Stephen Deas - The King of the Crags

'You have a fever again. I have told the others to rest for today and so will you.'

Semian lay back on his bed. 'You were right. Everything happened as you promised us it would. No one saw us until we reached the palace. The Adamantine Men were slow and half asleep. It was as though they didn't see us until we were already past them.'

Kithyr nodded. 'Blood has power.'

Blood-magic was wrong. Wicked and evil. Or at least so he'd always thought. Before the Great Flame had spoken to him, Semian wouldn't have suffered a blood-mage to live. Queen Shezira had outlawed them, as had many other kings. He'd even seen blood-magic once, wielded by an alchemist. Watching had made him queasy and uncomfortable. Yet that alchemist had been a servant of the Order, and the Order in its own way served the Great Flame. He knew better now. Kithyr had shown him. The men who'd first tamed the dragons, the very first alchemists, they had been blood-mages too. Blood and fire ran together.

'Let me dress your wound again.' Kithyr helped him to sit up and started to unwrap the bandages on Semian's leg. Semian almost pushed him away but relented at the last moment. The magician, it seemed, knew a great deal about dressing wounds.

'It's painful this morning.'

The mage nodded. 'It is festering and needs to bleed. I will suck out the corruption and dress it again.'

Semian rubbed his eyes. He felt weary and lethargic. 'It's getting worse. I don't even remember how I got it.'

'It is not a deep wound but it is long and ragged and the flesh is torn. It was a sell-sword's blade that cut you – a fool, coming to a fight with a dull edge on his blade.'

'I don't remember it.'

'You fought with fury. We won. They died. Yours was the only wound we took. What else is there to remember?'

Semian stretched his shoulders and fought against the growing fuzz in his head. Kithyr had the dressings open now. His leg throbbed and the air smelled rotten. 'A man should remember every wound and the person who gives it to him. You never know which one might kill you.'

Kithyr snorted. 'The sell-swords are all dead and I doubt this wound will be your last.'

'Are you sure? I can smell the air. The wound has gone bad.'

'It's been going bad for some time, Rider, but it will not kill you. While I am with you, no wound will kill you. Now hold your tongue. I have to cut the corruption away. This is going to hurt.'

'I know. I am not afraid of the pain, Blood-Mage.' He closed his eyes. His belly filled with anticipation; the pain, when it came, transcended all his expectations. The world he knew fell away and he found himself engulfed in ice so cold that it burned. He was back in the valley of ash-covered stone, with the crimson dragon that dwarfed even the Worldspine. With the dragon-priest with his pale skin and his white hair and his long bloody robes, holding out the blackened stumps of his hands.

Yes, said the priest. Yes. It is a start, a beginning, nothing more, but it is good. You have done well.

He tried to talk to the priest, to ask him what he meant, but even as he opened his mouth the great crimson dragon lifted a wing and slowly blocked out the sun. The sky went dark, the moon turned black and the world followed and Semian's head filled with the roar of rushing water.

When he opened his eyes again he was lying on his back, looking up at the roof of his tent. His leg was agony. Kithyr was bandaging it up.

'I had a vision,' Semian said.

Tm not surprised.' The mage sounded as though he didn't much care for visions. 'You were right. The wound is getting worse. I had to drain a lot a pus out of it. I've done the best I can. It will heal now, but you'll be weak and tired for a while.'

'The Great Flame will fill me with its strength.'

'Yes.' Kithyr stood up and nodded. 'It will. It will fill us all. You may need to lean on someone to walk for a while. You can still ride though, so all is well.'

Semian tried to get up, but the pain in his leg simply wouldn't allow it. 'Yes.' He winced. 'All is well.'

'The last of your Red Riders came back in the early light of the morning. They brought better news.'

'Yes?' The riders he'd sent to the further eyries. 'Did they burn?'

'Yes. They burned. The speaker's eastern eyries are reduced to ash. Narammed's Bridge as well.'

'Great Flame be praised!' Semian sank back to the ground. Those eyries weren't much more than fields and huts – there probably weren't even any soldiers there – but none of that mattered. His vision had been true. The kings of the east and the south would come to the speaker's call. Where they stopped to rest their limbs and feed their mounts they would find nothing but destruction. They would see her weakness.

He felt dizzy. He closed his eyes again and reached out. The mage took his hand and held it tight.

'I must leave you soon. You know that, don't you? The Great Flame calls me to a different destiny.'

'I understand.'

'We all serve the Flame in our own ways. I have done what I can for you. Semian, you must listen to the words of the Great Flame. It will speak to you in fire, but also in blood. When blood comes to you, you must heed it.'

Semian screwed up his face. 'I don't understand.'

'But you will. I'll have to bleed you again,' the magician said.

'If you must, but I cannot stay here. We have struck a blow, Kithyr, and many more must follow. It is a start, a beginning, nothing more.'

The world was getting hazy and starting to spin. The mage squeezed his hand. 'Yes it is. But it is good. You have done well.'

As Rider Semian slipped away into unconsciousness once more, the blood-mage let his hand fall. He smiled. 'You did not light the fires,' he whispered, 'but you will fan their flames into an inferno that cannot be extinguished.'

Jehal took a deep breath, sighed, and sat down in the middle of the floor to see whether anyone would even notice. He'd been in Furymouth for two weeks and he was pacing his palace like an animal in a cage.

Why can't I be content? The coffers in his treasury were full. His city prospered and his dragons were strong. Cousin Iskan was steering himself comfortably towards a marriage alliance with one of King Silvallan's brood. Furymouth was easy. A king could put his feet up here, indulge himself and watch the realm largely rule itself. If that wasn't enough, Lystra was carrying his heir inside her and yet was still as eager and soft to touch as ever. So why can't I be content? Why can't I be happy?

Approaching footsteps stopped behind him. Even from the sound of them, Jehal knew exactly whose they were. His uncle. Meteroa.

'Are you unwell, Your Highness? Or simply meditating? Please don't tell me you've gone mad. This family has had quite enough of that sort of thing.'

'No, Eyrie-Master, I am trying not to be restless.'

'And have traded that for disturbing your subjects with odd behaviour?'

'Zafir is hurling us all towards a war. I've been trying not to think about it but it's not really working. She wasn't listening to me. I thought it might be better if I wasn't there to see it happening any more. No more hammering my head against the stone walls of st upidity that most of the Speaker's Council seemed to have erected around themselves.' Jeiros was far too clever not to see what was coming but he was powerless to do anything about it. Jehal was fairly sure that the Night Watchman, Tassan, could see it too. The man was shrewd lor a commander of the Adamantine Guard. But the rest of them… The rest of them simply refused to see it. He smirked to himself. Maybe that's because the rest of them haven't met Princess Jaslynfor long enough. He lazily stood up and turned around. 'Not being there, I have discovered, is considerably worse. I lie awake at night and think of a hundred and one things that Zafir might do, and none of them are ever good. I find myself convinced that Zafir will turn everything we achieved to ruin. I ought to go back.' Why, though? Can't I leave them be? Can't I let Zafir drown in her own stupidity? He took a deep breath and growled, 'I am bored here, Uncle. This realm runs itself too well.'