Dawn of Cobalt Shadows (Burning Empire Book 2) by Emma Hamm (free novels to read TXT) 📗

Her sister planted her butt on the steep roof, crossed her arms over her knees, and stared down at the people as well. “You’ve receded back into your mind,” she commented.

“It’s the only safe place for me to truly say what I think.”

“You could always talk to me.”

“You’re one of them,” Sigrid replied, but her tone was soft and kind. “You always were more like them than I ever could be. I never understood it until all of us were together. You see the animals inside them, and you accept that for what it is. You can hear their voices in your head, and it doesn’t sound like a garbled bang of animalistic sounds. Their language is yours.”

Camilla shrugged. “It could be yours as well if you let go a little. But you’ve always had trouble with that. It’s why I’ve always stuck around beside you. I help.”

But could Camilla help her any more? Sigrid wanted desperately to learn what the other Beastkin were thinking. She wanted to let go of her human chains and become something more, like they had done.

She didn’t think it was possible. Every fiber of her being wanted something more than to be just a dragon. Something more than just… Sigrid sighed and shook her head to clear the dark thoughts from her mind.

There was only so much she could dwell on before it all turned to shadows and darkness in her mind.

Camilla shifted again, staring straight at her with eyes that saw too much. “Sigrid, tell me what’s going through your head.”

“You were right,” she whispered. “They don’t need a queen or a leader. They need a martyr, a symbol that will make them realize the world isn’t at their feet. Someone has to prove to them that the world out there can be more than just enemies.”

“I don’t like where your thoughts are going.”

“Neither did I. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense.” Sigrid met her friend’s gaze and tried to soak in every inch of Camilla. It could be a long time before she saw her sweet sister again. “And I need you to help me.”

“What are you planning to do?”

She almost didn’t want to tell her, but there was very little time to put it in place. Sigrid had spent the better portion of the night staring into the darkness, thinking about this moment. There were times when she wished she hadn’t ever become a matriarch.

This was one of them.

Sighing, she released her hold on the spire and slid down beside Camilla. Taking her sister’s hand in hers, Sigrid lifted it to her mouth and pressed a kiss to Camilla’s knuckles.

“They need a martyr. And the only way to do that is for someone to die.”

“You aren’t killing yourself.”

“I wasn’t planning on it.” Sigrid looked down at the dark hand in hers and wished they’d had more time together. Camilla was her dearest friend, but also part of her own soul. How could she say goodbye when there was so much that was going to be left unsaid? “Remember the stories you used to tell me? The ones your mother always told by the fire before the sickness took her?”

“Which ones?”

Sigrid lifted their joined hands and pointed toward a range of mountains almost entirely out of sight. “The ones about those hills. About the caverns and the people who lived in them.”

Camilla nodded. “The ancient Beastkin who could not die, and who could not live among us. Sigrid, those were just stories. Little things to tell children so they believed in a history that wasn’t just death and sadness. The ancients aren’t real.”

“But what if they are? What if those legends were passed down through generations because the ancients wanted us to find them?”

Sigrid hadn’t put much thought into the stories either until she’d been dragged all the way to Bymere and realized there was so much more to this world.

Lying in the darkness of her bedroom, terrified that the path she'd led her people down was even more dangerous than their original one, she’d heard Camilla’s mother’s voice in the shadows. Like tendrils of a song, they reached for her and whispered the old tales.

In her mind, she saw Camilla’s mother, the woman they’d both only known as “Mother,” beckon them forward.

“Come here, little girls. Would you stop putting your fingers in the bread before its risen, Camilla? My goodness, the two of you are going to be the death of me. Sit by the fire, if you’re so impatient, and I’ll tell you a story.”

They’d raced to the hearth immediately, tumbling on top of each other in a tangle of girlish limbs and giggles that lifted into the rafters. Mother had smiled, patted the both of them on the head, and then settled into her rocking chair she always kept by the flames.

Sigrid could still smell her scent, the warmth and happiness in her gaze when she and Camilla remembered the little things she’d taught them. Camilla’s family had taken her in when her own mother had died. They’d given her a good life. One that made her more than just a dragonling, but a little girl.

“Have you ever heard of the ancients? No? Well, let me tell you then, my sweet. Long ago, before the Beastkin climbed down from the mountains and into the arms of men, we lived in a kingdom all of our own.

“There were many of us there, so many that the animals left the mountains alone, because even they knew that only magical creatures could live there.

“But even more than that, there were Beastkin who were immortal.”

Both Sigrid and Camilla had gasped at that, their minds whirling with the possibilities. Immortal? Creatures who couldn’t die, no matter who tried to kill them?

Mother had laughed at their questions.

“No, children. They could be killed. They were not impervious to the blade of a sword. But they would live forever if they wished and stayed out of trouble.

“Among