“I expect you to not undo what the healer has accomplished, idiot.”
“You must be better,” Uther joked. “She’s back to abusing you.”
“You both make it so easy,” she muttered, looking back. That’s when she caught the horrifying sight of Keita . . . gesturing to Brannie to come out.
“What is she doing?” Brannie demanded.
“I think she just . . . revealed our location to the enemy.” Uther shook his head. “Would she really do that?”
Brannie sighed. “Probably.”
“Why would she do that?”
“We’re dragons,” Brannie explained, pushing the doors all the way open. “She probably thinks we could just burn them all to death. So why hide?”
“If we shift now or unleash our flame, all the humans die. Including her precious royal friends.”
Brannie glanced at Uther. “You have no idea how sad it is to me as a Cadwaladr to know that my cousin is even more stupid than you two.”
* * *
Aidan stayed hidden on the roof of the stables until Keita looked right at him and, with a smile, told him to come down.
Now he had no chance. Zealots with bows aimed arrows at him until he jumped down to the ground.
He’d never thought Keita could be so stupid . . . but she was. She was that stupid.
Aidan stood by a seething Brannie. He thought it was best if he stayed close to her to prevent her from killing her cousin. Because he only had to look at her face to see that’s exactly what she was planning to do.
“Now see?” Keita said to the priest. “We’re all friends here. No need to lie or hide things. Yes?”
“Your honesty is a true blessing, my lady. My god will be happy to have you on our side.”
“Oh, I’m sure he will. I am absolutely delightful.” Keita pressed her hands to her face. “But the eye thing . . . I can’t do that. My eyes are just too beautiful. As is my face. Actually, everything about me is beautiful. To destroy that for some god I could not care less about seems absolutely ridiculous, don’t you think?”
The priest’s handsome smile never wavered. “Trust me, my lady, your other choice is even less attractive.”
“Is it?” Keita asked, her head tipped to one side, her hand abruptly pointing at one of the Zealot guards standing near her.
The guard coughed and blood shot out of his mouth and down his chin. Seconds later, blood flowed from his eyes—he still had both—and his nose.
The priest, although physically missing his eyes, still had a sight provided to him by his god.
“What have you done, witch?”
“Me? A witch?” Keita smiled at that. “No, no. I am lacking that skill. But tell me . . . did you enjoy the water from the stream you rested by last night?”
Brannie stomped her foot. “Keita!”
“What? It will wash away soon enough.”
“You hope!”
“Can your chastising wait, O’ flawless one?” When Brannie looked away from her cousin’s gaze, Keita went on. “Now . . . where were we? Oh, yes! The death of your guards.” With a flip of her wrist and a flourish of her arm, she gestured to the guards once more, who began dropping like dead trees. Some fell right over. Others dropped to their knees first and then landed facedown. Blood poured from every orifice and the royals backed away.
“You shouldn’t be here for this,” Keita told the royals. She handed Lord Breeton-Holmes a sealed parchment. “Take this directly to Dagmar Reinholdt. She will take good care of you. And thank you, my lord.”
“Of course, my lady.” He rushed his family back into the castle and Keita sent their few guards to saddle the horses from the stables so they could get on the road right away.
“Now,” Keita said once she had the Breeton-Holmeses on the move, “back to you, priest.”
“I drank that water . . . why am I—”
“Still alive? Because I know from my studies that all your priests and priestesses partake of the Sinnoch root. It helps with your mystical sight. It also is a natural protection from the poison I used. It stops the toxin from killing you. So while your guards may be dead, you have as long as I allow you to live.”
No longer in good humor, the priest snapped, “What do you want, woman?”
“Information, of course. What else do you think I want?”
The priest suddenly looked around. “You brought us here on purpose.”
“Of course, I did. You’re all so fucking predictable with your shit-loving god, it wasn’t really hard.”
