Damsel Knight (39 page)

In other words, she received an order and carried it out. Boone can’t imagine her mother proposing a plan like that. Attacking without even warning your own people. Though, if she’s been trading away her own memories, it’s hard to tell how much of her mother is left.

“What do we have to trade anyway?” Alice asks, ignoring the surprised look Angus shoots her. Good. She’s learning.

“Magic,” her mother says. “Spells, knowledge, technology.”

At the last one the heavy man gives a huff of disbelief.

Her mother ignores him, but her blue-grey eyes flash with annoyance. “In return we’ll give you our own in trade. Our technology should interest you. You’ll find there are ways of enhancing the effects of magic without increasing the cost, in some cases bypassing the need for magic completely.”

Neven coils with tension, clearly holding back a multitude of questions. A noise comes from the balcony, distracting him from his agony. A horn. Its deep notes sing out a horribly familiar message.

A dragon is coming.

Chapter 41

“Are the soldiers prepared?” Her mother watches the small golden dot in the sky through the open balcony doors. She’s calmer than Boone’s mind tells her she should be. The mother she remembers would fret and worry over the least thing. A burnt dinner, not enough of something to make breakfast the way her father likes, whether the floors were clean enough. But this mother is not her mother. She has to keep reminding her herself of that.

The plump man nods, speaking for once. “Yes. All ready.”

“Don’t worry,” her mother says, turning back to the group across the table. Everyone but Timon is on their feet, the little boy looking around nervously. “We expected this. Our men can take care of it. I suggest you go and shelter with your people. The women will be scared.”

“That’s madness.” Angus moves his angry gaze between her and the growing golden dot outside. “Our men can fight.”

By his side Julius nods. “You’ll need our help.”

“And when was the last time your people fought a dragon?” Her mother asks. It might be her imagination, but Boone thinks she hears a bitter edge behind the words. “I hear your King never got around to replacing the last dragon knight he had.”

“I was his squire and I picked up a great many of his tricks,” Julius says. “We have working catapults. I’ve made sure of that. And stockpiles of bows and arrows.”

“And men and women to use them,” Alice adds.

A red dot flies up to meet the golden one. It seems so very small next to it. A spray of blinding white flame shoots from the golden dragon’s mouth. Gelert dodges, looking like a tiny fish trying to jump from a large river. Gelert might be of size with a small castle, but the golden dragon is at least ten times as big.

Boone’s heart hammers all the way up her throat, making it difficult to breathe. She’d never thought of Gelert as fragile before. Vulnerable, yes. Breakable, yes. There are enough people who want to kill him, and want is a powerful thing. But she had never pictured it as easy to do. Not for someone Gelert didn’t think he should be able to trust.

Now, against the monolith of a dragon, killing Gelert looks all too easy.

“Alright,” her mother sighs. “Do what you see fit. I’ll release your men. My men will take position on the roof. Don’t interfere with my men, and I won’t interfere with yours.”

Julius gives a half bow that she’s not sure is mocking or serious. His braided hair swings almost to his feet. “Understood.”

“And Bonn-Boone comes with me. You get one dragon expert. I get the other.”

Ness and Angus have already run from the room, but Neven stops at this, frowning. “I thought all people from the north were dragon experts.”

“We try not to be. As long as they have what they need, they stay away. That’s enough for any northerner to know.” The slim man offers Neven a smile that shows too many teeth. He leaves the room at the same brisk pace as the other two rich men.

Neven stares after them, a frown still on his face.

Sometimes she thinks she knows him better than she knows herself, and that expression is one she's seen before. Something's wrong. He doesn't know what it is yet, but he's puzzling it over in the same way he'd puzzled over an invention that didn't do what he expected it to do.

"Boone?" Her mother stands in the ornate doorway. There's a strain beneath the calm of her expression that reminds her of the haunted look she'd once thought must be a permanent part of her mother's face. It's comforting in a strange way to see something familiar.

She follows.

They walk down the marble steps, fast, but not at the all-out run her feet want to. Captain Airell leads the group, keeping pace remarkably well for someone his size. Jack is out of breath by the time they reach the ground floor, while the richer barbarians look as composed as if they were going for a stroll.

