by Emily L K
“Please wake up,” she begged him, “I don’t know what to do and I need you.”
No response. She reached for his Hum. Still nothing.
SHE DIDN’T SLEEP AGAIN though she was desperately exhausted. The cold that came with the failing daylight bit through her clothes and made her shiver violently. Even her fever couldn‘t warm her this time. She pressed herself against Rowan, even sliding her hands under his shirt to rest against the skin of his abdomen, but he had no more body heat than she.
Their blankets were in the pack left by the stairs but even contemplating dragging herself all the way over there was torturous. She didn’t have the energy to get around to the front of the building again and she couldn’t leave Rowan, not even for a few minutes.
Her family was often on her mind. Her mother was dead, as Rowan soon would be, but Saasha was still out there somewhere. She hoped. She entertained the idea of leaving this wretched forest and finding her sister, of falling into her arms and having Saasha tell her gruffly that everything would be all right. It was a bittersweet comfort.
It was the longest night of her life. Panic would take her every time Rowan’s heartbeat failed or his breath faltered, then relief would flood her each time he didn’t die and finally she would sob when she remembered she couldn’t help him. If their situations had been reversed, she had no doubt he would have been able to save her.
Finally, the sky lightened to violet and then to pink. She considered going to get the pack now; she thought she’d be able to walk.
A roar tore through the quiet of the morning and a shadow passed overhead. Cori rolled back in time to see the red underbelly of another dragon. It swooped around over the trees of the forest, banking to the east so that the rising sun caught its translucent wings.
She sat up and followed its progress with her eyes until it alighted on the ground before them. The red dragon wasn’t as big as the green but it was still an impressive size. It had dainty horns upon its head and a few budding along its tail. It opened its maw in an exaggerated yawn, displaying rows of pointed white teeth. When it cocked its head to eye Cori curiously, she lowered her own to Rowan’s face. She hoped that when it ate them, it would be quick and painless. Still, she couldn’t help the tremble that shook her hands.
The dragon was coming towards them, each heavy footfall creating a vibration through the earth. Cori tightened her grip on Rowan’s shirt and when the dragon’s shadow fell over them she scrunched her eyes shut and bowed her head. The dragon’s breath on the back of her neck as it snuffed at her was hot and she let out a strangled sob.
Little One. Feminine, gentle. Cori thought her fragile mind might rip apart under the immenseness of the dragon’s. Why do you hug your dead?
He’s not dead, Cori replied, but she opened her eyes and pressed her palm to his chest just to be sure.
I cannot hear his song.
He isn’t dead. His heart still beats.
If his song has stopped, then his heart is not far behind.
An ache swelled in her chest. She kept her eyes down and her tears spilled off her cheeks to soak through his shirt. The dragon dropped her nose to snuff at Rowan then she sat back on her haunches and cocked her head at Cori expectantly.
What do you want? Cori asked, more snappish than she should be towards a dragon.
I came to help you.
What? Cori’s head jerked up in surprise. How?
I’ll take him north, to the other Gold Eyes. They will heal him.
Can’t you take him south?
No, it is dangerous in the south. I will only go north.
Cori‘s eyes returned desperately to Rowan. She had to go back to Tauta to know if her sister had survived, but Rowan needed a healer, he needed the Dijem and she didn’t know where any were in the south.
You won’t take him to Cadmus will you? Cori’s heart broke at the decision she was about to make. The dragon snorted distastefully.
Cadmus and his dragons are poison. They sing their mad songs, come, come. Come, come, and they lure their prey and their prey is their own kind and the Gold Eyes who have always been our friends.
Cori looked down at Rowan again. Her breathing quickened. There was no time to think. He needed help now.
How do I get him on your back?
In response, the dragon shifted to the side and lowered to the ground. It was still a long way up and Cori barely had the strength to stand.
“Please forgive me,” she whispered and raised her hands, palms out. She gave a little push and Rowan rolled away from her, his limbs flopping awkwardly. Painstakingly, and using only the Hiram magic, she pushed Rowan towards the dragon then forced him up the red beast’s side.
