by Eric Vall
The Elders looked at each other and wore faces of perfect confusion. I guessed that they had almost forgotten about the scholar Olivier, but then again so had I.
“He disappeared just as the summoning circle opened above us.” Moskal tapped his chin in thought.
“What perfect timing,” I groaned out as I let my face fall in my hands. “I almost wished that asshole wouldn’t have disappeared. I was hoping to punch him at least once for Alyona.”
My anger rushed through me like a wild current of power, and the scales on my body seemed to multiply as I paced in front of the three Elders. For the moment, my exhaustion was shoved to the side, and all I could think about was tearing Olivier limb from limb.
“You aren’t the only one wanting a piece of flesh from him,” Ruslan muttered as he glared at the ground. “We welcomed him into our home, and he plunged a dagger into our backs.” Then the Elder looked up at me with sorrow in his eyes. “I’m sorry we did not listen to you before, Evan. You suspected him, and if I had only listened, maybe we could have avoided this whole disaster.”
A tiny voice in the back of my head wanted to say, “I told you so,” but I bit back the unkind remark and settled my hand on Ruslan’s shoulder.
“You were trying to be kind,” I told him gently. “It was that same kindness that made you welcome me into this city, and for that I’ll always be grateful. Don’t blame yourself too much. The city and buildings can be rebuilt, and we avoided any casualties… Well, Alyona is sick, but hopefully we’ll find a way to heal her.”
“Yes. This is all my fault,” Ruslan sighed and rubbed at his face. “Thank you, Evan, for not belittling my mistake and for your commitment to Alyona. But mark my words, if I ever find that scholar again, I’ll rip him apart piece by piece.”
“Unfortunately, he isn’t here to face our judgement.” Julia clenched her hands tightly around her clothes.
“He couldn’t have gotten far.” I flexed my claws as my mind raced, and I focused on catching Olivier’s scent.
I hadn’t focused on it when he first came to the city, but there were still lingering traces of it in the air. There was a chaotic amount of scents in the city, from the crumbled dead to the healed survivors, so I closed my eyes as I mentally searched through them all and focused on the path we had taken Olivier through the city.
“There!” I muttered.
The scent of ink and steel lingered as a meandering path through Hatra. It first appeared outside of the city, and I followed Olivier’s scent as he walked through Hatra. I had left him at the communal kitchens with the Elders, but I couldn’t find the scent anywhere else.
It was like Olivier had stopped existing inside of Hatra.
“It’s gone,” I gasped out as I opened my eyes. “It’s like he disappeared into thin air.”
“Thin air?” Ruslan glanced over at Julia as he tapped his fingers on his leg. “He had to have used a portal.”
“A portal?” I growled out as I paced again in front of the Elders. “He teleported out of here?”
My vision swam, and I stumbled over a piece of rubble. I steadied myself on one of the walls and drew in a deep breath as I felt nausea threaten to take hold of me.
“Sit down before you faint,” Julia spoke sternly as she pointed at me with her fan. “There’s nothing any of us can do. What’s done is done.”
I didn’t want to admit it, but she was right. Olivier could have been anywhere by now, and even if we did know where he was, would we be able to capture him? My limbs still shook from exhaustion, and I was sure the others were as exhausted as I was from the attack. We didn’t know how powerful the scholar actually was, and if he was powerful enough to bring an army out of nowhere, would he easily be able to destroy us if we went after him?
We had to rebuild more than just the walls. This attack showed that we needed to be more vigilant and that more than just the demons wanted Hatra destroyed.
Well, I wasn’t going to let them have their way.
“How much was destroyed?” I sat down on a broken wall as I watched the villagers begin to pitch more tents.
The survivors who had been previously corrupted by the miasma staggered about, but they did their best in order to help with the reconstruction of the small village and the clearing out of the corpses. The most important parts of the village were the residential area and the medical area. Restoring them had to be done quickly, along with rebuilding the farms.