Something needles at her. "This isn't the way to the roof."

"We have men outside. At the back of the palace." Her mother doesn't break her pace, carrying on in that direction, past the throne room. They speed up as they walk down the marble corridor. The wooden doors flick by faster as they near the end, rooms getting smaller as they move further from the grand front of the palace.

"Everything's ready Major," the plump man says.

They reach the door and step out onto cobblestone. Ahead a path winds through horse paddocks. The animals within are nowhere to be seen, having fled from the dragons overhead.

Doubt sends tingles down her spine. It feels a lot like fear. "You didn't say anything about having men back here."

Jack hesitates at her side. "I don't see anyone."

He's right. Nothing but green fields. The barracks to her left, a storage shed far to the right. Around it all the high wall of grey stone. Several men crowd a clumsy looking machine that may be a catapult, far away on the top of the wall to the right. But she can tell from here that they're not barbarians. Their clothing is too colourful for that.

Boone hurries to keep up. Whatever magic these people have cast on their endurance, it's more powerful than anything she's seen before. Her mother glides ahead with the rest of them. It's like she's joined a whole different species.

"Now." Her mother doesn't stop, doesn't look back.

The world explodes.

Boone spins around. On the right hand side of the roof of the palace is a huge smoking hole. Above in the blue sky, the two dragons jump apart, startled by the noise.

Another explosion rocks her ears. Blue flames roar into life, then disappear to smoke. Another explosion, and another, and another.

Boone's running before she realises. A hand grabs her arm, jerks her back.

She knows it's her mother before she turns around. She's felt those thin fingers dig into her arm enough times before. "Neven is in there!"

"He had a chance. That's more than his King gave my husband." Her mother pulls at her arm. She's strong. Her boots slip and slide along the cobblestone path.

The three rich barbarians are already at the wall. They walk up the nearest set of steps. Walk, not run. They're in no hurry. The work is done. This is a victory for them.

"You planned this!" Boone screeches. She wills her dead arm to move, but it stays limp at her side. Golden armour covers her mother's arm from shoulder to elbow in shining scales, like a dragon. Smaller scales cover her fingers. No skin within reach. Nothing to turn her dead arm to an advantage even if it did move. "You planned this from the start! There was no trade!"

"Mam." Jack sounds so confused. "There are children in there. In the cellars."

"Children don't matter in a place like this Jack. You know that." The woman tilts her head toward the still distant wall. "Now help me get her out of here."

They're heading toward the wall, but slowly. Boone's boots are outmatched by strength, but they fight for every inch they lose. Her shoulder burns where the arm meets the socket.

Jack's hands hover hesitantly. "I don't know if-"

Hate spins its furious way around her head. All those attacks. They'd only died down after her mother had seen her that day. And those little girl dresses, and the peculiar way Gelert had reacted to them. "You were leading it here! You didn't care about capturing the palace. You only wanted to get inside. To destroy the last barrier."

"Don't you see?" Her mother's pale blue-grey eyes look at her, wide and desperate. The tugs at her arm become more desperate. It can't be safe to stay here out in the open after what they did. "After your father was killed no one mourned. No one questioned. They accepted it. They hated me for being associated with someone who broke their precious rules. They won't change. An animal caged all its life won't think to leave if the cage door is opened. They're cruel, and they'll always be cruel. They're not worth your pity."

It's a million miles away from the woman who held her down to brush her hair or force new dresses on her. The one who told her to mind her manners, and became so despairing and furious every time she saw her with Gelert.

"They're not the ones who killed him!"

"One of them did." Her mother pulls at her, gold covered fingers digging into her arm. Her eyes dart around, taking in the shouting men with the catapult, the fighting dragons overhead, the slowness of their jerking progress toward the steps. "One of them had to spot that dragon and tell the soldiers. They killed my husband, and they felt nothing. They'll burn for that. They'll burn for him!"

