The Frost Eater (The Magic Eaters Trilogy Book 1)

by Carol Beth Anderson

  “Whoa,” Ovrun said. “How many guards?”

  “Four. Wearing the same uniform you used to wear.”

  He sighed. “I wonder if I know any of them.”

  “Hang on,” Nora said. After about half a minute of silence, she spoke again. “The dragon says the guards’ names are Zef, Kadish, Jushuen, and Thar.”

  “I know Jushuen,” Ovrun said. “I thought he quit.”

  “Guess he just got reassigned,” Krey said. “Do you trust him?”

  “I’m not sure. He’s a nice guy. I don’t know how loyal he is to the king, though.”

  “The dragon just told me she’s bound with chains, held by huge padlocks,” Nora whispered.

  “Does she know where the keys are?” Krey asked.

  “In Jushuen’s front pocket. He’s the one in charge, but all four guards have pistols.”

  “They only give firearms to the most trusted guards,” Ovrun said.

  Krey shook off his dread and squared his shoulders. “Let’s make a plan.”

  A quarter hour later, they were ready. In the dim moonlight, Krey saw Nora take Ovrun’s shoulders and pull him close to breathe, “Be careful.” Krey almost expected her to follow her words up with a kiss, but the two of them shared only a brief hug.

  Krey clapped Ovrun’s back. “You got this.”

  They returned to the rock outcropping that blocked their view of the dragon’s prison lair. Ovrun peeked around the edge. He turned and whispered in Krey’s ear, “Jushuen is the one with curly hair that hits his collar.”

  Ovrun walked past the barrier, and his loud, confident voice rang through the night air. “Don’t shoot. I’m Ovrun, a royal guard.” Hopefully Jushuen, who’d last worked at the palace months earlier, wouldn’t know Ovrun had been fired.

  Krey heard the guards scrambling around. Two voices shouted at Ovrun to stop.

  “The king sent me with a message.” Ovrun’s voice remained calm. “Jushuen, you know me, let me get closer so you can identify me.”

  “Okay, come closer,” a voice called.

  A few seconds later, Krey peeked around the corner. Ovrun was standing off to the side, and he’d distracted all four guards so they were facing away from Krey and Nora’s hiding spot.

  Krey took to the air, flying behind the guards and into the cave. The lantern light from outside shone on a dragon who was even larger than her mate. Her glinting, faceted eyes appeared to be fixed on Krey. He tried unsuccessfully to hide a shudder. “Hello,” he whispered softly.

  The dragon answered with what sounded like a huff. Hot air from her nostrils blasted Krey. He forced his attention back to Ovrun, who was talking to the guards.

  “The king sent me to tell you to release the dragon,” Ovrun was saying. “A wealthy group in the capital found out we captured her, and they’re threatening to go public.”

  “I don’t believe a word you’re saying,” one of the guards shouted.

  “That’s enough!” another voice said. “I know Ovrun. He’s trustworthy. And I don’t know about you guys, but I’m ready to be done climbing this mountain every night. Ovrun, just tell us the visitor password, and we’ll know you’re supposed to be here.”

  Krey groaned inwardly as their plans fell apart with that simple request for a password. They’d hoped Jushuen would trust Ovrun enough to take him inside the cave. Krey would’ve waited in the shadows at the top of the cave, ready to dive down and put Jushuen in a headlock if he didn’t willingly give up his keys. The dragon was even in on the scheme; she’d agreed to defend herself and her rescuers from the remaining guards.

  Time for an alternate plan. Krey thrust himself back into the air and flew silently toward the four guards, whose backs were still to him.

  “Why would they give me a password when Jushuen already knows me?” Ovrun was asking. It didn’t sound convincing to Krey, and he knew the guards wouldn’t buy it either. Hovering behind Jushuen, Krey blocked out the discussion and focused on the man’s pants. All he needed to do was grab the keys.

  The problem was, he couldn’t tell which pocket the keys were in. I could try both at once. But he’ll feel it; I’m no pickpocket. Even if I get the keys, what am I gonna do with them? Ovrun and I will both get shot.

  Krey returned his attention to the conversation.

  “We’re not releasing the dragon!” The guard who spoke turned to gesture at the dark cave, then shouted, “Jushuen! Behind you!”

