The Dragon's Torment Read online

  The Dragon’s Torment

  Book 1.5 | The Dragon’s Song Series

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One - Be My Wife

  Chapter Two - Husband Of Mine

  Chapter Three - The Caretaker’s Realm

  Chapter Four - Sister Mine

  Chapter Five - The Captain

  Chapter Six - Little One

  Chapter Seven - The Karaliene of Crushed Skulls

  Chapter Eight - The Stargazer

  Chapter Nine - The Temple of Umur

  Chapter Ten - The Swordsmistress

  Chapter Eleven - The Champion’s Arena

  Chapter Twelve - The Twelfth King

  Chapter One - Be My Wife

  Six years post war | Dahl

  Dahl cupped his hands in the water drum outside his door and splashed it over his face. The water was blessedly refreshing and he repeated the motion until he could no longer feel dirt on his skin, then he climbed the steps warily, kicked off his dusty boots and stepped into the cool kitchen.

  He sighed contentedly, glad to be out of the midday heat, and poured himself a glass of ale to have with his lunch. Some of the stable lads had caught a net of perch that morning and Dahl figured he could fry one up now and have leftovers for dinner. He hooked a pan over the fireplace to heat and set to work gutting the fish. Clean, neat fillets slid across his knife and as each separated, he tossed it into the pan. He might have been a server in the palace, but he’d picked up a few cooking tricks in his time there. Trill, girlish laughter floated through the window from the road outside and Dahl’s eyes snapped up from his work, heart lurching. They were right on time.

  Ale glass still in hand, he left his house and hurried down the front path as fast as he could without seeming too eager. Two young girls with long, dark hair skipped up the road. Well, one of them skipped; the younger tried to copy her older sister but could not conduct much more than a shuffle on newly found feet.

  Strolling behind them was a slight, blonde woman - their aunt - and the object of Dahl’s attention. As always, she looked preoccupied and, as always, Dahl felt saddened by the perpetual feeling of heaviness that surrounded her, the small crease of her brow and the fidget of her fingers at her side that Dahl knew spoke of how flighty she was.

  “Ho, Cori!” He called out, lifting a hand in greeting as he leaned casually against the gate. “How are you today?”

  “Well, Dahl, and yourself?” She didn’t even slow to speak to him. Not surprising though; every day she walked her nieces home from town and not once had she stopped to exchange more than pleasantries. It didn’t deter Dahl from trying his luck.

  “And how are you today, girls?” He added.

  “Well, thank you, Dahl,” the eldest - Bel - answered automatically; a well-rehearsed line. The younger ignored him completely, instead focusing her attention on collecting a posy of wild flowers from the roadside.

  “Busy at the Coffee House?” He asked Cori; another question he asked all too often. A breeze swept over the nearby fields, lifting the hair on Dahl’s brow and drying the sweat that beaded there.

  The Coffee House was Saasha’s enterprise. A very successful cafe she’d opened in Balforde, the town that they - the surviving servants of the Auksas estates - had settled in after the Advisor’s War.

  Many of them had been quick to settle down, particularly Saasha who’d married a local farmer and within a year had given birth to her first daughter. That had been six years ago.

  Dahl himself had taken pleasure in building his own house and garden, and working the fields that Saasha’s husband owned. Living alone sometimes became isolating. The days kept him busy, but in the quiet of the night he yearned for the hustle and hubbub of the palace kitchens.

  He’d been surprised - and pleased - when Cori had elected to remain in Balforde with her sister. He’d expected her to reside in Lautan as the Karaliene after the war but, aside from the occasional journey through the states in an official capacity, she remained with her family and left the running of Tauta to Antoni. She was no longer the Cori that Dahl had grown up with, but having her here was better than not having her at all.

  While Dahl thought desperately of something to say to slow Cori’s departure, the younger girl tripped over her feet, fell flat on the ground and promptly burst into tears. Cori reached down and pulled the girl into her arms. She hummed a lullaby, though it was not one that Dahl knew.

