Lord Imladrik will be sent back to the colonies, my lady. Nothing can prevent it.
That was not true. It could not be true – those days were done with, over.
Yethanial moved away from the fireplace, forcing a measure of calm onto her speculating mind. She pushed Caradryel’s infuriating smugness from her thoughts, returning to the labour of scholarship that had occupied her before his interruption.
I will not permit it. I have my dignity.
She reached the stairs and started to climb, her grey robes whispering across the stone.
Nothing can prevent it.
Imladrik had never loved Kor Evril. Its walls were dark, hewn from the volcanic rock that riddled Caledor and gave the kingdom its untamed aspect. They were as old as the bones of Ulthuan, having been raised in the days when Aenarion still walked the earth and daemons sang unchecked in the aethyr.
He preferred the open sky. Walls made him restless; towers made him feel confined. Perhaps it was the dragons that had done it to him; once one had ridden on the high paths, circling under the sun with the whole world laid out like a crumpled sheaf of parchment, the confinement of mortal chambers became hard to bear.
Imrik, his father, the one known to Ulthuan as Caledor I, had warned him of it. ‘They say steed and rider become alike,’ he had said. ‘They get into your mind, the dragons. Beware of that: they are creatures of another world. Never believe you control them. They only come to you if they see themselves already inside you – the dragon becomes you, you become the dragon.’
Imladrik knew the truth of that. He had started to speak like Draukhain, even to think like him. When they were apart, which was most of the time, he would sometimes catch himself pondering strange images of far-off mountains or shorelines. He knew then that Draukhain was on the wing, perhaps thousands of leagues distant, and that the great creature’s mind was reaching out to him.
Did he share such an understanding with any of his own kind. With Thoriol? With Yethanial? He wanted to say that he did.
But he had never shared their minds as he had shared Draukhain’s. He had never become one with them, lost in the joy of flight, of killing, in the perfect freedom that had existed since before the coming of the ancients and the ordering of the earth into its mortal realms and jealousies.
At times he felt like one of the poor fools who sipped the nectar of the poppy, forgetting themselves, gradually slipping from the real world. They, too, lost themselves in dreams. How different was he to them? If he wanted to, could he break free of it?
Possibly. But the question was moot; he would never want to.
He approached Kor Evril’s gates on foot. A clarion sounded and the heavy wooden doors swung inwards. Guards raced out to greet him, bowing the knee and lowering iron spear tips in homage. They bore the colours of his House – crimson, bone-white, black.
Imladrik strode past them, barely checking his stride. ‘Where is my son?’
‘He has not been seen, my lord,’ replied one of the guards, hurrying to follow him. ‘I thought he was with–’
‘He was,’ said Imladrik grimly. ‘He chose to descend alone.’ He walked briskly through the narrow streets, ignoring the startled looks of his people. They stared at him from narrow windows. They were not used to seeing their lord travel without an escort, with the black dust of the mountain caking his robes and with two swords in his hands. ‘He was not seen on the road?’
‘He was not,’ said the guard. ‘I will send out patrols.’
‘No need. I know where he has gone. I will go after him myself.’
The guard bowed, struggling to keep pace as Imladrik pushed up towards the citadel’s main tower. ‘My lord, there is something else.’
‘Make it brief,’ snapped Imladrik, maintaining his pace. His failure with Thoriol still rankled. The ceaseless war with the druchii would call him away again soon, so he needed to make his peace before then. The two of them needed to speak, like a father and son should. His duties had always taken him away. That was the cause of the rift – it could be healed, given time, given patience.
‘The King is here, lord,’ said the guard, looking up at Imladrik’s stern face with some trepidation. ‘He arrived last night.’
By then Imladrik was approaching the central tower, his own keep, and he could see it for himself. Two banners hung over the gateway: one the gold and white of the Phoenix Kings, the other the pale blue of Caledor II.
He felt his heart sink. He gazed up at the high window, knowing that Menlaeth would have installed himself in there with his entourage, waiting for his subject to come to him.
It was a petty indignity. Imladrik paused, toying with the idea of turning on his heels. He was the inheritor of the title once carried by his illustrious ancestor, and need bow to no living monarch.
‘My lord?’ asked the guard, hovering uncertainly. ‘Shall I send word that you are coming?’
Imladrik briefly glanced up at the sky – a wistful look. He half expected to see Draukhain up there somewhere, spiralling in the emptiness, his long sapphire body twisting in perfect freedom.
The dragon becomes you, you become the dragon.
‘Do no such thing,’ he said dryly, pushing the doors open and walking inside. ‘I shall announce myself. It is always nice to give my brother a surprise.’
Imladrik’s audience chamber was a long, many-pillared space, lit by tall arched windows that sent clear bars of sunlight across the stone floor. At the far end stood a low dais, upon which sat a throne of obsidian. Imrik’s old battle-standard hung