“I’ll die before I—”
“You came in contact with an Eastlander not too long ago,” she cut in to the priest’s declaration. “Three weeks ago specifically. You met him in a pub and followed him out later that night. What happened after you followed him?”
The priest smirked. “I’ll tell you nothing. Have your”—he glanced at Brannie—“manly thugs—”
“Hey!”
“—do their most evil. I can withstand anything.”
“Can you?” Keita asked. She winced a bit. “I guess I should have mentioned. The root you eat nightly for your sight. It will keep you from dying. It will not, however, keep you from the brutal pain.”
* * *
Once the Breeton-Holmeses made their hasty exit, Keita had Aidan drag the priest into the castle and leave him in the middle of the floor, far from weapons or anything he could use to kill himself. While the man screamed and writhed in utter, devastating pain, Keita sat at the main hall table, her feet up on the wood, a chalice of wine held in one hand.
When the priest wasn’t screaming and begging for an end to his misery, Keita yawned and sipped from her chalice.
It became so bad and went on for so long that Brannie had to leave for a bit so she could hunt down some fresh meat. It—thankfully—took a while before she found game worth the effort.
She had the animals skinned and put on the spit by the time the priest finally reached his breaking point.
Standing close enough to stare down at him but not close enough to be grabbed, Keita asked the same question she’d been asking for hours. “What happened to the Eastlander you followed out of that pub?”
“We . . . we tried to take him,” the priest, covered in sweat and his own blood, vomit, and excrement, panted out. “But he fought off my guards . . . and disappeared . . . into the forests.” He reached out for her but even her bare feet were too far from his fingers. “Now please. Please . . . end it.”
“Don’t evade, priest. You followed him out of that forest. To where?” He shook his head, trying to fight, but there was nothing left but his suffering. “Answer me, priest,” Keita said, her voice almost soothing. “Answer me or I will enjoy watching you suffer for days.”
He curled into a ball. “We followed . . . followed him to about ten leagues ... leagues . . . northeast of . . . Port . . . Cities.”
“And?”
“And . . . he suddenly . . . disappeared just when . . . we got . . . got close.”
Keita smiled. “That was very good.”
She turned from him and walked back to the table. Once she was again situated in the chair, her feet up on the table, a chalice of wine in her hand, Brannie asked, “Well . . . ?”
“Well what?”
“He told you what you wanted. Aren’t you going to finish him?”
“No.” Brannie, disgusted, stood, but her cousin snapped, “Sit down, Branwen.”
Without really thinking about it, she did. “Keita—”
“I don’t want to hear it, Branwen. Unless you’ve actually seen their idea of a cleansing . . . I don’t want to hear anything.”
“I’ve seen their cleansings,” Brannie told her, clearly remembering finding rows of those who refused to take Chramnesind as their one and only god. Staked to the ground in the kneeling position, molten silver poured into their eyes so they were frozen in sparkly horror. It had been one of the most appalling sights Brannie had ever been forced to witness and
the first time during a nighttime battle break that her and Izzy had ended up so drunk they couldn’t even stand.
“Then I don’t know what we’re arguing about, cousin.”
“Just because they’re bastards, doesn’t mean we have to be.”
Keita’s eyes rolled all the way to the back of her head. “You are such a goody two-claws.”
“Can we eat outside?” Uther asked. “Or in the stables? I just don’t think I can eat with the sound of his screaming.”
Keita gawked at the Mì-runach. “What kind of dragon are you?” she asked.
Uther shrugged. “A nice one.”
She let out a sigh. “Fine. If your fragile sensibilities can’t handle a little screaming—”
Before she could finish, Caswyn was up and across the room. He cut off the priest’s head midscream and the silence was . . . amazing.
Pointing the sword at Keita, Caswyn accused, “I thought you were some prissy little royal princess. But you are—”
“Lovely? Divine? Bold and sassy?”
“Vile.”
Keita shrugged, sipped her wine. “That, too.”
