“Come,” she said simply. “We have business to discuss with the Lord Skayl’n.”

  He raised a hand and rubbed his cheek. “What is it with these guys?”

  “I don’t know but I’m taking notes. Next time you lose your temper when I’m casting, I’m using a frypan the same way.”

  Valan gave her a startled glance. “You wouldn’t.”

  Doreia nodded vigorously. “I bloody well would, and you know it.”

  He groaned. “I do.”

  “When you’re quite ready,” the deity snapped, and they moved to stand before the altar.

  He waited until they’d settled, ignoring the concerned comments coming from the kings as they crowded around the woman who’d claimed them.

  “They will take care of her.” The god sounded almost disapproving. “It is this power gain of which I wish to hear more.”

  Doreia explained the idea that he could expand his pool of followers exponentially by recognizing half-breeds as being as sentient as any White Mountain and of as great a value, and by letting them live as equals rather than slaughtered.

  Soft laughter hiccupped behind her when she finished, and she half turned her head. Her mother met her eye, and she saw Valan’s eye and cheek structure looking back, her own, too, if she could bring herself to admit it.

  “It is the very idea I was trying to sell him,” the princess told her.

  She laid a fond hand on Trogaran’s thigh and leaned into Alanadine when the forest elf wrapped his arm around her shoulders.

  “They are as sentient as any of us,” she declared.

  “What you say is heresy,” Skayl’n reprimanded.

  “Only among the tribes,” the princess pointed out. “Have you ever wondered why other deities have so much more power than our own?”

  She let the god ponder that for a moment, then added, “I only wanted that for the gods who rule my people, that we might match the other races in deific power.”

  Her voice caught.

  “Was that so wrong?”

  Doreia clenched her hands into fists and kept them in her lap. She resisted the need to reach over and take Valan’s hand, while waiting for the deity to answer.

  “I could do with the extra power,” the deity admitted, “But to take it in the manner in which you suggest would cost me the very base that makes up my power.”

  “But…” Doreia began, and the god overrode her.

  “However, I can see another way I can leverage your suggestion, and for that I will reward you with your lives.”

  Valan blew out a breath of relief and rose to his feet.

  “I did not say you could leave alive,” Skayl’n stated, and he froze.

  Doreia scrambled to her feet beside him.

  ‘No…” the god continued. “For this to work you all need to die…and my people need to witness my wrath.”

  “But…” Doreia began.

  They turned, preparing to bolt toward the temple doors, and were seized by a force that held them in place. Standing with one foot raised to run, Valan wished he could look to his sister. If he was going to die, he at least wanted to say goodbye.

  Unable to move, he discovered he couldn’t look away when the White Mountain tribesfolk began filing into the open space before the altar. He had no way to protest the god’s words, when Skayl’n claimed he caught them in the act of defiling his most holy of places.

  Perhaps it is better this way, he thought. This way I cannot betray Brel and his people.

  The god’s voice arrived in his head.

  “The dragon will catch you.”

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  “He’ll what?” Valan shouted, but Skayl’n refused to be drawn.

  “You will see.”

  Valan thought frantically. If he was going to lose his life and not be able to say goodbye to his sister into the bargain, he at least wanted something good to come of it.

  “And the city?”

  The deity refused to be drawn.

  “You will see,” he promised. “For now, enjoy the show.”

  Varan wanted to ask how he was going to enjoy anything when he knew he was about to be murdered by a deity who’d promised… Valan paused, remembering.

  Skayl’n hadn’t promised anything. He’d just demanded they meet him before midnight or they would lose the offer of an audience. Valan wanted to hang his head in shame. They’d walked into a trap like an unsuspecting rabbit stepped into a snare…and they were just as thoroughly caught.

  We’re screwed.

  “Perhaps,” the deity replied, and Valan swore the god was laughing.

  There was no laughter in his voice, however, when he addressed the White Mountain elves now massed in the temple proper.

  “Whereas I had thought to purify them,” he announced, “I have come to see there is no redeeming vessels this flawed, and I would have the satisfaction of executing abomination and sympathizer together.”

  Were there not five children? Valan wondered.

  “Never,” the deity replied, even as he listed the princess’s improprieties, and the danger of dealing with ‘tainted blood.’ Out loud he concluded with, “Such is the transgression that brought these creatures into being, and such is my offense that nothing short of complete elimination will suffice.”

