Page 85 of A City of Flames

“Why are we here?” I repeat, sharper and with no cowardice.

The queen simply smiles, pulling on the lever. “To see where your loyalties still stand. The Golden Thief or me?”

My head turns to the creak of iron gates as they drag up and there at the end, resting through the dimness is a dragon, rattling in chains. It doesn’t take me even a minute to recognize it’s the one from my village and the one I’d so desperately wanted to win in the first arena fight I’d attended.

As if she remembers me, the dragon’s head lifts. Soft vibrations rumble the cracked grounds and I crane my neck, gazing at the thick horns just starting to grow on her.

I return my gaze to Sarilyn and say, “I have no loyalties to the Golden Thief.”

“Prove it,” she practically whispers in a taunt as her gaze travels down to my sheath strap and the few daggers I’d placed early this morning.

Hesitant, I look to my left where the dragon cocks her head, a purr emitting from her snout. Knowing what the queen is implying causes my chest to heave and my throat to close as if being choked. “It’s just a fledgling.” A painful plea in my words as I turn back to the queen.

Her stare is cold, ruthless, not the one I’d seen when she’d smiled and laughed during the dinner we’d had. “As a venator you’ll be expected to hunt as far as hatchlings.”

A horrid sickness twists in my gut, rising to my mouth and I swallow at the thought.

“Oh, come on Naralía,” she huffs out, like I’m a child needing guidance. “Is this not the dragon from your village?”

I can just about move my head to indicate any form of nod.

“Then kill it,” she orders.

I step back with quivering legs; I’m surprised to still be standing. “I can’t.” Before I could have, I’ve killed, even shifters but this? Everything? It’s all changing for me with each rising morning I wake up in Emberwell. “I—I can’t.”

Sarilyn grips my wrist as she raises it and grabs the blade from my sheath. Forcing it into my palm she says in a controlled calm tone, “Kill it or you leave me no choice but to set forth a punishment.”

My breathing pants out from my nose as I stare at her. Chains rattle in the background but I don’t dare look at the dragon as she snarls. An act I consider protective. “Then punish me,” I say through clenched teeth, startling the queen.

Silence stills if not for the distant cries from prisoners, yells of them taunting each other. And then the queen releases my wrist, a slow smirk creeps upon her gold-flaked lips. “And what would your brothers think of that?”

I clutch onto the dagger. My brothers. She’s using them against me, knowing how much I love, care, would do anything for the three. My mouth is incapable of forming any words and her smile sharpens.

She walks around me, her gown scraping over the rocks. “So let me ask you again, Naralía.” Stopping behind me, her curls brush past my cheek as she says in that same provoking whisper, “The Golden Thief or me?”

Staring at the blade, I curl my fingers around the handle and then glance up at the dragon. Fetters are at her hindlegs and front, but the bonds around her snout prevent any use of power. She’s defenseless... young.

So young.

When I look over my shoulder at the queen, I want to say no again, to disagree and run from this but her shrewd observation reminds me of her threatening words against my brothers.

I can hardly note how my legs start moving on that thought, how high above me the light from the arena filters through iron bars. But the dragon’s murmurs deepen as I close in on her and only shadows from the dungeon shield us.

Once I’d stood in front of her like this and she’d yielded before me. Now it’s the same. Her wings tuck in tight behind her and serpent eyes glisten in fire as she studies me, my blade, and the way it trembles in my grasp.

Maybe she knows. She’s not thrashing around or trying to get as far away with the little movement the chains offer her. She’s just... staring at me. A soft exhale from her nostrils blows tendrils of my hair and a strong need takes me over as I extend my hand towards the scales on her underbelly, growing and fragile, easy for anyone to stab through. The dragon’s head bows, as I spread each finger along the leathery touch. Like armor it shines when she moves and as my hand travels to where her heart is, I raise my head to gaze into her eyes.

Understanding transmits as if a thrumming connection waves through the two of us, it’s foreign, indescribable but above all... powerful?

She does know. Not maybe, not wondering, not a possibility for it to be otherwise. And the worst is how her eyes tell me that she accepts it.

“I’m sorry,” my whisper is so low that I don’t think the dragon can hear me.

I lift the blade, steel blazes under my palm and she cocks her head to the side, the chain denting into the scales of her skin.

“Forgive me.” I register how in this moment, I want to escape, take my brothers, and see what else there is in this world.

The dragon thrums soothingly, a sound so many would run from, to me it’s what I imagine peace as.

---