Rise of the Dragons. Morgan Rice

nodded back.

      “It was,” she replied flatly, loving Anvin for giving her recognition, and finally feeling vindicated.

      “And the shot that felled it,” he concluded. It was an observation, not a question, his voice hard, final, as he studied the boar.

      “I see no other wounds besides these two,” he added, running his hand along it – then stopping at the ear. He examined it, then turned and looked at Brandon and Braxton disdainfully. “Unless you call this grazing of a spearhead here a wound.”

      He held up the boar’s ear, and Brandon and Braxton reddened while the group of warriors laughed.

      Another of her father’s famed warriors stepped forward – Vidar, close friend to Anvin, a thin, short man in his thirties with a gaunt face and a scar across his nose. With his small frame, he did not look the part, but Kyra knew better: Vidar was as hard as stone, famed for his hand-to-hand combat. He was one of the hardest men Kyra had ever met, known to wrestle down two men twice his size. Too many men, because of his diminutive size, had made the mistake of provoking him – only to learn their lesson the hard way. He, too, had taken Kyra under his wing, always protective of her.

      “Looks like they missed,” Vidar concluded, “and the girl saved them. Who taught you two to throw?”

      Brandon and Braxton looked increasingly nervous, clearly caught in a lie, and neither said a word.

      “It’s a grievous thing to lie about a kill,” Anvin said darkly, turning to her brothers. “Out with it now. Your father would want you to tell the truth.”

      Brandon and Braxton stood there, shifting, clearly uncomfortable, looking at each other as if debating what to say. For the first time she could remember, Kyra saw them tongue-tied.

      Just as they were about to open their mouths, suddenly a foreign voice cut through the crowd.

      “Doesn’t matter who killed it,” came the voice. “It’s ours now.”

      Kyra turned with all the others, startled at the rough, unfamiliar voice – and her stomach dropped as she saw a group of the Lord’s Men, distinctive in their scarlet armor, step forward through the crowd, the villagers parting for them. They approached the boar, eyeing it greedily, and Kyra saw that they wanted this trophy kill – not because they needed it, but as a way to humiliate her people, to snatch away from them this point of pride. Beside her, Leo snarled, and she laid a reassuring hand on his neck, holding him back.

      “In the name of your Lord Governor,” said the Lord’s Man, a portly soldier with a low brow, thick eyebrows, a large belly, and a face bunched up in stupidity, “we claim this boar. He thanks you in advance for your present on this holiday festival.”

      He gestured to his men and they stepped toward the boar, as if to grab it.

      As they did, Anvin suddenly stepped forward, Vidar by his side, and blocked their way.

      An astonished silence fell over the crowd – no one ever confronted the Lord’s Men; it was an unwritten rule. No one wanted to incite the wrath of Pandesia.

      “No one’s offered you a present, as far as I can tell,” he said, his voice steel, “or your Lord Governor.”

      The crowd thickened, hundreds of villagers gathering to watch the tense standoff, sensing a confrontation. At the same time, others backed away, creating space around the two men, as the tension in the air grew more intense.

      Kyra felt her heart pounding. She unconsciously tightened her grip on her bow, knowing this was escalating. As much as she wanted a fight, wanted her freedom, she also knew that her people could not afford to incite the wrath of the Lord Governor; even if by some miracle they defeated them, the Pandesian Empire stood behind them. They could summon divisions of men as vast as the sea.

      Yet, at the same time, Kyra was so proud of Anvin for standing up to them. Finally, somebody had.

      The soldier glowered, staring Anvin down.

      “Do you dare defy your Lord Governor?” he asked.

      Anvin held his ground.

      “That boar is ours – no one’s giving it to you,” Anvin said.

      “It was yours,” the soldier corrected, “and now it belongs to us.” He turned to his men. “Take the boar,” he commanded.

      The Lord’s Men approached and as they did, a dozen of her father’s men stepped forward, backing up Anvin and Vidar, blocking the Lord’s Men’s way, hands on their weapons.

      The tension grew so thick, Kyra squeezed her bow until her knuckles turned white, and as she stood there she felt awful, felt as if somehow she were responsible for all this, given that she had killed the boar. She sensed something very bad was about to happen, and she cursed her brothers for bringing this bad omen into their village, especially on Winter Moon. Strange things always happened on the holidays, mystical times when the dead were said to be able to cross from one world to the other. Why had her brothers had to provoke the spirits in this way?

      As the men faced off, her father’s men preparing to draw their swords, all of them so close to bloodshed, a voice of authority suddenly cut through the air, booming through the silence.

      “The kill is the girl’s!” came the voice.

      It was a loud voice, filled with confidence, a voice that commanded attention, a voice that Kyra admired and respected more than any in the world: her father’s. Commander Duncan.

      All eyes turned as her father approached, the crowd parting ways for him, giving him a wide berth of respect. There he stood, a mountain of a man, twice as tall as the others, with shoulders twice as wide, an untamed brown beard and longish brown hair both streaked with gray, wearing furs over his shoulders and bearing two long swords on his belt and a spear across his back. His armor, the black of Volis, had a dragon carved into its breastplate, the sign of their house. His weapons bore nicks and scrapes from one too many battle and he projected experience. He was a man to be feared, a man to be admired, a man who all new to be just and fair. A man loved and, above all, respected.

      “It is Kyra’s kill,” he repeated, glancing disapprovingly at her brothers as he did, then turning and looking at Kyra, ignoring the Lord’s Men. “It is for her to decide its fate.”

      Kyra was shocked at her father’s words. She had never expected this, never expected him to put such responsibility in her hands, to leave to her such a weighty decision. For it was not merely a decision about the boar, they both knew, but about the very fate of her people.

      Tense soldiers lined up on either side, all with hands on swords, and as she looked out at all the faces, all turning to her, all awaiting her response, she knew that her next choice, her next words, would be the most important she had ever spoken.

      Chapter Four

      Merk hiked slowly down the forest path, weaving his way through Whitewood, and he reflected on his life. His forty years had been hard ones; he had never before taken the time to hike through a wood, to admire the beauty around him. He looked down at the white leaves crunching beneath his feet, punctuated by the sound of his staff as he tapped the soft forest floor; he looked up as he walked, taking in the beauty of the Aesop trees, with their shining white leaves and glowing red branches, glistening in the morning sun. Leaves fell, showering down on him like snow, and for the first time in his life, he felt a real sense of peace.

      Of average height and build, with dark black hair, a perpetually unshaven face, a wide jaw, long, drawn-out cheekbones, and large black eyes with black circles under them, Merk always looked as if he hadn’t slept in days. And that was always how he felt. But now. Now, finally, he felt rested. Here, in Ur, in the northwest corner of Escalon, there came no snow. The temperate breezes off the ocean, but a day’s ride west, assured them of warmer weather and allowed leaves of every color to flourish. It also allowed Merk to sojourn wearing but a cloak, with no need to cower from the freezing winds, as they did in much of Escalon. He was still getting used to the idea of wearing a cloak instead of armor, of wielding a staff instead of a sword, of tapping the