‘Is that it? You’ve seen a dragon? I could have told you that myself. My riders have eyes too, Zaster.’
‘Yes. The war-dragon your riders saw, Your Holiness.’ Zaster bowed low. ‘B’thannan. Rider Hyrkallan’s mount. It confirms that he is leading the rebellion, Your Holiness.’
‘Pshaw!’ Vale winced. The speaker had half a goblet of wine dangling from her fingers. She’d been known to throw it at councillors who annoyed her. ‘What else? Will you dazzle us with the revelation that the sun rises in the morning and sets at night? Of course Hyrkallan leads this insurrection. And Almiri? How much is she helping them? What about Sirion? Does he send aid to them too? Tell me something useful or be silent. I want proof of these treasons, not hearsay!’
Zaster had always been too quick to take offence. His lips drew tight together. He started to sit down; as he did, Vale found himself rising. It was such a surprise that he didn’t quite understand what was happening at first, and then had to wonder whether some sorcery was at work. But no, his own legs, nothing more. He looked from face to face, suddenly uncertain. He wasn’t supposed to have opinions, so what in the realms could he be needing to say?
His legs seemed to know what they were doing though, so he extended the same trust to his mouth.
‘Hyrkallan won the Speaker’s Tournament a decade ago when Hyram took the Speaker’s Ring, Your Holiness. And a decade before that as well, when it was Iyanza.’
Zafir gave him a scornful look. ‘Since when do Guardsmen speak in the Speaker’s Council?’
He bowed and fell silent, but he’d done enough. The spymaster nodded. ‘When the talk is of warriors, Your Holiness,’ he murmured. ‘Hyrkallan is a clever man, a good rider, strong, brave, with all the best qualities. Most of all he has experience and respect. The other riders of the north will follow him. They are much more dangerous with him than without, Your Holiness. As they have already shown.’ A thundercloud passed across Zafir’s face. No one spoke about Drotan’s Top, but it hung in the air throughout the palace. Hyrkallan had bloodied her nose there and it still stung, even if she’d bloodied him back since.
‘Give me dragons!’ shouted Prince Sakabian. ‘Let me smash them!’
Zafir glared him into silence.
He’s right though. Any other speaker would have summoned a hundred dragons, sent out the Guard and crushed this nonsense. Zafir does nothing. Why?
Vale felt he ought to have been sitting down but somehow he wasn’t. Instead, there were more words coming out. ‘Why is he doing this, Lord Zaster? Why did he not go north all along? He has the whole of the north as his weapon if he chooses to use it, for they would follow him. He could force Jaslyn off her throne and come at you with ten times the dragons that follow him now. Why does he not?’
Zafir glared at him. ‘If you’d done what was asked of you, Guardsman, then Hyrkallan and his Red Riders wouldn’t even exist, would they?’ She spat the words out. The fingers holding her goblet were twitching. ‘If you’d taken all of Shezira’s riders. If you hadn’t let
Almiri
, of all people, escape. I should have removed you from your post there and then.’
Vale bowed. He sat down.
‘They need to be dealt with, Your Holiness,’ snapped Zaster. ‘You should send Watchman Tassan—’ He didn’t get any further. Zafir’s goblet caught him on the side of his head. Hard. Zaster staggered and put his fingers to his temple. They came away bloody.
‘You
presume
to
tell
me what I should do?’ She waved a hand at Vale. ‘Send this idiot to finish cleaning up the mess he should never have allowed in the first place? Now that they have their dragons? And how many of the Adamantine Guard shall I throw away into the Maze?’ She snorted. ‘Very well, Lord Zaster, if they
must
be dealt with, and if my dragon patrols are not enough to satisfy you,
you
deal with them. Hire more sell-swords. Put a bigger reward on Rider Hyrkallan’s head. On all of them. My weight in gold for every one of them. And while you’re at it, they must be getting their potions from somewhere. Get me
proof
that Almiri is sending them supplies and I will reduce Evenspire to ash. Let their dragons turn rogue and eat them!’
