Dragon Thief (12 page)

I don't know if I asked the next question to absolve some of the guilt I was feeling, or to punish myself. It had fully sunk in how much of a bastard I had been, disappearing in a fit of pique the way I did. One of the last things I had said to Lucille—other than a grunt or a monosyllable—was that she was an ungrateful bitch.

“How is Lucille? Is she all right?”

Sir Forsythe shook his head. “The Dragon Prince is angry.”

Of course she was. “I guess I can't blame her.”

“The whole of the Lendowyn court, your husband especially, are convinced that your disappearance was at the hands of agents of Grünwald and King Dudley. That was why I was sent, My Liege. I was to gather proof of this, and retrieve you if I could.”

Given my past interactions with Grünwald and the Grünwald court, that had been a pretty logical conclusion. Wrong, but logical. “Mission accomplished, I guess.”

“You sound troubled.”

“Where's Prince Bartholomew? He woke up in the princess's skin and he just left?”

“You disappeared, My Liege.”

I nodded. Talking with him further, it seemed that Princess Snake had vanished the morning I'd made the bad decision to wear the Dark Lord's wedding gift. He would have had to make a run for it almost immediately. I couldn't quite reconcile that with what I had found out about this guy. I couldn't see him not taking advantage of the position he found himself in.

But he
had
disappeared, and I thought about what Sir Forsythe had said.
“The Dragon Prince is angry.”

The burned Grünwald village was even more disturbing now. Lucille hadn't waited for Sir Forsythe to return with evidence before attacking. Perhaps she took his capture to
be
that confirmation. Had she destroyed that town in retaliation for something that never happened? My heart sank.

What had I done to her?

We had to get me back to the Lendowyn court before this escalated any further.

 • • • 

I led Sir Forsythe in out of the cold. Inside the temple, the girls had sat down in a circle and turned their heads to face us as if they were in the middle of some sort of debate. It was still disconcerting to see them dressed as acolytes of the goddess of beauty and love. Now that I was less distracted by the aftereffects of contact with the Goddess, I noticed Lysea had gone beyond clothes and hairstyling. Most of them had elaborate makeup applied, including painted lips and nails. All except Krys.

I also noticed that Krys's clothing was different than everyone else's; her tunic had longer sleeves and a looser cut with a round neck hole rather than a vee. Also, while the other girls had jeweled accessories, necklaces, and bracelets, Krys had a pair of solid bracers on her wrists covered in elaborate knotwork.

In other words, she looked like the boy counterpart to the acolyte dress of the other girls. She also appeared more at home in her ensemble than the others did in theirs.

The fact that most of them still had salvaged swords and other weapons made the scene all the more surreal.

“He's still here,” Grace said, looking at Sir Forsythe.

“So am I,” I said. “What did we interrupt?”

Mary glared at me. “You
lied
to us.”

I glanced at Laya. “To be fair, you
were
holding a crossbow on me.”

“You dragged us miles away from—” Mary rose to her feet.

“Mary,” Grace said.

“—and nearly get us killed by these Grünwald—”

“Mary!” Grace snapped again, grabbing Mary's arm.

Mary stopped and sat back down.

“She's still right,” Laya whispered.

Grace stood up. “We're not holding a crossbow on you now. Does that mean we part ways now?”

Sir Forsythe stepped forward and said, “We will never abandon a distressed maiden to her fate. You need not worry, I will—”

I held up an arm to hold him back. “Quiet,” I told him. “Let the maiden tell you if she needs rescuing.”

“My Liege?”

I asked Grace, “Do you want to part ways now?”

“There is no treasure in Lendowyn, is there?”

I shook my head. “There's barely a treasury.” I patted Sir Forsythe's chest and dropped my arm. “The crown pays this guy with food, board, and the opportunity for extreme acts of self-sacrifice.”

“I do not serve for crass material gain,” Sir Forsythe said.

“Point made,” I said.

“Then why bring us at all?” Krys said. “After you slipped into that assassins' camp, you didn't have to stop for us. You could have ridden the carriage on your own through Grünwald. Why bring us?”

“I didn't want to abandon you.”

“What?” Grace sounded insulted.

I hooked a thumb at Sir Forsythe. “This guy is a bad influence.”

“You thought we needed saving?”

“I didn't know what I thought. I was improvising. Sometimes it works out—”

Grace glared at me. “Sometimes it doesn't.”

“Sometimes it doesn't,” I agreed.

“We didn't need no saving until we got involved with you,” Mary snapped.

“I'm sorry,” I said. “I messed up. Happens a lot lately.”

