Eona: The Last Dragoneye

I could not help the rush of hot truth to my face. “It is in the power, Kygo. I know Ryko told you about it. We saved the boat; that is what matters.”

“What if she did take pleasure?” Ido said. “She is an Ascendant Dragoneye, not one of your concubines. She takes whatever she wants. It is her due.”

“It was not like that!” I clenched my fists. “It was the power that created it. I did not seek it.”

“Do not hide behind your power,” Kygo said. “You are using it for your own ambitions. Your own pleasure.”

“I am not. I have always placed my power in your service. You know that’s the truth.”

His jaw set in disbelief.

There was one way I could show him I was loyal.

I jabbed my finger at the bloody slaughter in the distance. “That black folio can control my power.”

“Eona, what are you doing?” Ido half rose on his knees, stopped by the blade. “You will destroy us.”

I ignored his plea. “Anyone with royal blood can use it to bind a Dragoneye’s will.”

Kygo’s blade dropped from Ido’s throat. “What?”

“Your blood and the folio can compel our power.” My voice cracked.

Kygo released his hold on Ido. The Dragoneye slumped, sucking in air. I could not meet the bleakness in Kygo’s face.

“How long have you known that?” he asked.

“I told her when Sethon took the palace,” Ido said savagely. “So much for your truth bringer. Your Naiso.”

“Why didn’t you tell me, Eona?” Kygo said.

I finally looked up at him. “Why didn’t you tell me about the Hua of All Men?”

Within the lock of our eyes, the same reason stretched between us like a wasteland; neither he nor I trusted enough to place our power in the other’s hands.

Kygo turned his face away. “And you have put all that power in reach of Sethon, in the middle of his army.”

His words hollowed me into a cold husk. All he wanted was the folio and its power. I took a rough breath, fighting tears. Ido lifted his head, vindication in his haggard face. He had been right. Power always wanted more power. It was the nature of the beast.

“Sethon will not be able to stop Dillon,” the Dragoneye said tightly. “The boy is using the Righi.”

Kygo straightened his shoulders. “What is the Righi?”

“It is the folio’s death chant. It rips every bit of moisture from a man’s body and reduces him to dust.”

“Is that what is happening to those men down there?” Kygo touched the blood ring on his finger. “May Bross protect us.”

“Even Bross would find it difficult to stop him,” Ido said.

I looked down at the red churn of Dillon’s death march. He was coming for us. We had to face him or he would kill everything in his path — including the entire resistance army. His power drove a spike into my mind, over and over again, in time to my heartbeat. How could we possibly defeat a madness driven by hate and fed by the immeasurable power of the black folio? Even if we did, and wrenched the book from Dillon’s mind and body, what would happen then?

I looked across at Kygo. He was watching me, and in his eyes I saw the same dark question.

Beside me, Yuso unshackled Ido, the irons clinking as he pulled them away from the Dragoneye’s wrists. Ido slowly flexed his hands and rolled his shoulders, ignoring the captain’s belligerent refusal to step back.

“Your Majesty!” The scout rose from his crouch and pointed across the plain. “Sethon’s men have turned on each other!”

I hung back as Kygo crossed to the precipice edge. I did not know where to stand anymore. At his side? I doubted it.

“Lady Eona. Lord Ido. See this,” he ordered brusquely.

I followed Ido across the small clearing. We both peered over the edge. Below us, the ragged waves of foot soldiers around Dillon had changed direction and were pushing back against the horsemen driving them to their death. I squinted, trying to gain more detail in the haze of red mist and flying mud. They were not only pushing; they were hacking at each other and trying to flee.

“The boy has forced his way through an entire army,” Kygo said into the sickened silence.

“I would say Sethon has lost near to a thousand men,” Tozay said. “And the Hua- do of those left. He will have a task ahead to regroup.”

Kygo looked at Ido. “Are you sure you have to get near Dillon to defeat the folio?”

Ido nodded. “Dillon is draining the Rat Dragon’s power. My power.” Pain roughened his voice. “I will strike from that angle and block him from the beast in the celestial plane, but Lady Eona will have to strike the black folio. And that means contact with it.”

I flinched, remembering the burn of its words in my mind.

“We will need to use every source of power we have,” Ido added. “Including her compulsion over me.”

Even now, he baited Kygo. The two men stared at one another in fierce silence.

“You are ignoring another source of power,” Kygo finally said. “My blood and the black folio together can compel dragon power. If Lady Eona can get me close enough, I can stop Dillon.”

“No!” Tozay and I said together.

“Your Majesty, you must not risk yourself,” Tozay insisted.

“You want me to sit by while Lady—” He bit off what he was about to say. “I cannot sit by while others face such horror.”

A tiny glimmer of warmth broke across my desolation.

“That is what a king does,” Tozay said flatly. “Your Majesty, if you attempt to go down there, I will stop you by force. Even if it means my execution.”

Kygo glared at him. “I am not my father, Tozay. I do not blindly hand over my trust and my military because I cannot face the realities of war. I am not afraid of fighting.”

I gasped. He would anger the gods with such disrespect.

Tozay drew himself up. “Your revered father was never afraid,” he said. “He was devoted to this land and he did not want to see it plunged into eternal warmongering. I thought his son was the same.”

“I am,” Kygo ground out. “To a certain point.”

“We are not at that point yet, Your Majesty. Believe me.”

Kygo turned and walked a few paces across the clearing as if working the frustration from his body. “Then at least take some of my blood.”

His blood.

I stared at his clenched hand, the glint of gold flaring into an idea. “Your ring,” I said, the hope pushing me toward him. “Does it really hold your blood?”

He swung around, the possibility aflame in his face. “Yes.” His voice lowered. “I told you the truth about that.”

I bit my lip.

“There is not much in it.” He measured a sliver between thumb and forefinger. “Will that be enough?”

I looked back at Ido. “Is it?”

“No one has ever seen the folio’s blood power work. I do not know,” Ido said.

Kygo twisted the ring from his finger. “Take it.”

For a moment, I thought he was just going to drop it into my hand, but then he pressed it against my palm, the metal holding his body heat. With an ache in my throat, I remembered the last time he had pushed the ring into my hand. It had been his way of protecting me. Now it was his way of taking more power.

Yuso volunteered to take me on his horse to the plain below— no one dared suggest I ride behind Ido — and the three of us spent the short journey down the escarpment in grim silence. What was there to say? Either Ido and