“The infirmary was ravaged.” Ruslan ticked off all the places on his fingers, and I winced at the mention of the infirmary. “So were the living quarters, the kitchen, and all of the farms.”
“The storehouses were untouched, thankfully those were built underground long before Hatra fell.” Moskal tugged at the torn fabric of his clothing in exhaustion.
“How much food do we have left?” Julia paced in front of us and glanced at the extra mouths that had joined the village. “Is there enough stored until the farms start producing again?”
“We’ll have to check.” Ruslan shook his head and looked behind him at the survivors. “We hadn’t taken into account twenty more mouths to feed.”
“They’re going to come back,” I said and glanced at the three Elders and Laika.
“More bandits?” Julia sat down on a piece of rubble next to Ruslan and looked at me with confusion in her eyes. “They’ve never attacked Hatra before, and you’ve healed them of the miasma that was corrupting them.”
“No, whoever was controlling them.” I shook my head and swept an arm to point at the ravaged living quarters. “Either the scholar or anyone else, this wasn’t a one time thing. It was planned out, and we don’t know if Olivier has any allies.”
“There’s nothing here,” Ruslan scoffed and shook his head before he buried it in his hands. “Well, there didn’t use to be.”
“There always was something here,” Julia quietly added. “Maybe someone knew about the underground library.”
“That could be the reason why the miasma has been increasing over the years.” Moskal looked up at the sky and rubbed his face. “All for secrets we never even knew of.”
“They won’t get it.” My claws dug into the stone beneath me. “We’ll rebuild the walls and train for attacks like these. We’ll rebuild Hatra.”
“Evan?” Ruslan pulled his face out of his hands to look at me with fragile hope in his eyes.
“Hatra is your home, and it’s become mine as well,” I spoke firmly as I stared out at the surrounding buildings. “I won’t let them destroy this place.”
Chapter 11
“Rebuild Hatra?” Julia looked at the villagers who worked around us in salvaging the ruined walls. “That sounds like a dream.”
“We can do it.” I tapped my hand on the stone I was sitting on, and excitement filled my voice. “I can lift the heaviest of the stones into place, and I can dig quickly.”
Lifting the heavy stones of the ruined aqueducts would be easy for me in my dragon form, and I knew I could lift even heavier things. The stone giants were heavier than the broken walls of Hatra, and I had easily lifted and ripped those monsters apart.
“None of us still living ever saw Hatra the way it used to be.” A light settled in Ruslan’s eyes as he looked up at the sky. “We can’t even begin to imagine it, even though we’ve lived in Hatra’s shadows for centuries.”
Julia leaned over and placed her hand on Ruslan’s knee, and there was a glimmer of tears in her eyes as she blinked furiously. Moskal also placed his hand on Ruslan’s shoulder and turned to face me.
“How would we even start?” the Elder asked. There was a fire in Moskal’s pale blue eyes that shone fiercely, and I knew they would do anything to rebuild Hatra.
“With water and defenses.” My mind churned as I visualized the ruined walls of Hatra rise up and become greater than they had ever been.
I thought of the shattered aqueducts that followed the length of the river and how it could be rebuilt. Water was the lifeblood of
any city, and the base was already there. We just had to put the pieces back together. For a moment, I wondered if I could heal structures the same way I could heal people, but I shook that thought out of my head. It was too fantastic to be real, even in a world of magic and dragons.
“Water?” Ruslan’s brow furrowed as he considered my words. “I can understand the defenses, but the wells we use work.”
I looked over at one of the nearby cobblestone wells and sighed. I’d already seen farmers trudging back and forth from the wells with buckets of water for the farms. Even with my enhanced strength and endurance, I inwardly groaned at the thought of having to carry bucket after bucket.
“But how much time does that take out of the day?” I ran my hand through my hair as I began to list off all the issues with the current system. “Going back and forth with buckets to water the farms and fill all the water jars? And the baths.”
