Page 55 of The Dragon Queen

Royce went pale, then bright red spots formed in his cheeks as he rallied quickly.

“No, but Vigilance is a far hardier creature than that poor excuse for a dragon.”

I followed his gaze and saw that all the fire had gone out of Cloudy, literally. Where he was at my back, ready to attack, now he had become subdued. That long, red muzzle stretched forward and nudged at the shards of the broken eggshell. I watched his fiery eyes blink, as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

“You bastard…” I growled.

“You can call me all the names you like, queen-in-waiting, but I need you to pass the message on to your king.” He made a show of considering what to say next. “Or your husband. Perhaps both of them, since they’re always together.” Royce nodded at the broken shell. “Draven needs to stand down. He’ll be king of the three remaining duchies, though any son you manage to bear him?” He shrugged. “That still remains to be seen. Harlston is seceding from the state of Nevermere and will be recognised as a separate country with my father as king. Any incursion from the west will be seen as a declaration of war.”

“You think to win a war against our dragons?” Ged asked in a ragged voice. “You’ve less than half our number.”

“And all of the dragon eggs.”

Royce’s sneer was gone and the rider beside him was starting to look around nervously, obviously wanting to go. His dragon, however, sat there, still as a stone. His eyes were filmy, almost as if he were dead, not just controlled by the dragonstone at his rider’s neck.

“My father will smash every single one of them, leaving the dragonlings to take their last breath on the flagstones of his palace, if you make a move against us.”

“This is madness!” Ged shouted. “You’ll have no young dragons of your own.”

“We’ll make more when the young queen is grown,” Royce replied, and that’s when the true horror of what they proposed hit me.

I was right back in those memories of what Glimmer hadendured, trapped in the shell, unable to get out and away from the punishing psychic onslaught. Beatrice would be using Raina’s tactics to ensure the queen dragon was bonded to her.

Without Glimmer’s considerable mental resources to protect herself.

“No…” I barely whispered that, but Royce got exactly what he was looking for in that response. His eyes lit up, his grin like a knife’s edge against my throat. “No,” I said more firmly. People kept trying to make me queen, so I needed to act as one truly. “No, you will not do this.”

“Stay where you are, little queen, and the dragons will remain unharmed.” His eyes slid to the shells on the ground. “Well, the rest of them.”

Cloudy prowled forward, smoke trickling from his nostrils. His period of mourning was brief, and anger had replaced it.

We need help, I said, eyeing the two intruder dragons. They seemed to jerk to life, but not wholly. Just enough to start conjuring fire themselves.Those dragons are being coerced, but there are two of them and one of you.

More than one, Cloudy replied.

Before he could say another word, a rhythmic sound broke the silence. The breeze began to pick up, becoming brisk, before rough winds buffeted the lot of us. Everyone turned around to seek the cause, and that became immediately clear as Hadrian appeared behind the two intruders.

The ancient dragons were far fewer in number, I realised, because of their size, and while Hadrian would’ve been dwarfed by Aisenbran, there were few in Nevermere that could match his size. Cloudy and the Harlstonian dragons were like children beside him.

And that’s how the intruder dragons behaved.

Some primitive instinct fought the control their riders had over them, forcing their hearts to race, their muscles to tense, as they knew they were in danger, but it wasn’t their struggle I focussed on. It was her.

Glimmer!

My mind leapt over the space between us, trying to lock ontohers as she sat proud on Hadrian’s neck, her own body bristling with fury. She replied to my thought, but more besides, her scales glowing brighter and brighter gold in the evening sun.

You seek to use my brothers as bargaining chips?I didn’t know how Royce and his comrade stayed in the saddle as her mind lashed theirs.You seek to coerce my sister into becoming a breeding machine for your vile purposes?You come intomyterritoryand threatenmybondmate?

Glimmer, no!

I remembered this, the way her scales began to glow bright as the sun the moment she healed me. She was using some kind of power I didn’t understand, but I knew each time it took something from her. But she blazed like a wildfire, the dragonstones at the Harlstonians’ breasts dulling and then failing as Royce’s dragon turned around.

Was Royce ever supposed to bond with Vigilance, or had he used the same tactics as Raina? I wouldn’t get an answer now, but the change in Royce’s expression made me wonder. Vigilance’s snake-like neck twisted around, a savage snarl rattling in his chest. Cloudy rushed forward and by the sounds coming from the air, more dragons were arriving by the second. Vigilance’s jaws opened as Royce began to splutter, then hold out his hand, as if that would ward his dragon off.

No, Vigilance wasn’t his dragon anymore.

Royce seemed to come to the same conclusion, leaping off the dragon’s back and onto his companion’s.

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