Sixty One
Alara
“Is this it?” Niyah asks, fiddling with the many bags on her belt.
“For now,” I say softly.
She nods. “It feels unfair that we were together again and have to part so quickly.”
Sadness washes over me. “It won’t be forever, will it? I want to come and visit as soon as I can.”
“Of course not,” she says, stroking my hair. “You can come anytime when my stepmother is gone.”
“Gone?” I ask, but she shakes her head.
“Any burning questions before you go?”
Only a thousand.
“We heal better? Right?”
“Yes,” she says. “But the pain lasts.”
“I know that,” I mutter, and she flinches. I bite my lip. “Are we more connected with animals?”
“Mostly, but usually in small ways for most of us, some more than others.” She looks behind me. “Never had I heard of that extending to dragons though. Not for at least a hundred years.”
I smile. “I started humming to them and the more time I spent with them, the more I could… talk. Like a feeling of voices.”
“Humming?” she asks.
I nod, and then show her.
Her eyes instantly light up. “You know it?”
“Know what?”
“Mother’s song. She used to sing that to us,” she says softly.
“It’s mothers?” She nods. “I’ve been humming it all this time. I didn’t know.”
She smiles. “Your heart knew.”
I match her smile. “It did.”
I feel closer to my mother knowing that. All this time I had taken a part of her with me. It comforted me, and now it comforts others.
“A voice can be powerful too, sister,” Niyah says.
Her hand hesitantly reaches out and touches my neck, guilt flashing through her eyes.
“Maybe that’s why you’re different. Not only to feel a dragon’s emotions, but to connect with them through your voice.”
“You really think so?”
“I don’t know,” she says honestly. “But sometimes we don’t have to know everything, and sometimes things just take time to figure out.”
I grab her hand in mine and let loose a choked laugh.
“I feel like this is goodbye.”
Her eyes water. “Never. We may be parted, but not for long. You have my wedding to come to after all.”
I look past her and see Alexandar standing there, his raven flying overhead, the dragons tracking it like it’s a free meal.
“And it’s what you want?” I ask her.
“It’s what I must do.”
“That’s not what I asked,” I say softly, and she smiles.
“It’s what I’ve chosen. I’ll send a letter, or a crow, to invite you.”
“I’ll come, wherever it is.”
We both stand there, smiling, not wanting to let go.
“It does feel too soon,” I tell her.
“But not forever,” she replies, placing her forehead to mine. “Come visit the Elven lands when you’re ready. I have much to show you. Much more to tell you.”
“I can’t wait.” I look back to where Rohan waits with Drogonah, Escor, and Sparks, who is biting Drogonah’s leg. “I just have some things to do first.”
“They’re your family,” she says, a sadness to her tone.
I look back at her with tears in my eyes.
“I…”
She shakes her head. “I hope one day you will see me as your family again, sister. I know it’s too soon. We are still strangers but you feel it here, don’t you?”
She places a hand to her chest and I nod.
“I do, Niyah. I feel it, and I feel they are my family, too.”
She nods like she already knew that. “I’m glad you found them.”
“They found me.”
She smiles, and it’s a little sad. “Or you found each other when you needed it the most.”
A squawk up ahead has Niyah rolling her eyes.
“Well, I must go tend to my duties.” She hugs me tightly, and I squeeze her tightly. “Be well, sister.”
“And you.”
She turns away, ignoring Alexandar as she walks past him and heads back into the city.
She’ll make a great queen one day, but I’m not cut out to be a princess of the family. And though I know we will grow closer over time, I don’t want to be royalty, I already belong somewhere else.
“Ready to go?” Rohan asks as he reaches me.
I turn to him, looking over his ruggedly handsome face.
“Do you not want to say goodbye?”
He shakes his head. “I have nothing else left to say to the Lothmeres.”
“Maybe in time,” I say, watching them disappear from sight, people already at work repairing the walls.
“I doubt it.”
You never know, I want to say, but I drop it.
“Effy?” I ask.
“Dorkin tells me they are still looking for her.”
