Power of the Seers

by James David Victor

  Power of the Seers

  Dragon Oracle, Book 4

  James David Victor

  Fairfield Publishing

  Copyright © 2018 Fairfield Publishing

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Except for review quotes, this book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without the written consent of the author.

  This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  1. The Gray Dawn

  2. A Boy in a Dream

  3. Hair of the Dog

  4. Bon Voyage

  5. A Heck of an Upgrade

  6. Survivor’s Guilt

  7. It’s a Hard Knock Life

  8. The Persistent Specter

  9. An Unnatural Level of Persistence

  10. A Peek Behind the Curtain

  11. Joining the Party

  12. Davie’s Message

  13. Ghost of the Past, Ritual of the Present

  14. Not the Average Shopping List

  15. One Heck of a Long-Distance Call

  16. Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked

  17. The Throw Down, Down, Down

  18. A Very Happy New-Birthday

  19. Put Your Guard Up

  20. The Start of the Not-so-Great War

  Thank You

  Bonus Content: Story Preview

  1

  The Gray Dawn

  Bronn

  I kept my eyes closed, trying to cling to sleep and the dream that I was being pulled out of. But try as I might, I could feel my body waking up.

  “Davie…” I breathed to myself, my chest aching as I rose to consciousness and she drifted from my arms.

  My hand went to my lips, still tingling from where I had been kissing her. For a moment, it had been easy to forget that she was gone, and it was my own naiveté that had killed her.

  I let out a frustrated cry and threw my blankets off, rising to my feet, none-too-gracefully. I stalked to my bathroom and splashed cold water on my face. It didn’t make me feel better, though. Not that I deserved to feel better. I had somehow let a traitor into my inner sanctum, and the woman that I loved had been killed.

  That thought made anger rush through me again, and I knocked everything off the sink as I yelled. It all clattered to the floor, but I only felt more and more pathetic.

  Davie had been a better person than I could ever hope to be. She was smart and funny and brave, and somehow was willing to help the very people who had turned her entire world upside-down.

  And of course, beautiful.

  I remembered the first moment I saw her, tall and stately, with eyes that sparkled like the night sky. Her figure was like an hourglass, but with a feminine sort of softness around the middle. The kind that I could just imagine my hands sinking against as I held her, if that kind of thought wasn’t completely inappropriate.

  But now there would be no more holding, no more looking at her full lips as she mulled something over. No watching that cute, pink little tongue that she would stick out whenever she was being her snarky self. No more of her sarcastic quips.

  No more Davie.

  I heard a knock at the door and one of my butlers ask if I needed assistance. I managed to gather myself enough to answer. I had too much to do to be moping, and I wasn’t going to let Davie’s sacrifice be in vain.

  No, I was going to be the best prince I could be, and goodness knows my people needed it.

  I headed back into my room, picking out something simple but official for the day. I had far too much to do to spend an hour or so getting prepared with my full royal regalia.

  Ever since I had returned, it had been a nonstop struggle with the anti-humanist dragons that had broken through our shielding. My family had just barely been able to beat them back, and I had personally helped drive the last of them from our halls.

  I wasn’t quite sure how that worked, considering we had been gone for what felt like months, but apparently, time was not congruent along all the dimensions, because we had been only been gone a few days.

  As soon as we drove the last of the dragons out, all our energy went into strengthening our defenses. We didn’t have the magic to resurrect our shielding, making several of the court question how I had somehow traded our seer—who could generate shields—for another seer who so far just seemed to have a knack for projecting herself into other’s minds. I often had a difficult time responding diplomatically to those queries, and Mallory had issued several combinations of curse words that I had never heard before.

  I tried my best, working to build walls and summon allies from our far-flung countries, but we were suddenly facing the challenge of appearing on the edge of a human city that we had previously been invisible to. I had my human relation dragons working on a cover story that it was a movie set, but keeping the citizens at bay required an entire security team and that was a drain on our resources.

  “Your Majesty,” my butler said, nodding to me.

  “Vennihar,” I answered. I noticed the expression on his face and withheld a sigh. “Did you need something?”

  “Yes. Your guests are requesting that all of the excess clothing we provided for the previous seer be removed from the room and we return anything we had taken from her before. They say it is…painful.”

  Of course it was. All of those fine clothes were things that Baelfyre had provided, little promises of a future she would never have.

  Anger and pain rose within me, and all of it at myself. How could I have just let her sacrifice herself for me? Since when had I become so selfish? Sure, it was the easy answer. By Davie sacrificing herself, my people still got to keep a seer and their prince. It made the most sense, especially for my people.

  But to hell with sense and what was best for my people!

  We were bloody dragons, imbued with the power of the ages. How could we justify having our existence rely on a lone girl who just wanted to live peacefully?