Chapter Eight
Aidan sat in silence with his Mì-runach brothers for at least an hour in one of the castle bedrooms until he heard a faint knock at the door.
He opened it and Brannie stood on the other side. Her black hair was wet from a recent bath and combed off her face. She had a long, plain cotton shirt on and a map in her hand.
“We need to discuss tomorrow’s plans,” she said evenly.
“Yes. Of course.” He stepped back and allowed her in.
But once Aidan closed the door, Brannie suddenly spun to face him, her eyes wild. The map went flying as she hysterically asked him in a desperate whisper, “Who is that she-demon?”
“Your cousin!” Aidan whispered back.
“That’s not the Keita I know!” she continued to whisper. “We can’t go traipsing around with her! She’ll kill us all in our sleep!”
“No,” Uther corrected, also whispering, “we’ll probably all be awake when she does it. She’ll want to stare us in the eye as we’re bleeding out of every orifice!”
“But—” Caswyn said in his normal voice and they all immediately hushed him.
Poor Caswyn reared back and refused to speak again. Probably for the best. At the moment, they were all panicked and easily startled.
Brannie began to pace around the room. “Now I see what my mother was worried about.”
“What are you talking about?”
“If it turns out that Ren died on our queen’s territory, while under our protection, the Empress will declare war on Rhiannon and strike.”
“Well, that’s bad but—”
“Mum’s worried Keita will try and stop her by killing the entire royal family. From the Empress on down.”
Aidan had a hard time believing that. “You don’t think she would, do you?”
“If you’d asked me this yesterday, no. I wouldn’t have believed it. But after this . . .” Brannie shook her head. “She lured that priest here. But before that, she studied the habits of the Chramnesind priests and priestesses so she knew what poison to use to kill the guards and keep him alive but in torturous pain. That goes beyond mere dragon mayhem.”
“She is a Protector of the Throne.”
“I don’t want to hear that anymore, Aidan!”
Since they’d still been whispering all during their conversation, the strong knock at the door had all four of them screaming in panic.
The door opened and Keita stepped in. She’d also had a bath and was now sheathed in a soft red robe.
“Everything all right?” she asked, gazing at them.
Brannie cleared her throat. “Yes. Of course. You just . . . uh . . . startled us.”
“Don’t worry. I wouldn’t expect any more of the Zealots anytime soon. Last I heard, their attack squadrons were heading north.”
“Great,” Brannie muttered.
“So, tomorrow . . .”
“Yes. We were just discussing that.”
“We’ll be heading to the Port Cities. See if we can pick up Ren’s tracks. If we’re lucky, he’s already caught a boat back to the Eastlands.”
“I don’t understand, Keita. I know Ren’s skills. Why wouldn’t he just open a doorway and . . . you know . . . go home?”
“Unless you’re at my mother’s or Brigida’s level of skill, the Zealot priests can disrupt open doorways. Snatch witches right out of them. If Ren had tried, he’d have definitely been caught. We tried to get him to my mother, but we had to separate when we ran into a few . . . legions. I haven’t seen him since.”
“I’m sure he’s fine, Keita.”
“I hope so,” she said softly, her expression—for once—sad. But just as quickly she went back to the old Keita. “Anyway, we head out tomorrow morning?”
“We’ll be ready.”
“Excellent! See you all in the morning then.” She smiled and waved before walking out, closing the door behind her.
Once Aidan heard another door close somewhere in the castle, he went back to whispering. “If we’re going to survive this, we’re all going to have to calm down!”
“You calm down!” Brannie snapped back in a desperate whisper. “She likes you! I’m just the cousin with the high moral ground!”
“Aye, Branwen,” Uther muttered. “I do not envy you that.”
Brannie spun, one finger pointed in Uther’s poor face. “Is this you helping?”
“Oh, no,” Uther answered honestly. “Not at all.”
