Only Zhao remained. “If she burns me. I deserve it.”
“Yes,” she said, watching Dailee and Mingway back out. She cornered her eyes back to Zhao. She could make her move now, and wipe out his entire family. She hesitated, glancing back at Dailee. She didn’t have it in her to kill anyone, not even a kidnapper. It was evident to her that he was just a grief-stricken boy who didn’t think this through to its natural conclusion. He deserved punishment, but death wasn’t warranted.
“It means warm East wind,” Dailee smiled, but there was still a fair amount of fear in his eyes. “I am not going to let you get me. I didn’t get to be an old Water Wizard by standing too close to an angry Fire Dragon.”
Another much younger boy came running in. “Doctor, Doctor! Terrible news!” He paused and stared at her. “It’s true! The Lilac Princess has come to save us.”
Zhao folded his arms, glaring at the boy. “You have something to tell us?”
“It’s news from the palace at North Dragons Ridge. The Blood King has executed his daughters. There is no heir.”
Zhao pointed at Agne, “Except her.”
Dailee frowned at Zhao. “You have started a new war by taking her. Lenn, are you sure about this news? Is it verified?” He grabbed the boy by the shoulder and pointed at him, both of their eyes wide with fear.
The boy nodded. “The village chancellor is ordering all civilians and non-essential military personnel into hiding. He wants you to go with them. He says doctors are hard to come by and harder to replace. He wants you to take your two apprentices too, and keep them safe. The rest of the magical personnel will be staying to help defend the village.”
“I will also need to update him on this problem because at least one apprentice isn’t coming.” He pointed at Zhao, who frowned and folded his arms. Agne also noticed that Dailee’s finger was shaking.
“He is killing us all. Don’t you see?” Zhao said, sounding more defensive than persuasive as he pointed at the ground with one hand and toward North Dragons Ridge with the other.
“And! You are making it happen!” Dailee stepped toward Zhao, pointing his shaky finger in his face. “This is revenge. You are well aware there have been no major invasions since East Blue Plains – when she was old enough to begin using her magic on him.” He pointed at Agne. “It’s only been the Air Queen enforcing the borders; which is tolerable. I am sorry for your loss. We all lost people in the war, but your individual pursuit of revenge has put us all in peril. There is no telling what the princesses told the Blood King about your involvement. And please bear in mind they were his pups, we are just a neighboring village.”
Lenn interrupted, nodding. “Yes, the spy says they admitted selling her to Zhao, and that he brought her here to South Dragons Ridge. He is gathering forces and will attack this evening because the dragons can see in the dark, but we can’t. My mother says it will be a slaughter like nothing anyone has seen in history. I have to go grab some things, anything I can carry on my back and get out with my mother.” He ran out screaming “It’s true. It’s true. And I know the Blood King will bring the Air Queen with him. We will be destroyed, and she will wipe us from existence!”
“I have to find my parents,” Mingway said, also running out. “The Air Queen, gods! Zhao. I forgot, she is the daughter of the Air Queen, not one of the minor queens.”
“Stupid, stupid boy. Now the entire village will suffer the same fate as your family. Didn’t bargain on that, did you! You are willing to die for your revenge, but did you consider others may want to live.” Dailee flapped his arms out to the side in defeat. “Grief has poisoned your magic; it’s poisoned us all.”
“If we band…”
“Band humans together to cross the Dragons Ridge River? The one the King lets the man-eating Dragon Sharks live- free of tribute, that river – to attack the King? There is no way twenty magical humans can go up against them.” Dailee cut him off. “He just slaughtered his own pups, one of them the Crown Princess. He has an army of loyal dragons. They will burn through this village like it is made of paper! I have to see my children and grandchildren off, then report to the chancellor.” He walked over to Agne begging. “Go home. Perhaps if you are there, he will not kill us all. You know from talking to us that only a small few…criminals…were responsible. Please, our village knew nothing of this. Can you beg for your father’s mercy on our behalf? There are innocents here.” He held the stall door open. “I know you owe us nothing, but we, as a village, have done nothing to earn what your parents are about to rain down on us. As loyal citizens of Shestafa, please go in peace so that peace may come back to us.”
