It might only be his imagination, but perhaps there really was some energy drawing him here. As he made his way along the streets, he kept looking around. Closer to the Dragon’s Jaw, the street was empty, as if people avoided it. He really should’ve gone to find Eastley and Bingham, but if there was something here that he might find, and if Gayal suggested that Eastley not come, maybe he needed to come by himself.
It was foolishness, though. He knew that. Coming out here alone was far more likely to end with his capture than anything else. And if he were caught out here alone, no one would know that he was even here. Bingham and Eastley wouldn’t be able to save him. The only one who would…
Would be Gayal.
She wouldn’t lead him into danger. At least, he didn’t think so. He wasn’t sure that he trusted her—she was the king’s Tecal, after all, but he also wasn’t convinced that she wanted something to happen to him.
When he neared the rock, he could feel the city as it tried to press him toward the Jaw, and he decided to take a look at it. Gayal had suggested that he venture this way.
He found that the city itself ended about a hundred paces from the rock.
Nothing was built any closer to it, though there was plenty of flat land leading up to it. He stepped out, closer to the Dragon’s Jaw, and stood there, looking up at the jagged fingers of rock crawling into the sky.
He could almost imagine there was some incredible power here, something he could visualize as if a dragon were truly biting its way out of the ground. The size of the dragon would have to be enormous, much larger than the small dragons that he had seen outside the Hatchery.
Ty made his way along the rock, gradually winding his way upward. It sloped rapidly, forcing him to climb with both hands and feet.
He had to move carefully. At one point his foot slipped and he nearly fell, but he gathered himself, dragging back onto the rock and pausing.
Standing here in the space between the city and the mountain, it was almost similar to how he felt transitioning from Zarinth into the jungle. There was a space, and then it was barren. Empty. Something different.
He looked around, lingering for another moment before continuing onward.
He started toward the rock, but something caught his eye. It was in the space between the two largest towers of rock. They stretched high overhead, as if they were clawing at the sky, as if the jaw itself were attempting to bite at the blue sky overhead. The path was not easy. He continued making his way upward, hand over hand, wondering why he was doing this.
The answer was easy, but it wasn’t an answer that he was sure was the right one.
Because Gayal had suggested it.
He looked back at the city. From here, all he could see were the shops on the outskirts, but no people within the city. It seemed as if the city itself were closed off to him, as if it were all trapped within the confines of the Dragon’s Jaw. Increasingly, he began to question whether Albion might be here. Could that be why Gayal had suggested he come here?
Ty hurried forward.
He reached the lowest level of the rock and continued climbing. As he did, he glanced back, worried that he was going to draw some notice from inside the city, but nobody seemed to pay any mind to him. Ty hurried up the rock, using his fingers, digging his toes in, until he reached a small space where he could jam his hands in and climb faster. The farther he went, the more Ty began to think he was making a mistake. There couldn’t be anything here. Maybe this was Gayal’s way of distracting him while she had his brother moved to a different prison, a safer one.
Just when he was about to turn back, a strange scraping sound caught his attention. It was just in front of him.
He continued crawling. What was the worst thing that could happen? He could reach a little higher, take a look around the rock, and if there was nothing here, he could go back down. If there was something…
Still, Gayal had suggested that he come here. Maybe there was some reason that she had wanted him to come. He continued climbing, clinging to the rock, every so often he would look up the side of the Dragon’s Jaw, half expecting that he was nearing the top, but he never came close. It still stretched high overhead, gently curving inward, as if to bend it toward the city itself. It was well named, but the whole space left him feeling uncomfortable in general.
As he continued climbing, his foot caught a section of the rock, and then it skittered off, and he slipped.
He caught himself, dangling on the stone. He held tightly, trying to grip the rock as well as he could, but his fingers, digging in as much as they could, still started to slip.
His feet rushed the surface of the rock. He continued kicking and finally managed to get purchase.
Ty pressed his feet deeper and held tightly.
As he did, he looked down again.
The drop would’ve been dangerous.
And worse, someone was making their way along the ground. He recognized the dark cloak of the Dragon Touched. He could practically feel the heat from the Dragon Touched, and for a moment, panic set in, making him think that it had to be Roson James, or perhaps one of the others that had pursued him and Eastley through the jungle. He hadn’t gotten that good of a look at them, though, and as the Dragon Touched continued along the street, he found himself praying to himself, hoping that he didn’t look up.
The heat persisted.
