Book of One 04: A Child of Fire

by Baker, Jordan

  *****

  "I wish you would stay," Carly told Zachary as she rolled across the thick blankets and rested her head on his thigh. "You could captain one of the ships and help me whip these laggard pirates into proper shape."

  "I've responsibilities of my own, Carly," he said. "I know Ehlena and Stavros want to handle Aaron with kid gloves, but I worry about the lad. Not that he needs whipping into shape, but I would like to help him with his power. It is the least I can do for the son I did not have the chance to raise."

  "I understand," Carly said, sliding her hand up the inside of his leg. "I am merely being selfish. Truth be told, I'd keep you here, locked in my cabin if I could."

  "Oh? Do you fear I might run off with some other woman if you let me out of your sight?"

  "No, Zachary," she said, crawling her fingers up further and enjoying how his body responded to her gentle teasing. "I know better than to try to keep you, and Aaron needs you. When I touched him, I could tell how hurt and confused he is, but I sensed that he is stronger than he seems."

  "He is immensely powerful," Zachary said, and the fact that Aaron's powers exceeded even his own also made him very dangerous.

  "That is not what I meant. Aaron is his own man, just as you are. If you are to help him, then you will remember that."

  Zachary sighed.

  "You are far wiser than you let on," he said.

  "I have seen much of the world, and lived many lives. I am not so wise as you might think, but I have discovered many truths, the clearest of them all being that people cannot be true to themselves if they remain bound by others. Thus, I will release you from your captivity, on one condition."

  "Always a catch with the pirate queen," Zachary said as she slid her body under the thick feather filled blanket and crawled atop him. "And what condition must I satisfy that I might win my freedom?"

  "Need I say it?" Carly leaned in and kissed him lightly on the mouth, her tongue teasing his lips as she felt his powerful fire begin to warm her watery depths once again.

  "Please do. I very much enjoy the sounds you make," he said with a grin as he grasped her hair in his strong hands and pulled her into a hard kiss.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The air was thin and cold atop the snowcapped northern mountains and Borrican labored through the gusts of wind that sheared from many directions, pushing himself through the craggy peaks and sheer cliffs that descended to the rough trail below. He wondered why anyone would have created a path through such a forbidding place and was curious to know what might lie on the other side of the range. His question was answered when the mountains fell away, revealing a frozen land covered in ice and swirling with snow that fell from cloud covered grey skies. It appeared that the stories of the northern wastes were true, that it was a barren land, with little life and Borrican thought it was the perfect place for him to be to be while he struggled with his dragon form.

  As he flew down from the mountains, he noticed several valleys, sheltered from the open lands ahead, and he saw some rough growth on the ground and patches of evergreen trees. He noticed some movement and saw the heat of small animals that lived in the sanctuary and his stomach growled with hunger. Borrican raised one of his wingtips and circled around high above and saw several flocks of wooly sheep roaming the short grasses at the bottom of the valley but he saw what looked like larger goats picking their way along the rocky slopes and thought they looked much more satisfying. After a quick meal, he worked his way up out of the valley and continued on toward the frozen lands beyond.

  Borrican was surprised to see another range of mountains rising up on the horizon, with dark skies hanging overtop. At first he thought it might be signs of a storm and considered turning back to the valley, but then he scented smoke, and not the soot smell of a fire, but something sharper, acrid and sulfurous. No longer tired from hunger, Borrican pushed himself higher to get a better view and looked past the flat expanse of snow and ice, which he now realized was a very large frozen lake. He peered through the swirling snow and clouds of smoke and, before him he saw a land of molten fire.

