Daybreak (28 page)

He would’ve preferred all of his blood to fall. He longed for a more permanent ring of silence …

“I asked you a question, Seer.”

Crevan wrenched his chin up by his beard, forcing Argon from his trance. “They can hear it, Your Majesty.”

“Hear what?”

“The battle.” Argon blinked against the wavering colors, hoping to still the throb inside his skull. “They listen through the mages’ ears as the battle rages on. They feast upon its fury.”

As far as Argon knew, Crevan had never actually set foot inside the dungeons. It was obvious by how he bared his teeth against the noise that he found it unsettling. “Tell them to quiet.”

“I can’t, Your Majesty. Their minds are gone,” he said, when Crevan’s grip tightened. “Your beasts don’t understand that the things they hear are miles away. They believe themselves to be
in
the battle, a part of the fight.”

This didn’t seem to calm him. If anything, the King’s anger only grew. He whirled around to a large man who haunted the chamber’s doorway — a man so bruised and scraped that his body seemed lopsided, a man with more scar than skin.

“Silence them, beastkeeper! Silence them, or I will.”

The lump above the beastkeeper’s one good eye rose to nearly brush the uneven sprouts of his hair. The crack of his mouth fell in worry — revealing a half-row of broken teeth.

Once he’d thumped from the room, Crevan spun back to Argon. “Show me again.”

He didn’t have the strength to draw the vision. He was certain the effort would kill him. But the shackle upon his arm flared to life at the King’s voice. It understood the command and burned so angrily that Argon had no choice but to obey.

The scrying bowl crushed against his knees. The soldiers had carried it from the tower and into Devin’s cell at the King’s command. Something dark had overtaken the boy — some spirit that made him violent and angry. This spirit raged above the soldiers’ strength and even beyond the beastkeeper’s control. Though Ulric managed to keep him from erupting into his dragon’s form while he raged, his strength was still terrible.

Dark stains covered the floor near the chamber’s entrance — the prints of the soldiers who hadn’t escaped him in time.

But for whatever reason, the visions in Argon’s bowl seemed to calm him. This new spirit was as entranced by the magic as Devin had been. So Crevan had ordered Argon to stay in the dungeons day and night, hardly ever out of Devin’s reach.

The visions had so weakened him that Argon felt trapped beneath the basin. He wasn’t sure he could’ve lifted it to save his life. There was nothing to do but obey the King’s command.

He dropped his Seeing stone into the basin’s middle. Its marbled black surface began to spin violently, carrying the stone in a circle around the basin’s edge. As the stone rolled, the waters swirled. Colors leaked from its edges and came together in the middle, forming a picture.

A field of snow loomed out of the darkness. Wind stirred its flesh — a wind too great for Crevan’s birds, but not strong enough to dull Argon’s gaze. He Saw the bandit army gathering in the field. The woman at their lead carried an axe and a rounded shield. A strange mass of paint swirled across her features.

Argon held on tightly as Devin tore from the snow-filled pass. This was the part of the vision that shook him most: Devin’s fires would consume the woman. Her army would retreat inside the castle’s walls, where the mages would call the mountains down upon them — bringing every last bandit to a swift and violent end.

He braced himself as the fires grew inside the cloud, as the bandit woman’s face was stricken white with fear. But in the second before the fires fell, the image suddenly went dark.

It was as if the future blinked: a moment of black, and the image reappeared.

Only this time, everything had changed.

Something ripped across Midlan’s army — a shadow that tore through its magic and churned its steel aside. Bodies fell hewed in its wake. Blood coated the ground where the shadow passed.
 

The bandit woman and her army followed in its wake. They battled feverishly against sword and spell, widening the hole the shadow had left behind. Nothing the soldiers did seemed to stop them. It was as if they warred against the mountains, themselves …

Argon gasped when the vision suddenly changed. The shadow wrapped itself around his throat and dragged him from the clouds. Another flash of darkness, and Argon had fallen into the thick of the fight.
 

He stood in the soldiers’ ranks, helpless as the shadow crashed towards him. Bits of steel whipped past his eyes in a gold-tinged cloud. Hot spatters of blood stung his face. But worse than all of that was the noise — the roar the shadow loosed as it neared shook him to his bones. His spirit cringed and tightened against his marrow.

