Blood and decay

Saira

None of these books held the answers that I needed. I read all of the ones in the castle, even re-reading some of them to be sure. My eyes had long begun to sting from staring at the pages and the lack of sleep. Compared to finding the spell to speed Aurelia’s pregnancy along, that had been easy, it was in the same book that our mothers had used. But none of them held the information I now needed.

How could have this happened? I needed to know. The records of the family all showed that the children in the royal family were born as dragon shifters. Never had one of them bore a child and a dragon egg. Inigo was even born Elvish, that had never happened either. The few times that the family married outside of the dragon shifter race; those children were still born as shifters.

Was it my magic that did this? Was it because I used the crystal ball? There was no way to know, yet. I would search until I found something. Inigo and Vesta would be the reason Aurelia would burn this world down as my mother had warned me, and I couldn't blame her.

I would do whatever it took to protect them too, those beautiful gifts of the love that Aurelia and Kairios shared. I would have to find a way to do both; protect the children and protect the people of my kingdom. I refused to be the last of my kind after all of this. Who knew what my brother had done to the people. He was capable of unthinkable evils. At least we would be able to leave soon.

Hours from now we would be on the road to war. I needed to get some sleep before we left. When I climbed into my bed, the sheets were so soft and inviting that I had to curl myself up against them. Sleep came quickly. I didn’t wake until Aurelia was shaking me gently on the shoulder.

“Saira, wake up.” Her hand shook me softly once more.

I rolled in the bed pulling the covers up over my face and groaned my defiance. “You should have gone to sleep sooner. You can sleep on the road if you need to.” She countered.

I rolled back towards where she was sitting on my bed and pulled the blanket down over my eyes. When I looked into her golden eyes, one perfect and one scared and both ringed in red. She had been crying.

“You already said good-bye to the children?” The thought sent a bold of sadness through me.

“Yes. Kairios is with them now, saying his goodbyes. We will meet him in the courtyard. I had a riding outfit made for you. It matches mine and when the time comes, we have some armor that can go over it.”

She pointed towards the outfit that was hanging up next to a wall length mirror. When I looked back at her and took in her outfit, I was shocked. I had no idea why she would choose such a thing for us to wear, but I had to admit that I thought she looked amazing.

The shirt was long in the sleeves and tight on her arms, leather cuffs were at her wrists. The dark brown material then dropped down from the shoulder to perfectly cup over her breasts. There were no designs sewn or painted on it, only four small holes with a leather cord looped through them that sat between the exposed cleavage. Her stomach was exposed save for the small point of the shirt that pointed towards her belly button.

Her black scar was visible on her side. I wondered if that was why she choose this style; to show what she had been through. The pants looked to be made of soft, supple leather that was held up with a matching black leather belt. The buckle was a large square and made of gold. There was a knife strapped tightly to her right thigh.

High riding boots came up to her knees, the laces pulled tight. A cape was wrapped around her neck and was long enough that it would drag across the floor. The crown she had chosen today was an array of colored stones of yellows, oranges and reds all tied together with golden wire. Simple yet magnificent.

I got out of my bed and walked over to my own outfit. Folded next to the hanging ensemble was a mesh shirt that would be able to cover my stomach if I wanted. I almost put it on under the brown top but I decided that I wanted to match her as much as I could.

I dressed quickly in silence while she waited for me. It didn’t take too long to put on the shirt and bracelets that matched Aurelia. The boots took me longer to do up. Instead of a cape she had a sleeveless jacket made that had lots of little pockets sewn on the inside for all the things I used for healing and other spells. One was large enough to hold my crystal ball and the silver crystal.

Aurelia stared off blankly at the wall, thinking about her children I had no doubt. I couldn’t imagine the pain she felt for leaving them behind so soon after their birth. I was thankful that I did not yet have my own children to worry over. I hurried my dressing so that we could get to the court yard sooner than later.

“I am ready.” I called to her. “Let’s go.”

She got up and walked to the door without saying anything. We walked down the hall, quiet as well. I could tell each step was a battle of her own. She stopped twice and made to turn back, but she never went to them. I watched as she took a deep breath and balled her fists and charged on towards the court yard. I had to keep my stride quicker than I would have liked to keep up with her.

When we came out the large front doors, I was surprised to see how full the yard was. Everywhere I looked people were moving about, doing what they could to finished getting ready. There were three wagons loaded with provisions, each of them pulled by two massive muscled horses. Mana stood by his horse and held the reins while he waited for Aurelia to mount up. Scorch stood next to him with Star beside her. Blackfire stood on the other side of Mana and his horse.

Beyond the gates I could see the army marching on ahead, the rest followed on their way out through the city gates. It looked like a larger army then it really was while they were standing three in a row. Wagons full of armor and supplies broke the lines up here and there. Each of them had a younger boy or girl to give the soldiers a helping hand.

Aurelia was quick to mount Scorch and was up in her saddle with a blink of an eye. That was signal enough for us to follow suit. I always loved when I had the time to ride Star. A thrill ran through me as she seemed happy to have me near once more. My silver eyes never gave her any sense of fear or mistrust. She as one of the few.

We rode along the line of soldiers marching through the city. Aurelia led the way, followed by Kairios on Blackfire, then Mana, then me. Some greeted us kindly and some greeted us with snide remarks. A lot of the people still hated that we were the ones here, as leaders. We were not one of them.

Who were we?

A cast away Warlock princess, and Elvish man- which was rare these days- and a dragon queen known to burn her own city. What right did we really have to rule over them? Maybe we had none. What we did have though, was the power to save them.

Everything about Aurelia was queenly as she rode on by. The snide remarks bounced off of her and she only gave them a node of her head as an apology before moving on. She never shied away from their disdain like I did. Those who gave her a kind remark were given a kind smile or comment in return.

Some of those in the crowd were happy to see me. The ones that I had become familiar with while they attended my healing house. They had shared their pain and past with me, and I shared mine with them as well. They had grown to trust me over time.

More than both of us, they spoke to Kairios. They trusted him the most out of all of us. He had fought with them when it was a miracle that he could even walk. They all saw that he was a leader, one they truly wanted to follow. Mana received no kid hello nor any rude remarks. People completely ignored him, not even looking in his direction.

It was a relief when we were through the city gates. They had been fixed and could now close against anyone who may try to intrude on the fragile peace that was forming here. I hoped it stayed that way while we were gone. We would send any survivors that were found back to the city. It had to stay standing.

it didn’t take too long before we got to the front of the line. Kairios and Aurelia came to ride side by side in the front while Mana came to ride beside me. He and I had barely spoken in the weeks he had been here. I could not help the nervousness that I felt around him.

We marched throughout the day at a steady pace. A few times I had thought about crawling into the back of one of the wagons to sleep a little while longer. With all the noise of the march, I didn’t think I would be able to.

The next town over loomed ahead of us. It was a small town filled with farmers. Wheton was surrounded by the best soil for growing wheat for the entire kingdom. Almost everyone in the town worked on the farms. Jaxson had told us many things that we needed to know about the towns we set out to save.

I expected to see people out in the fields working, or even smoke coming from the roof tops. But as we got closer to the town, it looked dead. Not a single thing was moving. No sounds carried across the wind. As we got closer and closer, the smell of blood and decay met our noses.