“Thank you for protecting me,” I said as I tried my best not to gag. “I will never forget the things you have done in my name.”
There was a roar, and Dravak and I both jerked upright, watching as the six dragons that had been left to guard the aerie flew back into sight and swooped low, circling as they looked for a clear space to land. The first, a large, gold dragon, dropped down behind Dravak and the others, two green dragons, a blue, a red, and a smaller black dragon all landed behind him, clumping together.
The gold dragon peered down over Dravak’s shoulder and snorted once, smoke curling out of his left nostril, before he nudged the younger dragon’s snout with his own and looked at me.
“He fought bravely to protect me.” My voice wavered, and I could see understanding flash in the gold dragon’s eyes as he lowered his head to me once and then lifted it again, nuzzling Dravak’s pointy left ear. The dragon’s wings spread out wide and then wrapped around Dravak and the head, tucking them out of my sight. The gold dragon turned and hopped over to where the other dragons had formed a circle, herding Dravak along with him.
“What are they doing?” I asked Kitsuna as she let go of my shoulders and grabbed my hand instead, tugging me back toward the aerie. I’d been presented with heads before, but usually the dragons just let me say my lines and then they took the head and disappeared. They’d always performed the rest of these ceremonies in private—in a place where only other dragons could see.
“Allowing our enemy his final rest,” she said, her voice low, as we both watched the clutch of dragons drawing closer together, their wings outspread so that none of us could see what was happening inside their tight knot.
The gold dragon lifted his head and roared once, the sound this time a high-pitched wail rather than a scream. The dragons flapped their wings, joining together to let out a howl that made my blood turn to ice. I couldn’t help but shiver.
“Are they…” I didn’t know what I was going to ask. Are they celebrating? Are they crying?
“They’re waking the Pleiades,” Kitsuna said. “Calling for them to open the gates so that a fallen warrior can enter the hunting grounds of the blue dragon clan. They’re calling for the nestmates of his clan to come and retrieve him, to embrace him as one of their own.”
“Why?” I asked. “He’s the enemy.”
“He was the enemy.” Rhys reached over and took my other free hand, wrapping it around his own shaking one. “Now he’s just a dragon that’s died far from his home and his nestmates. This is their way of showing his spirit mercy, even if he did try to kill one of their own.”
The gold dragon howled again and lowered his head, a long, steady stream of flame pouring from his open maw. The other dragons joined him, and we watched as brilliant flames leaped into the air between them.
The flames crackled, and the dragons roared again, shifting, moving in a counterclockwise circle around the bonfire and the body in its center, all of them still breathing great bursts of fire into the blaze.
I heard a high, plaintive call from above and looked up, watching as Balmeer flew above them, keeping up with the gold dragon beneath him and crying out at the same time as the dragons, taking part as if he were one of them. The bird cried out again and then circled once before swooping low to land on Rhys’s shoulder again.
The flames burned higher, and from far away I could hear the matching cry of other dragons, howling as they approached, gliding around the aerie and taking stock.
“One of the patrols,” I said quietly.
“Black dragons,” Rhys said, looking upward. “I don’t think its Winston’s patrol, though. He was part of a mixed group of dragons that went north.”
“I know. He’ll be back soon enough,” I said. I tried to sound calm, as though I wasn’t worried about him even though I was terrified. “We’ll need to call together the nobles now. There’s no way that we can even pretend to negotiate after this.”
“So much for stealth.” Rhys shook his head. “Looks like we’re going to just have to use brute force instead.”
I heard another loud howl and looked up as more dragons poured into the sky around us, racing for the aerie. There, among the rest of the teaming mass of dragons, was a familiar black one, and I watched as he swooped down, scanning the ground, and I lifted my hand to wave.
The dragon let out a loud snort, smoke curling from his nose, and then jerked upward, pulling away and heading toward the landing area so that he could shift from one form to another.
There was a roar behind us, and I watched as the flames of the blue dragon’s pyre crackled, climbing higher as the blaze grew hotter. The dragons around him beat at the flames with their wings.
“How long will they…?” I asked, letting my voice trail off.
“They’ll stay with him until dawn,” Kitsuna said quietly. “Once the sun rises, he’ll have reached his final rest.”
“Should we…stay?”
“No,” she said as she led me away from the pyre. “We’ll leave this to the dragons.”
“Okay, then let’s go,” I said. “We’ve got a war to plan, and after tonight, I don’t think we have a week to plan it. We’ve got to make our move now.”
Chapter Eleven
“Allie?” Winston called out from the far side of the clearing, and I looked up, my eyes filling with tears. He was alive. There was a dragon body being burned to a crisp not ten feet from me, but I didn’t care because the dragon that mattered most to me was still okay.
“Winston!” I pulled away from Kitsuna and Rhys, sprinting for him. “I thought you flew north.”
“Oh, thank God, Allie.” He pulled me into his arms and pressed his lips against mine, not bothering to be gentle as he let his fingers tangle in my hair. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. I’m okay. We saw the dragons attack, and we came as fast as we could. There wasn’t much I could do. What are you doing here, though?”
“There are more fires in the White Mountains,” he said. “Bavasama’s soldiers are leading raids. Ardere and I came back to report it and get more soldiers. What happened here?”
“They just attacked us,” I whispered. “This dragon flew toward the aerie and started breathing fire, and then the sky was filled with dragons. Mercedes shot at them as quickly as she could but—”
“Is she okay?” Winston asked.
“She’s fine.” I pulled him close, more to hide my own shaking than to comfort him. “She’s with the Woodsmen and John now, making sure that there aren’t any more dragons in the forest. But while they were shooting things, the rest of us just sort of stood there, waiting for something to attack from the ground. But nothing came and then Dravak…”
Winston’s head jerked up, and I saw the flames from the dragons’ fire glowing in his dark eyes as his shoulders slumped. “Oh no.” He winced. “Not Dravak. He’s just a—”
“No, he’s fine.” I grabbed Winston’s shoulders and gave them a quick shake. “He’s fine. That’s not him. Well, it is him. Not the dead body, though. He’s just over there with the rest of them. He’s the one that killed the enemy dragon… Actually, Mercedes shot it in the wing and brought it down, and then Balmeer fought with it for a bit, but then it started for the aerie, and Dravak just went after it. He charged at this huge blue dragon even though it was at least three times his size, and Win—”
My knees buckled, and he grabbed for me, pulling me up before I could completely fall apart, and wrapped his arms around my waist, holding me against him. “He ripped off the other dragon’s head. He ripped it clean—”