Chapter 22

22

R hi

“Home?” I say. Pip butts his snout against my ankles and I reach down and scoop him up.

“Little rabbit is going nowhere,” Renzo growls.

The man examines him with shrewd eyes.

“Ahhh, Lowsky’s hunting dog. I’ve heard of you.”

“No longer Lowsky’s hunting dog. I’m hers now.” Renzo points towards me, his chest puffing with pride. “We all are,” he adds, tilting his head towards my other mates this time.

“Five mates,” the man says. “So it is true.”

“Yes,” I whisper as butterflies flutter in my stomach. Is he my dad, really my dad? “Five fated mates.”

“Then there is even more for us to discuss. It is not safe here. Let us leave. We have enough dragons to take you all.” The golden dragon rumbles and his dark eyes flick to hers. “Gwenhwyfar will carry you.” The man watches her, his face unreadable. “The connection between you is strong,” he comments.

“I healed her,” I say, an accusation in my tone.

He lowers his gaze back to mine.

“Healed a dragon.” His gaze falls back to Pip squirming in my arms. “And this is …”

“My pig.”

“Your familiar. I have not seen such practice for some time. May I?” He reaches out his hand and before I have a chance to tell him no, or to snatch Pip away, he’s pressed his fingertips to the crown of Pip’s head. Pip’s eyes dart to mine in desperation and he squeals. But nothing happens and the man simply withdraws his hand.

“Her magic,” he says cryptically. “You have her eyes. That same shade. Beautiful. And your magic is like hers. Do you dream like her?” And am I wrong, or do I see a spark of something, something almost like excitement, in those shrewd eyes?

He took my mom for her powers. That’s how it started even if it didn’t end that way. Does he think he’ll use me in the same way?

I don’t answer his question.

“Who are you?” I ask him.

That smile again, charming.

“You don’t know?”

“I have an idea. But I’d like to hear you tell me.”

“My name is Caspian Moray. Although some call me the Black Prince. I am ruler of the Western Kingdom and I believe I am your father.”

“The Black Prince is dead.”

He looks down at his body. “I may be incorrect – it happens very rarely – but I appear to be well and truly alive.”

“The Black Prince?” This time it’s Azlan who growls, laying his hand on my shoulder.

“We are wasting time,” the Black Prince says, spinning suddenly and strolling back towards his dragon. “Sopherina and Portia will take your mates. You will ride on Gwenhwyfar.”

His dragon lowers its head again, and he climbs up onto its back.

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” Azlan says, his brow knitted with concern.

“You never think anything is a good idea,” I whisper with a smile.

“The Black Prince is our enemy.”

“He’s my dad.”

“So he says,” Stone snarks from behind me.

“He is,” I say with more confidence than I really feel. “He’s the man from my locket. The man who owned this knife.” I glance at the assassin and he nods his agreement, then kneels down and plucks the knife from the sand, sliding it back into his pocket.

“It doesn’t mean we should go with him,” Tristan says.

I look at them all. Too often I know I’ve been a brat, storming off and leaving them no choice but to follow me. I know it’s not only brattish, it’s also pretty selfish. I peer towards the golden dragon and back to my mates. I’m going to try and do this the reasonable and grown up way.

“You saw how close we came to dying back there. If the dragon hadn’t intervened, we would have died – Christopher Kennedy would have killed us.” Tristan snorts and I glare at him. “I’m just facing facts here. We have no chance up against him – we all know that. But maybe we would with his help.” I glance towards the Black Prince, watching us from the top of his dragon. “He has dragons and fighters. You saw the damage they did to the academy and the council.”

Spencer nods in agreement and Renzo looks eagerly towards the dragons. I’ve won two of them over.

“And I called him,” I say to Azlan, Stone and Tristan, “without even meaning to, I called my dad to come help us. That must be fate. It must be fate intervening to help us.”

“You really believe that?” Tristan asks.

“Yes,” I say. Because that must be right. Why else would it have happened?

“I don’t like it,” Azlan says sternly.

“Me neither,” Stone adds.

“Seems like we’ve run out of choices, though, my dudes,” Renzo says.

“And you know she’s going to go whether we like it or not,” Tristan adds.

I pout at him. “I want us to be happy with this decision.”

Azlan stares into my eyes. “I’m not going to be happy with it, but I will go along with it. Just …” he lowers his voice, “be careful, Rhianna.”

I think that’s asking a lot – when am I ever careful? – but I make the promise anyway, and then we’re all trudging over the sand towards the dragons.

The golden dragon watches me come and when I reach her, I lay my hands on her cool scales.

“Hello again, Gwenhwyfar,” I say, testing out her name and smiling at her, Pip giving his own little squeak, “thank you for rescuing me. I guess we’re even now.” She rumbles a second time, lowering her head to the sand. She’s too big for me to climb up onto and there’s no Renzo here to help me now – he’s too busy climbing onto one of the smaller dragons with Stone, who is looking mighty unhappy about being the one stuck with the assassin as his travel companion.

