Dragon Prince - Chapter Twenty
Dragon Prince
Chapter Twenty
“What is all of this?” Hyunjoong asked, glaring at the mess of straps and leather in front of him.
“It is a saddle so that you can ride your dragon safely,” Suk-chul told him patiently.
“A saddle?” he asked incredulously, eyeing it. It looked somewhat like a saddle he supposed, perhaps if he looked at it sideways, and squinted.
“Yes. It will work just like a horse’s saddle, but there are several extra straps to secure you and it to your dragon,” he explained.
“I don’t like it,” Hyunjoong said flatly.
“It is necessary though. With it your dragon will be able to fly without worrying about you falling off if he needs to maneuver quickly.”
‘Can we please stop talking about me like I’m not here?’ Youngsaeng said irritably from where he was stretched in the sun across the warm rocks.
“I don’t need it. I’ll just use a blanket or something,” Hyunjoong insisted.
“A blanket won’t work. It will be better for everyone if you just use this.”
‘He will never understand what our bond allows us mate,’ Youngsaeng said quietly in his mind. ‘The bond he shares with Arunika does not allow him the same privilege. It is best to learn how to use it. I would not want to fly into battle without you secured even if we are more aware of each other than normal.’
“Alright, show me how,” Hyunjoong relented.
Suk-chul nodded and lifted the mass and carried it to Youngsaeng. He settled it on the dragon’s neck just above his shoulders between the two ridges of bone where Hyunjoong normally sat. The saddle itself was made from flexible leather that molded around the shape of the ridges and the dragon’s neck. A series of straps secured to the underside of his neck. Suk-chul instructed him how to secure them and then stepped back to allow him to try.
It took Hyunjoong three tries before he was able to do it the other man’s satisfaction. When he had, Suk-chul had him climb onto it and explained the series of straps that would secure his legs and waist to the saddle. When done properly, Youngsaeng would be free to perform any move without fear of throwing his rider. At the same time a few quick unlatches of various well placed buckles would have the rider free of the straps in under a minute.
Suk-chul repeated the process of showing him and then correcting Hyunjoong until he could do them to his satisfaction. It took him longer to be able to secure the straps, not only properly but quickly as well. When he had finally performed it to his teacher’s satisfaction, Suk-chul patted the dragon on the shoulder. “Now dragon, show your rider what it means to fly.”
Hyunjoong nearly corrected the man again but the joy and eagerness he could feel coming from Youngsaeng kept him from bothering. He leaned forward and ran his fingers down warm black scales. “What do you say? Should we show him how it is done?”
Youngsaeng didn’t answer with words choosing instead to gather his legs beneath him and launch himself from the ledge. A moment later his wings opened caught air, and they were flying.
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“Hey,” Yunho greeted him warmly as they joined his guards for dinner that evening. “It’s good to see you are alright. They told us where you were but it is pretty impossible to get anywhere around here without a guide or a dragon.”
Hyunjoong knew he wasn’t telling the absolute truth. One or all of them had very likely already memorized several places that would lead to the outside and how to get to several dozen other places. “I’m sorry,” he answered honestly. “I have been busy.”
Yoochun smirked and glanced between Hyunjoong and Youngsaeng who was sitting beside him. “I imagine you have been.”
“So, when you become King what will we call Youngsaeng? Queen? We can’t have two Kings,” Jaejoong stated seriously and Yunho laughed.
Hyunjoong shrugged. They hadn’t officially told anyone that they were mates, but he figured that word would travel quickly after their morning display before the council. If they hadn’t heard from someone else, his guards seemed to always know what had happened with him anyways. “We should probably worry about facing the current King before anything else.”
“Speaking of that,” Yunho said, “They don’t tell us anything. Is there a plan? What is going on?”
“We would like to know too,” Kyujong said offhandedly as he, Jungmin, and Hyungjoon joined them at the table.
“They haven’t told you?” Hyunjoong asked surprised.
“Not a word,” Jungmin confirmed. “My guess is that they haven’t decided for sure what they are doing yet.”
“There is more involved in this,” Yunho agreed. “The last thing we did, we just marched off and if we didn’t come back it wouldn’t have permanently damaged anything.”
Jungmin nodded. “I doubt anyone in here has any idea what is going on and it is making everyone edgy.”
Hyunjoong nodded his agreement. The entire cavern that had been turned into their dining hall was filled with the murmur of conversation yet there was an underlying tension in the air. “We don’t have a lot of time. Once the King knows we freed the dragons, who knows what he will do.”