  I could feel myself slipping into one of my moods, but I didn’t have time for it. I had made my selfish, heartless decision. I needed to live with it.

  “Do whatever they ask,” I said simply.

  “Of course, sir.”

  He nodded and quickly walked away, leaving me to stand in my doorway, thinking about the woman I had failed.

  I could still see her heart-shaped face, cheeks rounding in one of those sly smiles she wore when she was teasing me. The way her many-times dyed hair fell about her head in a frizzy cloud whenever she just woke up. Her long lashes, framing those eyes that could look right through me.

  I shook my head and pushed myself to keep walking. I was bordering on being late to the defense summit we were trying to create, and that certainly wouldn’t do.

  I made it down to the lower floor, steeling myself bit by bit. I couldn’t afford to show weakness to the people who were depending on me. I needed to deal with these dragons and then prepare for any other enemies that might try to take advantage of our after-war weakness.

  I reached the room to find that everyone had pretty much already gathered, and I was announced. Everyone stood, bowing, and I couldn’t help but find the whole spectacle ridiculous.

  What made me worthy of any of their esteem? Just because I happened to be the grandson of the king? Ridiculous. I hadn’t done anything but get an innocent person killed. What use was a dragon who couldn’t protect his charges?

  But I kept those bitter thoughts to myself and bowed in response.

  “Gentleman,” I said, taking my place at the head of the table with my grandfather. “Any updates on the situation?”

  “We are handling the media and human incursions, but the wall isn’t going to really do much of anything. It will buy us
minutes, maybe hours. We need to repair the old shielding!”

  “How?!” another argued. “The ways of old magic are lost. The only hope we had was the seer girl and now she’s gone.”

  “Any developments on her elder sister? Perhaps she can tap into—”

  Suddenly the doors slammed open and Mickey was standing there, breathing hard. The eldest of the sisters was quite different from Davie, half of her angular face scarred and her limbs much frailer.

  Several men jumped to their feet and our guards drew their weapons, but I held up a hand. I may not have known Mickey well, but I could recognize the determined expression on her face.

  “I’ve seen something,” she gasped, panting as if she had run down the stairs. Which, knowing her, she probably had. “Something that could save us all.”

  2

  A Boy in a Dream

  Bronn

  “Are you sure this is what you saw?” I asked for probably the third time.

  Mickey looked at me with wide eyes. Her rapid breath and heaving chest hadn’t stopped since she burst through the doors, even though I had dismissed the court after her first explanation and called all of the rest of our less-than-merry band to the room.

  “I am telling you, it was clear as day.” She winced a little. “Okay, well, as clear as my visions can be. But I saw it. There’s a boy someplace warm, and he’s got the old magic inside of him. I saw shield walls coming out from him as far as the eye could see in either direction and…”

  “And what?” I pressed. The two other times she had iterated this story to us, there was no ‘and.’

  “…and his shadow was…weird.”

  “Really?” Mallory asked, crossing her arms. Her face was pale, with deep, purple circles under her eyes. I didn’t think that she had gone outside since we had come back. In fact, I didn’t even think she left the room she shared with her parents unless it was to visit Mickey. We certainly hadn’t exchanged many words. Did she blame me?

  I certainly did.

  “A weird shadow? You wanna elaborate on that?”

  “No, not really.”

  Mal cleared her throat and cracked all of her knuckles, which succeeded in gaining our attention. “It was your sister, wasn’t it? You saw her shadow over his, right?”

  Mickey shrugged uncomfortably. “Maybe. Or maybe it was just what I wanted to see.”

  “I doubt it,” Mal said, standing. “If this kid is what you say he is, then he’s one of you mythical people, so he’s connected to your sister. It makes sense that your mind would project a sort of familiarity to him. Especially since you’re seeking him to build the shields and, from what I understand, shields were kinda Davie’s thing.”

  Huh. Since when did Mal get so insightful and talkative? While she didn’t seem to be in mourning as the others were, she did spend a good amount of time learning everything she could about our drastically different timeline and eating as much food as physically possible.

  “Fair enough.”

  “So, what do we do?” Mallory asked. “You said this boy was someplace warm. Did that come with any GPS coordinates? Because I can think of a lot of places that fit that criteria right now.”

  “I…I don’t know.”

  “Great,” Mallory continued, crossing her arms. “Let’s get started now, and maybe in five years, we’ll actually find this kid with your sister’s shadow. Just a few thousand locations to check, right?”

  “Wow, tone down the sarcasm there, short stack. Since when did you become the dubious one?”

  “Since I jumped out of one world with a living best friend and landed in another world with a dead best friend.”

  “You know, she was my sister!” Mickey snapped.

  “This isn’t productive.” Mal said matter-of-factly. “Like it or not, Davie is dead, and she died to give all of us a better chance at this whole living thing. So either you all can waste it squabbling and feeling bad, or you can enjoy the gift she gave you.”