Jeiros jumped to his feet. ‘Your Holiness, Evenspire is a city of thousands! As large as the City of Dragons itself! Your dispute—’ He bit his lip. ‘
Our
dispute is with Queen Almiri, not her subjects.’
Zafir snarled: ‘Then why don’t you find some way to lure her away from her defences, eh, alchemist? But
after
you have finished learning to count.’ She turned back to Zaster. Her face softened a little. ‘Spymaster, you have not answered the Watchman’s question. Why
is
Hyrkallan pursuing this foolishness?’
Zaster licked his fingers and shook his head. The look he gave Zafir was venomous. ‘Oh I dare say he’ll tire of this soon enough. Without him, I’m sure the rest will disperse.’ That would have earned him the goblet again, if Zafir hadn’t already thrown it at him. The speaker bared her teeth.
‘Sell-swords, Zaster. More sell-swords. They are cheap and expendable.’
‘Wasn’t Rider GarHannas among them?’ asked Prince Tyrin suddenly. ‘GarHannas of Bloodsalt?’ He was looking at Lord Eisal. Eisal pretended he hadn’t heard but the damage was done. The council slipped back to doing what it did best, sniping at one another and making sure that nothing useful ever got done. Vale closed his eyes for a moment. Ten thousand men and two hundred riders sat idle at the palace. If he’d been permitted an opinion, it might have been that they should be doing
something
.
10
Jaslyn
‘Is there news, Your Holiness?’
Jaslyn sighed and slid off her dragon. Her
new
dragon with his glittering silvery black scales. A real prize. Morning Sun, Isentine had named him, but Jaslyn still thought of her old dragon, Silence, every time she flew. In her head, this new one had a different name. Not morning, but mourning. It felt much closer to her heart. They sounded the same too, which kept everybody happy. Her little secret.
She took off her helmet and dropped it on the packed, scorched earth of the landing field. One of the Scales would pick it up later. ‘I wish you wouldn’t call me that, Eyrie-Master.’ She didn’t even glance back at the dragon behind her. The sun was low and its bulk cast them both into shadow.
Eyrie-Master Isentine bowed as best his age and stiff back would let him. ‘A thousand apologies, your . . . Your Highness.’
‘That’s all I am, Eyrie-Master. For as long as my mother . . . for as long as Queen Shezira is alive. Even imprisoned within the Adamantine Palace,
she
is your mistress. You should call me student and I should call you master.’ That had been one of her mother’s last commands. Isentine was getting old and they’d need a new eyrie-master before long. A master or perhaps a mistress.
She tried to smile but it seemed she didn’t know how any more. Isentine stared at his feet.
‘Not much,’ she said after they’d stood in awkward silence for far too long. ‘Hyrkallan has plundered Drotan’s Top. The speaker’s dragons have taken a couple of his riders but so far he evades her grasp. Everyone demands that I call him back and make him knight-marshal in Nastria’s place.’ She shook her head. ‘We don’t even know that Nastria is dead. Almiri begs and pleads for us to go to war. My husband-to-be is alive and still hasn’t found his way to Sand. His father, King Sirion, continues to shout for revenge for Hyram’s death but can’t decide whether it’s Zafir or Shezira who should feel his wrath. And I, I just feel that my time is running out. I want to climb onto Silence and fly away. Far, far away and never come back. Except Silence is gone.’
Isentine screwed up his face in horror. ‘Holiness!’
‘Highness!’ Jaslyn scowled.
‘Highness! You cannot—’
‘Cannot speak like that, Eyrie-Master? If not to you then to whom? Our knight-marshal is dead and our queen is imprisoned for treason. I’m surrounded by men and women I barely know who wear long stern faces and expect me to be my mother when I’m not. My elder sister only wants my dragons and my younger sister Lystra is far away, married and a hostage to that monster Jehal.’ She clenched her jaw. Sometimes when she thought of Lystra she wanted to cry, but that wasn’t allowed, not even where only Isentine would see. ‘I miss her most of all, Eyrie-Master. In her letters
she
, at least, sounds happy.’
