The trailing tail of sparks and light across his vision as the strike landed with a heavy thud finally clued him in to what it was he had seized up in his panic.

  The firestone, a hefty, fist-sized rock with a mercifully jagged edge, collided with the wolfish-face, still glowing a brilliant orange-white. It struck with something of a small explosion of fire, flames washing across the warg’s features like the flooding spread that followed the fall of a burning tree. The creature rocked under the combined force of the rock and outpour of heat, staggering to the side with a cracking scream, batting furiously at its ruined, smoking ear and eye with a paw. The moment he was free, Declan rolled sideways, not even thinking to drop the firestone, gaining his feet and preparing to launch himself in his opponent’s moment of vulnerability.

  Just as he was about to leap, he froze, finding there was no need.

  In the time he watched, the warg collapsed to the ground, limbs twitching, half its face so badly charred he could see the sheen of a blackened, cracking skull beneath now-absent flesh.

  “DECLAN! LEFT!”

  Ester’s shouted warning saved him. For a heartbeat he’d forgotten about the fight at hand, staring in horrified fascination at the convulsing form of the dying creature. Her shout brought him back in time to throw himself sideways, just avoiding being cleaved in two by the lunging blow of a heavy iron broadsword, half-eaten by rust and time. He scrambled to his feet, whirling on the wereyn only to find the fox-headed thing staggering into the wall, an arrow protruding from its temple. Others followed close behind, though, nearly a dozen who had pressed his side of the cavern when he’d been borne to the ground, and Declan hurled the firestone at them instinctively before lunging forward right behind it.

  The moment the rock escaped his grasp, he felt that odd, shivering warmth vanish from his hand, leaving it clammy and cold. It missed the foremost two of the rushing line, sailing through the pair, but struck a body behind them with a thunking impact and another eruption of light and heat. More flames washed out of it like pouring water, splashing across the unlucky beast to shower the two over its shoulders with what was almost liquid fire. Declan didn’t wait to see the outcome as the creatures started to howl in agony, rushing instead to meet the pair who’d been spared the torment. Only one of them was armed, and it was this one he angled for first, a bent, hunched form several inches taller than he, with a mountain-goat’s head protruding hideously from heavily muscled shoulders. It carried one of the Vigil’s longswords in one hand, but as it leapt with its partner its thick horns struck the low ceiling, cutting its momentum jarringly short. Sidestepping the suddenly lonesome lunge of the other—a boar-headed beast with striped fur running up its arms—Declan found himself between the two and didn’t give either time to recover.

  A flurry of spinning slashes shredded throat and exposed back respectively, cutting deep into the neck beneath the goat’s head and severing the spine of its shorter companion.

  They toppled, the larger of the pair sideways into the other firestones still piled atop each other nearby, scattering the glowing rocks and making the cavern dance with sudden, uneven light. Declan whirled to meet the rest, but found himself abruptly lacking in viable enemies. Ryn had carved through the last of his own opponents on the other side of the space, then leapt over the still-glowing lane of fire-blacked ground Bonner had burned down the middle of the group. The dragon was making quick work of the wereyn on Declan’s side, having taken them from behind, wielding his massive claymore in one hand with no more apparent effort than a child playing at swords with a stick. With terrifying ease he ripped a swath through the group, his form rusty, but oh-so-familiar.

  The dragon fought in the same style—with the same manners and balance—he had spent the last fifteen years instilling into Declan from the sidelines of his training.

  “Mother’s mercy,” Declan himself choked, watching the dragon finish the last of the beasts with a spinning lunge that ran the doe-headed wereyn at an upwards angle through the chest, lifting it clear off its hooves under the angled force of the blow.

  “Quite… Then again, we did tell you you had a knack for it.”

  Declan flinched and looked around. Bonner had moved to stand next to him, clearly worn by the power he’d drawn, but not in as a bad a shape as he’d shown after the battle with the drey. His eyes, however, were not on Ryn, but on something lower, closer to them, and Declan followed his gaze until a thrill of fascinated disgust shivered up his spine.