Yunho sobered, “He will know we were with you and he will know that you have found out everything and which side you have chosen.”
Yoochun’s fork clattered from his fingers and landed on the plate below it. “Changmin’s life will be forfeit,” he said in almost a whisper. Junsu and Jaejoong looked shocked.
Yunho nodded resolutely. “I knew it was a chance we were taking,” he said softly, “but Changmin wouldn’t have wanted us to do anything else.”
“My father won’t kill him,” Hyunjoong told them firmly. “He may hurt him, but he won’t kill something that may get us to do his wishes. He knows how much Changmin means to all of us.”
“I think you are right,” Yunho said slowly.
Yoochun picked up his fork and his fingers clenched around it. “There are worse things than death.”
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“Why weren’t there any families eating dinner with us?” Jaejoong asked curiously as they made their way through the halls to the place the council was meeting that evening.
“The women and children and anyone not up to fighting are in a different part of the mountain for their safety,” Jungmin answered. “I have to assume the dragons are in another part all their own.” Youngsaeng’s nod confirmed his words.
“All of the men who were eating dinner with us are capable of holding their own in combat?” Yunho asked a pondering look on his face.
Jungmin nodded. “Yes. If the clan decides to join you then every man in that room will be fighting alongside you.”
“The numbers aren’t great, but the style of fighting may make up for it. Still we will never be able to hold off an entire army for long,” Yunho said.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Hyunjoong mused. “I know my father will attack with his army. What if we hid the dragons in human form amongst our own? Youngsaeng how much magic can you do in human form?” he asked looking curiously at the dragon.
“Almost as much as when we are in dragon form,” he answered. “It takes some of our magic to hold this form but not enough to really hinder us. I think you are forgetting something though,” a smile spread across his face. “Just what is it that I need from you to create this form? There is no way that the dragons would all be willing to accept that.”
Hyunjoong waved him off, ignoring the suggestion of what they had done the previous night. “I wasn’t suggesting they have sex with anyone or anything like that. Can’t they just use any part of the person? Like a hair or a bit of blood?”
“To make an exact copy yes,” Youngsaeng answered, his voice betrayed the fact that he was utterly confused at where the prince was going with this.
“Then it wouldn’t matter,” Jaejoong responded eagerly. “If there are two people who look exactly alike standing on the battlefield, what is it going to matter?”
“It is disturbing for people to see someone who looks exactly like them. We would not want to give our own side anything that will unnerve our people further then they would be,” Youngsaeng countered.
“So they can copy the people who are staying behind,” Jaejoong suggested.
“How would that work?” Junsu asked confused. “They are staying behind because they are not fit for battle. We can’t have a bunch of children running around, even if they are adult dragons in reality.”
“No it wouldn’t work like that,” Youngsaeng told them. “The dragon would look the age that they really are. If a young dragon used you as their template then they were look like you did when you were a child, if they were an older adult then they would look as you will when you age. The only thing the original gives us is the basic shape and bone structure along with features. It could work.”
“We could gather a hair from everyone staying behind so that there is enough to choose from. That way the dragons would never have to see who they are copying,” Jaejoong continued.
“That could work,” Youngsaeng agreed.
Hyunjoong knew they would have pursued the matter further but they fell silent as they arrived at the cavern holding the members of the council. Within every member was present and seated awaiting their arrival. It unnerved Hyunjoong that they had already been discussing and deliberating before he and his friends had arrived but there was nothing he could do about it.
There were five empty chairs left at the edge of the semi circle and Hyunjoong, Youngsaeng, Kyujong, Jungmin, and Hyungjoon each claimed one silently. Hyunjoong’s guards filed in and stood at attention behind his chair as they always had whenever he had attended events with his father.
“Now that everyone is here,” Soojin’s voice, although not raised, carried over the clamor in the room and everyone present quieted. “We can begin.”
“We have decided that we must act now, to wait will be futile. We are willing to try the Prince’s suggestion. If it fails we will pursue other options,” she didn’t mention the small fact that if it failed, it would be because everyone had died trying to complete it.
An elderly woman that Hyunjoong knew to be the elder water dragon that had given him the egg spoke as soon as Soojin had finished. “My brothers and sisters have come to a decision as well. We will fight alongside you for as long as our goals remain the same. Your Youngsaeng has offered us the best option we can think of, we will be ready to join your ranks as humans within the hour.” Hyunjoong smiled as he realized that Youngsaeng must have relayed to her telepathically everything they had discussed.
