The screech came again, and again in quick successions. Vinnandra's ears hurt from the impact, and clutching them didn't help one bit.
Tania's screech was more like a high-pitched, piercing cry that spelt both pain and a need to protect something… or someone.
Vinn accompanied the guard hurriedly, her mind bouncing between what could possibly be going on and coming up blank. As they passed through the many corridors and hallways, she heard the maids gossiping amongst themselves.
"They say that Lord is bonded to three dragons." One of them was saying.
"Three?!" The other maid slapped her palm against her mouth as if she'd just come to the knowledge that a dragon grew three heads. "Isn't that much?"
Vinn didn't get to hear what more they were saying as they approached closer to her father's office. Her mind wandered to the man who she knew was the subject of their discussion—Lord Lenklock.
Vinn had suspected it was him when she saw his black dragon. The Lord of Lenklock was known informally as the central authority in the large expanse of the north which they ruled along side the Attamas'. It was in the north that cold and ice dominated. It was also there that the largest fortress in Dragonia was stationed—named Lenklock fortress.
When they approached the door to their destination which was barricaded by several guards—both her fathers and the council's men—Vinn could hear the rising voices coming from inside the office.
One of the council members in a tone devoid of every emotion was saying, "…even our witches were unable to repair it, Lord Albridge, do you even understand the severity of the situation?"
"I do." Her father replied in a small voice she almost didn't catch. The tone was unlike his status, but was like the man she had come to know in the last eight years.
"The Lord of Albridge summoned her," Fintra said to the guards.
"She will wait till she's summoned in." One of the council's guards replied gruffly.
Vinnandra took that opportunity to eavesdrop. She closed her eyes like she always did and stretched her senses so she would be able to hear them as much as she could.
"No you don't, Albridge. The people want an explanation, we're here for an explanation, and you better give us a damn good one." This time, a different person was speaking in a tone that said authority and power.
Somehow, Vinn knew that it was Lord Lenklock.
There was a long pause, almost like everyone was waiting for something to happen.
The screech came again, this time, it was more like a howl that Vinnandra felt deep within her bones.
What was happening to Tania? She got her answer soon.
"Albridge, if you keep dallying, my dragon will be sure to break yours. Spirit, soul, bones…it doesn't matter to Sallyn. He will crush anything and everything, until all that's left of poor dear Tania is the sensation of pain you will feel from a loss that you'll never recover from."
Those words didn't sound like mere threats, it would seem in fact that Lord Lenklock's terrifying black dragon, Sallyn, was bringing Tania into forced submission.
In her mind, Vinn's eyes still shut, she flipped through pages of books she had read on dragon kind. When she had seen Lenklock's dragon, she'd briefly thought it looked familiar although she couldn't pinpoint why. At least, she was sure she hadn't seen Sallyn before today.
Then like a light bulb it came to her. In the book, Dragon Kind, there was a chapter dedicated to what was termed the Three Dragon Kind of origin. One there was a dragon kind known as Dundare. A line of black, fierce dragons with blazing red eyes that possessed the special ability to bring other dragons to pain by what was termed simultaneous eye contact between the riders and the dragon,
In this case, it meant that Sallyn held Tania's eyes with his, and Lord Lenklock currently held her father's eyes with his too. By doing so simultaneously, Sallyn could inflict pain on Tania.
The problem with that theory though was that Sallyn was not a direct descendant of the Dundare dragon line. She knew this clearly because Sallyn's eyes were a murky white and not a flaming red.
Besides, all the original dragons of origin were dead.
Going by that theory, it would only mean that Sallyn was an indirect descendant of the line, and had somehow managed to master an ability even pure descendants wielded with great effort.
"But I've a clear explanation for you… one that will satisfy the people, the lords, and even the gods." Her father's voice cut off her thought, and she was jerked off from the book she was flipping through in her head.
"Pray tell what it is." Lenklock drawled in a bored tone like he would be anywhere but there.
"It is true that a child shall not pay for the sins of their parents." Her father started, his voice no longer small and growing terser and animated by the minute. "But when said child is an accomplice to the sins of her parents, then she shall pay the price!" He finished in what could pass for a shout.