  The dragon, it turned out, had not had to finish off all his remaining opponents. In a crumpled, smoldering pile that reeked of burned flesh and blood, a trio of wereyn lay one atop the other, trembling and thrashing. Had they been able to scream, Declan rather thought they would have, but as it was their voices appeared to have been stolen away by the acrid smoke which rose, thick and unforgiving, from their open mouths and gaping, consuming wounds. The creatures writhed in cruel silence, clawing at their chests and the charred holes that splattered their torsos, growing wider with every second, eaten away in expanding, glowing rings like the slowly burning edge of a dead leaf. The first of them went still after a few more seconds, the greater part of its body devoured and empty, leaving only a cave of blackened ash where there should have been ribs and muscles and organs. The other two quit their movements not long after, their torment mercifully ending. As they died, the life of the fire consuming them seemed to disperse as well, the burning glow fading and winking out.

  Only then did Declan notice the firestone, fallen innocently to the floor before the dead, as cool and as plain as any of the other random rubble scattered about the space.

  “Let me see your hand! Your hand, Declan!”

  Ester had joined them, her bow slung haphazardly over one shoulder even as she’d leapt the charred lane. She was snatching at his left arm desperately—the one he’d swung the stone with—pulling it up so she could examine his fingers and palm. Feeling a terrible dread, Declan looked down himself.

  Seeing the damage, all he could do was blink.

  A scattered handful of mild blisters marked the skin, particularly around the tips of his fingers where he’d first grasped the stone, but that was the extent of it. It hurt, now that he had a moment to take in the pain, but was no more uncomfortable than the stinging aftermath of any other minor burn. Ester, at his side, was gaping at the unremarkable wounds, mouth agape and strands of hair falling across her bloody face from where they’d gotten loose of her plait in the fight. After several seconds she gave a gasping, cracking laugh of relief, and looked to her father.

  “Not wholly unexpected.” Bonner was peering over their shoulders to take in Declan’s hand himself with a nod, speaking like he was observing some mildly interesting phenomenon. “Resonance with the pyromancy, undoubtedly. Still very impressive regardless, of course.”

  Declan himself would have had no words to respond with even if he’d known what the mage was talking about. He was stupefied, staring at the blisters, unable to comprehend. The firestone had eaten away the flesh and bone of the warg and wereyn almost as easily as dragonfire. How had his hand survived, practically unscathed…?

  Is he injured?

  Ryn was approaching now, having finished wiping the broad length of his claymore on the fur of some of the beastmen he’d cut down. He picked his way through the bodies as best he could, worried eyes on Declan’s arm, still held in Ester’s grasp.

  “Hardly,” Bonner said with a snort, pressing his daughter aside gently and taking Declan by the wrist. Without so much as a word he drew a quick rune in the air over the blistered palm, and before their eyes the damage faded to nothing, leaving the calloused skin unblemished.

  Good, Ryn kept on, looking over their bloodied forms carefully. Anyone else? Ester?

  “A few scratches, but nothing that can’t wait.” Ester frowned at Declan’s other arm. “That’s a nasty bruise, though…”

  Declan’s eyes barely flicked to the purpling contusion beneath the wet crimson splattering the inside of his sword arm, just below the elbow, where the warg had pinned him to the floor with most of its weight. He was still dumbstruck, struggling to catch up to the casualness with which Bonner and Ryn were treating what had just happened.

  “I-I don’t understand,” he finally managed to get out, unable to look away from the now-healed skin of his left palm and fingers.

  The mage looked about ready to explain, but Ryn cut him off. Later, he said quickly, repeating it when Ester started to protest. No. Later. We have to be away from here. There’s not a small chance there are more of these bastards nearby, beyond my awareness. With a clawed foot he shoved the body of one of the fallen wereyn off the corpse of its brethren for emphasis. Even worse would be if the Vigil heard that fight. Too many questions to answer, with their own swords scattered about the place.

  Bonner grumbled something in annoyance, eyeing one of the soldier’s blades lying nearby, but Declan just nodded numbly. It was Ester’s touch, returning to his arm, more gently this time, that brought him back to his senses.

  “They’ll explain,” she promised him when he finally looked around at her. “I’ll make them tell you at knifepoint if I have to, but Ryn’s right for now. We need to leave, before anything else comes running.”

  Again, Declan could hardly do more than nod.