The Gold Eyes don’t like that magic, the dragon observed. Cori didn’t respond. She reached up the dragon’s side and straightened Rowan onto his stomach so that his arms hung either side of the dragon before her wing joints.
I can carry both of you, the dragon told her. Cori shook her head.
“I-I can’t,” she said. “I have to go home. I have to find my sister.” She realised belatedly that she’d spoken out loud. She didn’t know if the dragon could understand her human voice. She repeated it in her mind.
Very well. Farewell, Little One.
Wait!
Cori pulled herself onto the dragon‘s wing, ignoring the screaming of her wound and reached for Rowan with shaking hands. She brushed his hair from his face then pulled the sapphire ring from her finger. She lifted his hand and slid it onto his little finger. His eyelids flickered and beneath them she saw that his eyes were a dark amber instead of their usual gold.
“I’ll find you,” he whispered and his eye closed again. Cori couldn’t bear it. He didn’t ask her to go with him. He understood why she was leaving him and he was all right with that. With a sob she pressed her lips to his to stop him speaking again. She couldn’t imagine the effort it must have taken to rouse himself and he had little enough energy as it was. She stepped away from the dragon who spread her wings wide and, with a few beats, lifted off the ground. Cori watched them until they were nothing more than a speck against the sky.
When he wakes, tell him I love him. Tell him.
The dragon didn’t respond. They were probably too far away by now. Finally she inspected her blood-soaked shirt. She pressed a hand over her bleeding wound, bent down to pick up the sword where it had fallen from Rowan’s hand the day before, then turned and trudged back to the entrance of the library.
There was no sheath for the sword - it was probably still on Rowan’s belt - so she used one of the blankets to wrap the blade then she put it in the pack with the hilt and half the blade sticking out the top. She couldn’t bring herself to eat, though she hadn’t done so for days, but she had a long drink of water and, after a moment’s consideration, a nip of rum.
She gingerly peeled her shirt back off her hip to assess the damage. All three claw marks were open and bleeding profusely. She poured rum over them, biting her lip to keep from crying out. She let the shirt drop to cover them again, shouldered the pack, then approached the forest.
She didn’t have enough magic to raise her barriers, so she moved doggedly down the road, counting her steps and studiously ignoring the voices in her head. Tears fell unchecked down her cheeks, but her lips were pressed tightly over the sobs that threatened to escape.
Pretty human, lovely human. Come, come. Come, come.
Shut up, she told them, but they were insistent.
The dragon souls pulled at her, tearing at her mind and devouring the slivers. They sang haunting melodies to entice her off the path and with every resistance she put up they broke her a little more. She pressed a hand uselessly over her wound and moved forward. The footsteps she’d been counting became a shuffle.
Pretty human, tasty human. Come, come.
With each seductive whisper her resolve failed. Finally, unable to go on, she staggered to a stop and then to her knees. She relinquished herself to them and as t
hey tore through the last of her sanity, she closed her eyes and thought of home.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
He was gone.
The obliviousness of sleep was not in her favour; when she woke, she was instantly alert and keenly aware of the hole that his absence left. Without thinking, she tried to expand her Hum, reflexively seeking him.
It hurt, she had no energy to spare for such a search but it brought her attention to a different Hum nearby. No, three Hums. Each sounded similar to the others, a repetition of a few harmonious notes, with a slight nuance of individuality.
“Did you feel that? I think she’s waking up.” A woman’s voice, strong but pretty. She felt a press against her mind and shrank away.
“Give her some space, Melita.” Another woman with a mature, sharper voice that commanded obedience.
“Yeh, back off Melita.” A man’s voice this time. She heard a scuffle above her and opened her eyes.
Identical faces framed by shocking red hair peered down at her, their golden eyes wide with curiosity. The only difference between them was that the man’s hair had been cropped short while the woman’s fell unrestrained over her shoulders.