Dread settled like a coiled snake in Vinn's stomach...twisting, stretching, and generally uncomfortable. In that moment, she knew her life would change forever with whatever her father would say next.
For the first time in a long long time, the true lord Albridge of the South, bonded to one of the strongest and canny dragons, stepped out from the chains that once held him back… whatever those chains were.
As he spoke his next words, his voice was devoid of any demureness, any submissiveness, and any weakness.
"My daughter…. No, Traitor Saegra's the hateful has caused great harm to Dragonia! She's the one who must account to the people!"
The word people rang like a bell across the hallway she still stood in, and when its echo recessed, all that was left was chills and goosebumps.
"Together with Saegra, Vinnandra the hateful not only deceived the Albridge royal family, but also brought shame to all of the Albridgians who loved and adored her."
For the second time that day, or was it the third time, the dam broke. Uncontrollable tears of hurt, pain, hurt, pain, and hurt kept on flowing.
"Is Vinnandra the hateful not Lord Albridge's daughter?" The question was sarcastic, daring, bold and lazy, and the voice that spoke it seemed to belong to a young man. Vinnandra didn't remember seeing anyone her age among the council. But she did not have the time to ponder it further.
"Usher Vinnandra the hateful in!" Her father screamed, as if to answer the question, and the doors that barricaded Vinn from the impending doom awaiting in the room opened.
Everything that happened next was a blur. The fog of tears over her eyes could barely allow her to take in the council members, or the situation in the room.
But she registered her father taking up a dagger and creating a deep gash in his left palm. In the same strong voice he continued, "I, Lord Tank Albridge, and my family, Pete Albridge, Cleo Albridge, and Fred Albridge, disavow Vinnandra the hateful as our blood.
"Today, in one voice we curse the day she joined us, and we'll forever celebrate the day she has left our ranks! Vinnandra shall not know us, and she is not ours to know anymore."
Amidst gasps of surprise by some of the council members who never thought her father… no, Lord Albridge would go as far as alienating his own daughter from his royal line, Vinnandra finally had a startling clarity with the physical pain she had come to feeling in the face of the disavowment.
Dragon Riders don't like it when others grovel, when they're weak, or when they're incapable… to her family she was all that, and it is why they found her so easily discardable.
Never again would she be discarded. She would fight, claw, cheat her way into somehow, wiping away the stain of her existence. Except deep down, she knew she wasn't that capable.
And that hurt.
On her knees before the not less than twenty men that stared at her with a mixture of expressions on their face, Vinnandra felt her status as a part of the royal family, stripped away from her bit by bit in the most heartbreaking manner.
She was no longer an Albridge.
She was still on the floor minutes later, back hunched from stifling pain, as her father and the council members all murmured in agreement that they finally had the best explanation for the people.
She could imagine what she looked like—pitiable, weak, incapable…discardable.
"I wonder how the maids will clean up all that tear and snot." The same young but gruff voice that asked her fa… Lord Albridge, if she was not his daughter, spoke again.
Vinn noticed it was just her and the mystery man in the room. She looked up and her breath hitched in her throat.
Blocks of ice, shaped, sculpted, honed, cared for diligently, and then kept in a snow room where it could never melt… that was how Vinn would describe this man's careless handsomeness that came together into some mad, put together, male of a man.
His lean muscles stood out, giving his physique a careless look of strength.
"Here," the mystery young man offered her a handkerchief, "at least have some conscience on behalf of the maids."
Unconsciously, Vinn took the offered piece of cloth. But instead of using it, she kept staring at it. The man sat beside her on the floor as if they were friends talking about the weather.
Who the hell was he? No member of the council should be this young, he didn't even look more than twenty even though he had a very mature aura about him.
"Do you know what happens to members of the royal family that commit treason, in this case you?" He asked, staring ahead.
"Instead of execution, they're turned into official slaves who serve another royal family." Vinn replied, her voice defeated.
The young man turned to look at her kneeling form, then quirked his eyebrows as if asking a question. "Well welcome to hell, Vinnandra the hateful."
It really wasn't supposed to, but why did those words have a different meaning as they rolled off his tongue?