Page 2 of House of Ashes
Bright colors caught my eye, drawing my scrutiny away from the dragon and barmaid. Another ferryman had clambered up on the rough-hewn bar to make his own toast, spilling shine everywhere. His nose was bright red, laced with purplish capillaries, from too many years of the Mistward rotgut.
“I hope he died screaming!” he yelled, and another cheer went up. “May Aurae spit on his corpse and Sunya eat his soul!”
I very much hoped for the same thing. I sent my own silent prayer to Aurae of the Fang, the dragon goddess of death, to drag him kicking and screaming straight to the darkest, iciest depths of the Nine Hells. Sunya of the Claw, the Judge of Souls, arbiter of justice and retribution, would surely weigh him heavily.
The bartenders went to work pouring more rounds for the ferrymen, who had likely never known such celebrity before and never would again.
I sipped at my mug despite the rancid taste, making it last, knowing I only had another two half-moons in my pocket; money that was best saved for another day.
My mind was fogged enough now, though I kept returning to the thought of what his last moments had been like—if he had died in agony, or comfortably, in his own bed and surrounded by family. It was like a sore tooth I couldn’t stop probing with my tongue, knowing it hurt and unable to help myself.
The barmaid had returned with the stranger’s shine. She leaned forward as she slid his mug across the table, showing a vast expanse of smooth, scaleless cleavage.
“Anything else, love?” she murmured, reaching for his hood with a flirtatious grin. “Why don’t we see what’s under there—”
One of those scaled hands gripped her wrist, gently forcing it away. The shine curdled in my stomach as I took in the blackened claws at the tips of his fingers; gods, he was of ancient dragonblood to have that much control over his draconic form. “That’s all.”
His voice was deep, smooth and dark as smoke. It was a sensual voice. The kind I wouldn’t mind whispering into my ear for a night while I forgot everything…
I twitched with irritation as I caught myself.
Unfortunately, unlike the coy Bloodless barmaid, I couldn’t just pick a stranger from the Wyvern’s Whore for a night of fun.
Dragons might be able to sniff me out, but I also struggled with the innate desire to find and bind to a mate. Once a mate bond was established, dragon and draga were of a single mind, sharing the mind-speech—and she would become his rider, directing the dragon’s fierce, primal form.
But there were no dragons worth mating on Mistward Isle.
This place was a nightmare packed with criminals and the cast-offs of society, and before my mother had died, she’d made it clear I was not meant to be the rider of a dragon who was a coward, a thief, or a liar.
If a dragon ever got close enough to touch me, through sight and scent he would be able to detect that I possessed the full dragonblood of a royal House.
It was because of that blood that wrapping myself in grimy layers and never exposing my skin was necessary. Mistward didn’t just host criminals, but exiles and usurpers; some would see my lineage as an opportunity.
Others would outright kill me if they knew who I was.
Especially now, in a tavern packed full of drunk dragons and Bloodless, all of whom despised the Drakkon for sending them to this stark, barren hellhole at the end of the world.
I took another drink, breathing deeply while the mug was in my face. The acrid scent of the shine would make it impossible for me to catch so much as a whiff of the stranger, and hopefully make my own scent that much less appealing.
The barmaid had gone again, and I kept a careful, if bleary, eye on the sea of bodies around us.
The ferrymen had finally vacated the top of the bar, possibly because they were now too drunk to climb it. All of them had received claps on the back for their denunciations against my father.
But other dragonbloods had arrived, drawn by the news, and now many of them huddled around one of the card tables, close enough for me to overhear. The cards themselves lay face down, long forgotten as they drew a ferryman into their circle.
“The Drakkon died without naming an heir,” the ferryman said, squinting at the leader, a large dragonblood male with dark auburn hair. “It’s been, what…three centuries since the last Interregnum? Princess Yura has already declared her intent to make the claim, take the throne of Koressis and name herself Dragonesse, but the House of Jade Leaves refuses to support her, and the Shadowed Stars are demanding that she back down.”
The dragons laughed roughly at that, even as my ears perked up.
“There’s going to be war, boys. The question is whether you choose to go fight for them, or sit here and rot in this shithole.”
The shine in my throat turned sour. Yura of the House of Gilded Skies…my half-sister.
Every bit as illegitimate as I was, a bastard child of the Drakkon.
He’d had a mate once, a draga from the Iron Shards. After a few decades of what seemed like a golden reign, she’d died in battle against a newborn Primoris.
My father had spent the rest of his life shattered by the broken bond, drowning the pain and loneliness of losing his mate with a series of mistresses, which had resulted in me and Yura.