Light Dragons 01 - Love in the Time of Dragons

never felt so alien, so alone, so completely out of my depth. I just wanted to sink into oblivion.
    “Sit down,” Kostya told Cyrene when she had worked out the worst of her swearing.
    “She struck you! Twice! No one hits my dragon and lives to tell about it!”
    “Go sit down,” he commanded.
    “No!”
    “Cy, it was an open- handed slap,” May said as she took her twin’s arm and forcibly steered her toward the table. “I’m sure Kostya will survive it.”
    “I’m very sorry,” I told him again.
    To my surprise, rather than look angrier with me, he rubbed his abused cheek and looked thoughtful.
    “Ysolde?” Gabriel indicated the table. “I believe since the subject of the blue dragons’ deaths has been broached, you would be welcome at the sárkány table. Perhaps we can discuss the issue more calmly.”
    “I’m not at all a violent person,” I told him, allowing him to escort me to a chair he placed on his other side. “I can’t even spank my son.”
    He said nothing, just held out a chair for me.
    “You must understand that the weyr does not seek to punish an innocent person,” Bastian said, taking charge of the meeting again. “But there are laws that govern us, and as Kostya said, one of those laws holds that wyverns’ mates are held accountable for the actions of their wyverns.”
    “What about other dragons?” I asked, too weary to be incensed.
    Bastian looked confused. “What other dragons?”
    “What about a normal dragon’s mate, a non-wyvern. Are they held accountable, too?”
    “No,” he said, frowning.
    “Why not?”
    Silence fell on the table. Drake cleared his throat and answered, “Wyverns’ mates are unique in dragonkin. They have power of their own, and are accorded a place of honor in the sept second only to the wyvern himself. Mates always support the wyverns’ decisions, and thus the law was set into place recognizing that position and power.”
    “Let me make sure I have this straight. You all think that because I was alive two months ago, unaware of any of you, unaware of Baltic, unaware of anything but doing my job as an apprentice for Dr. Kostich, and being a wife and mother, you seriously expect me to believe that I am guilty of the deaths of sixty—”
    “Sixty-eight,” Bastian interrupted.
    “My apologies. I didn’t mean to make light of that tragedy. Where was I? Oh, you want to hold me responsible for the deaths of dragons I didn’t even know existed in the first place? Is that what you’re saying?”
    Drake’s gaze dropped. Gabriel and May exchanged uncomfortable glances. Kostya coughed softly and scowled at the table. Bastian looked into the distance. Chuan Ren smiled at me, showing far more teeth than was called for.
    “Do I want to know what the punishment is for killing sixty-eight blue dragons?” I asked.
    No one looked at me. “The punishment for a crime of such a heinous nature outside of a declared war is death,” Bastian said at last.
    “Lovely. You want to kill me for someone else’s crime. That certainly sounds like justice to me.”
    No one said anything to that bit of sarcasm, either.
    I thought of fighting, thought of running away, thought of damning them all and just letting them make me a scapegoat, but something inside me finally reached a breaking point.
    “There is something going on with me,” I said slowly, looking again at my fingers spread on the table. “Much as I want to deny it, I am willing to admit that I have some sort of a connection to this person named Baltic. Despite that, no one can deny that I am human, and it is for that reason that I do not, cannot, will not admit that I am the dragon named Ysolde. However, if any of you can prove to me that I am, if you can show me that what I’m experiencing is due to a dragon hiding inside of me, then I will acknowledge the laws of this weyr, and will accept the punishment for the deaths of those dragons.”
    That got their attention. They didn’t look happy, though.
    “That seems reasonable to me,” Aisling said, nudging her husband with her elbow. “Of course you want proof that you’re really Ysolde. We’ll just have to show you that it’s so. I’m not sure how we’ll go about doing that other than giving you time to find yourself, so to speak. That’s only right and fair, especially since the weyr is asking you to give up your life. Doesn’t it seem fair to you, Drake?”
    His frown cleared. “It would seem that such a demand is not