The Warrior Princess of Pennyroyal Academy Page 21

  “Did I say unicorns were dumb?” said Forbes. “That seems quite sensible to me.”

  She studied the cave. “Wait here. Let me talk to them first.”

  He nodded, his eyes wide. He was jumpy and scared. With him so tightly wound, Evie was worried what might happen if her sister happened to recognize him as one of the dragonslayers who had tried to kill her in the first year. Things could go . . . badly.

  She walked along the stones toward the teeth of the cave. Inside the darkened cavern, echoes turned the gurgling water into a soft rush. The main chamber was empty. Cold and empty. It was an enormous cathedral of water-smoothed stone. Moss grew up the sides of the walls and across the ceiling. There were no signs of dragon life.

  As she continued through the home where she had lived most of her life, the surreal feeling sharpened. She’d only been gone since last summer, but it felt like a lifetime ago, the cave a foreign country. She passed through the main chamber and followed the slope into the rear chamber, where she and her sister had once slept side by side on a stone ledge. Despite being smaller than the first, it was still an enormous chamber of stalactites and walls pocked with veins of shimmering, multicolored mineral deposits. And it, too, was empty.

  Evie sighed with some measure of relief. Of course she’d hoped they’d be there so she could go about the business of trying to persuade them to help. But their not being there meant she could put off explaining why she’d run away for just a bit longer. She walked through the chamber, the room where she’d perched every night since the dragons had taken her the day King Callahan had died. She had become who she now was in this cave. She had learned how to live, who to be, amidst these dripping rocks and mossy walls. In spite of her fears, this was and always would be her home.

  She noticed something in a pile of stones near the wall. It was difficult to make out in the near darkness of the cave, but she recognized the shape. She pulled it free from the pile. It was a doll lashed together from sticks and bark. She had made it for her sister’s birthday many years ago. The shape was crude—two legs, two arms, a head, and a body—but it had been a controversial item ever since the day she’d made it. She remembered an argument it had caused between her parents. She hadn’t known then why a simple doll should lead to such strife, but now it was clear. Evie had made a human doll, based on her own shape and not that of the rest of her family. She hugged it close and thought of her sister’s face when she had first given it to her. She hadn’t cared in the least what the doll had looked like. She had wept, moved by Evie’s thoughtfulness. It had been her parents who had struggled with the meaning of the doll’s figure.

  A tear fell from her eye. Everything had such meaning now. It was as though that old Evie, the one who had eaten crispy goblin with dragons and sung songs with dragons and slept beneath the wings of dragons, had become nothing more than a memory. This was home, of course. But would the new Evie ever truly feel at home? Or would she—

  The deafening roar of a dragon echoed through the cave. She fell to her knees, dropping the doll to cover her ears. After the shock had passed, she realized what was happening.

  “Forbes!” She scrambled to her feet as another primal roar nearly buckled her knees again. She bounded through the main cavern, sending up splashes of water. Brilliant light lit up the cave as flames erupted outside. She could just make out a human voice amidst the crashing booms of the rampaging dragon.

  “No!” she screamed. “Wait!”

  She burst out into the night. Forbes was on his back, his sword lying nearby. Above him, a dragon towered sixty feet in the air. Her mouth was wide, her eyes filled with ancient rage.

  “Sister!” shouted Evie.

  The dragon’s head swooped down toward Forbes but stopped short. Her fangs, shimmering with saliva, were only a few feet from piercing Forbes end to end. She turned her reptilian head to Evie. And in the hot glow of fire, there was recognition.

  “Sister?” said the dragon in a scorched grumble.

  Now another dragon floated down from the black sky and landed with a thundering crash behind the other.

  “Mother!” shouted Evie. “MOTHER!”

