“They... Roland disappeared and they just left? Like they didn’t care?” The very notion was abhorrent. When Roland returned, he would hear about this. I would beg him not to ally with—wait. No, if Bet was talking about this, it was because it was important. Not just because it was rude and offensive. I turned to him. “You think the Destovians kidnapped him?” I hissed, trying to keep my voice down, but I could hardly even imagine such... such... well damn them, there wasn’t even a word for it!
If they’d kidnapped Roland and then claimed him rude for disappearing, that was beyond the pale. There was a burn in my chest, and while no dragon could breathe fire in human form, I could almost feel it there, ready and waiting for me to change, so that I could find the Destovians and burn them all.
No one hurt my Roland.
No one.
“Where?” I demanded, my voice rough.
Bet turned to me, an eyebrow lifted. “Gone,” he said, as though I were silly for not understanding what he’d said before. “They’ve taken their ship and gone back to Destovia.”
I gritted my teeth at the feeling of sheer uselessness, shaking my head, and the motion came out almost like it did when I was in dragon form—almost a whole body shake. “Where is Destovia?”
He considered a moment, cocking his head to one side, then narrowed his eyes, and... a tiny smile appeared on his lips. “If you go to the docks and head”—he pointed in a direction, and it took me a moment to orient it with an actual direction, sort of south-west—“west-southwest. They’ve only had about three days. A flying dragon would be able to catch up with them in no time at all. Not that I’m suggesting a flying dragonshould. They have ballista on the boat, so any such dragon would need to be quite careful.”
I nodded to him and marched out of the throne room, heading for the docks. I would make the Destovians sorry they’d ever even heard of dragons, let alone kidnappedmy Roland.
19
ROLAND
Ispent the night sleeplessly.
The rolling of the boat had my stomach doing somersaults, and when someone brought me a plate for dinner, I didn’t manage to keep down a single bite of it.
Worse, that buzzing at the base of my skull spoke to a hunger of an entirely different kind. I gritted my teeth, tried to think of anything else, and failed.
Forov visited again, and I attempted to convince him this was all pointless. If all went according to his plan, my niece or nephew would be monarch of Llangard by the time they returned me to it.
Unfortunately, the man truly wasn’t interested in my crown, only my Cavendish blood, and there was no real way to convince someone you didn’t have magic when they were sure that you did. If I failed to perform a cantrip, well, that was simply playacting.
Between the nausea and my hunger, I quickly lost all interest in talking sense. They weren’t listening, and there was rarely anyone to talk to anyway. Forov might visit, but mostly, theworld listed back and forth and my attention drifted as I laid back in a passably comfortable bed, trying not to vomit.
I was watching the reflection that the water’s surface threw against the ceiling of my lavish cell when I heard the peal of a bell. It was frantic and fast, ringing out up on deck.
I didn’t care. That bell didn’t require a single thing of me.
Even the thundering of footsteps didn’t matter.
The only thing that did?—
“Dragon!” someone shouted.
“Fire the bolt!”
I jumped up at once, rushing to the glass windows that made up one wall of the ship.
I expected a glimmer of gold, but there, on the horizon, was a green spot.
Aderyn.
A dry sob escaped me and I threw the window open wide. The sea spray tickled my face as Aderyn swooped toward the ship.
A long harpoon flew through the air, arching toward him.
My breath caught, a cry stifled by the terror of that sharp point.
But clever Aderyn just tilted to the side and the thing missed him.