“Look how dark her eyes are,” the woman said. “Almost all brown.”
“But not fully,” the man observed. “I can see blue in them. She’s still human.”
“Melita, Myce, I said space.” The twins backed away, giving Cori an unobstructed view of the older woman standing a few feet away.
She had long grey hair with a ruddy tint that hinted at a youthful auburn colour. The lines on her face placed her in her sixties, but she stood straight and strong like a woman of thirty. She had tattoos on her bare arms, small ovals of black ink that started at her fingertips and rose like armour - or dragon scales - up to her elbows.
Though she spoke, her attention wasn’t on Cori, instead she poured over a book and Cori recognised it as the one Rowan often carried around with him that told some of the histories of the Dijem.
“Jarrah,” Cori said, her voice cracking with fatigue. The woman glanced up, her golden eyes sharp.
“It seems my reputation precedes me.” She returned to the book and seemed to finish reading a page. Cori noticed that she read close to the back which she knew was blank.
“You knew Rowan?” Jarrah asked suddenly.
“Yes,” The question set her immediately on edge and she wondered what was in the back of the book. Had Rowan written something?
“Where is he now?”
This time her throat worked. “Gone.”
This seemed to give Jarrah pause. Beside Cori, Melita made a strange noise. She tried to sit up. Her vision swam.
“Stay down,” Jarrah advised. “The healing process takes a lot of energy, of which you had barely enough.”
Cori lay back, but she kept her head lifted so she could pull back her blood caked shirt. Across her hip were three neat lines, healed to silvery white scars like the fang marks on her arm.
“I know a dragon’s mark when I see it. They don’t heal the same way normal wounds do and they always leave a scar.” Jarrah held up her own arm. On it, beneath the tattoo, Cori could see a patch of silvery scar tissue, messy in its distribution across the skin.
“Mine was a near miss with Daiyu. She almost took my whole arm. Yours, however, does not seem right. Even a hatchling dragon isn‘t that small.”
Cori said nothing. She wouldn’t tell Jarrah how she’d received them, though she knew how intimate the healing process could be; she was sure Jarrah knew more than she let on.
Jarrah pursed her lips and drummed her fingers on the book cover. She didn’t seem pleased by Cori’s disinclination to discuss her wounds. She changed the topic.
“It’s a shame about Rowan. He had a lot of potential for someone so young.” Cori fought to keep her face blank. He’d never told her his age, and she didn’t want to find out from this woman. Jarrah continued. “He was the one who taught you, yes? He had good intentions I’m sure, but I’m afraid he didn’t do a very good job. Your Hum is incredibly undisciplined, he should never have let you use the magic until you had mastered control over the mind. Regardless -“ and she sighed “- if we’re careful I should be able to teach you what you need to know and still get a few human years out of you yet.”
Still Cori didn’t speak. She had no intention of going anywhere with Jarrah but she wouldn’t say so yet.
“Rest,” Jarrah said finally, when she conceded that Cori wouldn’t take part in the conversation, “we’ll talk tomorrow.”
This time Cori nodded. She let her head drop back to the ground as Jarrah opened the book in her hand again, straight to the back. Cori desperately wanted to see it. She didn’t want Jarrah reading anything Rowan might have written. She averted her eyes. The red-headed man fell into her gaze. He smiled at her.
“What’s your name?”
“Cori.”
“My name is Myce,” he touched his hand to his chest unnecessarily, “and this is my sister Melita. We’re of the House of Sarkans.”
Cori blinked back tears. Did she still belong to the House of Auksas now that Rowan was gone?
“How did you find me?” She asked at length to change to subject.
Myce glanced up at his sister before replying. Jarrah continued her perusal of the book, seemingly oblivious to their conversation.
“A few weeks ago we thought we felt Daiyu, so we headed east to see if we could find out more. Yesterday the trail just... Stopped. We thought we’d make for the library and see if we couldn’t pick it up again and that’s when we found you.”
