Aboard the Alby, Nat collapsed to her knees, shaking, and the smallmen howled in grief. “What happened? What happened?” Shakes yelled.
“She shot him—Nat shot him—” Brendon whispered.
“WHAT?” Shakes turned white. “WHAT DID SHE DO?”
Farouk stood next to him, stunned. “Wes is dead?” he whispered.
“ICEHOLE!” Avo said, kicking Wes’s body overboard. “WHAT ARE YOU MORONS WAITING FOR—GET THEM!” he yelled, and the slavers reloaded their guns and resumed firing on Alby.
“Help me,” Nat said. Wes’s body was floating facedown in the water by their ship, and she leaned over to reach for him. The smallmen lent a hand, holding on to her as she pulled him out of the water.
“Got him?” Shakes yelled.
“Yes,” Nat said, cradling Wes in her arms. He was already cold and stiff. “Let’s go, Shakes!”
The team ducked for cover, and it looked like the slavers would take their boat, but Shakes finally got the engine running and they sped away.
When Alby was out of range the slavers’ gunfire stopped, and the Van Gogh headed back toward its course to the Blue. On the deck, Nat cradled Wes’s body in her arms. “Wes, wake up, wake up,” she whispered. “Wake up, come on, wake up!”
“Wake up? You shot him in the heart! He’s dead!” Farouk exclaimed.
“No,” she said. “No,” she whispered when Wes did not stir. He was so very cold. “This wasn’t what was supposed to happen.”
Liannan knelt next to her and put a hand on her shoulder. “I think he’s gone,” she said quietly. “I’m so sorry.”
“NO!” Nat screamed. This was not the way it was supposed to end. No. Not like this. Not now. Not after everything they had done to survive. After everything they meant to each other.
“Let’s get out of here,” Liannan told Shakes. She looked sorrowfully at Nat. “It wasn’t meant to be.”
“What’s going on?” Shakes asked.
Liannan shook her head. “I’ll explain later.”
Nat held Wes in her arms and continued to sob. She’d believed she could save him. She had thought she could save them all. She hadn’t meant for this to happen . . . She hadn’t meant to kill him . . . She had thought . . . she had thought she was saving him . . . that she was saving them all . . .
They were right about me, then, she thought dully.
Subject has no heart.
That’s what they told her at MacArthur.
She was only a weapon, a vessel for fire and pain. She had no heart. There was a cold, dead space where it was supposed to be. She was not human. She was marked. She was a monster.
Subject is unable to love. Unable to feel. Subject is perfect for our needs.
She had believed they were wrong. She had believed her feelings for him were real, that what she felt for Wes was true . . .
She had believed she could save him as he had saved her. When he had kissed her before the traders came, when he had saved her from the white priests.
But she was wrong.
Subject unable to love. She did not love him and so she could not save him.
Brendon handed her his handkerchief, and Roark put a hand on her shoulder. Both of them were crying quietly.
Nat felt numb.
She thought she had been so clever. She had gambled and lost.
And now Wes was dead.
A few minutes later Shakes walked out of the bridge and knelt by his friend. “I kept telling him he’d get himself killed one day.”
“Shakes—”
He brushed off her hand, too upset to even speak. Don’t worry, I’ve never lost him yet, he had told Nat in the Trash Pile. Her fault . . . this was all her fault . . . she was such a fool to think . . . to think that she was different . . . and to hope that she could . . .
They brought Wes down to the captain’s quarters and laid him out on his bed. His face was gray and the bullet she had put in his chest left a neat, round hole.
Shakes staggered out of the room, as if he had no more strength even to walk. The smallmen followed after him.
Liannan entered.
“I killed him,” Nat whispered. “This is my fault.”
“Better that you had, or the slavers would have killed him and his death would have been worse than a thousand agonies. Plus, if it’s any consolation, you saved the rest of us. Can you do this?” she asked. “Get him ready for burial?”
