The Firebrand Legacy (19 page)

“Jon could have fed his blood to someone
else,” Giles said, “or what if he has an heir?”

Ansa thought. “I suppose it’s possible.”

Whereas Granddad would have been too old to
be the sorcerer, Didda was the right age. Carine braced herself
against the tree trunk, determined to disprove her crazy suspicion.
There had to have been an occasion when she saw Didda and the
sorcerer at the same time. There had to be some proof that Didda
was not the sorcerer. But during each action of the sorcerer’s,
Didda was nowhere to be found. When Selius died, Didda was out of
the house. When the sorcerer attacked the Bastion, Mom hadn’t seen
Didda for an hour.

But even though his whereabouts weren’t
accounted for, it didn’t necessarily mean that Didda was the one.
After all, Didda would never kill anyone. He would never terrorize
a city or threaten his daughter. Dragon’s bane, he would never even
go near a Manakor word. That wasn’t at all the gentle father she
knew.

It couldn’t be him,
it couldn’t
.

The crowd whistled and clapped as the
performers—minus Ansa—took their final bows.

“You have a question?” said Ansa, studying
Carine’s face.

Carine pushed herself off the bark. “You said
the power poisons. Can it change a person’s heart? Can it make a
good person kill?”

She wished with all her heart the answer
would be no, never.

Ansa met her gaze. “Mispronunciation turns
order to chaos. Using that power makes a person as sick—or
worse—than the darkest Heartless One.”

Carine was glad to put some distance between
her and Verdiford the next day. Her muscles felt weak as she swayed
front and back on the horse. When they stopped for lunch, she
rested against a sycamore tree, the crown of her head against the
bark. Staring at the sky, she slowly exhaled, but the slow-moving
clouds couldn’t sort out the jumbled questions plaguing her.

“What’s wrong with you?” David dropped a
green apple from Lord Tauno on her lap and sat down.

“Nothing.” Carine smoothed her skirt along
her legs, placing the apple on the ground. Her stomach was already
in knots; adding food to the equation wouldn’t help.

“Well, if you need to talk about anything, I
recommend Giles—very sympathetic.”

Carine snorted.

“Of course, there’s always his handsome older
brother.”

“Who, Marcel?”

David grinned. His eyes, when they met hers,
were bright as stars. He peacefully closed them and leaned back
over the grass, adjusting his arm where the sycamore root
threatened to discomfort him.

“Actually”—Carine took a breath—“I have a
favor to ask.”

“Ask away.” He pushed himself up onto his
arms.

“Do you mind if I borrow the wishstones?”

David pretended to clean out his big ear. “Am
I hearing this? Didn’t you cut off your hair because you heard that
some people thought hair and magic were connected?”

“I didn’t know what I was talking about.
Please, David.” She held out her hand.

He looked at her open palm but didn’t budge.
“You hate enchanted things.”

She shrugged. “A wishstone itself has no
inherent magic. I know that now. The only thing special about a
wishstone is the Manakor word. I want to look at the words.”

David pulled his drawstring bag from his
pocket as slowly as possible and dramatically plopped it into her
open palm.

“Thank you,” Carine said, pocketing the bag
in her surcoat.

“I thought you wanted to see the words.”

“I will, later.”

David laughed. “Oh, no, you don’t. You’re
going to dump them in a river or something.” He reached across to
her pocket, but she pulled away. His forearm rested on her leg.

“I won’t, I promise. Maybe I would have
before, but now I understand better—really.”

“Interesting ploy: you pretend to have this
huge change of heart, and little by little, you get rid of every
enchanted item we have with us. I see what’s going on.” He grinned
and reached across her.

She pushed his arm away, so he couldn’t take
the wishstones back. But David was quick. He reached over, and
laughing, yanked the drawstrings from her pocket. The bag whipped
out.

“Ha!” he said, and then his face fell.

The green vial of gullon blood had fallen on
the ground when he pulled out the wishstones. Carine’s heart sank
as David’s eyebrows contracted. Carine quickly put her hand over
the vial that lay in the dirt.

“Dragon’s bane,” said David, his voice
low.

“I can explain.” Her throat felt thick.

David let the bag of wishstones go and
snatched up the vial. “You lied to me.”

