Legacy of the Curse

by Deborah Grace White

  It was an expression of their love and longing, and Jocelyn didn’t need anyone to teach her how to feel those things. They were inextricably linked together for her, as they were for her mountain hosts. Her love of her brother interwoven with her longing to be free of the weakness that, through no fault of his own, was the price she paid for his strength. Her love of her country, so strong that the thought of leaving forever, like Princess Sarai had done, pierced her heart. How could she separate that love from her longing to be what a Kyonan princess should be? And how could she think of her love for the people close to her without longing hopelessly for them to really know her?

  She knew perfectly well how to feel, but she was so often denied the chance to express what she felt. She was trapped as surely as she so often trapped her words inside her throat. But no words were needed here. She stopped trying to copy the mountain people’s choreography and simply poured her own heart into her movements. She felt graceful in a way she never had before as she flowed across the space. She kept her eyes closed, not wanting to know if her departure from the locals’ example had created any displeasure.

  How exactly it happened, she couldn’t be sure. She just knew that she was channeling all her unspoken words—all her frustration and uncertainty and hope and confusion—into her dance, her movements getting stronger and faster with each passing second. She could feel the invisible web of interwoven power in the air around her more strongly than ever, as if it was being fed by the music, the singing, the movement of the dancers, even her own silent heart-song. Then, all of a sudden, she felt a surge of the indefinable energy burst out from her in all directions. It was like the familiar sensation she felt when she spoke, but so much more potent. She felt as though she had unintentionally thrown a net out all around her, and everyone else in the vicinity had been caught under it.

  The music didn’t stop, and neither did the dancing, but Jocelyn heard the dip in sound that suggested the musicians had faltered for a moment, and she felt the subtle change in the dancers around her. It was hard to define, but it was like the mood of the group was suddenly akin to the expression of confusion with which she was so familiar.

  She came to a halt right in the middle of the still-dancing throng, and her eyes sprang open, searching the space frantically. For a moment she couldn’t understand what she was seeing. The dancers continued to move, but their gestures were no longer fluid, and their faces looked confused. And it wasn’t just that they were less confident—something else was off about their movements. It took several long heartbeats for Jocelyn to realize what it was, and when she did she stepped blindly back, almost stumbling into the fire in her horror and confusion.

  The dance had changed. The steps she had observed so closely from her seat were nowhere to be seen. Instead the villagers were attempting new movements, swaying and revolving in a dance that Jocelyn recognized with an icy thrill to be her own. She was sure no one was intentionally trying to mimic her. They moved almost as clumsily as she had done when she first attempted to copy their steps, and they all looked confused, as if they didn’t know how or why they had changed their familiar choreography.

  Jocelyn’s eyes slid across the circle of seated villagers, noting that many of them were looking around uncertainly, trying to understand what was happening. Her maid and the two guards sitting nearby seemed oblivious to the anomaly, their vaguely uneasy expressions unchanged from how they had been for the whole duration of the group’s time in Montego.

  Jocelyn continued her visual progress around the circle, and she took another involuntary step back as she encountered Darius. The mountain chief’s gaze was fixed unblinkingly on her, his expression piercing. He at least seemed to have realized the source of the mysterious surge of power. She looked away quickly, her heart pounding, but her eyes fell instantly on an equally unnerving sight.

  Kincaid was right where she had last seen him, halfway across the circle. At some point in the dance he had evidently sat down on an unoccupied stone. Unlike the Kyonan outsiders who had traveled to Montego with Jocelyn, the Valorian man had obviously realized that something strange was going on.

  He was looking around at the dancers, his forehead creased in concentration. As Jocelyn looked his way, his eyes suddenly slid to her, and a look of amazement transformed his features. His gaze was far too shrewd as he held her eyes steadily, and she felt panic rising within her.

  Forcing her feet to move, she stumbled forward, pushing her way out from among the dancers. She tried not to look at Kincaid, but she had somehow become far too aware of him in the short space of their acquaintance, and she knew that he had jumped rapidly to his feet and was moving to intercept her. She was sure that she didn’t have the capacity to evade his questions through subtle means. She would have to evade him more literally.

  She abandoned any attempt to be inconspicuous and ran blindly toward the stone hut where she was being accommodated. She could sense Kincaid not far behind her, but she pushed on, almost throwing herself through the door and slamming it shut. She leaned against it as she had done that afternoon, breathing hard.

  “Jocelyn!” Kincaid’s knock as well as his shout made Jocelyn jump. She had somehow thought that the closed door would be enough to end his pursuit.

  She remained silent, her heart racing so frantically she felt like it might burst out of her chest.

  “Jocelyn,” he tried again, his voice dropping in volume but not in intensity. “Are you all right?”

  She stilled, surprised by the question, but didn’t respond.

  “Jocelyn, I don’t mean you any harm,” Kincaid said, and the sincerity in his voice brought a lump to her throat. “Please…I just want to talk to you.”

  She bit back a hysterical laugh at his words. Talking with her was exactly what he should not be doing.