Revenge. Old age isn't the worst form of magic, taking and never giving. It's revenge. King Robin has always purged all users of magic in the kingdom. The survivors fled to the north and are still all too happy to destroy that kingdom, even after a thousand years. Claudia destroyed her son in her attempts to avenge his death. Ness tried to kill a dragon that had nothing to do with his family's death. The medic died trying to take revenge for a slight that only existed in his mind. She tried to kill the only family she thought she had left.

It has to stop.

"Do you even remember him?" Boone digs her heels into the cobblestones, trips, loses another foot of ground. Her blood feels like it's searing hot, then a moment later freezing cold. The air around her sizzles from the fire being traded overhead. "Do you? Or did you trade all of your memories away. Would you even remember if you did?"

"I remember him." Her eyes flick uneasily to her left. The men around the catapult have noticed them. They shout to each other, distant voices barely audible over the clamour of the dragons. A few make their way to the stone steps nearest to them. "Of course I remember him. I wouldn't give those memories away."

"Then you remember the arguments we had? The way papa used to beg you not to work so hard? The way you'd make yourself sick over a stain that wouldn't come out? The way you cried in front of papa and asked him to take Gelert away?" The force dragging Boone forward stops. She's left panting, leaning as far away from her mother as she can.

The woman blinks in confusion. "That never-"

"You want revenge, but you don't even remember why. You don't remember him. You don't remember me." Boone takes a deep breath, lets it out. There's no other way. She has to get back to her friends. "You don't remember where you were that day, do you? Me and papa looked everywhere. The house. The gardens. I thought I'd missed you. That Gelert found you. But that wasn't true. You really did leave."

The grip on her arm loosens, but not enough to get free. Her mother shakes her head, mouth gaping. "I wouldn't do that."

"That's right. You wouldn't go anywhere without a male escort. You didn't think it proper. That's why papa was so angry when the soldiers came. He thought they'd done something to you. That wasn't true either. He worked it out in the end." Boone lifts her chin, doesn't let any emotion cross her face as she speaks the secret she'd pieced together the moment she found out her mother was alive. "It was you. The only reason you'd leave would be a matter of great importance. A matter for the King. You hated Gelert. You told them he was there."

Her mother flinches as if hit, her hand drops from Boone's arm. Choking sounds emit from her throat as if she's trying to find something to say. There is nothing to say.

Boone spins around, running back down the cobbled path toward the palace. The building looks strange. Bloated. The holes in the roof still pour out smoke, but it's clear whatever they'd done goes further than a few bombs. Giant glowing blue cracks spider web themselves down the walls of marble. They're not giving the building much of a chance to get out of this unscathed, or the people inside it.

"Stop her!" Her mother finds her voice. The words aren't an order. They're a plea.

Boone passes right by Jack, but the man doesn't move.

In the sky above the golden dragon sideswipes Gelert with its massive tail, sending the smaller dragon flying into the left of the palace. The far left side of the palace disappears in a hail of marble that reaches inches from her feet. Gelert skids across the ground, unturfing several hundred metres of grass.

The dragon struggles to his feet just in time to leap backward as the golden dragon lands where he had been. The size of the thing is massive. Its tail brushes the side of the palace, causing marble to crumble as if it were made of dirt.

Its eyes are completely unlike Gelert's black pools. They're a simple white with a slash of amber down the centre, and in the middle of that a smaller slash of black pupil. They remind her of snakes eyes. Not that much larger than Gelert's own despite its body being ten times as big.

It lunges at Gelert with a house sized foot. Not a roundhouse, but a large stone house. The bronzed claws are as long as the round table they’d sat around not long ago and wickedly curved. The momentum causes the golden tail to whip in her direction. She ducks just in time and keeps running for the door.

Chills prickle her skin despite the exertion. The end of the tail is as thick as a roundhouse in places. If it had been sweeping along the floor there's no way she could've dodged it.

A loud crack sounds behind her. She doesn't turn, jumping through the doorway and running along the marble corridor. Thin blue cracks pepper the walls.

A crash explodes behind her, and this time she does glance back. Red scales cover the doorway, or where the doorway had been. Gelert lies against the smashed in wall. He's not moving.