"Who are you?" Rib asked, approaching with Gavin as Damara let go of the stranger. "Where did you come from?"
Damara turned around, tears streaked down her face, a smile on her lips. "This is Jacinth," she answered for the dragon. "She took care of my brother and me when we lived with the Colony in Wystil."
When was this? Rib wondered, but had too many other questions to ask. Why are Jacinth's wings shredded? How has she not been given the firesap cure?
"Have you been here this whole time?" he chose to ask, meeting Jacinth's eyes. The flat scales around the dragon's face were rounded, as a female's always were. Rib detected sadness inside her expression.
"Yes," she replied. "I was hiding from you because I could go mad at any moment. You shouldn't be around me even now." Growing somber, Jacinth began to back away.
"Jacinth," Damara grabbed her wing, "I need you."
"No, you don't understand," Jacinth grieved. "I'm too dangerous. I?I killed my own pupil."
What?! Rib glanced in horror at Gavin, who remained calm.
Damara dropped her grasp and Jacinth bowed her head.
"I was too eager to be a mentor," the firebreather moaned. "I accepted him, even though I knew what could happen. He had just caught his first goat when he came to show me?I'd gone mad. I couldn't even think. I just?killed him."
Jacinth collapsed on the ground, hiding her face among the short, pale plants with a sob.
"That's when I came here. I told Wycker to shred my wings so I couldn't fly back. I can't tell you how many times I've gone mad since then?You have to go."
Damara went down on her knees and touched the despairing firebreather. "I can see the firesap in you," she murmured. "I'll know when it overwhelms you?Please, Jacinth, you're the only one who can save my brother's wife."
Jacinth's eyes peered up from the whitish leaves as Damara told her of the plague and their quest for the cure, how Jacinth would soon be the last firebreather left. Both Rib and Gavin kept silent.
New sorrow filled the dragon's expression. "I can't help you," she replied. "We have no way of getting to Wystil."
"Well?" Rib piped up. "Why not ride the sea serpent?"
Damara cast him a scornful glare. "And if the bewitchment powder wears off? I have none left."
Oh, right. Rib imagined them in the middle of the ocean in the company of an enraged serpent. Even if he was there to save Damara, he wouldn't be able to help Jacinth with her mutilated wings.
"This is what we must do," the young woman said. "There are Huskhns camping on just the other side of the Island. We go to them and force them to take us to Wystil. I'll threaten them with the sea serpent. It follows me. They'll believe me if I say that it'll destroy them at my word."
Threaten the Huskhns?! Rib's eyes grew wide. Could that really work?
Jacinth's face became stony. "No," she answered. "It's too dangerous. You can't put yourself in that position."
"I can," Damara argued. "I know how to defend myself."
"Damara," Jacinth sighed. "I saw those Huskhns fight Wycker before the firesap defeated him. They know what they're doing. They could kill dragons if they wanted to."
"So could I," Damara contended, standing up straight with shoulders squared.
She must be kidding. Rib couldn't help but think of all the different ways he could overpower her narrow frame if she were to attack him. Is she really that confident in herself?
Jacinth gave the young woman a small, sad smile.
"You still have the spirit of that tiny girl I knew so long ago," the dragon murmured. "Just don't let it convince you of a strength you don't have."
Rib studied Jacinth's solemn expression and sought to learn from her wisdom. The way she knew to speak to Damara was admirable, or so he thought.
Damara, however, was looking increasingly aggravated. She ground her teeth as if struggling to think of something to say.
"What are you wanting to say?" Gavin spoke up for once, his intent gaze on her.
Wanting to say?
Rib looked at how fiercely Damara bit down on her lip and reconsidered.
She's struggling not to say something?
When has she ever declined to speak her mind?
Rib's curiosity grew stronger at the taste of secrets in the air.
What could she be thinking of?
"Say it," he pressed.
It surprised him to see her eyes lock and narrow in on him the moment he spoke.
"No one understands," she voiced her thoughts icily. "You see me as weak. You're all mistaken."
Jacinth shook her head. "I would be mistaken to think of you as weak," she said. "You're far from it. But you have to believe me when I say-"
"No," Damara interrupted her. "You have to believe me."
"That you could kill a dragon?" Rib blurted. "Why would we?"
Jacinth cast him a look that told him he'd gone too far.
"Not that I could kill a dragon," the young woman snapped. She was giving up all self-restraint; he could see it in her eyes. "That I did kill a dragon. Because nothing can stop me when I decide I'm going home."