Furrowing my brow with concentration and with Pip in my arms, I manage to lift myself up into the air with my magic, just like I’d done that time in the gym with the rope. When I reach the top of the dragon, I grab ahold of her scales and scrabble up onto her back.

The butterflies continue to flutter around my stomach and I don’t know if it’s excitement at the prospect of riding her again, or nerves that I’m making another bad decision.

The other dragons lift up into the air. Spencer whoops with excitement and even Azlan appears to be struggling not to grin.

I screw up my eyes and steady my nerves. This is the right thing to do. It has to be.

The dragon spreads her wings and drags us high into the sky, sweeping after the others, until the convent is a mere dot in the distance and the Gray Isle is far far behind us as we fly out towards the West.

It takes us most of the day and into the night, but I’m not even a little bit tired, buzzing too much as we soar across the countryside, past all the places we passed weeks and weeks ago on the motorbikes and in Winnie’s car. Up here the wind is fierce and cold and would be keeping me awake even if the adrenaline wasn’t.

Pip isn’t loving the ride as much as I am. In fact, I think he hates it even more than he did Winnie’s driving. His body quakes like it did when he was unwell, and he screws up his eyes and buries his face in my lap. I try to comfort him, stroking my hand down his back and narrating everything there is to see from up here, but he’s having none of it, and in the end I give up and enjoy the flight. It’s a million times better than flying the broom, even if my thighs and my core ache and my eyes water. The dragon is graceful and the way she moves through the air is incredible.

Renzo said my dad was descended from dragons themselves and I begin to believe it. It’s like I belong up here, far away from all my problems on the ground, the wind sweeping through my hair and the stars sparkling around me.

The other dragons soar alongside us, taking turns to lead us, swooping in and out of position and my mates call to me with delight, our bonds thrumming with excitement.

As day breaks, bright golden light racing along the crack where the sky meets the earth, we fly over the border. A huge barracks stationed right below us, tanks, trucks and other equipment parked in neat rows, soldiers like tiny ants swarming between them. They must see us up above, and one or two magical bolts come tearing our way. The dragons dodge them deftly and then we pass over land I don’t think belongs to anyone. Empty like a ghost town, dead trees like skeletons staking the scorched earth, great craters pockmarking the ground.

No-man's-land.

And then, as the rays of light chase up into the sky, hitting the dragon’s body and turning her golden, we pass into the west. More barracks, more soldiers. No difference. Except no one seems to notice us here, or at least if they do, they don’t care. No bolts of magic, no warning shots. The busy little ants continuing their duties, until we’re beyond them all and out into the west.

I don’t know where I’m going from here. The West is a huge mass of unknown land. I don’t know where the people live, how they live.

We fly over desolate land, dry and bare, only dust and sand in all directions, not a single scrabbly bush or even a lone cactus in sight. No trickling streams or racing rivers. Nothing. Nothing at all.

This is the West. Desolate and dangerous. Where men struggle to survive. Where the dark magicals were exiled in punishment.

The winter sun bears down on the cracked earth, roasting further and we fly onwards until finally we spy something in the distance. The first signs of life.

First a farm, cattle chewing on spindly grass, sparse yellowing crops clinging to the earth.

Then a town. Rundown like so many in the republic. Empty and boarded up.

Then another and another, becoming bigger, packed closer together until they spill into one another, one continuing urban sprawl across the land, the tall towers of a city out on the horizon.

This is where we’re headed, I feel it in my bones, and I wish Pip would stop sulking and talk to me.

This isn’t the West I expected. The desert land, yes. But towns? A city?

The city is packed tight with tall dark towers, nobody visible on the narrow streets below. It seems newer, more sophisticated even than the capital back home. Smarter, cleaner, in a way more intimidating. These people aren’t struggling. They aren’t struggling at all. They are thriving.

I scan my gaze over the huge mass of city, looking for any sign of where we might be headed, and then I spot it, right in the center of the city itself, slightly raised above the other buildings on a mound: a large compound with dark walls of metal ringing its buildings, inside what can only be described as a grand palace, manicured gardens – the first green we’ve seen in miles and miles.

The dragons swoop around in a circle, spiraling lower and lower, and I see just how grand the castle is. No sandy-colored mansions here or grand white pillars, all dark sleek metal and black-paned windows; even the plants in the gardens are a dark shade of purple. There are also guards hidden among the buildings and the gardens and they step out forming a ring as the dragons circle lower and lower until we land on a flat patch of grass right in the center of that ring.

The soldiers are not like the ones that tried to ambush me. No grotty uniforms, no balaclavas. They wear grand sweeping cloaks that remind me of the one Christopher Kennedy wore, long leather gloves and black pointed helmets. They all stand with their heads bowed, waiting.

“We have her,” the Black Prince calls from on top of his brown dragon. “My daughter has returned.” The guards lift their heads in unison, thrusting their fists into the air and stamping their feet. My dad lifts his hand and they fall quiet. “Tonight we feast.”