EPIC: Fourteen Books of Fantasy (213 page)

I
T
WAS
HOURS
BEFORE
J
ADE
offered more than a glimpse indoors to check on her patient. She was unaccustomed to company, and thus left something to be desired as a hostess. The sun was setting when she was through for the day. Her first stop was the pot of broth. Nearly empty.

“At least he follows orders,” she muttered to herself.

She turned to the cot. He was lying where she had left him, but one look was all it took to know that sleep was not in his future. Sweat dripped from his forehead and drenched his clothes. His fists were clenched so tight they trembled, and his face bore a look of iron-hard concentration. The pain had returned, and it was clearly all he could do to bear it. She placed a hand upon his forehead. It was burning again. This was to be expected. His injuries had been severe, and while the things she had learned allowed her to work wonders, those wonders came at a cost.

“I’d like to tell you the worst is over, but . . . there is more on the way. Much more. Try to imagine it as all of the pain and suffering you would have felt over the normal healing process, but compressed into just a few hours. It is going to be an ordeal.”

His only reply was the quick, short hiss of his breathing.

“Listen, you need to try to focus on something else. If you don’t distract yourself, it will seem a thousand times worse.”

He turned his bloodshot eyes to her before shutting them again.

“Here,” she said, taking his hand and holding it tightly, “I’m right here. Talk to me. Was it worth it? Knowing how you feel now, and knowing that the sorceress and her beast would have left you in an even worse state, do you still feel like you needed to do this?”

“Yes, it was worth it! Even to try!” he growled through the pain.

“Really? Why?”

“Because a king needs to be more than a general! A king needs to care about more than borders. He . . . he sees Tressor and . . . they have an army. A massive one. They are not threatening, not moving, but . . . he sees an army, and he thinks the only way he can be safe is to have a bigger one. But we can’t! We don’t have the population for that! They will always have a bigger army. And when we begin massing troops, Kenvard and Ulvard start building up troops. It is dangerous! Unnecessary! There are better ways!”

His words were wild, passionate. They flew forth, propelled by pain and frustration and by the pressure of being held back for so long. Once spoken, though, the intensity quickly began to drain from his eyes and his mind began to wrap itself tightly about the pain again.

“Keep going. You have a better way? You would do it differently if you were king?”

“I . . . I . . . of course!” he said, grasping her hand in his. “Kingdoms don’t go to war for no reason. They need things! Tressor has plenty of food, but barely any mines and very few forests. Vulcrest straddles the Rachis Mountains. We . . . everything you pull out of a mountain, we have to spare! But we have so little farmland.”

“And?”

“We should give them copper, iron, coal. In return . . . they give us grain. Now . . . we need them. They need us. We don’t need to try to match their army, because they can’t afford to attack us and lose the trade!”

“That’s . . . That’s brilliant. Keep going! What else?”

For hours, through the worst of the pain, Terrilius spoke of the woes of his land and the solutions he envisioned. Some were flawed, others were inspired. Many were sweeping, revolutionary changes. They surely would require the full power of the throne to apply--but, in light of the troubles he described, they seemed nothing short of necessary. Widespread hunger, devastating disease outbreaks . . . all manner of problems plagued his people.

Jade had lived in this paradise for so long, and with her skills had helped to ease the suffering of the town of Rook so much, that she had forgotten the sorry state of the world that she had left behind. She’d managed to convince herself that things could not be as bad as she remembered. But to hear him speak of it, they were far worse.

Finally the pain crested and began to recede. Jade sat beside him and continued to hold his hand for more than an hour after exhaustion finally claimed him. He spoke with such dedication, such drive. It was unlike anyone she’d met, except perhaps Halfax. There was a spirit, a life to him when he spoke of those things he truly cared about. It made her care, too. For the first time since had she begged Halfax to take her to this place, Jade cared about the world outside of the niche she’d carved for herself. She wished he was awake again, so that he could hear him speak more of his kingdom and beyond . . . or simply just to hear him speak . . .

Throughout the night, Halfax had watched. Just because the boy was of a protected bloodline did not mean that the dragon trusted him. The prince had been planning to kill her, after all. His change of heart upon learning the truth could be an act. It was for this reason, the beast told himself, that he must watch. Deep inside though, far closer to his heart than he would ever allow himself to admit, there was another reason. He’d watched many generations of humans from afar. He knew the signs, the patterns. The way that she was looking at him, and he at her even through the pain, was familiar. He had seen many families begin with the same look. It was something that had been a long time coming. Something well past due. It was a sign that Jade would soon be ready to return to her own kind, to live the life that she deserved. It should have been what he was waiting for, what he wanted . . .

But he didn’t want it now. Not
now.
In his heart, he wasn’t ready.

For a dragon, everything is fleeting. Decades of memories blur together in the same way that days blur into each other for humans. Anything that takes less than a hundred years may as well be a blink of the eye. These twelve years . . . twelve short years . . . He never would have chosen this life for himself. He’d resisted it, planned constantly for the time when it would mercifully come to an end. But it had become comfortable. He had felt things he had never expected. Pride at watching her grow and learn. Fulfillment in teaching and protecting her. Happiness . . .