  He wasn’t much help as they broke camp, either. His right arm, it turned out, was likely fractured, and even after Bonner’s tending to it the limb ached badly enough that Ester had to help clean his sword and get his weapon belt on to sheath it. They gathered their things as quickly as they could and slung them over Ryn’s back, returned to his stallion’s form. With a wave of his hand Bonner dispelled the ice, the wall turning to water in a sudden torrent that fortunately flooded down into the woods more than it did into the cave. Once they were outside, Declan offered his good hand to help Ester drag the bodies of the scouts they’d slain under the overhang, guided by Ryn to find the warg he’d caught deeper in the woods. This done, the dragon led the two of them farther east, along the cliffside, leaving Bonner behind with assurances from the old man that he would catch up shortly. After they’d been walking for a minute or so there came a thunderous crack of breaking stone, followed at once by the raging cacophony of a thousand tons of falling earth. Even in the night they made out the massive cloud of dust billowing up into the sky as the outcropping came down in the distance, blotting out a portion of the stars far overhead. When the sounds of the avalanche settled, they waited, and it wasn't long before Bonner caught up to them, brushing his hands clean and smiling in an attempt to mask his fatigue.

  “Shall we?”

  Ryn, mercifully, didn’t press them for long. They kept off the High Road—with Vigil patrols about, the blood drying on their skin and clothing was too conspicuous for the main fairway even in the dark—moving instead through the trees for barely more than an hour. Declan suffered the throbs of his mostly-healed arm in a shared silence. None of them had the energy to talk, all weighed down by the heavy exhaustion of interrupted sleep and the toll of the battle. They settled, eventually, along the bank of a wide stream running south. Only the sticky chill of the mess they were in convinced them to bathe despite the early hour, Ester a little ways up the flow, Declan and Ryn within view of their things once the dragon had changed back. Bonner—his robes having kept him in his typically pristine condition—went off to gather dry wood. No one—not even Ryn—protested when he built them a small, genuine fire, very-much needing the more substantial heat of true flames once they hauled themselves out of the cool water. The mage dried their clothes with a word—new garments scrubbed clean as best they could with stones from the riverbed—but all the same the dampness clung to them, forcing Declan and Ester to once more sit huddled together, close as either dared to the burning branches. The wash had shaken much of their exhaustion, and Declan was finding it hard not to keep his mind from racing as he stared into the bright glow of the modest flame, barely noticing even the warmth of the half-elf’s arm on his.

  “Here, boy.”

  Declan looked up to see Bonner standing over him, holding out a hand. Resting in his palm, a single firestone waited, hardly more than a large pebble, and smoldering only a dull, languid red. All Declan could do for a long moment was stare at it, then look up at the old man, unsure.

  Bonner snorted before reaching out with his other hand to take Declan’s own. “It’s damn time you heard these answers, and you didn’t suffer more than a few blisters when I was pouring as much will into the rocks as I could manage. I hardly think this is likely to leave so much as a mark.”

  Then, ignoring Declan’s yelp of surprise, he pressed the stone between his fingers.

  As before, there was a fraction of pain, a jolt of uncomfortable heat, and then the sensation faded into a pleasant, tingling warmth that ran like dull needles over the scarred skin of his hand and forearm. Feeling this, Declan managed not to hurl the pebble away instinctively, though he couldn’t quite bring himself to curl his fingers around the thing when Bonner released it, leaving it with him. It felt pleasant, in his hands, like he was clutching a mug of hot drink. The mage stayed bent, peering at the firestone carefully, like he expected something interesting to happen. To Declan’s eyes, nothing changed. The pebble merely flickered a little, fading slightly before regaining its dull brightness.

  Apparently, however, this faintest sign of alteration was exactly what the old man was looking for, because he clapped his hands together like an excited schoolboy and gave a small “whoop” of delight.

  “Ryndean, have you seen this? An intuitive balance! You’re sure you haven’t taught him anything, even in passing?”

  The dragon, who’d been holding his clawed hands to the fire at Declan’s left, looked around. Catching sight of the stone, he too gave an impressed grunt before assuring the mage. Not a damn thing. How was I supposed to go about teaching him how to weave when I had my hands full enough not letting the world know what I was?

