by M. D. Grimm
For a moment Trystan froze. Then he snapped into action and sprang away from the spire, darting toward the storm, against the wind. He lost some feathers in his flight, but he was too scared to care. Terror and excitement wove inside him, equally clenching his stomach. He didn’t know what he was truly doing or why, but he just knew he had to.
He was meant to.
But even as he passed the point where the barrier had been and the storm came rapidly toward the city, an army unit tried to grab him. Trystan heard orders shouted as the unit split into two and surrounded him above and below.
“Secure him!” his father shouted. “Do not let him reach the beast!”
Trystan put all his focus in maneuvering around his attackers. The soldiers swarmed, but he managed to twist and turn, slipping through their hands. He dodged and kicked, punched and shoved, breaking free, only to be yanked back again. But he wasn’t as quick as he had to be, and his wings were grabbed, abruptly stopping his forward motion. Pain seared in his shoulders and back as he continued to struggle, but they yanked harder at his wings, and two soldiers managed to grab his arms while two others gripped his legs.
“Let me go!”
The storm seemed to quicken its speed. The pressure in Trystan’s head doubled. It bordered on pain.
“Hold him!”
Trystan glared at his father, who hovered in front of him.
“You idiot!” Trystan said. “You really plan on letting your city burn because of a son you never wanted in the first place?”
Gabreld swung his head around and met Trystan’s glare with one of his own. “This isn’t about you, Trystan. We will never be made to cower for a demonic beast like that dragon. He will never again get his hands on one of us. If you knew what was good for you, you’d shut your mouth.”
His eyes were ferocious, a fanatic’s gleam in them.
Trystan stopped struggling. There would be no negotiation. There would only be force. He turned his attention to the storm that somehow grew blacker. The lightning flashed brighter with an odd red tinge, and the thunder roared. Cold pellets of rain hammered into them, driven by the wind that still howled like a caged beast.
Fuck all of them.
He took a deep breath and screamed with his mind and his voice. “Asagoroth!”
The dragon’s roar threatened to shatter eardrums—in fact, several angels flinched as blood leaked from their ears—and demolished spires. The jeweled monoliths quaked and shook violently before exploding into tiny pieces that were flung like shrapnel at all who stood near. Trystan hunched his shoulders as the shards punctured and scraped flesh and the soldiers cried out in dismay. Chaos ensued, and it was only Trystan who saw the black race forward and descend like a cloud of wrath upon Emphoria.
The storm itself stayed outside the city, but the black was an all-consuming, blinding vision, bringing with it a sense of despair, hopelessness, apathy. Trystan felt the edges of it, but perhaps because Asagoroth directed it, he wasn’t touched by the worst of it. He managed to struggle free of the hands that held him, which suddenly became lax and listless. He couldn’t see anything and flew into a few soldiers who simply moved aside for him.
What had Asagoroth done? This was a power Trystan could never have imagined.
But even as he made his way as best he could through the black, someone grabbed his wrist. Gasping, Trystan spun around. It would seem his father was strong enough to fight the effects, at least for now. A pixie crystal glowed from around Gabreld’s neck, slightly illuminating his face. Fierce eyes met Trystan’s in the black, the only thing he could see.
The wind still howled, the thunder still boomed, and the lightning still cracked. But at that moment, they were only background noises. Trystan’s pounding heart was louder than all of them.
“Let me go,” he said fiercely, gripping his father’s wrist and pulling hard.
“You break my heart.” Gabreld grabbed his other hand.
“Seems fitting.” Trystan never ceased in his struggle. “You broke my heart, you and Mother. You don’t give a damn, Commander Gabreld. So fucking let go of me.”
Gabreld shoved his face near Trystan’s. The pressure in Trystan’s head intensified painfully, and he winced.
“Whatever else you are, you are an angel, Trystan. That dragon is a demon. Look what he has already done to us!”
“He wouldn’t have if you’d let me go!”
“Your place is with us, Trystan, not some villainous demon.”
“I have no place with you.” Trystan glared with rage. “I never have. Never will. It would have been more merciful to kill me at birth.”
