Dalen stepped up just behind him, supporting him with one arm. I could barely breathe.
“Forest.”
I ran to him, heedless of the others, my chest heaving with silent sobs. He opened his good arm to me, and I slid into it as he wrapped it around me. Beneath his half-open leather shell, his wound was slick with fresh blood.
“I left you,” I said, my voice breaking. “I had to leave you.”
“Jasper and the others arrived,” Forest said. “They outnumbered us by one, but we took care of them.”
I suddenly became aware of the silence around us and extricated myself from Forest’s embrace. Reality rushed back with painful precision—we had both survived, and we would return to the lives that awaited us.
“You’re a hero, Rain,” Forest said softly.
“No.” I didn’t want that title.
Distant shouts wafted on the breeze, likely some of the high king’s men, emerging to inspect the damage. And probably wondering what in the universe had happened.
“It’s time you were presented to the high king,” Jasper said. “Forest is right—you are a hero.”
“Sedge helped me.” Even now, I wanted to choke on his name. “Where is he?”
The silence that met me answered more loudly than words. I looked at Jasper.
“I saw him fall,” he said. “I don’t know if he survived.”
We made our way off the rooftop to the peak of the knoll and started down. I stopped short when I saw Sedge lying on the ground, his head on Flint’s lap.
I knelt by Sedge, who coughed blood as he looked up at me. Blood saturated his shirt and the edges of his breastplate where a blade had pierced through his armpit.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
He shook his head. “Don’t thank me.”
The revulsion I’d always felt for him melted into sorrow. In his piteous, last gasps of life, he couldn’t see his own redemption.
“I couldn’t have done it without you,” I said.
“The dragon magic. It was—” He grimaced, his body shuddering. “Too much. I wanted to be … strong.”
“Your strength helped save our kingdom.”
“It wasn’t my strength. I’m a coward.” He coughed again, throaty and deep. “I’m sorry, s’da?”
Was this the same boy who had done nothing but abuse me since the day we’d met? Had these moments of dying brought a glimpse of his heart the way it looked before it turned dark?
How young he looked. And sad.
“I forgive you,” I said.
“I wanted the glory,” he said, “and you got it.”
“No…”
He closed his eyes and drew a gurgling breath. When he spoke, his words were mostly air. “Turns out you were a better man than I was.”
Utter stillness replaced the spasms of pain across his face. Forest’s hand was warm on my shoulder as I drew in a long breath and made my peace with the boy who had meant me nothing but harm—until the very end, when he had given me exactly what I needed.
“Peaceful rest,” I whispered.
We scrambled down the hill, bearing Sedge’s body. When we reached the bottom, we laid him out on the ground, face and palms up, toward the Great God, who would bear his spirit home. Later, we would see that he was properly buried. For now, we left him and made our way to the front of the damaged hold, where several men were standing on the balcony taking in the view of the devastation and talking in loud voices. When they saw us, they stopped, staring down at us as though we were shades that had risen from the bodies of the dead.
Jasper cupped his hands around his mouth. “I’m Commander Dane of the high king’s army.” He gestured to me. “And this is Storm L’nahn, who woke the dragons and saved Ylanda.”
My stomach dropped to my toes. He had introduced me as the boy he knew I wasn’t.
We waited while two of the men disappeared from view. I shot a glance at Forest, whose expression was grim with the pain of his wound. He didn’t look at me, and it was just as well. Whenever his eyes met mine, the ache in my heart was unbearable.
Two men, dressed in the canary-yellow livery of the high king’s household, appeared from somewhere around the bend of the hold’s right half-tower. We stood at attention, our training kicking in and presenting us, I hoped, as the loyal soldiers we were.
“Where is the rest of your army?” the taller man asked.
“We were a special unit of thirteen,” Jasper said. “We’re all that remain.”
The tall man turned to me. “And you? You claim to have awakened the dragons?”
“Yes.” The word felt like a speck of dust.
“The high king wishes to see you,” the other man said. “All of you.”
We followed them down a hidden stairway of five or six deep steps that led to a ponderous door fashioned not from wood, but from vertical, wrought-iron rods thicker than my wrist, so close together I could barely see through them and four layers deep. We entered and waited while the tall man slid five heavy bars in place across the door, locking us in.
