Race for the Dragon Heartstone

by K. D. Halbrook

  Silver hadn’t realized she was almost running until a regal voice stopped her. Silver skidded forward on the humus, then fell to her knees. Right at the feet of Queen Imea.

  The queen smiled. She was very beautiful, with bronze skin and hair the color of moonbeams. Her dark eyes were ringed with the deep purple of a rare sapphire, and her platinum gown sparkled more than even the icicles glistening at the top of an ice cavern. Jewels gleamed, and in one hand, she held aloft a stunning royal scepter made of pure gold and silver and dotted with the finest gems in all the desert. The kind of jewels a great master jeweler would spend his whole life searching for.

  After Silver processed all the beauty of Queen Imea, she realized a group of people was behind the queen, all on their knees as Silver was. Unlike Silver, though, each had ropes around their wrists, prisoners of the queen.

  Queen Imea was quick to remind Silver of her crime. “My dungeon has an empty cell for you, Silver Batal. Or perhaps I will fill it with all of them? I might be willing to work out a trade.”

  Hiyyan mewled and lurched forward when he spied the group. Queen Imea threw her arm to the side, and Hiyyan skidded to a stop. The scepter was an extension of the queen’s impenetrable power, creating a force of some kind between Hiyyan and those behind the queen.

  It was Silver’s mother and father. Her cousin Brajon and Mele. Nebekker and Kirja, wrapped in a net. Ferdi, the Island Nations prince. Her once hero, Sagittaria Wonder. Even the guard, head to toe in his white uniform, who had been kind to her when she was in Calidia so long ago. Who had helped her get registered for her races, who had cheered her on to victory, and who had helped her escape when the queen wanted to arrest her.

  Silver repeated the queen’s words in her head—work out a trade—and her heart leaped. Freedom, for her and Hiyyan, was within her grasp?

  Her stomach lurched as if an anchor were being pulled up from under her belly button. Why not take it? Hadn’t she already turned her back on her family? Hadn’t she forsaken Sagittaria Wonder—and vice versa? And the guard … she hardly knew him. Between her freedom and his, she could choose her own. Of course she would choose her own! Who wouldn’t?

  As though he could read her thoughts as he used to, Hiyyan peered at Silver disapprovingly.

  No, Silver admitted to herself. She wouldn’t. But she also wasn’t willing to give herself or, even worse, Hiyyan over to the queen.

  “It’s a trial,” Silver repeated to herself. “A test. There’s a right answer, isn’t there? An answer that doesn’t turn my loved ones over to the queen, but that still allows our freedom.”

  Hiyyan snorted his agreement.

  “All I’ve ever wanted was to race water dragons. It’s still all I want.” But as Silver’s eyes went from family member, to friend, to hero, to helpful stranger, she became unsettled. If water dragon racing was all she wanted, truly, she would sacrifice everything else in pursuit of her goal. Her eyes fell on her father. Wasn’t that what he’d always done? Forced Silver to give up her dreams for his own?

  And yet, she could not fathom her father in a dungeon. And certainly not her supportive mother. She could not imagine her happy cousin locked away forever. She didn’t even want Sagittaria Wonder taken away from the sport.

  “Here are all the things in the way of water racing,” Silver said, slowly getting to her feet and limping in a circle around Hiyyan. His head followed her movements as she tried to untangle the test. “My family doesn’t want me to do it. Nebekker doesn’t want me to do it. Arkilah wants us for other reasons. Queen Imea wants us for—I don’t know why. Adherence to the law?”

  Silver looked up. Queen Imea twirled her scepter slowly through her fingers so that Silver and Hiyyan winced each time the filtered daylight reflected off the perfect gemstones.

  “Or even for power. Glory, I suppose. Possessing the rarest things in the land. You proved you loved precious things the day you came to my father’s shop in Jaspaton.”

  “It’s not wrong to love beautiful things.” The queen’s face was full of mirth.

  “No,” Silver admitted. “My family makes beautiful things, and I value that. But you’re supposed to be an example to all our people. You have to respect and adhere to the law. Instead, you took something that wasn’t yours.”