She nodded, acknowledging the Air temple blessing, and ran out, flying off into the late evening sky, the sun was just setting. She could here Zhao yelling after her. “Princess, please wait!”
She ignored him as she looked at the sunset, it didn’t hurt Fire Dragons to look at it because they had a second set of eyelids. She could see the sun’s corona burning around it. Its serene beauty was a stark contrast to the evening’s revelations. She hoped that what she just heard about her father wasn’t true, but a fear that it could be true was creeping into her mind. It would explain everything.
She wanted her life back the way it was before she met Zhao. He was right, she’d lived a very sheltered life, but she knew that other dragons did not live the way she did, and until today she had thought it was because she was a princess- wasn’t it? Or had she been a posh prisoner?
Three years ago, she had snuck a library book out not realizing it was the book about her grandfather’s rise to power, and the horrible things he did to take the throne. Had her wonderful, playful daddy learned things from his father? Was Zhao right, was she a pathetically naïve dragon? She didn’t want to believe those things, but couldn’t shake the idea that deep down she knew they were true.
“He puts me to bed at early evening. I am still treated like a little pup, with fairytales and tea parties.” She sighed, “Please don’t let those things be right about Father, please don’t let them be true. Because if they are, then Zhao is correct, the party is over in more ways than one. It’ll make my sisters’ betrayal seem trivial in comparison.”
She flapped her wings, turning on her Air Dragon speed. One thing kept ringing in her ears; the boy’s announcement that father had executed her sisters. It couldn’t be right, could it? Father dragons were protective of their pups, weren’t they? He would never kill his daughters; he loves all of them. She corrected herself. Yet another thing Zhao was right about.
The tall, jagged mountains and deep fjords zoomed by under her. She could see the campfires of a few small human villages. She wondered if dragons lived with them.
Why did father hate humans?
She frowned, and with a new determination decided it was time to stop being a little pup. She was thankful no one was around to see her cheeks turn a dark purple as shame and embarrassment filled her. The first thing she needed to do when she returned was to find out if what Zhao said was true. She needed firm proof, then she needed a plan to talk some sense into father – one that didn’t involve her own execution or staging a coup.
Loyal Generals
Chactau flew out in front of his dragons. He didn’t pay attention to the serene mountainous scenery around them. He was too focused on his orders; destroy South Dragons Ridge. Another thing that distracted him, the King ordered the Queen to stay behind and maintain order after the minor queens were told of their daughters’ execution. There had been wailing and crying that anyone would have understood, except the Royal Couple. They had seemed genuinely confused by the minor queens’ lament of the execution of their pups. The King even warned them they should be happy; they should be grateful they weren’t also implicated.
Chactau was apprehensive about his first mission with the King. He had heard rumors about the King being more ruthless than the Queen. He found the idea that anyone could be a more horrifyingly fierce fighter than her to be disturbing and
repulsive. He prayed he would be the same dragon he was right now when he woke up tomorrow morning. Things were way out of hand, but this wasn’t a bar fight that needed controlling. This was a kidnapped princess and seven executed young female dragons. It was a genuine threat to national security.
He was sure after further investigation he would be able to confirm it was a failed coup attempt by the Crown Princess. She must have realized the Queen would never allow her to have the crown. He wasn’t sure what the other princesses’ involvement was, but if he remembered their school days correctly, the princesses were a tight-knit group. What one knew, the others did too; it was a basic Earth magic saying to help remember how groups functioned in society; self-preservation and exclusion of non-members. The poor princesses chose the wrong side. They should have sided with Agne. Better to be the pampered sister of the future queen than dead; because he was sure the Queen would never have let any of them sit on the throne, and the King would have followed her lead on that point. It was the law: The Monarch could choose any of their pups if the first born was deemed unsuitable to rule.
