A Dragoneer's Silver Lining

Chapter Thirty Four

START

"Luina?" Drostan's voice broke under strain. He had never felt so lost, so confused, so...hurt.

She might as well stab him over and over and mercilessly kick him until he bled to death. Never in his life had he been betrayed and just when he found himself falling carelessly for Luina, there she was, standing a few feet away from him asking him to stand down.

Stand down even if she deserved to avenge her fallen comrades who escorted Scott. Stand down even if she betrayed her own Dragoneer.

His throat tightened. He had never heard of a member of a Dragoon betray his own Dragoneer written in the books of History. Especially coming from a Phoenician. The Kingdom who, for many years, struggled to maintain the peace of Immortalis that they would even go so far as to burning a Kingdom down to the ground because of betrayal.

"Drostan," Luina began, carefully taking one step forward, "I am not going to hurt you,"

"Why?" he asked, growing nauseous as he shook his head. Nightmares of his past threatened to dominate him. The face of his dying best friend, his Kingdom in ruins, his comrades dead.

"You attacked, we only tried to defend oursel--"

"Don't!" Drostan threw his hand up, shaking his head as he looked at her dead in the eye, "don't give me that,"

Luina calmly watched him, hands still raised as if she was trying to calm a famished lion. Drostan let an insane chuckle escape his lips, "you attacked your Dragoneer,"

"He is not who you think he is," Luina intonated her words carefully. "He is Scott physically, but spiritually he isn't,"

"You don't even have proof!" Drostan grounded out marching halfway towards her before he wheeled around as he began pacing exasperatedly in circles. Luina did not flinch.

"I’m not lying," she insisted.

"Prove it," Drostan hissed, pausing in midstep as he spun to face her. "Prove it," he reached her in two long strides before he stopped right in her face, "I need you to prove it, otherwise I will need to--" Drostan spun and let out a frustrated scream as he punched the nearby wall with his fist. It cracked minutely, his knuckles began bleeding as he  breathed heavily.

"It's true," came another calm voice.

Drostan slowly pulled away from the damage, debris crumbled out and fell to the floor. Menacingly, he turned to face the source of the voice. At the far end of the street from where they came from stood a white robed man with his hood pulled over his eyes.

Before Drostan decided to charge and kill him as well, the man threw his hood back and kept his piercing blue eyes trained on his. Slowly, as his foreign, striking features began registering in Drostan’s memory, his sprint broke off in staggering steps.

"Prince Auric." Drostan's eyes widened in disbelief, "why?"

The Prince’s strides did not falter as he stepped under the bridge with him. He glanced at the fallen and dead on the floor before turning to Drostan once more, "I'm helping you."

"This," Drostan swept his arm to gesture at the unconscious behind him, "is not helping. And the longer we stay here, the more suspicious the Queen--,"

"The Queen knows," Auric interrupted him.

Drostan flinched as if he had been burned by sputtering oil. Why does the Queen know what is happening now? Was she the one who summoned Luina which explained why she left them behind to return and attack Scott?

"We are not planning anything against the Dragoneers," Luina interjected, "we just need to get Scott back,"

"Calm down Lord Drostan," Auric began, "we did not assassinate your student nor caused as much harm as you did my fellow Oracles. But you need to listen to me,"