  “I found something that didn’t belong to anyone.”

  “Kirja and Nebekker belong together!”

  Queen Imea sighed. “I will protect you, of course. And in return, you will lead the desert to its ultimate glory.”

  “Winning the Spring Festival cup?”

  Queen Imea threw her head back and laughed at Silver’s confusion. “You are as sweet as a desert rose jelly, my girl. I will make you a deal.” The queen plucked a small blue-and-violet stone from her scepter and held it out in her palm. “Look what I have.”

  A flame burst through Silver, warming her insides. A dragon heartstone! “You’ve had this all along?”

  “It does not do to lay all our secrets out on the table at once,” Queen Imea said. She paced in a small circle, the crystals on the hem of her glittering gown dragging along the path so that a strange winter melody filled the air. “A dragon heartstone must be earned. Succeed, and the heartstone is yours. Fail, and I leave you and your Aquinder here, not even bothering to dig you a proper grave.”

  Silver ached for that heartstone. Not only for Hiyyan’s wing and her own arm, but for the even closer bond it would create between them. They could rule the entire world with a heartstone.

  Queen Imea paused. “You do mean the world of water dragon racing, don’t you?” she said, as though she could read Silver’s thoughts.

  Silver licked her lips. Did she only mean the world of water dragon racing? She recalled the wars of old between the Desert Nations and the Island Nations. The Aquinder were so powerful that when the deserts were about to fall to the islands, the Aquinder turned the tide of the war almost single-handedly. What could she and Hiyyan do with an even more powerful bond? Maybe more important, what could they not do?

  But Queen Imea smiled. “Yes, girl.”

  Silver clenched her fists. She would make the queen kneel to her.

  “Mrow?” Hiyyan cut through Silver’s wild thoughts, but Silver brushed his questioning tone aside. The queen laughed again.

  “What do I need to do?”

  Queen Imea spun around and stabbed a finger in the direction of Silver’s friends and family.

  “Tell them the truth,” the queen said. “You don’t love them. Don’t need them. Your past is nothing. All that matters is the race. Tell it to each of their faces.”

  Silver narrowed her eyes at her loved ones. The promise of freedom, of power, of—

  No. A roaring sound filled Silver’s ears, and she shook her head to rid herself of it. Where had this hunger for power come from?

  “I won’t.”

  Queen Imea walked closer, her eyes flashing in the low light. She stretched her arm out even farther.

  “Tell them, and you can take this stone. All the riches and glory of the world will be yours. Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted? To be a champion?”

  Yes, thought Silver. And what was wrong with becoming the greatest water dragon racer of all time? Ambition was not a dirty thing.

  Sagittaria, one moment behind the queen and the next beside Silver, placed a hand on Silver’s shoulder. “Do as the queen says. Don’t you admire my greatness? I achieved it alone.”

  “Yes…” Sagittaria was strong. Alone. No family to get in the way, no friends to judge her. “Hiyyan, what do you think?”

  Hiyyan’s feelings didn’t need words; they were splayed across his face: confusion and fear, distrust and hope, all rolled together.

  “We need that heartstone.”

  The trees seemed to speak to her, talking in crackling whispers and grunts, warning her of terrors to come, of dashed hopes, of promises of beauty twisted into things dark and sinister. Silver tried to curl her functional finger joints back and f
orth. When did blood start flowing into her hand, slow and thick? There was prickling pain.

  “Think of Hiyyan,” Silver whispered to herself, urging her aching arm and legs to move. She felt like she was made of ice, and her limbs crackled with protest. “Think of racing. Think of glory and ruling the entire world.”

  Silver paused and frowned. “No, not that last one. Where did that come from?”

  “Silver,” her mother called to her.

  But Silver turned away.

  “Yes. Choose yourself.” Queen Imea’s voice was softer than ever. “Your path is clear. You and your dragon for this heartstone.”

  The queen held out the dragon heartstone, and with a heart that was suddenly so light it seemed to fly from her chest, Silver reached for it. Then she yanked her hand back as the fullness of Queen Imea’s words reached her.

  “No, that’s not the deal! Deny my past for the heartstone, you said!”