Nat nodded and wiped her eyes. Together, the two of them wound his body in a sheet, wrapping him and blessing his forehead with oil. She put a hand on his cold cheek. He was so handsome and so brave.
“We will keep him here for a little while, let everyone have a chance to say good-bye, before we give him back to the ocean,” the sylph said.
Nat nodded. She walked back out to the bridge. There was no more sign of either the Titan or the Van Gogh.
The lifeboats were bobbing in the sea, on their way to the port at New Crete.
She found Farouk at the helm, looking lost and confused, his eyes red-rimmed from crying.
“Where’s Shakes?” she asked.
“Dunno,” the young soldier sniffed. “He looked like he wanted to murder somebody.”
From below, they could hear Shakes pummeling the walls of the cabin. Liannan joined them on the bridge. “I think we need to leave him alone for now. He doesn’t blame you, Nat, but he’s angry. He’s angry that he couldn’t save his friend.”
Brendon and Roark huddled with them as well. “None of us blame you; you did a brave thing,” Roark said.
Her heart was broken, but Nat held herself together and fought the tears back. Getting away was only one part of the plan.
“What do we do now?” Farouk asked.
“The same thing we did when we set out from New Vegas,” she told him. “We need to get to the Blue. The RSA is heading there. We need to stop them from entering the doorway. Liannan, you know the way?”
The sylph nodded. “Yes. Brendon, help me—we need to plot a course.”
47
IT WAS DARK WHEN NAT ENTERED THE crew cabin. Shakes was sitting on a hammock, bent over, his head in his hands, while Liannan rested her head on his shoulder, murmuring softly. The sylph looked up when Nat entered. “Nat is here,” she said softly.
“I can go,” Nat said.
“No, it’s all right, she can stay,” Shakes said, motioning for her to take a seat.
Nat could barely stand to meet his eye. “Shakes,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t apologize,” he said finally, looking up from his hands and attempting a smile. “Liannan told me what you hoped would happen. You did right. Besides, I hope I would have done the same.”
“I know,” Nat said. “You’re a good friend.”
“So are you.” He nodded.
They sat together in silence for a while, then Shakes told her about their time on the Van Gogh. They had been put in cages as well, but the Ear’s men hadn’t starved them, since they were going to be sold to the circus, which fetched a good price. Their cages were located down in the hold, so at least they had been warm.
On their second night aboard the Van Gogh, they saw Farouk. He wasn’t in a cage. The slavers could barely navigate or maintain their own ship. When they’d found out Farouk could do both, they pulled him from his cage and put him to work. When the rebellion started, it had been Farouk who let them out of their cages.
“Turned out the whole thing was Zedric’s idea. He’d escaped from the hold when Farouk caught him. He tried to persuade Zedric to stay, but Zedric refused. He forced Farouk to help him, since he didn’t know how to navigate. He was going to try and make it to the port at New Crete. But they got picked up by the slavers, and when Zedric resisted, they shot him on the spot.” Shakes raked his fingers through his hair. “I told Wes those Slaine boys were trouble, but he always did have a soft spot for Santonio survivors.”
“He told me what happened there,” Nat said.
“D
id he?” Shakes nodded. “Bet he didn’t tell you he tried to save them, did he—tried to get the Texans to sign the treaty, that’s why he got captured and tortured, but it was too late. They gave him a medal for the ‘victory,’ but he left the service anyway.”
Liannan returned and sat next to Shakes and put his hand in hers. “You should rest,” she said.
Nat left them alone and went to the captain’s quarters to check on Wes, covered in the shroud. Roark was sitting with him, keeping the body company. Tomorrow they would give Wes to the sea. She sat with them for a while, until Brendon urged her to lie down—he would sit with the body. She went back to the crew cabin and when she finally slept her dreams were full of fire.
* * *
The next morning, she woke to the smallmen talking excitedly. They were standing by her bunk.
“Get up!” Roark said happily.
“Come see!” Brendon said, tugging on her sleeve.
