The prison—as she had begun thinking of the building they had just left—was right at the midpoint between sand and grassy land, and the further they moved away from it, the more the ground sloped upward. It was not a mountainous terrain by any stretch, but the trees were more sparse here, though, so the grass was a lighter color than the deep verdant greens of her home. Gin looked over her shoulder every so often, taking note each time of how the mist obscured more and more of the stone edifice. After a few hours, the prison was covered entirely, but she thought she saw more water ahead. The mist had not lifted but was not as thick as it had been earlier in the journey. Suddenly, as though a blindfolded was ripped from her eyes, Gin could sense others ahead of them. She stumbled under the weight of the feeling. Sath stopped, sensing her sudden confusion.
“We need to go to the northeast, I think. I overheard Ysil speaking about a place called La’al Drygyr. Do you know what that means in Eldyr, Sath?”
“Drygyr means dragon. La’al means—well, it’s either a number or a color, because I can remember it being a part of one of the songs the nanny taught us to help us remember.” He closed his eyes a moment, and Gin smiled as she heard him humming a tune under his breath. “It’s a color; La’al means red. So la’al drygyr means red dragon.” Sath looked very proud of himself for a moment until the gravity of the situation hit him. “Gin, do you think -”
“That she was talking about an actual red dragon? Probably, but surely not THE red dragon. You don’t think that is Lord Omerith? The one Guardian I have never been able to contact? I don’t know if I hope so—or hope not.” She closed her eyes for a moment to gain her bearings and then headed northeast, with Sath right behind her.
Sixteen
The Opposite of a Jailbreak
“Gin, hang on a second.” Sath was again standing with his arms crossed over his chest as he often did when he was sorting something out.
“Why?”
“Humor me.” He rubbed a hand over the top of his head—another sign of frustration. “We need supplies, Gin. We don’t know what plants are edible here, or if there are animals that we can hunt for food. We certainly didn’t get anything from the other prisoners.”
She scanned the landscape ahead of them and soon let out a whoop as she spotted a chimney with smoke curling out the top. “Look! Over there!” She pointed, and Sath followed the direction of her arm until he also saw the smoking chimney. She started walking quickly toward the house, with Sath following along behind her.
“I just hope that smoke isn’t because they are cooking the last visitors they had,” he muttered. Before long, they reached the house and found it to be more of an inn than a house. Sath’s mouth was set in a thin line—he was still convinced that it was a trap, and it reminded him of the inn where he met Raedea so long ago. Long before he met Gin, when he was barely free of being the Bane of the Forest. She had been his first friend and moral compass. To think that she had been searching for her twin brother, Dorlagar, who did such unspeakable things to Gin...“I hope you found your peace—and your worthless brother, Rae,” he whispered as Gin opened the front door and walked inside.
The first room they entered was an ample gathering space, with wooden tables set at odd angles all over it. Similar wooden chairs were pulled up to the tables, and none of them seemed to be inhabited. “Not late enough yet, I suppose,” Gin whispered to him. Sath shook his head. Something was not right, but he couldn’t put a point to it. The fur on the back of his neck stood on end as he followed Gin to the bar where a young man was wiping it down.
“Can I help you, miss?” he said, and when he looked up at Gin, she nearly jumped backward. He was also dragonkind, like Ysil and the princess, but his inherited dragon traits were subtle at best—deep amber eyes and black hair and scales which only framed his face—there were none on his arms. Those seemed to be entirely human, and his entire demeanor so reminded Gin of Dorlagar that she gripped a nearby chair for balance.
“Aye, we require some food, but…”
“Of course. Go sit down, I’ll make you up something. We have a nice vegetable stew and some fresh bread. Two mugs of ale to go with it, I suppose?”
“I hate to impose further, sir, but do you have a room we could rent just for the night to get ourselves sorted out? We don’t have a lot of money, but -”
“One of these days, I’m going to have a word with the Mother Dragon about all this charity work I do.” He reached back behind him to a pegboard laden with keys, retrieved some, and then turned back to Gin as a wry grin spread across his face.. “Here. First door on the right at the top of the stairs. Get yourself settled and then come back down for your food.” He
