The soldiers dragged me further down the path and through a massive wall of wood that had been erected in a clearing. Sil walked ahead, his hands tucked into his robes, the soldiers on either side of him looking over their shoulders at me every few steps. As if they were worried I might make a break for it somehow.

  I debated it. I might have been able to get away into the forest fast enough. But that would still leave Ophelia and Sil trapped here, and while I didn't really care what happened to Sil, he had answers I needed—plus the ring. And there was no way I was leaving Ophelia behind. She knew too much about who I was.

  I tucked my feet under me enough to catch myself and stood up straight, not pulling against the guards, but not allowing them to drag me anymore.

  They led Sil and me further into the camp, eventually stopping at a small desk with a spindly man with spectacles seated behind it. The man brushed a hand across his balding head and then pushed the spectacles further up his nose, peering through them at me.

  "Name?"

  "Silvarin Mistari," Sil responded in front of me.

  The man with the spectacles wrote something down on a piece of parchment in front of him and then motioned with one hand off to the side. I watched the soldiers lead Sil away and then was pushed up to the desk.

  "Name?" The man said, peering up at me. His eyes instantly widened in recognition.

  "Problem Cran?" One of the soldiers asked, his hand still tightly gripping my upper arm.

  "No, no," the man said, swinging his head from side to side far too quickly. "Just thought I recognized her, that's all. What's your name?"

  I watched the man try to recover himself for a moment before finally speaking. "My name is Aria Grace." I said the words like I was announcing I was the empress. My tone earned a chuckle from the other soldier.

  "She seems to think she's someone important, worthy of giving out commands," the soldier told Cran. "General looked like he was ready to put a blade through her neck for the insolence."

  I felt warm spit on my face as he finished the sentence. That constant simmering anger in my gut began to boil and I had to fight the urge to jerk my arm away and punch him. I really missed having talons.

  Cran eyed me before scribbling something on his parchment. He ran another hand through his hair and motioned the same direction that they'd taken Sil. The soldiers shoved me away from the desk, leading me deeper into the camp.

  I wasn't sure who he was, or how he might know my face, but those were questions I would need to get answers to at some point.

  To call it a camp was, honestly, being far too nice. It was more of a prison. The large wood wall was so tall that it could be seen well above the makeshift tents that had been erected on either side of a well-trodden and muddy path. The soldiers led me through groups of prisoners, some hunched over as if they'd been carrying heavy weights all day, others wore marks from a whip like badges of pride—or shame—their chests bared and bodies open to the sun's harsh embrace. All of them had one thing in common, though; they kept their eyes to the ground.

  I quirked my head to the side as I continued forward, letting the soldiers guide me. They led me past more tents, some packed full of bodies that I couldn't tell if they were moving or not. Others were empty, devoid of anything but dirty blankets on the ground. The tents for the prisoners, I guessed. We also passed a tent where soldiers had lined up several of the beat-down-looking prisoners, their bodies stripped of all clothing. I shivered at the prospect of being so exposed for all to see.

  One of the soldiers with me must have noticed me looking, because he pulled the other to a stop and turned me toward whatever was happening.

  "Pay attention, Aria Grace," the man said, his voice taking on a nasally, mocking sound when he said my name.

  I added that to the pile of fuel I'd use to keep myself alive in this place.

  I watched as one of the soldiers with the group of prisoners stepped forward, drawing his sword with a swift motion.

  "You have been found guilty of abandoning your work. The [Empress of Dragons] has passed her judgement." Without another word he jabbed the blade of the sword into the first man's gut and then pulled it back out. He moved to the next man as the first fell to the ground, repeating the same words and then jabbing the blade into the second man's gut.

  I watched in horror as he continued, this time moving to an older woman whose face was completely black with bruises. Tears poured down her cheeks and her bare chest heaved with sobs.

  "Please," she repeated, loud enough for me to hear.

  The man paid her no mind. "You have been found guilty of abandoning your work. The [Empress of Dragons] has passed her judgement." He jerked the sword forward, the blade slicing through the old woman's flesh.

  She gasped in pain, her hands instinctively rushing to meet the wound as the soldier pulled out his sword and moved to the last person in the line. He repeated his line, but his voice faded out as something within me broke and I jerked away from the soldiers holding me. They erupted in yells as I pulled away from them, rushing toward the woman, my arms already rising to catch her.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  The flat end of a sword smacked against my chest, forcing my arms back down, another soldier having stepped forward to block my way, and I was forced back to a standstill, the strength of the man’s push holding me back just long enough for fingers to dig harshly into my shoulders as my escort caught on.

  My heart sank, and my eyes never left the old woman, even as her body began to crumple, the blood leaking from her stomach mixing with the wet, muddy ground beneath her. Her body convulsed with sobs as she fell to her knees, her eyes downcast—as full of disbelief as my own had to be.

  I watched her body grow still, the anger that warmed my gut a constant flickering flame that only grew as I let the fuel pile onto it.

  These were not my soldiers. They did not have the authority to kill my people. Not in my name.

  The soldiers pulled me away, the man with the sword watching me with narrowed eyes. I let them, my gaze falling on the face of the man who had stopped me from reaching the woman. I felt my lips twist into a snarl and my body pressed back against my escort.

  He would die for his insolence.

