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Her lips compressed, but she nodded.
Then her eyes flew wide, and she twisted in the saddle with a gasp, so she faced the burned-out farm.
Farther down the road, Connor and Reginald and their retinues pulled up, dust puffing, then settling, streaming back on the breeze toward them, carrying the strong smell of charcoal…and something else. Something Leif hadn’t detected before, thanks to the stink of ruin, but which he breathed in deeply, now, and growled in response.
The scent of humans. Several. And something else, something almost like magic, but different, undercut with lavender; a scent that set all his nerves crackling, and his nails morphing to dark claws.
Ragnar growled, too, sinking down low in his knees, a half-crouch, ready for a shift he couldn’t manage with his torq.
Something stirred in the long grass, and Leif strode forward and around the horse, putting himself between Amelia and whatever moved there, on the side of the road. He let his wolf press up close to his skin, skin which rippled with goosebumps, his shift a mere thought away. He let his growl build, louder, deeper, rolling off his tongue like thunder.
“Leif,” Amelia said behind him, more command than caution, but he kept moving.
The grass rustled, swayed, and parted. A little girl with white-blonde hair stepped out of the verge, and into the road, between Leif and the two lords ahead.
Leif choked back his growl.
Lord Connor reined his horse around, confusion clear on his face even from a distance.
Reginald swung out of the saddle and approached the girl; pulled a glove off his right hand and offered it forward as he walked. “Hello, there,” he said, soft voice, soft smile.
She was a tiny slip of a thing, in a ragged, dirty dress that ended in tatters at her knees, legs, and ankles, and dirty bare feet visible, the soles caked in old, dried mud. Her hair was tangled, and her nose was running, and despite the heat of the sun, the breeze had raised goosebumps on her bare arms.
Leif had goosebumps, too, but not from the cold. His wolf was spinning in internal circles, teeth bared, bristling with alarm. Something was wrong. Something was–
Overhead, Alpha shrieked.
Amelia shouted, “Reggie, no! Get back, get back!”
Reginald pulled up, hand still outstretched, brows snapping together. “It’s only a child!” he shouted back.
The drake’s shadow fell over them.
And the girl exploded.
~*~
Alpha was confused, and the images he pushed through their bond into Amelia’s mind were a jumble of color, and sound, andthreat, threat, threat, bad, danger, fight!A bombardment of aggression and fear and instinct so powerful she had to grip Shadow’s mane to keep from bending beneath the weight of it. She closed her eyes a moment, and tried to concentrate of what Alpha was trying to communicate, even as he shrieked overhead. Leif and Ragnar were growling in their wolf voices, and men behind them were shouting inquiries about why they had stopped. Too much noise, too much distraction.
Amelia took a deep breath, and opened her mind fully to Alpha; let him come flooding through every barrier, until her mind was his, and his surge of adrenaline and anger and fear boiled to life inside her, quickening her pulse, stuttering her breath.
She saw a field from above, hazy at the edges, tinted and gapped and full of holes. A memory, corroded by time. A field of fire. Drakes wheeling and diving, and breathing red-gold flames. Other drakes, too, of gleaming amethyst, and deep purple, great gouts of liquid, green heat pouring from their mouths, spilling down onto soldiers in soiled plate and mail. Men screamed, men died. Huge, lumbering gray beasts charged across the burned grass, some of them bearing siege towers and palanquins that smoked from stray dragon fire. Elephants. They screamed and trumpeted, and the drakes screamed, as purple clashed with black.
The scene tilted, wind rushed against her face, and she, too, realized she was mounted. That she was perched astride a drake. She shifted her gaze, and saw his sleek black neck, its spines, his pointed head, and sharp horns. He cocked his head, and she glimpsed a familiar red-gold eye, framed by the leatherwork of his bridle.
Alpha. It was Alpha.
She glanced down at herself, and saw silver armor, thick gauntlets with spiked backs, the edge of a green surcoat: the original Drake coat of arms. She pressed a hand to her chest – her flat chest – and marveled.
Alpha had had a rider before. Long, long ago. A man. Herancestor.
Alpha tucked his head, and dove. Down, down, down, the wind rushing in her ears, the battle rushing up to meet them. Their target was a lone man, dressed in purple robes, rather than armor, a hood shielding his head and face. A shaman. All alone, and unarmed, his bare hands held aloft.
Amelia leaned low over Alpha’s neck, and a voice that wasn’t hers, but her ancestor’s, said, “Go! Go! Kill him!” She drew the sword strapped to her back, and gathered herself, ready to leap to the ground and make short work of the shaman with her sword should Alpha’s fire assault fail.
Even as he dove, Alpha’s ribs expanded: the great breath needed to propel his fire down in a killing jet.
Closer, closer, closer…
