“Aren’t you tired of all the bloodshed?” asked Ash, who had been silent throughout the meal.
“Yes, I’m weary. Maybe I made mistakes in the past. I didn’t always know the dragons were shifters. For many years, at the height of my fame, I thought that killing dragons was no worse than slaughtering any other animal for meat, although you know we never ate the dragons. I suppose I should have questioned where the bodies of the dragons were taken, but I was too happy being idolized that I didn’t really care.”
“But you know dragons are shifters now?”
“Not all dragons are shifters, but I know it’s possible. The ones that live in a colony on the mountain beside this forest are shifters. I found that out myself when I first got taken in by the Wolvren. They had heard of my legend and challenged me to kill one of the dragons. I took off up the mountain alone and found one reasonably quickly. It was a small one, a baby really. I chased it, eager to take it back to the pack to show them. I would have preferred to kill a larger one, but I wouldn’t have been able to carry its body. It tried to breathe fire at me, but it was so immature, it could only breath smoke rings. Honestly, it was such a pathetic little thing, and yet I had no guilt about what I was doing. Not until it turned into its human form right in front of my eyes. It was a child. Couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old. He was completely naked and shivering. Of course, I couldn’t kill him then. I gave him my tunic and told him never to come down the mountain again. I’ve not killed a dragon since.”
“But you’re happy for the Wolvren to do it!” Spear said, sounding completely unimpressed by her story.
“I walked back up the mountain the very next day. I spoke to the dragon leader and told him to stay away from the forest. We came to a truce. If the Wolvren stayed in the forest and the dragons on the mountain, neither side would get hurt. I told the Wolvren they could kill any dragon that came into the forest but no further. They accepted it. No dragon or wolf has been killed since I‘ve lived here.”
“So, you are lying to your own kind?” asked Spear.
“In a fashion. It keeps them safe.”
“Don’t you have magic for that?”
“Yes, but may I remind you, my lie also keeps the dragons safe. Now, you’ve told me a lot of things, some of which has surprised me, and yet you left off the most important part.”
“What part?” I asked.
“I’m guessing you didn’t just come here to tell me a story. It’s a pretty long trek from Dronias. No, you want something from me.”
“Yes,” I admitted. “The dragons are good people. I wouldn’t be here otherwise. They don’t deserve the treatment they’ve had at our hands. I’m here... We are here because we want to save them. All of them. Years and years of dragons are trapped within our swords. I’ve found a way to defeat the Goblin magic and release their souls.” I paused for a second, barely daring to ask what I was about to.
“I’d like for you to give us your sword.”
Chapter Fifteen
“You are asking for my sword?”
“I gave you mine,” I pointed out.
“You let me borrow yours to keep us all safe. It’s not the same thing. You can see it right here.”
“I only want to borrow it. It’s not the actual sword I’m after, it’s the souls you’ve trapped.”
“Three hundred,” she said quietly.
“Excuse me?”
“If what you say is true, there are three hundred dragon souls trapped in that sword.”
I let out my breath. Three hundred! It was a massive number. I knew she was the most famous dragon Slayer in our land, but I’d not expected that kind of number. I didn’t have to look to know that the dragons were as stunned as I was.
“You have three hundred of my people trapped in your sword?” asked Spear incredulously.
“Not all are your people. There are many dragon colonies, but at least two hundred are from yours.”
“We need your sword!” shouted Spear angrily.
“My past has been questionable, and I’ve spent the last few years living in peace. I feel that by helping the Wolvren, I’ve atoned somewhat for my mistakes. I barely know you, any of you, so just because you come here with your amazing story does not mean I’m going to give my sword up so easily. No offense, but why should I?”
“Because the Morganna I have grown up idolizing was a fierce but fair warrior. Yes, she killed, but only to keep her people safe,” I shouted.
“My people who turned against me.”
“My father turned against you. No one else. Don’t take it out on the dragons, what my father did to you. He’s wronged a lot of people. Now is your chance to make it right. The Morganna I knew would do the right thing.”
“You are an idealistic little thing, aren’t you? Do you think that if you free the dragons it will somehow make up for everything your father did?”
“Yes, at least partly. I can’t change the past, what he did to you or the dragons, or any of the lies he told to the other Slayers, but you can change the future. Let the dragons go so that his years of hurting people can finally be over. You’ve been in hiding for years. Wouldn’t you like the chance to finally finish the man that caused this? Or are you a coward?”
She looked at me, listening carefully to my words. My guess was that she’d never been called a coward in her life. “Why do you hate your father so much?” she finally asked me.
“I loved him. He was an even bigger hero to me than you were, but he lied. He lied a lot and to a lot of people. He lied to me. My whole life has been a lie and I’m not the only one. The people in the village need to know the truth.”
“But why do you hate him?” she repeated.
“Because he’s not the man I thought he was.
“No one ever is!” she replied, pulling out something hidden beneath her flowing robe.
