Silence spreads across the table. A thick, cloying silence rife with thoughts of bloodshed. Just hours ago, we were in a battle to the death. And now? We stand in some semblance of tenuous peace.

I lean back in the hard-backed chair across from Ben Errol. Beside me is David and General Brackenridge with Sir Rey and Bridget's father behind us as guards. Ben Errol has a flinty-eyed man as his second and the black-robed mage with the scar from eye to chin as his third. Two guards in purple capes stand behind them.

None of us have touched the tea and sweet smelling treys of food before us.

"What do you want?" Ben Errol finally asks, his voice harsh and grating.

But I hide my grin. The first to speak is the first to lose. And judging by the harsh and knowing gleam in Ben Errol's eyes, he knows this.

"Peace," I reply softly.

He hides a scoff. "Peace. All I can do is direct a dwindling army."

"Then direct them away from here."

"Videlia will be in our hands by nightfall."

I cock my head, spreading my hands. "And how do you see such a thing? The power is not in your hands this day."

"This day, you're right," he grunts. "But tomorrow? This is a drop in the ocean for the Empire. Do you truly want their might turned on you?"

I shake my head, hiding a grin. "Then you expect surrender?"

"Flee. Take yours and flee."

I tap my chin, as if considering. But I have already decided.

David leans in from my right. "Ensure Videlia's safety for those who remain."

I nod, turning back to Ben Errol. "And what of those who remain?"

"They will be cared for as citizens of the Empire."

"I have seen how well the Empire treats their citizens," I reply, scorn dripping from the word.

He winces. "They will be treated the best of which I myself am capable of providing."

"And what proof do I have of such?"

"A treaty ensuring their safety and covering your retreat," he says, as if the words were rehearsed. He takes a mug and pours tea when his voice breaks.

I lean forward, catching his eye. "Words and paper mean nothing to the blood that will spill if you fail to keep your promise." The skinny man beside him shivers at the threat in my voice and the guards step forward.

"Which is why I propose a hostage exchange."

I lean back, struggling to keep the stock from my face. "As the royals do?"

He nods, steepling his fingers and meeting my gaze with a stark wisdom that has seen much which has both hardened and softened this man. "I will go with you to see the resting of my brother to ensure Videlia's survival."

"And our hostage?"

"We have Frida. Will you harm me at the cost of her?"

I lock down my emotions. "No."

"Then we have an agreement?"

I nod and reach across the table. He eyes the extended hand with disgust, but clasps my forearm, sealing the treaty.

----------------------------------------

I exit the tent with a brain as foggy as the smoke still erupting from Videlia. The dragons fly over her, carrying buckets of salt, sand, and whatever else they can find to stop the flames. A few dragons even returned from the hills, helping with the destruction they’d caused. I just hope they end up with something worth saving once all is said and done. The dragons I freed no longer have riders. The humans hopped off and returned to the jingoist army after one was almost skewered by his own dragon.

The men and women who were freed meander around the tent, some looking as if they're completely lost. Others sit staring into space, even as humans, Were, and Shifters hand out blankets and food. They lead the freed into Videlia and hopefully to a freedom that won't cost them their lives. But freedom of mind is priceless.

In that moment, the realization comes, watching the freed being tended and loved. I was not ready to free the men and women and dragons from their chains when we sabotaged the catapults and freed the wingless dragons.

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The chained doesn’t know freedom. Only one who knows freedom can set others free.

And somehow you just managed to put all the chained around me, just in reach of Beast or whatever the heck that was, by putting a small child in the very center of a battlefield?

I told you to watch, comes his amused voice.

I laugh aloud, shaking my head and feeling lighter than I have… well, ever since I can remember.

The mages embrace their sons, daughters, and loved ones, tears streaming down the faces of those in rag and in robe alike. Ben Errol kept his promise to release the mages. I allow a small smile on my face as the freed mages, humans, and Shifters grieve and rejoice all at once. It's my hope they can begin to heal, mentally and physically, after what they have been through.

But if I can… then anyone can. And that gives me hope for those in so much pain before me. It will take time, but they can find something worth living for again. And I will do my best to ensure that happens… but I also know that it will be their choice. They will have to choose to live again, for themselves. That is not something I can do for them.

Is this how you felt with me? I ask the sky.

Every tale is different. Every being takes a different color in the tapestry of life. But all are relevant.

That doesn’t answer my question, I say, amusement soaking into my pores.

It doesn’t? he asks, faux surprisement coating his voice.

