Page 78 of The Last Dragon King
He seemed shocked into silence, and so I channeled my inner Regina and took charge. I looked him right in the eyes. ‘Get dressed. Get my saddle, and ride on my back as a bowman.’
He stood there wide-eyed, as if hoping something might change. He’d waited too long to have an heir. His parents only had one child before his mother died in labor with their second.
We were out of time.
“My men will wonder why I don’t ride in my dragon form,” he said, shame marring his deep voice.
‘Tell them your wing is injured. Or better yet, tell them not to question their king. Let’s go!’I urged him. Every second we stood here talking, the Nightfall queen got closer to taking our Middle Bridge territory.
He got moving then, changing his one hand and wing back to human and then throwing on clothes. Within moments, he had secured my saddle and sat on my back holding a bow. As I walked out to the rows and rows of men dressed for battle, my heart was with my husband, my king. The queen was retaliating for her son, and I wasn’t going to let anything happen to Drae in his weakened state.
If he died, if they all died, I would be the only one with dragon magic left… and that thought was too terrifying, so I pushed it aside.
The men looked confused for a moment at seeing Drae riding on my back, but he started to bark orders and they quickly fell into line.
“Meet us at Middle Bridge!” he yelled, and then I took flight.
He was heavy, so my initial liftoff was wobbly, but pretty quickly I was able to balance myself and control my wing speed in order to smooth out the ride.
I flew faster than I ever had before, the drums of war beating throughout the entire kingdom. Below us, warriors rode to Middle Bridge on horseback. I squinted to try and make out anything in the distance. On the horizon ahead I saw smoke wafting up from Middle Bridge.
‘They’re burning it!’I shouted.
Middle Bridge was our only way through the Narrow Strait and into Thorngate, where we traded with the fae. A third of the food we consumed came from trade with Thorngate. This would devastate us. Anger swirled inside of me. Metal specks glinted in the sky and I knew it wasn’t birds.
‘Take down the human fliers,’I told him.
‘On it,’he replied and I drew closer, watching in awe as he expertly shot arrows while standing on my back. One by one, the flying humans dropped from the sky like stones, and I focused my sights on the bridge below. The fire was small, just at the beginning of the bridge, and our warriors were trying to put it out with buckets from the river. At the end of the bridge, the entrance to the Narrow Strait, was the queen of Nightfall. I’d never seen her in person, but I could not mistake the regal woman on horseback wearing a red leather battle suit and a tall golden crown. Her arms glinted with metal from the contraptions strapped there. Her face was pulled into a grimace.
‘Arwen, no! She’s too powerful,’Drae said, but I was already flying at her. She was right there in front of me. One stream of fire and the world would be rid of her. She was weak, a simple human. If I didn’t take her out now, she’d keep coming for me and Drae and his future children.
“Arwen!” He slapped my shoulder as if trying to steer me another way.
I built the fire up inside of me, ready to blast her with it, when her head snapped up in my direction. I’d been wrong to mistake her for a weak human, but I realized that too late. In one swift move she leapt into a standing position on her horse’s back and raised her arms. One second she was pointing at me and the next a dozen metal bolts flew from the device on her forearm right for Drae and I like comets falling from the sky.
I prayed he was strapped in as I did a roll midair to avoid the metal projectiles.
‘Holy crap! Are you okay?’I asked Drae as I straightened out.
‘I’m fine. Don’t get too close to her! That thing on her arm is shooting way farther and faster than I can with my bow.’
I nodded my dragon head, still shaken by the whole thing.
‘What do we do? They can’t take that bridge. We won’t survive the winter without the fae crops.’
The queen looked delighted at my retreat. She dismounted her horse and walked to the other side of the bridge that wasn’t yet burning. There was a glint of steel and a small flame flickered in her palm.
Stupid machine contraptions!
She was going to take the bridge.
‘Burn her forest!’Drae bellowed.‘If she wants to take our bridge, we take her land too.’
Yes!
It was brilliant.
Veering to the left, I flew outside the rocky cobblestone path of the neutral Narrow Strait and into Nightfall territory.