“David—”

“You stole this from me. I trusted you!” His
knuckles whitened over the vial.

“Please, David, I was trying to
protect
you.”

“I don’t want to hear it.” David stood, his
jaw tense.

Carine felt too weak—too unworthy—to stand,
so she pleaded from the ground. “You can’t feed it to the dragon.
You’ll die.”

“You think you’re so much better? This was my
mission, Carine. You can’t steal it from me!” David’s voice
broke.

“I wasn’t trying to—” she stopped. David had
the blood now. He was going to die saving the dragon. Even if he
hated her, she still had to stop him. “I took the blood because
even though you can’t save Kavariel, I can,” she lied. “My cloak is
fireproof. I thought that while you and Giles get the flame, I can
safely deliver the blood.”

“Liar,” David spat. He strode away
stiffly.

Heat flushed through Carine’s body. She
gripped her hair at her forehead and leaned over her knees. Just
like that, one of her two friends walked out of her life. Giles
would too, as soon as he found out that David had the gullon blood
again.

“We’re nearing Wyre,” Giles said that night
at the fire. No one else spoke. They’d been climbing mountains ever
since they left Verdiford five days previous; after thirteen days
of travel, of course they were approaching Wyre.

David huffed off to bed early, and Carine
seized her opportunity.

She plopped the bag of wishstones beside
Giles. “Teach me. What do these mean?”

He raised an eyebrow, as if to say: You
expect a favor after you gave the blood back to David?

“I know you’re mad about that, and I am too.
Please, Giles.”

He tossed a stick into the campfire. “I have
my own projects to think about.”

“Please.”

Giles clicked his tongue and sighed. “You
should be grateful that I, a prince, am giving lessons to a
shoemaker.”

She grinned, spilling the wishstones onto the
blanket.

Giles wiped his eyes and pointed to each.
“Friendship, protection, health, long life, joy, love, loyalty, and
peace—they’re the same words in most wishstone sets.” The words
seemed to swim as they reflected the flickering firelight.

“Okay, so this one is…”

“Friendship,” Giles said.

She repeated the word, memorizing the slopes
and valleys of the engraving. “And this one?”

“Protection.”

Carine examined the stone, mulling over its
possibilities as the wind changed and blew the thick smoke into
their eyes.

Giles coughed, and when the smoke subsided,
said, “Perhaps letting David have the blood isn’t the
disappointment I thought it was. His attempts to heal Kavariel
might be rather convenient.”

She eyed Giles suspiciously, still holding
the edges of the protection stone with careful fingers. “What do
you mean?”

Giles grinned. “Why is the dragon terrifying?
He’s unpredictable. What if we could defend ourselves without
needing Kavariel at all?”

“What are you getting at?” A pit gnawed into
her stomach. Carine didn’t have a good feeling about this.

“While David distracts Kavariel, I will
harvest some of the dragon’s blood. Just like the scholar
Firebrand.”

“Please tell me you’re joking.”

“Why would I joke? If anyone would know what
to do with power like that, it’s me.”

“Bad idea, Giles; Ansa said the power was
addictive and poisonous. You’re not supposed to use it.”

Giles raised an eyebrow. “Firebrand didn’t
know what he was in for. I do. Believe me, Carine, I have excellent
self-control.”

Carine sighed as Giles separated the coals
with a stick and stood. Now she had to stop them both.

As Giles snored lightly, Carine passed her
hand over the hot smoke. Her head rested on her knees at her chest
as she watched the firelight glow on the golden Manakor words.

It was odd sitting this close to a flame and
this close to Manakor. She thought about what Ansa had said and the
notion that maybe Carine’s family had more secrets than they let
on. If by any chance Granddad was Firebrand’s apprentice and Didda
had inherited his Gift of Calling through blood, then Carine would
have inherited it too.

The wishstones were scattered around her. An
experiment was the only way to know for sure.

Carine eyed the protection stone. If she
placed her hand in the coal fire while holding the stone, the
flames would burn her or the stone would protect her the same way
that the word
order
protected Firebrand’s apprentice.

She exhaled slowly and stared at flames. Even
though she could warm herself at fires now, Carine still wasn’t
ready to touch a hot coal, Gift of Calling or not.

