A Memory of Fire (The Dragon War, Book 3) (9 page)

"We fly from here,"
Tilla said. "I'll carry you."

"Unchain me and I'll fly
with you."

He had tried to shift many times
in his chains, only to find he could not. Whenever he'd summon his
magic, the ancient starlight of Requiem, his body would start to
grow, and wings would start to sprout from his back... and then the
chains would slam him back into human form, leaving him panting and
dizzy. Rune could shift with clothes, with weapons, even with armor;
those were parts of him like his skin. The chains were foreign
objects; they shackled his human form, and they shackled his dragon
magic.

Tilla shook her head. "I
cannot unchain you. Not yet. Not until you join us. I'll carry
you."

She stepped away from him,
leaving deep prints in the snow, and shifted. Her scales were white
as the snow, but her eyes were black, two pools of night against a
starry field. When she flapped her wings, she scattered snow across
the courtyard, revealing its cobblestones. Smoke plumed from her
nostrils, and fire glowed between her teeth, a single patch of color
in a white and black world. Rune stood before her, chained and
shivering, and she reached out her claws. She lifted him, an owl
lifting a mouse, and flew.

Wind whistled. Snow swirled
around them. The Citadel dwindled below. Rune watched it shrink
until it looked like a toy, just a pile of blocks white with snow.
The city streets snaked around it, bustling with people, thousands of
men and women and children all going about their lives. Thousands of
souls who cared not for his war. Thousands of souls who knew him as
an outlaw, a killer, a beast to be tortured.

They flew over the streets, the
city arena, and a dozen towering statues of Frey. They flew toward a
fortress with black towers, a place Rune had only seen once in
darkness.

"Castra Draco," he
whispered. "Bastion of the Legions."

The Legions had many forts
across the empire. Some trained recruits. Most housed garrisons of
troops. Some, like the Citadel, housed prisoners, and one—Castra
Academia—trained nobles for leadership. Draco was the heart of them
all. If the Legions were an empire of their own, this would be its
imperial palace. From this place did the generals command.

Will
she take me there for torture?
Rune thought, watching the fortress grow nearer.
Will
she place me in another dungeon and in more chains, and will the
whips of her comrades tear my skin?

Yet when they almost reached the
castle, Tilla banked and descended toward a street lined with tall,
narrow houses. Rune remembered this street. Last year, he had
rummaged here with Kaelyn through a barrel for posters. His heart
twisted at the memory.

"Kaelyn," he
whispered, and his eyes stung.

Last year, running and hiding
with Kaelyn through the wilderness, Rune had often found comfort in
thinking about Tilla—remembering her dark eyes, her smooth black
hair, her soft lips, and his childhood spent with her upon the
boardwalk. Hiding with Kaelyn, a wild rebel with flashing eyes, Rune
had sought his comfort with the ghost of an old love.

Today, clutched in that same old
love's claws, Rune thought of Kaelyn.

For
so long, Kaelyn, I wanted to escape you,
he thought.
I wanted
to go back home, back to Tilla, to never see you and Valien and war
again. But now I miss you.

He missed her eyes rolling at
him. He missed her finger jabbing his chest. He missed the sound of
her groaning at his jokes. And he missed her smile. He missed her
courage, her light that shone in the dark, and her love of life and
home.

He wondered if she even still
lived. Last time he'd seen the young woman, she had stood upon the
tower of Castellum Acta, dragon wings billowing her golden hair, and
she had cried his name. Had she fled with Valien through the tunnel?
Did she live now in exile, and was she thinking of him too?

Wings puffed out, Tilla
descended into a side street in the shadow of Castra Draco. Narrow,
three-story houses lined the street, their tiled roofs white with
snow, their gray bricks frosted. She placed Rune down outside one
house, shifted back into human form, and stood beside him.

Rune stood on shaky feet,
shivering in the snow. He wanted to hug himself, but manacles still
bound his wrists behind his back. Orange light glowed from windows,
and oil lamps flickered along the street, but Rune saw no other
people. Tilla walked toward the house, unlocked the door, and led
him inside.

"Welcome," she said,
"to my home."

