Making Acquaintances

ANDRA

Andra listened to the birdsong, enjoying how the morning sun colored the back of her eyelids golden. She didn’t want to open her eyes, afraid that when she did, she’d be back in Castigo’s manor.

She sighed, summoning the courage to crack them open. Miraculously, she was still in Bellris.

Her room was simply a round space in the center of a tree. She was still amazed that she didn’t have to share it with anyone.

The inside had been hollowed out, leaving a smooth floor, curved walls, a window, and a doorway.

She had felt uncomfortable claiming such a large space to herself. Amala practically had to force her to stay in the room at first.

Andra slipped out of bed and dressed, walking out into the crisp morning air. She leaned against the wooden railing of the walkway outside and gazed at the forest floor far beneath her.

She sighed with contentment as she watched some early risers moving along below, fascinated by their morning routines.

There were many women and children in Bellris. Andra couldn’t help but wonder what had driven them to cross a desert and join a rebellion.

~“Tiri,”~ she tried. ~“Are you awake?”~

The dragon didn’t reply. Andra wondered if maybe she was too far away.

She walked along one of the wooden bridges, heading toward her partner. Andra was so caught up in taking in her surroundings that she didn’t see the man in front of her until it was too late.

She bumped into him, eliciting an annoyed hiss.

Andra looked up and recognized the Rider who had challenged Kael when they’d returned.

“Watch where you’re going,” Egan growled.

“Sorry,” Andra mumbled, her gaze reflexively going to her feet. His tone immediately brought her back to the Hall, to the moment when she’d accidentally spilled some wine on a Rider. The quick strike that had followed stung as if it had just happened.

She’d spent so much time with Kael that she’d forgotten how harsh some Riders could be.

“Ah, you’re the girl that Kael brought back,” he said. She could feel his gaze crawl over her skin. “Are you his servant?”

“No.” Andra found herself lifting her head high to stare into Egan’s eyes, unsure of where the sudden well of courage had come from. “I’m not his servant. I’m ~no one’s~ servant.”

Egan held his hands up in a gesture of peace. “Easy, girl. It’s an easy mistake to make, considering the…” He gestured to her collar.

Andra reached up to touch the silver lock around her throat. How she wished she could rip it off and toss it away…

Covering the collar accomplished nothing. She could still feel the weight of it on her skin, feel the shame and powerlessness that it represented.

Even all the way here in Bellris, the magic of the Judges kept her bound.

“Still,” Egan went on. “You didn’t come to Bellris of your own free will, right? You were forced here. An unfortunate bystander in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

She frowned, thinking on Egan’s words. He was technically right.

Egan stepped closer. “You aren’t a Freeman. You aren’t being held here against your will, even if you were brought here. What’s keeping you here?”

Andra opened her mouth to reply, but no words came to her.

~Why am I here?~ she thought.

Bellris was beautiful.

The people had been kind to her.

But they were all here for a reason. For a cause.

They wanted to see the Kingsmen destroyed and Paerolia restored.

~Is that what I want too?~

Egan’s bloodshot blue eyes continued to pierce into her, and suddenly Andra was finding it hard to breathe.

“If-if you’ll excuse me…” She pushed past him on the bridge, her mind in disarray.

Maybe Tiri’s wisdom could help her sort out her feelings.

***

~“I have no idea why we’re here,”~ Tiri said.

~“That’s what I thought.”~ Andra sighed.

They were in a wide meadow, the lush, green grass dotted with the whites and yellows of tiny wildflowers. A small waterfall trickled nearby, the stream flowing into the lake that Tiri was lounging beside.

Amala had told them that the Freemen had cleared this section of the forest for the dragons to rest. The other dragons weren’t there, and Andra could only assume they had gone with their Riders to prepare for their fight against the Kingsmen.

Tiri watched Andra, a curious gleam in her eyes. ~“I’m here because you are here,”~ the dragon said simply. ~“What is bothering you?”~

Andra thought about it for a moment. ~“Everyone else here has a purpose. They’re all rebels, fighting for the good of Paerolia. And I’m just…here.”~

~“And what is wrong with just being here? You like this place, do you not? Is that not reason enough to stay?”~

~“I don’t know,”~ Andra admitted.

Andra could feel Tiri’s confusion, and she wished she could convey her feelings to her like true mind mates could.

~“We may not be truly Paired,”~ Tiri said, sensing her thoughts, ~“but that doesn’t mean we can’t try to understand each other.”~

Andra smiled, sitting down beside Tiri and leaning into her leg. ~“Will you tell me what your life was like before you came with us?”~

She felt Tiri’s amusement tickle the back of her mind.

~“What would you like to know?”~

~“Anything.”~ Andra shrugged. ~“Everything.”~

Andra settled in next to Tiri as the dragon told her about her life as a wild dragon with Ena. Not only through words, but through images and emotions.

Andra saw the high cliffs of The Howling Wall, felt the heat of the deep, fire-red ravines of the Volcanic Canyon.

Andra cringed at the fierce gales of the Gallanmere Snow Fields and tasted the supple flesh of the arctic hares.

But what gave Andra pause was the memory of a dragon, its scales the color of desert sand. Its sudden attack in the night had Andra’s heart pumping wildly with the fear and adrenaline of a savage battle to the death.