What is she talking about? Rib was astonished. She's gone mad!
"Damara," Gavin said in soft tones. "You need rest."
"Stressful day," Jacinth agreed.
"Maybe you'll feel better tomorrow," Rib put in.
"Shut up!" Damara yelled. "He was going to kill Tide! I stopped him."
"Kill Tide?" Rib's mind was wrenched in a whole new direction. "Who?"
"You mean-" Something seemed to dawn on Gavin. He stared at Damara with an expression that told Rib he knew something. "You're the one that?"
Damara met Gavin's gaze. "You know?"
Gavin swallowed. "Tide told me about?but not who?It was you?"
She nodded once, her mouth a firm line.
"What are you talking about?" Rib pleaded. It felt awful to be left in the dark like this. "Gavin, what did Tide tell you?"
His friend looked at him.
"He really doesn't know anything, does he?" Damara asked, still speaking to Gavin, though she now studied Rib with cold eyes.
"What don't I know?" Rib cringed under both their gaze.
"Tide asked me not to tell him," Gavin responded. "Too young. Not even six yet."
"Tell me now!" Rib cried, agonized by their vague commentary.
"Please," Jacinth said, "I don't understand any more than Rib does."
Gavin and Damara caught each other's eyes once more before the latter crossed her arms and nodded. Gavin rubbed the back of his neck.
Rib stayed dead silent, anticipating whatever he was preparing to say.
"Before Rib," the young man began, "there were dragons, four I think, that were terrorizing the upper kingdom. I was an adolescent at the time. I lived far enough away that I wasn't really afraid for my own life. But I still heard about the death. And the girl that was always with them."
He glanced at Damara, who looked as though she were reliving something, her expression dark, her body tense.
Dragons terrorizing Wystil?
They sounded like nothing but words to Rib.
It can't be true.
"There was another group of dragons that would come and fight the initial ones," Gavin went on. "They had a human with them, too. A man that hid his identity in a full suit of armor. Rumors surrounded who he was and what he wanted, but everyone called him the Dragon Knight. No one around me really knew what was going on. They thought it was some kind of territorial war. Wystil's army wasn't even strong enough to stop it."
The Dragon Knight?that's what people call?
"The first pack was defeated when they attacked the Wystilian castle. Only one dragon got away, with the girl on his back, they said. And that was all. That's the last we heard about them."
And Damara was the girl? Then who was the dragon?
It was like Gavin was making up some strange tale.
Where's the proof for all this?
"We knew t
he Dragon Knight still lived on the other side of the river. King Chadwick married his sister to him as a peace offering."
His sister married off?Theora and Tyrone?
"The King tried to convince people to move back into the upper kingdom and farm the land, but no one would dare cross over. We were alarmed at the occasional sight of dragons. Called for help whenever they ventured into our lands."
All those frightened stares?
A twitching discomfort grew inside Rib as the tale hit the core of one of his long-lived vexations. He had never understood why people were so adverse to him in Wystil.
Rib found himself watching Gavin's lips form the last of his story.
"But the dragons never did anything to harm us, and the King never sent any troops to confront them. As hard as it was to believe, we really were at peace."
Peace?
Rib saw Gavin's lips seal together. His friend was looking at him now, waiting for a reaction, it seemed. Rib was waiting for his own reaction, too.
There was a dragon war. Right before my time.
Such news was to shake his foundation, he thought. Everything lined up. It all made sense. If someone were to ask him if he believed it, he'd answer yes.
And yet, clearly the reality had not fully hit him, because he felt normal. Utterly normal. As though the war had happened centuries ago, or in some other land, some other world.
But it didn't. It happened in Wystil, and Gavin lived through it.
Tyrone was even a part of it! Suited in armor, fighting. The Dragon Knight.
And Damara?What was she doing with those beasts?
It was easy for him to believe that she'd keep something like this secret from him. That was no surprise at all.
But everyone else?
Tide? Tyrone? Gavin?
"Why didn't you tell me?" Rib asked.
Gavin cleared his throat, his eyes cast to the ground.
"When we started spending time together, Tide had a private talk with me. He asked me not to mention these things to you."
Tide asked that of him? Now Rib felt something. Did he not trust me?
He asked, "Why?"
"Because you're just a child," Damara's jarring voice cut in.
"I'm not."
"Jasper's twice your age."
"I'm still- It's different for dragons! You should have told me."
Gavin avoided his gaze, but Damara looked at him with light, criticizing eyes.
Rib stared back at her, anger slowly growing in his chest.