A cozy room greeted them. An
armchair stood by a fireplace. Leather-bound books stood upon
shelves. Plates of bread, cheese, ham, and fruits stood upon a
wooden table. Tilla stepped toward the fireplace and soon flames
crackled, filling the room with warmth and light.

"You are a legionary,"
Rune said, looking around the chamber. "I thought you would
live in a fortress, surrounded by blades and shields."

Tilla locked the door behind
her, then began unbuckling her armor and hanging the pieces on pegs.

"The common soldiers do.
I'm an officer. I'm the officer who saved Shari's life." She
gave a rare, crooked smile. "Some comforts are allowed for me
here in the capital. The house is mine. When I asked to be
stationed in Nova Vita, the Cadigus family bought it for me, a place
of my own outside my barracks."

Rune wondered who had lived here
before Tilla, and if Cadigus had truly "bought" the place,
or if he'd made the previous occupant conveniently vanish.

"Why did you bring me
here?" he asked, hearing the bitterness in his voice. "To
gloat? To show off your comfort while I languish in a cell?"

Her eyes flashed with rage, then
softened, and she sighed. She unbuckled her last plate of armor and
stood before him in a woolen tunic. Suddenly she looked so much like
the old Tilla—Tilla Roper from Lynport—that Rune could almost smell
the sea.

"Not to gloat," she
said. She began to load a plate with bread slices, slabs of ham,
cheese, and grapes. "To share this with you. Come, sit with me
and eat."

The armchair was wide enough for
two. Tilla sat in one corner, the plate on her lap, and patted the
space beside her.

"Will you unchain me before
our meal?" he asked, standing before her.

"You know I can't. Not
yet. Sit by the fire with me. Eat and drink with me. Please."

He wanted to refuse. He wanted
to barge against the door, break it open, and run into the street.
Yet he doubted he was strong enough. He was barely strong enough to
stand. He was too famished, too thirsty, too tired. He sat by her
in the armchair, his wrists still bound behind him, and let the
flames warm him. It was a tight squeeze. Pressed against him,
Tilla's body warmed him as much as the fire.

"It's a bit hard to eat
with my wrists chained," he said.

She held a grape up for him.
"Pretend I'm not your jailor, but your beautiful serving girl,
feeding you grapes in luxury."

"Is that a joke, Tilla?
You can joke at a time like this?"

"Eat
.
"

He could not refuse it. He
needed this food. He took the grape into his mouth, chewed, and
swallowed. The juices flowed down his throat, sweet and healing. He
had never known food to taste this good.

They ate, the fireplace warming
them. Tilla held out pieces of cheese, ham, and bread for him, and
he ate those too. He drank wine from her mug.

"It feels almost like the
old days," she said. "Sitting by the fire at the Old
Wheel."

He swallowed another grape and
looked at her. She stared at the fire, her face golden in the light,
as if lost in memory.

"I thought you didn't like
to remember," he said.

She looked at him, her eyes
soft. "I always remember, Rune. Always. I never forget. We
can have a life again. Together. Here in this home." She held
his knee and leaned closer, bringing her face but an inch from his.
"I spoke to the emperor about it already. He will let you live
here with me." A tear trailed down to her lips. "You and
me together again. Always."

He looked away from her at the
crackling fire. "And at what cost? I would have to serve him."

"You would. You would join
the Legions. You would train. The training is difficult, but you
will survive it, and I will be there, watching over you. You will
fight for Cadigus, a soldier like me. You will raise his banners and
bear his sigil. You will hail him in the days like I do. But at
night, Rune... at night you can come back here to me."

Suddenly the food tasted stale.

"I cannot serve him,"
he said. "How can you serve him, Tilla? How can you wear that
armor? Bear the red spiral? Worship the man who killed my father,
who burned our home, who crushes Requiem under his heel?"

"Because I want to live!"
She grabbed his cheeks and forced his face back toward her. Her
eyes flashed and her lips peeled back. "Because I'm a survivor.
Damn it, you don't have to love him. Do you think I do? Do you
think anyone does? Do you think I love the man who burned our home?
You don't have to love him, Rune. You only have to fear him."

"Is that what you do? Fear
him? Are you a warrior or a coward?"