The Elders shared a look of understanding between the three of them.
“So, you mean the old aqueducts?” Julia followed my line of sight to the wells, and the ghost of a smile lingered on her face. “We’ve been so focused on surviving the miasma that we’d never thought of rebuilding the water system as anything more than a dream.”
“Yes.” I nodded as I thought about the untold information inside the archive underneath the city. “There has to be something in the library that’ll help us rebuild them.”
“We wouldn’t know where to look first in the library.” Ruslan shook his head and laughed. “Not that we would know the first thing to do in one, this is the first one we’ve ever seen.”
Again, I wondered how terrible Hatra’s fall must have been and how much was destroyed as the city fell. I imagined that the attacking demons and miasma had burned down any of the libraries above ground. That was what I would do if I wanted to erase a city from the face of the earth, I’d get rid of all knowledge first.
“Then it’s a good thing Ilya and I found the archive catalogue.” I leaned against the wall and thanked whatever god was listening that we had found the catalogue.
“You did?” Julia’s voice was filled with such hope that her face almost gleamed in the light of day, and she seemed younger.
“Yeah,” I replied, and excitement filled my voice, but it was quickly replaced by doubt as another thought came to mind. “What if someone discovered the archive before us? And took out whatever was being protected down there?”
“I doubt it,” Moskal replied as he shook his head. “You and Laika sensed that there had been no one in there for centuries.”
I relaxed in my seat at Moskal’s words. He was right, I shouldn’t doubt my nose or Laika’s.
“That leaves the question of what we’re going to do with the bandits.” Julia turned to me face me
“How do you know they’re bandits to begin with?” I glanced at the survivors who were helping lift up tents and cart away the putrid corpses from earlier.
“They’ve come to Hatra to trade before.” Ruslan rubbed the back of his head where Julia had smacked him. “Goats, milk and cheese. Things they couldn’t go to a settlement for because they probably stole from them in the first place. They traded with us because they knew we’d never turn them in to any authorities.”
“In exchange for what?” I stood and paced as Julia had done earlier.
“Things we couldn’t make on our own.” Moskal looked at the bandits with a gentleness in his pale blue eyes. “Metals for Ruslan’s smithy, medicines, some fabrics and things. And news from the rest of Rahma.”
Of course the bandits would be the only way the people of Hatra would be able to know anything about the outside world. No traders in their right mind would venture near the miasma infected ruins and because of that, only those who society had thrown aside would come.
“I see.” Those were the only words I could say as those thoughts lurked in my head. “What are you thinking of doing?”
“They were victims in all of this. They were possessed by the miasma and forced to attack us.” Julia pulled out her fan from her robes and tapped it against the palm of her hand in a slow beat. “We cannot judge them.”
“Then we should invite them to stay here with us.” I smiled at the sight of Julia’s habit and looked at the survivors. “Those who don’t want to stay can leave with our blessings.”
“I’ll speak to them, they might be afraid of you now that they’ve come to their senses.” Julia pointed her fan at me with a flourish and smiled widely. “You find out what you can from the catalogue.”
That was a fair point. I would be scared of a giant black dragon if I were in their shoes, but I couldn’t help but feel a bit smug at having scared them.
One more benefit to being an awesome dragon.
“Yes, ma’am.” I grinned cheerfully until I remembered that I couldn’t read Rahma’s written language. “One problem with that.”
“Oh?” Julia snapped open her fan and fluttered it.
“I can’t read whatever language it is we’re speaking in.” I blinked at the three Elders and prepared myself for their disbelief.
“Well, that is a problem,” Ruslan snorted and nearly fell off his seat from the force of it.
“Not to worry, I have a plan,” I laughed for a moment before I felt a pang in my heart. “Could one of you look at Alyona? I don’t know anything about cultivators.”
Julia stood and walked toward me. Then she placed her hand on my cheek and smiled softly. There was a motherly kindness to that touch, and I leaned into it.
