A Night of Dragon Wings - By Daniel Arenson Page 0,60

leads this place?" she called out. "Bring him before me."

All around her, people abandoned gardens, wheelbarrows, toys, harps, and weapons. They began to gather around her, staring and whispering to one another. She heard her name spoken in awe. She knew these faces; she had seen them labor in Requiem's fields, dig in her mines, and forge steel in her smithies. She saw no nobles; the last lords and ladies of Requiem had fallen. Here were the commoners of Aeternum's Kingdom.

"Who leads you?" she repeated. She stepped onto a tree stump and wheeled her head around, seeking a ruler. "Bring him to speak with me."

Grom approached her, tall and grim, his ill-fitting armor clanking beneath his cloak. He cleared his throat and smirked.

"It will be… difficult to bring the Legless Lord here. I think you will find it easier if we took you to him."

Lyana gripped her sword tight and frowned. She was queen to these people; would she approach this Legless Lord, a son of Requiem, as an ambassador? She grinded her teeth.

"Very well," she said. "If truly this lord of yours— and I use the term lightly—has no legs and cannot approach me, take me to him."

She did not like this. These people had missed her coronation in the wilderness of Salvandos, yet they still knew her as the Lady Lyana, a knight betrothed to their king. And yet they did not bow before her.

I will find no loyalty here, she thought. Titles still mean something in the west, where King Elethor protects his people; here they are forgotten.

The brothers led her down a dirt path between gardens, tree stumps, and rows of game hanging from poles. A hall rose ahead, built of boles still rough with bark and the stumps of felled branches. Those branches, still leafy, formed a rough roof. The structure looked long enough to house a dragon.

They stepped through its makeshift doors, which were carved of branches and rope, and into a shadowy chamber. The air outside was cold and wet; inside the hall was hot and stuffy and scented of pine. A campfire burned upon the earthen floor, its smoke rising through a hole in the roof.

"My lord!" called Grom, standing at Lyana's side. "We have found another survivor. She is Lyana Eleison, once a lady of Requiem's courts; we found her by the eastern lake."

A cough sounded behind the campfire; a man sat there, hidden behind the flames. The coughing went on for a long moment, then ended with a wheeze. Finally the man behind the fire spoke, voice raspy.

"Bring her closer, Grom. Let me see her."

Grom and Gar grabbed Lyana's arms yet again. She tried to shake herself free, but the brothers gripped her firmly, and they pulled her forward. She grunted but walked with them; she was more curious to see this man than to fight his minions. They walked down the hall and around the fire, and there she saw the Legless Lord.

He was an older man; she guessed him sixty years old, maybe older. His cheeks were stubbly, his long hair grizzled. He wore a brown leather tunic and sat in a chair of twisting oak roots—a mockery of Requiem's old throne which had stood in its palace. Upon his knees, the man held a sword with a dragonclaw pommel; forged in dragonfire in Requiem's Castra Draco, Lyana thought. His legs ended below those knees, and cloth wrapped the stumps.

"Lyana," he rasped. Coughs seized him again, and he brought a handkerchief to his mouth. It was a moment before he could speak again. "Lyana Eleison, once a lady of Requiem; I am glad to see you survived the carnage. Welcome to our camp."

"Dorin Blacksmith," Lyana said, eyes narrowed. She recognized this one. He had forged steel in Nova Vita smithies, and he had served in the City Guard during the war, though last time she had seen him, he had walked on two legs. "I too am glad to see you live; I fought with you against the wyverns. I saw you slay two. You fought well, my friend."

The blacksmith hacked a laugh, then coughed again. "Yes, I slew more than two. The last one did this." He swept his hand across his stumps. "You have emerged unscathed, I see, though perhaps with less hair."

She took a step closer to him, shaking off the brothers' hands.

"Dorin," she said, "King Elethor lives. He reigns in exile, leading a camp of a thousand Vir Requis. We still fight. We will