  As he neared the edge of the frozen lake, Borrican noticed what looked like a habitation of some kind, though it was nothing like any he had ever seen before. Sprawling at the edge of the frozen land, just before the fires and the smoke began was a kind of large village that looked to be made of a combination of ice and stone. He focused his dragon sight and saw people among the dwellings and wondered who they might be and why they would live in such a barren place. Most of them were dressed in white furs and leathers, which allowed them to blend in with the snow and ice, and when he looked more closely he saw that there were many more of them he had not noticed at first glance. Borican realized that they had seen him as well, as several of them pointed up at the sky in his direction. With his dark, black scales against the white sky he would surely stand out.

  Since he had hoped to find a place to be alone, away from people of any sort, where he could do no harm, Borrican decided to continue on and within a few moments he passed out of the blinding snow of the frozen land to the black smoke and fire beyond. As he drew closer, he saw that the mountains that lay before him were hollow and filled with hot, molten lava that dripped out of them in slow moving rivers. On their far side, the terrain dropped into a landscape of craggy rock surrounded by rivers of fire that flowed in all directions and Borrican flew through the clouds of smoke and ash, wondering how far the flows of lava extended and what might lay beyond.

  It was like a twitch of instinct, the feeling that he was being watched, then from the side something appeared through from the smoke, streaking toward him. Borrican felt the air rush out of him as he was thrown sideways, his wings folding over as he spun and fell from the sky. Rushing fast toward the lava, he managed to spin and catch the air on his wings and he swooped low over the molten rock. The drafts of heated air rising from the lava pushed him upward and he beat his wings hard, climbing quickly. He felt it again and Borrican ducked low, tucking his wings in tight and dropping as a dark shape flew over him and sharp claws raked across his armored back. He turned his head before it disappeared and, through the ash and smoke, he glimpsed his attacker, though the dragon within him already knew what it was. Just ahead of him, he caught sight of a shimmer of green and the gleam of metal in the dim, smoke filled air and he flapped his wings, trying to catch up to it, but a moment later, a large, green dragon appeared from the smoke right in front of him, rushing straight for him, its jaws wide open.

  Borrican stretched out his wings, trying to stop, to avoid colliding with it, but the creature flew straight toward him, its arms outstretched and, with a great roarr, the dragon hit him hard, knocking him backward. Its claws gripped his shoulders hard, sinking into his flesh and Borrican's wings folded around his attacker as he plummeted toward the ground. He tried to pry himself free, but it was no use, for the dragon was larger than he was, and more powerful. A moment later, Borrican hit the ground hard, his armored back sliding rough along the rock and stopping only a short distance away from a moving flow of hot lava.

  "What is your name?" the dragon growled from between its teeth. "Who are you?"

  "Who are you?" Borrican asked, and he realized that he could hear the dragon's words ringing both in the air and in his mind as well. "Why have you attacked me?"

  "The defeated do not ask questions," the dragon said. "Now answer me, who are you?"

  Borrican could sense other thoughts behind the dragon's words, but he could not make them out. It was strange to hear things twice, with echoes in his mind mixed with the sound of the dragon's voice and there was something about the two sounds that did not quite match, at least not what he expected. The voice he heard in his head was softer than the dragon's growl, lighter in a way, but no less threatening, and even though the dragon had him pinned hard against the ground, Borrican was somewhat relieved to have discovered another of his kind. Since he could not move, and he was curious to know more about the creature, he
decided that he might as well answer the its questions.

  "I am Borrican Akandar, of House Akandra, Prince of Kandara," he said. "Who are you?"

  The dragon stared at him hard with its reptilian glare, its nose nearly touching his own.

  "Akandra," the dragon growled, and again Borrican thought the voice in his head was intriguingly incongruous, almost musical in a sense. "I know this name. By rights of battle, I claim you as my vassal. You will do as I say or I will have your head."

  "That sounds lovely," Borrican replied. "If it is a choice between getting ordered around or losing my head, I suppose I will take orders for now. Are you going to tell me your name?"

