“So, this is what it comes down to,” the king said in a regulated tone oddly devoid of emotion. “The Macobite orphan steals the dragon stone, the heritage of Efyllsseum and the blessed source of our eternal youth, betraying her own father unto death.”
“Leave my daughter out of this,” Magnulf boomed as he strode to the railing. “This is a unanimous decision by the Conservatory. War is upon us because of the greed of the crown. It is due time to return the light dragon stone to the kingdoms of the world and restore favor among all people everywhere.”
King Ferghell threw back his head and gave a caustic laugh. “What music to my ears! By some marvel of the stone, the doddering master mentor speaks again. Yet, it seems he has not regained his senses. Tell me, Magnulf of the house of Radmount, have you forgotten that the Opal of Light belongs to the kingdom of Efyllsseum? It is no accident that the stone was hurled down to our island. We were chosen to safeguard it. Who are we, mere mortals, to counter the High Dragon King’s wishes?”
Orlla came alongside her father. “And what if the High Dragon King entrusted us with the stone, believing we would share it with the world? Your motives for hiding it are corrupt. You seek only your own comfort and gain. The eternal youth you crave comes at the mainlanders’ expense. You know that the Opal of Light does not belong to us, and it was never intended to serve the few. It is the birthright of all.”
King Ferghell’s eyes glittered in the light of the flickering torch. “You, a gutter-bred Macobite dare to chastise me! You should have been put to work as a drudge in Efyllsseum. You were only granted citizenship because of your father’s legacy at the Conservatory. Your reckless actions have betrayed that heritage and brought shame upon the house of Radmount. You broke your Keeper pledge to hide the chosen kingdom from the outside world.”
“And for that I am deeply proud of my daughter,” Magnulf interjected. “I am ashamed that the Keepers stayed silent for centuries about the corruption that underlies this realm. Orlla has vowed to right the balance of power, and the Conservatory resolves this day to stand with her.”
“Tragically for your daughter, she will not succeed,” the king snapped. “My Protectors have their crossbows trained on your ship with instructions to spare none if I give the command to fire.” He paused, allowing his words to linger forebodingly in the salty air between them. “However, I am willing to negotiate with you in order to avoid spilling the blood of Efyllsseum’s Keepers. These are my terms: relinquish the dragon stone and your lives will be spared. If you refuse, every Keeper here will die tonight upon these waters. They will be branded as heretics for all posterity and will not receive the dignity of a Keeper burial.”
“A threat with little weight, I dare say.” Jubel stepped forward and gripped the rail of the boat. “If you kill the Keepers, what is to prevent the Protectors from overthrowing you? The stability of your reign depends on a careful balance of Keepers and Protectors, a state of affairs that you yourself have cultivated.”
Rage glazed the king’s features. “The Protectors remain loyal to me and faithful to Efyllsseum. I have no need of Keepers who are willing to break faith with the kingdom they swore fealty to.”
Orlla let her gaze travel over the Protectors lined up behind the king. “Where are Khor and Daglin? Did you kill them for letting me escape?”
The Protectors shuffled uneasily, exchanging strained glances, before lining up their crossbows again.
King Ferghell narrowed his eyes. “It is no concern of yours where my Protectors are assigned to serve at any given time.”
“I suspect they outlived their usefulness once they failed to capture Samten or me,” Orlla responded. “Surely their fellow Protectors deserve the truth. It is a good reminder to them of the consequences of failure.”
The Protector holding the torch aloft shifted his gaze briefly to the king, and then threw a sidelong glance at his companions.
Orlla studied their uncertain posture. She had managed to unsettle them, but if King Ferghell gave the order to fire their crossbows on the Keepers, they would most likely comply. Any attempt to fuel revolt on their part would require more than mere speculation that two of their own had been murdered. She fingered the dragon stone inside the sack she clutched in her left hand. Would it help her again—would it blind the king and his Protectors long enough for them to chart a course to the mainland?”
“Your flagrant disrespect of your monarch will not go unpunished,” the king seethed. “I will make an example of you on Efyllsseum before you hang.”