I recognized it at once. It was her legendary sword. It made my beautiful sword look dim in comparison. I reached out to take it from her, but she held it back, just out of my reach.
“I can’t let you take the sword, but if you tell me the secret to letting the dragons out, I will do it.”
There was a flash of light and the purple haze we’d been enveloped in before, now filled the air once again. Had she just left? Used her magic after everything she’d learned and disappeared with the sword? When the smoke cleared, I expected to find the clearing empty except for the dragons and me, but instead, I saw the Wolvren were back, circling us. Morganna still sat in front of me, her sword in her hand.
So it was a trick then. She’d summoned them so they could what? Eat us? Attack us?
“Sit!” she said to them. All at once, they all sat, like sentinels watching over us. She might tell us that she lived in peace with the Wolvren, but I could see she ruled them with an iron fist. Alpha was the only one who disobeyed her command. He walked past us and eyed us warily.
“You drew your sword. We all felt it. Are you in danger?”
“No,” she laughed. “I’m sorry Alpha. I had forgotten that particular piece of magic. I draw my sword so rarely now that I should have the summoning charm taken off it. As you are here, you may as well eat with us.” She waved her hands and the delicious spread that had laid before us multiplied so that it reached the hungry Wolvren pack surrounding us. It seemed that she had bought quite a lot of magic from the Goblins. No one I knew could perform magic like that.
“Are you okay?” he whispered to her, just loudly enough so I could pick up what he was saying.
“I’m fine. Why don’t you sit down and join us? They mean us no harm. In fact, the girl was just about to tell me some of her own magic.”
“It’s not my magic. It was placed in the sword by the Goblins. I don’t know how they did it and they have refused to tell us, but quite by accident, I found out how to reverse it.”
“What magic do you speak of?” asked Alpha warily. “Swords hold no magic.”
“Mine does, and so d
oes Morganna’s. They don’t kill. I could stab you right through the heart with my sword right now and it wouldn’t kill you. It would cause you immeasurable pain until you fell as if dead, but you would still be alive.”
“What good is a sword that does not kill?”
I was aware that to tell him the truth I would be betraying Morganna. Luckily for me, she beat me to it.
“The swords capture the souls of anything they hit.”
“But she said she could reverse the magic. After all the dragons you’ve killed, does that mean we will be surrounded by them?”
“No. The dragon souls are in the swords, but their bodies lie in my village. If we do let them go, there will be a reaction. For some reason, the reversal of this magic causes flames. It would be wise to stand back when we do it.”
“Morganna, what is she talking about? Surely you aren’t thinking of letting her do this. The dragons are our enemy.”
Morganna sighed. “I hoped this day would never come, but I always feared it would. It is time for me to make up for the actions of my past. I am old and weary and have carried this around in my heart for a long time. I have no more fight left in me. The dragons are not bad people. They didn’t deserve this.”
“You realize if they let the dragons from their colony go, it will also let the dragons from the mountain colony free and we will be overrun by them. Do you understand how foolish this is? How dangerous it is to our community?”
“It is no danger. I’ve never killed a dragon from that mountain. It is not my legendary sword skills or their fear of me that stops them coming down here. I’m sorry, Alpha, but I have lied to you. When I found out they were shifters, I spoke to their leader. We have a truce to keep out of each other’s way. They don’t come down the mountain because I asked them to, just as you don’t go up the mountain for the same reason. You’ve kept peace with them for all these years because of that.”
“Because you lied to us!”
“Remember how it was before I came to live among you? Dragons were killing your people on a daily basis. There was fighting and pain. I promised you I’d stop it and I have kept my promise, just not in the way you thought.”
The atmosphere around the campfire changed at her admission. I could see how uneasy Alpha was and it seemed his fellow Wolvren were equally angry.
“The dragons are not your enemy,” I said. “They are peaceful beings who have long since been persecuted by other beings, you included. Don’t have your pack end up like my village. For years, we fought the dragons mindlessly, spurred by lies and centuries of hate. The dragons never hurt us, not once, except to defend themselves, and yet we believed that they were the bad guys because people like my own father told lie after lie. I know you dislike the dragons on your mountain but look inside all your hearts. Do you actually know why? Or are you just doing what I did, what Morganna did, and following a tradition of hate rather than thinking for yourselves. Has a dragon ever attacked any of you?”
“Yes. Before Morganna, they would attack all the time,” growled Alpha.
“Did they really attack? Or were they defending themselves?”
“The girl is right, Alpha,” Morganna admitted. “All this hatred has to stop. I perpetuated it for far too long, and now is the time for me to end it. If you don’t want me to be a part of your pack anymore, I understand.”
“Of course we want you. Without you, our pack would have disbanded years ago. We would probably have starved to death without you.”
“If you only want me to stay because of my magic, you have no need to worry. I can bestow it upon you.”
“You know that’s not the reason,” he said quietly.
For the first time, I wondered if they were involved in some kind of relationship. He certainly seemed protective of her.
