Breath of Dragons (A Pandoran Novel) (23 page)

Was everyone on this cursed planet related to each other somehow?

"I believe I may have crossed paths with him once or twice," I said flatly.

"Is eet true thet an army of shadowguard hef assembled along the northern wall?"

The question had come from a man who had been listening to us and had not spoken until now. He had a slight frame and a very pronounced chin, eyes like coals, and if Sir Randik had called in the attention of our half of the table, this man's question called in the rest.

How had this man known?

Mercedes folded her hands on the table and sat tall, hiding the unease I knew she felt, and Sal Amorentis's gaze was unnerving from farther down the table. Catia, sitting beside him, studied me with a kind of hungry interest, but most of the table looked wary, like at any moment the shadows might jump out and attack them.

"Princess Daria," Mercedes said evenly, "would you care to inform my guests as to how the situation stands along the northern wall? We hear so many things, but you can imagine how little we actually see being this far south." Her tone was all cordiality but her gaze held the weight of a kingdom.

The summer breeze slipped lightly over my skin.

Remember: you are an heir to the throne, a regent of Gaia. And they will believe it only if
you
do.

I sat up straighter, chin up with my hands resting calmly in my lap, mimicking the poise and body language I'd so often seen Stefan display while in meetings with his advisors. It surprised me a little how easily it came, and adjusting my poise had a strange and immediate affect on my mind. As if someone had flipped a switch in my head, and a different, and much more collected person stepped forth.

"It is true," I said, letting my eyes fall upon the faces of each member in my audience. Eye contact would be important. Eye contact would convey strength and control and confidence more than any of my words ever could. "An army of shadowguard stand there now, waiting to attack. I'm afraid that Alioth is completely outnumbered and will not be able to prevent them from breaking through."

My words were met with silence.

And then glances were exchanged, whispers heard, and I even felt the spark of surprise from the guards around us.

However, the whispering was short-lived because the questions slammed into me from every angle at full volume. Why was I here? Why wasn't I helping my brother? Was it true that I'd refused to marry Lord Danton Pontefract? Why would I refuse something like that? Was Lord Eris controlling the shadowguard? And on and on and on. Mostly, they all couldn't understand why I'd refused Danton when Valdon so obviously needed Ordinor's support. I'd wanted to answer their questions, but it was difficult when they all came at once.

Thankfully, Mercedes stepped in. "Calm down, everyone, please," she interceded, and the table quieted at once. "I am sure that Her Highness will be happy to answer your questions, though she'll be unable to if she cannot hear them. One at a time."

I looked gratefully at her and she nodded slowly. I noticed that Alex and Vera had leaned back in their seats, probably to make sure everyone's view of me was unobstructed. Though Alex's eyes were like weapons, and he moved them around in silent challenge.

"Has Lord Eris really returned?" asked an elderly gentleman with thin, white hair that fell just past his shoulders.

"Yes," I replied. "Though we do not have direct proof that he is behind the wall with the shadowguard, we have good reason to believe that he is responsible for them. It is not the first time he has employed the shadowguard to do his bidding." The thought distantly crossed my mind that I had no idea where I'd learned to talk to people like this. I had picked up a lot in six months.

"But he is supposed to be dead," said the large man with the bulbous nose.

"Unfortunately, he is not." I said. "And he is plotting an attack on the castle at Valdon as we speak to finish what he started twenty years ago."

There were more murmurs and whispers, and Alex and Vera sat perfectly still, taking in every movement, every sound, and every word like silent predators tracking their prey.

"Why should we believe this nonsense?" It was Sir Randik. "There is no proof. On what authority do you have that Lord Eris and his shadowguard have returned?"

I was done dealing with this rude and arrogant man. I reached into my top, eliciting some baffled looks from the guests, pulled the arrowhead from its hiding place between my breasts, and dropped it right on the table with a clank.

