What a Dragon Should Know (Dragon Kin #3)(103)

The queen raised her hand and swiped it through the air. “Please, Lady Dagmar. I am in no mood for false modesty.”

Dagmar folded her arms across her chest. “Is this about Ragnar?”

She snorted. “I can handle that Horde hatchling myself. He’s a mage, you know? Not a bad one either. I can feel his power among the lines of Magick. But I guess all that means nothing to you as a follower of Aoibhell.”

“I’m not a follower. I agree with her teachings.”

Rhiannon gave a small snicker. “Even suggesting you may worship Aoibhell herself is an insult to those who believe in her word.”

“To turn her into a god would go against everything she believed.” Dagmar briefly glanced at the ground. “What is it you want from me, my lady?”

“I’ll be blunt since I’m not good with subtlety. I’m having an issue. It involves Annwyl’s twins. I need the help of a devious mind combined with a …”

“Barbarian will?”

The Dragon Queen leered. “Exactly.”

“I can help you.” As she’d promised to help Annwyl. And as long as the human queen breathed, she’d keep that promise.

Dagmar motioned away from the stables with a wave of her hand. “Tell me everything, Majesty, and we’ll figure it out from there.”

Olgeir stared out over the edge where he’d guessed Lady Keita had made her escape. At his feet, one of his favorite guards lay dead from an expertly broken neck, and behind him were the idiots he called sons.

“We’ll go after her,” his oldest said. “We’ll find her.”

“It’s too late!” He turned and his sons backed up. He may be old, but for dragons that only made them harder to kill. “Can’t you smell him? On the air? He already has her.”

“Who? Who has her?”

“The boy. That treacherous, bastard boy.”

One of his younger sons raised a brow. “Ragnar would never be fool enough to come back here.”

But Olgeir knew he had. Knew his son was fool enough to risk everything to become warlord of the Olgeirsson Horde.

“We’ll find him, Da,” his oldest said, the others roaring behind him. “We’ll find him and kill him. Bring his head back to you.”

“No.” Olgeir sneered. “Stay here. I’ll handle the boy. Like I always have.”

He stormed off, motioning to three of his best guards to follow.

Olgeir would bring Ragnar’s head back himself and mount it over his treasure.

His idiot offspring’s mother would complain, but she’d have to get over it.

Chapter 26

For three days the Blood Queen of Dark Plains held on. For three days the entire kingdom had been in mourning.

Yet the pain felt by the dragons who considered her family was a palpable thing, rippling through them all. Every day she’d see servants rush from the castle so they could sob among their own without upsetting the dragons any more than they already were. Even those cousins and aunts and uncles who hadn’t had a chance to get to know Annwyl before the birth mourned for the loss their kin suffered.

To be blunt, Dagmar simply wasn’t used to it. The Northlanders didn’t show their pain. They didn’t mourn. They simply set their dead to flame, either on pyres or at sea, and once the remains were nothing but ashes, three to five days of drinking ensued. Neighbor enemies didn’t attack at these times, probably one of the only lines not even Jökull crossed when at war. Drunken tears and sobbing were allowed only because they could be written off. “It was the drink,” she’d heard her kinsmen say more than once. “More than six kegs of ale and I’m a blubbering mess.”

Yet there had been no drinking in Dark Plains. Only the grim readying for battle and defense, and the painful expressions of those who were feeling the loss of Queen Annwyl.

To combat all of it, Dagmar had kept busy doing what she did best: planning, plotting, and executing.

A good portion of the defenses were up and ready. Some of them were buried deep in the ground beneath them, ensuring it would at least be hard for the Minotaurs to break through into the Garbhán Isle dungeons. Others were topside and at the ready. And a few were tests she’d insisted upon. She’d argued over the tests with Brastias, who seemed grateful to have something else to focus on. He thought they were simply too limited and specific, which may have been correct, but Dagmar still liked to test out her ideas when she could.

While the defenses were being built, the merchants and prostitutes had been moved from inside the main gates to a town about a league away from the edge of Garbhán Isle. This way the servants didn’t have to travel too far to get daily supplies, but strong defenses could now be erected that would protect the main gate.

Dagmar had happily helped with all that as well, glad to be of some assistance during this time. Yet there was still much work to be done, and she had every intention of making sure as much as possible was finished before she returned home.

As Dagmar walked across the enormous courtyard studying her list carefully, wind whipped around her, lifting the hem of her dress and her hair. It reminded her she had yet again forgotten to braid her hair and wear her scarf over it. She raised her gaze to the sky, her eyes momentarily blinded by the two suns blaring overhead. She saw the dragons at the last minute, dashing to the side as five of them landed.