  She scrambled across the stone and clung to her mother’s talon as tightly as she could. She had spent her childhood hugging her mother in this way. Any time she had been hurt roughhousing with her sister or gotten into a row with her father, she had run to her mother and embraced her talon. And all her life, it had never felt entirely satisfying. Now that she knew what she really was, and how naturally humans were made to embrace one another, she understood why she’d never been able to hug her mother closely enough.

  “Daughter,” rumbled her mother. “Is it really you?” She studied Evie with wide, black eyes. “We thought we’d never see you again!”

  “I’m sorry, Mother. I shouldn’t have run away last summer. I didn’t mean to frighten you . . .”

  Her eyes fluttered open as she heard the whoosh of beating wings pushing down a blast of wind. A third black shadow spiraled in the sky above. It pounded its great wings as it whirled round and round, then thundered to the ground and turned to face her.

  Evie stood and stared, her mouth hanging open, unable to comprehend what was standing right in front of her.

  One of this dragon’s horns was broken away. His scales had gone even whiter around the belly and mouth. And his eyes, as deep and black as a mountain lake under a moonless sky, looked down at her with utter shock.

  “Daughter?”

  HE WAS REAL. The grooves of his claw pressed against her face. It only made her squeeze harder. “Daddy! Daddy! Oh, Daddy!”

  He lowered his enormous head, brushing his snout against her back. “Where have you been?” he growled. “Mother expected you days ago.”

  “Where have you been?” She looked up into his eyes. Her face was red, covered in a sheet of tears. “Oh, I can’t believe it!” She lunged at his claw and held it so tightly, the muscles in her arms began to burn. “I thought you were dead!”

  “Dead? The Fates themselves couldn’t kill me!” He rested his head on the ground. She climbed up his face until she could see herself reflected in his huge black eye. Somehow, she did still look like the little girl he had raised. Yet she also looked like a strong, confident princess. So much had happened since she’d seen him last. “How I missed you, my daughter. Not a day passed that I didn’t wonder where you were.”

  “And I you. Oh, Daddy! I just can’t believe it!” She collapsed onto his cheekbone, even more tears pouring out of her. She felt as though she’d been living in a horrible drought and had somehow managed to adjust to the new conditions—not a happy existence, but a manageable one—and now the heavens had opened up again. She was nourished in a way she hadn’t been since he’d disappeared nearly two years earlier.

  “Before you lot get too blubbery,” growled Evie’s dragon sister, “why have you stopped me from killing this one?”

  Evie had completely forgotten about Forbes. He was cowering near the wall, his wide eyes darting from one dragon to the next, trying to assess which was going to eat him.

  “This is the knight who tried to kill me when I took Evie back!” She glowered at him, and he shrank even more.

  “I am sorry about that,” he said.

  “Sorry!”

  “Wait!” shouted Evie. She leapt down from her father’s face and ran back to where Forbes was standing. “Wait. Don’t hurt him.”

  Evie’s sister snaked her green head forward, teeth bared. “He just admitted it was him.”

  “Yes. It was him. But he’s had a change of heart. He’s not who he was then.”

  The dragon glared down, jets of black smoke puffing out of her nostrils.

  “Sister, you’ve got to listen to me.” She looked over at her mother and father. “Please, all of you. We need your help.”

  “What is it?” said her mothe
r. “Why have you brought him here?”

  “Pennyroyal Academy is under siege. The witches have it surrounded, and the wall is about to fall. If Calivigne can destroy the Academy, there won’t be any new princesses to stop her.”

  The sister snorted another impatient cloud of black smoke.

  “What are you saying, Daughter?” said Evie’s father. “You want us to fight in a war that isn’t ours?” His voice was as gentle as she had ever heard it. “I’ve only just made it back. Why don’t you forget that place? Forget the witches and the princesses and all of it. Let’s go north, just the four of us. Far away from all this. We can be a family again.”

  “After I eat him,” said Evie’s sister.

  “We can be happy there. Just as we once were here.”