He should have seen this coming. The queen controlled everything. The princesses had been forced into shared quarters, not because their mothers had lost too many political battles with Airyanna, but so they could be more easily spied upon. The queen wanted the other princesses in their so-called place; under the claws of her hind paw. Everything about palace-life pointed to this day. What confused him was that it was Princess Salma and not the Queen staging a coup.
As to the kidnapper: He had read about kidnappings in history but hadn’t heard of one in his lifetime. The Ice Queen Shestafa had been kidnapped when she was a small pup. The Bread Crumb Witch had cut one of her front paws off to make a wand for her magicless daughter. It’s said that dragons can provide magic to humans who don’t have it. He was sure one didn’t need to lop off a dragon’s body parts to get it, though.
Shestafa had moved glaciers over villages where she thought the witch was hiding, hence, her name the Ice Queen. It was another example of the citizens getting trapped in the middle of royal power struggles as villagers were crushed or flash frozen while Shestafa pursued justice.
He banked right, feeling the air currents change under his wings as he followed the King into the airspace of South Dragons Ridge.
“Fire and Air first,” The King said. “I want it burned to the ground in a hurricane of fire. Then the Water Dragons will cause a flash flood, followed by Earth burying the rubble. The troops can have any survivors to snack on if they like. No slaves, eat them or bury them.”
Chactau joined the roar acknowledging the order, and when the noise calmed down, he asked, “What about the Princess. Should we send one of the Air Dragons ahead and negotiate her release?”
“My daughter is a Fire/Air Dragon. Nothing we do will harm her. She’ll be able to fly free once their buildings are burned. They will pay for their part in this,” The King said not looking back at him. “I want them dead, and do not care what they have to say.”
“There is no valid explanation for this so we don’t care to hear lies.” Ja Hua said, scowling as she worked her fingernails into the king’s scales to lend her power.
“Yes, My King,” Chactau said. He thought a good explanation could be that the villagers didn’t know and weren’t a part of it. He would have said something, but he honestly wasn’t sure of what happened. He did think a better investigation was needed before the annihilation of an entire village was handed down as so-called justice. Maybe they knew, maybe they didn’t. Wouldn’t it be better to know? He glanced over at his majors, their fangs already dripping with saliva. They clearly supported the King.
The fall of south dragons ridge
The castle at North Dragons Ridge finally came into view. It was beautiful. The four tall watch towers stretched up into the violet and orange twilight. She had never seen it from this angle. There were large circular patrol stations every two hundred feet along the castle wall that surrounded the palace and its grounds. She also just now realized how many villagers had homes outside the walls. North Dragons Ridge wasn’t as small as she thought it was.
The walls facing the outside were a stark contrast to the inner walls. Inside, featured murals of little dragon pups playing with mommy and daddy dragons. Outside, were murals of her father burning villages, she could tell because of the blood red color of the dragon. A long, narrow tube of fire was burning through a village as he flew over it. Another one depicted him and Ja Hua using their Earth magic to cause a liquefaction earthquake to kill the livestock.
The survivors would be entirely dependent on the crown.
She did a double take as she saw a sky-blue dragon sinking a human Navy with her Air Dragon breath. The ships were engulfed by a rogue wave, and the sailors were treading in the water. They were being thrown about, helpless to save themselves. It had to be a painting of her mother. She shifted her thoughts, afraid to consider the implications of the murals painted on the walls.
Long ago, when the first humans and dragons united against the marauding gangs, both humans and dragons built the castle as a safe hold to protect their new nation. Human settlers had branched out to South Dragons Ridge, with four dragons, one of each power. They lived in peace for many decades. However, when her father came to power, the dragon descendants had joined her father. Now South Dragons Ridge was only protected by magical humans and a few Common Dragons – who would be no match for a full battalion of military-trained Elemental Dragons. If they even tried to fight. The boy, Lenn, was right, it would be a slaughter- or a feast depending on which set of dragons were sent in first.