My shoulders sag. “What about the underground? You don’t think…”
“No,” he says, arms coming around me. “Effy was last seen helping tend to the wounded, she will be found. And the underground, that’s in the royal’s hands for now.”
I nod, moving my hand to his.
“And Emerish—”
“He fled during the last game, but he will be found.”
“I just… I don’t want to see him again.”
“You won’t,” he promises, turning and cupping my face in his palms. “Ready to go?”
I take a deep breath. “Yeah. I’m ready.”
With one last look at the city, we go to Drogonah.
I lift Sparks with me, placing him in my lap as Rohan sits behind me.
Escor rumbles.
“It’s a long flight, Escor, and you are new to having someone on your back,” Rohan says. “Let’s not push it.”
He grumbles, flicking his tail back and forth and Drogonah chuffs at him.
“Drogonah, fly.”
Drogonah extends his wings, and then we’re up in the air once more, leaving the city, its pain and devastation behind us.
“To The Glade?” I ask.
“To The Glade.”
We land with a heavy thud, the other Dragonbonds with us. The rest of the clans and dragons are making their way home. The Dragorie are on horses that were provided by the new king, Ivor. We will meet them at home when we’re done.
The water is no longer ice surrounding The Glade, but a large lake with swirling water, and the smaller dragons from the cavern lap it up greedily, along with Escor as he flops down on the ground, chest heaving.
“I told you it would be a rough flight,” Rohan remarks, as he helps me down from Drogonah.
Escor mumbles while drinking from the lake, head hanging over the side as the younger ones copy him.
Drogonah takes off as soon as he can, going into the trees, the other leader’s dragons doing the same. Rohan watches them leave before turning to the others.
“Set up camp,” Rohan calls to everyone, and I wonder if he realizes that even the other Dragonbonds are taking his orders now when they all nod.
Sparks yawns in my arms, and I smile down at him.
“Sleepy?” I ask, and I feel his tired purr in reply.
He snuggles into my neck, my hair covering him.
The blue dragon from the cavern bumps into my side and I smile down at him, feeling his fear.
“It’s going to be okay,” I promise him.
“Ready?” Rohan asks, and I look up at him.
“Now?” I ask, holding onto Sparks tighter.
I thought we would have more time.
“No better time than now. If they stay here with us, the dragons will come out here and I’d rather this happens within the safety of the trees.”
“Okay,” I say and turn to them. “Come on, let’s go.”
The little ones come closer to me, and Escor follows, even as exhausted as he is.
“Eggs?” Rohan asks Varan.
He points to them on the ground. “There.”
Rohan picks one up, Kaldar and Adora too, along with the other Dragonbonds and a few of their own who can ride dragons that survived.
Without a word passing between us, we walk forward and into The Glade.
As soon as we hit the trees, I thought it would be silent, but dragons can be heard in the distance, growling and purring, and the younger ones stick closer to Escor and I, nerves rattling through them.
I hum along the way, stroking their heads to try and comfort them.
“How long do we walk?” Adora asks.
“As long as we need to,” Rohan tells her, rubbing his hand down the egg.
The snapping of tree branches and the heat increase a little. I turn my head to the side, seeing some dragons following us.
All I feel is curiosity from them, and when Rohan spots them, he doesn’t say anything, we just continue on.
I do stop eventually though, something guiding me forward and off to the right. Rohan follows, and that’s when we come across Vali.
I don’t know when he must have gotten here, but he’s moving branches out of the way to the entrance of a cave, placing rocks down. A moment later, a head peeks through, and another red dragon, slimmer than Vali, takes the rock with a happy purr.
Sparks makes a noise in my arms, and Vali turns to us, growling, but he stops when he sees who it is. The other dragon’s head peeks out, and they chuff to each other. Then, she disappears from sight.
But not for long, because when she peeks her head back out, she gently places a baby dragon down.
“Vali?” I choke out, and he purrs, licking his baby.
He made it back in time.
“We won’t interfere,” Rohan says, and Vali rumbles before he picks up his baby and goes inside the cave with his family.
