Page 6 of To Claim a King

Good thing, too - she wouldn’t have liked the answer.

Xandrie stoked the fire, set the table, and threw together breakfast.Wonder what they’d do if I just up and quit?She knew the answer. They wouldn’t notice if it weren’t for the missed meals and ever-mounting piles of laundry. They’d sigh, shake their heads, then hire a maid. Probably pay her something, too. Not quite true. Talia would miss her, at least a little. She was so busy with her craft and magics and healing, she barely had time for herself, let alone Xandrie, but she knew her younger sister loved her.

Xandrie set about scouring the pots and pans and plates left over from the night before. She could imagine that asshole Darsen, spearing a hunk of dripping venison with his knife and devouring it in four gulps. He was classy like that. Her parents would have spent the night fawning over him, telling him how wonderful he was, how delighted they were that he favored Xandrie, how they looked forward to the “happy day.”

“Gag me with a dishrag,” she muttered disgustedly.

The dirty dishwater slopped over the side of the sink, soaking her shoes. Xandrie untied her apron, scanned the kitchen to make sure it was in decent enough shape, then high-tailed it back towards the wall and the place she felt most at home: the wild.

Though she’d only been gone a few hours, Claws greeted her with a deep, resonant purr that only deepened when she pulled a branch from the ground and took the stance her brother had taught her. “Strength comes from the inside,” Damion always said. “You see the strike, you become the strike.”

She didn’t know why, but she practiced when she could - perhaps she felt a little closer to her brother that way.

The tiger knew what was expected of him. Tail beating the air, Claws reared up and lunged at Xandrie, eager to train. Neither of them held back or played it safe. If she was to improve, she needed all sixty pounds of white tiger cub coming at her at full strength. They lunged and swiped, jabbed and spun, rolled and kicked and ran dizzying rings around the clearing they called home.

After an hour of sparring, the two of them lounged on the soft moss beneath a magnificent beech, whose branches spread wide above them, dappling them in sun and shade. Xandrie’s chest heaved and Claws’ tongue hung out of his mouth, the two of them happy and exhausted in equal measure.

In a split second, their bliss was cut short. The air around them crackled. The hairs stood up on Xandrie’s arms. Claws sniffed the air, his eyes wide and wild. Xandrie strode into the clearing and scanned the sky. She could see no clouds. It didn’t feel like an electrical storm. She had neverfeltthat energy before; it made her heart beat faster in her chest, and everything in her awakened, warmed over.

With the air still spitting and hissing all about them, Claws took off running. Xandrie called after him, but he didn’t so much as pause. Then a deer broke the tree line behind her. Then another. And another. There were deer, antelope, and wild horses, all of them in a stampede. She caught sight of a massive grey wolf, which would have explained the madness, were it not for the pine martins and lop-eared rabbits underfoot. Hawks, owls, and nuthatches swarmed overhead. Every bird and beast – whether hunter or prey, nocturnal or diurnal – fled Westward, though Xandrie had no clue as to why.

Westward. The oaths caught in her throat. To the west were chalk cliffs that plunged into a deep, jagged ravine. Claws was headed towards death. Xandrie pounded after her beloved cub. She couldn’t let anything happen to him. He was her friend, perhaps her only friend, pathetic as it was.

She turned a corner just as Claws’ injured leg gave out under him and watched in horror as he slid towards the cliff edge. She sent up an entreaty. “Not him. Please, not him.”

Claws tipped over the edge and was gone. Xandrie cried out in despair but as she neared the edge, she saw a tuft of white fur poking up over the lip of the cliff. She fell on her belly and crawled towards him. Claws was dangling over the canyon, held aloft only by his leg, which was wedged tight in a crevice.

“To me,” said Xandrie. “Come to me.”

Claws executed the world’s most perfect sit up, tensing his abdomen muscles to raise himself back over the cliff edge and away from certain death.

Xandrie grabbed hold of his forepaw, and managed to pull him up, using all her strength. Safe. He was safe.

She sighed in relief and just then, a large rock skittered down the cliff face, clattering and smashing on the rocks below, taking her with it.

She was airborne, tumbling and screaming, yet knowing there was no escaping her fate.

The last thing Xandrie saw before she blacked out was a red dragon.

Dragoness

“She’s not back yet?” Rhey repeated, confused.

It had been over a day since Demelza had left; he’d expected her to take an hour of freedom and head back to the palace, and she’d left for a day.

He’d given the order - his nobles all over the Kingdom, and their subjects, were to return to the Golden City, their fair Tenelar. Dragons were fond of space and as such, the royal city was large enough for all of the Farden folks to live there. For a time, they would. They’d be uncomfortable and crowded, but safe. As one of their walls - the largest one - had been breached, their lands would soon be crowded by goblins, and other scum. Until they got to the bottom of this, and found a mage powerful enough to rebuild their protection, he wanted his people safe within his walls.

And that certainly included Demelza.

Vincent, who’d volunteered his service as a guard now that he was free of his usual duties, took a step forward, and offered, “I saw her pass us by yesterday. She flew at high speed, heading for the Lakelands.”

Well, that didn’t make any sense.At all.

“Let’s give her a day.” He’d send her guard after her if she didn’t make it by the morrow. “Other than Elza, are we missing any nobles?”

The clerk shook his head. Everyone had made it safely.

Everyone, except his closest friend.

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