Page 21 of Queen of Legends and Lies
Icy fear crawls down my spine as a horrible thought dawns on me.
Is this somehow happening because of me?
Chapter Eight
Unease wraps a fist around my heart and squeezes.
What’s causing the chaos? Is this some new ploy of Xenon’s, of the drachen’s? A distraction? Is it somehow my fault…again?
I leap into the air, wings unfurling with a snap that ricochets off the high spires. With my wings out, my vision sharpens, allowing me to see things I might otherwise miss.
Below, beyond the imposing palace walls of Tirene, streets are ablaze.
Flames lick up facades, devour rooftops, and send plumes of black smoke to join the chaos above.
Inside the palace grounds, it’s no less dire.
Fire grips several outbuildings, tendrils of destruction reaching for the heart of my home.
I circle higher, wary eyes catching pockets of smoke mushrooming from the palace woods. The nightmarish scene sets my heart pounding, not from fear but from a deep-seated need to protect.
The water brigade is swift, already pumping streams onto the flames, assisting the water elementals who can conjure the lifesaving liquid at will.
Some of the homes are lost. Walls are already crumbling, bowing in to crush whatever or whoever’s still inside. My gut clenches with grief for those who called them a haven. All we can do now is stop the decimation.
As the flames rage in the southwestern woods, I drift closer to the fire paddock tucked safely within the central courtyard. Unlike the panicked shouts of the people, the dragons radiate calm.
Their serene faces tilt toward me, their wise eyes seeming to say,“This fire holds no power over us.”
Of course they’re not worried.
It takes more than flames to worry a dragon.
But their calm also leads me to believe no one snuck in to set these fires. They would have had to fly over the walls to do so. And the dragons would’ve noticed.
I spin away from the paddock. Right now, I’ve got a city to save and people looking to me for guidance.
Below, the woods bordering the palace grounds are shrouded in thick choking smoke. My eyes sting, not just from the acrid fumes, but from the devastating sight.
A sudden flash of light catches my attention.
Like a warning beacon, a lone tree ignites. The flames lick upward, hungry for the canopy. They destroy the leaves in mere seconds. The burning corpses fall into the unseen, where they’ll ignite more fires in the underbrush.
A figure bursts from the tree line, racing toward the people passing buckets hand to hand. “Looks like it was smoldering all night.” Soot and sweat coats the man’s face, but his garb marks him as a woodcutter, someone charged with thinning the woods on crown lands. “Then, poof, it just went up.”
I pivot in the air, ready to rally the guards, when my gaze snags on a strange sight. Water, where there should be none, pours along the paths of the courtyard.
Following the current, I spy the source.
The main well in the courtyard, once an unreliable source of fresh water, gushes over its ancient stony rim like a miniature waterfall. It’s spilling out, flooding the cobbles with careless abandon.
A palace guard flies up to me, yelling to be heard over the noise below. “Flooding on the west side. Looks like it has been for a while. The battlement walls might go!”
My heart stutters.
Water and fire, elements clashing with a force that could tear the very stones from beneath our feet. I glance over my shoulder at several guards awaiting orders.
“Spread out!” I point toward the palace. “Search for injured. Assist where you can!”
