Page 68 of House of Ashes

Myst peered into the hollow bone, saw it was licked clean of marrow, and tossed it into the flames with a sigh. “Sounds fascinating. Do tell me more.”

“I…” My voice broke, and I cleared my throat. “Myst, we’re pretending to be mates. This means our heads if we’re found out…”

“It’s rather simple then, isn’t it?” she said, patting the distinct bulge of her over-full belly. “Don’t be found out.”

Rhylan narrowed his eyes. “It took Kirana days to talk Erebos around to this plan, and you just—”

“Erebos!” Myst snorted, sending twin spirals of pale flame into the night sky. “Old, fusty, stodgy Erebos…of course he wouldn’t know a good idea if it jumped up and bit him on the snout.”

“No love lost between those two, is there?” Rhylan muttered to me, and I shrugged. I’d never heard Myst speak of Erebos before, although she would talk at length about the magnificent bulk and glorious hoard of Caru, the Ascendant of the Jade Leaves.

“So your plan may have a few gaping holes—” Myst waved a claw dismissively. “—but naturally my last scion must become the Dragonesse.”

All the world came to a pinpoint focus on Myst. “Your last scion?” I repeated, utterly still inside.

Much of the time, true dragons emulated the same emotions their dragonblood descendants exhibited; Erebos’s humor was a reflection of Rhylan. But at other times, you looked at a true dragon, and you saw only the dragon.

This was one of those times. There was no readable emotion on Myst’s small, vaguely feline snout or in her eyes; she was a being as far removed from me as I was from a flea.

And like all true dragons, she was at heart driven by two motives: power and greed.

“My last scion,” she repeated. “The last of my blood. Honestly, Serafina, you should have produced at least two offspring by now to carry on the bloodline, but I can see you’re hopelessly behind schedule, so I’ll have to come with you.” She gave Rhylan a sidelong look. “Though maybe not children of Erebos’s bloodline…”

I quickly put an end to that line of thought. “If I’m the last scion, then there are no others who can claim this eyrie behind my back. That’s good to know.”

“Indeed, and I will seal the doors behind us.” Myst examined a claw, flicking away a remnant of venison. “They’ve been sealed, in fact, since Nerezza was brought out in chains. In such turbulent times, the wise dragon keeps her head down.”

“So you don’t know where everyone went?” I asked desperately. My call to arms would have a radically different outcome if my people had migrated into the territory of the Raging Tempests, rather than the Lunar Tides or Jade Leaves. We’d always had a rather fraught relationship with our southern neighbors.

“No idea,” she said blithely. “I decided the time was right to take a nap until you returned home.”

So she had been in the Dreamlands, at least until I’d touched the doors and announced my presence here.

It didn’t surprise me; it wasn’t like she could have come to Mistward herself to collect me, although I’d prayed someone would do just that. But, because of her nature, I couldn’t hold it against her that she’d been in the Dreamlands while I suffered.

Ascendants, as much as dragonbloods adored their own, were a different breed. They abided by different laws, some not entirely clear to their dragonblooded creations, and thousands of years ago had collectively agreed that the politics and punishments of their descendants were to be handled by the Drakkon and Dragonesse.

While many Ascendants would continue to provide counsel to their Houses, few, if any, would interfere in dragonbloods’ daily lives. My exile had been ordered by the Drakkon, and thus she would have been relatively powerless to change it.

In fact, it was slightly strange that Myst was involving herself at all in our scheme; I had half expected her to turn me out and leave me to make my way on my own.

But, if I was her last scion, I was literally the final living being in a ten-thousand-year-old bloodline who could continue said line.

For true dragons, it was considered a Great Work to build an eyrie and select the man or woman who would receive their blood. If a House naturally died out, it was rare—only one instance had ever been recorded by historical scholars—for an Ascendant to choose to begin anew.

With thousands of years of effort invested into her descendants, Myst’s goal to see her House lineage carried on was understandable, at least from my perspective. I was sure that for her, there was much more beneath the surface that I would never be able to understand.

While I was lost in thought, Rhylan removed the venison from the spit and carved it, giving me a heaping portion on a bowl we’d scrounged up from the parlor at the top of the eyrie.

“Eat up,” he said quietly. “We’re leaving at first light.”

I chewed and swallowed mechanically. The food was close enough to my fare on Mistward that I didn’t focus on it entirely, leaving me free to consider Myst’s extreme investment into ensuring that…well, that I had children.

Making her last scion Dragonesse was an understandably draconic goal; there was no Ascendant who did not vie to see their descendants on the throne.

But she wanted her House brought back to its full glory.

Gods…when I thought about my future Drakkon, the future father of my children, I could only see one face.