“Very well,” Soojin agreed. “In one hour Myungki will lay out our plan to all involved. Two hours after he is finished we will move out. Everyone knows what you are to do. You are dismissed.”
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“The egg will be safe here?” Hyunjoong asked Youngsaeng as he glanced at it worriedly.
Youngsaeng, who was sitting behind him pressed tightly to his back hummed in response. “It will be fine. This is my personal room. No dragon would enter it.”
“What if the King can come here,” Hyunjoong asked suddenly. “You create portals; he has dragon magic of all kinds, what if he can do it too?”
“He can’t,” Youngsaeng replied instantly. “It isn’t a portal I am opening; it is a window to home. Most dragons can only do it to two places, their home of residence and the home of their birth, their Haven.”
“You were born here?” Hyunjoong asked, momentarily tracing that thought.
“I hatched in this very room,” Youngsaeng responded. Hyunjoong took in the room with an entirely new feeling of wonder.
“What if the King has the magic of a dragon that was born here too?” Hyunjoong asked.
“It wouldn’t matter. He would need to see it in his mind and feel it in his soul that this was home, he could never do that. Remember how you barely survived Arunika sharing a memory with you? It would be the same for him to be able to see this place and his mate would not aid him in that,” Youngsaeng told him.
At his words Hyunjoong relaxed into his mate. It made him feel a lot better knowing that the remainder of the clan and the egg would be safe here. “If dragons only have two places they can open a portal to, how are you going to open one tonight that will put us a half a day’s ride from the city?”
“I am special. My home is with the clan which means that it has been many places over the years. Any place that the clan has been I can use as my home because at one point it was,” he explained.
“So if a dragon moves they could still open a portal to their old house?”
“Probably. No one that I know of has thought to try, but probably.” Youngsaeng ended his sentence by placing a kiss on Hyunjoong’s neck and running his hand down his side.
“Stop that,” Hyunjoong muttered shrugging him off. “We have to leave in a few minutes.” The meeting in which the plan had been outlined had been thorough, and everyone had been dismissed from it to prepare for motion.
“We have exactly thirty minutes before the sun sets and another thirty before I have to open the portal. We have plenty of time,” Youngsaeng replied and Hyunjoong knew he was grinning.
“Well if every time we have sex is going to be this quick I’m not sure I’m going to enjoy it that much,” Hyunjoong replied.
“Oh don’t worry,” Youngsaeng murmured, his hand finding its way beneath the man’s shirt. “When this is all over, I plan to spend the entire day in bed with you.”
“I would like that,” Hyunjoong replied honestly, trying very hard not to think that this may be their last time together if anything went wrong.
“We should do a bit of a preview then,” Youngsaeng told him. A moment later, Hyunjoong was too busy giving into his kiss to offer him a verbal response. He supposed the kiss was response enough.
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“I don’t like it,” Hyunjoong said darkly. He pulled back on the reigns of his stallion as it danced beneath him. Its coat gleamed in the light of the crystal hanging from his saddle that was helping to light the darkness of the night.
‘You don’t have to like it nor do you have to permit it,’ Youngsaeng replied as he swung his head to face him. ‘It is strategically sound and you know it. Your protest stems from your jealousy.’
Hyunjoong glared at Kyujong who was checking the straps on the saddle holding him safely onto Youngsaeng’s back. “It does not,” he countered. It was the truth, at least in part and they both knew it.
‘He has shot his bow from my back before, he will be safe. I have seen all there is to see from your mind, we will not miss and we will not be caught,’ Youngsaeng reassured him.
“If something happens to you, will I know?” Hyunjoong asked intently.
‘Yes,’ Youngsaeng replied after a moment. ‘Even incomplete we are bound. You will know if something happens to me.’
“Alright,” he finally relented.
“I’ll make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid,” Kyujong told him seriously, locking eyes with him.
‘As will I,’ a feminine voice spoke into his mind. Hyunjoong turned to face the green dragon that was slightly larger than Youngsaeng, with Suk-chul seated upon her back.
“Thank you Arunika,” he replied honestly.
‘I,’ she said hesitantly. ‘I am sorry for what I did to you. It was not just nor was it right to reach into your mind like that. I was angry and in pain.’
“I understand,” he replied, hearing the honesty in her voice. She nodded and then turned back to face the pool they had gathered around.
