Ashborn Chapter 10
Summoned to the Aerie, the Calderin family faces a deadly conspiracy designed to sacrifice them and destroy the Order from within.
Heads turned. A hush fell over the Great Hall. Despite the low volume, Kaelin’s voice had carried through the room.
Jessa’s mouth opened. Then closed. Her cheeks had gone pale.
“I...I didn’t realize,” she said finally, her voice thin and brittle. “No one told me...”
“Perhaps,” I bit, “you weren’t letting...” Kaelin put his hand on my arm, shaking his head.
“No one told you Dareya is my sister?” He said, his tone razor-sharp. “Or that you’ve spent the last several minutes tearing her down?”
“Oh, come on!” Jessa cried. “I was joking.”
“No, Jessa.” I was calm. “We all know that you weren’t. You’ve hated me and tried to have me kicked from the Order from the day the Crucible began.”
“You called her dragon - or was it her? - a consolation prize.” Tamsin’s voice was flat, her arms crossed around her baby, as if to shield her from the poison in the room.
Jessa had barely opened her mouth to respond when a junior steward stepped into the group, his face flushed from running.
“Tempered Calderin,” he said, breathless, but formal, holding out a sealed envelope, “you’ve received special dispensation to escort your family to the Aerie this afternoon.”
My mother looked at me, confused. “The Aerie?”
I nodded, heart pounding.
“Awesome! Cool! Dragons!” Sethus and Orin could barely contain their excitement. “Thanks for arranging this, Dareya! You are the absolute coolest big sister! In the world!”
This wasn’t normal. Civilians weren’t allowed anywhere near the Aerie. Certainly not in the middle of a lockdown.
“I didn’t request this.” I said carefully.
“I understand, Tempered.” The steward bowed. “The order came from the Command at the Citadel directly. I am to escort you and your family at the top of the hour.”
“Of course. We’ll be ready.”
“Oh, how lovely.” Jessa crooned as she slips her arm through Tamsin’s. “I will have to tag along of course. If Sorren is there, I’ll have to introduce him to my best friend. It will be a lovely outing.”
The steward was only a few steps away. He turned back to us. “It is not a group request. Calderin family only.”
“But I’m practically family!”
“You are not on the manifest,” said a voice behind me.
Warden Brielle stepped up to us, her expression neutral. “Tempered Dareya Calderin and her direct relatives. No others.”
“But I.”
“You have not been cleared for proximity access.” Her voice was smooth. “Besides, I doubt Sorren would vouch for your conduct today.”
“Well, I suppose I wouldn’t want to intrude,” she said, voice tight. “But do have fun and tell me all about it when you get back.”
The twins’ excitement had tempered a bit. Mother and father exchanged worried glances.
“Perhaps we should head to our lodgings and rest this afternoon.” Kaelin gently took Tamsin’s elbow to lead her out of the Great Hall. “Alira needs a feed soon and you both could use a nap. We’ll join you for dinner.”
Warden Brielle tilted her head slightly and shook it. “I’m sorry, but it is a summons and order, not a request for a social invitation.”
The meal service staff set our trays on the table where we were standing, and we sat down. Bread and a stew of roasted meat and root vegetables, probably left from yesterday’s supper. None of us had much of an appetite, stirring our steaming bowlfuls, but very rarely putting the spoons to our lips. A few of the other Riders in the room looked over at us with something that felt like jealousy. I knew they wanted to see their dragons just as much as I wanted to see Veyrakh. But this felt wrong.
The steward had returned. “Sergeant Major Calderin and Mrs. Calderin.” He addressed Father and Mother. “Lieutenant Calderin and Mrs. Calderin.” He addressed Kaelin and Tamsin. “Miss Calderin, and the Masters Calderin. Tempered Calderin.”
Father and Kaelin both looked up.
“The escort has arrived.” His voice was smooth. “Please follow me. The timetable is fixed.”
Orin leaned to me as we followed the steward from the Great Hall to be met with an armed detail of sixteen Soldiers with orders to escort us to the Aerie. Their dress uniforms were crisp. Weapons visible. “I’m not sure I want to go.” His whispered voice shook. I put my arm around his shoulder, pulling him closer to me. He didn’t pull away.
“Everything will be okay.” I lied. “The dragons will love you because you guys are my family and I love you.”
We crossed the parade field and entered the Aerie building. My family had been gently forced into a single file without us noticing. Four guards walked ahead of us in rows of two. Four guards behind us. The other eight guards walked on either side of us. Hemming us in. Their weapons trained on us. Not, I realized, dragon killing weapons. Boots hit the stone in perfect rhythm as we climbed the narrow stone staircase. This was the prisoner transfer formation. The dragons weren’t the threat. We were.
We reached the top of the final staircase. A place I’d been many times between the bonding ceremony and the day the restrictions were set in place.
Normally, the doors were open wide to the wind. To the sun. To the sky. Today, they were sealed. Locked from the outside.
The guards halted. Two stepped forward, each inserting a key into the panels on either side of the towering, farasite-reinforced doors. The keys turned in unison. Lines of runes glowed faintly across the metal’s surface. With a hiss of the ancient hydraulics, the great doors began to part. We stepped past the threshold as soon as the doors had opened just wide enough to walk through.
The Aerie was vast. Its ceiling was lost in mist and smoke. Ramps and ledges carved from a black stone spiraled towards the upper arches. Daylight filtered weakly through slitted skylights. Skylights which were usually open. Now sealed shut.
This place was built for freedom. Now, there was none.
Dragons were there. Not all of them, but enough. The ones who had been caught when the doors were shut. When the Aerie was sealed. Their scales shimmered in the low light, eyes glowing faintly as they watched us. No wingbeats. No rumbling breath. Just silence thick enough to choke on. Not resting. Waiting.
I turned back just as the last sliver of hallway disappeared behind the farasite edge. The doors sealed behind us with a slow, echoing groan, the locks tumbling back into place. None of the Soldiers who had escorted us had entered the Aerie. They weren’t supposed to come in. We weren’t to be coming back out. Alive.
The dragons remained still. Like statues. Not a twitch of a wing or tail. Beside me, Alira shifted in Tamsin’s arms. Then her face crumpled.
A soft whimper at first, then as though the weight of the room settled in her tiny new body, she let out a wail. Tamsin began to jiggle her, patting her, trying desperately to shush her as she warily eyed the blue-scaled dragon who had taken notice, tilting his head toward the newborn.
This could be the moment.
Tamsin leaned on Kaelin. Mother leaned on Father, gathering their three younger sons about them in their arms.
I stood back from my family, knowing that I led them to their deaths. I didn’t deserve to be in their embrace when the dragon fire roared through the room.
Will they be quick or toy with us to draw it out? Aim for the baby first or will we all burn together?
The dragon which had taken interest in Alira, who I now recognized as Catrin’s dragon, Maeryx, hadn’t moved. He blinked slowly as Alira’s cries bounced off the stone, echoing through the room.
I realized, then, that I had not counted the dragons. There were nooks in the stone. Hollows beneath the ramps. Perches lost in the smoke above.
We didn’t know how many dragons were there watching. Or where they were. Or what they were waiting for.
Then I noticed something. Something small but protected by a fireproof casing. A steady red light had just lit up.
A camera. Filming.
They weren’t here to stop a tragedy. They intended to sacrifice us and capture our deaths on film. To blame the dragons. To dismantle the Order.
The press release was probably already written.
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