Katarina held out her hand to Loren. “Your dragon amulet, Loren. Give it to me.”
Loren’s eyes narrowed, her pupils slowly shifting into reptilian slits. “The dragon amulet is mine.”
The queen sighed. She held her hand out to Jorrne who helped her swing her legs to the side, letting them dangle off the bed. She was still too weak to stand, but she could wave her daughter to come closer. “You’ve become very protective of that amulet. Why is that?” Queen Katarina asked, her calmness startling the king.
Loren lightly touched the amulet with the tips of her fingers. “It’s mine, I’m meant to have it as the heir of Aldoran.”
The queen nodded. “That is true. But the true duty of the bearer of that amulet isn’t simply to keep it. You may be the heir to the throne, Loren, but you have no idea what that amulet does, do you?”
The princess began to doubt herself. A crease formed in her brow as she thought, and her hand fell to her side. “The dragon amulet is given to the next ruler of Aldoran, a symbol of strength and honor, that time honored traditions would be carried on by the next generation and that the might of the kingdom will not falter.” She said stiffly, as if reciting a passage from the book.
“That is all true Loren, but that is not the whole purpose of the amulet. It is about time I tell you.” The queen smiled patiently, and held her hand out again. This time, Loren reached around her own neck and unclasped the necklace, and pressed the amulet into her mother’s palm. Her eyes cleared and returned to their normal hue, and the princess was left with a vague feeling of sheepishness.
The moment the silver dragon amulet — delicately formed into a dragon with outstretched wings and inlaid with dazzling blue gemstones by smiths in the time of Ylfair the Dragonheart — touched Katarina’s skin, her own eyes changed. They became the golden, shining eyes that Loren had only moments ago. The princess gasped in alarm, but was enraptured by the beauty of her mother’s eyes. The king tentatively reached a hand to touch the pendant, but Katarina moved it out of his reach with a huff.
“Mother?” Loren asked, fear and concern in her voice.
Queen Katarina smiled kindly. “Don’t be alarmed. This is the true power of this pendant. It is not simply a trinket or an heirloom. It grants magic to our bloodline, those who are the children of dragons, descendants of Ylfair the Dragonheart. You may have felt its magic already, but under what circumstances, I don’t know. But the main purpose of this amulet being in our possession…” the queen trailed off.
Loren was about to ask a question, to prompt her mother into continuing, when she heard a loud rumbling from beyond the windows. Queen Katarina smiled, and Loren rushed around the four-poster bed and threw open the windows. She saw Lind, the great dragon, flying through the sky. Watching Lind fly always filled Loren with a sense of awe. As she watched, the blue and gold dragon flew closer to the open windows of the queen’s chambers. The dragon approached the wall, and flapped his mighty wings to hover in the air. Loren saw the dragon’s shining golden eyes immediately. “Mother!” she called back over her shoulder, the realization dawning on her.
“Yes, Loren. We alone can speak to him, call him, even command him if need be. Now come away from the window and let him hunt. You can visit Lind below the castle later.” The queen said with a smile. Her eyes, still gold from the amulet’s magic, were weary with fatigue.
Loren eagerly returned to her mother’s side, eyes full of wonder and a stream of questions pouring from her mouth. The king smiled and stood, opting to stand a distance away from the girls and letting them talk. The princess was animated in her curiosity, gesturing and speaking a mile a minute. The queen met all of her daughter’s inquiries with a patient smile and gentle laugh. Queen Katarina looped the amulet back around Loren’s neck, the silver dragon’s magic laying dormant again, if only for a little while.
King Jorrne excused himself from the queen’s chambers while the mother and daughter were catching up. It was wonderful to see his family back as it was: happy and together. But he had other matters to attend to. With an authoritative nod to the queen’s attendant, the king strode off down the hallways of the castle, steel armor ringing with every step.
The War Room was cleaner than it was usually kept. The parchment and scrolls that usually littered the large wooden table had been cleared, and the ink stains from dozens of pots had been scrubbed out of the wood. There was no one seated around the large table that bore the map of the kingdoms carved into its surface. King Jorrne trailed his fingertips on the lacquered surface of the table as he approached it and took his seat at the head of the table. There, carved in the western part of the map, were the hills and plains of Aldoran. The map was bisected roughly in the middle by the jagged lines that denoted mountains. The Kilrough Mountain Range stretched from the southern coast and ended just before the barren, frozen north. King Jorrne tapped an area that denoted plains and the city of Rhodia on the map. It wasn’t very far from the mountain range. Loren had gotten quite a distance away from Aldoran, away from home, before she was found. The king didn’t want to know what would have happened if the foolhardy princess hadn’t been surprised in a dingy inn.
“Your Grace.” A
