“I can feel this storm coming even inside the castle, my handsome Starfall.” She stepped past him to look at the approaching dust cloud. Her quick wit, heart-shaped face, and confident movements were typical of the wild Utauk tribes, the nomadic trader clans that ranged across the Commonwealth. Penda was slender, with large brown eyes even darker than her rich brunette hair, which hung long and loose. He felt the familiar rush of pride that came to him each time he saw his clever, beautiful wife. Adan wanted to show his people he was not like the aloof kings or corrupt regents the Suderrans had endured before he arrived.īehind him, a door into the castle tower opened unexpectedly, and Penda emerged onto the gazing deck.
#WAKE THE DRAGON SERIES HOW TO#
As he stared at the labyrinth of streets below, he tried to think of how to help. Adan had promised to be a different sort of king when he accepted the throne of Suderra, one of three kingdoms in the Commonwealth. His father had taught him better than that, instilling in him compassion and a desire to work on behalf of the people he ruled. He would not abandon his people to their own problems, though. Afterward the people would emerge with brooms and brushes to scour their walkways and outdoor stairs, then shake out the banners of celebration for which the ancient city was known. The citizens of the capital knew how to find shelter and wait until the weather passed. Adan had reigned here for only three years, but Bannriya had stood for nearly two thousand years and had endured many a storm.
#WAKE THE DRAGON SERIES FULL#
He guessed the full force of the storm would strike within two hours. The weight of rule had not yet made him feel older than his years. His blue eyes looked young for a king’s, compassionate and curious. He brushed the hair aside, securing it with the plain circlet crown he wore, and ran his hand down along the goatee that punctuated his rounded chin. The stiffening breeze whipped strands of reddish-brown hair across his face and high forehead, and into his eyes.
In the face of such a storm, his power as a king meant little. The oncoming clouds roiled like smoke, stirred up by some titanic disturbance in the desert far to the west. On clear nights, Adan loved to stare at the stars from this gazing deck, but today it only offered him a view of the thickening curtain of dust. The fortified main castle had been built on the high point inside the great walled city.
Councilors, commanders, and trade representatives returned to their homes in the outer districts. The ministry buildings closed for the day, with the business of the kingdom pausing to weather the storm. “Very bad.” More warning flags were raised on towers across the city, and rumors spread just as quickly. Mothers called in their children, and the bang of closing shutters echoed through the lower alleys.Īdan Starfall, the young king of Suderra, stood alone on Bannriya Castle’s highest tower, watching as his great city prepared for the storm. Innkeepers rolled up canvas awnings and lashed them in place. Spice merchants covered baskets of cinnamon bark, lumpy turmeric roots, and dried peppers before dragging them inside their shops. Protected within the city’s walls, men and women scurried through the streets.
On the high sandstone towers of the central castle, red flags whipped and twisted in the rising wind they served as warning signals to alert the people to prepare for rough weather. Brown and angry, the murk loomed in the sky as it approached the capital city of Bannriya from the west. THE great dust storm prowled over the boundary mountains like a living thing.
0 kommentar(er)
