The Dragon Knight's Curse (The Dragon Knight Series Book 2) (5 page)

“And why not tell Braden about it?”

“I trust him, but I can’t trust his comrades if they’re the ones to find it. Besides, after thinking it over, I believe Odet is clever enough to look without drawing as much notice as the guild would.”

“But you could still be getting her into danger.”

“Royals are always in danger.”

“Did you at least send my regards or something?”

“Uh, sure.”

“Liar.”

We had to wait a day and a half for Ethan and Catherine to return from whatever they were doing. I never bothered to ask. Ethan wanted to spar, but I used my mending wound as an excuse to avoid the pointless exercise. He then asked Ghevont, but the scholar just laughed as though it were the funniest joke he had ever heard. As I expected, Cat seemed receptive to having Marcela around, if only to give her brother another target for his incessant mouth.

Once everyone became acquainted, I booked passage to Dranall. The soonest available ship was large, cheap, and crowded, but it at least looked sturdy enough to survive a storm, though I couldn’t say I was an expert at evaluating boat durability. No tears left Marcela as the sails unfurled and the ship began to be steered by wind and rudder, but I had a feeling she was simply waiting for us to be out of sight.

Odet

A fluttering pair of little legs roused me, as they often did throughout the night, but what forced me to stay awake was the harsh beam of sunlight inflaming my eyes. I pulled the blanket over my face. Elisa groaned beside me. I hauled her side of the silky covers to my own. She groaned more. I spun around so that the covers enveloped only me. My sister tried clawing back her share of blanket, but did not have the strength to drag it away from me. Her kicking legs then rolled me to the edge of the bed until I fell off it. I landed on the wooden floor with a stifled thud.

Elisa immediately regretted what she did and, looking over the brink, said, “Odet! Why didn’t you stop me? Are you dead?”

I squirmed in fake pain. “No, but five ribs are broken. Oh no! I can’t feel my legs!”

“You’re a bad actress.”

I shot a hand upward, curling my fingers for dramatic effect. “There goes my dreams of being on stage.”

After unraveling myself, I did everything required to make me presentable to the outside world. I tolerated most of the hour long routine I had to endure to accomplish this mission. It wasn’t so much the acts of bathing, dressing, combing, and teeth scrubbing that irked me, it was the obligation itself. Unless illness had me clinging to life’s ever crumbling cliff, my parents become rather dismayed every time I neglected to keep up my appearances in public. My younger self experienced quite a few laughs when I exited my room wearing only my nightgown.

My more ostentatious mother never understood these sentiments of mine. In fact, the queen once told me that of every aristocrat she ever met, which included my sisters and some men, that I could most easily revert to living among the foulmouthed commoners. I think she was trying to scold me, but I took it as a compliment. I also don’t know why she equated being foulmouthed to being a commoner. Nearly every filthy word I could recite came from overhearing it from my father. Honestly, she verbally slugged it out with the best of them when she howled at the king.

My itinerary for the day did not include going out of the castle, so I wore a simple green dress and kept my hair loose. The last donned item was an inch long crystal secured to a necklace. The normally transparent crystal was a rare mineral called vlimphite, though most people just called them prana crystals. Certain caves speckled throughout Orda held most of the world’s vlimphite reserve deep within their bowels, a few holding several hundred pounds of the stuff.

The mineral was remarkably efficient at holding prana, getting several prominent scholars to declare the material as a new living organism. Their research even suggests it “grows” under the right conditions. But whatever its precise standing in nature, its importance to the magically inclined made sure a noble house always sprang up with the discovery of another crystal cave, sometimes after a battle or two.

Until the crystal caught an influx of someone’s spirit energy, it stayed a translucent color, but as my particular gemstone possessed the pure prana of my deceased grandmother, it gave off a bluish hue. Like the current queen, my grandmother wouldn’t have been regarded as a great caster. All the same, as a valkrean, every Astor woman had to learn to channel holy prana, the prana given to us by way of our family eidolon. Without mastering this power it would be impossible to summon the eidolon in times of great need. To help me in that endeavor, the crystal was handed down to me instead of Beatrice.