  Bel sighed, placing her hands on her hips and giving her sister a look of impatience, reminding Dahl very much of Saasha.

  “See, Aunt Cori, this is why you don’t want children,” Bel said. It sounded like a statement an adult would make; perhaps a conversation between Cori and Saasha that Bel had overheard?

  “Hush, Bel,” Cori chided with a frown.

  “You want to have children?” Dahl piped up. His heart thumped unevenly.

  Humans rarely had children with a life partner, preferring that they are a product of casual copulation. He wished he’d asked Tarp how one would initiate such a relationship while the old man had been alive. Too late for that now.

  “We could have children together,” he blurted out. “What I mean is, I could father some children for you, I mean...”

  He trailed off as Cori pinned him with her strange blue-gold eyes. He couldn’t read the emotions behind them. Not anger. Sadness maybe? He held her gaze, much as he wanted to look away. It was the younger girl who interrupted them.

  “Can you sing the Dragon’s Song again?” She sniffled in her aunt’s arms.

  “Goodbye, Dahl,” Cori said stiffly before humming the lullaby again. The three of them continued on their way. Dahl let out a breath and felt a cold sweat break on his forehead. That had been a bad idea. He turned and went back to his house, resolving to apologise to Cori on the morrow.

  The following day when he heard the girls’ laughter, Dahl stood himself tall and walked purposefully to the front gate.

  “Hello, girls,” he called as he approached. “Hello -” he stopped short. Cori wasn’t with them.

  “Ho there, Dahl,” Travers, the girl’s father, greeted with a wave of his hand. “Finished at the farm for the day?”

  “Yessir,” Dahl replied quickly. “The harvest of the back paddock should be done within the week.”

  “Good, good. Come on, girls.” The three of them continued on their way. Dahl stared after them. He wanted to ask where Cori was, but what if she’d said something to Saasha and Travers? They may think he was harassing her. Or perhaps her absence was a complete coincidence. He returned to the house, hoping she would be back the following day.

  She wasn’t. In fact, a month went by and Dahl worked himself into a state wondering if something terrible had happened to her. A logical part of his mind told him it wasn’t possible. At the least, Saasha would have told him, but if the Karaliene had been killed, the realm would be in turmoil. It still didn’t stop a small part of his mind from fretting.

  Finally he couldn’t hold his tongue any longer. Heart pounding, he plucked up the courage to ask Travers where she was. Travers frowned.

  “Don’t know, sorry Dahl,” he said. “You’ll have to ask Saasha.” Dahl nodded, but as he watched Travers and his daughters leave, he resolved that there would be no way he’d be speaking to Saasha. Those sisters told each other everything.

  Instead, he threw himself into his farm work, staying long days to get the ploughing done, ready for the next season’s planting. He’d almost given up on Cori when he arrived home one evening to find her waiting for him.

  Dusk was falling, leaving an orange haze on the horizon and there she was, sitting on the top step. One leg did a nervous jig and her hands were crossed over her midsection
, as if she were cold despite the warm summer eve.

  “Cori!” He exclaimed, and she stood up quickly.

  “Hello Dahl.” She said nothing more and for a moment they stood awkwardly.

  “Where have you been?” He asked finally, unable to keep the accusation from his tone. If she noticed it, she didn’t react.

  “What? Oh. I had to go to Lautan for a little while. Antoni had an issue with... never mind. Listen, Dahl, I wanted to talk to you.”

  His relief at her reason for being away was short lived. Her next words tumbled from her mouth almost incoherently, but they made his heart stop.

  “I want to have a baby.”

  “A baby?” He said after another long pause. “With me?”

  “Well, you were the one offering,” she said dryly, a small glimpse at the Cori he’d once known.

  “Well, yes, but... I thought - I mean... When?”

  “Now?” She shrugged then, suddenly nervous, she wrapped her arms around herself again, pressing one hand to her chest.

