Redheart (Leland Dragon Series) (15 page)

Chapter Thirty

Riza awoke to the gentle music of trickling water. She became aware of the cool rush bathing her throbbing ankle, and a damp compress against her eyes. She rolled to her side, but was urged again to her back by a mild nudge. Her foot was guided and submerged again into cold wetness.

She tugged the compress from her eyes. Bright sunlight flooded her face. Above, a canopy of green leaves swayed in a breeze. The ground beneath her back was lush and cool. Bird song twittered playfully, echoing among thick ferns. The pungent scent of honey soaked the air, and when she breathed in deep, she could taste sweetness at the back of her throat.

She sat up slowly to find Kallon crouched beside her at the edge of a meandering stream, his eyes riveted to her leg. She shifted, and he carefully coaxed her ankle back into the water. She smiled, and tugged her ankle from the stream on purpose, only to have him repeat the motion.

“Must keep still if you wish to heal,” he said.

“Have you been there all night?”

“Yes.”

“Keeping my ankle in the water?”

“Yes.” His muzzle swung toward her. His nostrils flared as large as her fist, and the breath he sucked in stirred her hair against her cheeks. “You still smell of blood.”

Blood. She’d seen it redden the eyes of those angry faces in the night, and the memory rushed a chill through her heart.

“You’re shivering,” Kallon said, his nose bumping her chin. “You cold?”

“A little, I guess.” She looked around herself at the walls of shifting green. “Where are we? This place doesn’t feel real. It’s like a little pocket of forgotten magic.”

“If there is any magic left in these mountains, it’s here. If there was any magic to begin with.”

“So we’re still in Leland?”

“We are.” He yawned, and a drop of his saliva splashed to her thigh. It stung through her skirt like hot bacon grease.

“You’re exhausted.”

“I’m fine. It’s you who needs rest. We have much more flying to do when you’re ready.” His eyes closed, and his muzzle hung so low it brushed her lap.

“You’re not going to take me back to Durance, are you?”

His eyes snapped open. “No. You can never go back there.”

“Then where are we going?”

“Not we. You. Home. Back to your father and your people.”

She stiffened. “But I don’t want to go back there, either!” She grabbed his jaw to look him deep in the eyes. “I would rather go back to Durance than to face my father and admit to him that he was right.”

He pulled his face from her hands.

“Please, Kallon,” she begged. “Don’t take me back there. It will make everything I’ve been through all for nothing.”

“All you’ve been through has been for nothing. Violence stalks you, Riza, and you are too innocent to recognize its traps. You walk straight into them, and it’s me who keeps pulling you out.”

“Maybe my place is with you, then.”

“You really did hit your head hard.”

“What?” She leaned forward. “What’s wrong with that? Even my father speaks of a time when dragons and humans used to live together as equals. If I give him enough wine.”

“Not equals. Servants and masters.”

“Oh, come on. Dragons served by choice, not bondage.”

“What do you know about it?” He sat back with a snort.

“I know what I see of you,” she said. “I know you keep helping me, and not because you’re my servant.”

Wispy curls of steam puffed from his snout.

“Dragons could crush us out of existence any time they want, but they don’t. They choose a higher calling. They forfeit their own will for the sake of a greater good.”

He poked his snout toward her face. “Human survival is the greater good?”

“No.” Impulsively, she stroked his cheek, which she found cool and smoother than she’d guessed it would feel. “Our being together is the greater good.”

He pulled from her touch. “Humankind and Dragonkind, you mean.”

She withdrew her hand, fingers curling into a fist, which she pressed to her lap. “Of course,” she said.

He regarded her for long time. “If more humans thought like you, Riza, you wouldn’t be in so much danger among them.”

She smiled.

“Lay back and rest now.”

She didn’t feel like resting, she felt warm and tingly inside and ready to walk, or even fly. But she lay back anyway, and watched him watching over her until the melody of the spring faded from her ears, and the green leaves huddled together in a blanket of darkness against her eyes.

Chapter Thirty-One

Kallon squinted open an eye. He must have dozed. He didn’t mean to, but he felt as though he’d already been tired for days, and his vigil over Riza had drained what energy he had left. His peering eye found Riza staring directly at him. Her thin legs were lumpy beneath his chin. He’d fallen asleep with his head on her lap.

“Why did you say that if Leland had any magic left it would be here?” she asked.

He lifted his head. Then he groaned, his neck gone stiff. Riza wiggled her feet and legs. They must have gone stiff, too, with the weight of his slumbering head on them.

“Why would it be here, if there was magic left? And why did you say ‘if there was any to begin with’?”

“How long have you been awake?” He gazed up, but the bushy leaves of their green haven blocked the sun. The temperature was no gauge, either, for this place was warm with morning sun and cool with an evening breeze at the same time. It was a comfortable memory of the Leland Province that once was.

“I’ve been awake for a while,” she said. “My ankle is better.” She held out her foot. Her ivory flesh was pickled from the water, but the black-blue discoloration was nearly faded. “I think there is magic here. How did you know about it?”

The metallic tang of blood still overpowered her scent, which concerned him. Predators of any species knew the smell of the wounded, and he wanted her rid of it. “It would be good for you to bathe entirely,” he said.

“But it’s so cold!”

“It’s good and clean.” He poked the tip of his tongue into the bubbling stream. It
was
good and clean, and he drank.

“Well. All right.” She crawled forward and dipped her hands into the water, swishing them in lazy circles. “I’ll bathe if you tell me how you know about this place.”

“I have known about it for years.” He waited for her to move further into the stream, but she only pressed her mouth into a tight line and stared back. “I don’t like talking about this,” he said.

“You don’t like talking about anything.” She smiled, and her eyes were rich with the emerald of the velvety grass she sat on.