  No! Krey turned vertical and propelled himself straight upward, as fast as his magic would take him. Beneath him, guards shouted, and for the second time in twenty-four hours, Krey heard gunshots. This time, there were too many to count. The chances of anyone hitting him were slim; he was high in the air, and they couldn’t see him well in the dark. Ovrun, on the other hand—

  Before Krey could create ice to take out the shooters like he’d done the night before, Ovrun roared with unmistakable pain.

  Pure fury catalyzed the ice Krey had eaten hours before. He rained dense, freezing spheres on the guards below. He was too high to aim well, but one guard cried out. Krey grinned and formed another ball.

  Before he could throw it, a stream of flames shot straight up into the sky, aimed at Krey. Ash eater! Krey sped through the air in an insane zigzag course. The ash eater didn’t let up, carving the black sky with a blinding, continuous ribbon of orange heat.

  Krey roared with panic as fire lit up his left jacket sleeve. He slapped at it with his right palm, dropping at least twenty mets in the process. When his clothing was no longer flaming, he flew as fast as he could, away from the guards.

  In seconds, he was out of the ash eater’s range. His arm seemed to be fine; the flames must not have burned through his shirt. His relief, however, was short-lived. All at once, agony flooded his right palm. He touched it gingerly and found that it was covered in huge blisters.

  Krey stifled sobs as he soared through the sky. He needed medical care, but they had to finish their mission, one way or another. He pictured Zeisha’s face and dug deep into his well of determination. Forget the pain. Focus. A minute or so later, he landed in a tree with a view of the cave area. Silent tears washed over his cheeks.

  The scene below sent dread into his heart. Golden lantern light shone on Ovrun, who was prone on the ground, dark blood underneath him. He was moaning.

  A moment later, it got worse. Nora exited her hiding place.

  Krey wanted to shout at her to turn around and go back to the orsas. One of them, at least, could escape uninjured. It was too late for that, though.

  The guards shouted at her, but she spoke in an authoritative voice he’d never heard her use. “I am Ulminora Abrios. Put your weapons down.”

  Krey pushed all the air out of his lungs, clenching his teeth as hard as he could. His hand was in so much pain, he wanted to gnaw it off. From the looks of Ovrun, he was in worse shape. And there was Nora, letting the royal guards know that she was involved in all this. So much for keeping her father in the dark.

  “It’s her!” Jushuen shouted. “Your Highness, what are you doing here?”

  “She’s been missing for weeks!” another guard said. “Grab her!”

  “No!” Again, Nora’s voice brooked no argument. “Drop your weapons. If you choose to touch me, I hope it’s with a hand you don’t mind losing.”

  Krey watched as all four men dropped their guns to their sides.

  “Place your guns in your holsters,” Nora commanded.

  They obeyed.

  Nora ran to Ovrun and knelt by him. “Where are you hit?”

  Krey couldn’t hear the quiet response. Nora lifted Ovrun’s arm, then tore off her scarf and began wrapping it around his left bicep. An arm wound—he could survive that, as long as it hadn’t hit a major artery.

  The guards were focused only on Nora. This was Krey’s chance to get close again. And this time, he wasn’t going for the keys.

  He returned to the sky, and the cold air felt both wonderful and torturous on his bur
ned hand. He cursed; how was he supposed to do anything with a destroyed right hand? Please, God, tell me that ash eater doesn’t have any fuel left.

  The guards huddled together, whispering, and Krey found an angle of approach that would keep him out of sight of all four men for as long as possible. If they only kept their eyes on Nora, he could do this.

  No time for caution. Krey flew directly at the nearest guard and, using his left hand, pulled the man’s gun out of its holster.

  “Hey!” The huge guard turned, but Krey was already out of reach, pointing the gun at the guards. “Get him!” the guard cried.

  Nora screamed, “No!” as Jushuen reached for his gun.

  “I’ll shoot!” Krey threatened.

  Jushuen froze. The ash eater, however, lifted his hand and once again shot flames toward Krey.