  The dragon stepped back and released his shoulders from its powerful claws and Borrican saw that while the creature was surely a dragon like his own current form, it was very different and he noticed that its body was distinctively female. Unlike his own, jet black coloring, the dragon's skin was a dark green with a metallic sheen that reminded him of gold and silver and the heavily armored scales that ran along its back, tail and limbs glimmered with the hues of amber and brown with an almost iridescent sheen running through them. The dragon also had long, sharp horns that looked as though they were encrusted with enough jewels to fill a king's treasure house. The gems were a variety of colors but most of them various hues of green and blue, which also encrusted the creature's sharp talons and even sharper claws. Borrican used his wings to push himself up from his back and onto his feet.

  "I am called Vale and I am of the Aledra," the dragon said, with voice that was now less of a growl and a hint of something feminine to it. "You are now my vassal and you will do my bidding."

  "Wonderful," Borrican said. "Are you the only dragon who lives here or are there others?"

  The dragon called Vale shifted on her feet and tilted her head to the side.

  "You speak strangely, Akandar, but you should not speak at all unless I command it."

  "That's not going to be very helpful to me," Borrican said. "As for speaking, I was hoping to figure out how to do that properly. It seems you can understand me though."

  "I hear your thoughts, but your voice is that of a wildling. Are you a wildling?"

  "I don't know what a wildling is," Borrican told her.

  "It appears that you know nothing," Vale snorted derisively. "Perhaps you will not make a good vassal. Come, vassal, I must bring you to the circle of elders."

  "Elders?" At least that seemed to answer his question. "You must mean other dragons, older than you."

  "I am old enough," Vale said, her tone showing her irritation. "The elders are very old and very wise."

  "I will be pleased to meet them," Borrican said. "I will follow you."

  "No," she said. "You will fly ahead of me, where I can see you. I may have claimed you as my vassal, but you have not yet been bonded."

  "Whatever you say," Borrican replied with a shrug, wondering what she meant, but he supposed he could ask the elders. "Which way is it?"

  "You know nothing at all," she said with a sigh and Borrican caught an echo of what he thought was either disgust or disappointment, or perhaps both.

  "I know a lot more than nothing, but I must admit there are probably a lot of things I don't know," he said. "Which way to the elders?"

  "Fly beside me," she said and leapt into the air.

  He followed her and together they flew through the clouds of smoke over the seemingly endless flows of lava. Wary of another dragon attacking him from the clouds of smoke, Borrican kept a watchful eye.

  "Must you make so much noise?" Vale said, glancing over at him with what he thought looked like more of a glare.

  "Am I flying too loudly?"

  "No, you are thinking too loudly," she told him. "All of dragonkind can hear you. It is as though you want them to attack us."

  "That is the last thing I want," Borrican said.

  "Then quiet your thoughts."

  "I don't know what you mean," he said. "Do you want me to stop thinking?"

  Vale looked over at him again, seemingly confounded.

  "Yes," she said after a moment. "It would be best if you did not think."

  "Don't think," Borrican said. "I will do my best not to think."

  "You are thinking about not thinking," Vale growled. "You know less than nothing. You are very stupid, Akandar."

  "I am not stupid," Borrican growled, his irritation turning quickly to anger, and he felt the urge to attack her.

  "If you wish to live beyond this day, you will not think about attacking me," Vale said.

  "I was not going to attack you," Borrican insisted. "Can you hear my every thought?"

  "Yes," she said. "You speak like a full blood, but you have the knowledge of a hatchling."

  "A hatchling?"

  "Yes, you are like a hatchling, a youngling at best. Now be quiet."

  Borrican somehow felt like he had just been spoken to like a hatchling, the way a mother might scold a disobedient child. He grumbled to himself then he realized that Vale could probably hear every thought. Borrican wondered how he could think of nothing, since the idea of not thinking did not make any sense. Vale looked over at him and growled, so he tried to focus on things he saw, the lava, the rocks, the patches of grey sky breaking through the black clouds of smoke.

  "Now you are describing where we are," Vale told him. "That is very unwise."

  "Why?"

