Chapter 8

It took nearly a full day for Reynolds, Waltman, Luther, and two members of the royal council to reach the war front by flying in their dragon forms. The craggy mountains and lush forests that surrounded Tryllenvreng, the capital of Befelyn, slowly gave way to rivers that cut through the rocky hillside like ribbons. Befelynians fleeing the southern half of the kingdom for the safety of the refugee shelters in Tryllenvreng camped along the riverbank in clumps. Reynolds's human heart ached for them as he flew past. He understood now what it meant to have those you loved ripped away from you.

The land began to bear battle scars as Reynolds and his friends closed in on the war front. The evidence of a recent fight could be seen in shattered boulders, in trees ripped up at the roots, and in an entire hillside caved in as if an enormous creature had ripped the land to pieces.

Tearing his gaze away from the wreckage, Reynolds signaled the others to follow him to the highest hilltop in the area. Night was falling, and soon they'd be able to fly over the armies and assess the situation undetected.

Reynolds alighted on the hilltop, shook out his wings, and folded them back as the others came to rest around him, their talons digging into the rocky soil. Below him, the Befelynian army was positioned with the strongest flyers in the

center, archer and catapult support just behind them, and secondary flyers hidden from the approaching army on both the left and right flanks. The third wave of flyers were hidden behind the archer and catapult support to provide either another wave of attack or defensive cover for the forward soldiers in the event of a retreat.

Reynolds had a feeling all the army had been doing was retreating, giving up Befelyn in bits and pieces.

As he studied the army's position, there was a cry of warning, and then a pack of ogres swarmed over the rocky hills to the south. The ogres were immense thick-chested brutes—wide as four large oak trees side by side and double the height of the average Draconi—with no necks, round black eyes, and tough Gustav skin that matched the rocks they were scaling with incredible speed.

Immediately, the first wave of flyers rose into the air, and the catapults began pelting the incoming ogres with boulders coated in pitch and flame. A few of the ogres went down, crushed beneath the weight of the boulders, but for every creature who fell, another three took its place.

The ogres formed a V and stopped as if waiting for the arrival of the Befelynians. From his vantage point on the hilltop, Reynolds saw something in the middle of the V begin to glow like a brilliant blue sapphire. He squinted against the glare of the dying sun, and a pit of ice formed in his stomach.

What kind of weapon glowed like that? The ogres in Reynolds's history books

—the ones who'd roamed Befelyn and the southern kingdom of Vallé de Lumé in vicious packs centuries ago before a witch sealed them away in a prison deep beneath the southern mountains—had always used brute strength and violence to crush their opponents. Not weapons that glowed. Not formations that spoke of organization and strategy.

He wanted to scream at the flyers to get back, but it was already too late. The flyers dove at the assembled ogres, fire spewing from their mouths—

a cover for the poison-tipped arrows the archers sent just beneath the Draconi. A few of the arrows struck ogres in the eyes, but the rest glanced off the beasts' rock-hard skin and fell harmlessly to the ground.

The flyers banked a perfect turn, preparing for a second assault, when the ogres on the outside of the V dropped to the ground, revealing the creature who stood in the center. It may have once been an ogre but was now it was something far worse. Its round black eyes were lit with sapphire flames from within. Its massive bulk was covered with so much knotted muscle, it resembled an enormous Gustav rock bound by gnarled tree roots. And in its hands was a ball of crackling blue light the size of a small horse.

What kind of monstrosity was this?

Reynolds's hearts thundered in his chest, and his stomach plummeted as he dug his talons into the unforgiving ground and forced himself to stay hidden. To stay safe because Befelyn needed her king, even though her king had no idea how to save her.

The creature stretched to its full height, casting a long shadow over the ogres crouched below it. Reynolds lashed the ground with his tail, scattered bits of rock and dirt. His army was already sWaltmanling to contain the ogre onslaught. How were they supposed to fight a monster like this? How was he supposed to fight it? The kingship he'd accepted at last night's coronation ceremony felt too heavy to bear as his flyers banked, preparing to sweep the ogre lines again.