Gabreld’s eyes widened. “Trystan,” he said, stunned. “We are not monsters.”
He felt Asagoroth’s rage feed his own.
“No?” Trystan said with a snarl. “Tell that to Roland.”
Without warning Trystan smashed his forehead into his father’s nose. Gabreld cried out, jerking his head back, and Trystan managed to wrench his arms free, pain lacing through his head. He kicked off his father’s chest and darted away, deeper into the black, into the storm. The sounds from the storm grew louder, guiding him.
The black slowly dissipated from the city, but the storm never relented. Trystan glanced back to see the soldiers, blinking as if waking from a dream. He didn’t see his father anywhere. Looking beyond them, Trystan was stunned: Emphoria was in shambles, most of the spires completely gone or at least half gone. Angels huddled together, their lighted wings the brightest illumination. He hoped to the Light Anna was all right.
Trystan turned back and faltered, stopping his forward movement, his wings stiffening in deeper shock. The storm clouds, thunder, and lightning had receded, and he got his first face-to-face look at Asagoroth, the great dragon.
He was gorgeous. Magnificent. Beauty and danger in perfect unison. He was a power to be reckoned with, one that would never be defeated or conquered or destroyed. What he wanted, he got. What he hated, he destroyed. That was it. That was all.
Trystan could only gape, his eyes bulging.
Asagoroth’s wings were the storm and the thunder his roar. The lightning was his will, the wind his breath. Blacker than black and roiling with heat just beneath the surface, Asagoroth hovered before him, his enormous, horned face slightly turned, and a large, oval eye stared directly at Trystan. A blue eye. The eye from Trystan’s dream.
The diamond pupil was large, and Trystan could see his reflection in it. The blue of the eye was like fire, not ice. But Trystan knew in his gut it could turn cold in a finger snap. But at that moment, it was all flame, flickering with wrath, desire, fury, need. Passion.
The heat of Asagoroth was as intense as a star. Trystan could feel it against his own cool skin from where he hovered. There were times when Asagoroth moved his wings that Trystan saw slivers of red and white, of blue and orange between the scales, as if a ferocious fire lived inside the dragon, fighting to be released.
Trystan had never felt so insignificant in his life.
“Do not fear me.”
Trystan shuddered at Asagoroth’s true voice. It was as deep and strong as the foundation of their world, as the core of the universe. But it didn’t boom as when Asagoroth had spoken to Emphoria. No, it was light, oddly reassuring.
It was a warming fire in a cold night.
Trystan gulped. “Asagoroth.” He couldn’t raise his voice above a whisper.
Asagoroth didn’t come any closer. He seemed to wait, to let Trystan make the first move. Trystan’s heart fluttered in his chest when that realization struck him.
“You will keep your word?” Trystan asked, pushing the shaky words out of his mouth. “I go with you, and you will leave them alone?”
Asagoroth seemed to consider him. Then he turned his head, stared at Trystan with his other pale blue eye.
“You care for them?” he said. “Though they do not cherish you? Though they demean you?”
Trystan crossed his arms over his chest, his wings f
luttering nervously.
“They—” He sighed. “I don’t want them dead. I just want to leave.”
Asagoroth blinked, his gaze never leaving Trystan. “I will keep my word. I always keep my word.”
Trystan nodded. “Then… then I will go with you.”
A gleam entered that blue eye, one that made memories of Trystan’s dream and the mind-sex in that cave flash vividly in his mind. He took a careful breath, knowing Asagoroth was still in his head, seeing those thoughts. The dragon smiled. Trystan clearly saw the curving of that mouth on the massive snout, the smoldering in that fiery eye.
“Come, then, my love.”
Trystan flew forward. He wasn’t fearful anymore, but he was still overwhelmed. How could he not be? Simply looking at Asagoroth blew his small mind; it was like he was staring at the One Who Brought the Light. As he came closer, the dragon’s heat intensified. He feared he’d be burned if he touched the dragon, but at the same time, he knew Asagoroth wouldn’t harm him.
