By breakfast, the next morning, Aurelie decided that Valice's absence eclipsed the news that she had to share with the King. Poking her egg with her fork, so that the yellow ran, Aurelie sat staring at her plate. The smell of them made her nauseous. She pushed the plate away.
The King, Aurelie, and Kaidenâwho decided that it was safe to be in her presence againâwaited for Mir to arrive. Something didn't feel right and she made the castle guards fetch the man responsible for Valice.
Aurelie felt Valice stir in her thoughts. Something was wrong.
She had not come to her rescue even though she felt Revin harm her. At first, Aurelie was relieved but now she couldn't stop the awful feeling that tingled in her stomach. Aurelie tapped her fingers on the table.
"Valice," she called.
Her thoughts flooded with everything that could have happened to the dragon.
I should have told her not to fly around those farms.
They paid most of the farmers off, but there was no way to track them all if they didn't show up at the castle with their list of stolen livestock. God forbid one of them took it upon himself to get rid of the problem.
The King pressed his hand against hers to stop her from tapping her fingers. She looked up. "He's incompetent. I don't know what you were thinking of putting him in charge," she said.
"He was a general in the army before you were born." Kaiden looked up from his plate.
The King shifted uncomfortably. With the tense atmosphere at the table, the awkward silence and vile glances from Aurelie, she'd be surprised if he wasn't worried about another situation.
"What?" he asked the King. "He was."
"And you were a good man once," she said adding a nasty glare. "Things change, don't they, uncle?" She turned to the King with a sparkling smile. "The man worries more about his whores than he does of Valice. She's supposed to be under our protection."
Kaiden pointed his fork at her. "That's no way for a princess to speak."
"Oh, I'm sorry," she said, wiping crumbs off the white lace tablecloth to keep her hands busy. "It appears that you've forgotten that you have no say in how I speak or act anymore. It might be the lying, abandoning and being the reason that the fathâ," she cut herself off before she said too much. Her heart bounced up and down in her chest, making her feel as if she were falling. The reason the father of my child was taken from me.
Mir stepped into the room, straightened his postured and continued his walk until he reached the edge of the table. "Your Majesty, Prince Kaiden, Princess Aurelie," he greeted.
Aurelie looked to her father, giving him the chance to speak first. She better not be dead, you useless piece of garbage.
"The dragon, Mir, the Princess has reason to believe that something is the matter," the King said.
"Yes, sir," he said, rubbing his fingers together. "There was an accident last night."
"Last night?" Aurelie's hands formed fists under the table. He had a whole day to call her.
You can be glad the King is here.
The King held a hand to silence her. "What accident?"
"She tried to leave the cave, and the entrance collapsed. The boulders have one of her wings. We've been trying to lift some of them, but it's proven difficult. She's in pain and won't let us near her anymore." Mir rubbed his short, stumpy chin.
A pang ran through Aurelie's chest.
Valice did try to come to my aid.
Her foot tapped against the floor and an orange flare set on the room.
You could have called me. She huffed. He probably didn't know himself until this morning.
Being silent in this situation was challenging. Aurelie gave the King a chance to deal with the matter, but she would certainly not let this man near Valice ever again.
"And you've known this since?"
Aurelie turned to Mir, eyes blazing. He recoiled, growing pale. There was no right answer to the question. If he knew before the King called him up, he was a moron not to come to her immediately and if he only found out this morning he was incompetent. It didn't seem like he understood the severity of the situation until he saw her.
General since before I was born, huh? She glanced in Kaiden's direction.
Mir swallowed hard. "I heard of this last night," he said. "It was too late to wake you and the Princess."
The King turned to Aurelie, and gave a short nod, gesturing her to speak. "So, if she was hurt in the early afternoon, how is it that the man in charge of her protection only hears of it when the King has retired to his chamber?" she asked sternly. "It is an hour's travel by foot, is it not? By horseback, news would have gotten here much sooner."
"Yes, butâ
"Mir," the King said as he stood. "Let us say here, simply, that the dragon no longer concerns you."
Kaiden stood. "Emileâ
"Walk with me, brother, and I shall hear your concerns." The King wiped his black armor clean of any crumbs. "Aurelie, go to the dragon and see what must be done."
"If the boulders are too painful to lift, I'm going to need a witch," she said and stood too, "and a healer. Though, I don't suppose we'll find one that knows how to deal with dragon flesh."
Mir was still at the table, pale and sulky. She wished that he not be around her for too long. Or she might do something that would upset mostly everyone in the castle and outside of it.
"A witch you won't find here," he said.
Aurelie bit her bottom lip. She could find a witch, and quickly. Orken. Observing her father, the King, the killer, the deceiver, and despite all that, the man she grew to trustâcautiously but sincerely. She sighed, and rested both her hands on the table, deciding that she had to take a leap of faith and bring Orken to her aid.
"I know a witch who would die to be here for this," she said and dragged her tongue along her cheek. "He is important to me, father, andâ
"You don't trust that he will be safe here?"
She nodded. "I need you to say that he will be. He's a difficult man and like you said, you do not have a good track record with witches." You also killed Sasha and he will most probably try to kill you, several times and ways. "You will not harm him whatever happens."
"You have my word. No one will touch your wizard."
Aurelie took a second to think and looked him over once more. She hoped that this was not the lion's den.