Suddenly, a purple sprout emerged from the
earth at her pinkie toe. As the firelight flickered, the tiny
sprout expanded, blooming into a single azalea. Carine scrambled
away from it. Azaleas grew on bushes, and like other plants, took
time to develop. This sudden flourishing was unnatural, the work of
magic, and it set her teeth on edge.

She looked around and shivered, but David and
Giles slept soundly, and the trees and night were still.

With a shiver, she remembered that Didda knew
how much she loved azaleas. If the leather glove on her mouth had
been his, if Jon the apprentice was the same man as Jon of the
Mast, if Didda was the heir of Firebrand, then he could be present,
causing azaleas to bloom where they didn’t belong.

The idea was not comforting. Carine hurriedly
picked up the wishstones, doing her best to avoid touching Manakor
in the process. Accidentally, she grazed one of the words. Pain
zapped through her finger, but as soon as she dropped the stone in
the bag, the hurt faded.

Carine panted, frozen where she knelt by the
campfire. The stone that burned her lay in the dirt, and her
finger, which a second ago carried pulsing pain, showed no sign of
a burn.

Looking around again into the empty night,
she picked up the stone more carefully.

Carine tucked under her surcoat between the
two armed princes, but sleep didn’t come.

Wyrian plains lay black on the horizon,
speckled with tall, scorched trees. Rain bolted down in heavy
drops. Carine’s cloak did her little good against the persistent
downpour, which soaked her hair and dribbled off her hands.

They proceeded over the hills and slowed out
of a hushed respect when they crossed into a burnt forest that now
grew eerily green at the base of the trees. The trees scraped the
air like black claws. What had happened to this kingdom that had
once been so great? Power and its pursuit cared nothing for its
wake.

“This is why we need the dragon back,” David
whispered. “So Navafort doesn’t…”

He trailed off as they climbed a hill, but
Carine understood and even agreed. Kavariel did need to return, but
she couldn’t let David die for it. She watched his slightly
disproportionate features and felt a sigh in her heart. She had
never felt friendship like this before, one where when she talked
with David she felt at home, a friendship where she thought he
could feel at home with her too.

Even Giles, with his arrogance and bluntness,
meant something to her too. She couldn’t let him destroy himself by
drinking Kavariel’s blood.

“Wait,” Carine said as she watched Giles’
clenched jaw. David and Giles turned, but their attention clearly
lay ahead. “I know you both want to approach the dragon. But that
beast will burn us all to ash, do you understand? We came here to
capture the flame to save Navafort, remember? We get that flame as
soon as we have the opportunity, and then we turn around.
Okay?”

David frowned. “Who do you think you are,
Carine?”

She should have expected that. She was
nothing to them in terms of status, and neither of the boys were
happy with her at the moment. Furthermore, capturing the flame was
only a short-term solution. Still, buying time was a worthy goal in
itself. She gritted her teeth and spat, “I care about you.”

David rolled his eyes.

“Giles,” she pleaded, “you understand, don’t
you? The smartest thing is to get the flame and go.”

“Sure,” he said, with the tone of a parent
tolerating their chatty child.

“Wait a minute.” She reached over for David’s
reigns and pulled both horses to a stop. Rainwater dribbled down
the edges of her hood and showered her face. “We’re not taking
another step until you both agree—honestly—to do the smart thing.”
She glowered at David. His hair flattened over his forehead, but
wearing his oversized helmet, the rain clinked against him. He met
her gaze with anger. “David, I need you to promise me.”

Giles peered over the crest of the hill,
where orange light glowed. “I think you should see this.”

David and Carine scrambled from the horses
and looked.

It was a wide valley and deep. The terrain
leveled for what seemed like a hundred miles, mostly covered in
forest. A few trees with leaves remained in the distance, but most
were petrified, charred by the dragon’s flame.

Within the forest was a clearing. It ebbed
with activity as nearly a hundred folk—mostly humans, but a few
fauns and centaurs too—stood at varying distances from the one they
had all come to see: Kavariel. At this distance, they were small
and still like chess pieces. The low murmur of Manakor rumbled
through the trees. The sound raised goose bumps on her arms, but
that wasn’t even the worst of it.