  Evie could feel herself being pulled apart inside. More than she had in years, she felt like the little girl who wanted to live simply again with her mother and father and sister. But now there was a new force pulling her as well. There was a princess inside her, one she hadn’t known was there. Her lips quivered. She didn’t know what to say. It was her mother who finally spoke.

  “This war is ours. Witches are as much a threat to dragons as knights are. Or have you forgotten where they’d been keeping you?”

  The father sighed, letting out an acrid puff of black.

  “The witches had you this whole time?” said Evie. “Daddy, is it true?”

  He took a deep breath and raised his head. He looked at his mate, then back to his human daughter. “That day . . . the day you ran off . . . I went after you because the storm was coming, but it moved faster than any storm I’d ever seen. I kept flying, kept hoping I’d catch a glimpse of you down there in the forest. Then a bolt of lightning knocked me clear out of the sky. I crashed somewhere . . . I didn’t know where I was, and I was so dazed from the lightning strike. The last thing I remember . . .”

  “What, Daddy? What was it?”

  “It was a witch. She was smiling at me. I was stunned. I couldn’t move. She kept coming and coming. I lost consciousness then. And when I woke . . . there were hundreds.”

  “What?” Evie turned to Forbes, who looked just as surprised as she was.

  “I’d no idea how I got there. Only that there were three other dragons with me. They’d chained us all inside a cave somewhere high up in the mountains. There was snow everywhere, ice as clear as crystal. And the air was so thin.” He looked straight into Evie’s eyes. “That mountain was crawling with witches. They were training, Daughter. Just as you train to battle them, they were training to battle you.”

  Evie stared at her father, astounded. An army of witches. Just as Malora said.

  “We finally broke free, me and some of the others. But it was as if they were collecting dragons, just keeping us there until they needed us for their wicked brews.”

  “This is our war, too, whether we’d like it to be or not,” said Evie’s mother. “Once they’ve finished with the princesses, they’ll come for us.”

  “You can’t seriously be suggesting we risk our lives to save a place that trains knights,” said Evie’s sister. “I’d sooner trust the witches than them.”

  Forbes looked every bit as terrified as he had when he was about to be eaten. He locked eyes with Evie, and she gave him a nod. He swallowed hard, then took a step forward and looked up at the dragons.

  “If you agree to help us,” he said, his voice quivering, “I will devote every breath I draw from now until I die to bringing an end to our war.”

  More smoke vented from the sister’s snout. “Might not be many breaths, mate.”

  “My mother was killed by a dragon,” said Forbes, directing himself to Evie’s father. “It upended my life, just as your disappearance upended Evie’s. I have every reason to hate you and want you dead.”

  Evie’s sister opened her jaw and let out a deep, threatening growl.

  “Uh, Forbes . . .” said Evie.

  “But I trust your daughter,” he continued. “It’s difficult for me to trust people, but I do trust her. If she thinks we’re wrong about each other, the knights and the dragons, then I’m willing to put aside what I believe about you. Because I believe in her.” A pained look came over him. “Blast. I’ve just complimented you, haven’t I?”

  The crickets chirped from the darkness. No one moved.

  “This isn’t an empty promise, Daddy. He’s going to be king someday. And kings have the power to stop wars.”

  “The power to start wars, too,” said her father. “You’re asking me to risk my family by trusting a knight!”

  “A knight who already tried to kill me, by the way!” said Evie’s sister. “Look! See? See?” She raised her wing to show the scar on her side.

  “I said I was sorry!” shouted Forbes. “That wasn’t me, anyway. I missed.”

  She roared, buckling his knees.

  “You’ve got to help us,” said Evie. “We can put the world back on the right path, but we can’t do it without you.”

  Evie’s mother stepped forward. She lowered her head with love in her eyes. “We trusted a human once before, and she became our daughter. Perhaps it’s time we trusted another.”

  Each of them looked to Evie’s father. He looked down at his youngest daughter. Then, slowly, he began to nod.