“We are ready,” Soojin declared, as she rode forward on a large black horse
Youngsaeng nodded and stepped forward. He lowered his head, touching his nose to the water. At his touch the surface flashed brightly. ‘It is open,’ Hyunjoong heard the dragon say into his mind. Soojin urged her horse forward and into the water. As before, when it was fully in it seemed to disappear. Behind her the rest of their troops, humans, and dragons in human form alike, followed her either mounted or on foot.
Hyunjoong stood on his stallion with his guards mounted behind him, watching them go. In his mind he went through the plan again and again, especially the first essential part. He could see no flaw in what they were planning to do, yet it still felt like a suicide mission. Perhaps with time they may have been able to speak to other clans and get more people to help them, but there was not time for that. They needed to move now.
Youngsaeng turned to look at him and emotion flowed between them without a word being spoken. ‘Go,’ the dragon told him gently as the last of the gypsies stepped through the portal. Hyunjoong nodded and nudged his horse forward. It obediently stepped into the pool and a moment later Hyunjoong felt the coolness of it race up his leg. There was nothing he could do to stop it now. Everything would begin with the breaking of the dawn.
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Any large institute was active long before dawn, as residents and workers alike prepared for the approaching day. The King’s personal home was no exception. Located in the heart of the palace and surrounded by the city, the King would wake with the sun and his house with him. As such the King was already rising from his bed when his window shattered inward, an arrow slicing through the air and embedding itself in the floor near the foot of the bed.
The King ignored it for the moment, stepping over the glass and around to the door that opened to his balcony. He grabbed a small jar on the way, forgoing any weapon in favor of it. He wouldn’t need a weapon with it in his possession. Seconds after the arrow had entered his room he was standing on his balcony looking for its source.
There in the sky, racing from the palace, were two dragons their scales shimmering in the dawn light. They were a black and a green, both young judging by their size and both carrying human passengers. It would be a simple thing to capture them with his magic but he had to admit he was intrigued. For the moment he let them go free, tucking the jar back into his robe. It would be a simple matter to hunt them down whenever he chose and he missed the chase hunting a dragon had always been.
With a smile on his face he strode back into his room and plucked the arrow from the floor. Attached was a rolled piece of parchment and he pulled it free. The arrow itself was one of home making, unmistakably the arrow of a gypsy. That in itself was interesting. He held it up to his nose and inhaled deeply. The smell of blood from a metal dragon permeated it and he laughed to himself. Metal dragon magic would have been the only way the arrow would have been able to pierce the shields surrounding his palace. He had never thought of wasting the blood that way, but it was an interesting idea.
The King tossed the arrow on the bed for further perusal and unrolled the parchment. On it were two simple words written in a script that very few people knew. It was a way of writing taught to him by his father and his father before him. He had personally passed it down to his own son and that left no doubts as to whom the note was from. His smile widened into a smirk as he stared down at the page and read the two words: I know
He tossed the paper on his bed and strode confidently to his wardrobe. In short order he was clothed in light travel clothing. The clothes were plain, much plainer then a king would wear, but the armor he would cover them with shortly would make up for it. Fully clothed he strode from his room.
Just outside the room, a servant waited at attention for his appearance. “Prepare my horse for travel. Gather my personal guard and three other units of their choosing. Also bring the special prisoner from my dungeon, he will be coming as well,” the King didn’t spare the servant another glance as he walked by him and the young man scrambled to do as ordered. His orders would be carried out without question. The consequences of not doing so were well know.
He strode through his chambers and to a door that remained locked at all times. At his touch there was the sound of a click and the doors swung open, closing behind him once he was inside the room. The light of the dawn lit the room casting the only object, a bed, in its eerie glow. Upon the bed lay a woman dressed in a flowing white gown. Her eyes were closed in what seemed like slumber, and she appeared peaceful.
On the skin of her face were deep scratches that seemed to not want to heal. They formed a series of symbols on both her cheeks and her forehead. Another area of marks was visible in the center of her chest. The King walked to her and passed his hand through the air above her body. The wounds flashed a bright red and fresh blood beaded forth from them revealing a fifth mark that was located on her stomach and staining her dress pink with the bit of blood. At a second pass her eyes open and she stared unseeing at the ceiling.
Smirking, the King bent and whispered, “Come my Queen, it is time that you met your son.”
Chapter Twenty One
Masterlist
AN: I think I take some sort of pleasure out of writing my creepy bad guys... That was his little scheme and now everything is rolling!!! (And I am way to hyper to type a serious authors note)
Chapter Twenty
“What is all of this?” Hyunjoong asked, glaring at the mess of straps and leather in front of him.