My mother noticed early on that my skills as a warrior-caster were far ahead of most children in my station and said the crystal would be better left with someone who could make use of its sacred potential. If a time ever came when my prana reserve dropped to dire straits, then I could use the prana stored in the crystal for an emergency spell or two. I first refused the offered crystal. Something in me said it was wrong for me to keep such a treasured memento, but Leandra’s adamant bearing would not yield.

Her manner confused me. I plainly saw in her unsteady eyes that she did not like the reality that one of her daughters wanted to train in the art of blades and casting, but her open support contrasted that inner feeling. I concluded that my father convinced her it was best I learn to fight if I so desired it. Still, while the king enjoyed our sparring sessions—something I’m certain he feared he would miss out on with no sons—he carried a pang of reluctance as well. It seemed as though the gods themselves had persuaded them to train me, whether they enjoyed the idea or not.

Bell, who had been up for two hours before me so she could eat, put on her leather armor, and guard my door, handed me my letters for the morning as I sat down to eat. My family had already awoken an hour before me, so it was just us younger sisters at the table. Most of the two dozen letters came from friends, but one had the shield and crossed-blades insignia of the Warriors Guild. I pulled the string to allow the paper to unfurl.

The title of the letter was “A Business Proposal.” The rest of it never stated his name, but reading through its contents soon had me realizing Mercer was taking advantage of my offer to help him. He explained that an old cult called the Advent were responsible for the valkrean attacks and that an important item of theirs was the original work of
Summertide
. This work was key to disclosing a possible stronghold of theirs. Anyone with this rare edition could very well be in league with the cult and should be treated with suspicion.

He entreated me to use my “very, very vast resources and feminine wiles” to “very, very quietly” seek out any existing copy of the poem in any collection within my grasp. If I found it, I was then to keep a close “eye, nose, tongue, and ear” on it until he retrieved it himself someday, as he knew someone with the ability to solve the mystery it held. As per his request, I threw the letter in a fireplace after I finished eating.

I next made my way up to the throne hall. This open-aired room had forty foot high marble pillars of glorious white supporting the squat domed roof. Enclosing the elongated space from three sides was a flight of steps one had to climb for ten feet to reach. My mother loved this high, airy room. It would have been her favorite if she didn’t have to meet with a tireless flow of dignitaries every morning. Before I reached her at the other end, Elisa and I curtsied to the nobles waiting to be met with the queen, slowing my progress.

Standing alongside her, wearing an increasingly common expression of seriousness, was my eldest sister. I did not blame Beatrice for the change in her conduct the last couple of years. I would be much the same if I was next in line to become a ruler of a kingdom. Everyone expected her to continue the peaceful legacy our family have worked tirelessly to maintain. Everything would be scrutinized, from her choice of dress to the men she could make king someday. I knew of a close friendship that had recently become strained due to her turning down his requests for a more intimate relationship. She was already comparing young men to the standards of an old king.

I saw the weight bearing down on her every day, but she had all the support in the world, so I did not so much worry about her mental state as much as pity it. I strove to give Beatrice a flash of levity by telling Elisa to run as fast as possible to our eldest sister and hug her. With all her gusto in tow, Elisa did as I bid, almost making a giggling Beatrice tumble over when she embraced her legs. My older sibling, however, presented a playful scowl to me, knowing I had been the one to let the girl off her leash.

I waited a moment for Leandra to finish speaking with a man I recognized to be a financial advisor. When he left, I asked, “Can we still afford this place?”

“As long as I refrain from anymore major renovations for another decade or so. What is it you need?”

“There’s a change of plans in my day. I’ve been given a top secret project that might require research outside the castle.”

She frowned. “Are you sure this isn’t merely an excuse to meet with Gerard? And what about the training session with your father? He so enjoys those, and he leaves for Brey Stor tomorrow.”

“Gerard and I already have non-secret plans to meet later, and Dad leaves in two days.”

“What? Gods, what day is it? Is it not Lindus? I swore your father told me he was leaving on… Oh! That wicked man! Never mind. Very well, go play whatever game you have planned.”

“I swear it’s not a game, Mother. I’m not even taking Elisa with me. Her orders are to keep Beatrice’s spirits up for me.”