  "We are at the flows," she said, which Borrican took to mean the rivers of lava below them. "At the flows, there are many contests, many battles."

  "Between dragons?"

  Vale glanced at him again and Borrican did not need to hear the echoes of her voice to know what she was thinking. He cleared his mind and thought about as little as possible, focusing on the feeling of the wind on his wings as he flew across the sky. They emerged from the clouds of smoke to a land of mist and steam that rose up from hot pools of water that flowed into streams that ran across the rocky terrain. Patches of green moss and short grass that grew longer and streams flowed together and became a river that meandered its way through the low, rolling hills toward a lake at center of a large valley that was surrounded by craggy peaks. It reminded Borrican of Kandara, though the land below was empty and there was neither a city nor people, but he saw that there were many dragons instead.

  Many of them appeared to be resting, while others were gathered in groups, likely talking about whatever dragons might talk about. A number of the creatures turned their heads skyward and stared as Borrican flew past and he did his best not to think of anything, as Vale had told him. The last thing he wanted to do would be to offend or anger the dragons, especially since many of them looked to be much larger and more powerful than he was. Several of them leapt into the air and began following them as Vale flew toward the largest peak. Borrican saw a large opening, a kind of cave, on the side of the mountain, with a flat plateau of rock jutting out from its base and he followed the dragon, matching her flight as she swooped down then spread her wings and slowed her descent to land just outside the entrance.

  Borrican followed her through the large entrance and into a very large cavern. After a moment, his eyes adjusted to the darkness and Borrican saw that the inside of the mountain was a large, round, flat surface and, above it, were numerous rock ledges with dark caverns behind them. Vale made her way toward the center of the circle and glanced back at Borrican with a look that said he should follow. She stopped in the center and thrust out her wing in front of Borrican, which he took to mean that he should stand a few steps behind her. Vale glanced back at him to make sure he had settled in place then she turned again and looked up to the many ledges in the cavern and let out a thunderous roar. The intense challenge in her dragon voice startled Borrican and the dragon part of him felt the threat in her call, which he found to be a strange way to announce oneself.

  From the darkness behind the ledges on the inside of the hollow mountain, dragon shapes appeared and Borrican had to strain to see the cr
eatures as they emerged from their individual caves. He half expected to hear them return Vale's greeting, but there was only silence in the cavern, broken only by the sound of slow, deep breaths, and Borrican realized that the dragons were communicating with their thoughts and he was not included in the discussion. He resigned himself to wait silently and did his best to think as little as possible.

  "Vale," said one of the dragons, who was perched on one of the lower ledges. "Who is this creature you have brought here?"

  "He is Akandar and calls himself Borrican, from the land of Kandara," she said, sending her thoughts to the assembled elders. "He is a strange dragon."

  "Akandar?" roared another dragon, from another ledge, higher up. "Why has the son of Akandar left his lands?" The dragon shuffled forward to the edge and looked down at the two dragons standing in the center of the circle below.

  "I have heard of the Akandar," Vale said. "I do not know the story of this house."

  "Youngling," said the first dragon, and Borrican glanced over at Vale in curious amusement as the dragond continued. "The Akandra are an old house among our kind. They remained in the mountain lands to the south to honor an oath made by the great Talon Akandar, an oath made to the younger creatures, the humans who now call themselves Kandarans."

  "An oath to the humans?" Vale was surprised to hear of such a thing. "Why would a dragon commit to those creatures?"

  The first dragon on the lower ledge glanced up at the others then back at Vale and Borrican.

  "It was an agreement between Talon and a dragonfriend, an oath of honor between kindred spirits. It is an old story, one you will learn when you receive the wisdom of your line. It is enough to say that the dragons of the Akandra line have honorably protected the people of the mountains for many generations."

  "And why would a son of Akandar appear in the flows?" Vale asked. "I thought to take him as a vassal, though when we fought, he offered little challenge. These Akandra must be a weak house."