She's kept the most secrets of all. Dangerous secrets.
"What were you doing on the back of that dragon? Watching people die?"
"You think I wanted to be there?"
Her voice was heavy with resentment.
"I don't know," Rib answered accusingly. "Did you?"
Damara bared her teeth like a fierce wolf.
"He made me his slave," she hissed. "I was weak. I hate myself for not stopping him sooner."
A slave? The word struck Rib in the face. He thought of Gavin. Of Memory.
"Who was it?" Jacinth's growl rumbled from her throat. Rib had forgotten she was there, but now that she spoke, he saw how passion lit the red of her face like glowing embers. "Who dared take you?"
The young woman relaxed her face to near-neutral.
"Chasm."
Chasm?
Who is-
Rib's thoughts were cut off by the short blast of white-hot flames that escaped Jacinth's jaws. Gavin leaned away from the heat, but Damara neared the dragon and laid a calming hand on her. Jacinth's snarl died on her lips and the creases around her mouth smoothed out to veil her gleaming teeth, though her eyes remained intense with hate.
"That snaking, vile creature," Jacinth cursed. "Never anything to him but lies and trickery. Had I known what he'd grow up to do?" The dragon's tail lashed behind her, scraping the earth.
"Who's Chasm?" Rib asked. "Does everyone know but me?"
He looked to Gavin. "Do you know?"
Gavin's dark blue eyes told him he did. Rib held their gaze, feeling further apart from the young man than ever. It felt like the time he'd learned just how far away the moon really was, and that he'd never be able to touch it like he'd dreamed when he was small.
"Who was he?" Rib repeated quietly.
His friend looked uncomfortable. He clenched his jaw and turned his head.
"Gavin," Rib begged. "Why won't you tell me?"
The pain in his voice must have been too much for Gavin, because he parted his lips and said, "Because?because he was your father."
Father?
The concept didn't register in Rib's mind at first. He forgot what a father was, or that he ever had one. When he remembered, he could only think of Tyrone. Tyrone was a father. Tyrone was like Rib's father.
But in reality?
Chasm?
The air was pressed from his lungs as crushing truth overwhelmed him. He couldn't breathe.
This dragon they curse?
My father?
He was barely aware of Jacinth advancing to peer into his dumb stricken face.
"I see it now," she said. "He has the same jaw."
"What?" Rib found his voice again and stepped back, tail curling. "How?how can you be so sure? How do you know that he's my?"
"You were the last thing he made me search for," Damara answered dryly. "Your mother lied to him about where she laid her clutch. He realized it after she died. That's when we found Tide guarding you from the sea serpent in the sunken pond."
That was when?
Rib felt dizzy.
"What happened then?" He was hardly conscious of the question exiting his mouth.
Damara's fingers traced the hilt of Gavin's knife still hanging at her side. Her hair fell into her face and covered most of her eyes, but she didn't move her hand to fix it.
"I pleaded with Chasm not to hurt Tide," she spoke, sounding hollow. "But he just told me to watch."
Rib could see where the story was going. It was how this conversation even started. He didn't want to believe it.
"Tide was feeble. He wasn't even awake to know when Chasm dove for him. It was all I could do to watch?until I was granted the strength to stop it."
Rib's eyes stared blankly at Damara's hand, her knuckles white as she now gripped the handle of the sheathed knife.
"You killed him? Actually killed him?"
It sounded impossible.
"Drove a dagger through his skull."
It can't be.
Rib lifted his eyes to Damara's and knew she spoke the truth.
She killed my father.
The emotions stacking up inside of him made his throat throb and his chest restrict even more. His wing shoulders twitched, his mouth moved slightly. There was a silent roar building in his ears, filling his head. Without another word, he walked past Damara and the others to a tall ridge well away from them.
There, he stood with all four legs quavering. His eyes consumed the horizon of ocean and distant land, but his mind processed none of it. He couldn't take in all that he'd just heard. So many things to grasp. As he focused on one, the others would start to slip until he caught them by the tail and pulled them back into his conscience.
My father was a treacherous dragon.
Chasm.
No one told me.
My father?
And Damara killed him!
Chasm.
Rib shook his head repeatedly, violently, softly. Nothing helped to clear it.
He wanted to both dive off the ridge and crumple where he stood. His body urged him to scream, but his throat locked it all inside.
No one told me.
And Chasm!
Killer?killed.
Chasm.
Rib found his lungs burning for air and he forced himself to inhale. His breath was shaky and he choked.
