Reflection- Dragon's Bane

by Rachel R. Smith

  Everything that happened afterward seemed to take place in the blink of an eye.

  Casimer made a lunge for the bell pull.

  “Now!” Nerissa shouted, giving Raysel the cue to use the crystals.

  But no warmth rose up from the stones. Horrified, Nerissa realized that Casimer had not been reaching for the bell pull. He grabbed one of the ornamental swords from the wall and thrust it in Nerissa’s direction just before Raysel threw himself in front of her.

  He was too late. A sudden impact high on Nerissa’s left arm sent the crystals spilling from her hand.

  In the span of the same second, Rian freed Dragon’s Bane from its sheath. Casimer was still leaning into his initial strike when Bane’s lethal edge plunged between his ribs.

  Rian withdrew his blade, and the ornamental sword clattered to the floor. Crimson bloomed on Casimer’s shirt, the stain growing in size alarmingly fast. Stunned, he pitched forward, pressing one hand to the mortal wound while flailing blindly with the other. As his weight dragged him down, he caught a handful of Rian’s shirt, tearing loose one button after another until the mysterious mark on his chest was fully revealed. Up close, despite the tattoo being faded and distorted, the vague shape of a dragon was discernable.

  A haunting, gurgling gasp bubbled up from deep within Casimer’s throat. “The Dragon’s Mark…can only mean…you are”—he paused, struggling to speak, and a rivulet of red streamed down from one corner of his mouth—“my son.”

  Rian looked down at him, his face strangely calm. “I am,” he said.

  Another gurgle rose from Casimer’s throat, making it seem like he might speak again, but the light had faded from his eyes.

  Nerissa’s mind reeled at the unexpected course of events. Casimer was Rian’s father? she thought, only now realizing that when Rian said his father was chief among the Ohanzee’s enemies, he hadn’t meant the literal chief. Distantly, she heard Amon lamenting that this wasn’t how things were supposed to go.

  Raysel whirled around, taking Nerissa by the shoulders and checking her up and down for injuries. “Are you hurt? Did I get to you in time?”

  His touch sent a wave of hot pain pulsing out from Nerissa’s upper arm. She looked down at her sleeve with a surreal detachment and was vexed to find that a slice had been cut in the fabric. Through the gap, she could see a deep gash had also been cut in her skin, matching the length of the one in the fabric.

  Raysel’s eyes followed hers to the wound. “You’re bleeding!” he exclaimed.

  “I’m alright. I didn’t even feel anything until now,” she said vacantly.

  “If she says she’s alright, then let’s go. We have to get out of here before anyone comes,” Amon said. He was already halfway to a door on the other wall. “This leads to the long gallery. There’s an access door to the servant’s corridors on the far end.”

  “We’re not going anywhere yet,” Raysel snapped as he ripped her sleeve open all the way. “She never admits when she’s seriously hurt, and she’s bleeding a lot. Find me a cloth so I can bind this wound.”

  Rian straightened from wiping Bane clean, and his face paled as soon as he saw her.

  That’s the first time he’s looked at me in weeks, Nerissa thought idly.

  Amon snatched the table runner from the desk Casimer had been writing at earlier and handed it to Raysel. “Hurry,” he urged, staring warily at the door.

  Raysel huffed in irritation. “I am hurrying, though not for your benefit.” He hastily doubled over the thin fabric and cinched it around and above the wound.

  A wave of pain rolled over Nerissa, so intense she saw tiny stars flash before her eyes. Raysel cupped her cheek in his hand. “We can’t stay here,” he said. “Do you think you can follow me?”

  Nerissa nodded vaguely.

  Raysel didn’t look convinced, but he took her by the elbow of her good arm and led her out of the room anyway.

  The portrait-filled gallery passed by in a blur of gilt frames and unrecognizable faces. When they reached the opposite side, Amon opened an inconspicuous door tucked between two paintings, and they stepped into an austere hallway.

  Amon took a moment to orient himself and then pointed to the right. “This way. The access to the tunnels is right next to the kitchen.”