I shake my head, frustration and amusement leaking from me. Did I expect him to not speak in riddles? Not really. I know him too well by now.

Flash walks up to me, his mouth set in a thin line.

“Nova?” I ask, my heart dropping from my chest to my toes.

He gives a succinct nod.

“Take me." A part of me fears I am too late, that in the mix of ensuring Videlia's survival, I may have missed my last hours with her. But I know what she would have wanted me to choose. She fought for this. She would want me to see it through. And so I did. But now... it is time to see my dragon.

Flash leads me through the people, all who watch me as if I am untouchable. As if I am from another world or am a deity.

I want to tell them I am just like them. I was a slave and eventually ran… but eventually, I found hope beyond my past and joy beyond my present. I want them to know the hope in my heart and the joy of my soul, even in the midst of pain. This is the freedom of the chained and unchained alike.

Flash breaks into a jog after we exit the hundreds of people milling around with humans from the city along with Were and Shifters tending to them and the freed wolves, and I follow at his heel, leaping between mutilated bodies and ignoring the stench of exposed and decaying limbs and torsos. A severed hand lay in a puddle of brown and crusty blood beside a headless torso and someone screams as they are taken from the battlefield missing a limb.

I loathe this… but it no longer turns my stomach as it used to when I was a child with my first kill. Since then, death has been commonplace.

Still yet, I don’t look down after that, not wishing to know what squelches beneath my bare feet but knowing innately what intestines beneath skin and bone feels like. This is why I hate changing form. It leaves me without boots. Most of my pants sort-of survived. They’re just more tattered and holy than usual, but with enough to prevent any indecent exposure.

We circle bloating dragons who made craters when they landed, bypass a large boulder launched from who knows where, and finally come upon a crater where a dark form lay.

Shock takes the strength from my limbs and a ringing sounds in my ears.

“Roland? Roland?” Flash grips my shoulder and shakes me.

I blink, not even flinching at his touch, even though he touched a bolt that is healing into my skin.

Flash pulls his hand away, looking at the bolts healed into my flesh and the areas around them streaked with red and hot to the touch with concern. “Roland…” he says, drawing out my name. "I thought you would have those tended to by now."

But I cannot take my eyes from the dark form below. “Not now, Flash,” I growl.

Nova lay in the center of a crater. Bodies and parts are all around where she landed.

Something broken and taught within me snaps when she’s still as the dead bodies around this field of war.

I stop. I cannot. I can’t…

Roland, she yet lives, comes a soft whisper from Cynic. A whisper that knows death is near.

We can smell it on the air.

I force my feet to move, sliding down the side of the crater. I fall in front of her nose, feeling a breath of air from her nostrils that is so small I almost think I imagined it.

I place my hand on her snout and she moans.

“I’m here,” I whisper, and one large eye opens a mere slit as her nostrils flare.

Disjointed images flow from her mind to my own, images of flying into a massive whirlpool and then I see dragons and the serpent-like winged creatures who fought with us this day. With those images comes moments of fear, hope, and pain. Pain of being rejected where you thought you belonged.

She gave up much to bring me an army.

A tear drips from her eye, a glistening drop that shatters against the ground reddened with the lifeblood pouring from wounds too large for me to dam. I see Morgana's touch in many places of fresh flesh enclosing wounds, but even she cannot heal this.

Nova gives a large sigh, and I feel her drifting from my mind.

Stay with me, girl. Don’t leave me.

Her eye languidly blinks and she shifts her body, her face twisting in pain. She asks through image and emotion if we won.

I glance up, giving a sad smile as the serpents swing above with dragons all around, no longer fighting. Cries of pain from the wounded and the clank of armor and stomping of boots meets my ears but I no longer hear the yells of anger and screeches of the dying nor the ringing of swords or the sinking, sucking sound of metal into flesh.

“We have won,” I say softly.

She relaxes against the ground, breathing out a sigh. She gives into the drifting, her soul content with her sacrifice, feeling it worth it.

“Nothing is worth your life, beautiful one.”

She peeks open one eye, a joy in their depths despite the pain. She speaks in images of strength. Of her standing up and doing what was right. Of fighting. Of bravery. And she gives me the credit.

I snort softly. “No, dear one. Your strength has always been a part of you. You merely needed someone to help you see it.”

I know I don’t imagine her smile.

A breath of air comes from her lips, and I know the sound of a soul leaving a body.

“Take me instead,” I hoarsely whisper, my throat tight, but know it’s too late.

I lean my forehead against her snout, soaking in the warmth of our bond for the last time as she slowly drifts away.