The Dragon of Cecil Court

by Genevieve Jack

  There was a long pause. “I heard a commotion at the other end of the dungeon, but the sound was muffled. I couldn’t make out words.”

  “That was us.”

  “You and Gabriel? I thought I heard a third.”

  “Tobias is with him.”

  The stranger shifted, bringing his mouth closer to the grate. “Are they here, in another part of the dungeon?”

  She blew out an exhausted breath. “No. They’re upstairs at some sort of banquet.”

  The stranger scoffed incredulously. “If you truly are mate to the heir, why are you in the dungeon if he’s being welcomed back like the prince he is?”

  Feeling exhausted, Raven wiped the sweat from her forehead. She was so hot she could hardly think. It felt like her brain was boiling.

  “Eleanor knows if she keeps me here, Gabriel will do anything she asks. He would never cooperate with her otherwise.”

  “I see. So you’re a dead woman walking.”

  Raven shook her head. “No. Gabriel will come for me. He’ll make sure she treats me well or he won’t do what she wants.”

  He gave her a pitying laugh. “Maybe, at first. But she’ll find a way to keep you from him.”

  “You don’t know that. Gabriel will never allow it.” She closed her eyes. Her head pounded.

  “It’s clear to me that you aren’t from here, so let me explain something to you. Gabriel is the eldest heir to the throne of Paragon. Eleanor enjoys her seat on the throne and will not give it up. A rebellion is rising among the kingdoms. Eleanor’s best bet to stay in power is for Gabriel to entertain suitors. An alliance by marriage with one of the other kingdoms could stave off the rebellion and give her an excuse to appoint him ruler of another court and save her seat. She needs to use him, which means she’ll use you.”

  “Gabriel will only cooperate so long and so far. We’re bound. He’ll burn the place down before he takes a second mate.”

  The dragon snorted. “You’re not understanding this, are you? Gabriel will do it for you. All Eleanor has to do is keep you alive. He does what she wants, you get fed. He refuses, you don’t. A dragon will do anything for his mate. Anything. At first he’ll do it for a chance to see you. Those visits will grow longer and longer apart. Then he’ll do it for simple proof you’re still alive. Then he’ll do it for her word she will not harm you. Soon you’ll be as good as dead, locked in a coffin of stone with just enough to keep your heart beating while Gabriel plays out her wicked scheme.”

  An invisible vise clutched her torso and squeezed. He was right. If Eleanor had any intention of being remotely kind, she wouldn’t let her bake in this dungeon. A chill slicked over her sweat-drenched skin.

  “You understand now,” he said. “You see what I’m telling you is true.”

  “Fuck,” she whispered. She was tired and her head was throbbing. “Every time I think I understand the level of evil Eleanor embodies, I’m proven wrong. She soars right past it.”

  He laughed a deep, rumbling chuckle. There was the dragon. Up until then, she might have mistaken him for human based solely on his voice. But that laugh, that was the laugh of a beast biding its time somewhere inside.

  She closed her eyes and leaned her aching head against the wall. “Come on, Gabriel,” she said under her breath.

  “You may get one chance, maybe two, to get out of this cell,” the dragon said. “Eleanor may entertain the idea of letting Gabriel see you at first, the better to string him along.”

  “I’m counting on it.”

  He lowered his voice. “It will be soon. He’ll want to see you before he sleeps.”

  Raven wondered how he could tell the time in this dim pit of obsidian.

  “When they take you upstairs, you need to do something for me. For us.”

  Raven narrowed her eyes. “Us? I don’t even know your name.”

  “No, but you already know we are on the same side when it comes to Eleanor.”

  She rubbed the back of her neck. “So?”

  “Listen to me very carefully. I am going to tell you a story about Eleanor, and if you want to survive this thing she has planned for you and Gabriel, you’d better listen.”

  A blond guard dressed in a red-and-black tunic with a braided gold sash across his chest slid a key into the lock of her cell. Raven remained perfectly still, her body weak and thirsty from the heat, until the door was completely open.

  “Come with me,” he said. “Now.”