  In the smaller confines of the servant’s passages, the group had to move slower, which Nerissa was immensely grateful for. The heat in her arm had turned to an icy fire, and she was having a hard time making her feet move the way she wanted them to.

  The farther they went, the louder the sounds of the kitchen became. They had just reached the door they were looking for when a young woman carrying a laundry basket came around the corner of an intersecting hall.

  Rian and Raysel both shuffled in front of Nerissa, blocking her injured arm from the woman’s view.

  She tilted her head to the side as she tried to get a better look at them. “Lord Amon? What are you doing down here?”

  Amon gave her his most charming grin. “We were heading down to the kitchen for a snack.”

  “If you wanted a snack, you should have sent for one,” the woman chided gently. “There’s no need for someone of your station to be wandering these dank halls.”

  “But then how would I know the full selection of pies the cook has available for us today?” he said with a mischievous wink.

  The woman giggled and started past them. Once her back was to them, Rian brought the flat of his hand down in a single swift hit to the back of her head, and she crumpled to the ground unconscious.

  “Did you really have to do that?” Amon asked, wincing.

  Nerissa didn’t hear Rian’s answer. The throbbing in her arm was threatening to overwhelm all of her senses.

  Amon flung open the door, and Nerissa stumbled down a set of stone stairs, supported between Raysel and Rian. The familiar scents and sounds of the canals registered at the edges of her awareness, but she was only distantly aware of them. The next thing she knew, someone was lifting her onto his back and running. She thought she saw a blueish-white light bobbing through the darkness ahead of them, though it was hard to distinguish it from the other stars that filled her vision.

  The last thing she remembered before everything went dark was the sound of a horse’s whinny and the hazy form of a wagon floating in the middle of the canal.

  Chapter 17

  Return to the Hidden City

  Nerissa

  Enveloped in soft warmth, Nerissa drifted in a peaceful dream—one that was far more pleasant than the rocking, bouncing, swaying haze that preceded it. For a moment, vague memories of anxious voices and pain skittered across the surface of her thoughts, bringing with them a fresh, burning ache. Yet even that was dulled to a mere echo of its original intensity.

  The only thing that penetrated her dazed state was a voice, melodic and soothing. Nerissa recognized the tune—a lullaby her mother used to sing to her. The singer’s voice, too, was familiar, though strangely out of place. The realization made something click in Nerissa’s mind, and her awareness sharpened. That voice. It wasn’t possible. How could she be here when she was supposed to be…

  Nerissa’s eyes fluttered open, and a feeling of disorientation immediately washed over her. For the first time in weeks, she awakened to actual daylight and not the bluish-white illumination provided by glow lamps. Instead of having a view of the underside of the top bunk, she saw the sun’s muted rays filtering in through the gauzy curtains of a window a few feet over the bed. The rich aroma of savory food filled the air. No, this definitely wasn’t the storeroom—but it was a bed she had woken in before.

  “Ildiko?” she rasped. She shifted in an attempt to roll onto her side and let out an involuntary groan as the movement sent a lance of pain rocketing up her arm.

  The singing, clear and sharp like the ringing of tiny bells, halted. “Oh dear! I didn’t realize you would wake up so soon. Do try not to move too much,” Ildiko said. She laid down the measuring spoon in her hand a
nd hurriedly put the cap back on an open jar of powder. “Even though I’ve given you something for the pain, I’m sure your wound is very tender.”

  “Tender?” Nerissa grunted. “That’s a gross understatement.”

  Ildiko smiled wryly as she dragged a short stool closer to the bed. “I am sure that it is an understatement, yet I find it best not to remind my patients of just how painful their injuries are.” She poured a glass of water from a carafe beside the bed and offered it to Nerissa, who accepted it gratefully.

  “Ildiko, I’m glad to see you again—and I’m particularly glad to see that you are looking well—but what is going on? How did I end up in Darnal?” Nerissa asked after taking a sip.

  “I don’t find it unusual that you can’t recall. The wound on your arm caused you to lose a lot of blood. You’ve been in and out of consciousness for the last three days as a result.”

