Dark Magic (The Chronicles of Arandal)

Chapter Nine


Bright sunlight woke Devon. Sitting up, she ran a shaky hand through her tangled hair, the little darts of pain, souvenirs from her escape the day before, helping to ground her.

As she looked around the hut, she remembered everything that had happened since she’d left the castle. It was like a dream. Too much for one day. But it was all true, and now she must continue her journey.

Or did she have choices she had never imagined?

She was free of her father’s power now. She could make her own decisions. And what if she was making the wrong one? She had read the book and thought she could seek help from the dragon. That was before she had met Galladar. What if she called him to her? Would he come back?

Then again, if he took her away she might be safe, but what about her people?

Devon leaned against the wall, trembling, her heart racing in her chest. Pressing her face into her hands, she struggled to cope with her roiling emotions.

She had felt so alone. So different from the daughter her father wanted. From all other women that she knew. The girls in town who had been her friends had never been her equal. Because she was the princess, she had always been a little apart from them and from the women of the court. Some of them envied her. But Lady Ellena and the other mature women treated her like a child too ignorant to know her place or learn her duties.

Trying to focus on physical necessities, she ate the porridge she found in the kettle at the fireplace, then drank water from a gourd hanging on the wall. Finally she searched through the clothing in the hut and took a loose shirt and britches that looked as if they belonged to a young man.

Outside, she checked the position of the sun before starting off, making her way through the forest. She encountered no living people, but the first time she walked into a hut and almost tripped over rotting bodies, she gagged and went running in the other direction.

She was more cautious after that, sniffing the air before she approached any dwellings. All of them were empty of living people. In some she found food. More porridge. Stale bread. Cheese. And deer meat that had been preserved.

She took some of the meat and cheese with her. When she found a water skin, she took that along, too.

The country grew rougher, more rocky, the slopes more pronounced. In the distance, she could see the northern mountains.

She continued on, keeping up her spirits by remembering the songs of her people. She didn’t sing them aloud, but she ran them through her head. Songs of love. Of battles. Of death. Of courage. And of the gods.

They comforted her and kept her mind occupied—except when she thought of Galladar. He had taught her the secrets of her womanhood. If anything could turn her from her purpose, it was him, but she struggled to put him out of her mind.

She traveled for three days, meeting no one, eating the food she had found in several huts and also a few sweet mountain berries that she found. She drank from clear mountain streams where the water was cold and pure. Sometimes she wished Galladar would appear and stop her. But he never came, and she pressed onward.

Other times she let her mind turn back to her parents and her brother. Grantland was no scholar, but if he survived, perhaps he would make a better king than her father.

When she let herself think about the monster, she almost lost her nerve, but somehow she kept walking into the mountains.

Gradually the trees grew shorter and more scraggly and the low vegetation more compact. The sun was dipping behind a tall peak when she came to a place where the ground was scorched and rocky. Beyond that was the mouth of a cave.

This must be the place she had read about.

Now she must make herself acceptable to the dragon.

She retraced her steps to a fast running stream she had crossed. Waiting until twilight, she pulled off her travel clothing and washed her body in the cold water, using a bit of soap she had brought along. Then she dried herself with the shirt.

When she was clean, she opened her bag again. With trembling hands, she took out the garment she had hidden in the lining. A thin white gown that Brinna had sewed for her wedding night.

She pulled it over her head, feeling the silky fabric cup her breasts. The waist was snug, with the skirt flaring out over her hips. She had seen herself in this gown. She knew her nipples showed indecently through the cups of the bodice. And the skirt did nothing to hide the golden triangle of hair at the top of her legs. Only her husband and her serving women should see her like this, but here she was, out in the open air.

She reminded herself that Galladar had seen her with less. He had seen her naked. Although she squeezed her eyes shut, willing herself to banish him from her mind, she couldn’t forget him. He had brought her pleasure beyond her imagining, and she had given that up—because she must.

Next she took out the gold chain with the Arandal crest of a laurel branch and a sword worked onto a flat disk. Quickly she slipped the token around her neck, so that the crest lay flat against her chest.

Would she please the monster?

Would he accept her as a sacrifice?

She wasn’t going to cut her own flesh with a knife. But she knew how to do something similar.

Her heart pounding wildly inside her chest, she went back to the scorched earth and continued on to an open field where the rocks were small and sharply pointed, covering the ground like a treacherous carpet.

Her hands were trembling as she unbuckled the straps of her sandals and tossed them away.

Teeth clenched, she took a tentative step onto the shifting surface.

A sharp rock dug into her sole, but she took another step, and another, ignoring the pain. She was halfway across the terrible field when a voice stopped her in her tracks.

“Who dares approach this place?”

She looked up and saw a man standing rigidly at the opposite side of the rocks, about twenty yards away, his back to a mountain cliff.

He was tall, with dark hair and dark eyes fixed on her like a hawk watching a rabbit. He wore black leggings and a black shirt open at the neck.

It was Galladar.

Shock rolled over her, but she managed to ask, “What are you doing here? Where is Cragor, the dragon?”

“I killed him,” he said in a flat voice.

“No,” she gasped.