Nat followed them to Wes’s cabin, where Liannan and Shakes were hovering by the doorway. The two of them were smiling so intently, it was as if they were almost shining with happiness. Nat felt the first stirrings of hope in her heart.
“Go. He wants you,” Liannan said.
As in a dream, Nat walked into the room.
She found Wes sitting up in his bed. His face was no longer gray, but pink with life. His chest was bare, and the wound right over his heart was merely a scab.
“Hey, you.” He smiled, putting his shirt back on and buttoning it up. “I thought I was a goner when I saw you pull that trigger. I’m lucky you’ve got such terrible aim, huh?”
Nat fought a smile. She remembered that when she had raised her gun, she had hoped for this outcome, had wished for it with everything she had.
“Seriously though, I felt that bullet rip me apart. But I’m here.”
“You are,” she said with a laugh, feeling giddy with happiness. They were wrong about me, she thought. They told me I didn’t have a heart. They told me I would never love anyone . . . and look . . . look at him . . . look how beautiful he is . . . how alive . . .
“You knew this would happen?” Wes said. “But how?”
“It doesn’t matter how,” she said. “You’re here, and that’s all that matters.” A powerful protection spell. I must like him so very, very much, she thought.
“Nat,” he said, taking her hand in his. “I wanted to say something to you before . . . I don’t know if you want to hear it . . . and I don’t know what’s going to happen when we reach the Blue . . . but . . . maybe we can . . . after you find what you’re looking for . . . if everything’s okay . . . maybe we can . . .”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes.” Whatever happened, the answer was yes. Yes!
His eyes lit up with joy. “Yes?”
“Yes.” She leaned down, but he was the one who pulled her to his lap, his strong arms surrounding her, and then they were kissing, and kissing, and kissing, and his mouth was on hers, and they were together, where they belonged, and she buried herself deep into his arms, and he kissed her everywhere, her nose, her cheeks, her neck, her mark, and she was laughing with happiness.
“All right then,” Wes said, squeezing her tightly, his old grin returning, happy to be back on his ship with his crew. “What did I miss?”
Nat was about to reply when Roark burst into the room. “We’re here . . . at the doorway to Arem. But Donnie says we’ve come too late.”
Ahead of them, on the distant skyline, they saw the battleships approaching the small island.
48
THE NAVY FLEET HAD SURROUNDED A tiny green island, almost invisible as it was hidden so well by the gray frozen ones around it. It was in the middle of the archipelago, a small green gem.
“Supercarriers,” Wes said with a frown.
“Missile destroyers, frigates, missile cruisers. It’s a full drone army.” Shakes whistled, peering through the binoculars. “They’re serious about this.”
Liannan paled. “They must not be allowed to enter the doorway. My people cannot defend themselves against this firepower. If they are allowed to enter, it will mean death to Vallonis. If only we still had our drakonrydders . . .”
Nat was startled out of her paralysis. She had been overwhelmed by the size of the fleet, helpless against the magnificent array and might of the country’s massive military machine, commanded by soldiers somewhere in bunkers, hidden far away where they could not be stopped. She had done this. She had given away the stone, and now it was too late—there was nothing they could do now, nothing they could do to stop it—but something Liannan said struck a chord in her.
Drakonrydders.
“The drakon,” she whispered. “The monster in the sea. The wailer. You called it a protector of Vallonis.”
“Yes, but it is missing its rider and it is uncontrollable without one, a wild animal; otherwise it is our greatest defense.”
Nat felt as if she were waking up from a deep and dream-filled sleep, as the memories she had long suppressed returned to her all at once.
The voice she heard inside her . . . that had ceased to speak because it was speaking in other ways . . .
The song of the little white bird . . .
The creatures that came to feed them . . .
They all said the same thing . . .
You have returned to us.
Bless you . . . bless the drakon . . . bless its rider.
The voice had stopped speaking to her after the death of the white bird. The wailer had been grieving. The wailer was the drakon.