My heart is so full at seeing them, and Rohan gently presses the back of my neck as we continue on.
We also come across Inkeri with another blue dragon, her mate, I realize, as I spot three younglings with them, one as small as Sparks. Varan goes over to them, and Inkeri takes the new baby over to him, all purring and rumbling their greeting.
I smile softly at them.
Next is Edgar, the dragon I first met in The Glade, along with his mate, Bela. Their baby is bigger now as it climbs along his mother’s back.
I never thought I would be here, in The Glade again, with Rohan.
I thought I would have died in The Games.
I’ve never been so happy to be alive.
We gather more dragons as we continue, and when we reach an opening full of lush trees and small ponds of water, Drogonah is there.
He sits back, Celeste at his side, like they’re waiting for us.
The cavern dragons take off, running over to them, playing and rolling on the ground, the other dragons that followed us slowly moving forward, too.
Rohan stops, and we follow suit, watching them.
Celeste and Drogonah rumble and huff, talking to the others.
The cavern dragons are fearful at first when others join them, but when a blue one goes to a green one, licking its face, that seems to break any hesitation in the air.
Each cavern dragon finds an adult, and I hold Sparks tighter in my grip, watching as the younglings find someone to look after them.
“Alara?” Rohan asks quietly as I look down at Sparks, tears blurring my eyes.
“He would be better here, right?” I croak out. “Where he can be loved by them all?”
Rohan is silent, and I hold back a sob as I stroke over his little head. He stretches, tail curling around my arm as he looks up at me.
“He would… he would be better off here, wouldn’t he?” I ask again.
“Alara.”
I walk forward through the dragons, tears flowing.
Sparks reaches up and licks my face, a purr coming from him.
“Hey,” I say, kneeling down on the ground and spotting a red dragon up ahead.
She watches me, and her eyes go to Sparks.
I lift Sparks up so he’s facing me.
“This is where you belong.”
He chuffs, a little sad and confused and I take a deep breath.
“Here you can really grow as you’re meant to be, you know?”
He wriggles in my grasp, and I place him down on the ground and back away from him.
He chuffs, looking from me to the red dragon.
“It’s okay,” I tell him, wiping my face on the sleeve of my tunic. “It’s okay.”
Sparks turns and walks to the red dragon, and I have to look away.
I can’t watch him walk away, no matter how much I think it’s for the best, I can’t do it.
I continue wiping my tears as I walk back to Rohan, his eyes full of concern.
This is for the best, it is. I know this. But it hurts so, so much.
But then I feel heat at my back, and I turn with blurry eyes, looking up.
“Drogonah?” I ask, confused.
He leans down on a growl, Sparks in his mouth and nudges him against me.
I grab him automatically, and Sparks curls into my neck, under my hair.
“But—”
Drogonah growls, teeth bared, and I close my eyes in relief, Escor growling in agreement.
“If you’re sure.”
Growl.
“Do you really think he would let him go anywhere else?” Rohan asks, as he steps up beside me and strokes Drogonah’s snout.
“I thought it was for the best,” I say, running a hand down Sparks’ back. “It’s where he should have stayed.”
“What’s best is with us.” He wipes my tears. “What do my eyes tell you?”
I sniffle, looking into them. “That he’s better off with us.”
He nods.
“Okay.”
He grabs my wrist and places his mouth there for a moment. “Good girl.”
He walks past me then and begins to place the egg down, and the other Dragonbonds follow suit.
“Step back a little,” Rohan tells me.
I do, and we all seem to move aside as dragons come over to the eggs.
I can feel their protectiveness surging already, making my heart pound.
The red dragon that was looking at Sparks picks up an egg, purring as she takes it away gently and others do the same.
“We got them home at least,” Sigrid says. It’s the first time she’s spoken.
“We did,” echoes Varan.
Durruk nods. “They can finally be at peace.”
“And we will continue to protect them,” Rohan adds.
We watch them for a while, none of us wanting to leave, none of us breaking the silence, but we can’t stay here forever, there is much to do.
“Come,” Rohan says, holding out a hand. “Let’s go home.”