Trystan flew above the dragon’s head, noticing the black, glistening scales. They shimmered like onyx, flame showing underneath and between them every time the dragon moved. Asagoroth had three horns on either side of his head: one set jutted up from his cheeks, the other set from behind his jaw, and the last started above his eyes but curved back to strike out behind his head. They were spikes of razor-sharp onyx. A proud ridge ran along the top of his head, slightly darker than the rest of him.
Trystan hovered above Asagoroth a moment before bracing himself and lightly lowering to the dragon’s head. His bare feet touched the smooth scales, and though there was heat, it was again warm and comforting. Blinking in surprise, Trystan knelt and stroked the scales. The heat was like Asagoroth’s voice when they’d spoken. It was a fire to bask in, to savor. Trystan felt it seep into his cold skin, like the heat of the sun on a summer afternoon.
“Amazing.”
Asagoroth shuddered, and Trystan froze.
“I have missed your touch,” he said.
Trystan found himself smiling.
Starting at the base of his skull, there were smaller horns that tracked down his spine and tail. They were relatively smaller than the ones on his face, though each one was still bigger than Trystan’s entire body.
Then Asagoroth lifted up his head in an arrogant tilt, and Trystan clung to the smaller horn closest to him—though he had to actually wrap his arms around it to get a firm grip—and stared wide-eyed, not knowing what to expect.
“Listen to me, angels, and listen carefully.” Asagoroth’s voice echoed over the city, and though Trystan was closer than the others, he wasn’t impacted any harder than they were. “I have what I came for. Now I will keep my word, and I shall leave. I shall not seek vengeance upon you for the wrong you did to me a millennium ago. But should you follow us”—his voice darkened, becoming a threat—“I will not be so forgiving. Remember this day. Remember what you see with your own eyes. Remember what I did to your city with only my voice. And know that I can do far worse. Do not tempt me.”
The dark clouds suddenly enveloped them, covering Trystan’s sight. He felt Asagoroth turn and the storm followed. Asagoroth’s movements were so smooth and elegant Trystan was never once jostled. Wondering, Trystan gradually let go of the horn and realized he was in no danger of falling off. Though he knew Asagoroth was moving at great speeds, he didn’t feel it. The wind blew in his face, but he felt as safe as if they were perched.
“Amazing,” he said again.
It struck him then, truly struck him as they sped away from Emphoria, from the other cities, far into the borderlands, and even passed them: he was with Asagoroth. He was with this wrathful force, one that had set out to claim him. One that wanted him because of who he used to be. Roland.
Trystan felt a dark twinge to his excitement. He also realized then the pressure indicating Asagoroth’s presence had faded entirely. Asagoroth was no longer inside his head. Part of him actually felt a little lonely without that presence.
Foolish, he told himself. Absolutely foolish. Asagoroth was right there. In fact, he was riding the freaking dragon. He would never be alone again. That mental connection had been intensely intimate, and he wasn’t familiar with intimacy.
But what if Asagoroth eventually thought claiming Trystan was a mistake? What if Trystan was so different from Roland that Asagoroth no longer wanted him? What then? Would Asagoroth simply abandon him, or would the dragon kill him, then finish what he started and destroy the Upper Realm?
Trystan closed his eyes, dread knotting his gut.
What had he done?
Chapter Eight
They flew for a long time. Long enough that Trystan lay down on Asagoroth’s head and fell asleep, exhaustion and hunger catching up to him. Asagoroth was warm and comforting, and Trystan felt safe despite his growing dread. He had to speak to Asagoroth. He had to truly question Asagoroth’s intentions and start off with an understanding. It was the only way to assure himself about where he stood in the dragon’s eyes. And heart.
Trystan jerked awake when he felt them descending. He sat up, blinking away blurry vision. With a start he realized the storm clouds were gone and Asagoroth was revealed in all his glory. He was enormous. His wings seemed to stretch forever, and they were glossy, leathery while his body was long and sinuous, covered with onyx scales, shiny and smooth. His tail was spiked and nearly the length of his entire body, but the tip was rounded, nonlethal. He flew with enviable grace and elegance while being silent and swift in a way Trystan knew he would never be.