It seemed to radiate in Ty’s belly, working its way through him. He’d been feeling that sensation more often of late.
He stayed motionless, half afraid that he would have been detected, but the Dragon Touched moved on, leaving him with nothing but the memory of the panic.
He looked up. His fingers hurt. He wasn’t a rock climber by any means, but his work in Zarinth had certainly given him a measure of sneaking skill. He had to use that as well as he could, putting it into action so that he could make his way up the rock. He had to pick his way more carefully, though.
As he crawled up the rock, his mind kept working through what Gayal had told him.
The first dragon tooth.
She had wanted him to come here. There had to be something up here.
But if there was, would there be an easier way?
Ty hadn’t seen a path, and he had not seen anyone else making their way up here, other than the Dragon Touched that had been patrolling.
He picked his way far more carefully now. With each step, he found himself moving carefully. Hand over hand, working his way up the rock, and he finally saw a flutter of what looked to be light.
That was odd.
He held onto the rock for a moment, keeping himself pressed up against it.
He wiggled up and finally he found a narrow ledge, crawling along it. An opening in the rock revealed even more light. It glowed with a pale bluish white light, much like he had seen near the Hatchery.
Does that mean there’s somebody here?
Ty hesitated.
He didn’t want to crawl through here if that meant there were others up here, but Gayal had suggested he climb. She had suggested that he would find answers here.
Albion.
Why here, though?
He reached the narrow ledge, and he hesitated, lingering on it long enough for him to catch his breath. There had been no other sign of Dragon Touched, but he had to be careful here.
Gayal’s words kept coming back to him. The first tooth. The Dragon’s Jaw.
This was where he was supposed to be.
Curiosity sent him forward.
A glowing light in the distance caught his attention, and he followed that, feeling a hint of energy around him as well.
There was an opening, and within that he saw a little bit more pale white light.
The sound he had noticed came from in front of him.
Voices.
Ty stopped.
If this was one of the Dragon Touched, he would have to be careful. He didn’t know if he was forbidden from climbing the Dragon’s Jaw and should have questioned Gayal
before coming up here.
Still, Gayal had told him to come here.
There had to be some reason. Some answer.
As he moved forward, the voices were louder, but he didn’t see anything. It was almost as if the voices bounced off of the walls around him.
The echoing off the rock made it difficult to determine anything about the voices, so if they were saying something that he wanted to understand, he couldn’t. It was just a dull reverberation that made it difficult to make anything out.
The cavern opened up even more. On either side of him, the fingers of rock stretched up high and away, but the platform he stood on seemed to connect to them. It was odd. He felt as if he were in some sort of ring of rock, as if the Dragon’s Jaw surrounded him, as if he were now bit by the teeth.
It was almost as if he were heading into the dragon’s belly, getting swallowed by it. Were there other openings in between the other fingers of rock? Or was this the only one? If so, how had he found it?
Something in one of the voices caught his attention. A single word. He tensed, though he was certain of what he had heard.
Albion.
He snuck forward, holding one hand along the rock wall. One foot slipped, and he made more noise than he intended.
Ty froze, staying motionless.
This was why Gayal had wanted him to come. This was Albion’s prison.
He glanced back, but he could see only stone.
She had told him where to find his brother.
That seemed… surprising.
Then again, she had never been interested in the Dragon Thief. Had she? She had been more interested in seeing Ishantil calmed. At least, that was Ty’s impression.
He slid carefully forward. One foot after another.
The space in front of him was not what he thought. It opened up, and then he froze.
Situated in front of him were three cells. Strange bars of twisted metal stretched from the ground all the way up dozens of feet and curved back toward the rock. Each one had somebody trapped inside, but his eye was drawn to the one in the middle.
Albion.
Those were the voices he had heard.
Ty started toward him before catching himself.
This was the prison. It was open-air but not impossible to reach. Why would Albion have been held here? Unless the Dragon Touched thought they needed to keep him away from the rest of the city. There would be no remnants or relics that he might be able to use here.
The two prisoners on either side of his brother were older, with graying hair and long beards, and were incredibly thin.
His brother had grown a thick beard in the time since he’d last seen him, and his eyes had hollowed out, but he didn’t look quite as ragged as they did.
“Albion?”
His brother grabbed for the bars before jerking back and standing a step behind them, looking at Ty. He’d given little thought to what he’d say to his brother when he saw him again, and now realized that mistake. He didn’t know what to say to the person he thought he’d known, only to learn that Albion had been keeping an impossible secret from him. Ty suspected he was still the priest he’d believed, but now he was more.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
“What happened? Why do they have you here?”