  They had a tighter grip on me this time, though, and when the soldier with the sword noticed my struggling against them, he stepped forward once more, bringing his sword hand up, his armored knuckles connecting with my face in a hard punch. My lip split under the assault, and the hit was enough to send me into a daze, allowing the soldiers to drag me away as they left the old woman's corpse to soak in the mud with the rest of them.

  *** *** ***

  The soldiers dragged me to one of the tents filled with people mulling about and tossed me into the mud. My hands and arms sank into the muck up to the elbows, and I just sat there, staring down at the ground as they walked away.

  Whatever message they had hoped to send, I had received it. Though I wasn't sure they would like my translation of it.

  My anger continued to stew, a constant boiling emotion that tainted everything I felt. I wanted nothing more than to destroy everything around me. To burn it to ashes and dust as I ground their bones between my teeth. But I was stuck in this damned human body, too far from my dragon form for it to even matter.

  I let out a huff and pushed myself to me knees only to find a hand extended down to me. I reached up, wrapping muddy fingers around the hand, and let my eyes follow the arm up to the face of the person looking down at me.

  I didn't recognize the man that pulled me to my feet, but his dark blue eyes held a kindness to them that didn't match the features they'd been laid within. A hard face stared back at me, lines etched along his forehead and around his eyes that painted the picture of a man whose shoulders were laid heavy with worries. He had dark brown hair and stubble on his cheeks and chin that gave him a wild look.

  I saw some of myself in him as we stood there for a moment.

  "Are you okay?" he asked, keeping his voice low.

  The others who had been watching us started to move away, though a few remained, their eyes glancing around the camp. They always seemed to find their way back to the man.

  "I'm fine," I told him, doing my best to show my confidence.

  His tight-lined mouth cracked into a smile. "Of course you are." He let my hand go, which was only fitting now that I was standing on my own. "I'm Lilan."

  "Aria," I said, wiping some of the mud from my hands onto my pants. It was a useless effort, as I only managed to smear it with some of the woman's blood.

  "You want to get cleaned up?"

  "Is that an option here?" I motioned around the camp.

  He shrugged. "Not really, but I'm sure we can scrounge up something for you to wear." He motioned for me to follow him and then led the way around the side of the closest tent.

  I followed him to a rough looking well that had been erected in behind the tent, where he drew up a bucket of water.

  "It's cold, but should do the trick."

  I held out my arms and he poured some of the water over my hands. I wiped my palms together, letting the cool water scrub away at the mud sticking to my skin.

  When we'd emptied the bucket, my hands were completely clean of any mud, but they still held a red stain from the blood. He left the bucket resting on the well and I followed him inside the tent.

  At least half a dozen people were situated on the blankets inside, though the path in the floor was almost as muddy as the one outside. Many of the other people were shirtless or wearing nothing more than tattered rags. Lilan led me to the back corner, where a small crate had been placed on the ground and then began looking through its contents.

  "It might be a little big," he said, pulling out a slightly tattered shirt, "but it should at least keep you covered."

  I took the shirt, careful not to let it touch any of my currently ruined clothing, and waited for him to rummage through things again. A few breaths later he pulled out a pair of pants and held them up in front of me, as if trying to imagine how they would fit on me in the same way a seamstress might imagine the look and cut of a dress before making it.

  "Unfortunately, there isn't much we can do about the boots." He looked down at my boots and I followed his gaze.

  They were mostly still unstained, though the mud had caked around their soles and there were splotches of blood staining the tops of them. It was hard to say exactly where the blood had come from, though, as it could just as easily have found its way there during one of the many fights that had punctuated my journey to this godsforsaken hole.

  "I'll make them work," I responded as I took the pants. "Is there somewhere I could…" I let the words trail off as he eyed me.

  "Change in privacy? No. Not in this place. You'll be lucky to get enough time to yourself to use the privy."

  I had expected as much, but hearing it said out loud was enough to make my heart drop a little. I turned my thoughts back to the sight of the old woman, the soldier's sword sticking out of her stomach, and the anger overwhelmed the sadness.

  "Very well. Could you?" I held out the clothing items to Lilan and he raised an eyebrow.

  "Uhh, sure. Of course." He took the clothes without saying anything else and then looked away, at least feigning like I had some sort of privacy.

  It was a nice gesture.

  I stripped my dirty clothes off, careful to step on one of the blankets and not into the mud as I let the cool air of the coming evening wash of me. Shivers rippled their way through my arms and legs, leaving small bumps all across my skin. There had always been something freeing about stripping free of armor and clothing. That was perhaps because I had spent so many years in my true form, feeling the wind against my skin with every passing moment.

  I didn't bathe in the feeling for long, though. I could feel eyes sticking to my back, and even Lilan seemed like he was getting a bit nervous about how exposed I was. I pulled the pants on first and then the shirt. They were both a bit too big for me, so I tucked the legs of the pants into my boots after pulling them over my feet.

  "Thank you," I said when I was once again dressed and Lilan had turned his full gaze back to me. His cheeks looked a little warm.

  "Of course. Happy to help out where I can. The more of us stick together, the most of us will make it out of this alive."

  I nodded in agreement.

  "Shall I introduce you to the others?" His mouth quirked into a smile again, his eyes showing the same air of kindness as before.

  "That would be great." I offered him a smile in return and turned when he passed by me, my gaze scanning the room as I looked for any sign of Sil.

  He had been brought this way, hadn't he?