My siblings, me?we're half Chasm.
Memory. Half Chasm.
Never knew?never told. r />
Rib blinked.
Never knew? I never knew him.
Said to be a liar, a killer.
But how?
He couldn't imagine himself being related to such a monster as that. The monster they said he was. The monster Damara said he was.
How can she be so sure?
How can I be sure she knew what he was?
Rib pictured his father, pictured him like a larger, grimmer version of himself. His imagination set Damara on his back. She drew a knife and thrust it through the back of his skull. No warning. No eye contact as he convulsed and died.
No, Rib told himself. She said she was saving Tide.
She was saving Tide.
He placed his mentor in the picture, beneath Chasm, unconscious. The imaginary Damara kicked Chasm's bloody body and knelt over Tide, who awoke. He was fine. Perfectly fine.
But Chasm. Rib's father.
Couldn't he have changed?
If he was just given the chance?
Everything except the image of Chasm's corpse faded from his mind.
Did he really have to die?
The fact that Rib never met his father made him even less sure. He could only base his thoughts on the accounts that Damara and her friend, Jacinth, had to give on Chasm. And he hardly knew either of them.
If Damara's kept secrets all this time?how can I trust her word now?
I've seen her tell lies before. I've even helped her lie to Mortaug and Gavin.
Rib wished he could have met his father before he died.
Before Damara killed him.
He thought if only he could talk to him, reason with him, show him what it meant to be a friend to everyone, then maybe his father could have changed.
But I'll never get that chance. Because Damara took away his chance.
Damara killed my father.
Rib swallowed past the knot in his throat. He needed to know more. He needed to hear Damara's justification for it all.
The feeling was lost in his limbs as he turned and walked back to the small group that watched him approach. Everything felt so distant. He wondered at how he was even able to control his movements.
Damara. He faced her with face lacking expression. Why did she do it?
"What made you so sure?" he asked, his voice sounding empty.
"Of what?" she replied. Her gaze was questioning, as though she intended to read his every thought.
"That he couldn't change. That he had to die."
Damara scoffed. "If you knew him, you'd know it too."
"But I didn't know him," Rib responded on point, a spark of anger flashing in his heart. "Because you killed him before I could. How can I know you were in the right?"
Damara stared him dead in the eye.
"If I hadn't killed Chasm right then," she laid out plainly, "he would have murdered Tide, and raised you and your siblings to be murderers just like him."
Murderers?
The concept was abstract, absurd. And yet, here was Damara, telling him that his whole family had the potential of becoming beasts of violence and chaos.
Us?
Rib shook his head slow in disbelief. Her words were an accusation.
Me?
"No," he spoke in a daze. "Nothing could ever have made me a murderer. You don't know what you're talking about."
"I do. More than you."
Anger sparked again. "No, you don't! You're wrong. My family isn't what you say. My father could have changed."
Damara surprised him with a bitter laugh.
She finds that funny? Rib's anger was a tangible thing now. It balled up in his heart and threatened to burst through.
"Perhaps it's true," Damara said, "when you say nothing could make you a murderer. You're a coward like your mother. But believe me when I tell you- nothing could have changed your father."
Rib stared at her.
How.
How can she be so bold?
So bold as to tell me that.
"Chasm wasn't the type that could be reasoned with," Jacinth broke into the conversation, her voice steady. "He set his mind on things and refused to compromise for anything else."
Rib didn't look at the dragon, but his gaze hardened.
What does she know?
"Rib," Gavin also spoke up. "Some people don't change."
Gavin. Rib's heart jolted. He's siding with them?
"But they do," Rib protested. His voice grew louder as he thought of something more to support his case. "And you should know! Look at Mortaug. He kept you as a slave. What makes my father any different?"
"Murder," Damara hissed.
Rib couldn't keep from baring his teeth.
"Accusing my father of a crime you're just as guilty of?? This is it. Get the Huskhns to take you to Wystil if you can. I'm staying here."
"It's just as well," she answered, ice cold. "You aren't needed."
Good.
Rib turned around, headed back for the shipwreck where he would find Mortaug and Jasper waiting.
"No, Damara," Jacinth spoke up behind him. "He's the only one that can keep you safe. If he doesn't come, we aren't going at all."
"Jacinth!" Damara gasped.
Oh, how she begs, Rib thought, listening to the young woman plea with the firebreather as he stalked out of the mountain's depression. As if innocent.
He heard feet running to catch up. Gavin appeared in front of him.
"Rib," the man said. "We need to talk."
Chapter 20