~“Dragons fight each other?”~ Andra gasped, breathless.

~“Humans war with each other, do they not?”~ Tiri said, looking in the direction of the rebel city. ~“Dragons are no different.”~

Andra frowned as she thought about this new revelation. Working in the Hall, dragons had been nothing but majestic and otherworldly. Noble creatures.

This new vision of dragons as wild beasts disturbed her.

The beating of wings distracted Andra from her thoughts, and she looked up to see Eithne and Kael descending from the sky. He dropped nimbly from Eithne’s back.

Eithne and Tiri took off together, flying deeper into the forest to find some breakfast.

“You’re up early,” Kael commented, watching the dragons fly away.

“As are you,” she said. The rising sun cast a golden glow over Kael’s face, and she could see the dark circles under his eyes.

“There’s too much to do to permit myself to sleep past sun”—Kael stifled a yawn—“rise.”

“You look half-dead,” she told him.

“Just half?”

Andra laughed, and Kael eyed her, a twinkle of amusement in his eyes. They seemed to flash silver in the sunlight, and Andra could see the faint line of a scar that ran along his jaw.

“What?” Kael asked.

Andra blinked. “Huh?”

“You’re staring.”

She looked away, the sun feeling suddenly much hotter on her face. “I was just wondering…”

Kael remained quiet, and she could sense that he was waiting for her to arrange her thoughts.

“Why did Colmen call you the symbol of the rebellion?”

The Rider sighed in exasperation. “You know Colmen,” he said, dodging the question. “He likes to exaggerate things.”

“I saw the way everyone was looking at you,” she insisted. “There’s got to be a reason.”

Instead of replying, Kael walked over to the lake and sat in front of it, patting the patch of grass next to him. Andra sat next to him. She hugged her knees as if to contain the curiosity bubbling up within her.

KAEL

“They call me their symbol, Andra, because of who I am,” Kael forced the words from his mouth like he was extracting poison from a snake bite. “Not only the first Rider to abandon the Hall and join them, but the son of a Judge as well.”

Andra’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Your father is a Judge?”

“Was,” he corrected. “He died when I was sixteen, just before I left for the rebellion. They said he fell ill, but he was in perfect health the day before.”

“You think someone killed him?”

“My brother,” Kael felt the anger sear through him like dragon’s breath. “Caedo.”

Andra gasped at the name. “I’d see him sometimes at the Hall,” she said.

“I never got along with Caedo. He was always so certain that he’d be a Rider, but he got passed over at the Pairing. When Eithne chose me, he was furious. As if my becoming a Rider was a personal slight to him.”

Kael could still remember the rage in his brother’s eyes. The pure, unbridled fury.

“He became obsessed with becoming a Judge after that,” Kael continued. “With taking my father’s seat someday. I think it finally came to a point where he could wait no longer.”

Kael slipped off his boots and dipped his feet in the lake. The cool water did nothing to put out the fire burning inside him.

“So why did you leave the Hall?” Andra asked.

“I spent a lot of my childhood in the house of a Judge, Andra. I saw the corruption. Saw the bribing and the blackmail, the abuse of the labor contracts to subject entire families to a lifetime of servitude.”

Kael looked at Andra, looked at the collar around her neck. “Something had to be done.”

“And you’d fight the Judges…even if it meant you had to face your brother?”

Kael thought back to Janis’s report. Rumors that Caedo had joined the Kingsmen.

“~Especially~ if Caedo is a part of it. It’ll give me the perfect excuse.”

The silence between them stretched on. Various scenes played out in Kael’s mind of how he’d see Caedo again.

~Would it be on the battlefield?~

~At a trial?~

~Would it only end after one of us is dead?~

Kael felt Andra’s hand on his, and he looked down to realize he’d been tearing at the grass underneath them, his knuckles white. He relaxed his hand, letting Andra smooth out his fingers.

He could see that he’d worried her; her emerald eyes were filled with concern. He took a deep breath, willing the anger to bleed out of him.

“But enough of that,” Kael said, trying to not-so-subtly change the topic of conversation. “You need to get ready.”

“Ready for what?”

Kael slipped on his boots and stood, helping Andra to her feet. He frowned, thinking toward the coming evening.

“Something I’d rather not do…but everyone insists it’s necessary.”

Andra went pale. “We’re not…we’re not going to be fighting or anything like that, right?”

Kael shook his head, his face grim. “Oh no, nothing like that.”

She breathed a sigh of relief.

“I’d ~much~ rather be going into battle than this.”

Andra froze, eyes wide.

Kael pulled her along as he made his way back to Bellris. “I know how you feel,” he said. “We’ll suffer through it together.”

“Suffer through ~what~, Kael?”

“A party.” He spoke the words like they were a curse. “A big celebration for all the Freemen.”

“Anyway, I want you to attend with me. It would be good to introduce you to the rest of the Freemen,” Kael said as he turned his sights back to the forest.

Andra’s stomach clenched tight, the thought of so many strangers jostling around her making her feel queasy.

But that wasn’t the only thing that made her anxious…

She thought back to the celebrations at the Hall of Riders.

At those parties, Andra had been just a servant, but for the first time ever…

She’d be a welcomed guest.

And she’d be attending on ~Kael’s~ behest.