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  She touched her face gingerly, no longer feeling the swelling or lacerations. “More wyvern magic?”

  Alaric smiled and kissed her. “It’s not all stealth and illusion you know.”

  Elsbeth took his hand, lacing her fingers through his. “I am so sorry, Alaric.” The words poured from her in a rush. “I saw them on my descent and tried to warn you. They caught me in the tunnels. I thought if I led them here, they’d be too busy stealing your gold to bother with you and the egg. Then we heard her chirp, and…”

  He placed a finger against her lips to halt her babbling. “Beth, stop. You did a brave thing coming back.” He hugged her to him, and his tone was admonishing. “Brave and foolish. Those tunnels are treacherous. Getting lost would have been the lesser of the evils that lurk in those blind places. “His hands slid down her back to cup her bottom. “Don’t ever do something like that again, or I’ll redden your backside.”

  The events of the past hour struck her then, and she shuddered in delayed shock. “Don’t worry. I’m not very good at playing the valiant. You’re on your own the next time.” She was only half teasing him.

  They embraced in the dim lair, surrounded by the scatter of gold and gems Malcolm and his companions had died for. Elsbeth savored Alaric’s warmth, his scent of winter cedar, the feel of him against her. She couldn’t stay, and he couldn’t leave. Not yet.

  A series of whistles and anxious chirps drifted toward them. Alaric stiffened, alert to his offspring’s call. “She’s frightened.”

  Elsbeth stepped away and gave him a small push back toward the roofless cavern. “You best go back. I know nothing of wyvern young, but I’m guessing she wants her father.” At his hesitation, she nudged him again. “I’ll be fine, Alaric.”

  His handsome features tightened. “Tell your villagers those men are dead, killed by me. Others will be reluctant to challenge. If you tell them otherwise, some might come and search. I’ve no longer the patience, nor the time, to fend off greedy humans lurking where they shouldn’t, and I’ll kill whoever I must to protect my child.”

  Elsbeth nodded. “Go. She needs you. And Angus needs me.”

  Alaric lifted her in his arms. He made love to her mouth, tongue sweeping in to lay claim, to imprint his memory on her. “Wait for me, Beth,” he said against her lips. “I’ll return by next summer.”

  “I’ll wait.”

  “Swear it.”

  “I swear.”

  He set her down and strode toward the tunnel’s darkness. He didn’t look back.

  Spring in Byderside was a busy season. There were the fields to attend and the sowing to do. And there were always weddings and the infant blessings after the long winter. On this particular April day, Elsbeth sat on a bench in the village square and tuned her fiddle in preparation for a performance that night.

  Irena sat next to her, puffing on her favorite pipe and calling out pointers to those who decorated the square for the ceremony. “Old Angus would have had plenty to say about this union, my girl. The widow Aelis, marrying that young pup from Hallowfaire.” Irena chewed the pipe stem. I can hear him now.” She lowered her voice in a fairly accurate imitation of Angus’s. “What’s that woman doin’ marrying a lad still wet behind the ears? Can’t find herself a real man?”

  Elsbeth laughed. “That’s jealousy talking. He never admitted it, but I think he was sweet on Dame Aelis. Besides, Duncan Pharr is only two years younger than Aelis, hardly a stripling.”

  “That, and he’s rich and handsome. Aelis improved her lot the second time around.”

  “He’s also kind. I’ve watched him. He dotes on her.” Elsbeth played a few experimental notes, satisfied with the tone. “He’s asked me to play Gundrig’s Ballad for her tonight. Very romantic.”

  Irena sighed around the pipe. “I do like that one. I could once sing that son in a way that made gods weep.”

  “And seduced dragons and drakes?”

  She eyed Elsbeth askance. “I never thought of myself as a legend. Maybe your wyvern lover exaggerated.”

  Elsbeth chuckled. “Not likely. Alaric was quick to tell me that dragons, not wyverns, embellished their tales. But about themselves, not others. Irenya Firekiller is much admired among dragons and wyverns alike.”

  She smiled when Irena chewed harder on her pipe stem and muttered a short, “Hmpf.”

  They remained on the bench another half hour, chatting while Elsbeth rosined her bow and checked her fiddle one last time. The square gradually filled with people, dressed in their finery and eager to celebrate Aelis and Duncan’s union with dance, song and plenty of good ale.

