Up in Smoke - Katie MacAlister [25]
“What matters is that it’s all over and done with, and everything is forgiven and forgotten,” Aisling said in a loud voice, shooting a meaningful glance at her wyvern. “We’re all friends here, no matter how prickly the boys may get now and again.”
“Prickly!” Gabriel objected.
“Boys!” Drake added, an outraged look on his face.
Aisling giggled.
“Why did you betray them?” I asked Gabriel.
Silence, heavy and pregnant, fell upon the room. Gabriel studied me for a moment before answering. “Fiat Blu, the wyvern of the blue dragons, used Aisling to strike at Drake. I tried to reason with him, but Fiat has always been . . .”
“Insane,” Aisling offered.
“Unreasonable,” Drake said.
“. . . difficult,” Gabriel finished. “He would not listen to my attempts to defuse the situation, leaving me in an awkward position. I did the best I could to rein him back from the destruction I knew he would inflict, but he was more unbalanced than I thought, and he succeeded in poisoning Aisling before I could stop him.”
I sipped my coffee as I mulled over what he was saying. “What happened to the unbalanced Fiat? Didn’t you tell me there were two blue wyverns?”
“There can only be one true wyvern at any time,” he answered.
“You’ve been taking answer-avoidance lessons from Drake,” Aisling told Gabriel. “I’ll tell you what I know, May, although I have to pry every little bit of information from these guys.”
“I’ve noticed that particular trait myself,” I murmured.
Aisling gave her husband a long look that he ignored. “I gather that Fiat’s uncle Bastian—who, I have to admit, kind of wigs me out because even though he’s Fiat’s uncle and a hundred years older, he looks the same age as Fiat. Anyway, Bastian was born to be wyvern, but Fiat somehow convinced everyone in his sept that Bastian was insane, and he took over as wyvern instead.”
“Bastian tried to usurp Fiat several times, but failed,” Gabriel said as he gutted an apple. “There. I have been forthcoming with information not asked of me. Now will you stop shooting annoyed glances at me, little bird?”
I smiled. I couldn’t help myself; he was just so completely charming when he dimpled at me.
“A couple of months ago my uncle, my friend Rene, Jim, and I went to free Bastian, and he immediately took over control of the sept as the rightful wyvern. Only he let Fiat escape, and now the blue sept is divided, with some of the dragons following Fiat, and others swearing to support Bastian.”
“A civil war? That doesn’t sound good,” I said, wondering whether that was going to affect the silver dragons. The gods knew Gabriel had enough on his plate without heaping blue-dragon issues on it as well.
“It serves to keep Fiat busy, and away from us,” Drake grunted. He stood up, going around to help Aisling out of her chair.
She made a wry face. “Fiat isn’t happy with me for what he views as a betrayal, which coming from him is pretty laughable. My money is on Bastian, though. He’s been biding his time, and I think he’s going to make a great wyvern. But you can judge him for yourself when you see him at the sárkány, May. Thanks, sweetie. I need to visit the mothers-to-be room quickly, so don’t talk about anything good until I get back.”
Gabriel waited until Aisling had left the room before cocking an eyebrow at Drake. “Still haven’t told her she’s not going to the sárkány?”
“No.” Drake grimaced. “She’s not going to be pleased, but it is too dangerous. She will just have to understand.”
Gabriel cast a considering glance my way. “May-ling, if you were in Aisling’s shoes, and I forbade you to attend a weyr meeting to which you wished to go, what would you do?”
“I’m a shadow walker. I would simply slip into the shadow world and go anyway. But if I was Aisling herself, I’d probably grab the nearest blunt instrument and smack you upside the head, then go to the meeting.”
Drake snorted. “Aisling is not so crass. She would not behave in such a manner.” He paused as he walked past me, eyeing for a moment a small stone bust of a woman that sat on an isolated pedestal. He picked up the bust and stuffed