A Shade of Dragon 2 (2 page)

T
he masked guard carried me
, my face beginning to thaw and blazing with pain, down a twisting flight of stone steps. I feared I was being taken to the Aena castle’s dungeons.

The walls were lined with torches, spears, and shackles; at least they were well-kept. No blood on the stones. No rust on the chains. You could tell that the recent residents of this home cared very much for its maintenance, comfort, and style—or perhaps they had imprisoned few people.

But you could not say that for the dungeons of Castle Aena anymore.

Each cell was filled with men, though I struggled to find any women, and none were beneath middle age. I was dumped outside of the cells, and manacled to the wall.

“You don’t need to do this,” I told the guard, panicking as he turned to exit the room. Would there be mice in here? Rats? My dad always said that when it snowed outside, it drove vermin indoors... I scooted closer to the wall, then away from it, thinking that perhaps they hid in the crevasses of the stone. “Do you want me to be a chamber maid? I can be a chamber maid!”

The guard exited the dungeon without glancing back. Now it was just me in here: me and the meager torchlight, and the other weathered, exhausted prisoners. Starving prisoners. Forlorn and doomed prisoners.

One of them called out to me. He was young and dark-haired, with a tattoo of a fireball on one hand. “Hey. Where did you come from?”

“I was kidnapped.” I might as well trust him; we were both prisoners now, after all. “I’m from Earth…” But I was beginning to think that this would be the country where I’d die. My eyes panned warily around the dungeon before returning to his. “I was kidnapped after passing through the portal, kidnapped by Lethe.”

“That cowardly, conniving—”

The dungeon doors behind us groaned as they opened, and we broke eye contact, lapsing into silence.

Five guards entered the room, each prying spears from off the wall as they passed them.

I swallowed.

“There she is,” the guard announced, indicating me. “I found her wandering in the west wing. She’s no chamber maid I’ve ever seen. And look—look at her hem, there. Singed. No ice dragon could get so close to a fire.”

“She looks like an Earth maiden,” a short, broad guard observed. They all wore masks, so it was only possible to differentiate them by their body types.

“Friends with a dragon, are you?” another of the guards asked. He was the tallest of them, and he stuck his spear into the spluttering flame of a torch until it turned a hot coral red. “Perhaps you’d be wanting to give us a name right about now, as to who let you into this castle and why?” As he spoke, the tip of the spear hovered closer and closer to my body, and I shrank away, trying to disappear within the folds of the dress.

“Prince Lethe Eraeus! He brought me from the ocean gate! He—he was keeping me as his prisoner!”

The guards shared a look amongst themselves.

“And why wouldn’t he tell anyone he had captured an Earth woman in our territory?” the blue-masked guard asked. “Why hide you in royal quarters?”

Because I’m the claimed mate of his sworn enemy, part of me answered. But another part of me wasn’t so sure. Why had he taken me to a royal chamber, when he could have just as easily dumped me in this dungeon? Why hadn’t he tortured me, or had me tortured for him, when the guard staff was clearly amenable to the practice? Why had he stripped the freezing wet clothes from my body and dressed me in rich blue velvet—the gown of a princess—if I was nothing but a prisoner?

“I—I don’t know,” I stammered. It was the only way that I could answer.

“Not good enough.” The tallest guard darted forward with his spear and jammed it into the ribbon which bound my dress together down its center. I was mortified as the corset loosened and opened to reveal a sheer white slip underneath. Thalissa had dressed me; no one else had seen me this way.

The spear moved against my side, and I threw back my head and howled. The reaction was so intense that I wrenched against the metallic shackles until they bit my wrists and smeared themselves in a lacquer of my blood.

“I’m sorry! I don’t know!” I howled. “Anyone could tell you that torture is one of the least effective methods for gaining information!”

At this, the tallest guard leaned close and pulled his mask down. He was fabulously ugly, with cratered cheeks and beady eyes. “It is an effective method of intimidation.”

I went still with horror as the realization dawned on me. This was all for the benefit of the other prisoners—the fire dragon men. They were torturing me to set an example.

