I tried not to imagine a dragon.
Some miles later Vaelith fell back so she was riding beside us. “You holding up, Crane?”
“I’m holding up.”
“You’re quieter than I have ever heard you.”
“I’m conserving my screams for the dragon.”
She barked a laugh, reaching over to slap me on the back so hard that I pitched forward. “That’s the spirit. The troll Moerrven wouldn’t have sent a missive if Sky had been eaten. And if thedragon had eaten him, there would be no reason for anyone to summon the Grey Guard.”
I tilted my head and thought about that. “You know what? That’s actually helpful, thank you.”
“I’m a giver.” She shot me a cheeky grin, then kicked her horse forward and rejoined her wife at the head of the column.
By mid-afternoon I was exhausted, and I had no idea how the rest of them looked so relaxed. After years of dance, I considered myself in excellent shape, but I had nothing on these soldiers, and I started to nod off. Aeldryc noticed right away.
I pulled Periwinkle to a stop for a moment, as Aeldryc hauled me up into his lap, looping Periwinkle’s lead to a ring on Bram’s saddle. The familiar fit of my back against his chest, his arm around my waist was so absurdly comforting that I almost cried.
“Don’t get used to it,” I muttered into his shoulder. “I’m still riding tomorrow.”
“I would not dream of underestimating you. But my lap is here should you ever need it, husband.”
“Don’t think I didn’t hear that,” Vaelith called back.
“Mm.” I closed my eyes. The world rocked gently with Bram’s stride. Somewhere ahead, Vaelith was telling Ilyndra a story Icouldn’t hear the words of, just the cadence. I was asleep before the next mile.
I didn’t wake until the constant steady pounding of hooves came to a stop.
“Pip.” Aeldryc’s voice was close to my ear, warm with amusement. “We have arrived.”
I cracked an eye. We were in a town. It was bigger than Sorrend, smaller than Feravael, with stone buildings with steep slate roofs climbing up a hillside. Mountains rose behind it in granite sheets. The air smelled of cold rivers and woodsmoke. A market square spread in front of us, busy with afternoon trade.
I rubbed my face. “Where are we?”
“Stonedeep proper. The seat of the county.”
“Did I sleep the whole way?”
“I suppose you needed it.”
I straightened up and looked around. The Grey Guard had dismounted. Ilyndra was speaking with a troll who appeared to be some kind of official. Vaelith was leaning on her saddle, watching the square with the alert disinterest of a woman who had been a soldier for three centuries and was professionally bored.
“PIP!”
I knew that voice. I had known that voice since I was fifteen.
I was off Bram before I’d processed how. My boots hit the cobblestones and I turned, and there, sprinting across the market square in what appeared to be a borrowed troll-sized tunic belted with a leather cord, hair longer than I remembered, eyes wider than the sun, was Sky.
He was uninjured. So uninjured that one might even say he was glowing.
He hit me in the chest at full speed and we both went down on the cobblestones in a tangle of limbs and curses. He was laughing. I was crying.
“You’re alive.”
“Of course I’m alive.”
“You were KIDNAPPED. BY A DRAGON.”