  Elsbeth rose. “I’m off. I need to change out of my everydays and dress for the wedding. I’ll see you later. Do you need anything before I go?”

  “No. Get along. We can’t start the dance without the fiddle and the flute. Ewan will come searching for you if you’re late.”

  Back home, Elsbeth rifled through her small chest of clothes, deciding what to wear. She paused and lifted a length of indigo silk from the chest. Alaric’s gift to her, along with a priceless emerald. She’d found both nestled in her pack when she returned to Byderside.

  The silk, a long tunic dress, belted with an embroidered kirtle, flowed across her palm soft as warm butter. It caught the light of her candles in a bright sheen reminiscent of Alaric’s gem hoard.

  In nine months she’d heard nothing of him. No whispers of a wyvern or dragon returning to the county, no admiring comments of a skilled bard visiting the nearby towns. Elsbeth tried not to fear that silence. Nine months was a small passage of time compared to eight years. But it was so much harder now, with Angus gone and her only company the vibrant memories of her fortnight with Alaric at Maldoza.

  She took the tunic and kirtle from the chest and brought it to Angus’s room, now hers since his passing. It had taken her weeks to adjust to sleeping in the room, and there were days when she walked in, fully expecting to see him reclined in the bed, sipping his medicinal tea or softly snoring.

  Elsbeth missed him as much as she missed Alaric. Angus had died three days following her return from Maldoza. He’d held her hand and slipped away with a sigh just after dawn. She had mourned him and still did, but his death had been a blessing—a rest from the terrible sickness that left him crippled and bedridden.

  She touched the tunic with reverent fingers. Angus would have been ecstatic to see Alaric again. He’d always been fond of him and had not bothered to hide his disappointment when Alaric left Ney-by-the Water.

  Voices from outside, chattering and cheerful, floated to her. Elsbeth hurried with dressing. She plaited her hair, weaving a beaded black ribbon through the plait to dress it up. There was no mirror for her to check her appearance, but the admiring looks from some of the men and the envious ones from the women told her the tunic suited her.

  “Well, lass, aren’t you a fine sight this evening?” Donal Grayson took her hand and bowed over it in a courtly gesture. “You’ll outshine the bride I think.”

  He’d exchanged his tattered farmer’s clothes for colorful coat and trews, and Elsbeth returned his compliment. “I think you’ll outshine the groom.” She eyed his garb. “And here I thought you only owned clothes in shades of brown and…brown.” He laughed at her teasing and offered to escort her back to the square.

  The wedding went smoothly with only a minor mishap when Duncan spilled a little of the union wine on his new wife’s bodice. Aelis, ever good-natured, only laughed and joked he’d have to lick it off when they were alone.

  The celebration after was a merry affair. Lanterns, strung on ropes and hung from low tree branches, lit the square. Tables, mounded with rich foods cooked by some of Byderside’s finest cooks, were flanked by barrels of wine and crocks of warm ale. Guests from Byderside, Durnsdale, and Hallowfaire feasted and drank and finally called for the fiddler and the flutist to play.

  Elsbeth took her place next to Ewan at the edge of the dance area. Ewan looked to her for guidance. “What do
we play first?”

  She tucked the fiddle beneath her chin. “Gundrig’s Ballad, then Merry Alice. After that, we’ll play whatever the spirit wills us to play.”

  Guests began dancing as soon as the first chord was struck. Elsbeth played with gusto, as lost to the music as the people who twirled to its rhythms. She and Ewan played a dozen tunes straight before taking a break.

  He gave her a sheepish look. “I have to water the verge, Elsbeth.”

  She swatted him lightly on the arm. “Well don’t just sit there telling me about it, Ewan. Get going. I can play a tune or two without you.”

  Ewan dashed off, leaving his flute in her keeping. Elsbeth gazed at the crowd surrounding her, laughing, drinking and celebrating the marriage of Aelis to Duncan. A tall, imposing figure caught her eye. She inhaled sharply at the brief glimpse of broad shoulders and rose, her heart fluttering in her chest. The crowd parted, revealing a blond stranger, from either Durnsdale or Hallowfaire. Her sudden exhilaration died a quick death.