  “Follow my orders, I said!” Angrily, the queen flicked her wrist to the side and threw the stone into the trees.

  Then she slammed the end of the scepter into the ground, causing the path to crack in a thousand places, dark lines running up and down the field like tiny rivers of dried blood. The forest began falling in on itself. Hiyyan cried out. Her parents screamed.

  “No!” Silver dove into the opening, falling as fast and hard as the huge branches around her. The hole closed, and the sun was blotted out.

  FOURTEEN

  The voices came from every possible direction.

  You should just give it to her.

  Why? Because she looks so pathetic lying there? None of them are innocent.

  She’s very young.

  That’s not in her favor!

  Stop arguing, you two. This decision is far more complex than anything you’ve said so far.

  Yes.

  It was that voice, the fourth one, that reached Silver’s ears, that made her go still. The voice was close enough to her that she could feel the breath of it float over her cheeks, and low enough that she wondered if the other three heard the single word uttered or if it was meant for Silver only.

  Her lower back ached where a rock was lodged beneath, and there was a steady, thrumming pain in her ankle. Running water sounded in the background like a lullaby. She could sleep so easily. But Silver forced her eyes open to see who was gathered around her.

  They were water dragons. Four of them in a circle.

  A Glithern, small for its breed but sporting the familiar iridescent, rainbow skin. He blushed and turned his face away when Silver looked at him. Next to him: a Padahu, the water dragon with a single line of black down the center of her face, one side of the line yellow and the other red, her hair the same dual shades and falling over her furry black robes. She looked left to right and back again, avoiding Silver’s gaze. Her mouth seemed to turn up on one side and down on the other.

  And two …

  Silver could hardly believe her eyes. Hiyyan’s joy was thick enough to spread on flatbread. His voice came to her when Silver was carrying Nebekker’s heartstone, loud and clear:

  Two Aquinder. There are more of my kind! In close proximity to a heartstone once more, Hiyyan’s words to Silver were clear and complex.

  Eyes shining, the female Aquinder graced Silver with a regal nod. Hiyyan’s body blossomed with warmth, and a low hum buzzed in his throat. His happiness filled Silver to the brim.

  The male Aquinder stood as erect as a stone; the skin around his ample beard and mane was wrinkled, with a gray pallor. Ancient. And he was staring at her with great disdain.

  The female had a clean, smooth face and wore a white cloak fastened with sapphires, her furry chest thrust out proudly. Her dark eyes studied Silver so fiercely—and yet, somehow, kindly—that Silver was certain the dragon could see into the depths of her emotions and guess at things Silver herself didn’t know.

  Both were full of grace and beauty. These were no racers. These were leaders.

  “Two more Aquinder,” Silver whispered.

  The yellow-red-faced dragon curled her talons into the soft soil of the burrow. Do not argue on her behalf, Ssun. She can’t be trusted. A typical human. One moment they’re dependable and the next they’ve thrown our needs to the wind and taken off for their own adventures. I understand the impulse, and it doesn’t make for a good ally.

  The only person she needs to be an ally to is the Aquinder, argued the Glithern called Ssun. That should make you two happy.

  The old, male Aquinder snarled. Silver caught sight of a double row of teeth. It was like looking at a future version of Hiyyan. A healthy version, long into the future.

  “Who are you?” It took all of Silver’s energy to rasp out those words. “Can you help Hiyyan?”

  You see, Dortaal? Ssun said, rearing back his head excitedly. Her first words, her first thoughts. She is loyal.

  Her first words were about us, the old Aquinder, Dortaal, said drolly.

  Carefully, Silver propped herself up on her elbow, her wounded arm dangling uselessly at her other side. She blinked a few times, washing away the cold blurriness. Behind the four dragons, roots and piles of rock crowded the space she was in. A wide stream ran along the left side of the burrow. There wasn’t a single light source that Silver could see, and yet somehow the space was bright, full of daylight’s spectrum of colors. The forest was gone.

  The last thing she remembered was leaping into the hole. Before that, Queen Imea had been here … her parents and friends … Sagittaria Wonder. Where had they gone? What was happening?