  Krey cursed and flew evasively. The fire kept coming, paired with gunshots. Krey evaded both bullets and flames, but his fear and pain destroyed his customary magical efficiency. His feathery fuel ran out, and he plummeted at least three mets to the hard dirt, dropping the gun somewhere along the way. Frequent changes of direction had resulted in him staying close to the scene, and he landed between the guards and Ovrun.

  The fall knocked the wind out of him, and before he could recover and push himself up, two guards pinned him down, one on his back, the other on his legs. Krey groaned and tried to breathe.

  “Stop!” Nora cried. “Let him go! I’m here on behalf of my father, and he’s—”

  “No, you’re not!” a guard shouted. “He would’ve sent you with a note or the password or something!”

  Even with the side of his face smashed into the ground by a heavy hand, Krey could sense the shift in the air. The guards didn’t believe any of them, not even the princess.

  The weight on Krey’s legs lifted, and he heard Jushuen speak. “Shackle Ovrun and the other guy. I think we can get the princess down the mountain without restraining her, especially if she knows we’ll kill her friends if she doesn’t cooperate.”

  Krey’s eyes found Nora. For a second, she looked panicked, but then her expression turned intense and focused.

  From the cave, a massive ROAR erupted.

  Krey felt the weight on his back shift, and he heard the other guards move, probably to look at the cave. Nice distraction, Nora.

  The princess ran several steps away and bent down briefly. What’s she up to? She sprinted to Ovrun. She knelt, then leaned over him, giving him a hug and whispering in his ear.

  “What are you doing, Princess?” the biggest guard bellowed. Apparently the guy had gotten tired of trying to figure out why the dragon had roared.

  “Nothing. Just helping my friend sit up.” Nora leaned over Ovrun again. He draped his good arm over her shoulder, and she pulled him into a seated position.

  “Appreciate the help, Your Highness,” Jushuen said. “Now move, so I can get these shackles on him.”

  “Hang on,” Ovrun said, his voice strained but surprisingly strong. He reached behind him, and when he lifted his hand, there was a pistol in it.

  Krey smiled. That must be the gun I dropped! Nora, bless her, had picked it up when the guards were distracted. Thank the sky she’d gotten the weapon to Ovrun; he was the only one of them who actually knew how to use it.

  “Ovrun,” Jushuen said, “don’t be stupid.”

  An ear-splitting BANG sounded, and the gun in Ovrun’s hand kicked back. Jushuen screamed, and Krey heard him fall. “Hands up, all of you,” Ovrun said. “A hand wound is bad enough. Next time, I’ll aim for the chest.”

  “The gun’s empty,” the biggest guard said. “There were ten bullets to start out with. I shot at your flying friend nine times. You shot once.”

  Krey had to admire Ovrun, who remained calm and pulled the trigger. All that emerged from the gun was a soft click.

  “Zef,” Jushuen groaned, pain thick in his voice, “burn him.”

  Krey held his breath, prepared to see his friend turned into a torch.

  Nothing happened. Finally, a little bit of luck. The ash eater is out of fuel.

  Nora stood. “Guys, can’t we just talk?” She held up both hands in a calming gesture, and Krey rolled his eyes. Talking wouldn’t work right now.

  Then a hard ball of ice shot out of each of Nora’s hands. The guard on top of Krey toppled to the side. Krey leapt to his feet and took in the situation. The guard who’d been pinning him down was lying on the ground, a broken ball of ice by his head. The largest guard was clutching his throat. Jushuen was on the ground in agony, cradling a bleeding hand. And the one remaining guard, the ash eater with no fuel, was pulling his gun out of its holster.

  Krey turned on his frost magic, but his pain made his magic sluggish. Even as he felt ice forming in his palm, he knew he didn’t have time.

  Unlike the ash eater and Krey, Nora’s weapon was ready. One more ball of ice flew out of her raised hand. The ash eater’s gun fell to the ground, accompanied by the ice that had smashed into it.

  Krey dove to the ground and grabbed the gun. He leapt up and pointed it first at the ash eater, then at the other guards. Hoping he didn’t look as inept with a weapon as he really was, he said, “My friend told you to put your hands up.”

  Two guards raised their hands high. The man who’d been on top of Krey was still on the ground, probably unconscious. Jushuen, sobbing and holding his bloody hand to his chest, lifted his uninjured hand.