Gasps were heard all around as the people saw the irrefutable weapon of the shadowguard. Those nearest leaned closer to get a better look at the triangle of shiny obsidian. They didn't come too close, however, as if the arrowhead were a viper that might lash out and strike, injecting its deadly venom. Alex's surprise was marked clearly on his face. He hadn't known I'd saved the shadowguard arrowhead that had punctured my skin. "My scar is just beneath this dragon." I touched the tattoo on my shoulder. "The wound almost killed me, and it would have, had not my Aegis taken care of it before I reached your healers."

Flickers of unease and hesitation lit around the table, but it was Sir Randik who broke the heavy and anxious silence, his cheeks splotchy. "If that is true, your highness, then how can you
still
refuse Lord Danton? Alioth and Valdon will not survive against Lord Eris without Orindor's help."

"Then Orindor should help out of loyalty to the crown," I said. "Not because of a marriage."

Apparently, this was the wrong thing to say. The table erupted in chatter—much of which I didn't understand because it was all in rapid Saqai, but I got the gist of it. They thought I was an idiot.

Well?

Conscience, whose side are you on?

"You hef sealed Valdon's fate, then," someone said.

"Valdon is perfectly capable of sealing its own fate," Sal offered, his eyes hard as he looked at me. "If they are going to ignore the other territories, they should not expect help to come to their aid on a whim."

My goodness, was he really that upset that I'd rejected him? "Whim? A whim is a spontaneous tryst, Sal Amorentis. Not a battle between armies," I said.

There were a few snickers, and Sal's face colored.

"But without Orindor's help, what weel Preens Stefan do?" It was Catia.

Mercedes sat quietly, her fingers steepled on the table while her gaze settled upon me. She looked intensely intrigued, like she had suddenly seen me for the first time and was trying to figure out what I was.

I thought that was a question I'd like an answer to as well.

"Prince Stefan is doing everything in his power to stop Lord Eris's shadowguard from penetrating the wall," I said, "and that is why I am here this evening. I need…
we
need to ask for your help."

There was a general discord of emotions that hovered in the air, and many of them were not in my favor.

"You expect us to sacrifice our
lives
for you when you will not even sacrifice your hand in something as simple as
marriage
?" It was Denn's uncle again.

"
Sir Randik
." Mercedes voice cut through before anyone could speak, her eyes like daggers. "We will have no more talk of Princess Daria's betrothal. You seem so obsessed with it yourself, one might think
you
were pining for her hand."

There was a general murmur of amusement around the table. Vera looked particularly satisfied, but Sir Randik's face turned a violent shade of red.

"We do not
expect
anything," I continued. "We only ask this of you because the one thing that can and will stop Lord Eris is if the territories unite against him."

"But you have been in Gaia for less than a year, your highness," Sir Randik continued. "With all due respect"—
nothing following this has ever been even remotely respectful
—"you should leave matters of diplomacy to the prince, because your understanding of this world is incipient, at best. It is a universal truth that Gesh does not interfere with the politics of the mainland." He leaned forward, his eyes squished between fat cheeks and a thick brow. "In case you weren't aware, a title won't imbue a person with sudden expertise on subjects clearly foreign to them."

"Clearly," I replied. "Otherwise your title would have imbued you with the integrity befitting a
real
gentleman."

The table was silent—apprehensive. I couldn't read Mercedes expression, but Sir Randik's face darkened to a very unsettling shade of purple. Vera was the only bright spot of amusement at the table, and for once I was truly thankful for her presence.

With a deep breath I stood up and leaned forward, placing my hands on the edge of the table. "Let us not forget the one hundred years of darkness, where years of civil war made this realm ripe for a man like my uncle to rise, beginning what we all know as the Dark Reign. Let us not forget that during the Dark Reign, my uncle turned brother against brother, father against son, controlling minds with his dark magic and bringing unspeakable horrors to those who resisted him. Let us not forget that he single-handedly wiped out cities and burnt their citizens alive as examples. And let us not forget that he wielded a power so strong, he cast this entire world in darkness for six full days. All so that in his bloodlust, he could take the shield of power and steal the unity stone from the guild in order to take over this world.