“It is a saddle so that you can ride your dragon safely,” Suk-chul told him patiently.
“A saddle?” he asked incredulously, eyeing it. It looked somewhat like a saddle he supposed, perhaps if he looked at it sideways, and squinted.
“Yes. It will work just like a horse’s saddle, but there are several extra straps to secure you and it to your dragon,” he explained.
“I don’t like it,” Hyunjoong said flatly.
“It is necessary though. With it your dragon will be able to fly without worrying about you falling off if he needs to maneuver quickly.”
‘Can we please stop talking about me like I’m not here?’ Youngsaeng said irritably from where he was stretched in the sun across the warm rocks.
“I don’t need it. I’ll just use a blanket or something,” Hyunjoong insisted.
“A blanket won’t work. It will be better for everyone if you just use this.”
‘He will never understand what our bond allows us mate,’ Youngsaeng said quietly in his mind. ‘The bond he shares with Arunika does not allow him the same privilege. It is best to learn how to use it. I would not want to fly into battle without you secured even if we are more aware of each other than normal.’
“Alright, show me how,” Hyunjoong relented.
Suk-chul nodded and lifted the mass and carried it to Youngsaeng. He settled it on the dragon’s neck just above his shoulders between the two ridges of bone where Hyunjoong normally sat. The saddle itself was made from flexible leather that molded around the shape of the ridges and the dragon’s neck. A series of straps secured to the underside of his neck. Suk-chul instructed him how to secure them and then stepped back to allow him to try.
It took Hyunjoong three tries before he was able to do it the other man’s satisfaction. When he had, Suk-chul had him climb onto it and explained the series of straps that would secure his legs and waist to the saddle. When done properly, Youngsaeng would be free to perform any move without fear of throwing his rider. At the same time a few quick unlatches of various well placed buckles would have the rider free of the straps in under a minute.
Suk-chul repeated the process of showing him and then correcting Hyunjoong until he could do them to his satisfaction. It took him longer to be able to secure the straps, not only properly but quickly as well. When he had finally performed it to his teacher’s satisfaction, Suk-chul patted the dragon on the shoulder. “Now dragon, show your rider what it means to fly.”
Hyunjoong nearly corrected the man again but the joy and eagerness he could feel coming from Youngsaeng kept him from bothering. He leaned forward and ran his fingers down warm black scales. “What do you say? Should we show him how it is done?”
Youngsaeng didn’t answer with words choosing instead to gather his legs beneath him and launch himself from the ledge. A moment later his wings opened caught air, and they were flying.
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“Hey,” Yunho greeted him warmly as they joined his guards for dinner that evening. “It’s good to see you are alright. They told us where you were but it is pretty impossible to get anywhere around here without a guide or a dragon.”
Hyunjoong knew he wasn’t telling the absolute truth. One or all of them had very likely already memorized several places that would lead to the outside and how to get to several dozen other places. “I’m sorry,” he answered honestly. “I have been busy.”
Yoochun smirked and glanced between Hyunjoong and Youngsaeng who was sitting beside him. “I imagine you have been.”
“So, when you become King what will we call Youngsaeng? Queen? We can’t have two Kings,” Jaejoong stated seriously and Yunho laughed.
Hyunjoong shrugged. They hadn’t officially told anyone that they were mates, but he figured that word would travel quickly after their morning display before the council. If they hadn’t heard from someone else, his guards seemed to always know what had happened with him anyways. “We should probably worry about facing the current King before anything else.”
“Speaking of that,” Yunho said, “They don’t tell us anything. Is there a plan? What is going on?”
“We would like to know too,” Kyujong said offhandedly as he, Jungmin, and Hyungjoon joined them at the table.
“They haven’t told you?” Hyunjoong asked surprised.
“Not a word,” Jungmin confirmed. “My guess is that they haven’t decided for sure what they are doing yet.”
“There is more involved in this,” Yunho agreed. “The last thing we did, we just marched off and if we didn’t come back it wouldn’t have permanently damaged anything.”
Jungmin nodded. “I doubt anyone in here has any idea what is going on and it is making everyone edgy.”
Hyunjoong nodded his agreement. The entire cavern that had been turned into their dining hall was filled with the murmur of conversation yet there was an underlying tension in the air. “We don’t have a lot of time. Once the King knows we freed the dragons, who knows what he will do.”