“No,” I murmured, letting my damp eyelashes close. I’d been crying.

“This is your last chance, my lady,” the tall guard leered, his glowing spear tracing the lace of my dress. Sweat prickled over the neckline and soaked the slip beneath. “Confess who allowed you entry to this castle.”

“It was Lethe!”

The spear came down like a whip and burned the top of my right breast. I shrieked.

“What the hell is going on here?” A familiar male voice intruded into our horrific little bubble of heat, and sweat, and pain. “Just what do you think you’re doing? Let me through! I said let me through!”

Lethe shouldered his way through the hedge of guards, and his eyes opened wide at the sight of me. We gazed at one another in a moment of sudden stillness, and then he turned from me.

“Unchain her,” he commanded coldly. “On whose authority have you tortured this woman?”

There was another moment of quiet as the guards refused to step forward and receive credit.

“Was there no command given? Has our guard become a rogue faction unto itself? Confess, you animals!”

“It was I.” The blue-masked guard stepped forward, his head high but his eyes averted. “I thought her a threat to the castle security, my lord.”

“Am I truly your lord?” Lethe hissed. “Or are you your own lord? I said unchain her, you barbarians!”

Three guards rushed forward to unclasp the bloodied manacles from my wrists. As the irons fell away, I collapsed forward. A pair of arms suspended me mid-air. I gazed up into Lethe’s face, but he was not looking back at me. He still glared at his guards.

Lethe gestured to the blue-masked guard. “Manacle him.”

I heard screams of protest, a scuffle, and the clank of chains fastened as Lethe pulled me from the dungeon. He did not speak to me as we ascended the winding stairwell. I peered up at him. Hadn’t they tortured me exactly as he would have done? And yet…

But he did not return my stare. He kept his eyes straight ahead and his jaw firm, as if I was not there at all.

W
hen we reached
the top of the stairs, stepping into a sweeping marble foyer, Lethe covered my eyes with a silken handkerchief from his pocket, securing it behind my head as a blindfold. I didn’t struggle. He took my arm—his hand so very cold—and dragged me along winding corridors, up two more flights of stairs, down another long hall, and then finally through a door into a warm room. The blindfold came away, and I recognized it immediately. The windows dominating the northern wall. The roaring fireplace. The bookshelf. The feather-down mattress. I had been returned to my new quarters—“home.”

I turned to face Lethe. There was something different about him now, and he seemed aware of his own vulnerability, as he returned my gaze with eyes more distant and harsh than I had seen yet.

“Thank you.” I didn’t need him to acknowledge my consideration. I just needed to express my gratitude.

“Do not thank me,” Lethe commanded, turning from my eyes and retreating to the exit. “You would never have been discovered if you had not disobeyed my commands. You deserve your marks.” He hesitated and glanced over his shoulder at me. The dress was still undone, my slip singed on one side and the burn still red raw on my chest. “Perhaps, with this next opportunity, you will trust me.” He laid his hand on the door’s brass knob and turned. “Are you hungry?” he demanded, as if it was not a question but an insult.

“Y-yes,” I murmured, uncertain of the proper response. I hadn’t eaten since last night; it had to be close to noon now, or midday, or however time worked in this place. I cleared my throat. “Yes, sir, I am.”

“Good.”

With that, he wrenched the door open and stepped out into the hallway, slamming it behind him.

Next, a key turned in a lock, and I flung myself toward the door, jiggling its frozen handle.

Dammit.

Trapped.

I
wrapped
my arms around myself and curled up near the fire, rocking back and forth. It had been hours since Lethe had disappeared, locking the door behind him. I’d tried screaming and pounding on the door, even though I’d known it would do nothing. This was a castle. Entire wings stood vacant of all life in the wake of this insurgency. I’d pressed my ear to the door and listened for footsteps, voices, anything. But there was nothing.

Bedraggled with exhaustion and hunger, I collected the quilt off of the mattress and trudged back to the meager halo of heat produced by the dying embers of the hearth. It was becoming colder… and colder… and colder. Even inside the blankets, I rubbed my hands together and blew warm breath into them.