"And I believe your lands were struck, were they not?" I looked straight at Sir Randik, who shrank back in his chair a little. "Yes, I believe I read you inherited your mountains from your oldest brother, who, after leading a small rebellion against Lord Eris, was tied to a chair with a bowl of small rats fastened to his stomach, and he died as they clawed their way through him." Sir Randik blanched, and then I turned my attention back to the crowd, who looked very uncomfortable.

"I do not say these things to bring up pains from the past. I need you to remember what it is we are up against. I need you to remember that it was our disunity in the first place that allowed a man like my uncle to bring about so much horror and almost succeed in taking over this world. He might have failed last time, but this time, he has something that he did not have before: the shield of power.

"Sir Randik is right: I arrived in this world just a few months ago. I do not pretend to understand the nuances of your relations with mainland, and I am certainly not trying to act like an expert on the matter—that's not why I'm here. If I've given any of you that impression, I am sorry because I know that I am the very least among all of you. I've been thrown into a life of privilege, where my grandfather has seen fit to have me dressed in all the finest gowns and stuffed with all the richest foods, with no special regard for my education. So I challenged all of that.

"Yes, I read. I studied. Everything I could get my hands on. And then I entered the games. I did not do it because I had some ulterior motive for power. No, I did it because I wanted freedom to make my own choices and educate myself further to help this realm. I did not want to be a decorative trinket sitting in some lord's bedroom." This earned a couple of snickers from the far end of the table. Not surprisingly, the groupies looked confused. "I wanted to be my own lord. I wanted the freedom to act. The way I went about it was deceitful, and I do not fault you for your lack of trust in me.

"But I swear on my life that I am not lying to you about this. As we speak, there is an army of shadowguard gathered along the northern wall, and it is only a matter of time before they break through. You say that I should marry Lord Danton Pontefract to seal Orindor's allegiance to Valdon—perhaps I should reconsider. But that would only help short-term, and based on the past
all
of you are well aware of, the shadowguard would eventually find their way here. Lord Eris will not stop at Valdon. He will try to carry out what he failed to achieve last time, and the only way we might stop him is if we stand together."

I paused, giving my words a chance to breathe and settle. "Please…I am not standing here before you as the princess of Gaia. I am standing here before you as a young girl who, in her limited time in this world, has witnessed magic of the darkest kind and had her father murdered in front of her by a man who will stop at nothing to gain power."

The table was silent. So silent, I heard the ring on Catia's pinky finger clink as she tapped it on the stem of her wine goblet. Eyes drifted from me down to the tablecloth and around at each other like they were all trying to pretend I wasn't there. Because if I was there, they would have to deal with what I had just said.

And then a gust of wind ripped through the terrace, tilting the lanterns, and the back of my neck tingled with sudden premonition. I looked behind me just in time to see one of the guards holding a bow with a black arrow aimed straight at Mercedes.

Chapter 12

Demons in the Night

T
ime has one direction: forward. At least that is what I had always thought. But for me, it was not so. For me, time was a malleable thing, substantive and changeable. It would move forward and backward and sometimes stop altogether. I never knew when this would happen; it just would. And then I would find myself the only moving creature in a world of stills, like an actor on a stage where all the other players had stopped moving in order to end the scene. Except in my case, the scene hadn't ended. It was just beginning, and I had a few seconds to act when no one else could, like when I had pinned the giant's hand to the support beam with my dagger. In this case, I had a few seconds to save someone's life.

I didn't have time to cross the table and reach Mercedes. My next best option was to deflect the arrow. So I grabbed my glass of wine and threw it at the archer's hand—the one that held the arrow in place. My glass hit its mark just as the archer's fingers
very
slowly released their grip, and with the snap of release, time returned to normal. The arrow sank into the table with a
thud,
mere inches before Mercedes, black feather fletching still vibrating from impact.