaz smirked, leaning back in his chair. ‘No. You personally have not. But I told you before you left for Malarye that I believe the dragonharts once did, and I was correct.’
He pulled a book from the floor, the spine cracking as he eased the leather bindings onto the table. It was an old thing, all faded ink and yellowed parchment, but Jaz seemed to read it as if the words were already imprinted on his mind.
‘Damon and the Dragonharts before him all had access to their own magic that was strong enough to shatter the skies. But after what happened with Damon and the war that led to his death, the gods intervened and swore no dragonhart should have that sort of power at will. And so, they bound the dragonharts’ magic into the symbol we still see today, and through that, they bound it to the very dragons.
For a dragonhart to access magic after Damon – for you to access the magic in your blood – both your dragon and the symbol must be connected through you.
That is how the magic has saved your life twice now. ’
Her mind spun. Quick. Quicker. Trying to decipher everything Jaz had said.
She wanted to deny it, to tell him that he was wrong and that she didn’t have the ability to wield magic, let alone anything as strong as he suggested.
But … even as she tried to deny it to herself, she knew it to be true.
She’d felt it. Felt the sentience in the brooch, felt the connection between her and Thara as that power had flowed through her and kept her safe.
It was all beginning to make sense now. The dark magic, her magic, the symbols…
Her voice was lacking all of its largeness when she spoke.
‘You think I can stop Elrod and his soldiers?’
Jaz smiled.
‘I think it’s a good place to start.’
Arla’s hair flew behind her like unspooled ribbon.
The fates chose you.
Perhaps. But truly, the fates could fuck off.
‘Were you ever planning on telling me the dragonharts had magic?’ Arla called above the wind.
‘Why, when you worked it out anyway?’
Arla huffed, ducking before a branch could take off her head. ‘Because I’ve asked you for months, Thara, to help me. You didn’t think telling me I could access your magic would help?’
Thara’s voice was oddly flat as she answered through the bond. It only sparked Arla’s ire.
‘You know as well as I that the fates would have punished me for revealing something so significant. If you would prefer me to share all that I know, Dragonhart, I expect no pity when the fates enact their punishment.’
No. Never. As angry as Arla was, she would never allow Thara to be subjected to whatever punishment would be doled out to her for speaking of forbidden things.
No matter if the fate of the world was at stake.
The sound of Thara’s pain when she’d tried to explain before echoed in Arla’s mind like a war drum.
‘That’s what I thought.’
The dragon beneath her dived and twisted and pulled up from the ground with such speed it made her eyes water. Her muscles ached, the increasingly familiar tightness of her body working together with Thara like they’d done in Malarye.