“He’s well. Gone on an errand at the moment. And you? And your ... friend?”
“Free. Both of us.” Aidan flicked his eyes upward. “He treated you well?”
A trace of remembered despair wiped away the young prince’s smile. “My debt is everlasting.”
Aidan opened his arms and the two embraced, the bond between them more clearly visible than the torchlight.
“Don’t let me singe you too badly,” Aidan said, laughing and pulling away as sparks flew. “I’ve not learned how to manage this little problem yet.”
The smiling prince shook his head, raw emotion adding a rasp to his voice. “I was afraid we’d get here too late, but Davyn swore that Lara would save you if anyone could. A number of Ridemark warriors were most displeased when we released Lara, and she insisted on coming here alone while we convinced them we were right. She even left Davyn behind, so he could guide us through the mountains.”
Aidan looked around the shoreline. “Is she all right? There was fighting ... gods, where is she?”
“She’s well, I think. But I don’t know where she’s gotten off to.”
I shrank deeper into the shadows and sank to the damp stone, wishing they would all go somewhere else. I had no place with these people.
Before the two of them could discover my hiding place, Davyn returned carrying a large leather bag. He and Aidan greeted each other as brothers.
“Davyn, have you seen Lara?” said Aidan.
The Elhim looked about sharply, then shook his head. “No. Not since I left for the cavern. She seemed unharmed.”
The prince joined them, and Davyn dumped out the bag—bloodstones. “I think this is all of them, unless he’s squirreled more away. I’ll bring in other Elhim to search more thoroughly. Your men have rounded up a few more conspirators in the cavern; most of the villains haven’t arrived as yet.”
The prince jerked his head toward Narim, who stood watching all this bleakly. “What am I to do with him? Hanging seems appropriate for one who attempts the life of King Devlin’s cousin.”
Sorrow shadowed Aidan when he looked on Narim. “Let him go. Let them all go. There’s nothing you can do that will compare to what’s going to happen. Soon, I think.” He glanced up at the quiet night, and the hair on my arms and neck prickled. For even as he said it, a growing darkness obscured the stars in every direction. Wind rose beyond the heights and lightning licked the clifftops. “I would suggest you all take shelter,” said Aidan. “No harm is intended, but accidents could happen.”
Though looking puzzled, the prince ordered his men to take the Elhim prisoners back to the caves. When the soldiers grabbed Narim’s arm, the Elhim resisted, growling furiously. At a nod of Prince Donal’s head, the soldiers left Narim by the edge of the water, his hands bound and his feet tied loosely so he could not run. He said nothing more and paid no attention to anyone. I remained in my hiding place at the bottom of the great boulder. Aidan would not follow his own advice and climbed up on the boulder above my head. Neither Prince Donal nor Davyn would leave him. They stood uncertainly only a few steps away from me. And so we waited, though I didn’t know for what.
Black clouds drove in from all sides. The wind whipped the lake into froth. Thunder rolled continuously, booming and crashing from the cliffs. Before very long, Narim rose slowly and awkwardly to his feet, craning his neck, scanning the sky. “MacAllister,” he said, his voice choked with horror, “what have you done?”
Dragons! Fifty or a hundred of them gathered over us, blotting out the stars, and as if at a herald’s trumpet blast, they released a firestorm upon the lake. The water churned and boiled, filling the air with smoke and steam. In a deafening explosion of wind and water, stone and fire, the rocky dam that held the water in the valley was blasted into dust. First a hissing stream and then a flood poured through the gaps in the rock wall and swept the remaining barrier away. As each screaming dragon released its cache of flame, it circled the valley and disappeared westward.
By the time dawn light colored the drifting fog, the air was still. The only sound was the distant rush of falling water, as the last of the lake drained into the lowlands. One dragon remained, a blot of gleaming copper, perched on the clifftops far across the gaping emptiness.
Davyn and the prince emerged from behind the boulder pile, where flying shards of broken rock and scalding spray had forced them to take shelter, and gaped at the empty lakebed. Narim stood at the edge, stunned, appalled, disbelieving. “They’ll never be able to speak with us again,” he said. “They’ll grow wilder, farther from us.”
Aidan spoke softly from atop his boulder perch. “They’ll never again be slaves to anyone, humans or Elhim. Without the lake water to tempt them, they won’t return here. The water was the difference, you know, the reason you were able to bind them in the first place. It wasn’t just the jenica you put in it to keep them still. Whatever element of the water enabled them to understand our speech also enabled the binding of the bloodstones. That’s why the Riders could never bind a dragon to a new stone.”
Narim’s grief was bitter. “Only the one in five hundred years, those like you, will ever hear their voices.”
“You needn’t fear. I’ll pay the price for this as well.”
I wasn’t sure exactly what he was talking about; we would all pay for this night’s work. The world would pay.
“What about the springs?” said Davyn. “Isn’t there still a risk?”
“Keep watching,” said Aidan.
After a while, the lone dragon spread its wings and glided from the clifftop, spiraling down into the fog-filled valley. A blast of white-hot fire blossomed from the deeps. When the fire receded, the dragon soared upward, returning to its distant perch. The bottom of the valley had been melted into a smooth shelf of rock, the springs irredeemably buried.
Narim sank to his knees and buried his head in his hands. How does one face the ruin of dreams carried for half a thousand years? Despite all, my heart wept for him.
Chapter 35
The prince convened a hasty trial for Narim. He took evidence from Davyn and from the Elhim who were a part of Narim’s plot. I could not remain silent, which meant, unfortunately, that I could no longer stay out of sight. So I stepped out of my niche, brushed past MacAllister without acknowledging him, and told the prince I wished to speak.
Prince Donal listened carefully to my tale of Narim’s tender care for me. I told him how all the Elhim, including the conspirators, had risked the safety of their sanctuary to take me in. I gave no other evidence. Whatever I knew of Narim’s crimes—and my own—I left to others to tell.
The prince already knew MacAllister’s mind, and only asked if he wished to add anything. MacAllister declined. Weak and foolish, as always. Even if he took no satisfaction in vengeance, how could he not see the rightness of punishment? We must pay for our deeds. Surely the prince would understand that.
I wandered over to the edge of the abyss and peered down on the scorched rocks and dried mud that were all that remained of the lake of fire, waiting to hear the verdict—to hear if my name would be listed among the condemned. After a sober deliberation, the prince announced that Narim would not hang, but that he and his Elhim conspirators would be exiled from Elyria for as long as they might live. Gods, Aidan and his cousin were two of a kind. Naive. Stupid. Who would ever be able to tell if an Elhim wandering the roads of Elyria was Narim or some other?
But the prince called forward one of his aides, his scribe who was charged with marking the wrists of those sworn to the prince’s service. While three soldiers held Narim still, the man used his needles and ink to mark, not a wrist, but Narim’s forehead with an X, and beside it the prince’s own mark. “Wear this mark of infamy forever, Elhim, and be grateful to my cousin and Mistress Lara that you yet breathe. Never was sin healed by betrayal, and never was good built upon the abused honor of a warrior. Begone from my father’s kingdom, and never tread its paths again.” The other conspirators were marked in the same fashion.