  She rose and followed, glancing back to get a glimpse through the bars of the neighboring cell. A flash of pale skin and chestnut hair caught her eye before the guard tugged her elbow and thrust her toward the door.

  “Where are you taking me?” she asked the guard, her throat cracking from thirst.

  “Silence.”

  The sheer pleasure as they climbed the circular staircase and the temperature dropped had her breathing more deeply. When the guard opened the doors to the palace proper and a cool breeze wafted over her, she almost moaned.

  He half dragged her down the hall and thrust her into a room. The door closed and locked behind her. Well, this was far more comfortable than the dungeon. A bed was situated at the center of the room, swathed in white linens and facing an open window with a view of the stars. But it was the door to the right that drew her. A bathroom.

  She turned on the faucet and lowered her lips to the flowing water. It was cool and sweet. She drank until her belly could hold no more, then filled the tub. She stripped out of her clothes and got in even before it was full. In a small ceramic indent in the side of the basin, there was soap and what she assumed was shampoo, although she couldn’t read the labels. She lathered her skin and then her hair, rinsing away the caked sweat and grime.

  She’d just finished washing when the sound of footsteps in the adjoining room sent her reaching for a towel. She wrapped it around her body and crept behind the door. It opened toward her nose and she held her breath. Gabriel stepped into the bathroom.

  “Gabriel.” She blew out a relieved breath.

  Gabriel whirled and took her in his arms.

  He kissed her and cupped her face. “I was so afraid. I didn’t know what she’d done to you,” he said breathlessly. “This… this doesn’t seem so bad.”

  She closed her eyes. “They didn’t keep me here.”

  When she opened them again, his held the intensity of an angry dragon. “Where did they keep you?”

  “In the dungeon.”

  Gabriel cursed and backed away, shaking his head.

  “It’s hot there. Dreadfully hot. And they didn’t feed us all day.”

  A heinous curse flew from Gabriel’s lips, and he charged from the bathroom and to the door. “I want food in here now!” he yelled to the guard outside the door. The growl that followed rattled the walls. The man bolted for places unknown.

  She pulled him back into the room. “We need to talk.”

  He closed the door. “What is it? Is there more? Did they hurt you?”

  “No. Listen. There’s a man in the cell next to me. A dragon. He told me that if they allowed me out tonight, there was something I should do, something that could help us.”

  Gabriel narrowed his eyes. “Who was this dragon? What was his name?”

  She shook her head. “He didn’t tell me his name. He said there’s a magical object hidden in the library behind a book called The Saddle of Arythmetes. It’s a box with something inside that he says will help us escape, and if I can get my hands on it and bring it to him, he may be able to break us all out of here.”

  The growing scowl on Gabriel’s face told her what he thought of the idea. “Raven, you have no idea who this man is. If he’s in a dungeon in Paragon, he is no friend of yours.”

  She hugged the towel tighter around her. “I can’t explain it, Gabriel. I trust him. He… he reminds me of someone.”

  “You were hot and tired and starved. This person offered you some comfort. But you have to realize this is likely a trap. Why do yo
u think they put you in that cell next to him? Odd, don’t you think?”

  Raven furrowed her brow. She hadn’t thought about it at all.

  “This dragon tells you to steal something from the library and bring it to him. What then? I’ll tell you what will happen, Raven. He’ll turn you in, and then Eleanor will have a reason and an excuse to keep you down there permanently.”

  The truth behind his words fell heavy on her shoulders. He was right; she wasn’t thinking clearly. If not for Gabriel, she might have made a terrible mistake. There was a knock on the door. Gabriel opened it and rolled in a tray laden with food of a type she’d never seen before.

  When the door was closed again, he took her by the shoulders. “Come, let’s find you something to wear.”

  He led her to a closet filled with lustrous fabrics.

  “Wow. This is all gorgeous.”

  “This was my old room. They’ve replaced the clothes with things that are fashionable now. Unfortunately, it’s all for men. Here. This should work to sleep in.” He handed her a pair of stretchy tights and a soft shirt that would have likely been formfitting on him but hung on her like a tunic.