Looking at their surroundings, Trystan didn’t recognize a damn thing.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“Far past the Outer Borders of the Upper Realm.”
Trystan blinked. They were on the very edge of… anything. The beyond was nothing but gas and black and particles without formation. The clouds below them were gray and unfriendly, the sky above black with a few smattering of stars, but the majority of it was blank.
If Asagoroth decided to abandon him, Trystan would never make it back to any of the angelic cities.
But even as that dark thought weighed him down, Trystan saw a crumbled structure appear over the rise of the clouds. It looked to be an ancient temple, made of stone and carved by hand. It was markedly different from the sleek, jeweled spires Trystan was used to.
“What is this place?”
“A long-forgotten place of your people. Roland brought me here.”
It hurt to hear the other angel’s name. Whether or not Trystan was Roland once didn’t matter. He didn’t have any memories of his supposed previous life—he only had the sense of déjà vu at times. He wasn’t Roland.
Asagoroth flew down sharply into the structure through a crumbled hole in the roof. The temple was wide enough to hold Asagoroth’s body but not his wings. The ceiling, the parts that weren’t falling apart, arched high and curved smoothly. Asagoroth landed lightly, folding his wings tightly to his sides. His sharp claws Trystan could now see clicked and scraped the stone. They were black onyx like the rest of him. In fact, the only color on the dragon was his blue eyes and the occasional flame that showed between his scales. The rest of him was a shimmering, solid black.
Trystan took a careful breath before jumping off the dragon’s head and fluttering down to the stone floor. He tried to be as graceful, but he felt odd and clunky. He hid his embarrassment and folded his wings behind his back, looking around. The stone was cold and cracked under his feet as he felt a strong chill race up his spine. They were far away from the sun, and having removed himself from Asagoroth’s heat, he felt the cold more acutely.
Trystan’s stomach took that moment to make itself known. It rumbled loudly. He blushed.
A rumble came from Asagoroth’s chest. A laugh. Trystan turned around to see Asagoroth looking at him with… joy. It was joy in those massive blue eyes.
“Come. Food is this way.”
Trystan blinked and followed the towering drag
on. “How could there be food here? And would it still be edible after a millennium?”
“Trust me, Trystan. You shall see. You shall know.”
Trystan had to fly to keep up with Asagoroth’s slow steps. As he flew alongside the dragon, he couldn’t help but be amazed once again by Asagoroth’s enormity.
As they journeyed through several massive corridors, Trystan noticed the faded murals on the walls. All the walls. Every square inch was covered in paint. He flew closer to a few, memorized and envious of the talent. It only took a glance to suspect that this was Roland’s work—the scenes depicting a giant black dragon with a dark-haired angel sort of gave it away. Trystan swallowed a sigh and rubbed his chest at the heartache and continual dread.
He returned to Asagoroth’s side and didn’t look at the rest as they past several round, empty chambers filled with stones from the crumbled wall. Then they came to one, a chamber bigger than all the others, filled with gold and jewels.
Trystan stopped short, hovering in awe.
The floor was heaped from wall to wall with gold, silver, and jewels and precious gems. They glittered and gleamed, defiant against the ravages of time. They shone with inner light and dazzled Trystan’s eyes. Emphoria wished it could shimmer and shine like this chamber. And, of course, there were murals in here as well, several enormous scenes that covered the entirety of the walls.
Asagoroth walked over the treasure like it was solid ground. He also glanced at the walls, eyes shining with a soft adoration. When Trystan stopped, he turned and eyed him.
“You truly do not remember, do you?” There was a note of sadness in his voice.
Trystan couldn’t look at him. He hovered in the air, suddenly feeling unworthy. “No. I’m sorry. I….” He shook his head. “I’m… I’m not Roland.”
And at that moment, it felt like he was confessing a crime.
Silence drew out between them. Then Asagoroth turned and continued into another chamber. Trystan followed, suddenly not very hungry.
But when he entered the next chamber, he reconsidered. A garden with all manner of edible delights sprang up before his eyes, jewels in their own right. Asagoroth stayed on the edges of the garden, nodding as if in satisfaction.