“Then let me do what I need to do. I truly believe that now is the time to be strong in our hearts as well as our bodies.”
“Very well, but if this hurts us...if it hurts you...” He stopped.
“It will not hurt me, right?” Morganna looked at me.
I hesitated. It would hurt her. I’d been exhausted giving my own blood to save four dragons. I could only imagine how difficult it would be spilling three hundred dragons’ worth.
“The magic needs a blood sacrifice. You will need to cut your hand with the sword. The blood of a Slayer is the only thing that works.”
“No!” shouted a number of people at the same time as she held the sword’s blade to her hand.
“What if they are lying and want to take over our village?” shouted Alpha.
“Everyone needs to get back!” shouted Spear and Ash at the same time.
“We don’t want to hurt you!” I said, more for Alpha’s benefit than Morganna’s. “Everyone needs to get back. The dragons’ souls produce a massive amount of heat as they escape. The forest will catch on fire.”
“So, she needs to stick her sword in her body and then our forest will burn down?” screeched Alpha.
“No. The neighboring trees might get scorched, that’s all. If Morganna stands in the center of the clearing and everyone moves back behind the tree line, it should be fine.”
“How much blood will I need to sacrifice?” asked Morganna, getting to her feet.
“I don’t know,” I replied honestly. It had taken just a few drops for each of the dragons I’d freed, but a few drops times three hundred was a significant amount.
“I guess there is only one way for us to find out.” She put the sword to her hand a second time. “You heard her, everyone needs to step back.”
The wolves looked unhappy at the turn of events, but they obeyed her orders, retreating back to the tree line.
“Wait. The fire could hurt you too,” said Ash. “Let me turn into a dragon so I can protect you. I have fireproof skin to shield you. I can also fly you up to the sky away from the flames.”
“You want to turn into a dragon now? This just gets better and better doesn’t it?” Alpha sneered.
Morganna tossed a look at Alpha to shut him up.
“If you harm one hair on her head!” he warned Ash.
“I won’t.”
Ash ran behind a tree to undress and a minute later, his red wings flapped into the sky through a puff a violet smoke above Morganna. He landed by her side as she held up her sword once again.
From behind a tree, I watched the pair of them. Morganna with her sword held aloft and Ash, magnificent, standing just behind her. For the briefest of seconds, I felt a surge of jealousy. Did Ash and I look that good together? I threw it off. It was a stupid thought, and yet, despite their age gap, they looked good together.
Morganna held her sword up, waiting for the moment to spill her own blood.
Chapter Sixteen
The famous blade of Morganna glinted in the lowered sun. I cast my gaze around the assembled group of people. What a strange bunch we all were. To either side of me stood my friends, the dragons, all but Ash in their human forms. Surrounding the rest of the clearing were the Wolvren, most in their human form, some as wolves. All looked wary of what was about to happen. And then there was Morganna and me, the only true humans and Slayers to boot. I wondered if these three groups of people, all sworn enemies, had ever stood together in a unified cause before. It seemed doubtful. Every person in that circle would have thought nothing about killing another at some point and yet here we all were, waiting for Morganna to free the dragons.
I could see the doubt on the Wolvren’s faces, but it was the face of Alpha that made me the most nervous. He was almost directly opposite where I stood, and both Morganna and Ash shielded my view of him, but every so often, they’d move slightly and I’d see him. He was on edge, it was plain to see, but it was not anger on his face, but fear. Fear for Morganna’s life. I didn’t know the extent of their relationship, but I was willing to bet that he was in love with her. Whether she felt the same as he did was anyone’s guess. I studied her now—my childhood hero. She didn’t waver as s
he brought the sword down to her hand. This was why she was a legend. Her strength was plain to see. She turned and whispered something to Ash, who nodded back at her. She slashed the knife over her palm and red blood spilled out. At exactly the same moment, Ash lifted her fifty feet into the air, out of harm’s way. I held on to the tree I was standing behind and waited for the breath of hot air that I knew would follow. I wanted to keep my eyes open, but I wasn’t Morganna. I closed them and hid my face behind the tree. I waited. One second, two seconds, three seconds. The heat hadn’t come. Was I really so far back as to not feel it? I doubted it. The heat that erupted when I’d freed Ash’s father had consumed both my childhood home and the dragon town hall.
“Was that it?” I heard someone shout out. I didn’t recognize his voice so it must have been one of the Wolvren. I opened my eyes and peeked around the tree. Looking up, I could see Morganna still in the air suspended by Ash, but the ground and surrounding trees were scorch-free. Had something gone wrong?
Alpha ran into the center of the clearing. I took his lead and met him in the middle just as Ash lowered Morganna carefully to the ground. Alpha didn’t ask any questions, he just took her in his arms protectively. It made me feel ridiculous to have been jealous of Morganna and Ash looking good together, if only for a second.
“Where are the dragons?” Alpha demanded.
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