“My spirits are fine,” said Beatrice, picking up her smallest sister from the floor she had been sitting on.

My mother shooed me away when she noticed an impatient noblewoman creeping closer to us.

As we walked back downstairs, Bell asked, “So what game are we playing this time?”

“Ugh, you too? I’m being serious. Remember Mercer? He needs our help.”

The first collection of books that came to mind was, of course, the two palace libraries. One collection mostly consisted of more modern works, but I still rummaged through it just in case. As expected, the well-ordered room allowed me to quickly determine that my goal did not lie there.

The second library contained a somewhat smaller horde of rarer scrolls and bindings. The head librarian, the middle-aged son of the former literature coordinator, was permanently ensconced within this circular chamber. Beatrice and I used to believe Hubert’s antipathy to the outside world came from his secret vampire nature, so we often involved him in our scarier games without his knowledge. There was no reason not to trust him with my undertaking, but I played it safe and lied anyway.

On asking if he could help look for what I needed, I told him a friend of mine was seeking some rare works to add to their collection and so I wondered what writings we had extra copies of. He brought me the thick registry tome and we looked through its texts. While pretending to look through unrelated works, I scoured for the mention of
Summertide
, which I found under its proper category.

According to the archive, we had two of the three editions of the poem, neither of which was the original. The dead end meant I had to move on to other collections in Ecrin. Before I left home on horseback, I made sure to find a scroll written in Old Voreen so I at least recognized what the language looked like. To keep up appearances, I also marked down a pair of works I knew my “friend” not to have and said I would return later if a transaction would occur.

A similar pattern held in the next three libraries I visited with Bell, each located in the manors of friends near the castle. When noon arrived, which I concluded more by my gurgling stomach than the fiery clock in the sky, I decided we deserved a break. Owen’s home wasn’t far away, and since I figured I should check his family’s collection anyway, I directed my steed to his sea-hugging house to fill my need there.

Western Ecrin didn’t actually have many good beaches, but the Vealora family’s Ruby Manor was positioned near a nice little strip of white sand. Even under the best conditions the Lucent Sea was always a bit rough on this side of Alslana, but a few of the more skilled servants could cast a calming spell over the shore if they had to. Giving it its name, the Ruby Manor was constructed from a combination of red brick and mahogany, and kept to Alslana’s typical open-air style on the bottom floor.

The gatekeepers readily recognized me and had the entry opened before my horse broke out of his trot. As I handed the reins to a servant, he informed me that the older masters of the home were away, but the young lord was eating his meal on the balcony with a few of his friends.

Going up to the large, curved balcony revealed that his company included the Vernon siblings, two brothers who I didn’t care for, and his cousin Sabrina. She had a crush on Owen that went back a few years. As only child prone to bouts of illness, Owen picked up his friends from anywhere and the Vernon brothers had taken advantage of that. They never did anything overtly malicious, if perhaps act too much like uncouth tavern patrons at times, but the fact they sometimes neglected his easily granted friendship did not sit well with me.

Using my years of ingrained experience, I politely conversed with everyone and delicately ate my steamed fish until I excused Bell and myself. Owen’s library was hardly large enough to fit six shelves of books and scrolls, something viewed as mildly embarrassing for such a prestigious family. At least it meant my investigation would be quick here.

Near the end of my search, Owen came in and said, “The brothers left. Sabrina was wondering if either of you would like to join us in a game of charades or cards.”

“Sorry, maybe later. We’re a little busy right now.”

“Doing what?”

“Looking for a book.”

“Which one?”

“Don’t worry about it. It doesn’t appear you have it anyway. I suppose I’d be a little worried if you did.”

“You’re not making sense.”

“Good, then I’m being successful in my mysteriousness. We’ll have to go once I’m done.”

“Well, you’re no fun today.” He walked out of sight before I heard his steps come back in. “Oh, if you’re
that
interested, my dad has a big shelf full of books in his study.”

“He’s not big on epic poems, is he?”

“No, but my mother is. She actually keeps her favorite in there.”

Bell gave me a sidelong glance before asking him, “Do you know which that is?”