  “Oh, all right then.” He stepped towards her and she flinched away a little. Trying not to show his hurt at the gesture, he reached past her and opened the door. “After you.”

  The room was dark but when Dahl went to light some candles, Cori stopped him, his skin tingled where she touched him.

  “Leave it dark,” she said then after a pause added, “have you got anything to drink?”

  “Ale?” he offered, going to the cold box. “Or some wine?”

  “Wine, please.” She drank the glass he handed her in two mouthfuls then held it out for a refill. Another two she drank like this and Dahl wondered, drinking his own glass just as quickly, if this was some ceremony he didn’t know about. Oh, how he wished Tarp were around to ask. The old man had known everything about anything.

  “Do you want-” he began to ask but Cori cut across him.

  “No,” she said, putting her glass aside and pushing him back towards the bed. She pulled her shirt off, revealing plain cotton undergarments. Dahl copied her, tripping in his haste to get his trousers off.

  “Hurry up,” she urged, and he obliged. The moment his underpants were free of his ankles, she pulled him down to the bed.

  It was quick and business-like; nothing sensual about it and not how Dahl had fantasised it happening. The moment he rolled away from her, Cori climbed off the bed.

  “You’re going already?” He asked, breathless and disappointed.

  “This isn’t a relationship, Dahl,” she didn’t even look at him as she dressed. “This lasts only until I’m pregnant.”

  “Of course,” he replied, though her abruptness had him taken aback; they had just made love after all. Cori paused by the door. She looked as if she wanted to say something, but she simply shook her head then left. Dahl sighed and lay back against the pillows, his arms up behind his head. The moment replayed in his mind; the softness of her skin against his and silkiness of her hair. Had that really just happened? He grinned to himself in the dark.

  CORI CAME BACK THE following week, and she was already drunk. Dahl guessed that she may have been at the tavern but, as the week before, she wasn’t in a conversational mood so he didn’t ask. They made love in the dark again and then she left, refusing his offer to stay the night.

  And so they fell into a weekly pattern. Dahl began to anticipate, and look forward to, her weekly visits, though he tried in vain to ignore that she wasn’t as enthusiastic as he.

  In an attempt to further their relationship and prolong her stays, he began to cook his evening meal around the time he expected her to arrive. The first night he’d done this, she’d become angry, reiterating her statement of, ‘we are not in a relationship!’

  He had placated her by assuring her that the meal was for him as he was hungry, but she was welcome to eat with him. She refused and waited impatiently for him to finish eating. It was a few weeks before she relinquished her angry stance against him. “Fine,” she’d told him, “I’ll eat with you, but I know what you’re doing and I don’t like it.”

  Dahl had happily accepted that and secretly added a notch to his belt in his challenge of winning Cori over.

  After she’d made this decision, Cori seemed to lose some of her resistance towards him. She would talk to him as they ate. Often they would recount their past in the kitchens of the palace, revelling in the humorous tales of their innocent years. They never spoke of the Advisor’s War; Dahl had learned long ago never to mention it or the Karalis, whatever had happened to him.

  Sometimes they’d forget to extinguish the candles before making love and sometimes - rarely, but sometimes - Cori would lie in bed with him for a little while after and they would talk some more. However much he coaxed her though, she would never stay the night.

  Weeks turned to months and months became a year. Dahl’s life was blissful, and his heart was so full for Cori he thought it might explode. She had softened towards him, no longer fighting any signs they were in a relationship, though they’d never verbally agreed upon it. She visited him more often, sometimes just for a meal and company, and they occasionally went to the tavern together where they’d dance and drink. Dahl could never drink as much as Cori and on the one night he’d tried, she’d had to get help from Travers to get him home. Still, she didn’t stay the night.

  One rainy evening Cori arrived later than normal. Dahl was waiting anxiously at the table, their meals before him getting cold. When he heard her coming up the steps he stood. She stepped inside quietly and he immediately noticed her red eyes and the tear tracks on her cheeks.

  “Ho, Cori! What’s the matter?” She struggled to speak for a moment before dissolving into tears.