She was not alone. Never alone.
I have been searching for you, but now it is you who must come to me. Journey to the Blue. The Haven needs you.
It is time we are one.
Don’t resist your power. You have to accept who you are, Wes had told her.
She was part of the drakon. She was its familiar, its shadow. When the ice came, the universe was split in two, so that when the drakon was born sixteen years ago, it was split as well, its soul born on the other side of the doorway. The drakon had been looking for her ever since.
She had no heart.
Because she was the drakon’s heart, the drakon’s soul. She and the monster were one and the same. Torn from the other, lost, alone, and only complete, together.
She walked out to the deck, watched as the navy made its way toward the green island that held the doorway to the other world. This was why she had journeyed to the Blue, because the Blue needed her as much as she needed it.
“Nat—what are you doing?” Wes asked, running out to the deck where she stood by the railing, her arms outstretched. “You’re going to get killed!”
She stepped away from him, as she felt her power surge within her, wild and free, unchained; she let it wash over her, let it cover every part of her body and her soul, felt its fury and its delight at being unleashed. She did not cower from it, she did not hide from it, she let it run over her, take over her spirit, she accepted the force of its magnitude.
It scared and exhilarated her.
The awesome power within her, that had kept her alive, that kept her safe.
She was a drakonrydder. A protector of Vallonis. They had kept the land safe for centuries upon centuries. She was the catalyst for destruction. She had been preparing for this all of her life.
She knew now why she had given the stone to Avo, and in turn to his commanders.
She was drawing the RSA to the doorway, drawing its entire fleet there, its entire might to one location, so that she could destroy it. Her dreams had prepared her for exactly this moment. Everything in her life had led up to this, so that she could answer the call, could perform her duty when the time came.
Fire and pain.
Rage and ruin.
Wrath and revenge.
Valleys full of ash and cinder.
Destruction.
Death.
She had brought the war here, had brought the war to the edges of the earth, to rain vengeance on her
enemies, to protect her home. This was what she was made for, this was her purpose, her calling.
She turned to Wes and blinked back angry, happy tears. “I know what I have to do now. You were right, Wes, I can fix this thing.”
Then Nat raised her arms to the sky and called for her drakon.
49
DRAKON MAINAS, ANSWER MY CALL. HEED MY WORD.
ARISE FROM THE DEEP AND VANQUISH OUR ENEMIES!
Nat was the drakon, she was its heart and soul, she was its master and its rider.
The sea parted, and a blackened creature rose to the surface. Its skin was the dull color of coal, rippling and studded with spikes. Its eyes were the same shade of green and gold as Nat’s, the pale green of summer grass, the gold of a bright new morning, and it carried the mark of the flame on its breast, the same one that was on her skin. Its massive wings fluttered and folded, a curtain, an umbrella. It was huge, almost as large as a ship, a wonder to behold, terrifying and beautiful.
“DRAKON MAINAS!”
“ANASTASIA DEKESTHALIAS,” he rumbled.
Her real name. Her immortal name that had come to her in a dream. Natasha Kestal was Anastasia Dekesthalias. Resurrection of the Flame. Heart of Dread. Heart of the Drakon.
The creature fixed upon Nat and Nat felt something inside her transform, as if she were opening her eyes for the first time. The world around her grew brighter, and the smallest sound resonated in her ears. Even her mind seemed to expand. She stared into the creature’s eyes and in a flash, the two of them were linked.
Nat’s chest burned; she could hardly think as a new and intense pain washed over her body.
What was it?
Fire. She was breathing fire.
She was made of fire, of ashes and smoke and blood and crystal.
She was burning, burning.
Nat could see everything the drakon saw, felt everything it felt, sensed its anger and its rage.
The drakon rose into the air and the sky exploded with gunfire and missiles as the ships targeted this new enemy, but the drakon was faster and flew higher.
Destroy them! Vanquish our foes! Rain death upon our enemies!
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