“You,” he snarled, baring his teeth.
“Who else?” Estella said, smiling a predator’s triumphant smirk as she strolled down the narrow stone walkway. “How are you even surprised? Have I not been the one pulling all the strings so far?”
Justin dismissed that with a sneer. “I don’t care if you hate our family, but how can you work forher?” He jerked his head toward Algonquin, who was watching the exchange with an amused expression. “You’re a seer, can’t you see she’s just playing us against each other? You’re betraying our whole race!”
“Don’t be so dramatic,” Estella said, stepping onto the island. “The Lady of the Lakes here would have my head on a pike in an instant if she could manage it. At the moment, though, we share a mutual enemy, which is as close to allies as our kind gets.”
“Don’t lump me in with you,” Algonquin said with a disdainful sniff. “But the white wyrm is correct on one issue at least. Eliminating Bethesda the Heartstriker is something I’ve desired for many years now. The Quetzalcoatl was at least wise enough to stay on his continent, but the broodmare’s brats are forever squeezing into my domain. That is an annoyance I would give much to end, including delaying my own gratification that would come from killing one of the three dragon seers for as long as it takes to hand you over.”
Estella nodded like the implied death threat was a great compliment. Justin, however, had had about enough of this. “You’ll never win,” he growled. “Heartstriker is better than you in every way. We will crush your plans to dust.”
“But there is noweanymore, is there?” Estella said sweetly. “Or did my ears deceive me when I heard Bethesda throw you away.”
Justin clamped his jaw shut, and Estella knelt beside him. “There, there,” she whispered, brushing the water from his bruised face. “I saw this would happen. I knew she would betray you. That’s why I came.”
He opened his mouth to tell her where she could shove the compassionate act, but Estella put a finger on his lips, casting Algonquin a pointed look before leaning in until her lips brushed his ear. “I know we’ve been enemies since before you were born,” she whispered, each word leaving little puffs of frost on his skin. “But you’re not in a position to be judgmental. The Lady wants to give you back to Vann Jeger. His anger is an inconvenience for her. The only reason she’s not dragging you back to him right now is because she knows I want you.”
“Why?” Justin growled. “Are you looking to die?”
That was supposed to be a threat, but Estella smiled like he’d told her a joke. “Do you know what I am?” she whispered. “You might be a whelp now, but I’ve looked into the future. I’ve seen what you become: a prodigy, alegend. Your mother was a fool to throw you away. I am not. I know what you are worth, Justin, and I want it for myself.”
He jerked away, eyes wide in confusion. “What are you talking about?”
“I want you to join us,” Estella said, looking him up and down. “Times are changing, and the Daughters of the Three Sisters are no exception. We can no longer afford to ignore strength when it appears, and unlike your mother, we’re smart enough to know that.” Her fingers trailed down his shoulder to trace lightly over his bicep. “Wewould not throw you away. The fact that I’m willing to bargain for your life with the Lady of the Lakes proves how much we need you. I will set you free of this tomb where your foolish mother left you to be food for Algonquin’s fish, and all I ask in return is your sword at my side.”
Justin opened his mouth, theNoalready on his lips, but it never got out. Ideas were forming in his head. Dangerous ideas that quickly became dangerous plots. Just considering it was a huge risk, but Justin already knew he was going to take it. At the end of the day, there were ways dragons were supposed to die, and being chopped up and fed to fish was not one of them.
“IfI came with you,” he said. “Would I get a sword?”
“The very best we have,” Estella promised.
Justin thought a moment longer, and then he nodded. “You have a deal.”
Estella smirked one last time and shot to her feet. “Svena!”
Justin looked up in surprise. He hadn’t even realized there was another dragon in the room until Estella yelled for her. When she stepped forward, though, he saw why. Svena looked terrible. Her scent was next to nothing, and she limped down the stone bridge like she’d been on the losing end of multiple fights. She hardly looked like the great and powerful White Witch everyone was always going on about, but Estella didn’t seem to notice her sister’s terrible condition. She just nodded at Justin. “Take our newest treasure home and let him have his pick of our mothers’ arsenal. Nothing is too good.”
Svena nodded silently and grabbed Justin’s shoulder. A cold wind rose at the same time, filling the cave with the scent of snow and the bite of dragon magic. Both grew stronger by the second, filling Algonquin’s grotto with arctic ice, which the spirit didn’t seem to like at all. Justin had just enough time to appreciate that before Svena’s magic bit down hard on his chest, yanking him to the other side of the world.
***
“Your sister looks very ill.”
Estella turned away from the falling snow to look again at Algonquin. As usual, the ever changing Lady of the Lakes had shifted while her attention was distracted. Now, instead of the idiot Heartstriker whelp’s face, the spirit wore Estella’s own, smiling coyly at her from the water’s edge. It was unnerving as always, but Estella had seen Algonquin’s tricks before, and she didn’t let them get to her now.
“My sister is my concern, not yours.”
Her reflection laughed. “You don’t seem very concerned,” she pointed out. “That’s unlike you, Northern Star. When we first met, your clan was your life.”
“My clan is still my life,” Estella snapped. “Nothing has changed.”
Algonquin’s eyebrows lifted in Estella’s own skeptical look, and the dragon turned away with a glower. A spirit could never understand the sacrifices required of a seer. Of course it hurt her to make Svena suffer, but it was the only way to destroy Heartstriker for good. Besides, her sister would recover eventually, which was more than Estella could say for Brohomir. Or herself, for that matter.
As always, that thought darkened her mood, and Estella hurried on to other things. “I believe our business here is complete,” she said stiffly. “I will take my leave.”
“Not quite yet.”
Algonquin’s words were still echoing when the water around them began to surge. That was probably meant to be frightening, but it was hard to scare a seer who already knew her own end, which was why Estella didn’t even flinch when the Leviathan’s black tentacles emerged from the water at Algonquin’s feet, rising up to encircle the little stone island in a wall of slick, black flesh.
