Page 47 of Water Dragon
They were both speaking to their rapt onlookers.
“That is not true,” Malcolm shook his head. “The elemental magic is a gift bestowed upon the heads of our ancestors in order to keep the peace between the kingdoms.”
“You never were the brightest one, were you, Mal?” Ewan asked, Iona clenching her fists at the man’s insolence. “Your great kings of old saw a chance to brainwash the people into believing some mythos that they created around how they harnessed the power of nature to be used for their own purposes. It’s a lie, Malcolm. It’s all a lie. And the funny thing is that they began to believe in it themselves. They believed it to the point of making their heirs buy into it, which is why I don’t blame that dumb look on your face. You’re right, I don’t want to return the power to the people. I just don’t want it to be controlled by you. By your lineage. Or by yours,” he finished, moving his gaze to Ewan.
“All these years?” Ewan asked.
“All these years,” Leon confirmed.
“I don’t know who it is that has sold you on this lie,” Malcolm said. “But I know the truth. I’ve grown up with it. I’ve seen the power that the watermagic holds, and I have felt it. I feel it even now that you’ve bound it in my bloodstream. It’s there. If you think that unleashing this magic won’t cause suffering, then you’re wrong. Each House was charged with being their elemental magic’s Keeper. It has brought many blessings, but it’s also a grave responsibility. The Houses are aware of this. We’re raised to be aware of it, to accept it, and to acknowledge it. The truth of this can’t be undone by your stories of how the elemental magic has somehow been abused in the name of self-aggrandizement and greed. I know the truth of the watermagic because I will be its Keeper. Your cause is moot, Leon. Stop this now.”
“You arrogant water spawn,” Leon scoffed.
The earth that had been twirling softly through the air suddenly clumped together and went flying straight for Malcolm. In a breath, he turned and ran back to Iona. He grabbed her hand without even pausing and pulled her with him behind the tents. They had just reached cover when the clumps of earth went thumping against the canvas.
“We have to get to Maize,” Iona said. “Perhaps she has the counterspell.”
“Speak up, please,” Leon’s voice sounded. He was crossing the tiltyard, walking in Malcolm’s wake. Iona could tell from how his voice was louder with each step as he added, “I couldn’t quite hear that.”
Then, suddenly, the tent flew into the air, flipping over. It had been ripped from the ground; the poles that had been driven deep into the dirt to secure it dangling on the ropes attached to them. Iona reached for Malcolm, grabbing at his arm as Leon was once more in their line of sight. He approached them calmly.
“Howis he doing this?” Iona asked Malcolm.
Even though she knew he didn’t have a ready answer, she hoped he might have begun to form a working theory.
“Oh, as with most things in this life, it’s only a matter of will,” Leon replied casually.
But Iona’s eyes had caught on something that Leon might have missed. Her sword, laying where she had discarded it, the ripping away of the tent exposing it. She didn’t know what good it might do, but it seemed a better idea to have it on her person than to leave it. This conviction made her leave Malcolm’s side to take a handful of steps forward, getting herself positioned above the weapon, hiding it under her skirts. Leon couldn’t know what she was doing. He was too far away to have spotted the sword. She just needed to find some way of getting it into her hands.
Leon stopped at the edge of the tiltyard.
“My father loved you like his own,” Ewan said, stepping forward to meet him. “I’ve thought of you as a brother. But I cannot let you do this.”
Leon smiled then, looking as though he wondered exactly how Ewan proposed to stop him and, when Ewan moved his hand as though reaching for the earth the same way Leon was, nothing happened.
Ewan tried again, but the earthmagic did not respond.
Malcolm took a slight step forward.
Iona shifted her foot to try and get it under the sheathed blade of the sword.
“He’s bound you,” Malcolm said. “Just like he did me.”
Leon’s smile broadened.
“You didn’t think I’d reveal myself before I’d made sure the elemental magic was taken entirely out of commission, did you?”
Malcolm shook his head slowly.
“You cannot take it out of commission,” he said. “It moves and flows whether you want it to or not. You will only bring destruction by going against its very wishes, Leon. It wants to be used for the good of the many, not abused for the sake of the few.”
“Grand words,” Leon admitted. “There’s just this one thing I cannot reconcile myself with. It didn’t chooseyou, Malcolm. It chose your great-great-grandfather. You’re just rings on the water, not the stone that caused them.”
“What are you going to do about it?” Malcolm asked, but Leon merely sighed gently.
“If I told you, well, then that would ruin the surprise,” he replied. “First and foremost, though, I’m going to ask you very nicely to file into a line and head in the direction of the castle cells. I think you’ll find a few of them empty and waiting for you.”
Iona shifted her weight as surreptitiously as she could. If she could manage to slide the sword up one leg, she might be able to reach the pommel through her skirts and somehow…