  “Saasha’s pregnant again,” she sobbed as he put his arms around her.

  He patted her back and said “there, there,” but beyond that he wasn’t sure what to say. He’d occasionally wondered why it was taking Cori so long to fall pregnant but they’d been having such fun that he hadn’t thought too much on the matter. He hadn’t realised how upset Cori was to not have conceived until now.

  “I don’t think I can have babies,” she whispered through her sobs.

  “Oh ho now,” Dahl chided. “Don’t think like that. Sometimes it just takes longer.” But he did wonder.

  She left not long after that, not in the mood to eat. Dahl cleaned up their untouched meals thoughtfully. He didn’t know what to do about Cori’s baby dilemma. Frankly, he didn’t know much about babies at all, only that they came from the copulation between man and woman. He worried at Cori’s sadness but he thought he might know a way to cheer her up.

  HE SAW CORI AROUND Balforde and they exchanged a few words, but she didn’t come to his house for a few weeks. Understandable, given the circumstances, but he was itching to talk with her and give her the gift he’d prepared. Finally, unable to wait any longer, he sought her out at the cafe one morning and asked her to have dinner with him that night.

  “Please,” he’d almost begged.

  “All right then,” she resigned.

  When she arrived for dinner, she stopped in the doorway and took in the meals laid out on the candlelit table. Dahl was sitting in his best clothes, waiting. He smiled and stood.

  “Come and sit,” he told her, taking her arm and leading her to her chair. She followed in silence and sat down obediently.

  “Cori,” he began, resuming his seat. His heart hammered and his stomach twisted. She stared at him with that unreadable expression, blue-gold eyes boring into his, and it made him nervous. “I’ve loved what we’ve been doing the last year - what I mean is I love you and even if we can’t have babies - which I’m not saying we won’t - but if we don’t, I still want you to be around always. Will-you-be-my-wife?” The last few words fell from his tongue in a jumble but Cori understood him. Her eyebrows shot up and her mouth dropped open.

  “Dahl-”

  “Oh wait,” he interrupted, patting the chest pocket of his shirt. He reached inside and took ou
t a silver band. He held it out to her. She stared at it until his arm began to shake from exertion.

  “Dahl,” she said finally, “I don’t know what to say.” She took the ring - to his relief - and turned it between her fingers before closing it in her fist. “Thank you.” He stood up, too elated to eat now, pulled her up and kissed her. They fell back towards the bed.

  Afterwards, Dahl held her in his arms.

  “Stay the night,” he begged.

  “All right.”

  DAHL WOKE EARLY. FOR a moment he lay with his eyes closed, remembering the night before. He still couldn’t believe his luck; Cori was his. He smiled and rolled towards her... and found the space beside him empty. His eyes shot open, and he sat up.

  The light coming in the window was pink with the dawn and the curtains floated on the breeze. There was no sign of Cori in his house. Not that he needed to look; his eyes snapped immediately to the bedside dresser and the silver ring atop it. His heart thumped unevenly. Why had she left her ring here?

  He surged out of bed, all vestiges of sleep gone, and pulled on his trousers from the night before. He left the house at a run. He had to find her. She wouldn’t have left without good reason, would she? Perhaps something had happened at the cafe and she’d been needed there.

  He went down the road to town at a jog. The sun rose steadily to his left, making the last of the rain clouds glow rose and gold. There were a few people out already and he waved to those he knew, forcing a smile to his face though it felt brittle in his anxiety, but he didn’t stop until he was at the cafe.

  “Where’s Cori?” He asked breathlessly, leaning on the counter. The barmaid behind it paused in her stacking of plates to look at him in surprise.

  “I haven’t seen her this morning,” she told him. He smacked his hand on the counter, making her jump. “She must be here!”

  “Dahl!” Saasha’s voice was sharp and reprimanding. Dahl turned around to see the older sister in the doorway to the kitchens. She wasn’t showing yet in her latest pregnancy, but she looked wearied.