Yunho sobered, “He will know we were with you and he will know that you have found out everything and which side you have chosen.”
Yoochun’s fork clattered from his fingers and landed on the plate below it. “Changmin’s life will be forfeit,” he said in almost a whisper. Junsu and Jaejoong looked shocked.
Yunho nodded resolutely. “I knew it was a chance we were taking,” he said softly, “but Changmin wouldn’t have wanted us to do anything else.”
“My father won’t kill him,” Hyunjoong told them firmly. “He may hurt him, but he won’t kill something that may get us to do his wishes. He knows how much Changmin means to all of us.”
“I think you are right,” Yunho said slowly.
Yoochun picked up his fork and his fingers clenched around it. “There are worse things than death.”
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“Why weren’t there any families eating dinner with us?” Jaejoong asked curiously as they made their way through the halls to the place the council was meeting that evening.
“The women and children and anyone not up to fighting are in a different part of the mountain for their safety,” Jungmin answered. “I have to assume the dragons are in another part all their own.” Youngsaeng’s nod confirmed his words.
“All of the men who were eating dinner with us are capable of holding their own in combat?” Yunho asked a pondering look on his face.
Jungmin nodded. “Yes. If the clan decides to join you then every man in that room will be fighting alongside you.”
“The numbers aren’t great, but the style of fighting may make up for it. Still we will never be able to hold off an entire army for long,” Yunho said.
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Hyunjoong mused. “I know my father will attack with his army. What if we hid the dragons in human form amongst our own? Youngsaeng how much magic can you do in human form?” he asked looking curiously at the dragon.
“Almost as much as when we are in dragon form,” he answered. “It takes some of our magic to hold this form but not enough to really hinder us. I think you are forgetting something though,” a smile spread across his face. “Just what is it that I need from you to create this form? There is no way that the dragons would all be willing to accept that.”
Hyunjoong waved him off, ignoring the suggestion of what they had done the previous night. “I wasn’t suggesting they have sex with anyone or anything like that. Can’t they just use any part of the person? Like a hair or a bit of blood?”
“To make an exact copy yes,” Youngsaeng answered, his voice betrayed the fact that he was utterly confused at where the prince was going with this.
“Then it wouldn’t matter,” Jaejoong responded eagerly. “If there are two people who look exactly alike standing on the battlefield, what is it going to matter?”
“It is disturbing for people to see someone who looks exactly like them. We would not want to give our own side anything that will unnerve our people further then they would be,” Youngsaeng countered.
“So they can copy the people who are staying behind,” Jaejoong suggested.
“How would that work?” Junsu asked confused. “They are staying behind because they are not fit for battle. We can’t have a bunch of children running around, even if they are adult dragons in reality.”
“No it wouldn’t work like that,” Youngsaeng told them. “The dragon would look the age that they really are. If a young dragon used you as their template then they were look like you did when you were a child, if they were an older adult then they would look as you will when you age. The only thing the original gives us is the basic shape and bone structure along with features. It could work.”
“We could gather a hair from everyone staying behind so that there is enough to choose from. That way the dragons would never have to see who they are copying,” Jaejoong continued.
“That could work,” Youngsaeng agreed.
Hyunjoong knew they would have pursued the matter further but they fell silent as they arrived at the cavern holding the members of the council. Within every member was present and seated awaiting their arrival. It unnerved Hyunjoong that they had already been discussing and deliberating before he and his friends had arrived but there was nothing he could do about it.
There were five empty chairs left at the edge of the semi circle and Hyunjoong, Youngsaeng, Kyujong, Jungmin, and Hyungjoon each claimed one silently. Hyunjoong’s guards filed in and stood at attention behind his chair as they always had whenever he had attended events with his father.
“Now that everyone is here,” Soojin’s voice, although not raised, carried over the clamor in the room and everyone present quieted. “We can begin.”
“We have decided that we must act now, to wait will be futile. We are willing to try the Prince’s suggestion. If it fails we will pursue other options,” she didn’t mention the small fact that if it failed, it would be because everyone had died trying to complete it.
An elderly woman that Hyunjoong knew to be the elder water dragon that had given him the egg spoke as soon as Soojin had finished. “My brothers and sisters have come to a decision as well. We will fight alongside you for as long as our goals remain the same. Your Youngsaeng has offered us the best option we can think of, we will be ready to join your ranks as humans within the hour.” Hyunjoong smiled as he realized that Youngsaeng must have relayed to her telepathically everything they had discussed.