My eyes wandered to the northern windows.

In their lowest corner, the wavering sun descended.

It was almost nightfall.

I wondered about the time. Was it, like on Earth, almost five o’clock, or six, when the sun was low in the winter season? Had it been almost an entire twenty-four hours, and on Earth, had a day passed as well? Had my mother gone to Dulles, anticipating my flight from Portland International to DC, and found I had never boarded? Had my father already called her in a panic when I had never returned from the going-away party the night before? Had Michelle’s family, the Boston Ballingers, realized that she, too, was missing? Did the evening news blaze with our images, information as to when we were last seen, tearful interviews with our friends and family?

Footsteps in the hall, muffled by the heavy oak door, distracted me from my thoughts.

“Hello?” I called, climbing to my feet and hurrying to the door. I banged at its frame until my fists ached. “Hello, is anyone there?”

The sound of a key turning in a lock made me pause.

It was Lethe.

The door fell open, and with it came a warm, lemony scent which caused my mouth to water. I moved back a step and allowed him to enter. He held a large, steaming bowl. My eyes followed it, ignoring the door, which he shut behind him with his foot.

“I have brought you a stew for dinner,” he informed me. “Please, have a seat. There is a small table near the window—”

“No,” I said. He cast a glare at me and I shrank back. “It’s so cold,” I explained, and his icy stare relented.

“The fire, then,” he said. “I will rekindle it. Have a seat.”

I settled by the fire, and he rested the meal in front of me. I didn’t wait as he stuffed the fireplace with kindling. I only heard an occasional exclamation of pain; it seemed that the ice people could not withstand fire, as the fire people could not withstand ice. Still, he built the fire for me as I shoveled the stew into my eager mouth. It was almost entirely gone, spoon scraping the porcelain bottom of the dish, when I finally raised my head and saw the roaring hearth now between us, throwing its warm orange light into the chamber.

The fire bothered him, and it was purely for me that he entertained its presence. I remembered Theon with a pang of gratitude: the day we’d been at the ice rink near the mall in Beggar’s Hole. He’d told me he detested the ice, but agreed to skate on it only to please me. Heart swollen with appreciation of Theon, I looked to Lethe, thought of him, and smiled.

Somehow… somewhere in that icy cavern of this self-proclaimed prince’s heart… there burned a small fire, maybe even only a pit of embers, for the welfare of others.

I cocked my head, intrigued.

“Thank you,” I said again.

Why did he imprison me, if he seemed to not care much for the needless cruelty of his compatriots? What was I to him—some sort of pet? A bargaining chip? What did he want?

“Does it hurt terribly?” he asked, turning from the fire and treading deeper into the room, away from its heat. He stood silhouetted against the frost-encrusted window, all color bleached away by the dying of the sun. “Your burns? Do they still ache, or is the way of fire inoffensive to you? Do you, perhaps, lover of fire, treasure the pain?”

I hesitated. “It hurts,” I admitted.

He nodded and turned toward me again. “I have brought a salve,” he said. “Come to me. I cannot stand to be near the fire.”

I stood and trod toward him, still enshrouded in the blanket. He held a glass disc, brimming with a dark orange cream, and I saw that his hands were scarred from their fleeting contact with the flames. I cracked the blanket open and allowed him to see the marks on my body again. Did he wince at the sight of them—or was that only my imagination?

Dipping his fingers into the dark orange cream, he thickly painted the salve on the burn on the top of my right breast. As soon as the salve touched the wound, its throb numbed, and the redness disappeared before my very eyes. I didn’t even mind the coldness of Lethe’s fingers. Next, his fingertips trailed across my face, moistening the scratches. And then, he infiltrated my torn slip and painted the salve over my side. At this, my eyes popped open and I shuddered. His eyes flicked to mine and for a moment we stood, eyes linked; then my eyes drifted from his, down to his chest. There—
there!
—winking at me in the folds of his tunic was a shard of milky crystal. Was it—could it have been?—the other shard of the magical mirror, belonging to the Aena dynasty?