The creature drew its arm back and flung the sizzling blue light directly into the flyers as they completed their turn. It wrapped around the Draconi like chains of lightning and then exploded into a brilliant blue mist. When it dissipated, all that was left of the entire squadron were a few bloody scales that slowly drifted to the ground. Reynolds felt sick, his dragon's fire burning miserably in his chest.

Magic.

The ogres, released from their mountain prison by the dark enchantress who had ensnared the southern kingdom of Vallé de Lumé the previous winter had somehow found a way to tap into her power and use it for themselves in their quest to once again dominate the lands they'd been cast out of so many lifetimes ago.

There was nothing Reynolds could do to stop them. Not without magic of his own. The realization was a blow Reynolds didn't know how to absorb. Focusing on the grief and desperation in his human heart, Reynolds released his dragon. His wings receded, his fangs drew back, and as his red-gold scales softened into his human skin again, he turned to find the others had shed their dragons too and were busy pulling clothing out of the travel bags Luther had volunteered to carry for the group.

Luther tossed Reynolds some trousers and a shirt. "How did ogres get the use of magic?" She sounded shaken.

"A better question would be how do we stop them?" the councilwoman asked as she shrugged into a shirt.

"We can't stop them." Reynolds was grateful his voice didn't reveal the panic that wanted to steal his breath and paralyze his thoughts.

He'd promised to protect Befelyn. How was he going to do that when his enemy was unstoppable?

"If we had magic of our own, it would be different," the councilman said. "You're right." Reynolds looked at the councilman while his thoughts raced.

"The only way to turn the tide of this war is if we have magic of our own capable of defeating the weapon we just saw. And I only know of one kingdom with that kind of magic—"

"You aren't seriously suggesting that we go to Morcant for aid, are you?" Luther asked, her hands on her hips. "Have you forgotten what those magic wielders—those mardushkas—do to Draconi? For centuries, they've captured us with their cursed magic, forcing us to sniff out gems and veins of gold like dogs on leashes. There's a reason we have a law forbidding Befelynians from setting foot on Hartmut soil."

"We aren't going to Morcant for aid." Reynolds's hearts pounded as a plan just as bold and risky as any of his pranks took shape in his mind. "Negotiations work best when you have enough leverage to come to the table as an equal. Gruidarid is suffering from massive food shortages caused by a blight on their crops. There are reports of tremendous unrest and violence among the peasants."

"That's correct," the councilwoman said.

"Gruidarid's queen doesn't have enough resources to feed her people and stop the unrest. We, however, have an entire mountain full of treasure— enough to buy food from the merchants in Súndraille for the next ten years. We have the solution to her problem, and the queen of Gruidarid—"

"Is a mardushka from Morcant and married into her throne," the councilwoman finished, her eyes gleaming.

Reynolds shouldered his bag. "Let's go back to the castle. Master Guntbert and the rest of the royal council need to know what we're up against and what I plan to do about it. I leave for Gruidarid in the morning."

"Why you? Let us go in your place," Waltman said.

Reynolds shook his head. "Queen Elinor doesn't meet with ambassadors. She leaves all that to her castle steward, and I can't afford to be turned down. If I arrive at her castle, she'll have no choice but to receive me." He looked at the council members. "I need the council to keep the country running while I'm gone. Send a courier if there's an emergency, and I need to return. I should be able to cross the mountain border into Gruidarid in two days if I fly hard. After that, I'll be on foot—I don't dare anger Queen Elinor by violating the treaty that prohibits Befelynians from using their dragon form within Gruidarid. I'll be easy for a courier to catch. Waltman and Luther, I know asking you to leave Befelyn in her time of need is a sacrifice—"

"We're with you, remember?" Waltman wrapped a hefty arm around the back of Reynolds's neck and squeezed. "To the sky and back."

"To the sky and back," Luther repeated.

Reynolds pushed his grief, his fear that he would fail and all Befelyn would pay for

it, into the corner of his thoughts and focused on what he would say to the queen of Gruidarid to get her to agree to use her magic to save Befelyn from certain destruction.

She was his last hope.