Page 2 of A Matter of Dragons

She stared at me just long enough to assess that I was not joking.

“Stars save us,” she muttered. “His hatching prophecy must have been to drive the women in his family mad.”

“I’ve heard worse,” I replied. “Much worse.”

Her gaze snapped back to me, her eyes burning. “Your hatching prophecy is perfectly honorable.”

I rolled my eyes. I was not about to have another argument over my thrice-cursed idiotic hatching prophecy.

“Is that why you’re here?” I asked.

Mother shook her head briskly and dusted non-existent crumbs off her lap. “No, actually. I’ve finally admitted to myself that I’ll never convince my only hatchling to flap his wings outside this sad little town. You’re like a clam stuck fast in his shell.”

I made a noncommittal grunt. After waiting nearly a hundred years for my mother to stop playing matchmaker for me and my terrible prophecy, this sudden victory felt strangely hollow. I’d thought I’d be having this battle with her for the rest of my life. Honestly, I wasn’t too sure how I’d manage our awkward and infrequent social visits without that constant struggle over my disappointing prophecy. And my disappointing life.

Mother leaned forward and lowered her voice. Then, oddly, she switched to Draconic, as if she weren’t completely certain one of my human or dwarven neighbors didn’t have their greasy ear pressed to the doors.

“I’m worried about Lord Donovan,” she said.

“What?” I said.

“Donovan of Valgros.”

“I know who Donovan is.” I set my teacup down on the table beside me. “He doesn’t go by Lord anymore. He declared himself king two decades ago.”

Mother waved her hands as if the change of title were meaningless. And to us, it was. Valgros was a tiny, nowhere kingdom on a set of miserable rocky islands in the northern seas; Donovan had basically declared himself king of nothing mountain.

“Why in the blessed Mothers’ names are you worried about Valgros?” I asked.

She glanced over her shoulder. Odd. I’d rarely seen my mother this disquieted about anything. She was a black dragon, after all, and there are not many things beneath these blue skies that can threaten a black dragon.

“You heard what he did to the elves?” she whispered.

I nodded; the three cookies I’d eaten before she’d arrived leaped over themselves in my gut. I’d made a hobby of chronicling the history of the human world for the past century. Even after writing about so much bloodshed and betrayal, the reports that came out of Valgros were still notably gruesome. Even the children had been slaughtered. I shivered.

“It’s spreading,” she continued. “The dwarves are gone now too. And Valgros is twice the size it was a generation ago.”

I frowned. That was probably all true. I’d spent a night a few months back drinking with a dwarf whose family had left those parts in the hold of a smuggler’s ship; if half of what he’d told me was true, Valgros really was the most miserable fiefdom on the continent. Apparently, Valgros had now spread that misery to all the neighboring islands, and even a few luckless stretches of the northern coast.

“But Donovan’s an idiot,” I said, repeating the assessment I’d been told by at least a dozen sources.

“Exactly.”

Mother took a cookie and settled back in her chair, waiting for me to put the pieces together. And, eventually, I did.

“If Donovan’s an idiot,” I said, “how is his kingdom still expanding?”

She nodded, giving me a tight-lipped smile. I picked up my teacup and drained the last of my now-cool hibiscus tea.

“But, that still doesn’t explain why you’re interested. Valgros is nowhere. Unless you’ve suddenly become fascinated by fishing and wool exports, why do you care what happens up there?”

Mother looked down at her teacup, strangely still and silent. I had the odd sense that she was deliberating whether or not to share something with me. Finally, she shook her head, sending her long, auburn hair cascading over her narrow shoulders.

“Call me crazy,” she said, “but Rensivar’s body was never found.”

I choked, spraying tea down the front of my shirt. Mother glared at me.

“Sorry,” I coughed, wiping tea off my chin. “Sorry, but, really? Rensivar?”