Was it possible that contact with Theon was again within my grasp?

Lethe withdrew his touch, smearing the remainder of the salve on his own damaged fingers and sealing the disc beneath a pewter cap. He deposited the balm into his pocket.

“You must be terribly bored,” he said, clearing his throat. “There are books, you know. Dozens of books. You should educate yourself on our ways, on the history of our land, whilst you are here.”

I wanted to mention that he could easily undo my circumstances, but I did not. He knew. He simply refused.

“What did your father say?” I asked, advancing after him.

At this question, Lethe hung his head.

“You should learn the ways of the ice dragons,” he went on, as if I had not spoken. He stepped to the bookcase and slid a thick tome from its utmost shelf. “Here. A History of War. It is not as conclusive as we would have hoped—but the ice people were never in charge of The Hearthland’s presses.” He turned with pursed lips, but his eyes remained glued to the cover of the book. It was as green as the grasses which no longer grew here, and its leather binding was etched in filigree. “This explains our history, and delves briefly into our customs.” His eyes rose to mine and I was surprised to see that they were not the ice I had come to expect. In fleeting moments, there was warmth there, as if I had seen through a tiny window, a chink in metallic armor. “There are not many books in existence which honor my people,” he went on, extending the tome toward me.

I swallowed, uncertain, but took the book. I didn’t want to be rude. In spite of kidnapping me, and those occasional flares of rudeness, he’d been oddly kind.

I traced my fingers over the filigree. “Does it mention you in here?” I asked.

Another hesitation. “Yes, actually. I was just a boy at the time of its publication. My people had already lost their foothold on the castle.”

I flipped the book open, and he darted forward, clapping it shut again. He almost caught my fingers.

“Don’t—don’t read it whilst I am here. Just… read it later, when you are alone; I have greatly treasured the company of books in my lifetime. Haven’t you?”

I offered a small smile. “Me, too,” I said. Something about him made me sad. “Why don’t you want me to read this in your presence?”

“This is our country too, you know.” He was constantly changing the subject. So evasive. So… afraid? “We were relegated to our sliver at its tip. But we are another people on the same land. We deserve more. The Hearthlands are not the inherited right of the fire dragons.” His jaw tensed. “My people have struggled to coexist here. And I have been promised this opportunity. Why must Theon receive it as his birthright?” His voice rose and sharpened. “What has he done that is so noble?”

“Theon is a good man,” I said.

“I am a good man,” Lethe replied, his voice as low as mine. “Do I deserve to burn in the sun, Lady O’Hara?” His hand rose to my cheek and cupped my face. I hissed at the iciness of his flesh. “Do I deserve the abuse of a family which blames its children for its failures?”

“No,” I promised him. And I meant it. I shuddered as his thumb stroked my sore cheekbone. “Of course not, Lethe.”

His hard eyes softened. “You’re cold. Come. Let us sit by the fire.”

I settled in front of the hearth and peered up, hesitating with surprise as he sat next to me, so near to the crackling fire. “Does this hurt you?” I asked.

At this, Lethe offered a self-effacing smile. “I’m no stranger to pain,” he replied. “What has been your impression of my home country, so far?”

Well, Prince Lethe, it’s freaking freezing. But he needed a gentle touch. He was only beginning to crack open, and the slightest misstep could cause him to snap shut again. “It is beautiful, as Theon told me it would be.” I did not want him to forget—nor did I wish to forget—that I belonged to Theon.

Lethe’s brow knitted. “Theon promised a country you have not yet seen,” he deduced. “The former prince had not yet seen what he would surely have construed as its devastation.”

“There is a secret beauty in everything, for those willing to see it,” I told Lethe, reaching forward and boldly placing my hand over his own frigid one. In the light of the fire, he had begun to flush. “I do love the snow.” And it was true, even if I also loved the sun which refused to shine here now.

Lethe stared at my hand on his, and then raised his eyes to meet mine. They had changed, darkening to a more soulful blue—like a deep lake.

Who was Prince Lethe Eraeus, truly?

My eyes fell to the spines and swirls of the book’s cover.