Eona: The Last Dragoneye

Their savage arrival slammed power across our body, knocking us backward through the air. We twisted, muscles straining to stop the impetus. A huge green body rammed us, emerald claws ripping through red scales. We screamed and ducked, our tail battering the bright green flank. The clash of Hua boomed across the sky. The Rabbit Dragon pounced, but the blue beast rammed him, and the huge pink body tumbled past.

Go lower. Ido’s mind-voice cut through the fury of dragon battle. To the soldiers.

We found the ranks of bright Hua streaming down the hill and dived toward them. The ten followed behind us in a shrieking, ragged circle. The Rat Dragon twisted through the air, claws and teeth driving the Ox and Tiger out of formation, flattening the circle of dragons into a lopsided crescent.

Now!

We opened our pathways, the familiar orange taste of his power roaring through us, drawing up our energy. But this time we were not left behind. This time we were riding the roiling wave of Hua with Ido and the blue beast. Around us, the dragons were trying to re-form their circle. We had to stop them.

Bind the lightning, Ido ordered.

We felt the blue beast harvesting the tiny cold sparks of energy within the clouds, drawing them into the burning rush of our united power. We clawed at a bright flicker, pulling it into the rolling force. Deep within us we heard a howling song of destruction, a churning mix of gold and silver power spiked with the flashing fire of lightning.

Eona, aim it at the soldiers. How?

Channel, like you do when you heal.

We felt our combined power gather into a crest, hanging for a moment as if offering the chance to step back. And then it broke, crashing into a rush of devastation.

With all our strength we tried to channel it downward, but most of it flooded through our unpracticed grasp and slammed into the ten beasts around us. Their circle broke across the celestial plane. Shrieking, they vanished, leaving the bitter taste of despair.

Ido and the Rat Dragon were not so clumsy. With iron control, they sent destruction into the earth below. The fireball of lightning and power ripped through the bright points of Hua marching toward the village, obliterating the ranks of soldiers in its roaring path. Flames washed across the hill, the savage energy glowing through the celestial plane like a false dawn. Dirt and rock and ash spun upward into high arcs, then fell across the village and beach in a dark driving rain. The battle lines broke as screaming people ran for cover from the pelting debris.

I gasped, dragged back into my earthly body by the sudden sharp impact of a rock that sent hot pain through my shoulder. I blinked through a blur of tears, the heat and shape beneath me coalescing into Ido’s body, the tight wrap of his arms holding me against his chest.

“It’s not finished yet,” he said.

He rolled over until I was under him, the full length of his body shielding me, his weight braced on his elbows. The aftershock boomed across the beach, the sand shifting under us, a fine layer of ash sweeping across our skin in a hot wind. Ido winced as stones thudded against his back and clumps of earth exploded around us in plumes of dust.

“It will stop in a moment,” he said, glancing up at the leaden sky.

The wild savagery of the dragon battle and the exhilaration of power slipped away from me. I was hollow, a shell made of distant screaming, falling ash, and the dank stench of incinerated land and people.

“What did we do?” I whispered, horror locking me under him.

“We stopped Sethon from killing everybody and taking us.” He touched my wet cheek with a bloodstained finger. The coppery tang echoed the drifting smell of death in the air. “You should be celebrating.”

Celebrate? When all I could see was the image of all those soldiers on the hillside extinguished in just one fiery moment. “We killed them all. So fast.”

He watched me, his brows drawn into a small frown. “It was us or them, Eona. Your power just saved all your friends.”

Although it was true, I shook my head, unable to find words for the desolation that pierced my spirit.

“You are too tender.” Hesitantly, he cupped my cheek in his hand. “You will be undone if you think of them as men. They are your enemy.”

“Is that what you do?”

“No, I do this.” He lowered his mouth to mine. I closed my eyes, part of me knowing I should push him away — the other part longing for a moment that held life, not death.

I felt Ido’s body tense and opened my eyes. The tip of a sword slid along his jaw, forcing his head back. Kygo stood over us. Under the streaks of ash and sweat, his face was white with fury. “Get off her.”

The shock in Ido’s eyes hardened into rage. Slowly, he pushed himself away from my body, the sword guiding him back on to his knees.

“Are you all right?” Kygo asked me. His voice snapped like a whip.

I nodded. Somewhere in the village, a child wailed, the heartrending sound rising above the other calls and shouts; closer, the sporadic sounds of steel meeting steel echoed through the blanketing quiet of the drifting dust.

Kygo shifted the sword against Ido’s throat. “Did you make that fireball?”

Ido’s lips were drawn back into a snarl. “You should thank us,” he said. “Lady Eona and I saved your precious resistance.”

Kygo’s eyes fixed on me. “You did that, Eona?”

I curled my body against the boat, away from the awe in his voice. “You were outnumbered. I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

Kygo stepped back from Ido and lowered the sword. The Dragoneye rubbed the thin line of blood that the blade had pressed from his skin.

“Now you have your army of two, Your Majesty,” he said acidly. “Tried and tested.”

I stared at the Dragoneye. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t be naive, Eona.” Ido shot a malicious glance at Kygo. “Do you think he got me out of the palace to nurture crops and redirect rain? I am here as a weapon, and you are here to blunt or sharpen my blade at his command.”

I looked at Kygo. “That’s not true, is it?”

Kygo straightened. “You said it yourself, Eona — we are outnumbered. We will always be outnumbered. I swear I never wanted you to break the Covenant. I just wanted you to control him.” He nodded at Ido. “He has no problem killing people.”

Ido laughed, a sharp bitter sound. “You are not so different from your uncle.”

Kygo’s hand tightened around the hilt of his sword.

“When were you going to tell me about this, Kygo?” My voice sounded distant, as if I stood lengths away from myself.

“When we got to the eastern rendezvous. Before the final strike.”

I stood up. “Well, now I know.” Beyond the boat, the bodies of three soldiers lay on the sand. Caido looked up from salvaging their fallen weapons as I rounded the prow.

“Eona,” Kygo called behind me. “I was going to ask you.”

I looked over my shoulder. “Thank you for that consideration, Your Majesty.”

Wrapping my arms around my body, I walked steadily toward the battle-torn village, the huge blackened gouge in the hill above it like a long, deep scar.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CAIDO STEPPED BETWEEN the two bodies sprawled across the narrow ridge above the beach. One man had no obvious marks on him, but his neck was bent at an ominous angle. The other had been stabbed in the heart, flies