  “Oh, thank you, Daddy! Thank you, Mum! When this is over, we’re going to make the world a better place for dragons and for humans.”

  “I do hope that’s true, little girl,” said her father.

  She turned to Forbes, then back to her family. “Right, well then, let’s go.”

  “Now?” roared her father. “I haven’t had supper!”

  “The wall might already have fallen, Daddy. We’ve got to go straightaway.”

  “About that,” said Forbes, suddenly looking quite ashen. “How are you proposing we get back?”

  “My family will take us.”

  “I’ll carry you, little boy,” said Evie’s sister with a grin. He looked over at her and gulped.

  “He can’t ride with us,” said Evie’s mother. “We’ll roast him alive.”

  “She’s right,” said Evie, crestfallen. “I’ve been riding dragons for years, but your delicate skin won’t be able to handle it.”

  “My skin isn’t delicate!”

  Evie was suddenly struck with an idea. “Hang on, I know what to do.” She reached into her knapsack and found her final magical item: the Needle of the Poorest Maiden.

  “You want to sew me a basket or something?” said Forbes. “That will take—”

  “Needle, needle, sharp and fine.” The needle jumped out of Evie’s hand and began to flit about like a fairy. Yard upon yard of blue fabric streamed out of the clear night air. Finally, when a large pile of material sat at Evie’s feet, the needle vanished with a pop. The tail of the fabric fluttered to the ground.

  “Are my sewing things still inside?”

  “Just where you left them,” said Evie’s mother.

  “Give me ten minutes.”

  Evie scooped up the material and dragged it into the cave, leaving Forbes to spend those agonizing minutes alone with the dragons. When she returned, she had assembled a crude harness chair out of the fabric and several thin logs.

  “Not bad for ten minutes,” she said, running a bit of the fabric around her sister’s claw. “Go on, climb in.”

  Forbes reluctantly approached Evie’s sister and stepped inside the contraption. There were two handles sewn inside of it, fashioned from woven strips of bark. He lifted them but couldn’t figure out what he was meant to do with the drape of fabric hanging below. “What is this? How am I supposed to—”

  “We’ve no idea what to expect when we get there. You may not be able to wait for my sister to land. If there is some sort of emergency, use your sword to cut this piece here and then hold on
tight to those handles. You’ll come down in a hurry.”

  “How do I steer?”

  “You’ll see when you’re in the air. It’s crude, but it should get you to the ground without dying.”

  “‘Should’?”

  “All right, Sister, take him up.”

  “With pleasure.” She stretched out her wings, then blasted into the night. Forbes shrieked as the fabric went taut and he was slung into the air. His terrified screams rained down from the sky as the dragon spiraled higher into the night.

  Evie looked over at her parents and nearly broke down in tears again. “I never thought I’d see the two of you together again.”

  “Aw, this is no time for tears, love,” said her mother, giving her a gentle nudge. “Go on, ride with your father. I know how long you’ve both waited for that.”

  Evie smiled at her, then bounded across the cave mouth and scrambled up her father’s leg. The intense heat of his body was something she thought she’d felt for the last time. She seated herself where his neck met his shoulder and grabbed hold. Even though his scales were almost too hot for her to bear, she put her cheek against him and closed her eyes. A moment later, she lost her breath as the ground rushed away and the dragons plunged into the open sky. Millions of stars shimmered above as the whole world slept below. Her mother sailed next to them, her wings beating rhythmically as she soared through the air.

  The great green lands of the west flowed past like a gentle current. She held tight to her father as he glided through the black sky, but her mind wandered to the sprawling world below. Somewhere down there, the innkeeper she had met on her way to Demetra’s was sleeping alone in his bed, his beloved wife murdered by the Vertreiben. Somewhere down there, Wormwood had been scattered into the forest after the attack on his camp. Somewhere down there, Remington’s subjects mourned their king, slain by witches. With so much evil in the world, she wondered, how would anyone survive without Pennyroyal Academy?