‘Perhaps, Your Highness, she will persuade . . .’
‘My- Queen Shezira and King Valgar have been in the speaker’s dungeons for more than a month. Our knight-marshal plotted with King Valgar to murder Speaker Zafir, and our queen apparently pushed Lord Hyram off a balcony.’
‘Lies, Your Highness. All lies.’
‘Really? I want to believe you, Eyrie-Master. But their accusers are not Zafir’s servants or Jehal’s. They are Adamantine Men. Perhaps they might be bribed to lie about Nastria, but about Hyram? They were his own Guardsmen. He died under their watch. They failed. Why would they lie? I cannot believe they would conspire against their own lord.’
‘But surely you cannot believe—’
‘What? Can’t believe that my mother would have pushed Hyram to his death? After the way he betrayed her? I remind you, Isentine, of whom we are talking.’
Jaslyn tore herself away from Morning Sun, walking briskly towards the looming tower of Outwatch. Isentine struggled to match her pace. Walking meant he couldn’t see her face. She wasn’t like her mother. She couldn’t hide it all away. She couldn’t be strong all the time on the outside no matter what she felt on the inside.
She took a deep breath. ‘That’s not why I came here, Eyrie-Master, nor why you called me.’ Although any excuse would do. She liked the bleakness of Outwatch, sitting on the top of its cliff, presiding over miles and miles of tunnels and caves where the dragons were kept. Liked the flight over endless miles of barren featureless burning sand and rust-coloured stone that brought her here. Liked this isolated and inexplicable oasis of green that just happened to be the greatest eyrie in the north. Now that Isentine knew better than to turn out the guard for her whenever she arrived, it was the windy, lonely, lost place it had always been meant to be, and it drew her in whenever it could.
‘It feels empty here,’ she murmured, as much to herself as to Isentine.
‘Most of your dragons are at Southwatch,’ huffed Isentine. Of course they were. She’d sent them there, after all, to stand guard over Almiri in case the speaker brought war across the Spur.
‘Yes.’ And the few she’d left here spent most of their time in the Worldspine. Wasting their time searching for the remains of the white dragon that had nearly killed her.
‘I might have found the dragon you’re looking for.’
The words grabbed hold of her as surely as a strong pair of hands. She froze. For a moment she thought he meant the white.
‘What?’
‘There’s been another hatchling, Your Highness. A male. A hunter.’
Jaslyn’s heart climbed into her mouth. ‘What colour?’
‘Deep blues and greens, Your Highness.’
Jaslyn started walking again. An overwhelming disappointment settled around her. Not the dragon she was looking for. Not her Silence.
‘But he’s a vicious one, Your Highness. He won’t eat or drink anything we bring him. He attacks the Scales. He’ll die before the end of the week. I’ve never met anything quite like it. We’ve always had hatchlings that wouldn’t take and there
have
been a lot of them lately, but this . . . this is exceptional. I might even have put him down if it wasn’t for your order.’
‘Does he speak?’
Isentine didn’t reply. As far as the eyrie-master was concerned, it seemed that anyone who thought dragons could talk probably believed in ghosts and gods and all manner of other foolishness. It didn’t help that the one time Silence had spoken to Jaslyn, as he lay dying, he hadn’t
spoken
as such; rather, his thoughts had mingled with hers.
Or maybe she was going mad.
Silence had been ash-grey. He was dead now, but in his last thoughts he’d told her that he would be reborn. He’d told her that dragons lived in an eternal cycle of birth and death. No one had ever thought to mention this to Jaslyn before, but Isentine had confirmed, when she’d pushed him, that the alchemists believed this was true. It was a secret passed down among them, shared only with kings and queens. She was as good as a queen, he’d said, so now she could know. She’d nearly hit him for that.