The bedroom door opens, and Nayadi, King Marrkul’s witch, shuffles inside. I jump and wait for Golmarr to spring away from me so we are not caught in bed together, but all he does is tighten his hold around my waist. Nayadi walks to the side of the bed and peers down at me with her foggy eyes. A trickle of fear sends goose bumps up the back of my neck.
“It is about time you made it home,” she says, her blind eyes surveying Golmarr. They shift to me, and she runs her hands through the air in front of me, like she is combing her fingers through hair. She pulls a handful of air toward her face and leans into it, breathing deeply. Her eyes slip shut for a moment, and the sides of her mouth slowly pull into a wide, toothless smile. With a growl, she opens her eyes and grasps my cheeks in her bony fingers, pinching them so hard that I yelp and pull away, but she doesn’t let go. Golmarr’s arm leaves my waist, and he grabs Nayadi’s wrist, shoving her hand from my face.
“What are you doing?” he asks, climbing over the top of me without letting go of the old crone. Nayadi pulls her lips away from her gums, and for a moment it looks like she is snarling…but then she smiles, and I wonder if I imagined it.
“She killed the dragon,” Nayadi says. “Not you.”
Golmarr drops her wrist and steps between me and the witch. “Why would you say that?”
“She’s marked with his magic for anyone with seeing eyes to behold. He left his golden aura around her.” She runs her hand through the air in front of me again, but Golmarr grabs her wrist. And then her words register. She called the dragon he, not it.
“You knew him,” I whisper and blink, and when I open my eyes again, the discoloration leaves Nayadi’s eyes, and I see her how she once was: long, dark brown hair braided down her back, smooth pale skin, blue eyes, two curved swords held in either hand. Unbidden, a memory of this woman overtakes my thoughts, and I know I am witnessing something Melchior the wizard passed on to me.
When she walks into my tower, the first thing I notice is her face. She is barely older than a child. Her eyes are such a pale shade of blue that I cannot help but stare into them for a moment. They are framed by black lashes, and her dark, braided hair makes the pale color even more remarkable. At her waist she carries the black stone blade of her people. Her twin swords are strapped to her back, as I requested, and I can tell by the way she keeps tightening her shoulders, she is forcing herself not to draw them.
Piles of gold are behind me, the treasure I got from two desperate kings. The payment for binding the fire dragon beneath the mountain nearly two hundred years earlier. Not a single piece of the treasure has been spent or lost; it is as complete as the day it was delivered to me. She studies the treasure, and greed fills her eyes. It diminishes any beauty I first thought she had, for I have had hundreds of years to learn what true beauty is.
“I will divide this in half. You may pick either pile, Nayadi. You take half of the pile now, and when you have brought me the fire dragon’s scale, you will get the other half,” I say.
She forces her eyes away from the treasure to look at me. “What is the worth of a single dragon scale?” she asks.
I shrug. “They have no worth, for there are none except those attached to the beasts.”
Her eyes narrow. “Then why are you paying me so much to bring you one, Melchior, son of Mordecai?” I frown at her words. “I know who you are, old man. And I know how old you are. That is what I want—eternal life, not your gold. Tell me how to get that, and I will bring you a dragon scale.”
I take a deep, patient breath. “I have watched almost every person I have ever cared for die from old age or disease. Eternal life is not necessarily a treasure, though once I thought it was.”
“Then tell me how to become like you, a wizard, so that I can bind the stone dragon that is destroying my kingdom beneath a mountain, the same way you bound the fire dragon. That is what I want in exchange for the fire dragon’s scale.”
I shake my head. “You don’t know what you’re saying, child. The price will be high. Everything comes at a price.”
“I am no child! I am nineteen. And any price is worth saving my kingdom.”
“Very well. If the ability to work magic is the payment you wish, then you have only to perform this feat and you will have it, but I make no promises regarding the stone dragon.” She blinks at me and smiles. I stare into her striking blue eyes. Such a pity. Such a high price to pay. “Hold out your swords.”
She reaches over her head and crosses her arms, sliding a short sword out from a sheath behind each shoulder. She lowers them before me, and I pull energy from the air and touch each blade. When I am done, the metal has turned from gray to a pale, silvery blue. “You have seven days before the magic leaves your blades. Seven days to face the fire dragon before your weapons are worthless against his scales.”
“Why don’t I just kill him?” she asks.