  Silver swallowed against the cold dryness in her throat and tried to speak again. “Hiyyan. He must be healed.”

  The female Aquinder leaned so close that Silver could see layers of depth in her eyes: the reflection of the fantastical light, yes, but also of seas and, deep down, a gentle orange glow. Silver looked away. The Aquinder’s gaze made her squirm.

  The Aquinder you’re bonded to is on the cusp of death. But, for a moment, he is safe.

  Silver shook her head. She knew the truth because her own life was dwindling into darkness, too. “He isn’t. None of the medicines have worked. Help me find a dragon heartstone. It’s the only hope we have left.”

  Silver remembered Queen Imea throwing the dragon heartstone into the crevasse, and her heart leaped again.

  “It should be here!” She stumbled to her feet, her woozy head making her sway. The female Aquinder put a paw out to steady Silver, and the shock of the touch zapped through her limbs.

  Silver snatched her arm away. “Don’t hold me back!”

  Ssun giggled. Look at her ferocity. She is a friend to our kind.

  Dortaal’s voice cut in. She is afraid because she shall die, too. They’re bonded.

  Silver never imagined she could dislike an Aquinder, but Dortaal was testing her limits.

  “I am not. I don’t care about me. Only Hiyyan.”

  Both things can be true: a fear for herself, a fear for the Aquinder. Care for the Aquinder and care for herself can also both be true. Must be true. The Padahu paced, her expression a gentle rebuke. I don’t like her understanding things she shouldn’t know. On the other hand, she should see what world she has become a part of.

  She is not part of my world, Ge, the ancient Aquinder said.

  Peace, Dortaal. Her gift makes her more part of our world than almost any other, the younger Aquinder countered.

  Ssun nodded. Kyan is right. The girl possesses a dangerous gift. A challenging one. A rich one.

  Dortaal grunted. One she doesn’t deserve. He waved his claws dismissively. A child. I’d rather communicate with one equal to my age, to my wisdom.

  You’d rather none of them be able to communicate with us, Ge said.

  If only that were an option!

  “Who are you?” Silver said again, crouching. She paid only half attention to the foursome, her eyes scanning the ground, her fingers grappling beneath stones. Queen Imea had thrown the dragon heartstone here. Wher
e had it gone?

  We are water dragons; that is all, Kyan, the female Aquinder, said. Child, get up.

  With a graceful movement, Kyan held her paw out, palm up. In the center, the dragon heartstone glowed with a weak but steady violet light.

  Silver gasped. “Please,” she whispered. “Please. That’s what I need.”

  She asks so sweetly, Ssun said, nodding with approval.

  Desperately, Dortaal corrected.

  Both things can be true at the same time, Ge repeated.

  If I give this to you, Kyan said, what will you do with it? Will you use it to heal the Aquinder to whom you are bonded?

  “Yes! That’s the reason I want the heartstone.”

  The lovely water dragon’s eyes went flat. She moved closer, bent down, obscuring the other figures in the room. Her scales shimmered like a valley river in the summer sun. Despite definitely being younger than the other Aquinder, there was still something about her that made Silver think she had been alive for a very long time. Silver thought of the ancient goddesses of the old mythology. It was said they had buried gems and precious metals under the desert for humans to find. Had they also buried dragon heartstones?

  Kyan’s mouth twitched in a barely concealed smile. Your understanding of the world outside your own is small, I’m afraid. Her talons curled around the heartstone, and she righted herself again. And that is what gives me pause.

  Yes, said Dortaal. He stroked his mane. It was decorated with glass beads that made a discordant tune as he moved. She doesn’t understand the purpose of the heartstones. She is not worthy.

  Have any of them ever been? asked Ge. I suppose it depends on how you look at the situation.

  Dortaal moved closer, so Silver scooted back. Those teeth were so near her.

  What will you do with the heartstone? Will you race with it, using the water dragon like some kind of herd animal in your quest for glory? Will you go to war with it, using the strength and power it gives to overtake your royals and claim the world for yourself? Will you allow Hiyyan to subjugate other water dragons and make claim to his world as well?