  “Thank you.”

  “I think you’ll like this meal. It tastes a bit like your pork, but spicy and with more of a tang.”

  He loaded her plate and she sat down in front of it. In minutes, she’d inhaled half of it while Gabriel sipped a glass of wine across from her. She supposed he’d already eaten. It had to be late. Paragon’s two moons were high in the night sky.

  “Something else the prisoner said is bothering me,” she whispered.

  Gabriel leaned forward, all his attention on her. If he thought she was stupid for listening to the man in the dungeon, he gave no indication. Her mate was fully attentive with nothing but concern in his eyes.

  “He said that Eleanor would want you to entertain a union with royalty from one of the other kingdoms. He said she needs it. She needs to use you to buffer relations because there is a rebellion rising.”

  Gabriel leaned back in his chair and threaded his fingers over his stomach. “Hmmm.”

  “That sounds ominous.”

  “Eleanor hinted as much tonight. She introduced me to several women from royal families across the five kingdoms.”

  Raven dropped her fork. “Then maybe this dragon is right. He says Eleanor will slowly try to distance me from you in an attempt to coerce you into playing the bachelor and smoothing over political turmoil.”

  Gabriel rubbed his face. “I don’t know, Raven, but I won’t allow them to send you back there. If Mother wants my cooperation, she’ll allow you to stay here.”

  She scoffed. “This is just a different type of prison.”

  Tension crackled between them. Neither option was ideal, and they both knew it. Eleanor had the upper hand. Gabriel rubbed the back of his neck in exasperation.

  “Tell me about today. What happened?” Raven asked.

  “Eleanor executed Brynhoff and blamed his dead heart for everything that happened at Marius’s coronation. She told the Highborn Court that Tobias and I were ‘recovered’ by Ransom, Scoria’s successor and the new head of the Obsidian Guard. She basically absolved herself from all responsibility for Marius’s murder while simultaneously forcing Tobias and me to support her as empress while we recovered from our prolonged absence.”

  “Fuck. She’s brilliantly evil. Now whatever rebellion is stewing, they can’t use Marius’s murder or your disappearance against her to gain favor with the populace.”

  He nodded. “She has all of us right where she wants us.”

  Suddenly Raven wasn’t hungry anymore. She leaned back in her chair and toyed with her food, twirling her fork. “So what do we do?”

  “We bide our time. We do what we have to do. And we pray.”

  Raven thought back to just a few days ago. After she’d delivered their baby, she’d died. She’d lost too much blood and her heart had temporarily stopped beating. In that dark moment, she’d had a vision that the goddess Circe had come to her. She remembered the goddess, her creamy olive skin, dark hair, and eyes the color of molten gold. She’d seemed so kind.

  Raven raised her chin and said, “I think prayer is an excellent idea.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  A long time ago

  Nathaniel peered around the corner into his mother’s private parlor and spotted her inside, the yellow silk of her floor-length dress bunched in her hand. His scrawny body was slight enough she didn’t notice him at first, which was exactly what he wanted. She was doing something strange, something he’d never seen a dragon do, and he wanted to watch.

  Mother had drawn a symbol on the obsidian floor in chalk, a strange symbol like the ones he’d been taught in school that only the witches of Darnuith used. His schoolmaster said witches were evil, filthy creatures that couldn’t be trusted, which made the fact that the symbol was here, drawn by his mother, all the more odd. On one side of the symbol was a bowl of water. On the other side, a white bird. The bird’s feet and wings were bound, and it writhed helplessly in its spot.

  Mother paced around the circle, her citrine ring glowing gold on her finger. “Fitzucalcula,” she said. Nothing happened. “Fitzucalcula!” she said again, louder.

  “It needs fuel,” Nathaniel said.

  His mother’s eyes snapped to his. She was so beautiful, a dark, red-lipped queen whose eyes turned soft and loving when she saw him.

  “What are you doing up, Nathaniel? Isn’t it past your bedtime?”

  “I felt it,” he said, pointing to the circle.

  She tilted her head. “What’s that? You… felt the symbol?”

