Ström’s gone, like a barbed dart of deep maroon and forest green, as he flashes up into the roiling skies. I’m left with Bjorn, my cousin, and Insinio now, as an unsure knot of Storm Guards linger all around, waiting on orders from their King.
Rhennic flicks his fingers for a few to join us now, as he gets an arm under Bjorn and Insinio helps escort me back inside the palace. The chapel took a lot of damage to the stained glass roof but is otherwise intact; only Mikkel’s nasty green poison coats the ground and the stone in swathes here and there.
It gradually soaks in as it blisters and bubbles even the grass to death.
“Do you need a Storm Dragon retinue to escort you to Iceland?” My cousin is all business, but also kindness, as he helps us get back inside, up to our staterooms in the palace.
“No, probably not.” I think it through as we take a few minutes to get our shit together. “No one knows we need to go to Iceland; no one living, at least. The Black Dragon Knights, if they’re tracking us, will expect us togo after Mikkel back to Denmark. It gives us a chance to get to Iceland fast, incognito, and we need to take it.”
“Blood Dragons are faster flyers than Storm Dragons, anyway.” My cousin chuckles, though it’s tight, and his handsome face is grim. “We’d probably just slow you down. I still wish I could help you more in this, Rikyava, but Denmark is restricted airspace for us. I can’t send people there without starting a Storm-Blood war. With the Danish Blood Dragons, at least, even if King Huttr doesn’t support it.”
“It’s not a good time to split the Jarls in their support of our King,” Bjorn growls as he’s finally able to walk on his own without Rhennic’s help, his injured hip healing fast. “They’re already far too split, and King Huttr’s support weakened. Technically, the Jarl of Copenhagen still supports our king. Push him with this, however…”
“And my uncle loses more support than he can afford.” I curse as I walk with Insinio, furious. “The Jarl of Copenhagen might just pull his support from Huttr anyway if Mikkel goes in there all guns blazing and the Jarl finds out he and I are life-mated. Fuck, fuck, fuckity-fuck.”
“What are you going to do if your mate attacks Copenhagen’s Jarl?” Rhennic’s question is astute, as I set my jaw and chew on it for a moment.
But the answer is there for me, just like it would be for all my drakes.
“I’ll back Mikkel the fuck up for everything that Jarl’s done to him, Lærke, and his family.” I know it’s true as a battle-song fills my heart, with Aesa’s Truthstone blazing on my chest. “I just hope Lærke and Ström can talk some fucking sense into him before he hops to it. And that we can get some serious firepower in the mix by bonding Baldur first.”
“What if Baldur Siggurðsson is truly a lover, and not a fighter?” Bjorn growls. “What if Lærke is right, and his magic doesn’t lend us anything for fighting?”
“Then I hope it has some kind of fucking surprise for us,” I growl back, feeling worse and worse. “Because if we take on one of the top three most powerful Jarls in our Lineage without our King’s permission,especially if that person is still loyal to my uncle… we’re going to need some serious reasons, and firepower, to back us up.”
It’s all gone from bad to worse, however, as I churn the situation over in my mind. Bjorn and my cousin are right; if I can’t get my Third Drake to stand down, or if Lærke and Ström can’t stop him, we’re opening up a serious shitstorm for our King with his already-tenuous situation among the Jarls.
But Mikkel won’t be swayed from his decision to strike; I feel it deep inside our bond, as his blackest snarl fills my entire chest. Even at a distance, I can feel his utter wrath. Mikkel has been nursing this vendetta for years.
Ever since he was born—as a dragon, not a man.
We make it back to our rooms, faster than fast. In a moment, Bjorn and I have all our things, plus Mikkel’s, Ström’s, and Lærke’s, shoved inside our fly bags, along with all our translated texts and arcane items. In five minutes, we’re up atop one of the palace’s landing-plazas on a high turret, ready to fly. I’m giving hugs goodbye to Insinio and Rhennic, as they step back now, to give us shifting space.
“Go do what you have to; save your mate.” Rhennic is serious as he stares me down from a safe distance. I see what he doesn’t say shining in his storm-purple eyes; that if Layla or one of her drakes ever needed him, he’d be there in a trice, to fuck shit up or die trying, no matter the stakes.
“I will,” I say, nodding to let him know I got the message. Rhennic nods back, and then Insinio is raising his big multi-layer wings, as he gives it to me straight.
“The Intercessoria can’t officially help you with anything pertaining to the Black Dragon,” he says as he watches me with his vivid silver eyes. “But I want you to know that like fuck am I going to leave a good Dragon King out in the cold when we should be helping against something this heinous. Heathren and Iwillhelp your uncle however we can, even if we have to go rogue from the Intercessoria to do it. I give you this promise—and I never take promises back.”
As Insinio pulls the massive longsword out of its sheath across his back now, he plants the point defiantly to the stone of the tower. With a snap, he spreads his huge wings to the fullest; a kind of silver-grey mist sparkles through the air in intricate whorls and Archangelic sigil-patterns.
And I know he’s made some kind of oath to me, something dire.
“Thank you,” I whisper, as I put my hand to my heart. Aesa’s stone whirls in approval at whatever the big Archangel did; with a deep nod, he acknowledges me, then lifts his sword up over his shoulder and slides it away.
There’s suddenly nothing more to be said, as Bjorn shifts up into his big, all-gold drake. As he clamps one of our silver silk fly-bags in his taloned fist, I take a deep breath and grab the other.
I’ve got Hekla’s bright blue scale in my fist as I shift up as well, roaring as I lift crimson and black wings to the skies. With one last nod to my cousin Rhennic and to Insinio, I give them my thanks.
Then we’re off, Bjorn and I flying fast towards Iceland.
And the drake we hope is our salvation there.
12
BREAK
Conflict roars through me as Bjorn and I fly fast over the open ocean towards Iceland. Near midsummer, the light stays longer in these high latitudes; the beauty of the extended evening does nothing to soothe my churning, however, as Bjorn and I fly as quickly as we dare over the endless water.