Orlla turned her head and whispered to Erdhan. “Tell the Keepers to weave veiling and protection runes. Take my father and Jubel with you. Stay well back where you can’t be seen from the king’s ship and keep your face hidden beneath your cloak.”
“Are you intending to blind your king?” Erdhan asked incredulously.
“I intend to do what I have to,” Orlla replied. “And I will have no remorse for it. He brought this judgement on himself.”
Erdhan furrowed his brow. “Don’t you think he will anticipate you using your power against him? Perhaps he has something more devious to counter your move with.”
“Nothing is more powerful than the Opal of Light,” Orlla said. “King Ferghell is about to experience the full extent of the light dragon stone’s power. Alert the Keepers to fashion the runes.”
Erdhan gave a grim nod of acknowledgement as he slipped back to the other side of the boat where the Keepers were gathered.
“This is your last chance to turn over the dragon stone before I order the Protectors to put an arrow through the heart of every soul aboard your vessel,” the king warned.
Orlla dangled the sack containing the Opal of Light over the edge of the boat. “You may want to reconsider that threat. If I have an arrow through my heart, I cannot guarantee I will be able to hold on to this precious cargo. One slip from any one of your archers will leave the Opal of Light buried at sea for the next five hundred years.”
The king’s eyes glittered in the flickering torchlight. He motioned to the Protectors on either side. “Lower your crossbows until I give the order.”
“A wise move,” Orlla remarked, fighting to mask the relief in her voice. “It would be a shame for a stray arrow to strip you of eternal life and hasten your demise.”
“Enough of your childish games.” The king snapped his fingers. Several Protectors broke away from the rail and disappeared into the shadows of the boat.
Orlla frowned across the water trying to make out what they were doing, but it was impossible to see anything on the far side of the boat.
Jubel glided to her side, a throwing knife in each hand. “We have begun the veiling runes, but we’ll need a little longer. What’s happening over there?”
“I’m not sure,” Orlla admitted. “I tried to force the king’s hand, but I fear he is losing patience with me. I can’t predict what he’s planning next.”
They stared across the inky black water until King Ferghell and two Protectors reappeared herding a hooded prisoner in front of them. A second cloaked figure followed a short distance behind, overseeing the escort.
“Who is the prisoner?” Orlla asked, frowning. “Khor or Daglin?”
Jubel shook her head. “I have no idea, but it’s hard to believe the king would dare anger the other Protectors by parading a disgraced Protector around like that.”
“I have given you every chance to voluntarily return what you stole from Efyllsseum,” King Ferghell roared across the water. “Now, I will show what will happen if you continue to defy me.”
He signaled to the Protectors who shoved the prisoner forward, then lifted him up on the railing of the boat. The cloaked figure who had followed them carefully wrapped a chain attached to an iron weight around the prisoner’s feet. When he was done, he lifted his head and looked directly across at them.
“Barhus!” Jubel hissed, her voice laced with venom. “It is clear now why King Ferghell refused to allow us to bar him from th
e Conservatory despite his litany of offenses. Barhus has been spying for him all along.”
Orlla turned her attention to the hooded prisoner swaying precariously on the boat’s railing. Her heart pounded in her chest. Would the king really drown one of his Protectors to force her to turn over the Opal of Light?”
“The runes have taken effect,” Erdhan whispered behind her. “You’ve disappeared from sight.”
Fortified by the news, Orlla called across to King Ferghell. “You cannot kill those you cannot see. Our runes give us the advantage now.”
“Whatever veiling runes you have woven will not save this man’s life.” The king gave a scornful laugh.
“We have more than merely runes at our disposal. Nothing you do will spare you the ire of the dragon stone when I release its full power,” Orlla shouted to him as she reached into the sack.
“Do it and he dies!” the king bellowed, jerking the prisoner’s hood down.
Orlla’s mouth fell open.