  He nodded. “It’s whispering to me. Not in words exactly.” He shook his head. “But I can sense it. It’s telling me what to do to make it work.”

  “Well, come in. If the symbol is speaking to you, you must help me with it.”

  He jogged to her side and she squatted beside him and kissed him on the cheek.

  “Can you tell what Mummy is trying to do?”

  Nathaniel concentrated on the things in front of him. “It’s a spell like witches do.”

  “Ah, ah, ah.” She wagged her finger. “It is a spell, but it’s a new kind of spell. One that dragons do, or will do when I figure it out. I have a friend from the fairy realm who is teaching me, only I can’t get it to work.”

  “What’s it supposed to do?”

  “I’m trying to make this bird look like a narwit. Dragons can use illusion on themselves, but we can’t change how other things appear. If I can learn this spell, I can learn to extend my illusion beyond my body.”

  Nathaniel narrowed his eyes. “It needs fuel.”

  “I heard you say that before. How do you know that?”

  “I can feel it.” He pointed at the symbol. “That’s the magic—it’s like the gears for grinding flour.” He pointed to the water. “That’s what you are grinding.” He pointed to the bird. “That’s what the magic will act upon. The illusion will wrap around the bird.”

  “What do you mean when you say it has no fuel?”

  “There’s nothing to turn the gears.” He looked up at her. How could he make her understand?

  “Ah, but the magic word is supposed to turn the gears. Fitzucalcula.”

  Nathaniel shook his head. “Dragons don’t have magic in their words.” He laughed.

  Her eyes widened, and he could tell the moment she understood. “You genius boy. Of course we don’t. We have magic in ourselves.”

  He nodded.

  She hugged him around the shoulders. “Would you like to do the honors, or shall I?”

  He gazed up at her with such love he thought his heart would explode. “Can I, Mummy?”

  “Oh yes, dear boy. You are very good at this. Let’s see you make it work.”

  He extended a talon from his left hand and pressed it to the skin of his right index finger. A bead of blood formed there, and he held it over the circle. Three fat drops sla
pped the floor.

  Immediately the symbol glowed to life and started to spin, lifting off the floor and taking the bird and the water with it. It was a whirlpool. A hurricane. A blur of feathers and rain.

  It all crashed to the floor and broke apart rather abruptly, the magic dissipating like clearing smoke. There in front of him was the cutest pink narwit, wiggling its four ears at him and grunting softly. His mother squealed.

  “Very good. Very good, Nathaniel.” She hugged him tight.

  He smiled so wide his cheeks hurt.

  “I have an idea.”

  He widened his eyes expectantly. Perhaps they’d do another spell.

  “How would you like to skip fighting in the pits for a few weeks and instead work with Mummy to write her new book on dragon spells?”

  Nathaniel jumped up and down. He hated fighting. If he could, he’d never go to the pits again. “Oh yes, Mummy, please.”

  She kissed his temple. “Done. Now go to bed. Tomorrow we’ll experiment with something new.”

  He obeyed, so excited for this new adventure.

  Nathaniel woke with a start and was pleasantly surprised to find Clarissa still curled into his chest. She was his. Finally. Just the thought filled him with warmth and a seemingly bottomless well of love and protective instinct. He kissed her on the top of her sleeping head, drawing the scent of warm, sex-exhausted woman into his nose. A dragon could live on that.

  So why, after such a perfect morning, had he dreamed about his dead mother?

  It had to have been Grindylow’s suggestion that the dragon queen was to blame for Clarissa’s curse. Nathaniel had wonderful memories of his mother. Together they’d filled her spell book with magic adapted to a dragon’s abilities. It was groundbreaking, and he had come to practice magic with her on a regular basis. It was that magic that had saved them all.

  When Brynhoff had murdered Marius, his mother had safely transported them to Earth, using the very magic he’d helped her develop over the years. He’d understood it better than any of his siblings. And she’d likely been murdered by Brynhoff for protecting them. That was three centuries ago. He didn’t even know who the queen of Paragon was now, but if it would help his mate, he would find out.