heard you’ve been supporting the rebellion.”
“Rebellion is my father’s word,” Rodric said. He ducked his head. “I thought of it more as helping people. Things have been worse since you left. The food shortage, the deaths . . . someone had to do something. And my father . . . well. You saw my father.” He looked up at the sky. “Care to explain the dragon?”
“It will take a while,” she said. “But it isn’t Vanhelm’s. They’re here, but it’s mine. It follows me.”
“What exactly—”
Magic crackled in the air, and Aurora felt a rush of heat, a rush of fury and yearning that almost choked her. And she knew what she would see before she turned, knew before the fire ripped across the square.
A horde of dragons, swooping out of the sky.
THIRTY-ONE
THE CREATURES CIRCLED THE CASTLE, THEIR SHRIEKS tearing through the air. One let out a burst of flame, and the west tower buckled under the heat.
“Vanhelm,” Rodric said. “They’re attacking.”
“No,” Aurora said. “No, they’re not.”
“Aurora?”
She ran to the edge of the dais, reaching for the connection between her and the dragons. If she could find it, if she could calm them, lure them down from the sky . . . but the dragons burned too hot, driven on by vengeance and rage.
Her dragon was still there, a separate beat from the others, shrieking but not burning, not attacking . . . not yet.
Rodric ran up beside her. “If it’s not Vanhelm, then who? Aurora?”
“It’s Celestine,” Aurora said. Another dragon dove over the square. Fire raced across the cobblestones. “It’s my fault.”
“Celestine?” Rodric flinched from another rush of dragon fire. “The witch? She’s dead.”
“No,” Aurora said. “No, she’s not.”
She ran down the steps, but she could see nothing but fire. She did not know where Celestine would hide. She did not know where to look. The screams rattled around her head.
If she were Celestine, if she wanted Aurora to find her, wanted to make a point, where would she wait?
And then she knew.
She looked up at the castle, searching for her own tower. A green light danced around the window. The screams of the dragons distorted, replaced by far-off laughter, and a singing that sent prickles down Aurora’s arms.
Aurora ran. The light floated in front of her eyes now, brushing around her hair, luring her onward. She ducked around the blazing pyre, around the remaining guards and through the castle doors.
“Aurora!”
Rodric’s footsteps pounded behind her. “Stay here!” she shouted. “Get people to the river. I’m going to stop this.”
“How?” he said. “Where are you going?”
She ignored him. She ran faster than she had known was possible, tearing through the corridors, her arms catching on tables and flower vases, until she reached her tower door. It was still unlocked. She kept running, around and around, past the tapestries, through the dust, until she crashed into her bedroom. That room was empty too, but the fireplace was open, lights gleaming above the ashes.
Celestine waited in the room above. She sat on a stool, turning the spinning wheel with flicks of her fingers. The air glowed.
“It is a pity,” Celestine said, “that a beautiful thing like you spent her whole life locked in this tower. This spindle was the thing that brought you your freedom, in the end. Do you not think?” She turned her head to look at Aurora, and her smile was wide and hungry, like the smile of a dragon.
“Stop them,” Aurora said. Her voice was hoarse. “Stop the dragons.”
“Stop them?” Celestine tilted her head. “But you were the one who brought them here.”
“I didn’t—”
“You did not what? You did not take a dragon’s heart?”
“I didn’t summon them here.”
Celestine laughed, and the spinning wheel clicked. “Are you really so dim, Aurora? You brought them here. You. I told you that you would regret eating that piece of dragon heart. They are drawn to you. They were drawn to you in Vanhelm, they are drawn to you now. They are following you.”
Aurora stepped closer. “No,” she said. “I saw you in Vanhelm, when the dragons attacked—”
“I helped you in Vanhelm,” Celestine said. “You were trying so hard to send the dragons away, but they were not listening, were they? Poor thing, fighting to control your magic, your new link to the dragons, and still knowing so little. You are too weak to handle them all, so I was offering my assistance. We both have that link now, thanks to you, and since I actually understand how to control it, I thought