“Do I know of the Daza peoples, Souda, you ask?” Akir said with interest.
A small clearing of the throat from Meena, who appeared to be Akir’s second or counselor, and Akir shook his head self-consciously. “Yes, of course. There will be time later to talk. But for now, I will tell you that we Binshee, and my family, have been members of the royal line of the South for hundreds of years. My older brother rules over the Southern Kingdom right now, but we are being attacked. Tales of strange dragon attacks on our border towns and outposts that burn with strange, chemical fires…”
“Not dragons,” I growled. It was Inyene’s abominations, wasn’t it?
“No, you are right,” Akir’s tone turned serious again. “Our Vicious Drakes,” he waved a hand to the twelve or so smaller Oranges with saddles on, “—they knew immediately that it was no dragon doing this, and then we heard tell of strange metal monsters that acted like dragons stalking the skies…” He shook his head at the insult, and I could only agree.
“My brother is trying to hold the Southern Kingdom’s borders, but, my dragon and her brood have been insisting that we travel with our company to this new thing she sensed…” The man cocked his head to one side just briefly, and I could feel a tension to the air and almost hear the slightest noise as he communicated with his dragon, before his eyes turned back to look straight at me, and the Stone Crown upon my head.
“Our dragons have heard your call, and we came,” he finished simply, and I felt humbled by his loyalty to a cause that he had never heard of before.
“This hunt belongs to all,” Ymmen advised me, and I nodded at his dragon-wisdom.
“Thank you, Akir of the Southern Kingdom,” I said as graciously as I could. How could I explain everything that had happened? I gestured helplessly to the Stone Crown on my head. “This is the problem,” I settled for, feeling ashamed. “But Fargal the Eldest Sister and oldest dragon knows a way to undo its enchantments. That is why I called every dragon I could here…”
Meena at last broke her silence, and when she spoke, her voice was surprisingly soft, despite her harsh demeanor. “Then we had better help you quickly,” she stated, looking to the rising dawn in the east. “We winged past Torvald on our way here, and she is sorely embattled. Surrounded on all sides by more of these metal dragons, with her walls blackened and burning. They had only a dozen dragons and their wall-defenses against so many. We split our forces to give them aid – but I fear that Torvald will be lost by nightfall…”
Oh no! My heart thumped. Abioye! Montfre!
“Little Sister.” I felt Ymmen’s warming presence wrap itself around my mind, as the great Black dragon stepped a little closer over me, as if to shield me from my own thoughts—
“Skreych!” Just then there was a loud and indignant shout from the skies overhead. Looking up in alarm, I saw that there was another, smaller convocation of dragons approaching at blistering speeds. They were of mixed breeds and types, but the angry one at the front I could recognize even without the effects of the Stone Crown.
It was the Lady Red.
“Foolish girl!” the Lady Red hissed and snapped at me, almost as soon as she and her cohort had landed with a sudden onrush of wings, scattering the smaller dragons and the company of the Southern Kingdom in their fury.
Ymmen took a step forward, emitting a low growl.
“Why couldn’t you leave that thing where you found it!? For all eternity!” the Lady Red berated me. I do not know if it was the sheer force of her personality that allowed her to speak to me thus, or if it was the magical effects of the Stone Crown upon my head – but I heard her words like a hot wind. I opened and closed my mouth to answer, thinking about how I needed to ‘save’ the Stone Crown from Inyene, and that Abioye had been about to be killed by the captain of the Red Hounds—
But none of it felt like a worthwhile excuse when faced with the long millennia of abuse and insult that this Stone Crown had inflicted upon all dragon memory and history.
“Rivita, Seventh Daughter!” came a loud, booming voice through my mind and, as each dragon swiveled their heads to the black pit of the Circle of Grom, I realized that it was not only me who heard the voice of the Eldest Sister, Fargal the Many-Colored.
There was a sudden hiss of steam and rush of air as two mighty claws with talons as black as onyx latched onto the edge of the Circle as Fargal hauled herself up.
“Dear Sands and Stars!” Akir gasped at the bulk of the gigantic Fargal, who was easily twice the size of even the largest White dragon here.
Fargal the Ancient pulled her bulk up to one side of the Circle in slow and measured movements. Her scales shone and flashed in the morning light, and I could see how her wings had become folded and torn against her back from her long, self-imposed exile from the world.
“You see right, my children, and children of my siblings,” Fargal said, crouching cat-like on the edge of her home. “I am Fargal, and Fargal is me. Eldest Sister. Last of the First Brood.”
There was a hushed silence from the rest of the dragons all around, before a keening sound started up. The dragons started swaying their necks, whistling and singing to the eldest – even the Lady Red, whom Fargal had called Rivita.
“Rivita, Seventh Daughter of my sister, you are right to be angry. This child of the western wind did not know what it was that she was doing. She has brought this evil back into the world – where it now, with the Metal Queen, presents the greatest danger that any of us have ever faced—”
My heart lurched in sudden dismay.
“But there is a chance, if you can master your anger, that we can undo this evil, once and for all. This child of the western wind, this dragon child, has agreed to help us destroy the Stone Crown, and to release all of those lost to us back into our hearts!”
“Ssssss…” There was a rising chorus of dragon noise, as, singularly and in groups, I felt every dragon eye turn towards me. They were not kind looks, but judging, assessing sorts of looks.
“Girl,” the Lady Red – Ritiva – said, her eyes flashing as she looked at me. “My Eldest Sister speaks wisely, and I cannot deny her – but you should know this: It was MY Den Mother who bore another human woman, once, a long time ago. One of the first of your Dragon Riders called Artifex.”
“The Lady Artifex!” I gasped, and of course it made sense. Both the Lady Red and the depictions of Artifex’s dragon were Crimson Reds.
“Pfft.” Rivita gave a snort of flame. “My mother carried Artifex well and for many, many years, before her human’s life had come to an end—”
“And ended up in the Lost Shrine under the Masaka Mountains?” I muttered.
“And then, heartbroken and sore, my mother took the Western Track,” Rivita explained. “I saw what effect the world of humans and of knights and of crowns had on my mother. I saw how she had to leave this world.”