Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“Give the signal to Tiger Division to move into position, and return to your battalion.”

With his jaw set, Tuy bowed again and backed away. Sethon watched him issue the order to the twelve flagmen clad in leather armor who stood along the top terrace step of the platform. Immediately, two men at the far end of the line raised their large square pennants — one yellow and one white, on sturdy poles — and snapped them across the gusty air at right angles to their bodies. Below, the yellow division broke away from the main formations.

Sethon gave a grunt of satisfaction. “Now it is up to us, Lady Eona, to draw Lord Ido’s focus.” He stroked my hair again.

I pulled my head away. “You have had one day of dragon power,” I said. “He has had twelve years. You will not defeat him.”

I knew he would punish my defiance, but it was worth it. Strength came with bold words. I tensed, waiting for his blow. Instead, he laughed.

“When I had Lord Ido in that cell, I learned three important truths about him,” Sethon said. “Firstly, he must be in possession of his full faculties to use his power. Secondly, he can only direct his power to one task at a time.” Sethon leaned down until his face was close to mine. “The final truth is more about the man than the Dragoneye. After three days of my attentions, there was a moment in that cell when he regained both his faculties and his power. He could have razed the building to the ground. Instead, he directed his power elsewhere — to help you, I believe — and so he lost his chance to escape.”

Understanding prickled across my back. Ido had used his power to save me from the bereft dragons at the fisher village, instead of escaping.

“Lord Ido will protect you at all cost,” Sethon said. “It is why I know he is up on that ridge waiting to attack. Why I know this platform is safe. And why I know we will defeat him.”

With bullish purpose, Sethon rose from the chair and hauled me to my feet. My legs were locked into stiff crooks, and only his hard grip kept me upright as I stumbled to the edge of the platform. The flagmen who lined the step below us dropped into bows as Sethon pointed to the ground. “Do you see that squad of men down there?”

I stood swaying on the edge. Below us, about fifty soldiers stood in formation, their leather armor dull gray, as if they had emerged from the shadows.

“I call them my hunters. Every one of them knows what Lord Ido looks like. And every one of them knows how to disrupt a man’s Hua and render him senseless. They are here to capture Lord Ido and deliver him to me, safely contained by the shadow world. And you and I will keep Ido’s power focused on other matters while they do it.”

The strategy was simple and clever. Sethon did not need twelve years of dragon training; just fifty hunters who knew how to fight their way through a melee, and a distraction that would pull Lord Ido’s attention away from his earthly body. It was well worthy of Xsu-Ree.

“Begin the attack,” Sethon said to the flagmen.

Red, green, and yellow flags arced in a graceful sequence. A roar rose from the thousands of men below as the yellow division marched toward the ridge. I prayed to the gods that Kygo and Ido were ready.

Deep within my core I felt the rush of Ido’s union with the blue dragon. The sensation was muted by the black folio, but it still held the dark, crisp flavor of the man and his spirit beast. The taste of hope.

Around us, the air suddenly compressed. The clouds above the battlefield contracted as if they were a huge flexing muscle. Three jagged spears of lightning ripped the sky, their crackling power slamming into the yellow battalion. Gouged earth sprayed upward, the pale flash of bodies visible in the dark churn. The impact surged across the battlefield, reaching us in a wave of sound that held the force of a punch. Sethon and I both staggered back a step, the flagmen below us crouching for cover. I turned to hide my exultation.

“Continue the advance,” Sethon ordered.

The flags sent the order across the battlefield.

A thick rain of arrows flew from a line of archers across the ridge. The dark slivers momentarily filled the silver sky then were lost against the dull background of the ridge as they fell to earth. Only the sudden dips and gaps in the rush of men below showed their final destinations.

A low rumbling vibrated through my feet. To the left of the escarpment, a crack opened in the earth. On either side, the grassland collapsed inward, the chasm deepening and lengthening along the battlefield. It headed straight for us, as if two huge hands tore the earth apart. Screaming men fell into the heaving channel; half of the blue battalion was lost under convulsing earth and huge plumes of dust. I ducked as dirt and gravel pelted down in a stinging shower. Sethon was wrong: Ido was going to destroy the platform. Three of the flagmen dropped their pennants and scrambled down the steps.

“Hold your positions,” Sethon yelled.

They froze as the roaring progress of the chasm shook the structure. A wave of heat swept over us. I gagged, dirt and fear caught in my throat.

It stopped. There was only the patter of falling dirt, and Sethon’s harsh breathing, then screaming, from below.

I blinked away the grit and tears. The chasm had sliced past the platform and run the length of the plain, splitting a third of Sethon’s forces from the rest of the army.

“My nephew knows his Xsu-Ree,” Sethon snarled. He closed his hand around the pearls binding my wrists. “Show me the dragons!” he said, his face so close I could smell the metallic power of the folio on his breath.

The blood compulsion propelled me into the energy world, the transparent shape of Sethon’s features streaming with thick black Hua, the pathways along my arms riddled with dark veins. Sethon gasped at the sudden shift.

Below us, the battlefield whirled in violent iridescent reds and oranges — thousands and thousands of soldiers reduced to pulsing points of Hua, caught in the shock of the double attack from earth and air. The resonance of the lightning strikes lit the mangled earth in a fading white afterglow, and the dark scar of the chasm held the Hua of dying men flickering like the tiny glow of fireflies.

Above, the blue dragon circled the plain, his huge body doggedly resisting the folio. Another gossamer thread linked the beast to the ridge: Ido, working his power. The red dragon thrashed against the thicker stream of energy being pulled from her body, the dark return of Hua from the folio dulling her crimson scales. My eyes locked on the golden pearl under her chin. Her renewal.

Make it right. Kinra’s plea pounded through my blood.

The Rat Dragon dived, his power tearing another gaping chasm on the right side of the battlefield, straight through the red and green battalions. Hundreds and hundreds of bright points of Hua flickered and disappeared, caught and consumed in the splitting earth. Ido was carving out two unbreachable chasms that divided Sethon’s army into three. At the top of the ridge, bright lines of Hua—the resistance — surged down the steep slope to meet the remnants of the red and green battalions corralled between the deep trenches. I knew Kygo was among them, no doubt at the front, and I sent a desperate prayer to Bross to protect him. Ido’s position was easy to see; his thin thread of power rose from the center of the advance straight to the dragon, the beast above him still ripping the earth at his command.

“Stop him!” Sethon yelled.

The compulsion surged through me and reached toward the red dragon. Bitter black energy hooked her power, forcing us into union. There was no glorious warmth or cinnamon joy; just rage and fear in both of us. I fought it, trying to wrench myself free from the union — to save her from Sethon’s control— but the blood power burned its way through like acid eating another pathway to our bond.

“Stop Ido’s dragon,” Sethon ordered. “Attack it.”

“No!” I gasped, feeling the howling denial echoed through my bond, but the Mirror Dragon and I were already coiling our strength toward the blue beast.

We spread our talons into weapons, our massive muscles bunching into deadly intent. We launched ourselves at the Rat Dragon. He swung around and met our attack, shrieking, his power dragged away from the second chasm. It was not finished — a bridge of land still connected the two battalions. Our claws caught on blue scales, slicing open one flank into a gash of bright energy. He roared, his huge tail slamming into our chest and knocking us backward. The energy world spun past us in a blur of color as we strained to break free of the hold on us, but the tether was too tight. Circling upward, we swung around to face the blue beast again. He retreated through the air,