  Weave. That was a word Declan knew, and he clung to it. He stared at the glowing stone, feeling Ester’s eyes doing the same beside him, forcing himself to comprehend, to piece together Bonner and Ryn’s exchange.

  “Is… Is this magic?” he asked tentatively, unable to keep his heart from skipping a single beat at the thought.

  “Of a sort, yes.” Bonner scooted over so that he didn’t block the fire and sat with his back to the flames between Declan and Ryn. “It’s not of the kind I have mastery over, mind you, nor one you’re likely to find among any human or elf, outside your own line. Ordinarily, that stone would leave you with a nasty kind of burn, and the one you took command of in the cave should have scalded you to the bone, as it did the wereyn.”

  Declan reeled at this image, leaving Ester to voice the pressing question first.

  “What do you mean, ‘took command of’? Is that what he did? How? I’ve never heard of anything like that…”

  “Resonance,” Bonner said with a quaint nod, like this explained everything. Seeing their blank expressions, he sighed and elaborated. “Ryn’s said before Declan has an affinity for this sort of arcana.” He waved a hand at the firestone. “It used to be called ‘pyromancy’—fire magics—but such delegations of subject are doubtlessly long abandoned in this day and age. The important thing is that that affinity very likely offers him a natural connection with spells of this sort, allowing him to take control of the casting despite he himself not having produced it. Resonance.” He looked at Declan with excitement. “That King’s blood of yours is something, I must say…”

  There was a dense silence following this musing, Declan gaping at Bonner for several long seconds before managing to speak.

  “‘King’s blood’,” he repeated, astounded. “The Vigil adage?”

  It was Bonner’s turn to look at him blankly. Eventually the man turned to Ryn, obviously seeking to draw out an explanation, but the dragon addressed Declan instead.

  Are you thinking of The Woodsman’s Rest?

  Declan nodded, recalling the conversation he’d had with Brohn and Dia, the innkeepers. Ryn grumbled something dissatisfied under his breath, but before he could continue, Bonner cut in.

  “What does the Vigil have to do with bloodline?” he asked the dragon, distinctly perplexed.

  Nothing and less, Ryn muttered in answer, allowing his tail to slink over his clawed feet and bask in the heat. More warped history. Apparently ‘the blood of Kings’ is the rank-and-file’s term for describing anyone who survives something they shouldn’t. Bastardized it from how the al’Dyors have been viewed for so many generations.

  Bonner started to snort at this, but the sound died on his lips. “I suppose I can understand the confusion… They must appear a hardy line, with Elysia’s gifts in their veins for hundreds of years now…”

  Very hardy, Ryn affirmed. I can’t speak to any attempt on their lives succeeding, to my memory, save for a few who’ve married into the name. He looked at Declan now, meeting his eyes intently. To be of ‘King’s blood’ did not always mean what those innkeepers would have had you believe. They were only half in the right, and even that much credit I’m loath to give them. Time has a way of warping the truth, as you’ve been shown already. It’s no different, in this case, and barely a taste of the reason I kept you away from the army, when you were younger.

  “What does it mean then?” Declan asked with anticipation, feeling what might have been a throb of warmth from the stone, like the magic was responding to his excitement.

  Ryn took a moment to gather the words. To put it simply, it used to signify exactly what it spelled out, in a way. ‘King’s blood.’ ‘The blood of kings’. It had no more context, in the years before the Endless Queen, than any other way of saying that one was of royal lineage, some branch of the al’Dyors who ruled Viridian centuries even before Sehranya’s rise to power. He ignored Declan’s widening eyes. But after… it came to have a different understanding, at least for a time. It was the term used to describe only the most direct lines of royalty, the eldest descendants of Elysia al’Dyor, who claimed the crown some years after her father’s—Igoric’s—death. It meant one bearing the blessing and weight of the gifts granted by the primordial line of the dragons for their ancestor’s efforts in the war against the Endless Queen. Ryn took a breath, apparently needing to steel himself. But history forgets. It forgets that there were two siblings who proved themselves worthy in that conflict. Elysia, Crown Princess of Viridian, eldest daughter of the King, was only one. The other—