The sight made her soften—just a little.
“You could have left,” she said. “You could have flown far away from here.”
“We had a deal,” he said simply, then turned and headed deeper into the cave. “Come on. I want to show you something.”
“All right,” she said, “but first I need your help.”
At sunset they would put everything in motion. Asha told him the plan as she followed him down slick rock-hewn steps.
When her foot slipped on the stone in front of her, she pitched forward.
He caught her around the waist.
“Careful,” he said, mindful of the stitches in her side. He was warm and steady beneath her hands, and for the merest of heartbeats, neither of them stepped away.
An odd silence rose up. And then, quite suddenly, he ducked his chin and released her, continuing on down the steps, following the click-click-click of dragon talons below.
Asha broke the quiet. “How did you find this place?”
“Redwing found it.”
“Who’s Redwing?”
“Your dragon.”
“You named him?”
He shrugged in the darkness. “I had to call him something. He’s reddish. He has wings.”
She shook her head. The next time Elorma called her unimaginative, Asha would send the slave his way.
There was light, suddenly, breaking up the darkness. When the stairway ended, a round chamber lay before them, with a deep pool at its center. A natural skylight high above let in a solitary pillar of light and water that flowed gently down the walls.
Asha walked the perimeter of the pool, looking upward.
“What is this place?” Her words echoed up the walls.
“I thought you would know,” said the slave, his gaze fixed on the dragon.
It seemed like some kind of ancient, sacred space.
Whatever it had been, it was now a perfect place to hide.
“I think his wing is torn. . . .”
“What?” Asha spun, looking where he looked: at the dragon staring into the water, his head cocked, watching the fish swim in circles.
She needed this dragon to aid her in her plan. He couldn’t help if he had a torn wing. Slowly, Asha approached from one side. The slave approached from the other.
“He doesn’t need a name,” she said as they closed in on him.
“And why’s that?”
“Naming a thing endears you to it.”
Like slaves. The moment you started calling them by their names was the moment you started losing power over them. Better to keep them nameless than to be risen up against.
“Kozu has a name,” he pointed out.
“Yes, and soon he’ll be dead.” Asha crept ever closer to the dragon perching on the side of the pool. She could see exactly which wing it was. Black blood dripped from the thin membrane.
Slowly, she reached for the wing. The dragon darted away, quick as the wind, and jumped to the other side of the pool. His forked tail lashed playfully.
“You hate Kozu that much?”
The question broke her concentration. Asha whirled on the slave.
“Have you seen my face, skral?” She stepped toward him. “Do you know what Kozu did to the city right after he did this to me?”
He didn’t flinch, just met her gaze. “Have you seen the collar around my neck, Iskari?” It was the calm of a gathering storm. “Your own betrothed sends us to kill one another in the pit while you stand by, placing bets.” His eyes were colder than steel. “For that, maybe I should hunt you down.”
“I’d like to see you try,” Asha muttered, turning back to the dragon. The sooner she tended that wing, the sooner she could carry out her plan.
“There’s something I’ve never understood,” he called after her. “Why did Kozu turn on you then? On that day, and not before?”
The dragon before her braced himself, crouching low on his front legs, tail swishing, eyes daring Asha. Slowly, she started closing the gap between them.
“Something else I don’t understand? You should have died. Dragon burns are deadly, Iskari, and a burn like that?” His voice softened suddenly. “You were just a little girl.”
A fire sparked in her belly. He hadn’t been there. He didn’t know the first thing about it.
In her pause, the dragon broke his stance and slithered to the other side of the pool, closer to the slave, who was more friend than foe. He left behind a black spot of blood.
Asha rose to face the slave.
“I was alone,” she said, thinking of the sickroom. Of her father filling in the gaps in her memory. “I’d gone to end things. To tell Kozu I was done with the old stories. He kept pressing me, getting angrier and angrier, and when I refused for the last time, he flew into a rage, burning me and leaving me to die while he attacked the city. If Jarek hadn’t found me in time . . .”
She rarely told this story aloud because she didn’t like to think about it. But now, hearing it on her own lips, something didn’t make sense. The slave was right. A burn as severe as the one Kozu gave her would have to be treated immediately.
There must be a detail she was forgetting. She needed to pay more attention when her father told the story next.
Asha fixed her attention once more on the dragon, who stood behind the slave now, using him as a shield. She stalked him down.
The slave held out his arm, stopping her.
“Why did you need to end things?” he asked.
Because the stories killed my mother.
Asha remembered that last night. Her mother could no longer speak; it took strength she didn’t have. Asha sat with her in the dark, stroking her beautiful hair, only her fingers kept catching and the hair kept coming out in clumps. She remembered trying to get her mother to drink, and how the water dribbled down her chin. She remembered lying down beside her and covering her face in kisses.
Asha remembered falling asleep to the beat of her mother’s heart. . . .
And waking up to a body cold as ice.
She squeezed her eyes shut.
“You don’t know,” she whispered, pushing past the slave. “You have no idea the kinds of wicked things the old stories are capable of.”
He caught her arm, stopping her. “Not Willa’s story. It seemed . . . the opposite of wicked.”
So na?ve, thought Asha. The old stories were like jewels: dazzling, beguiling, luring you in. “They’re dangerous,” she whispered, staring over his shoulder at the dragon staring back.
“Well then,” he said softly. “I guess I’m drawn to dangerous things.”
Asha felt her cheeks burn. She looked back into his face.
“I’ve been thinking,” he went on quickly, his gaze holding hers, “about the first time I ever saw you. You were eight—or maybe nine. My mistress invited your mother for tea, and you came along. While Greta served them in the gardens, you wandered into the library.”
Strangely, Asha remembered that day. Remembered the enormous dragon head mounted on the library wall. The lifeless glass eyes, the pale gold scales, the open mouth showing off a multitude of knifelike teeth . . .