Light My Fire (Dragon Kin #7)(57)

Where are you? his father finally asked.

In Costentyn’s cave. I’ve found some humans here. When I walked in, they were talking about how the baron of the nearby city had sent them here. They are stealing Costentyn’s gold for this baron. And to send a message.

A message? To whom?

Dragons . . . maybe Annwyl.

I see.

This can’t be ignored, Da. I’ll be dealing with them, but—

Yes, yes. I know. I think there are Cadwaladr kin nearby you. I will have them join you. But Celyn . . . and this is important, son, keep control of them as best you can. We don’t need this spreading outside the walls of that city. Understand me?

I do, Da.

Good.

His father was gone, off to handle this in the best way he could. And since Celyn had utter faith in his father, he thought no more about it, instead focusing all his Cadwaladr rage and hate on these men. These worthless human men.

Finally, after the dragonfear had washed through them and the humans were able to move again, one of the men raised his sword and screamed, “Kill it!”

Celyn welcomed them to try. . . .

Miles had just taken another basket filled with gold and jewels when he heard the screams from inside that dragon’s cave. He doubted the dragon had come back. The creature had definitely been dead by the time they’d finished with him. Even after they’d known he was dead, they’d kept stabbing him, kept bashing him . . . just to make sure. Them dragons could be tricky. The baron had said they were evil and the one in the cave needed to be killed. Although, truth be told, that dragon hadn’t put up much of a fight. Not the kind of fight Miles would have expected. But when they’d walked into that cave filled with gold, he’d understood better what the baron had wanted.

Yeah. Sure. The dragon dead of course. Miles didn’t care one way or another about that. But the baron really wanted this gold. He wanted to raise an army, perhaps take on the queen. How people could be okay with that woman ruling their lands when she lay down every night with a dragon—even worse, had its unholy babies—Miles could and would never understand.

But this had nothing to do with any of that. Miles understood that once he saw all that damn gold. For hours now, they’d been working to clean out this cave and yet they weren’t even half done.

A few of the men had already shoved some gold and jewels into their pockets, but Miles wasn’t about to risk that. At least not yet. The baron could be mean when he thought he was being cheated and Miles had no intention of hanging from any gallows for some bloody gold. So he kept moving those buckets along.

Until the first body nearly hit him in the head.

It was Terence, landing hard between the two lines of men. He was still alive, and desperately trying to hold his guts in. A chore with that large hole in his stomach.

They were about to go to him, to help, when they heard more screaming, saw more of their friends and family come flying out of that hole that they’d spent days opening so they wouldn’t have to travel all the way through that big cave with buckets of coin

Black claws gripped the cave opening and a massive head covered in black scales suddenly appeared. Lowering that head, the creature was able to maneuver those bright white horns past the opening, and then it was there.

Big. Black. Covered in scales. And not nearly as old as the one they’d found in the cave. Reading a bloody book, no less, and drinking a giant chalice of wine. Miles remembered thinking, “Well la-de-da,” before they’d rushed it.

Maybe this one was its son or something. But whatever it was, it was bigger, younger, and meaner.

So much meaner.

Old Robert, thank the gods, was the only one not pissing himself from that dragonfear they’d all heard about but that they hadn’t felt when the old dragon had reared itself up. And it was Old Robert who rallied the boys.

“What are you doing?” he bellowed. “Kill it! Kill it now!”

Swords were unsheathed and spears raised.

“Charge!” Old Robert screamed and a group of the lads ran forward as Miles scrambled for his spear.

This dragon, unlike that other one, didn’t panic though. He just lifted his back claw and slammed it down, and the screams of his friends filled Miles’s ears.

Then the dragon opened its maw and flames came flying out. Big, giant flames that burned a group of the lads in seconds, barely giving them time to scream before they were nothing more than ash.

Panicked, terrified, Miles ran behind a big tree. He hid. Like a weak baby. But he was shaking so much, he couldn’t raise a sword or spear if he wanted to.

The baron’s soldiers, a unit left behind to keep an eye on the men—probably to keep them from stealing—split apart and went at the dragon from opposite sides.

They weren’t scared like the rest of them. They were soldiers, after all. Some of them, it was said, had fought with dragons before. So they were ready for this dragon.

What they weren’t ready for, however, were the arrows.

One arrow after another came raining down from the top of that cave. Miles leaned back and took a look. It was a woman. Pale, she was. With long, white-blond hair that pooled around her as she crouched at the top of the cave opening with a curved bow. And, she never missed a shot. Not one. Each arrow she sent out hit one of the baron’s men in the neck or eye or under the arm. Each shot meant to kill . . . and each shot did.