  “Three days?” Nerissa asked.

  “Yes, but you’ve only been in Darnal for a few hours. After leaving Marise, the group stopped long enough to stitch up your wound and then drove through the nights to get you back here as quickly as possible.” Her pale lips pressed together into a thin frown. Whatever she was about to say, she didn’t think Nerissa was going to like it. “Your cut was deep, so I’m afraid you will likely have a rather large scar. Aside from that, once you’ve had a few days’ rest, I expect you’ll make a full recovery.”

  “A scar is a small price to pay in exchange for Chiyo’s freedom,” Nerissa said, feeling oddly undisturbed by the idea. She looked down at her left arm, which was still throbbing in spite of being swaddled in a thick layer of clean bandages. “The cut didn’t seem all that bad at the time.”

  “Well, you were probably in shock,” Ildiko replied. She tapped the rim of Nerissa’s glass, encouraging her to drink more. “It’s surprisingly common for patients with these types of wounds not to realize right away that they’ve been injured.”

  Nerissa obediently took another sip. “It sounds like you have quite a bit of experience treating sword wounds.”

  Ildiko chuckled softly, and the silver strands in her hair shimmered in the sunlight. “The Ohanzee do have a tendency to encounter the sharp side of a blade from time to time, whether by accident or otherwise.”

  Nerissa gestured with her good arm toward a large earth-fire stone that was sitting beside the foot of the bed. “I see you got out your crystals for me.”

  “I knew not to wait to use them this time,” the older woman replied with a wink.

  “Oh, Ildiko, you don’t even know the half of it,” Nerissa said. “We’ve learned so much more about crystals since the last time I saw you.”

  “So I’ve heard, and I’ll want you to tell me all about your discoveries later. For now, however, I need to inform the chiefs that you are awake.” She rose from the stool, took Nerissa’s empty water glass, and refilled it before placing it on the night table. “In the meantime, there is someone waiting here who will be extremely relieved to learn you are awake. He can fill you in on the events of the last few days while I’m gone. Just relax, and I’ll go and get him.”

  Her curiosity piqued, Nerissa tried to gently push herself up into a sitting position. That was a mistake. She let out an exclamation as the throbbing in her arm intensified enough to bring involuntary tears to the corners of her eyes. It seemed any movement at all was enough to aggravate the injury.

  Though Ildiko was already halfway across the kitchen, she whirled around at Nerissa’s pained utterance. “Careful! If you must move, at least allow me to help you,” Ildiko fretted, hurrying back to Nerissa’s side. “The pain will lessen the more you heal, so you’ll have to be patient for a little while.”

  “Let’s hope the crystals help me heal extra fast then,” Nerissa said as Ildiko adjusted the pillows so that she could recline on them in a semi-upright position.

  Ildiko gave her a sympathetic smile. “If they work as well as they did last time, you’ll be up and about before you know it.”

  Nerissa watched expectantly to see who her visitor was, assuming Einar or Raysel would walk in. But it was neither Einar nor Raysel who appeared in the doorway.

  It was Rian.

  At the sight of her, he bounded across the room and grabbed her good hand, pressing it tightly between both of his. “Do you remember who I am?” he asked.

  For a moment, Nerissa could only stare at him in bewilderment, trying to figure out why he would ask such a thing. After weeks of awkwardness between them, along with everything that happened at the palace, that was hardly the first thing she expected him to say. “Of course I do. Why wouldn’t I?” she finally answered.

  He let out a long sigh of relief, as if he had been holding his breath the whole time he was waiting to hear her answer. Perhaps he had been. “When you awoke from your last injury, you didn’t remember anything that took place at the masquerade—including meeting me. I was afraid you might have forgotten me again.”

  Although Nerissa wanted to argue that it would be impossible for her to forget him, she had forgotten him once before. And while snatches of memories from that fateful day came back to her from time to time, any meaningful recollections of their first encounter were lost. But there were so many other things she hadn’t forgotten and certainly never would, like the nights they had spent together watching the stars, how endearing she found the strange duality of his confidence and vulnerability, or how happy she had felt the first time he called her “My Phoenix.”