Slowly, Akolom raised his head and looked across at her. A cloth gag covered the lower half of his face and his hands were bound in front of him. But even in the shadowy darkness, Orlla knew what his eyes were telling her. His thoughts bore down on her until she could feel the weight of her master mentor’s command not to relinquish the dragon stone to King Ferghell under any circumstances.
She tore her gaze away from Akolom. If she disobeyed his command, albeit unspoken, she would be violating her sacred Keeper oath. But she couldn’t just stand by and watch him drown at the hand of the king he had sworn fealty to and devoted his life to serving. Her chest heaved up and down as she wrestled with the magnitude of everything at stake. Samten would die if she returned to the mainland without the stone. Her thoughts swirled at dizzying speeds as she tried to reason with herself. If she turned over the Opal of Light to spare Akolom’s life, it didn’t necessarily mean they had lost. They had stolen it once, they could steal it again. Perhaps some of the Protectors could even be swayed to help them this time.
“You have had ample time to consider your course of action,” the king said. “What is your decision?”
Orlla’s face betrayed nothing as she silently hauled the sack with the stone up over the railing.
“A wise choice, rune weaver. You will not regret sparing the life of your fellow Keeper,” the king called across to her.
Orlla raised her head and looked across at Akolom. She had saved him but doomed the mainland. Could he ever forgive her?
As if reading her thoughts, Akolom gave the tiniest of nods.
Tears pricked at Orlla’s eyes. Before she fully registered his intention, he pushed himself off the boat rail and plunged headfirst into the churning water below.
Chapter 31
“No!” Orlla screamed, a rod of terror cleaving a path through her heart. She knew what she must do. She could feel the Opal imprinting its will on her. In one swift move she wrenched the dragon stone out of the sack and raised it above her head, her lips mouthing the forbidden rune inscribed upon it that she had sworn to her father never to use unless the fate of the world was at stake. Something told her that time had come.
A blinding light lit up the sky and a thunderous bellow whipped up the water around the boats. Protectors and Keepers alike cried out in fear, dropping to their knees and shielding their faces. A live current rippled from the stone down Orlla’s arms, and a moment later, a lustrous, leathery wing split the inky water between the boats.
A shimmering silver-scaled dragon rose from the depths of the sea with a limp, dripping Akolom curled in one claw. As it flew over them, it opened its mammoth jaws above the king’s boat releasing a sulfurous blue flame that crackled as it charred everything in its path. Protectors screamed in agony, leaping into the water to douse the fire that licked the boat.
In the chaos, Orlla lost sight of King Ferghell and Barhus. Those Protectors who did not die instantly threw themselves into the water, but it was impossible to tell whose heads were bobbing between the boats. Orlla hurriedly stuffed the Opal of Light back inside her sack and turned to the terrified Keepers scrambling to find shelter as flaming masts from the inferno in the king’s boat toppled toward them.
“Take heart!” she assured them. “The dragon of light is with us. It will not harm us. Man the sails and make for the mainland!”
She caught her father’s searching look, wincing in anticipation of his reproof. “I had to use the rune,” she apologized. “Akolom was—”
“I would have done it if you hadn’t. The words were on my lips,” her father cut in. “Now you know the truth. The era of the dragons never died.”
Before she could press him for more information, he turned and began hollering instructions to the other Keepers. For a while, there was utter pandemonium as they worked in the semi-darkness trimming the sails to turn the vessel. Protectors continued to leap from their flaming craft, those who could swim attempting to climb aboard the Keepers’ boat, their glistening faces contorted in terror and pain. Jubel and the other Keepers showed them no mercy, allowing none to clamber on board despite their desperate pleas. The Protectors had declined to come to their aid when the king had threatened their lives moments earlier, and now judgement had rained down from above.
Orlla was almost certain King Ferghell had succumbed to the raging inferno that had swept down the side of the boat where he had been standing. Her gut told her he had been the target of the attack, that the High Dragon King had lost patience with his self-serving ways, just as he had lost patience with the dragons five hundred years earlier. But it was disconcerting to be unsure of his fate amid the chaos in the water.