The ground came closer as Argon’s legs collapsed beneath him. He pressed his hands against his ears and watched from the tops of his eyes as the shadow burst through the last rank. It dragged the darkness in behind it — a seething, impenetrable cloud …

“Gah!”

Argon was so desperate to escape the cloud that he pulled himself from the vision. His head slammed hard against the dampened wall.

*******

“It’s impossible! It’s
not possible
!”
 

Crevan’s voice cut across his ears. Argon struggled to pull himself from the dark, struggled to make sense of all the screaming.

Ulric was there, though his voice sounded … strange. His words barely slid out between ragged breaths: “I wouldn’t have believed it, had I not seen it for my —”

“They were
bandits
!” Crevan roared. “Nothing more than an aimless pack of savages. You had every advantage. And you still lost!”

The chains upon Ulric’s wrist began to shriek with the King’s fury. Even through the cloud that muddled his head, Argon caught the hiss of its power.
 

“Please, Your Majesty!” Ulric yelped. “They weren’t bandits — you
know
they weren’t. Only one race in the Kingdom could’ve withstood our spells.”

“No, it isn’t possible!”

“I didn’t believe it either! But after what happened, there’s no mistaking what they were.”

Crevan roared again. There was a sharp
clang
as he slung his sword against the wall. Argon’s eyes snapped open in time to see the two halves of its blade strike the ground.

The King’s face was crimson with fury. He gripped the black dragon sewn onto his tunic, as if he meant to rip it from his chest. After a moment, his growling ceased. He spoke with deadly calm: “You let my mages die, you led a full branch of my army to its slaughter. You’ve lost my dragon —”

“He’ll return, Your Majesty,” Ulric whimpered. He fell to his knees and clutched his wrist out in front of him as the chained impetus burned. “He was wounded in his fight with the Dragongirl. Physical pain weakens the curse for a moment, makes its prisoners flee. But I can feel its hold returning,” he added when Crevan stomped towards him. “His presence is growing stronger. He won’t be able to resist my commands for long.”

“Good.”

With that single utterance, the shackle’s blaze went out. Ulric crumpled in relief — and Crevan’s eyes slid over to Argon.

There was nothing in them but the edge of steel: the cold promise that he would be dealt with … and dealt with swiftly. “You lied to me, Seer. You can’t tell me that you didn’t know those bandits were whisperers. You must’ve Seen their powers. You’ve failed me for the last time —”

“Your Majesty?”

Crevan dragged his glare from Argon and fixed it upon the door, to where a steward had appeared. Unlike most of Crevan’s stewards, he didn’t hide behind the doorway but stood boldly beneath its arch. He kept shoulders squared and his back straight — no doubt in an attempt to distract from the fact that he was a good head shorter than any of them.

“What?” Crevan snapped.

“I apologize for the interruption, Your Majesty. But I wanted to let you know that the Grandforest patrols have been reached and are ready to march upon Lakeshore at your command.”

Crevan’s glare slipped back. He squinted as if he’d just heard a secret whispered in a foreign tongue.

The steward raised his brows. He glanced at Argon and Ulric before he slipped up next to Crevan, favoring his right leg in a limp. “I’m sorry, Your Majesty. I should’ve been clearer.” He dropped his voice in a whisper that Argon had to strain to hear. “You told me — in the strictest confidence — that you wished to have the Countess brought to Midlan. Something about her having a weapon that might help us deal with the trouble in the Valley, a weapon she isn’t likely to give up without some sort of, ah,” he cast his eyes around him again and whispered something that sounded like
persuasion
.

Argon began to wonder just how long he’d been out.

Crevan, for his part, brightened immediately. His glower melted into a most unsettling grin. “Yes, very good. Give the order — and I want her brought in
alive
,” he added with a snarl. “D’Mere will be no good to me dead.”

“Of course, Your Majesty. I’ll see that it is done.” The steward bowed deeply before he limped from the room.

When Crevan turned back, Argon feared the steward’s interruption had only bought him a little more time. But the King’s anger seemed gone, and his eyes were alive with thought. “I’m going to give you one last chance, Seer. Watch for the Dragongirl. Tell me everything you See. I need to know when she’ll cross the Kingdom’s shores … and I want to know
where
.”