“Very well. Follow me.” His weary legs pushed to stand.

“This stream was once a river. Its mouth is near the top of Mount Gore. It circles the mountain, disappearing into the earth and reappearing again among the trees and boulders.” He glanced over his shoulder. She was following, but was favoring her ankle. “Can you walk?”

“Yes. Please go on.”

“Legend says the river is the heartbeat of the province. It pumps life into the veins of crystal ore that run deep through the land, in all territories, dragon and human.”

“Look there,” he said, and paused at the edge of a wide pool that parted the lush growth. Here, his eyes traveled upward to the sheared-off top of Mount Krag. Beyond the mountain the sky arched as a tapestry of puffy clouds threaded through turquoise linen.

“Oh. It’s breathtaking.” Riza came up beside him and rested her palm against his shoulder.

“That trickle was once a waterfall. Follow the water with your eyes, do you see that ledge up along the mountain, just there?” She nodded. “You can’t see from here, but there’s a place that was once the home of Orman Thistleby. He’s the human who helped me when I first brought you to my cave.”

“That day you saved my life.” Her face turned to him, and her chest rose with a deep breath. “The first time you saved me.”

The warmth in her voice stole his words. He simply nodded.

“Where is he now? You said he was in trouble that day the bird fell from the sky.”

Shame clamped his chest. “I don’t know. I tried to help him but failed.”

“What do you mean? What happened?”

He shook his head. He couldn’t bring himself to explain.

“Kallon, what happened to your friend?” Riza moved closer. “Is he dead?”

“I don’t know,” he whispered, in case the trees were listening. “If he is, it is because I failed him.”

“Tell me what happened,” she said.

He closed his eyes. “He was taken by a White. I followed them to Wing Valley, the first time I have been there since…”

“Go on.” Her fingers brushed his scales, and he was embarrassed by the pleasant shudder that arced tiny lightning down his spine.

“I found him behind a shelter, tied like a thief. When I tried to free him, your human friend in black was there.”

“Jastin Armitage?”

He nodded. “Then the White accused Orman of spying, and there was a struggle, and your friend wounded me, and Orman was taken.”

“He is not my friend.” Such venom oozed from her words that he tipped his head to find her face. He was startled by her eyes. Their inner glow had been snuffed and replaced by shards of ice. She turned away, and stepped closer to the edge of the pebbled mountain pool. Her frozen gaze stared out across the horizon.

A steady dribble of water pocked the surface of the pool, marking time as Riza stood silent. He wondered what she was thinking. He had his own dark thoughts about Jastin Armitage, and guessed, even hoped, a little, that hers might be the same. She surprised him, though.

“Is that Mount Gore? The high, green peak in the distance?”

He turned to look. “Yes.”

“Is it wearing a crown?”

He smiled without intending to. “That’s the dragon council arena. It’s carved from the mountaintop, as are the chambers of the council leader. You can’t see those from here. They go deep into the mountain.”

“Carved by magic?”

He’d never considered how the arena came to be. It had just always been there. “I don’t know,” he said.

“Mount Gore is where the river comes from. If the river is the heartbeat, then that mountain is the heart.” She spun to face him. “So the blood pumped by the heartbeat must be magic, right?”

He settled onto his haunches and blinked. “The wizard spoke almost those very words.”

“The wizard?”

“Orman.”

“Oh. Your friend.” She moved toward him again. “Where was he taken, Kallon?”

“To Mount Gore, I think.”

“Then that’s where we should go look for him.”

Kallon shook his head. “No. You have no place there, and I have no place there anymore. I can do him no good. In fact, I would probably make things worse.”

“But how do you know unless you try?”

“No.” He meant it. “He’s not helpless. He’s stronger than he seems.”

She pressed a finger to his chin. “You’re braver than you let yourself believe. You’re a dragon of action. It takes all your strength to resist that.”

“I will not go, Riza. That mountain was once mine, but I forfeited my right to it. To return now would be returning as a stranger.”

He thought he would find disappointment in her expression, but he didn’t. She only nodded, very lightly, and then smiled in a sad way. Then she pressed her cheek to his throat and hugged him tightly. A flutter of resistance tickled his brain, but he closed his eyes and let the embrace come.

The air flashed cool. He opened his eyes to find himself and Riza engulfed in a shadow. Then the shadow was gone, and the air was warm again.

“What was that?” Riza asked.

“Something flew over. I’ll go see.” When Riza moved to climb onto his back, he stepped away and shook his head. “No, you stay here where it’s safe. Take your bath. I won’t be long.”

“Wait, look, was that it? There’s a bird up there on that ledge.” She pointed.

“No, the shadow was too large. That’s probably one of Orman’s birds. He had many like that.”

“It looks like the one I was taking care of in my room.” She turned to Kallon with a hop. “Will you take me up there? I think I know that bird!”

“First I’ll fly. If all is well, I’ll take you up there when I get back.” He flicked his claw in the water and splattered her. “Bathe, and wait for me.”

“Bossy.” She kicked a splash against his forelegs.

As he moved to turn, she looked up to the flapping bird high on the ledge, and to the snowfall of pale feathers it released. He paused.

“Don’t try to climb up there. Those rocks are sharp and slippery.”

“Don’t be silly. I’m going to take a bath.” She wiggled her fingers. “Shoo.”

“Riza.”

“It was your idea. Do you want me to bathe or not?”

Still he hesitated. “I won’t be long.”

“I know.” She turned her back, stepped out of her rags of clothing, and moved cautiously into the pool of water. He watched for a moment. Then he turned and stretched his wings. But she squealed, and he darted a look over his shoulder. “Cold,” she said, hugging her arms to herself. Then she submerged.