Six pairs of eyes stared at me and I felt more uncomfortable in my skin than I had since before I'd ever come to Lendowyn. I wanted to shout that this wasn't
me
.

Maybe that was why I clung to Snake's identity with them long after I had decided the guy was reprehensible, trying to disown my stupid decisions by being someone else.

“So in Lendowyn,” Grace asked, “do they round up people for sacrificial offerings?”

“Uh, no.”

“And there's less of Grünwald between us and Lendowyn than there is between us and anywhere else?”

“Yes.”

Grace nodded. “Fine.”

“Fine, what?”

“If you want to make things up to us, lead us across the border to Lendowyn. We can ply our trade anywhere, but I'd prefer somewhere that doesn't have a history of human sacrifice.”

“But I want to go home,” Thea said.

I saw Mary roll her eyes. “The farther from White Rock, the better.”

“But—” Thea started to blubber. Krys reached out and pulled Thea to her. She rocked back and forth with her, whispering, “Shush, your home's with us.”

“If that's what you want,” I said.

“My Liege?”

“What?”

“May I make a suggestion?”

“Still trying to rescue us?” Laya asked.

I sighed and shook my head. I doubted Sir Forsythe could make things worse. “Go ahead,” I told him.

“You have the right to declare your own retainers.”

“What do . . .” I trailed off.

“I'm sorry,” Grace said. “What is he talking about?”

“He means that I should offer you all an opportunity for something other than an outlaw life in the woods living off of what you can steal.”

“And if that's what we want?”

I shrugged. “Then that's what you want. Unlike Sir Forsythe, I'm not into non-consensual rescue. But he's right. I'm the new face at the court, and most of the people around me have other loyalties. The more people I hand pick, the better.”

“So,” Mary said, “servants?”

“Handmaids that can do some serious damage if needed,” I said.

Sir Forsythe bowed and addressed them all: “My Ladies, just over the border I left a camp of the princess's most loyal followers. They only wait for me to return with her, or news of her. You can join the court immediately.”

Grace shook her head with a half-smile. “And you'd pay us as much as this guy?”

“At least as well,” I agreed.

“You're not thinking—” Mary began, but Grace held up a hand.

“What about martial training?” Grace said.

“I'm sure Sir Forsythe here could teach you a thing or two.”

Grace said to the others, “Let's think about it.”

“Uh huh,” Mary said. “There's one problem here.”

Only one?

“What?” I asked.

“You're not a princess right now.”

There was that.

 • • • 

Sir Forsythe had overlooked the main flaw in his idea, that the same Lendowyn laws that had made me the princess in the first place meant that, by law, Snake was the actual princess of Lendowyn right now. And he'd remain the princess until someone else inhabited Lucille's body.

“Damn,” I said, “it seemed such an elegant solution too.”

Sir Forsythe rubbed his chin, smoothing his goatee. “I only know the basic lore, but the effects of the Tear are supposed to be temporary.”

“Tear?” I repeated.

“The Tear of Nâtlac,” he responded.

“What, in the name of all that's unholy, is the Tear of Nâtlac?”

“That is the jewel the Dark Lord gave you, My Liege. Didn't you know?”

Apparently I had missed some orientation when I fell into the role of nominal priestess of Nâtlac.

According to Sir Forsythe, every time the Dark Lord gives up possession of a soul, he sheds a single crystal tear. Of course, the crystal has some magical properties having to do with soul-swapping. Anyone who puts on the jewel will have their soul exchanged with someone whom the Tear deems compatible, a body where the soul is most comfortable.

“So he takes it off, we swap back, right?”

“No,” Sir Forsythe said. “It doesn't work like that.”

Of course not.
“How does it work, then? You said it was supposed to be temporary.”

Well, it
was
temporary, he told me. The traditional length of the enchantment was a year and a day.

I may have said something unkind.

“Is there any other way to reverse the effect?”

“The stories say that the death of the physical body will reverse the process.”

“The death of—”

Mary stood and placed a hand on the hilt of her salvaged sword. “Want my help?”

“No!”

A year and a day. I cursed my own stupidity, especially now that I knew one of my own retainers had all this information about the thing. “What if . . . What if he's taken it off, and one of us puts it back on again?”

“That is not part of the lore. But I suspect that if Prince Bartholomew would re-don the jewel, his soul would be drawn back to his original body—but if
you
wore it? I don't even think the Dark Lord Himself could predict where you might find yourself.”

Great. We just had to find Snake, and the jewel, and force him to put it on again. Simple . . .

Something was wrong.