* * *
The next morning, Brannie rose before the two suns. She put on her chain mail and boots and went down the stairs and outside to the guards’ quarters. There she found only a few, very battered old weapons—not much better than the ones they’d taken off the dead guards—but an ample supply of surcoats. Some that might actually fit the Mì-runach, big bastards that they were.
She slipped one of the surcoats on over her head and wrapped a belt around her waist. The guard’s weak sword and dagger hung from it. Better than nothing she supposed, but she’d give anything for a real weapon. Perhaps they could find a solid blacksmith along the way. Even weapons made only for humans that never changed their size would be better than these.
“I’m coming into the room,” Aidan called out seconds before he did just as he said.
Brannie frowned at him. “What was that?”
“When I don’t announce, you yell at me that I snuck up on you.”
Brannie was going to argue that point until she realized Aidan was right.
Shrugging, she turned back to a small box filled with axes, most likely used for chopping wood rather than anything war-related. She grabbed one, figuring it was, again, better than nothing.
“It’s not my fault all of you move like jungle cats. Perhaps if you stomped a bit.”
“Unlike my brothers, I don’t know how. I learned to be stealthy very early in life. It helped me survive my kins’ form of familial kindness.”
He grabbed one of the surcoats and put it on. It pulled tight over his chain mail–covered chest but there was nothing they could do about that. There were only a few other surcoats that were bigger and those would have to go to Uther and Caswyn since they were much larger than Aidan.
Good thing Éibhear wasn’t here. They had enough trouble finding leggings to fit that body. And his chain mail shirts took twice as long to make as everyone else’s.
“He’s so ridiculously big!” she exclaimed to the air.
Aidan looked around. “What are you talking about? And to whom?”
“I’m talking about Éibhear and his chain mail shirts.”
Aidan gave a small smile. “Your mind just . . . wanders away, doesn’t it?”
“All the time. Got me in so much trouble during my training.” She picked up the rest of the surcoats and started walking back to the castle. “The Warrior Trials were a nightmare. For a whole year I at l
east had to pretend that I was listening . . . when I really wasn’t.”
Aidan stopped, gazed at her a moment. “It took you a year to become a Dragonwarrior? A year?” He threw up his hands. “I never heard less than a decade. Minimum.”
Brannie rolled her eyes. “Me mum took six months, and to this day I haven’t heard the end of that shit.”
Aidan nodded and admitted, “Your mother frightens me.”
Brannie patted his shoulder before she walked on. “She should.”
By the time they reached the castle doors, Uther and Caswyn were awake. Uther’s arm was still in a sling made of cloth but his fingers could now move a bit. And Caswyn was grinning ear to ear, his human color back to normal.
“What a great healer!” he announced loudly, taking the surcoat from Brannie. “I haven’t felt this wonderful in years! I could take on a . . . take on a . . .” Words faded away as he struggled to pull the surcoat down over his chest.
He stopped when it wouldn’t go past where his nipples would be under the chain mail.
Cringing, Brannie dropped the surcoats to the ground and sorted through them, tossing the obviously too-small ones aside until she found a few that looked—hopefully—big enough.
She handed one to Caswyn and he again struggled to get the garment on.
Brannie and Aidan joined in to yank the surcoat down the dragon’s human chest. It took some time and a lot more energy than they’d thought it would. But once it was done, he was tucked in there.
“Can you breathe?” she asked.
“Enough.”
Uther’s took a bit less time and Caswyn accused him of having a bigger surcoat than his and for his mate to give it to him. “You stingy bastard.”
As the two bickered, a happy and vibrant Keita swept out onto the steps.
Wearing a red velvet dress covered with a red velvet robe, she spun in a circle, and asked, “Isn’t this beautiful?”
“Compared to what?” Brannie asked. It was a nice dress, but she felt the need to be difficult.
But, as usual, Keita ignored her, taking another spin. “Breeton-Holmes’s adult daughters left me a divine wardrobe to choose from.”
“Good thing they had to run for their lives and leave their family home and all their belongings.”