He dug his claws deeper into the ground. No. This was right. This was good. She would move on, as she should have years ago. It was as it should be. The rest didn’t matter.

Terrilius woke the next afternoon to a ravenous hunger, a dull ache over his entire body, and the desire to sleep for another day. In a chair beside the cot was Jade. She was fast asleep, a book open upon her chest. He rose from the cot slowly, every joint in his body clicking and popping from lack of use. He managed to make it to his feet, but dizziness forced him to the cot again. Beside him was a pitcher of cool water and some coarse bread and dry meat. Hardly the courtly breakfast he was accustomed to, but at the moment his stomach assured him that it would do. He was stuffing his mouth in a distinctly unregal manner when his host awoke.

“Oh, oh, you’re awake,” she said, the residue of sleep slurring her words somewhat.

She closed the book and placed it on the table before standing and leaning over him. Rather than interrupting him, or even asking him, she began to test this part of his body and that, nodding thoughtfully as she did. A poke at the ribs, a squeeze at a shoulder and knee, and various gentle tests later, she spoke.

“No more bleeding, that’s good. Still a bit swollen. Still a bit bruised. The breaks are almost finished knitting. That rapid healing treatment is really something, isn’t it? How do you feel?” she asked. “Besides hungry.”

“Tired. And sore.”

“Your fingers look to be working just fine. I was a bit worried about your jaw, but if you can chew that stuff, you’re fine. Move your feet a bit, would you? Yes. Yes, it looks like the potions did their work. A few aches when the weather is bad will be your only reminder of this little adventure.”

Terrilius swallowed the last of the meat and water.

“I thank you for your aid, and, again, I apologize for my foolishness. If you can lend me a horse, I will be on my way to the castle.”

“I don’t have a horse. When I need to go somewhere, I ride Hal.”

“Well, then I . . .”

He paused at the sound of rapidly retreating footsteps on the snow. Outside the window, he caught the merest glimpse of Halfax disappearing among the trees.

“Where is he off to?”

“Probably to find you a horse. I rather think Halfax is eager to be rid of you.”

“He tried to kill me.”

“You and your men tried to kill him, and planned to kill me. You can’t fault Halfax for doing a better job. Besides, he brought you to me to fix you up, so that should set things right.”

“I hardly think that it does . . . but it doesn’t matter. It probably would have been better for my kingdom if he
had
killed me. This fiasco only proves how worthless I really am.”

“Now, Terry, that’s not true.”

“It is! The very fact that I am still in this place is proof enough that my own men despise me. In the past, wars have been fought to secure the land where a royal had fallen. For me, they are unwilling to face a single dragon. But I do not blame them. What reason have I given them to respect me?”

“Precisely!” Jade snapped angrily, “What reason
have
you given them to respect you? For heaven’s sake, Terry, you are a prince! Have some self-worth! I’ve only known you for two days, but in that time I’ve learned an awful lot about you. I’ve learned that you have ideas, good ones. I’ve learned that you’ve got more drive than a dozen men when you find something you care about. And yet somehow you think that none of that is enough to be a leader. How can you expect people to respect you if you don’t respect yourself!?”

“I have done nothing of any worth in my life.”

“Nothing? For three years, your father thought there was a terrible sorceress and her terrible dragon in this very tower. Who was the first one in all of that time to try to do something about it? You! You were doing it to prove you were a man worthy to lead, but anyone willing to risk it all for something they believe in is already worthy to lead. And you faced a dragon and lived to tell about it! I was going to fix up your scars, but--”

She smashed a vial on the floor, filling the room with a sharp scent.

“--to hell with it! You want people to respect you? You wear those scars like a trophy! And if that doesn’t work, you come back here and you drag the head of that black dragon
thing
from the ground and give them a
real
trophy! You can lie and tell them you killed it with your bare hands and they will never know, but it won’t matter, because they will never truly believe in you until you stand up straight and give them someone to believe in!”

Jade was out of breath, eyes wide and mind slowly catching up with what it had allowed to slip from her lips.

“Do you really--” he began.

His thought was cut short by approaching hoofbeats. A horse burst into the clearing. Not just any horse, but the very one that the prince had been knocked from when he first encountered the dragon. Halfax stalked in the shadows, his very presence enough to keep the frightened steed within the clearing that so few animals would venture into.

“Go! Get on your horse, go back to your people, and be the man you know you can be!” she demanded, pointing out the door.

The prince looked her in the eye, then looked to his horse. When his gaze returned to her, there was a look of resolve in his eyes. Without another word, he left the tower and climbed atop the horse. Halfax was nowhere to be found, vanished in order to permit the prince to leave. And so he rode off.

The dragon appeared again when the sound of hooves faded into the distance. He watched as Jade stood in the doorway, her eyes straining to watch the strange visitor leave. He knew from the look in her eye that her heart and mind went with him.

If there had been any doubt that the young man had made an impression upon her, the days that followed put it to rest. She spoke only of “Terry.” She told of the ideas he’d had, of the remarkably swift recovery. Sometimes she spoke of things that irritated her, other times of things she had admired, but always she spoke of him.