Snake was a member of the Grünwald court, an exiled bastard member, but still, a member. That group was steeped in the lore of Nâtlac. King Dudley certainly assumed that his bastard half-brother knew enough of their evil little rituals to have planned a coup around sacrificing a bunch of teenage girls rather than, say, raising an army.

All that meant that, unlike me, Snake was probably quite aware of what happened as soon as he woke up in the wrong body. He'd only had to look at the necklace for confirmation.

So if that was the case, why would he run off? He'd know that by removing and replacing the necklace he'd return to his own body. If Sir Forsythe was right, slitting the princess's throat would do the same thing.

Probably, since I swapped him out while Weasel's goons were roughing him up, he hesitated returning right after it happened. But he'd know that his body was still around as long as he stayed put . . .

But still, he could have taken some sort of advantage from being the princess. Why did he disappear?

I was obviously missing something.

It was a long day.

While I really, really wanted to get out of Grünwald as quickly as possible, discretion made us wait. We were almost on top of the capital, and trying to escape with eight not particularly inconspicuous people was going to be dangerous enough without trying to do so in broad daylight. And after last night, everyone needed some rest, including me. So we camped out in the Goddess' temple until nightfall.

I took my rest on the far side of the octagonal room from the girls, leaning against one of the pillars to catch what sleep I could. What I remembered from my dreams was fragmentary, but I think they involved a couple of rude situations with the Goddess, though she spoke with Lucille's voice and stared at me with the eyes of a dragon.

The dream was interrupted by someone touching my shoulder. “You awake?”

I yawned and blinked my eyes. “I am now.”

The temple was deep in shadow. The braziers had long ago burned down to glowing coals. I could only see the outline of the person next to me, but I recognized the voice. “Krys?”

“Yeah.” She quietly slid down, her back to the pillar next to me.

“What do you want?”

She quietly laughed and said, “Things I can't have, usually.”

“I know—”

“—the feeling. You've said that before.”

“I did?”

“And I thought you were just . . .”

“Just what?”

“You
do
know.” She was quiet for a long time before she said. “You're going to find it, aren't you?”

“What?”

“That magic thing you and the knight were talking about.”

“The Tear of Nâtlac?”

“Yeah, that.”

“I'm going to try.”

“To become the princess again.”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“It may be the only thing that can help me fix all the things I've screwed up.”

She was quiet again, long enough that I almost thought she had fallen asleep. Then she said, very quietly, “But you were trapped, weren't you? It wasn't your body. It could never feel right.”

“This doesn't feel right.”

“It doesn't?”

I sighed. “Krys, Snake's body may be closer to how I see myself, how I used to see myself, but it still isn't me. And now it actually feels a lot less me than it was when I was in the princess's body.”

“But . . .”

“You were going to ask to use it, weren't you?”

“I—”

“It's all right. Someone has a magic widget that looks like it could fix all the problems in the world. Why wouldn't you want to use it? See, I know that feeling too.”

“I guess you do.”

“But it's not a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Using an artifact from one of the nastier Dark Lords of the Underworld? You'd have to be desperate, drunk
and
stupid to ever think that's a good idea.”

“But you used it.”

“Making my point.”

“But you didn't know how it worked. We could be more careful this time, watch my body as I—”

“Krys?”

“What?”

“It isn't just about you. Do you want to force some random innocent guy to live through what you're living through?”

“Uh?”

“And if he
wasn't
an innocent guy, if he's a manipulative homicidal bastard like Snake here, you'll be unleashing him on your friends—the friends you would be abandoning.”

“I'd come back.”

“If you're lucky, you might. But that jewel has its own logic. I ended up three kingdoms away. Who's to say it won't put an ocean between you and those you care about? And you won't just have a new body to deal with, but a new past. What if this guy is married? Has children? You'd take away someone's husband? Their father?”

She sucked in a shuddering breath and said, “T-That's not fair.”

“Life isn't fair.”

“But you—”

“I did something thoughtless and stupid, and hurt one of the few people I care about in this world. What's the point of that if I can't be an object lesson on what not to do?”

“So you won't let me use it.”

“You still want to?”

“Yes . . . No . . . I don't know.” She drew her knees up and rested her head on them. “I feel so trapped.”

“Well, if you're going to look for divine intervention, I suggest that looking for it from the Goddess Lysea is less apt to end in horrifying consequences than looking for help from a Dark Lord of the Underworld.”

I think I might have heard a weak chuckle. “She seems more pleasant company.”

“Krys, I know my word doesn't seem like much right now. But I promise that once I undo this mess I caused, there will be a place for you if you want it.”

“Your word as a princess?”

