He signaled to Dubhán, and the aughisky cantered up the trail to fall in between Laoise and Sinéad, riding through the humming ravine. Laoise looked tired—dark circles standing out beneath her fiery eyes, worried creases bracketing her full lips. Sinéad looked far worse—her dirty hair limp and dull, her spine curved with exhaustion. The journey had been exacting for all of them; Sinéad, the only human among them, must be near her breaking point.
“I have a proposition for you, Laoise.” Despite Wayland’s jests to Irian, Wayland had neither the intention nor the desire to kiss Laoise. The Gentry maiden was striking, with her flame-red hair, warm brown skin, and exquisitely curved figure. But there was no spark in their interactions, no heated undercurrent to their conversations. He owed her his life, after she saved him in the catastrophic moments before Emain Ablach plunged into the ocean. But he imagined kissing her would be like kissing a sister. “Tell us where we’re going.”
“And?” Laoise said after a beat. “Usually there is a second part to a proposition. Ifthis, thenthat.”
“I hadn’t gotten that far,” Wayland replied breezily. “Perhaps we could call it a favor and decide on the payment later? I think we’d all benefit from a little information. A little direction. I’m beginning to think we might die of exhaustion out here. As pretty as these magical rocks may be, I’m not particularly eager to become one.”
Laoise’s jaw set. “I have reasons for keeping our destination private.”
“Pray, then—share the reasons. If not the destination.”
“Because—” A cold breeze whipped from the jewel-smeared bluffs and mussed Laoise’s flaming curls. Her ember eyes skimmed the rocky crests hunched like the crooked spines of giants. Wariness, recognition, and then delight tangled over her expression. She pointed at the horizon. “They’re all the family I have left.”
With his eyes, Wayland followed her finger to where a wildfire glow spilled over the ridge. An answering rill of fear swept his veins. Long years of combat training—though rarely employed—automatically dropped his right hand to his hip. But his weapons were lost with Emain Ablach—down to the ceremonial claíomh he had used in the final battle between the Oak King and the Holly King. Wayland had left it where he’d sheathed it on the Longest Night.
Deep between his father’s ribs.
He fisted his hands in Dubhán’s mane. The yearling wheeled, thrashing his head as Wayland’s growing alarm spilled into him. They weren’t alone. Balor planted his huge feet and shielded his eyes as he stared at the mountain. Sinéad propped herself over her aughisky’s neck, her mouth parting with fear and awe. Irian cursed, inventively; the Sky-Sword sang out a trilling note as he slung it from its scabbard.
Only Laoise was unbothered by the intensity of the red light blooming above the mountains. She began to smile, a toothy expression of sheer glee.
“Easy, tánaiste,” she called over her shoulder to Irian. “If you wave that thing around too much, one of them might take a shine to it. And steal it from you.”
Them?Confusion surged through Wayland as the glow resolved into… shapes. Startlingly bright blobs of red-gold hurtling toward their group at a speed he could not fathom. Almost as if they had—
Wings.
A blinding shaft of sunlight blazed above the eastern ridge and illuminated translucent webbed wings and coruscant red scales. Wayland counted six—no,sevenshapes, although they were notall the same size. Long, sinuous necks; serrated tails spiked with stacked laminae; flexible plates frilling serpentine heads lined with rows of teeth.
Wayland’s jaw dropped. They weredragain.
“Oof!”The first and largest of the flying serpents barreled into Laoise, pummeling her horizontally off Linn’s narrow back. She transformed into her anam cló at the instant of impact, clashing with a creature nearly as large as she was. Renewed dread burned through Wayland in the moment before he realized—they weren’t fighting. They wereplaying.
Luminous scales chimed against one another. The pair gleefully tussled, grappling with clawed talons as they beat wide membranous wings. A few moments later, the other creatures joined the fracas. Smaller than the first serpent, they clung to Laoise’s frilled mane and hung from her plated tail, gnawing at her limbs in playful exuberance. Beneath Wayland, Dubhán wheeled again, understandably unnerved by the wrestling mass of scales and wings.
Wayland would have been able to keep his seat had it not been for the last of the creatures hurtling directly into his chest and knocking him bodily off his yearling. His spine impacted the dirt-strewn rock. His breath gusted from his lungs; he gasped as his vision fuzzed black and white. When he blinked away the blurriness, it was to stare directly into the inquisitive features of a dragan the size of a large cat, perched directly on his chest. It inspected him with glittering red eyes before unexpectedly licking him from collarbone to chin. Its tongue was lightly barbed, rasping like sand against his skin.
“Oy!” he cried, attempting to shove it off. This only entertained the beastling, who latched talons deeper into the leather of his jerkin, barked a shower of red-gold sparks from its snout, and painlessly mouthed his wrists with gleaming, needle-sharp teeth. “Laoise! A little help, please?”
“Nidhoggur! Bad!” Laoise had shifted back into her Gentryform—her voice collided with the little dragan, who made its ruby eyes huge and pleading as it placed a clawed paw directly over Wayland’s mouth, as if to sayshh. Wayland swore he heard Irian choke on a laugh. Laoise hoisted the now-wailing creature off Wayland’s sternum and settled it easily on her shoulder. It gave a disgruntled hiss before nestling around her neck and threading its claws through her curls. “Sorry. Hog’s never met a stranger before. But I think she likes you.”
Wayland sat up, rubbing his chest where the tiny dragan had burned a hole in his tunic. “What…arethey? Whatis… she?”
“She’s draig goch,” Laoise didn’t so much explain as cough, in Wayland’s opinion. “A red draig. They all are.”
“They’re awfully small… draigs.” Sinéad spoke aloud what they must have all been thinking.
“They’re babies,” Laoise said, giving Hog’s tail an affectionate tug. The biggest draig took offense at this, baring its teeth and snorting twin flames from its flared nostrils. “Except you, Blodwen. You’re more of an adolescent.”
“Consider me impressed, Laoise.” Irian looked like he was trying to stifle laughter. “Dare we ask how you came to be mother of a hefty brood of juvenile draigs?”
“It’s a long story, and a long hike to the Cnoc. Shall I tell it as we go?”
Wayland remounted a still-leery Dubhán, turning him to follow the rest of the group. Nidhoggur detached from Laoise’s shoulder, taking flight on stumpy wings that seemed too small for her rotund body. She wobbled boisterously through the air to collide once more with Wayland’s chest. This time, he was prepared—he had no intention of being knocked from his mount a second time. He tried to fend off the tiny draig, but the creature just happily curled herself around his waist, latching sharp talons through his belt loops and tucking her head beneath the hem of his shirt. Within seconds, Hog was loudly snoring, her plump red body ringing him with heat.
When Wayland was sure no one was looking, he dared stroking a finger along the scaled fiend’s ridged spine. Her glass-smooth scutes radiated dry heat. She began to purr, her throat thrumming against the skin of his abdomen.
Wayland hid a smile.