  “Nora,” Krey said, “Ovrun doesn’t look good.”

  She spun around. Ovrun was clearly woozy. She caught him by the shoulders and eased him to the ground.

  Krey confiscated the remaining guns and locked the guards in their own shackles. He returned to Jushuen to find that he’d lost consciousness. Krey easily retrieved the keys from the guard’s pocket.

  Heart still pounding from all the action, Krey crossed to Nora and Ovrun. He knelt next to them. “I think the dragon speaker should free the captive. I’ll take care of Ovrun.”

  Nora looked up, her eyes puffy from tears. “The bleeding’s slowed down already.” She lifted her hands, and in the dim lantern light, her palms looked black. She wiped them on her pants and walked toward the cave, muttering epithets at the guards as she passed.

  Krey used his good hand to peel away the cloth Nora had wrapped around Ovrun’s wound. “She’s right; it’s not bleeding much anymore,” he said softly. “How are you doing?”

  “I think it was just a graze,” Ovrun said. “But”—he groaned in muted agony—“I’ve never hurt this much. I’m having trouble staying conscious.”

  “I think I should wrap it in clean cloth,” Krey said. “Or at least something less bloody than what’s on here now.”

  “What did Nora use?” Ovrun asked.

  “Her scarf.”

  “She must be cold,” were Ovrun’s last words before he passed out.

  Krey took his jacket off, stifling a scream as it passed over his blistered hand. The garment was too thick to wrap tightly around the wound. He removed his shirt and put his jacket back on.

  When anything touched his hand, pain ripped through it. This wouldn’t be an easy task with only one good hand. He was relieved Ovrun couldn’t see him fumbling around.

  Once his shirt was torn into a few rough strips, Krey examined Ovrun more carefully. The bullet had carved a furrow into Ovrun’s tricep.

  Krey did the bulk of the wrapping with his left hand, using his injured hand in smaller ways when he really needed it. He tucked in the end of the makeshift bandage just in time for Ovrun to wake with a moan.

  “You’re gonna be okay,” Krey said. “We’ll get you to a blood eater if we can. But even if we can’t—it’s disgusting, man, but it’ll heal.”

  Ovrun let out a sound that Krey was pretty sure was a hybrid of a groan and a laugh.

  “You okay if I get up?” Krey asked.

  “Yeah.”

  Krey used another strip of his shirt to bandage Jushuen’s injury. The hand was mut
ilated, and it would probably never work the same again. Even a skilled blood eater couldn’t fully heal a wound like that.

  They’d already found a shackle key on the same ring as the dragon’s padlock key. Krey retrieved shackle keys from the other three guards’ pockets too.

  A noise emanated from the dark cave, and Nora exited, followed by the massive dragon. Lantern light shone off the beast’s shiny, black, reptid skin. Krey could now see that her compound eyes were gold, just like her mate’s. Her brutal beauty took his breath away.

  Nora approached Krey, and they both walked to Ovrun. “Osmius’s mate hasn’t told me her name,” she said, “but I think she trusts us a little bit. I told her about Ovrun’s injury, and she offered to fly us out of here. Of course, she might just be offering because it’s the fastest way for us to lead her to Osmius.”

  “What about the orsas?” Krey asked.

  “We’ll board them at a nearby stable. She said she can lead us to one a few clommets from here.”

  Krey looked over at the dragon, who’d unfurled her massive wings and was flapping them. It was probably the first time she’d gotten to do that since her imprisonment. Dread filled his gut at the thought of riding atop such a creature. “I can fly myself, at least for now,” he said. “I just need to eat some more fuel.”

  “She said she can fly much faster than you, and if you want to stay with us, you’ll go on her back.”

  His heart dropped. Bile rose in his throat. He swallowed. “Is this how you feel when you fly with me?”

  Golden lantern light gleamed off Nora’s teeth, which were bared in a bright grin. “Yep.”

  34

  Even at a young age, our local healer loved using his gift. He did not, however, love collecting his own fuel. Someone devised a schedule. Every week, different families gave the boy blood from the animals they butchered.

  One week, it was our family’s turn. My mother handed me a clay jar full of yellow blood and told me to deliver it to the healer. I argued that it was too gross. She told me I was seventeen and needed to get over myself.