A Feast of Dragons - By Morgan Rice Page 0,18

of the Sea of Fire.

CHAPTER NINE

Gwendolyn ran in the open meadow, her father, King MacGil, beside her. She was young, maybe ten, and her father was much younger, too. His beard was short, not showing any signs of the gray it would have later in life, and his skin was free of wrinkles, youthful, shining. He was happy, carefree, and laughed with abandon as he held her hand and ran with her through the fields. This was the father she remembered, the father she knew.

He picked her up and threw her over his shoulder, spinning her again and again, laughing louder and louder, and she giggled hysterically. She felt so safe in his arms, and she wanted this time together to never end.

But when her father set her down, something strange happened. Suddenly, the day went from a sunny afternoon to twilight. When Gwen’s feet hit the ground, they were no longer in the flowers of the meadow, but stuck in mud, up to her ankles. Her father now lay in the mud, on his back, a few feet away from her, older, much older, too old, and he was stuck. A few feet away, lying in the mud, was his crown, sparkling.

“Gwendolyn,” he gasped. “My daughter. Help me.”

He lifted a hand out from the mud, reaching for her, desperate.

She was overcome with an urgency to help him, and she tried to go to him, to grab his hand. But her feet would not budge. She looked down and saw that they were stuck in the mud which was hardening all around her, drying up, cracking. She wiggled and wiggled, trying to break free.

Gwen blinked and found herself standing on the parapets of the castle, looking down on King’s Court. Something was wrong: as she looked down, she did not see the usual splendor and festivities, but rather a sprawling cemetery. Where there once sat the shining splendor of King’s Court there now sat fresh graves as far the eye could see.

She heard a shuffling of feet, and her heart stopped as she turned to see an assassin, wearing a black cloak and hood, approaching her. He sprinted for her, pulling back his hood, revealing a grotesque face, one eye missing, a thick, jagged scar over the socket. He snarled, raised one hand, and raised a glistening dagger, its hilt glowing red.

He was moving too fast and she could not react in time. She braced herself, knowing she was about to be killed as he brought the dagger down with full force.

It stopped suddenly, just inches from her face, and she opened her eyes to see her father, standing there, a corpse, catching the man’s wrist in mid-air. He squeezed the man’s hand until he dropped it, then hoisted the man over his shoulders and threw him off the parapet. Gwen listened to his screams as he plunged down over the edge.

Her father turned and stared at her, a corpse, his flesh decomposed; he grabbed her shoulders firmly, and wore a stern expression.

“It is not safe for you here,” he warned. “It is not safe!” he screamed, his hands digging into her shoulders way too firmly, making her cry out.

Gwen woke screaming. She sat upright in bed, looking all around her chamber, expecting there to be an attacker.

But she was met with nothing but silence, the thick, still silence that preceded dawn.

Sweating, breathing hard, she jumped from bed, dressed in her nighttime lace, and paced her room. She hurried over to her small, stone basin and splashed water in her face, again and again. She leaned against the wall, felt the cool stone on her bare feet on this warm summer morning, and tried to compose herself.

The dream had felt too real. She sensed it was more than a dream—a genuine warning from her father, a message. She felt an urgency to leave King’s Court, right now, and to never come back.

She knew that was something she could not do. She knew she had to compose herself, to gain her wits. But every time she blinked, she saw her father’s face, felt his warning. She had to do something to shake the dream off.

Gwen looked out and saw the first sun just beginning to rise, and she thought of the only place that would help her regain her composure: King’s River. Yes, she had to go.

*

Gwendolyn immersed herself again and again in the freezing cold springs of King’s River, holding her nose and ducking her head under water. She sat