  Flame leapt around Valan, setting cloth alight and causing him to cry out in pain, then it lifted away from his skin, enveloping a thin layer of air that did little to keep the heat at bay. He heard Doreia’s shriek of pain and the kings and princess cry out, then the flame flared blindingly bright and the world flickered out.

  He landed heavily on a surface that gave, then sprang back, beneath his weight, and he landed in company.

  Doreia’s soft ‘oof’ came from the weight on his right, and Trogaran’s groan came from his left. From farther away, came other groans, then Brel’s voice slipped through their skull.

  “We’ll be landing, soon.”

  “The city?” Valan asked. “What happened to the city?”

  “The White Mountains left, declaring their holy campaign at an end. Without their allies, the Oshalans couldn’t hold the ground against some very upset citizens.” The dragon paused, then continued, amusement lightening his mental tones. “No one knew exactly how many adventurers had come to retire there, but they know it now.”

  “But…we can’t ever go back, there…can we?” Doreia voiced the question for which Valan was most dreading the answer.

  “It is not your home,” the dragon replied shortly, “And I believe we have some royalty that needs to make a homecoming.”

  “But won’t the White Mountains find out we aren’t really dead?” Valan asked.

  “No. The only ones who’ve seen us dwell in the local mountain range, and you will be living far away from White Mountain territory. The only reason your fathers were there was due to an attempt to bring peace to a small kingdom on the White Mountain borders…”

  “We hoped that when their more powerful neighbors offered peace, they would accept the opportunity.” Trogaran’s mental voice sounded beyond tired. Regret gave his words weight, and Alanadine added more.

  “Instead, they took the opportunity to take five kings and weaken their neighbors. We thought they would ransom us, but…they didn’t.”

  The serpent elf’s response came, angry and bitter. “They enslaved us, like every other non-White Mountain sentient they capture.”

  “We were paraded to show their victory, then auctioned to the highest bidder and sent deeper into their lands.” Valan thought that came from the sea elf. “We do not even know if we have kingdoms to return to.”

  “Or what disruption our return will bring,” the other human king added softly. “I would rather not bring civil war to my heirs.”

  “We will not leave you where you think you will cause harm,” the dragon soothed.

  Silence followed, and they felt him descend.

  “I don’t understand,” Doreia commented. “How does this increase his worshipper base and power?”

  “Because he has changed the nature of the purification ceremony,” Brel replied. “Now, he ‘executes’ all half-breeds as he did you, and teleports them to a place of sanctuary far from White Mountain lands. I am taking you to one, now.

  “And in return?” Doreia asked.

  “In return, he asks they pray for the safety of other half-breeds that fall within his lands,” Brel replied.

  “So he becomes a deity of protection for half-breeds,” Doreia concluded. “His power will be…”

  “As great as any non-White Mountain deity within a few short decades,” Brel agreed. “It is why you are free, and why we will meet in the first of his sanctuaries.”

  “Which is where?” Trogaran asked.

  “On the southern edge of your lands, where it meets the forests of Alanadine at the mouth of the inlet leading into the bay where Sveraste’s people dwell.”

  “Close to my home,” the serpent elf observed.

  “And mine,” the other human king put in, and both had longing in their voices.

  The dragon ignored them, backwinging to slow his forward momentum and dropping.

  “Now, brace,” he ordered.

  They landed in the soft pre-dawn light, in the courtyard of a high-walled temple, where a group of priests had gathered. The dragon waited until Ravendar and his men slid from its back, then morphed back into human form.

  He greeted Trogaran like a brother.

  “I am sorry it took so long to find you.”

  “You did not give up,” the North king replied, his voice rough with emotion. “For that my kingdom thanks you.”

  He looked around, finding Valan and helping him to his feet, while Alanadine assisted Doreia to her feet.

  “I have a daughter,” the elf king said, and Doreia answered with a shaky laugh.

  “And I, a father,” she replied, brushing at her eyes.

  Valan looked from them to the man still gripping his arm. He might not have known the name of a White Mountains god, but he did know of the trouble succession could bring.

  “I do not want a kingdom,” he said, and Trogaran smiled.

  “But I still want another son.” His smile faded to anxiety. “Will you stay?”