  She didn’t have a chance to voice any of those thoughts though. He continued on, not expecting a response from her. “Ildiko said you would be fine and told me to go home and rest, but I wasn’t going to leave until I knew you were alright.” He reached out tenderly toward her injured arm, letting his hand hover over the bandages. “I am so sorry Casimer was able to do this to you. Even with Shae’s warning that your life would depend on how fast I drew my sword, even with all the practicing I did, I still didn’t draw Bane fast enough.” His fingers snapped into a fist, and he pulled away from her. “I was right by your side both times my father attacked you, and I was unable to do anything to protect you from him either time.”

  Shae’s warning. Nerissa remembered him telling her about the seer’s vision on the night of their first kiss, and the way he described it just now didn’t match. Shae had not said Nerissa’s life would depend on it. She had said Rian’s father would attack a woman he cared deeply about. If Nerissa had any lingering doubts about Rian’s feelings toward her, the inadvertent admission in his statement would have quashed them.

  Suddenly, Nerissa saw the connections she had missed before. It was no wonder Rian had been so insistent about accompanying them to confront Casimer. No wonder he had redoubled his efforts practicing while they were in the storeroom. He knew the time Shae had foreseen was coming.

  Even though moving intensified the bone-deep throbbing in her arm, Nerissa leaned over to take his hand again. “There’s no reason for you to feel guilty because of Casimer’s actions,” she said emphatically as she laced her fingers through his. “And thanks to you, he won’t have the opportunity to hurt me, or anyone else, ever again.”

  A fierce light lit up Rian’s eyes, and he enfolded her hand in both of his once again. “You’re right, he won’t. I know it wasn’t in our plan, and I never had any intention to kill him, but I can’t say I regret my actions either. I’d have done anything in order to protect you.”

  “You would make a fine guardian,” she said, knowing the reassurance would make him happy.

  It had exactly the effect she wanted. He beamed—the first genuine smile she had seen from him in weeks.

  “I think I owe you a thank you as well,” she added, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. “You were the one who carried me through the tunnels, right? I guess we’re even now.”

  “I think it was much harder for you to carry me out of the caves than it was for me to carry you to the wagon. I owed you that much at least.” For some reason,
a hint of pink appeared on his cheeks, and he looked away. “After that, we made for Niamh as quickly as we could. We dumped all of the antiques and excess food we were carrying so that we could move faster. The poor horses were nearly exhausted in the process, but we made it here in about half the time it normally would have taken. We had to get back as quickly as possible—both for your sake and to take advantage of the lead we had on the Senka. You must have been miserable the whole time. I remember how uncomfortable it was to ride in the wagon between Rhea and Barr’s village, and we weren’t moving as quickly then.”

  “It’s probably good that my memory of the journey back is hazy,” Nerissa said, and Rian nodded in agreement.

  “We stopped only long enough to drop off Amon a couple miles outside of Niamh. He may be our ally, but we still weren’t going to bring him back to Darnal. We were already bringing one outsider here anyway.”

  “An outsider?” Nerissa asked.

  “Desta was with us, too.”

  “Oh! She’s been with us for so long, I’d almost forgotten she isn’t an Ohanzee.”

  “It’s easy to forget, isn’t it?” Rian laughed softly, his fingers curling reflexively over hers. “It’s not like we had any other choice. We promised Shae we would take care of her, and we couldn’t spare the time to go back to her village, nor could we drop her off and let her find her own way home, like we did Amon. I can’t say the chiefs were happy about us bringing her here. But there’s a lot they aren’t happy about right now, so I think Desta is at the bottom of their list. She’ll be staying with Raysel’s family while she’s here.”

  “I bet she and Aravind will get along well.”

  Rian grinned. “When we first met Desta, she reminded me of Aravind, so I suspect you’re right.”

  “Speaking of Raysel, where is he?” Nerissa said, her voice cracking.

  Rian gently untangled his fingers from hers to reach for the water glass on the nightstand. “He went to Niamh with the lead group to make preparations for your return.”