“As Princess Frank of Lendowyn.”

I heard her chuckle again.

“What?” I asked.

“I bet you make a very interesting princess, Frank.”

“Wait until you meet my husband.”

 • • • 

It was a long march to the border under cover of darkness. We were lucky that it was overcast with very little wind, since none of us were really dressed for the weather. I was probably best off, even though my clothes were still crusted with the sewage we had escaped through. The girls all had the ceremonial robes from the Goddess, which meant they were covered and had sandals at least, but the temple garb wasn't intended for processions through the snow.

Sir Forsythe was worst off, though he refused to show any discomfort. Not only was he still half covered in dried sewage, but his clothing amounted to a dirty shirt and a pair of boots that must have come from one of the fallen guardsmen in the dungeon.

We moved without stopping, and I could tell when we crossed the border into Lendowyn because I could feel the weight lift off of my shoulders.

That should have been a warning.

If history had taught me anything, it should have been the fact that
any
time things seem to improve—especially when things improved this quickly and this easily—it was only because I was operating on inaccurate information. My assumptions always seemed to come back to maul me when I wasn't looking.

I had even less excuse for my oblivious optimism than usual, because Sir Forsythe had already spelled it all out to me.

Instead, the first sign I recognized anything going wrong came just as dawn began to light the sky. Rabbit stopped us with a series of urgent grunts as she ran forward, ahead of Sir Forsythe. She dashed up the forest path, toward a rise, crouching as she approached the top.

“My Lady, please—”

I held up a hand as I walked up next to Sir Forsythe. “Wait.”

I had seen her react like this before, and I could already feel the shreds of my relief blowing away in a sudden wind. I took a deep breath of the morning air.

Damn it!

“How close are we to your camp?”

“Just over that ridge, My Liege.” Sir Forsythe pointed at where Rabbit crouched. “Less than a mile. What is she doing?”

“What do you smell?”

“Smell?”

I ran up to join Rabbit. The smell I referred to was faint at this distance, muted by the cold still air, but still unmistakable. I knew what I was going to see before I cleared the top of the ridge, something I didn't want to see for too many reasons.

“No, damn it!” I said as I stood looking down across a rolling field that spread from the edge of the woods. I could see the campsite, as Sir Forsythe had said, on a hill less than a mile away.

What remained of the campsite.

A half-dozen black streaks had been seared into the ground, around the site, all intersecting in a circle about fifty yards across. A few tent poles still pointed up at odd angles, but the rest of the campsite had been rendered into piles of unidentifiable ash.

“Why?” I whispered, finding it hard to find my voice. “Lucille? Why?”

I felt something touch my hand, and I looked down to see Rabbit staring up at me with a concerned look. I just shook my head, unable to find any more words to express myself. This wasn't some snap of rage venting against an enemy, however imagined. This was systematic obliteration of her own people, six methodical passes searing the ground and ending at the former campsite.

Somehow I had pushed her too far, and she had given in to the monstrous instincts of her new body.

I had lost her.

The others caught up with me and we advanced on the wreckage like a funeral procession. The fires had cleared the thin cover of snow for hundreds of yards around the campsite, and no new snow had come in the meantime to cover the scars. Our feet crunched in a frost-covered mixture of soot and mud. It was the only sound marking our approach aside from Sir Forsythe's occasional mutter. “This makes no sense. The Prince Dragon ordered us . . . Handpicked the people who would save the princess.”

Even with Sir Forsythe spelling out exactly what had happened here, however inadvertently, I still avoided putting together the last few pieces of the puzzle.

As we reached the remains of Sir Forsythe's camp, Rabbit spun around and urgently held up her hands, halting all of us. Once we all stopped moving, I still heard the sound of feet crunching in the icy, sooty mud.

Someone else was here.

The clearing where Sir Forsythe's team had made camp was made of several rolling hills, and they had chosen the tallest to make camp. From this site, they had a good view all around to the tree line. It also meant that when anyone approached the site from any direction, at least part of the clearing was blocked from view by the hill it sat on.

Someone approached from the other side, and was about to crest the hill themselves.

I barely had time to register all of that before the unseen party stepped into view, less than twenty yards from us.

Two people cleared the top of the hill, and the one in the lead was intimately familiar to me; the short stature, the curves, the blonde hair . . .

... the growing expression of shock that mirrored what I imagine was showing on my own borrowed face.

I couldn't help thinking how strangely surreal it was to see the body of Princess Lucille walking around without me. Sir Forsythe took one look at her and began drawing his sword. “Prince Bartholomew?”

Then all hell broke loose.