She watched the silver white dragon ascend into the sky until it appeared no bigger than a bird of prey, then beat a path toward Narto at the foot of the Angladior mountains. Its gleaming scales twinkled under the moonlight, leaving a trail like a shooting star. The words of the cryptic rune emblazoned on the Opal of Light played over in her mind. A dragon rune. It couldn’t be mere coincidence. The dragon had arisen when she had spoken the words aloud. The rune had awakened it from the slumber it had been condemned to centuries earlier. The High Dragon King had once again turned his attention to the affairs of earth. They were no longer alone.
A drumbeat of hope stirred inside Orlla. She had not been forced to relinquish the Opal of Light to King Ferghell after all. Maybe Samten could still be saved, along with the rest of the mainland.
Erdhan materialized at her side, his face a chalky mixture of disbelief and awe. “Are you all right?” His eyes smoldered a brilliant blue in the moonlight.
Orlla nodded, peering at him curiously. “Your eyes are aglow again.”
“The light didn’t affect me this time.”
“Thank the High Dragon King. He has gifted you with sight that protects you as well as any rune.” Orlla’s shoulders sagged. “But I have no idea if Akolom survived—if the dragon managed to pull him out of the sea in time.”
Erdhan rubbed a hand over his jaw, casting a disquieted look over the water. “The legends … when the High Dragon King hurled the stones from his throne room and condemned the dragons. I thought they died out a long time ago.”
Orlla was quiet for a moment. “It seems the light dragons only lay dormant. The Opal of Light has awakened them.”
“You think there are more of them?” Erdhan asked.
“Yes, I felt them awaken when the light shot through me. There are legions of them, and now they are free.”
Erdhan frowned. “Which means the dark dragons await the unearthing of the Onyx of Darkness.”
A shadow fell over them as Jubel came alongside them. “We must prepare for such an eventuality. Evidently, the dragons were not condemned to death, only to sleep until the stones called them to life once more.”
Orlla stared at the sack in her hand, her thoughts swirling. If the light dragons were under the control of the Opal of Light, its location could never be revealed to Hamend or Brufus. Either madman would uti
lize the power of the dragons to fortify his own kingdom and extend his reach into others.
Orlla swiftly tied a knot in the mouth of the sack and turned to Jubel. “We must take the Opal of Light deep into the Angladior mountains. Hamend and Brufus cannot be trusted to share the stone without our oversight. Once they know the true extent of its power, they will try to control the dragons to serve their own purposes. We must become Keepers of the stone, with allegiance to no one kingdom over another.”
Jubel eyed her with a stiff grimace. “You understand that such actions will doom us from ever setting foot on Efyllsseum again.”
Orlla nodded, glancing across at her father, busy adjusting rigging with several other Keepers. “This requires the unanimous agreement of the entire Conservatory.”
After Orlla explained her plan to take the Opal of Light to an undisclosed location in the heart of the Angladior mountains. Jubel directed a meaningful look at the other Keepers. “We must be willing to accept the consequences of moving the Opal of Light to a central location on the mainland. We will never again return to Efyllsseum. Eternal youth is no longer promised to us. Those of us who have passed the natural fourscore-or-so years will wither and die in the Angladior mountains.”
Orlla’s chest tightened as she stole a look at her father. Their eyes met, and a flicker of understanding passed between them. He was ready to die on his own terms.
One-by-one the Keepers muttered allegiance to the interim master mentor’s course of action.
Jubel gave a nod of satisfaction. “Then it is decided. We will rebuild a new Conservatory deep in the Angladior mountains, far from the reach of any king or tyrant seeking to profit from the Opal of Light. The light dragon stone will be a gift to humankind, not a weapon in the hands of a despot.”
“And what of my son and Akolom?” Magnulf asked.
“As soon as we make land we will mount a search for Akolom,” Jubel replied. “The dragon struck out in the direction of Narto. Perhaps it has deposited him at the dock.”
Opal of Light: An epic dragon fantasy (The Keeper Chronicles Book 1) Page 26