  She could feel Kincaid’s presence as he waited hopefully outside the door. But after a few minutes, during which she remained unresponsive, he evidently gave up, because she could hear his retreating footsteps.

  She let out a long breath, banishing him from her mind. She couldn’t imagine that she would be called upon to answer his questions now. She was leaving first thing in the morning—unless Darius expelled her before then after witnessing whatever had just happened—and she was unlikely to ever see the young Valorian again.

  There was plenty else to occupy her racing thoughts, after all. What in the kingdom had just happened? She wished she could convince herself that the strange change in the villagers had some other cause, but there was no doubt in her mind that she had been the source. She had felt the power leave her, stronger than it had ever been.

  But how was such a thing possible? She hadn’t opened her mouth—she had just been dancing. Were her movements going to start having the same impact as her words? She felt a numb terror racing over her skin at the thought. She would have to lock herself in a lonely tower like some princess from legend if so.

  If only Eamon was here to help her make sense of it, but she was more alone than she had ever been in her life. And more afraid.

  The uncertainty about what had just happened was bad enough, as was the fear for her future. But there was something even worse. She couldn’t shake the memory of how it had felt to release such power, even though it had been unintentional. To her shame, underneath the horror and confusion and shock, she felt an intoxicating thrill at the way she had, with a single motion, compelled so many people to bend themselves to her will.

  And that terrified her more than all the rest.

  Chapter Six

  Given the disturbing events of the evening, Jocelyn was not surprised that she had great difficulty falling asleep. The very air of her hut seemed to hum with power, and she couldn’t turn it off any more than she could stop the constant litany of unanswerable questions from running through her mind.

  But just as she was accepting the idea of a wakeful night, she most unexpectedly felt herself slipping toward unconsciousness. It was a strange feeling—s
he was sure it wasn’t normal to feel that transition from waking to sleeping, but that’s how it was. One moment she was awake but drifting, the next she was asleep, and instantly dreaming.

  The dream was lifelike, realistic. She was lying on her pallet in the same stone dwelling, but instead of moonlight, the light of late afternoon slanted through the small window. She knew it wasn’t real, and not just because there was no way she could have slept that long. She could just tell.

  As she lay there, wondering what the point of such a mundane dream would be, she felt an urgent compulsion to rise. For a moment she struggled with it, instinctively resisting the concept of an external force interfering with her will, but it would not be denied. All at once she realized there was no reason not to follow the inclination. It was a dream, after all, and she therefore had nothing either to fear or to lose.

  She stood and pulled on her clothes, her movements unhurried. Making her way out of the hut, she entered the central space with confident steps. She was unsurprised to find that no one else was in sight. After all, this dreamworld belonged to her, didn’t it? Why should anyone else be present? The fire was still smoldering, no longer properly burning, but not fully out either, ready to be stoked for the day’s activities.

  But she didn’t head toward it. Still prompted by an unidentifiable urge, she turned instead toward the northern edge of the village. She hadn’t strayed to this side of Montego during the previous day, but she somehow knew exactly where she was going. She walked calmly between dwellings until she reached the end of the flat area that marked the mountain capital. There was an opening in the rocks, out of which a small track emerged, winding up toward higher ground. It was not the way east toward Valoria, but she took the track without hesitation. It didn’t matter where she went—it was only a dream.

  As she followed the track, something strange began to happen. The light, so strong when she had left Montego, began to fade. The shadows lengthened, just as one would expect, but much too quickly, as though the transition of twilight had been condensed from hours to minutes. Likewise, she became confused about how long she had been traveling. One part of her mind was dimly conscious of having walked for some time, but the greater part of her perception suggested that the journey had occupied only a few short minutes. Before she knew it, she was walking in the darkness of total night, only a clear moon illuminating the mountain track.

  Incredibly, she still seemed to know exactly where she was going, the strange compulsion pulling her forward. And she still followed her route without reluctance. She was curious to see where the dream path would lead, and more intrigued than ever by the strange anomaly that was allowing her mind to understand that she was dreaming even while she remained in the dream. Perhaps most surprising of all was that she was not in the least afraid, despite the fact that she was walking alone through unfamiliar mountain terrain in deep darkness.

  Only once did she feel a small stirring of fear, when a sudden sound, like falling rock, broke the stillness of the summer night. She stopped for the first time since leaving Montego, looking behind her in an attempt to locate the source of the noise. But there was nothing there, and after a moment she continued, unable to deny the persistent pull that still gripped her mind.

  The walk had so far been monotonous, one rocky outcrop looking much like another. But just as she was starting to become aware of being both cold and tired, she rounded a bend in the path and came to an abrupt halt, her mouth falling open.

  This dream had just become interesting.

  Because there, eerie and enormous in the gleaming moonlight, stood a dragon. It was as tall as five men, and although its wings were currently folded against its sides, she could tell that if they were spread, their span would be monstrous. The creature was looking steadily at her, eyes alight with a studied interest that brought Kincaid and his scrutiny irrelevantly to her mind. The vast reptilian head of the dragon, its bearded ridges framing the temples, swayed slightly toward her, as if taking in every detail of the human visitor. The clear summer moonlight glinted off its enormous scales, their color lost in the cold light.