“Of course,” Julia replied, and her voice was as soft and kind as any mother’s. “Now, off you go.”
I stood and bowed cheekily before I ran off to where I smelled Polina would be. The dryad was nearby in the living quarters as she created poles and tent frames for the villagers to use. There was a bead of sweat on her forehead, and I wondered just how much she had overexerted herself. Hopefully, the favor I needed from her would provide her some rest as well.
“Polina, we found the archive catalogue!” I waved to the dryad as I slowed my pace down. “Can you help me go through it and see if any books are missing? And also see if there’s anything that could help us rebuild?”
The dryad blinked at me for a moment until her lips formed a small circle.
“You think that someone might have stolen some books?” Polina brushed her sweat laden bangs away from her face as she took a step toward me. “How would he have gotten down there?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t think this was all just a coincidence.” I shoved my hands into the sleeves of my shirt and frowned at the ground. “There are too many things happening at once, and I’m suspicious. Days after we find the library, a scholar arrives in Hatra, and the same day he arrives, Alyona is attacked, and a summoning circle appears over the city? And not to mention the destruction of the Asura village.”
“That makes sense.” Polina nodded as she pushed her curly braid over her shoulder. “Where is the catalogue? Do you have it here with you?”
The dryad looked at my empty hands curiously and then up at my face as if I would make it appear out of thin air.
“It’s back in the library.” I nodded behind me in the direction of the library.
“Well, I was supposed to be taking a break soon anyway.” Polina shook her head and let out a sigh. “I think I’ve made enough poles.”
I glanced at the small mountain of poles that towered over the dryad and patted her on the shoulder.
“Let me know if you need to be healed,” I told her, and I was serious. I didn’t want anyone to get hurt or exhausted from overuse of power.
“I’m pretty tough,” Polina laughed as she tried to shove me. “I’m part of the Blue Tree Guild after all.”
“I never doubted that for a second.” I swayed with her attempted push and smiled. “Where are your sisters and Anton?”
“Oh, they’re helping rebuild.” Polina shrugged and latched onto my arm. “Trina and Marina are working to br
ing the farms back to life, and Anton is helping with all the tents and pavilions.”
I thought about the Blue Tree Guild as we walked to the library in silence. There was a power there in that guild, and I wondered if it could be used to save Hatra and Alyona.
Power was what ruled this world, and it was what I needed more of. The power to protect the people important to me.
If it was power that lurked in the library, then I would take it. I would use it to protect everything that was mine.
And anyone who dared to harm what was mine would suffer.
Suddenly, I stumbled on the staircase and blinked in confusion. I hadn’t realized we had come to the library already. My mind had been lost to my instincts, and all I could think about was possessive anger and the desire to build a dome around the city of Hatra so no one could ever harm it again.
Maybe I was going insane.
In silence, I led Polina to the catalogue that had been forgotten on the floor in the atrium, and I sat down as she flipped through it at a nearby table.
The library was suffocating. All I could see was Alyona on the floor covered in miasma and on the verge of death. Over and over again, that was all that I could see even when I closed my eyes.
It wasn’t right. Alyona wasn’t meant to look like that, she was supposed to be covered in the light of the sun, the moon, and the stars. In my mind, she danced in a field of white flowers, and I could almost smell the fragrance of the flowers. The scent was a delicate and sweet smell that reminded me of winter and lightning.
Alyona’s scent filled the library, and I was tormented by it. I couldn’t even imagine Hatra without her, and the possessive anger swelled up inside of me again. I could feel hatred running through my veins and the thickness of rage in my mind.
The priestess had somehow settled so deeply in my mind and heart that I knew if she didn’t return from that cursed sleep, I would go mad.
It was my instincts, I knew it was. The dragon part of me that had awoken ever since I put on the mask in my aunt’s shop. I had thought that there would be no darkness to it, but there was.