“Oh!” Keita gasped seconds before she turned and started stalking back toward her cousin.
“No, no, no,” Aidan said quickly, stepping between the two before they could get near each other. “Both of you stop it,” he ordered. “We don’t have time for this. Look at poor Caswyn. He’s practically falling off his horse. He’s weakening by the second and you two want to keep this ridiculous fight going? We have our orders—let’s just get them over with.”
Brannie closed her eyes, taking a moment to get control of her intense anger. She knew he was right, but Aidan also knew that she’d hate admitting it.
Which meant, of course, that she wouldn’t.
“Let’s go,” she muttered. But she just as quickly stopped and pointed her finger at Keita. “But if any of my troops suffer because of you—”
“Oh, for the love of the gods, let it go!” Keita nearly screamed at her. “Your troops! Your troops! You and your troops have one purpose in this world! Protect the throne! Do your job, Branwen the Awful!”
Brannie was reaching for Keita’s throat when Aidan slapped her arm down and stepped into her.
“Stand by the horse, Princess,” he ordered. “I’ll be right there.”
With much flouncing, the princess stomped off and Aidan said to Branwen, “I need your help. I can’t do this alone. Do you understand that?”
“I’m just so frustrated,” she bit out between brutally clenched teeth.
“I know. But let’s get Caswyn and Uther someplace safe, where they can heal. Food and a good night’s sleep is probably all you need. I won’t say tomorrow will be a better day, but it will be a new one. We’ll start again, and we’ll get it right.”
“But I want to kill her,” she admitted in a whisper.
“You can’t. Otherwise, most of my kin would have been dead a long time ago instead of irritating Rhiannon with their needy presence at Devenallt Mountain.”
A small smile managed to turn up the corners of her mouth. “Your mother will annoy our queen, won’t she?”
“Greatly. She will greatly annoy our queen. And, to be honest, probably already has annoyed her. My mother doesn’t usually waste time with that sort of thing.”
Brannie nodded. “Knowing that does help.”
Without another word, Brannie returned to her horse and mounted him. Once she was comfortable in the saddle, she took in a deep, cleansing breath, and let it out.
Closing her eyes, she finally said with obvious great pain, “Where to first, Keita?”
Keita, sitting sidesaddle behind Aidan, pointed down the road. “That way. There are friends of mine where we can stay with for the night. But remember, we’re not kin, you and I, and we’re definitely not dragons. All of you are my guards. Keep that in mind, and we’ll be able to get much from them without any trouble.”
Shaking her head, Brannie said, “You and I have vastly different definitions of the word friends.”
Keita shrugged. “That’s why I have so few. But who needs them,” she asked, flashing that brutally bitchy smile, “when you have kin?”
Brannie, with some great force of will, choked back her next words, and headed off down the road. The rest of them followed.
* * *
Briec the Mighty, Shield Hero of the Dragon Wars, Lord Defender of the Dragon Queen’s Throne, and extremely proud father of two of the most amazing and perfect, perfect daughters in the known universe, watched his first daughter, Iseabail the Dangerous, General of the Eighth, Fourteenth, and Twenty-Sixth Legions, help her men make quick work of a gigantic, burned tree stump.
Izzy didn’t have to help her troops do this sort of grunt work. Briec definitely wouldn’t. But she wasn’t just a royal with a title. She loved the world of the soldier. From the most mundane guard duty to creating elaborate battle plans, she could do it all. And do it all well.
Briec hadn’t been happy when his daughter had made it clear to one and all that she wanted to join Annwyl the Bloody’s army. She’d only been sixteen. A baby, even for a human. But he’d foolishly assumed that a few months of living in the muck and mire as an army private would change her opinion and she’d be back, safe, with him and her mother at Garbhán Isle.
He’d been so wrong. She came home, of course, for leave, but always with her eye on getting back out there. Back to the muck and the mire and the blood and the danger and the harsh world of being a soldier in an active army. There were those who felt Izzy had only gotten her rank because of her family connection to Annwyl the Bloody. As fast as Izzy moved up those ranks, this attitude wasn’t exactly shocking. But the troops quickly learned that Izzy wasn’t just some daft royal who thought it would be fun to play with true warriors.
And those who pushed her, those who really didn’t want her as part of their army, soon learned she was not a girl—now a woman—to be pushed.
Briec never asked her for specifics of what her life in the military was like. He honestly didn’t want to know. But as long as she came home with her usual smile and happy attitude, he didn’t really worry about it.
Of course, if someone had hurt her, if someone had crossed those lines that Annwyl the Bloody insisted her troops respect, Briec wouldn’t have stopped until he’d caught the bastard and had him on a spit for the entire Cadwaladr Clan to feast upon . . . as was their way.
But Izzy had never needed his protection. Over time, she’d even earned respect from the most bigoted and hardened human soldiers who thought royals shouldn’t do anything but get out of their way.
Now she had control of three legions and was the right-hand woman of the queen and the queen’s second in command, Brastias.
Once the stump was pulled out of the ground, she ordered it to be taken off and broken into kindling.
Hands on her hips, she looked around the growing camp and tried to figure out what issue would next need to be tackled. That’s when she saw him.
Briec loved how her face lit up, her smile wide.
“Daddy!”
She ran to him, jumped up, threw her arms around his neck, and hugged him tight.
It was true. Izzy was not blood; her father had been her mother’s first love. But she was still Briec’s first daughter, as far as he was concerned.
“You’re here!” she said when he’d placed her back on the ground.
“We’re here.”
She suddenly took his hand and pulled him toward the general’s tent. Once inside, she faced him. “Where’s Fearghus?”
“With the twins. They said they need to talk to him alone. But why is that?”
An answer came from a dark corner. “The mad queen is missing.”
Father and daughter turned and watched the ancient Cadwaladr witch limp out of the shadows.
“Where did you come from?” Izzy demanded.
“Don’t whine so.”
“I wasn’t whining, Brigida. What do you want?”
“I’m here to help.” She made an expression that some might consider a smile but both Briec and Izzy stepped back from her.
She rolled her eyes. “I don’t know why I bother with you idiots.”
“Perhaps you shouldn’t then,” Briec replied. “Bother, I mean.”
“Can you get Annwyl back?” Izzy asked.
“I have no idea where she is.”
“Then what can you help with?”
“Preparing for what’s coming our way.” She rested against her walking stick and Briec noticed that the old She-dragon was having trouble breathing. She was as worn down as he’d ever seen her. But he wouldn’t count Brigida the Most Foul out yet. No. Not her.
Only a fool would do that. And Briec was no fool.
At first, he’d traveled down the road of the Battle Mage, learning about magicks and the spells that controlled them. But his interest hadn’t lasted and he had ended up becoming a Dragonwarrior instead, much to his mother’s disappointment and his father’s surprise.
Briec still remembered enough about the world of magicks and mystics, though, to know and see real power when it was staring him in the face. Even when that face was a little hard to look at.