Page 14 of Fire to the Stars
The journal of dragon slayer Abel Estellio.
My horse’s ears flick forward. I follow his attention beyond the line of trees, to the local cemetery, but it’s just a funeral. Townspeople gather together, dressed in black. Fresh plots darken the ground. A cardinal in a green worship robe and a twin-suns brooch offers words of comfort to the victims’ families. Coins clink as low-level priests—the clergy without a brooch—pass donation trays through the crowd.
They’re preying on fear of Diu under the guise of promotinggenerosity. Disgusting.
“Where to next?” I ask.
“Once we reach Bourlin’s town limit, we should see a fork in the road,” Abel says. “We’ll go left.”
“I found the dragon!” a woman shrieks.
Abel halts his mare, which pulls the lead line between us taut. I tense in the saddle, forced to watch as the mourners descend upon a cowering man. But that poor man can’t be a dragon. He’s a survivor. His burns are visible from here. If he were a dragon in human form, his injuries would have magically healed.
“Heathen!”
“Greedy scum!”
“Pin him down!”
Gendarmes race to the scene with muskets raised. They scream at the man—thevictim—to stay down.
I can’t afford to watch. If any Diu-fearing person uncovers my secret, they won’t care that I’m a daughter who loved her papa. A horse trainer who tended to any newborn foal round the clock and fell asleep in the hay with its head on my lap. They’ll scorn the fact that even with the self-inflicted dragon-claw scars down my cheek, I look in the mirror and love myself.
I kick my horse forward. Abel halts again.
“Leave them be,” I say. “The Gendarmerie will sort it out.”
“The violence will stop immediately if a slayer intervenes.”
“Angry mobs aren’t that easy to appease.”
“They’re just afraid. If I tell them that man isn’t dragon cursed, it’ll put everyone back on a proper moral trajectory.”
I shake my head. The naïveté of this boy, I swear.
“Humans don’t magically contract amoral behavior just because a dragon appears. It’s not a disease,” I reply. “Those people are choosing violence because theywantviolence. You can’t change them.”
“But—”
“Even if a slayer’s wordcanspread peace, do you really think they’ll find comfort inyou?”
His jaw clenches. Shame turns his gaze downward. Good. As much as I dislike prodding at people’s insecurities, my safety comes first.
“If you really want to lead by example, start by interrogating yourself.” I cluck the horses forward. “Otherwise, let people reap what they sow.”
If a celestial material from Noctu’s domain of magic is the only weapon that can destroy Diu’s curse, then I declare all meteorites property of the Slayers Guild.
—His Majesty King Francis I on national strategy against dragons, January1 AA
Chapter Five
Abel
According to my map, we won’t see civilization again until we reach Ravinfort.
“Why Ravinfort?” Claire asks.
“Ravinfort is the slayer capital of Florent.”