She let her legs hang loose instead of tucking them against her body as defeat began to creep into her soul. There wouldn’t be anything she could do to stop her father. She was as helpless as the sailors in the mural featuring her mother’s rogue wave as she roared to push the water up over the edges of their boats.
She had been surprised by everyone’s reaction to her in South Dragons Ridge. They didn’t know she was real - they thought she was a myth. One thing was sure, what they believed about her abilities was, indeed, a myth. How had her father kept her a secret? There were so many dragons she had seen, surely someone would have known she was real. She wondered if any humans lived in North Dragons Ridge, and if they traveled back and forth between the villages. But as she scanned the ground, while staying low and out of sight, there was no evidence of humans in the village.
She wondered how Zhao had carried her that far? He would have needed a dragon to … She glanced at the murals of her parents being depicted as conquerors. She couldn’t deny or pray it away anymore. Her sisters sold her to be killed, and her parents were murdering tyrants. Zhao had been telling her the truth.
She noticed the tower guards were at their posts and flew in low over the pine trees to stay hidden in the twilight. Then she remembered; her father executed her sisters and she couldn’t be sure of what would happen to her.
She snuck in the back to see if she could get the guard to go find her mother. She needed help talking her father out of attacking South Dragons Ridge. They weren’t responsible for her kidnapping– she was. She was the one who snuck out of her room, and she needed to take responsibility for that, even if it meant she could never go to the library again. She couldn’t let innocent people die for her naiveté. Her world was already shattered, no sense in dragging others into it as it crumbled around her.
She banked her wings to fly around to the rear of the castle, now realizing how much she loved it. From here, the towers and central buildings looked safe and sound, with inviting lights burning in the windows.
She landed just outside the rear of the castle, which she was sure would be close to her room. She couldn’t wait to get back into her own little hot rock bed: If her father permitted her to return to it.
“Princess, you’re alive.” A Fire Dragon gate guard, without a rider, greeted her. Now that she thought of it, most of the c
astle guards didn’t have riders. Her father demanded one hundred percent loyalty. He considered the bond between a rider and dragon to be a division of loyalty to serve on the castle guard with a rider. The signs were all there, she had just been too blind to take them in.
She frowned and knitted her brow, staring at the hard-packed dirt floor as she came to accept that she was the one out of the loop and not Zhao. Her father killed Zhao’s family and his entire village. She wondered if it was his village depicted on the outer wall or some other village.
She looked the guard in the eyes. “I was taken, I escaped and came home. It wasn’t the fault of the people of South Dragons Ridge, it was just a grieving boy. You have to let everyone know. There is no need to attack South Dragons Ridge. They had no idea what my sisters were up to.”
“You don’t understand.” The guard pulled her into the gatehouse, closing the door with his tail. “He has gone mad. You were never meant to leave here. He so crazed at the idea of you being sullied by your sisters that he executed them himself. Their courtyard is an alarming, bloody mess. I beg you, princess, please do not go there. Your innocent eyes shouldn’t see that.”
She nodded staring at the guard before he broke eye contact and looked at the floor. Looking around the little guard hut, she figured these were also his quarters. His coal bed still had a faint glow from where he had slept there. “They’re dead,” her voice trailed off.
“You are the only one of his pups who can use both of your powers. That made you his favorite.” He nodded.
“Why?”
“The eldest said she was trying to prove that you were not worthy to take his crown. He took that to mean she was challenging his ability to make royal decisions in his own reign. She was executed, along with her betrothed. Your mother performed both executions with Generals Loutic and Chactau at her side. The king put down the others for being a part of tainting you with the outside world. You weren’t going to take his place, you were his little dolly to play with, and dress up. Princess, you never should have come back here.”
The Lilac Princess and the Blood King Page 4
