loved Queen Shezira, but there's nothing we can do for her. We have to look past that. Zafir will execute her and nothing we do will change that.'
As if you cared. 'Rider Hyrkallan doesn't agree.'
'I lyrkallan should go home. Jaslyn will need riders like him for the war. She needs riders like you too. And there will be a war, Jostan. The Great flame has shown it to me.'
Jostan felt something inside him break. 'Are you sending me away, Semian? Are you telling me you don't want me here with you?'
Semian shrugged. 'You only came because Jaslyn sent us both away. I know how you used to look at her. I felt the same way for a while. And yes, she's a princess, soon to be a queen, but in war who knows what could happen? The Red Riders don't mean anything to you, Jostan. You came because you had no dragon and nowhere else to go. Well now you have a dragon, and if you go with Hyrkallan then I'm sure Jaslyn will have you back. She will need every rider she can get. Please understand: I don't want you to go if your heart is here, but it isn't, and I don't want you to stay while your heart is elsewhere.'
Jostan looked back. Semian was walking them steadily away from the tent.
'Don't tell me you want to be with Nthandra.' Semian shook his head. 'She's not right for you, Jostan. She's one of us. She's given herself to the Great Flame. She embraces the fire and the fire brings her joy. Have you given yourself to the Flame?'
Jostan shook his head. 'I don't even begin to understand it.'
'You see. You belong with Hyrkallan and Princess Jaslyn and the riders of the north. What we're doing here is…' He frowned, reaching for something. 'It's something special. You were a good friend, Jostan, almost a brother to me, but do you see how our paths must move apart? And Nthandra has chosen too. I'm sorry for you that she didn't choose you.'
Jostan closed his eyes. 'She's a girl, Semian.' Even more than Princess Jaslyn was. He wasn't sure which one he feared for the most.
'Yes. And I will look after her.'
'That's not what I mean. I mean that's not why I'm going to stay, Semian. I'm not going back to the north, and I doubt you'll rid yourself of Hyrkallan so easily either. But even if you do, I'm staying with you because I remember who you are and because of what we endured together. Because you are almost a brother. Because I don't trust your new friend the blood-mage, and I think someone should stay to look after you. Besides, who knows, maybe the Great Flame will touch even me given time, eh?'
Semian stopped. He shook his head and looked Jostan up and down, and for a moment Jostan thought he was going to get a rebuke, but then Semian smiled. 'Then you're as good a friend as I'm likely to find and I shall be proud to fly with you. There may come a time when you wish to change your mind. You know you can leave whenever you want. We'll give you everything you need to get back to one of our queen's eyries. I'll even give you a dragon.'
Jostan laughed too. He couldn't help himself. 'You realise you're talking as though the Red Riders are already yours.'
'Oh, they are.' Semian was still smiling. 'Hyrkallan just doesn't know it yet. He and the others who haven't been touched by the fire, they'll leave soon enough. But you can stay. I still have hope for you. Come.' He tugged Jostan into motion again. 'Whatever Kithyr and Nthandra had to say to each other, I'm sure it's said.'
He was right: the blood-mage was gone when they returned. Nthandra was almost asleep, and as Jostan and Semian lay down one either side of her, she made no move to go to either of them. Jostan felt the weight of his arms and his legs and his head pressing him into the ground. A good fight was always a guarantee of a good night's sleep. The last thing he remembered was Nthandra's hand, snaking between the blankets, reaching out and holding his own, squeezing tight. She almost seemed happy. And then the darkness engulfed him and sucked him down into a place so dark and so deep that he thought he might never escape; and as he sank he dreamed, and in his dreams he saw his friend Semian, crying out against the tyrannies of the speaker. He saw riders rally around him, a few at first, then dozens, then thousands, and among those laces were riders he knew were his friends. He saw the riders rise as one and descend upon the Adamantine Palace from all sides, an irresistible tide of fire and scales. He saw the speaker and her lover caught naked and whipped: he saw Queen Shezira freed and given the Speaker's Ring. He saw the realms rejoice and sleep in peace. And amid the teeming happy crowds, through the endless celebra-tion, he saw Princess Jaslyn, smiling at him, reaching out her hand. He saw everything that he wanted to see and he felt a presence at his shoulder, an old and wise and respected mentor whose name he couldn't quite remember, whispering softly in his ear.