I wasn’t sure why, at this point, he felt the need to secure the door. Perhaps it was simply habit.
We walked through a narrow tunnel, lit at intervals by oil lamps set into crevices in the wall. A second, four-layer-thick iron door sat at the end, and we walked through it and up a curving flight of stairs, then through another passageway that opened to a set of heavy wooden doors.
The tall man stood before the doors. “When you enter, simply bow and wait for His Majesty to address you.”
My palms were wet and I was breathing too loudly. The doors opened soundlessly, and we stepped inside a large, tapestry-hung room that was more opulent than I would have imagined possible. The high king sat on a long, low bench against the back wall, robed in traditional red and gold. Even seated, he seemed remarkably tall, with broad shoulders and a long, sloping nose. He wore a thin silver circlet on his head, and his hair hung well past his shoulders. His expression seemed practiced, as though he had no intention of showing us what he was feeling.
But I saw it in his eyes—awe. The high king of our great kingdom could not comprehend what had happened.
My legs trembled beneath me as I bowed low and waited for him to speak.
“Which of you claims to have awakened the dragons?” His voice was deep and thin, as though he hadn’t spoken in a long time.
I placed my hand on my racing heart and bowed my head. “I did, Your Majesty.”
“Come.” He waited as I approached, my footsteps faltering. “So you are he, the dragon-waker I had long ceased believing in.”
“I—” The storm in my breast rose to a fevered pitch. I couldn’t accept his honor as someone I wasn’t. “I am she, Your Majesty. Not he.”
His eyes widened and he rose slowly to his feet. “You’re … a woman?”
“Yes.” I sank to my knees. “I deceived my commander and everyone else. They’re all innocent.” A small lie to make up for my much larger one. My parting gift to Forest.
The chamber fairly crackled in the silence, everyone waiting with me for the high king’s response. I had begun to tremble so violently that I sat back on my feet and pressed my hands against the cool stone floor. When the high king spoke again, my heart seized.
“You willfully defied the law, knowing its consequences?”
“I did.”
“And yet the Great God chose to show you favor.”
I opened my mouth and closed it again. The high king seemed to be speaking more to himself than to me.
“Your Majesty.” Forest stepped forward, hand cradling his wound. “What Rain has said is only partially true.”
My heart clenched within me. No! Don’t implicate yourself!
“I discovered her deception some weeks ago and remained silent,” Forest continued. “I’m complicit.” He looked at me, his eyes bathed in sorrow. “There’s no life for me without you,” he said softly.
Jasper cleared his throat. “What she hasn’t told you, Your Majesty, is that she also single-handedly defeated Tan Vey on the roof of your hold. I saw the very end of it—he looked as though he were under the influence of some sort of … dragon magic.”
The high king looked at me. “Is this true?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. Tan Vey swallowed something that gave him dragon power.”
“How … how did he end up on the roof? How did he escape the dragons?”
“I saw him climbing up,” I said. “He must have run from his post when the dragons broke free.”
“No one in here would have survived, had he gotten past Rain,” Jasper said.
“And I wouldn’t have made it to the dragons if it weren’t for the rest of my unit,” I said. “They fought off the soldiers who would have stopped me from entering the catacombs. Truly, I didn’t accomplish this alone.”
The high king made a temple with his hands and pressed his forefingers to his lips. For several moments, he seemed overcome. “The only power greater than myself is our Great God, who saw fit to return us to the care of his dragons. I dare not question his method of bringing us this unexpected salvation.” He reached his hand to me. “Rise.”
I must have looked unable to do so, because suddenly Jasper was there, taking my arm and helping me to my feet. I steadied myself and gazed at the high king.
“What is your full name?”
“Rain L’nahn,” I said.
“Rain L’nahn, you have served your high king and your kingdom, and you have done what no one before you has dreamed of doing. I offer you a hero’s honor and my personal blessing.”
I clapped my hand over my mouth before realizing I had done so. “Thank you,” I whispered through my fingers.
“The Great God has seen fit to bless our kingdom with deliverance through a means I would never have foreseen,” the high king said. “All of you standing here were part of that. You have my clemency and my deepest appreciation.”
I closed my eyes as a grateful tear sneaked its way down my cheek.