"A survivor," she
said. "I joined the Legions and I served him. I did what I had
to do to live. And I'm trying to save your life too. Call it
cowardice if you will. I'd rather be a live legionary than a dead
resistor."

Rune thought of Kaelyn again,
the woman who hid in burrows, crawled through the mud, and fought
through fire and rain. He thought of Valien, his guiding star, the
man who lived in ruins but sang for light. They were brave. They
were noble. Did they even still live?

"I don't want to die,"
he said, Tilla's hand still holding his knee. "But I have to
believe they're still alive somewhere. Kaelyn. Valien. The others.
I have to believe there is still hope for them. For Requiem. And
for you, Tilla."

She blinked tears from her eyes.
She rose to her feet.

"Come with me, Rune. I
want to show you something."

She helped him to his feet and
headed toward a staircase. They climbed upstairs into a bedchamber.
A clock stood upon a bureau. An iron spiral hung upon the wall over
a bed. Outside the window, beyond a few snowy trees, loomed the
towers of Castra Draco.

"What did you want to show
me here?" Rune said, lips twisting bitterly. "The spiral
that hangs over your bed? The fortress that shadows you even here?"

She shook her head. "No.
I wanted to show you this."

She stepped toward her bed and
lifted something off her pillow. When she turned back toward him, a
shaky smile trembled on her face, and her eyes were moist.

A string of seashells lay in her
palm.

Rune blinked and felt his own
eyes dampen. The memories pounded through him. Once more he was
walking along the beach under the cliffs. The waves glistened in the
sun and splashed over his bare feet. A boy of fourteen, he collected
seashells into a pouch, choosing only the nicest ones. He strung
them along a string for her. He gave her this gift for her birthday,
and she laughed and tousled his hair.

"You kept it," he
whispered.

She placed it around her neck
and touched his cheek. "It means more to me than all the
spirals and forts in the world. It means more to me than my sword,
than my shield, than my empire. It's our childhood. It's our
memory. It's our love."

She kissed him. Her lips were
full and soft, and her tongue sought his, and her fingers smoothed
his cheeks. It tasted like salt—the salt of her tears and the sea.
Rune closed his eyes and he hated her, and he hated what she fought
for, and he loved her.

"I want you to come into my
bed," she said. "And I want to make love to you. Because
I love you, Rune Brewer. I always have, and I can't bear to lose
you."

She took him into his bed. It
was soft and warm and so was she. She removed their clothes, held
him close, and kissed him again. Their bodies moved under the
blankets, a dance more intoxicating than wine, than all their flights
over the sea. He had never lain with a woman before, but this felt
right. This was home.

When it was done, they lay
together in bed. He lay on his back, and she leaned up on her
elbows, kissed his lips, and played with his hair.

"I want us to stay here
forever," she said. "Stay with me here."

He looked at her pale face, her
smooth black hair, her dark eyes that spoke of so many years and lost
memories. He wanted to stay here with her. He wanted to choose her
kisses, not the whips and the rack.

He looked up at the iron spiral
that hung above them. He looked out the window at the fortress
towers. And he thought of Kaelyn—his comrade, his friend, the woman
he had fought with. He thought of her still fighting in the mud.

"Flee with me," he
said to Tilla. "Flee south with me, and we'll fight him
together. But I cannot join him. I cannot serve him. Not for you.
Not for anything. Flee with me south and fight with us... or return
me to my cell."

Her tears splashed against his
chest. She took him downstairs. She flew with him. And she
returned him to his cell.

 
 
ERRY

She wandered along Maiden Island,
tears in her eyes.

"Tirans," she
whispered. "My father's people."

She reached into her pocket,
found her father's medallion, and clutched it so hard it hurt.

All her twenty years, Erry had
lived among Vir Requis, her mother's people, an ancient race with the
magic to become dragons. She had lived with them in Lynport upon the
docks. She had served with them in the Legions. And finally, she
had spent moons with ragged Vir Requis refugees upon Horsehead
Island. Erry had inherited Requiem's magic from her mother, and she
too could become a dragon, unlike her father's people. Yet she had
always felt the outcast. A half-breed. The scrawny bastard of a
whore and a foreign sailor.