had never experienced the like before, but the desire to rip Luag’s throat out made her wolf’s body tense in preparation to spring.
Children were to be protected. Always. That they were Chrechte only made their protection that much more imperative. Their race did not reproduce easily. Her parents had been considered blessed beyond measure to have succored two children of the Faol past infancy.
“We’re not spawn,” the older boy said defiantly, even as his small body shook with fear.
Luag drew his fist back and Ciara’s haunches bunched a split second before leaping.
One hit from a warrior’s fist could kill a child.
But before she could jump from her hiding place, a mighty roar sounded from the sky. So loud and filled with anger, it froze even Luag—who now stared above them with shock and denial.
Looking up, Ciara understood his reaction. She could no more believe her eyes than her dreams of the strangely glowing cavern. Yet, this was no nighttime fancy. A great red dragon flew against the clear blue sky, his scarlet scales so dark they looked near black, his furious roars shaking the treetops.
The boys looked unafraid though and Ciara knew this…this mythical creature of old was their ultimate protector. Perhaps even the prince the older boy had spoken of.
The dragon’s head turned toward her brother and Luag, amber eyes fixed balefully on the men who had threatened the young shifters. Luag threw his dirk, not at the dragon but at the smallest boy. No doubt hoping to distract the dragon so Luag could run. The coward.
The knife missed the child’s body but cut his arm as it flew past. The boy fell backward, crying out as blood welled from the cut.
The dragon roared again and then opening his great mouth even wider, orange flames shot out, devouring everything in their path.
Unable to move in her shock, Ciara stood by while her brother died with a scream that would haunt her nightmares. Luag was already running, but it was to no avail. The dragon had command of the skies and flew after the tormenter of children. Another blast of flame and Luag’s screams were even more terrible than her brother’s had been; he and the trees he’d tried to hide amidst turned into naught but ash.
’Twas a miracle the entire forest did not catch, but the dragon cast his flame with care.
The dragon turned and flew back, landing near the boys who clambered onto his back with more speed than sense. They were gone moments later, the sky clear as if no mythical creature had ever been.
All that remained were the ashes of her brother, Luag and some trees. And her own heart. She had stood by while Galen died a terrible death. She had done nothing for him, or for the boys.
Not that the little ones had needed her help, but she should never have stood by while they were threatened to begin with. The knowledge that she could have died with her brother no boon against the pain.
Luag’s ashes she left for the wild animals to piss on, but Ciara scooped her brother’s ashes into the skin she’d retrieved from her things in the cave. Tears mixed with bits of bone and ash as she gathered the precious remains, leaving the grit of her brother’s life behind on her bare hands.
She would spread his ashes in the wind from the top of Ben Bristecrann just as they had done their father’s.
With no time for grieving, she walked through what was left of the day and the night that followed to reach the hill. It had gotten its name from the tree split by lightning that still grew by some miracle on its summit. Her da had claimed the place was blessed.
Since his ashes mixed with its soil, she thought it was sacred anyhow. Ciara spoke the words of Chrechte passing in a broken voice as the wind picked up what remained of her brother and took it to join their father.
It was late morning of the next day before she reached their cottage and could inform her mother of Galen’s death.
Ciara told no one of the dragon. Only that Luag had led her brother into danger and she had come upon both of them dead in the forest. She told her clan she’d prepared and lit her own funeral pyres and they’d not doubted her.
She was her da’s daughter after all and he’d been known as one of the most stubborn men in the Highlands. Luag had