  She had a point, and I sensed that it was a good time to step in.

  “Mickey, do you think that perhaps you could divine where this location is? Anything we can do to help?”

  Her brow furrowed, and she chewed at her lip. Her feet, much smaller than Davie’s, paced across the room.

  She really was different from her younger sister, and those differences just emphasized the gaping hole the younger seer had left within all of us. She was all fine lines, gentle steps, and sweet expressions. Even when she was angry, there was an air of benevolence to her.

  I missed Davie’s rasp, and the way she made the world move around her rather than conforming to it. I missed the space she took up, and the sure gait of her steps. I missed her.

  “Get me a map. Oh, and a pen!”

  I quickly strode to the door, ducking my head out to commission one of our staff to bring us what Mickey had demanded. They must have sensed the urgency of the moment, because they hurried off and returned in less than a handful of minutes.

  Once the supplies were in my grasp, I closed the door again and handed them to Mickey. She spread the map out at the table before pulling up a chair and uncapping the pen.

  “What are you planning on doing?” Mallory asked between sighs. I didn’t get the feeling that the dwarven girl was bored, but rather that she just wasn’t getting enough oxygen. I reminded myself to get her to our doctor in the next few days.

  “Something I read in a book once.”

  “Uh-huh, and what kind of book?” Mallory questioned.

  “…it was young adult fantasy.”

  “Of course it was.”

  “What?” Mickey snapped. “It was Davie’s favorite genre and we liked to read together.”

  “…oh.”

  There was an awkward moment as Mallory sheepishly turned red, but Mickey busied herself with holding the pen over the map and closing her eyes. After a beat, she started to hum gently. It was an unfamiliar melody, low and with a gentle rhythm.

  Strange… The more her humming went on, the more a strange tingle began to work its way up my spine, building in my head until my thoughts were a sort of pleasant buzz. Mickey swayed back and forth, and I found my breathing syncing up with her movements until it was difficult to remember what exactly was going on and why we were here at all.

  My body stopped being a finite, contained thing, and I felt like everything that was me spread out, intertwining with an energy I hadn’t noticed before. Suddenly, I was rushing away on the gentle breeze circulating throughout the room, seeping into the earth beneath the foundations of the house, sweeping through the city and feeling its heartbeat.

  And then, faster than a blink of my eye, I saw her.

  Abruptly, I was no longer some ephemeral mass whisking through the universe. I was just Bronn, the useless prince, staring up at the woman who should still be alive.

  My breathing stopped as I took the sight in. Her form towered over me, still and lifeless. The same jagged, blue crystal that had enveloped her sister now incased most of her, but the most horrific was the sharp outcropping jutting from her chest.

  My chest heaved but oxygen refused to come to it. Was this how she had died? Somehow, I had hoped that it wouldn’t be like this, that her energy would be scattered to the dimensions, or that she would ascend to a higher plane for her selfless sacrifice.

  But no, she was stranded in some other universe, impaled and strung up like some sort of war conquest.

  It was disrespectful! After everything that she had done, she deserved so much more! Anger welling up in me, I reached out for her. If I could not save her, the least I could do was give her the proper burial rights of a hero!

  “I did it!”

  I was yanked right back into my body and the palace. I lurched forward, gasping, and it took several seconds for my head to clear.

  “Whoa, are you guys okay?”

  I blearily looked up to see that Mickey was giving us all a curious look, while Mal was paper-white and Mallory was stumblin
g to a wastebasket to lose her lunch.

  “Did…did you mean to do that?” Mal asked between ragged breaths, echoing my own thoughts.

  “Do what?”

  I composed myself and stood as straight as I could. “It felt like I was taken out of my body and dragged through the city.”

  “I saw my home again,” Mal murmured.

  Mallory groaned as she stood up. “I saw—” She never made it through her sentence and had to lean over the wastebasket again to retch.

  “Huh, well, isn’t that an interesting side effect.”

  “Yeah, that’s one way to look at it.”

  “Not to minimize the fact that you guys went through some sort of seer’s version of an acid trip, but look! I found the place!”

  We all gathered around the table to see she had indeed made a circle on the map. I raised an eyebrow, but it was Mal who said exactly what I was thinking.

  “Uh-huh, and how do we know this means anything at all and isn’t just a random circle on the map?”

  “Trust me,” Mickey said with determination. “I can feel it.”

  “Uh-huh…” While I wasn’t close with Mal, I appreciated how practical she was. I had thought that Davie’s befriending of her was a mistake back when we were in her dimension, but I was very much wrong. “Do you have anything more definitive than that?”

  “Nope!” Mickey answered brightly. “I guess you’ll just have to trust me.”

  “No offense, but I know even less about you than I do about everyone else. You were just a rock for almost the entire time we were captive.”