  “Well,” said Jocelyn, speaking her thoughts aloud to the beast in a way she never would have outside of a dream. “I didn’t expect you.”

  “Didn’t you?” the dragon responded amiably. “But I’ve been expecting you.”

  She just blinked, her eyes roaming over the beast’s vast form, from the triangular plates running from its neck down its back to the tip of its enormous tail, to the muscular strength of its back legs. It leaned back on its haunches, its front legs resting on the ground in front of it. Jocelyn tried not to stare at the dagger-length talons that sprouted from the ends of its legs. It was probably best to be polite to a dragon, even a dream one.

  She frowned, something niggling at the back of her mind. Her father had described dragons to her on more than one occasion, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that her unconscious mind could conjure up such an image of one. But she felt unnerved—the beast seemed altogether too real. The dragon magic it emitted in a constant ebb and flow was so strong that she felt like she was at risk of losing consciousness as it washed over her. But such a feeling shouldn’t be possible in a dream, should it?

  “This is a strange dream,” she muttered.

  The dragon had seemed content to let her look it over in silence, but it made a strange guttural sound in its throat at her words. After a moment of alarm, Jocelyn realized that the creature was chuckling.

  “You are not dreaming, daughter of kings.”

  Jocelyn raised her eyebrows at the strange salutation. “I must be.”

  The dragon shook its head. “No.”

  “But…” Jocelyn trailed off. As enjoyable as it was to speak so freely, what was the point of arguing with a creation of her own consciousness about whether it was real? But still…again she felt a stirring of unease. Looking at the mighty form of the creature in front of her, it felt somehow presumptuous to conclude that it depended on her mind for its existence.

  “I am very real, young one,” said the dragon, as if it could read her thoughts. “And you are in truth here with me in the mountains. I called you from your sleep and led you out of Montego to meet me here. You should have known it was not practical for me to come to the village to meet you there.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Jocelyn, again frowning. It must be a dream, but she had no idea what her mind was getting at. Why would she expect the dragon to meet her in Montego?

  The dragon did not immediately respond, instead narrowing its eyes and leaning its mighty head closer to her. She resisted the urge to pull back.

  “Hmm,” was all it said.

  “Who are you?” Jocelyn asked tentatively, for the first time entertaining the thought that all this could be real. But surely not—no one had seen a dragon in almost two decades.

  “You don’t recognize me?” the dragon asked, surprised. “I am Elddreki. I did not think you would forget our previous meetings so quickly.”

  “Our…” Jocelyn stopped herself, feeling more unnerved than ever.

  The dragon was certainly behaving consistently with what she had been told about the beasts. Her father had explained to her that, perhaps due to their immense lifespan, it was the way of dragonkind to think of a human bloodline almost as though it was one person rather than a long series of separate individuals.

  Many times she had heard her father talk about Elddreki, the dragon who had twice helped him to protect his throne, the only dragon to leave the Dragon Realm in centuries. She knew that to Elddreki, any interaction with her would be considered a continuation of his friendship with her father.

  She swallowed.

  “I’m glad you came,” Elddreki continued, conversationally. “I wondered if you would forget our agreement—human memory is so frail.”

  Agreement? Jocelyn blinked, but didn’t say the word aloud. It was finally breaking on her that this was really happening. Somehow, impossibly, she had walk
ed in that trance-like state from Montego to this meeting place, and was actually speaking with the famed Elddreki. Her heart raced frantically inside her chest as she tried to figure out when dream had ended and wakeful reality had begun. Or had she been awake all that time? But certainly the sunshine that had illuminated her path at the start of the journey had not been consistent with the reality of this moonlit night.

  The strangest thing was that she still didn’t feel afraid. Elddreki was awe-inspiring, no question. But she knew innately that she didn’t need to fear him.

  “I’m…I’m Jocelyn,” she said when the silence had stretched to its limit.

  “I know who you are, young one,” said Elddreki indulgently. He gave her a hard look. “Do you know who I am?”

  She nodded, her eyes again traveling over the dragon’s impressive form in the moonlight. He was just as her father had described him and yet, somehow, not at all what she would have expected. He spoke to her as if they were…well, friends. And she could feel it, too—an undefinable kinship. Elddreki’s magic was overwhelming as it rolled off him, but at the same time, it was familiar. It woke an answering whisper within herself, as though her own power—which she had never understood—was a trickle to its raging torrent. No comparison in its magnitude, but identical in its substance.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, her voice coming out more confidently this time, “but I don’t know what agreement you mean. I suppose it was made between you and my father, but I’m afraid he never mentioned it to me. What did he agree to do?”

  Despite the tension of the situation, her words brought the same release that Jocelyn always felt from prolonged speech. The energy of the mountains swirled around her as she spoke, weaving past the dragon and settling over Jocelyn like a net even as her own words seemed to add to it. Instead of answering her question, Elddreki stared hard at her through his snakelike eyes, which were once again narrowed.