  She returned to her seat. The dull despair she had fought off for months seeped into her soul with an insidious chill. Alaric had promised he’d return, and she believed him. But sometimes it was difficult, especially now in the middle of a wedding celebration.

  She smiled weakly when Irena caught her eye. A few of the guests called out to her, requesting a lively reel or a more sedate cotillion. Elsbeth took up her fiddle. The tune she chose was not a favorite of Angus’s, nor one she’d written for Alaric. She’d composed this one for herself and her memory of a past summer day when she’d flown on a wyvern’s back, breathed in the wind and saw the green and gold lands stretched out below her.

  A hush fell over the crowd as she played. Many who’d come from the nearby towns whispered their admiration of her skill, the way her music captured some indefinable wish, or emotion, or memory. Those of Byderside were quick to boast it was she who saved the village by bewitching a wyvern with her fiddle.

  Elsbeth remained oblivious to them. She wakened from the haze of her memories to enthusiastic applause and a voice that made her knees weak. Had she not been sitting, she would have fallen.

  “The gods still dance upon your bow, Elsbeth Weaver.”

  She looked up, and this time another tall, broad-shouldered man stood before her. Not a blond farmer, but a dark-haired bard with the summer storms trapped in his gray eyes and wyvern blood in his veins. He wasn’t of Hallowfaire or Durnsdale, but a far country where mythical beasts roamed rolling plains, and ancient kings, descended of gods, built temples to their dead.

  The first question on her tongue was not one she expected to ask. “What did they name her?”

  Alaric laughed, a joyful sound that turned a few heads their way in curiosity. “She is Peregrine, out of Damoshin, by Alaric.”

  He plucked the bow and fiddle out of her hands and set them on a nearby table. Elsbeth threw her arms around him when he lifted her, uncaring of the neighbors who stared at her in open-mouth amazement.

  “You’re here,” she whispered. “You came back.”

  He crushed her to him and brushed a delicate kiss across her lips. “I promised I would. I keep my promises.” His features were more somber, his shoulders tense. “Wyverns may mate with women and bond with them. But they cannot breed with them. I can’t give you children, Beth.”

  Elsbeth stroked the line of his nose with one finger. “I will love you all the days of my life, but I can’t give you six hundred years, Alaric.”

  He rested his forehead against hers, his relief palpable. “And I will love you until the end of both our days. That will be enough.”

  She thought of her most recent tune. “Will you take me flying again? Far from here. To the great oceans and the land of your birth.”

  “You’re not afraid?”

  “Only if you let me fall. Only if you stop loving me.”

  Alaric tightened his embrace. “The world itself will fall before that ever comes to pass, my sweet Beth.”

  Calls rose from the milling crowd, demands for Elsbeth to play another tune. Ewan had returned and stood nearby gesturing to her fiddle where it lay on the table. She sighed, reluctant to leave Alaric’s arms. He was here. He was here! And she thought her heart might burst with the knowledge.

  “I have to play,” she said.

  Alaric shook his head. “Not this time. This time the fiddler dances.” He nodded to Ewan. “You’re on your own with this one, lad. Play something lively.” He released Elsbeth and held out his hand to her. “You flew with me once. Now let me fly with you.”

  She laughed and gripped his hand. “Come, wyvern,” she whispered for his ears alone. “And soar with me.”

  ~End~

  About the Author

  Grace Draven is a Louisiana native living in Texas with her husband, kids and a big, doofus dog. She has loved storytelling since forever and is a fan of the fictional bad boy. She is the winner of the Romantic Times Reviewers Choice for Best Fantasy Romance of 2015 and a USA Today Bestselling author.

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  Titles by Grace Draven

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  THE WRAITH KINGS

  Radiance

  Eidolon

  The Ippos King (2018)

  * * *

  Phoenix Unbound (Penguin/Ace)

  Coming soon

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  FROM THE MASTER OF CROWS WORLD

  Master of Crows

  The Brush of Black Wings

  The Lightning God’s Wife

  The Light Within

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  OTHER STORIES

  Entreat Me

  All the Stars Look Down (Sunday’s Child)

  Beneath a Waning Moon

  For Crown and Kingdom

  Sunday’s Child / The King of Hel

  Wyvern

  The Undying King

  Lover of Thorns and Holy Gods

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  Connect with me:

  website: gracedraven.com

  Facebook: facebook.com/grace.draven

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