Do you see? This is how the world should be…
The dream stayed with him, more real than the waking world, when Semian shook his shoulder an hour before dawn and told him to get dressed and put on his armour.
'I had a dream,' he said. 'I dreamed that we set the realms to rights.'
In the moonlight he saw Semian smile, no trace of surprise on his face, as if he'd seen it all too. 'Yes. And that is how it shall be.'
He dressed and then reached out to wake Nthandra but Semian stopped him.
'No, Jostan. Let her lie. Let her sleep. Come. It's time to wake the others.'
In a daze he followed Semian from tent to tent. Everywhere riders awoke with a happy puzzlement in their eyes and spoke of dreams. They dressed as Semian asked and followed him until they all stood outside Hyrkallan's tent, waiting patiently. I know what this is, Jostan thought, and yet it was a dreamy thought, and one that didn't seem to have much weight. He half noticed Kithyr sidle in among the crowd, the last of them, pale and shaking and yet with a hungry gleam in his eyes. His head felt full of clouds. Am I drunk?
As Hyrkallan emerged, the riders watched him in silence. Twenty pairs of eyes followed him as he moved among them. Semian was in the middle, standing awkwardly, tipped slightly to one side from the wound that Zafir's mercenaries had given him.
'What?' Hyrkallan shouted, when he couldn't bear their stares any more. 'What?'
They were looking at him, not at Rider Semian, but somehow he was their heart. Jostan could feel it, even in himself. And the blood-mage, standing next to Semian now. Shanzir, Hahzyan, even GarHannas, who really ought to have known better. Hyrkallan was looking at them all, sizing them up. Jostan could almost read his thoughts. Why did I do this? Why did I even start this stupid, doomed crusade?
For Queen Shezira, Jostan wanted to say, to him, but his mouth stayed firmly closed. For the queen you served for all your life, the queen you love more than anyone can know. Except me. I know.
Hyrkallan threw his helm to the ground. 'You want glory?' he screamed at them all. 'Then do what riders have done since time began and serve your queen. You!' He pointed at one of King Valgar's men. 'Go home. Serve your queen. When Speaker Zafir turns her eyes to the north, Almiri will need every dragon Valgar had. You!' He was pointing straight at Jostan. 'Go home and serve yours. Serve Queen Jaslyn.' Jostan blinked and tried to listen, and yet the words seemed slide over him like water over a stone, never sticking in his mind, never quite heard. Hyrkallan clenched his teeth and a shiver of fury ran through him. 'You!' He stabbed at GarHannas. 'Why are you even here?'
GarHannas turned a dangerous shade of red, but he didn't move. Didn't speak.
Jostan bowed his head. Hyrkallan had gone too far. Even he knew it. Screaming and shouting at young blades like Jostan and Shanzir was one thing. Screaming at someone like GarHannas only made him look stupid. He'd lost them.
'Lead us, Rider Hyrkallan.' It was GarHannas who spoke. None of the rest wanted him.
Hyrkallan shook his head. 'No. I'm leaving you. I'm going back where I belong. Where we all belong. I'm going home, and I'm going to serve my queen by making the north so bloody dangerous that Zafir won't dare lift a finger against a single hair on Queen Shezira's holy head. You should join me.' He looked straight at GarHannas now. 'You can piss about in the mountains all you like, but twenty dragons aimlessly burning peasants in the Spur won't even get Zafir's attention. I'm going, and if I ever have to come back, I'll have the whole fucking horde of the north with me, five hundred dragons and fifty thousand men. That's where I should be and so should all of you.'
Jostan was barely listening now. Hyrkallan shook his head in disgust.
Semian spoke so softly that it seemed he was whispering, yet his voice was clear. 'Jaslyn needs a knight- marshal. Shezira needed a knight-marshal, a proper one, not one who could barely hold a sword. A marshal who would lead and conquer, not one filled with so much guile that she was strangled by her own schemes. Lady Nastria
