Read Online The Dragons' Chosen by Gwen Dandridge - Free Book Online Page B

for me to be here. I’m positive of that. But I am not sure what I am supposed to do!”
    She shrugged off her train of thought.
    “So what’s our plan?”
    I rearranged my riding skirts. “There is no plan, we arrive in a fortnight.”
    A little sound of air escaped her mouth. “You can’t be serious.”
    I patted Winter’s neck before I spoke. “I must go. You’re a comfort to me and I value your thoughts, but there’s no way out of this. You must know that.”
    “Well, actually, no, I don’t know that.” She relinquished Janis’s mane and waved her hands. “Look at what you’re doing. Don’t you have any sense at all? Can’t you see what your people are doing to you? They’re sending you to your death.” By this time she was so upset she was sputtering. “Your own father sent you to die.”
    I held my composure against this onslaught, trying to make her understand. To put it right. “No, it isn’t like that. Those are my people, my responsibility. Father is king. It is his burden. We both know our duty. There is no honor in causing our towns to be burned to the ground, thousands killed. That’s what would happen if I’d stayed. Someone had to go, and I was the one chosen. One life, one princess of royal blood—one instead of thousands.”
    I thought back to a conversation with my father two weeks before I left. “Genevieve, I never thought I would rue my kingship. Here I stand bound, wishing that I were but a farmer, with no obligation, no duty to my kingdom.” He had reached out, placing his hand on my shoulder and spoke, misery heavy in his voice. “We’re two of a kind, both of us confined by duty and honor. I wish it were different.”
    Tears had brimmed in my eyes, threatening to fall if I moved. He pulled me close, rocking me gently. The tears did spill then. We both knew the cost to our land, our people. I shivered, thinking of the devastation that dragons would wreak on our land.
    He had moved away, pacing back and forth. “As a king, you steel yourself to the loss of your children—your sons, perhaps to war, and your daughters to distant marriage, but this…
    “We don’t really know what happens at the Crystal Cave. Perhaps there is some hope. Perhaps—no, no, I’m fooling myself.” He sank into a chair, his head buried in his hands.
    I had remained silent, grieving for him and for me. When next he spoke, looking up, it was with such despair that I could hardly bear it.
    “Your mother is taking this hard. Her own great-aunt, Victoria, was one of the chosen. Your mother sits for hours in front of the gallery of chosen princesses, looking at her great-aunt’s portrait, looking at the portrait of you now also gracing the wall.” He held out his hand. “I will abide with you as long as I am able.” I folded myself up on the floor next to him, resting against his knee, and we sat silently there for the better part of the night.
    Chris stared at me in dismay, probably wondering at my sudden silence. I realized there was no way of instructing Chris, who hailed from a land bereft of kings, of the obligations of royalty to their people. I turned my head away so I didn’t have to address her lack of understanding. We rode awhile in uncomfortable silence.
    “Might I ask why you disappeared so abruptly in the Goddess’s maze?” I asked after some time.
    “Oh, um. I was startled before. I think I have a handle on that now. My karate instructor says that self-awareness is the beginning of discipline. That even the most fearless person can flinch.” She looked at me. “You know, that second before you leap into action when your focus wavers?”
    “No.” I shook my head, utterly confused by her comments.
    Chris shrugged, “Oh, well, it can happen.”
    A screech came from above and we both looked: a falcon kiting, beating its wings to stay in a single place. The falcon dove, rising with some small luckless mammal in its grasp. Lately, I watched predators and prey with a new