Aurelie placed a hand on her tummy. Soon, there would be two beings that depended on her. The instinct came to her so quickly. Just as the seed of knowledge was planted, Aurelie felt a presence within herself that was magical in the way that it embraced and filled her.
Right there where she stood, she saw her life as it would be once the child came. A basket in her hand, a crib in her chamber, and a new seat at the table. To protect that child, she needed her dragon.
"Okay, I'm going to need some shadow walkers to go to Peter Donahue's cabin. Three at least and with some guards if you want them to come back alive."
There would be a whole person that depended on her, that took all her love, and that would both teach her and learn from her. She was in awe.
"We better send Peter along, then," the King said.
Aurelie frowned. "He's still here?"
"Yes, at the monastery, preaching Alysia's laws. Whatever those might be."
The stench caught her breath before she entered the cave; copper, urine and moist earth. It was the smell of death if ever it had one. Valice lay with her head sticking out of the cave entrance, her eyes heavy and her breathing low. The boulder that caught her wing blocked most the entrance in width, Aurelie had to squeeze through sideways to enter.
It made her angrier that they tried to shift the boulder in the first place. A small army and tools would be required, and the movement would destroy Valice's wing altogether.
She cautiously looked up, hearing Aurelie footsteps.
"Help is coming." She touched the dragon's nose with the tips of her fingers and caressed it. Valice did not respond.
Vera refused to come closer than the line of guards that made camp about a hundred feet from the entrance. They set up large tents, had their own cook, junior healer, and an outhouse. That's where Vera placed her herb pouch and tools. A pool of blood that would have filled a small fountain soaked Valice's wing and ran up to her chin.
When Aurelie left them, Vera had just summoned the healer to discuss which concoctions would be potent enough to heal a dragon's flesh. The young woman, as Vera herself knew very well, would probably just be a body to bounce ideas off of and nothing more. On the journey to the cave, Vera said that she had just finished training her a month prior.
A murmur of voices caught her attention. She left Valice and walked until she could see their tents. A large tree had appeared behind the tents. It was certainly not there before, she would have remembered.
The guards gathered their weapons, and gathered rods, covering them with cloth, to light by the campfire. Aurelie ran.
"Stop!" she screamed.
The ground shook, disturbed by the sudden coming of large roots. The tree's bark expanded and leaves appeared, one by one and then one by a hundred until Jermyn's hollow eyes opened and suspiciously peered at the guards. They stood at the ready, surrounding him. A flutter of joy warmed Aurelie's chest.
"Hello, old friend." She smiled.
Jermyn's bark lips moved up in anger. "Move!" he ordered the guards and waited for them to create a path.
They turned to Aurelie, waiting for her order. She nodded. They walked backward, and stopped in a cautious stance; their burning stakes pointed in his direction.
The ground trembled as he made his way past them. "Aurelie," he glanced down, "have you noticed that every time you call upon me, I end up with a stake pressed up against my behind? I'm tired of meeting only when one of you needs something."
"And yet you give out your seed with the promise of only being called when we're either dead or dying."
Jermyn gave her a sneaky smirk. "Where's this dragon?"
"Here," she led him toward the cave, "I'll show you. She's badly hurt."
"You know about the shadow walkers that showed up to transport Orken?"
Aurelie nodded. "I sent them."
"Daerious won't let him leave alone. That girl won't let Daerious leave at all. And Orken won't leave until he knows you're alive. I don't know how I got in the middle of it, but here I am, finding out if you're alive and not restrained."
Aurelie lifted her hands and rotated her wrists. "Not restrained."
"Your shadow walkers can't say the same."
They arrived at Valice's cave. "They've captured them? No one got hurt, I hope."
Jermyn shrugged, shaking off a few leaves. "Once you know that you just have to poke the shadows, there's not much else to those creatures. They had 'em pinned up before they entered the house. Peter along with them."
Aurelie sighed. Well, that bridge is burnt. The image of Peter tied up in his own house brought a cheeky smile to her face. It wasn't right, and she didn't picture him being quiet about it. The poor man tried to make them leave so many times, and now her friends completely took over his house.
"If I knew that you were still there, I'd have sent an army," Aurelie smiled and waved him to follow her. "You won't see much of her from here, Jermyn, but this is the cave."
"It pongs." Jermyn pursed his lips. "How can you keep the poor creature here?"
"The general in charge was an incompetent fool." She shook her head in wonder at how ridiculously vile Mir was to take such poor care of her.
Jermyn kept quiet for a moment and then folded his arms. "But she is your charge, Princess."
Aurelie looked, guilt overshadowing her features. He was right. She had been selfish in her grief and abandoned the dragon. A poor excuse, and one that she had become too comfortable using. "You're right."
Jermyn pressed his stump against her shoulder. The playful push sent Aurelie flying sideways and skidding to a stop just before she could tumble over.
"Oh well," Jermyn said, glancing down uneasily. "I best get going."
"Mhmm," she murmured. Please don't form scales. Please don't form scales. They were getting harder and harder to hide. Never mind the awful pain that came with their formation. Her skin had been pierced one too many times.
"I'll return with the others," he said. Roots grew out of his legs and dug into the ground. His face froze and as he grew smaller, faded into the bark.
Approaching Valice's cave, she summoned the golden light from her fingertips that connected her to the thoughts of the dragon. "I won't let you stay here." She pushed past the bolder and put her hands on Valice's head. "Never again."