“Very well,” Soojin agreed. “In one hour Myungki will lay out our plan to all involved. Two hours after he is finished we will move out. Everyone knows what you are to do. You are dismissed.”
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“The egg will be safe here?” Hyunjoong asked Youngsaeng as he glanced at it worriedly.
Youngsaeng, who was sitting behind him pressed tightly to his back hummed in response. “It will be fine. This is my personal room. No dragon would enter it.”
“What if the King can come here,” Hyunjoong asked suddenly. “You create portals; he has dragon magic of all kinds, what if he can do it too?”
“He can’t,” Youngsaeng replied instantly. “It isn’t a portal I am opening; it is a window to home. Most dragons can only do it to two places, their home of residence and the home of their birth, their Haven.”
“You were born here?” Hyunjoong asked, momentarily tracing that thought.
“I hatched in this very room,” Youngsaeng responded. Hyunjoong took in the room with an entirely new feeling of wonder.
“What if the King has the magic of a dragon that was born here too?” Hyunjoong asked.
“It wouldn’t matter. He would need to see it in his mind and feel it in his soul that this was home, he could never do that. Remember how you barely survived Arunika sharing a memory with you? It would be the same for him to be able to see this place and his mate would not aid him in that,” Youngsaeng told him.
At his words Hyunjoong relaxed into his mate. It made him feel a lot better knowing that the remainder of the clan and the egg would be safe here. “If dragons only have two places they can open a portal to, how are you going to open one tonight that will put us a half a day’s ride from the city?”
“I am special. My home is with the clan which means that it has been many places over the years. Any place that the clan has been I can use as my home because at one point it was,” he explained.
“So if a dragon moves they could still open a portal to their old house?”
“Probably. No one that I know of has thought to try, but probably.” Youngsaeng ended his sentence by placing a kiss on Hyunjoong’s neck and running his hand down his side.
“Stop that,” Hyunjoong muttered shrugging him off. “We have to leave in a few minutes.” The meeting in which the plan had been outlined had been thorough, and everyone had been dismissed from it to prepare for motion.
“We have exactly thirty minutes before the sun sets and another thirty before I have to open the portal. We have plenty of time,” Youngsaeng replied and Hyunjoong knew he was grinning.
“Well if every time we have sex is going to be this quick I’m not sure I’m going to enjoy it that much,” Hyunjoong replied.
“Oh don’t worry,” Youngsaeng murmured, his hand finding its way beneath the man’s shirt. “When this is all over, I plan to spend the entire day in bed with you.”
“I would like that,” Hyunjoong replied honestly, trying very hard not to think that this may be their last time together if anything went wrong.
“We should do a bit of a preview then,” Youngsaeng told him. A moment later, Hyunjoong was too busy giving into his kiss to offer him a verbal response. He supposed the kiss was response enough.
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“I don’t like it,” Hyunjoong said darkly. He pulled back on the reigns of his stallion as it danced beneath him. Its coat gleamed in the light of the crystal hanging from his saddle that was helping to light the darkness of the night.
‘You don’t have to like it nor do you have to permit it,’ Youngsaeng replied as he swung his head to face him. ‘It is strategically sound and you know it. Your protest stems from your jealousy.’
Hyunjoong glared at Kyujong who was checking the straps on the saddle holding him safely onto Youngsaeng’s back. “It does not,” he countered. It was the truth, at least in part and they both knew it.
‘He has shot his bow from my back before, he will be safe. I have seen all there is to see from your mind, we will not miss and we will not be caught,’ Youngsaeng reassured him.
“If something happens to you, will I know?” Hyunjoong asked intently.
‘Yes,’ Youngsaeng replied after a moment. ‘Even incomplete we are bound. You will know if something happens to me.’
“Alright,” he finally relented.
“I’ll make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid,” Kyujong told him seriously, locking eyes with him.
‘As will I,’ a feminine voice spoke into his mind. Hyunjoong turned to face the green dragon that was slightly larger than Youngsaeng, with Suk-chul seated upon her back.
“Thank you Arunika,” he replied honestly.
‘I,’ she said hesitantly. ‘I am sorry for what I did to you. It was not just nor was it right to reach into your mind like that. I was angry and in pain.’
“I understand,” he replied, hearing the honesty in her voice. She nodded and then turned back to face the pool they had gathered around.