This was strange news: Argon had never known the Dragongirl to leave the Kingdom. Though he wondered where she’d gone, he knew better than to ask. For now, he would be content in the knowing that Crevan’s eye was turned elsewhere. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

The King stared at the wall above Argon’s head for a moment. His hand traced the jagged scar that cut through his beard — and his eyes turned dark as the dungeon’s innards.

“Once I have the Countess, the problem in the Valley will end swiftly,” he said, turning to Ulric. “I want your mages prepared to move the moment Argon knows where the Dragongirl will be.”

The archmage’s jaw went tight. His glare cut to where Argon lay. But in the end, he nodded.

“Good. And what about the prisoner from Copperdock? Has he spoken?”

“He hasn’t shut up,” Ulric growled. “He blathers on day and night about how we’ll all be sorry. But he hasn’t said anything useful, if that’s what you mean.”

“Then why don’t you kill him?”

“I’ve tried,” Ulric said evenly, the fury in his scowl dulled by exhaustion. “Spells don’t work, swords are useless. I’ve got him sunk inside a vat of water even as we speak. If that doesn’t kill him, I’ll have no choice but to lock him up somewhere and hope the worms do the rest.”

“Do whatever it takes. If he won’t talk, then he’s of no use to me,” Crevan said off-handedly. He took a few stomping paces towards the door before he paused. “In the meantime, I want you to gather the birds. Send them to the Endless Plains — to
threaten
, not destroy. They can kill a few of the giants, if they wish. But I’ll need the rest.”

“For what?”

“To work the soil, of course. We haven’t had a shipment since Gilderick disappeared. If I’m going to reclaim the Kingdom, my army must be fed.”

“But, Your Majesty — my grip is faint enough as it is,” Ulric said, pawing at his ears. “I can barely control that dragon with the mages hanging from my wrist, let alone a flock of birds —”

“Your problems don’t concern me. You’ll do as I command.”

The chains glowed hot with these words, and Ulric had no choice but to nod. He dragged himself to his feet and shuffled from the room.

“Watch for her, Seer,” Crevan growled as he went to follow. “Your every vision, every thought, and every dream had better be about the Dragongirl.”

“Yes, Your Majes …” Argon reached for his Seeing stone, but his arm locked up. A searing pain traveled along his tendons and bone — the path of a molten finger not to be ignored.

Tell the King the truth. Tell him what he needs to know
.

Argon was no warrior, and he wasn’t a young man, either. He crumbled quickly beneath the pain. “There’s a great power in the Endless Plains — I’ve Seen it.”

Crevan froze in the doorway. “What sort of power?”

“I do not know, Your Majesty. In my visions it was a murderous storm that tore the wings from your beasts. Only by the mages’ spells was it at last made silent.”

Crevan scowled, though the fall of his brows was more brooding than angry. “Very well, have Ulric send some of the mages along — but I want them back at their posts the moment the giants are taken care of. I won’t risk letting the Dragongirl slip past me again.”

Ripples fanned across the basin’s waters when Crevan slammed the door, trembling under the force. 

Argon lay heavily upon the cold stone floor and buried his face inside his hands. The silence broke him: not long ago, he’d been safe inside his tower, warmed by the chatter of young mages, the noise of their work, the odd blast of a mis-formed spell.

But now all of that was gone, as well.

Crevan had ripped the young mages away not long after he’d taken Devin. Now they were scattered all across the Kingdom, forced into the ranks of the battlemages. Fury stung Argon’s flesh when he thought of the horror their young eyes had seen, of the terror they were being forced to witness. The realm suffered beneath Crevan’s rule. But at least the young ones had been safe.

Now the Kingdom was at war once again, and he’d called out the power of every mage.

Argon’s nails bit into his skin as he clutched the sides of his head. Oh, he wished desperately to be a stronger man — to have the strength to resist the pain, or the freedom to end it. But she would never let him. No, he was doomed to serve her until Death closed his eyes.

“Why?” Argon whispered into the cold. “I’ve done everything she’s asked for. I’ve kept to her plan. Why is she doing this to me?”

“You’ve been chasing your
own
visions,” a sly, crackling voice answered. “You’ve done only the tasks that served your purpose, and you’ve ignored the rest. The King will never triumph without your visions … so she’s sent me to make certain you listen.”