“You did well to make it so far, especially for a human,” Melita interjected softly.
Cori nodded but didn’t say anything. It had felt like she’d only taken a few steps into the forest before the dragons had brought her down. And the thought of Jarrah, a Dijem healer, being so close when she’d put Rowan on the back of the dragon and sent him north tore at her. If only she’d waited a few more hours, then he might be here beside her.
He also might have died in those few hours, another part of her mind reminded her quietly.
Melita and Myce exchanged a second glance. Myce said, “we’ll let you rest,” then they both stood and moved away to a pile of camping gear. Jarrah moved with them though she was still absorbed in the book. She’d flicked to the front now and was reading one of the stories she herself had authored. Cori closed her eyes and slept for a while. It was the only way to keep her desolation at bay.
The next time she woke it was dusk and the three Dijem were sitting around a fire. Melita offered her some bread which she accepted and ate half-heartedly. She didn’t join them at the fire, instead rolling to her side and closing her eyes. She listened to them talk, but they said little of consequence, mostly discussing their return to the west.
Cori instead recalled the fight with the dragon. The green had lured them north, pretending to be Daiyu by somehow masking its Hum. Rowan had said most dragon’s could no longer weave magic. Had Cadmus been the one to create the deception? It seemed like an immense amount of magic for one man to wield, and yet a thousand years ago he and Daiyu had taken on Tauta single handedly and almost won. Cori shifted, tucking her hands between her knees. She hadn’t appreciated the strength of their enemy until now. Why had Rowan been foolish enough to think he could take Cadmus on alone? Tears pricked her eyes and she let them fall silently down her cheeks.
Night fell and the other Dijem lay down by the fire to sleep. Cori waited until they were completely still then sat up.
She moved cautiously to collect her pack and the few belongings they’d pulled from it in their search for her identity. She paused over Jarrah, taking in the woman’s lined face and sharp features. Rowan had always spoken highly of Jarrah but she gave Cori an uneasy feeling. She leaned across the older Dijem and retrieved the book.
She stuffed it into her pack - she couldn’t read it now - and walked away from the camp. When the light of the fire had
died away behind her, she glanced at the sky to gain her bearings and turned to the south. The last thing she did was raise her barriers so they couldn’t follow her.
SOMEONE DID FOLLOW her though it wasn’t the Dijem who had found her in the forest.
By morning she’d found the road she and Rowan had travelled only a few days before. She was south of his farm and the forest was well out of sight - not that she ever wanted to see it again.
As she trudged down the road, energy waning, she occupied her mind by imagining what they would do if - when, she corrected herself sternly - Rowan returned. He’d said they could do anything she wanted. They’d stay near the ocean, she decided, though not in Lautan. Perhaps they could travel south through Shaw and to the kingdom of Dodici. It was hot down there, she’d heard, and if this trip had revealed only one thing to her, it was how much she hated the cold.
A snort from behind broke her from her reverie. She jumped and span, hands raised in defence. She jumped again when she realised how close the horse was. He extended his nose to her outstretched hands and lipped her fingers.
“Sunny!” She said in disbelief, flinging herself at him and wrapping her arms around his neck. He nuzzled at her hair affectionately. For a long time she stood, breathing in the strong scent of his hair that reminded her so much of Rowan. Tears splashed freely down her cheeks.
Sunny was the one to break the embrace with an impatient toss of his head. Cori let out a choked laugh and wiped the tears from her face before she took a firm hold of his mane and tried to mount him. It took three attempts in her weakened state but eventually she got up. He had no reins, but she squeezed his side and he headed in the right direction.
IT WAS ALMOST DUSK when the first sentry for Bandar Utara saw her. They shouted a warning at her from their outpost and she saw an arrow cocked in her direction. She lacked the energy to even raise a hand to halt them. Luckily for her, the second sentry to look over the wall recognised her and shoved his peer’s weapon away. Shouts relayed her arrival back to the great city so that by the time she reached the gate, an entire contingent was there to greet her.