“We are ready,” Soojin declared, as she rode forward on a large black horse
Youngsaeng nodded and stepped forward. He lowered his head, touching his nose to the water. At his touch the surface flashed brightly. ‘It is open,’ Hyunjoong heard the dragon say into his mind. Soojin urged her horse forward and into the water. As before, when it was fully in it seemed to disappear. Behind her the rest of their troops, humans, and dragons in human form alike, followed her either mounted or on foot.
Hyunjoong stood on his stallion with his guards mounted behind him, watching them go. In his mind he went through the plan again and again, especially the first essential part. He could see no flaw in what they were planning to do, yet it still felt like a suicide mission. Perhaps with time they may have been able to speak to other clans and get more people to help them, but there was not time for that. They needed to move now.
Youngsaeng turned to look at him and emotion flowed between them without a word being spoken. ‘Go,’ the dragon told him gently as the last of the gypsies stepped through the portal. Hyunjoong nodded and nudged his horse forward. It obediently stepped into the pool and a moment later Hyunjoong felt the coolness of it race up his leg. There was nothing he could do to stop it now. Everything would begin with the breaking of the dawn.
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Any large institute was active long before dawn, as residents and workers alike prepared for the approaching day. The King’s personal home was no exception. Located in the heart of the palace and surrounded by the city, the King would wake with the sun and his house with him. As such the King was already rising from his bed when his window shattered inward, an arrow slicing through the air and embedding itself in the floor near the foot of the bed.
The King ignored it for the moment, stepping over the glass and around to the door that opened to his balcony. He grabbed a small jar on the way, forgoing any weapon in favor of it. He wouldn’t need a weapon with it in his possession. Seconds after the arrow had entered his room he was standing on his balcony looking for its source.
There in the sky, racing from the palace, were two dragons their scales shimmering in the dawn light. They were a black and a green, both young judging by their size and both carrying human passengers. It would be a simple thing to capture them with his magic but he had to admit he was intrigued. For the moment he let them go free, tucking the jar back into his robe. It would be a simple matter to hunt them down whenever he chose and he missed the chase hunting a dragon had always been.
With a smile on his face he strode back into his room and plucked the arrow from the floor. Attached was a rolled piece of parchment and he pulled it free. The arrow itself was one of home making, unmistakably the arrow of a gypsy. That in itself was interesting. He held it up to his nose and inhaled deeply. The smell of blood from a metal dragon permeated it and he laughed to himself. Metal dragon magic would have been the only way the arrow would have been able to pierce the shields surrounding his palace. He had never thought of wasting the blood that way, but it was an interesting idea.
The King tossed the arrow on the bed for further perusal and unrolled the parchment. On it were two simple words written in a script that very few people knew. It was a way of writing taught to him by his father and his father before him. He had personally passed it down to his own son and that left no doubts as to whom the note was from. His smile widened into a smirk as he stared down at the page and read the two words: I know
He tossed the paper on his bed and strode confidently to his wardrobe. In short order he was clothed in light travel clothing. The clothes were plain, much plainer then a king would wear, but the armor he would cover them with shortly would make up for it. Fully clothed he strode from his room.
Just outside the room, a servant waited at attention for his appearance. “Prepare my horse for travel. Gather my personal guard and three other units of their choosing. Also bring the special prisoner from my dungeon, he will be coming as well,” the King didn’t spare the servant another glance as he walked by him and the young man scrambled to do as ordered. His orders would be carried out without question. The consequences of not doing so were well know.
He strode through his chambers and to a door that remained locked at all times. At his touch there was the sound of a click and the doors swung open, closing behind him once he was inside the room. The light of the dawn lit the room casting the only object, a bed, in its eerie glow. Upon the bed lay a woman dressed in a flowing white gown. Her eyes were closed in what seemed like slumber, and she appeared peaceful.
On the skin of her face were deep scratches that seemed to not want to heal. They formed a series of symbols on both her cheeks and her forehead. Another area of marks was visible in the center of her chest. The King walked to her and passed his hand through the air above her body. The wounds flashed a bright red and fresh blood beaded forth from them revealing a fifth mark that was located on her stomach and staining her dress pink with the bit of blood. At a second pass her eyes open and she stared unseeing at the ceiling.
Smirking, the King bent and whispered, “Come my Queen, it is time that you met your son.”
Chapter Twenty One
Masterlist
AN: I think I take some sort of pleasure out of writing my creepy bad guys... That was his little scheme and now everything is rolling!!! (And I am way to hyper to type a serious authors note)