He glanced at the others before turning his attention back to Ty and shaking his head. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“I came to…”
He wanted to get his brother out of here, but Ty wasn’t exactly sure if he could. He wanted answers, though. And if he could find what Roson James and the rogue priests were after before they did, he might be able to use that and trade it for his brother’s safety.
As he looked at the other man next to Albion, Ty realized that he would have to work quickly or Albion would end up just like them. Fading. Dying.
“You should get moving,” Albion said, looking past him. “If they find out that you’re here, they—”
“They will what?” Ty asked.
Albion shook his head. “You don’t want to know.”
“I can help you.”
He breathed out slowly. “There is no help for me, Ty.”
“I can help.” He took a step toward him, and as he neared the bars of the cell, he could feel something radiating through them. It was a strange energy, heat that reminded him of what he had felt within the Hatchery.
Ty reached into his pocket, pulling out the note, and held it out to him. “You left this for me.”
“They didn’t get to it,” Albion said, something in his expression softening.
“What is it?”
“They can’t reach it,” Albion said, grabbing the bars of his cell. “I know it’s asking a lot of you, Tydornen, but you need to get it first.”
“Get what?”
Albion flicked his gaze past him, before turning to Ty. “Return to Zarinth. That’s what you need to do. The answers are found within the Flame.”
Confusion struck him. “What?”
Albion stared at him, intensity in his gaze.
And Ty understood.
He couldn’t tell him. Others were listening. Perhaps the prisoners, or perhaps soldiers or Dragon Touched, or maybe Albion simply didn’t want to tell him the truth.
His brother jerked his head to the side, his expression gaunt, and there was a weight in his eyes, but something else, as well.
“Find it before they do. Answers are found within the Flame.”
“What kind of answers?”
“Answers about the real reason I returned to Zarinth.”
Albion released the bars of the cell, flicking his gaze to the note in Ty’s hand, then looking up to Ty again.
“Let me get you out of here. I know someone—”
Albion just shook his head. “No. Not yet. Do this for me, Tydornen.”
There was sound nearby, shadows that swirled.
Ty backed toward the direction he’d come. Soldiers—or Dragon Thief—were coming.
“Go,” Albion whispered. “The Dragon Thief must do this.”
Ty reached the path back. His brother wanted him to be the Dragon Thief, so he was going to have to become it.
But how?
The Flame provides.
And the note.
What did it mean?
As he looked to Albion, he found his brother staring at him, at the note still clutched in Ty’s hand, and then he turned away.
Ty backed out the way he had come until the cells were no longer in view, taking one last lingering look at his brother and hoping that wasn’t the last time he would see him alive.
Chapter Twenty-Three
It was late in the evening when Ty reached the tavern where he had left Bingham. He had circled around the city, concerned about whether or not there had been anybody following him, but he hadn’t seen any signs of being tracked. Ty wouldn’t put it past it for there to be somebody, and so he had been cautious. There had been no sign of Gayal and no sign of any of the Dragon Touched, so he thought he had managed to slip away without getting caught.
He kept expecting that he would run into Eastley but didn’t really know where he might have gone. Perhaps he was still searching for more information about the Dragon Touched, or maybe Eastley had even been stupid enough to try to attack them, though Ty didn’t think that even Eastley would do something like that. If he had seen Roson James, though, he wouldn’t put it past Eastley to try something.
He still hadn’t figured out why Gayal had wanted him to find his brother. There was a strange dynamic between her and Roson James, enough of one that left Ty questioning whether he even wanted to get caught in the middle of it.
But now he had something more to figure out. He needed to understand what his brother wanted him to find.
The answers were found within the Flame.
If that meant going to speak with the priests at the temple, he wasn’t sure that he would be interested in doing that. Not since they had targeted him, leavi
ng him thinking that perhaps the priests want to be trusted. Or maybe he meant the actual Flame atop the temple. Ty had already snuck into the temple once, and he figured that he could make his way through it again, if that was going to be the key to getting the answers that he wanted.
Still, he had not come up with anything other than that Albion had wanted him to help.
But not help him escape.
His brother had been trapped, getting weaker, thinner, but he had not wanted to be rescued. He had wanted Ty to find what he had been sent for.
Not only that, but he had wanted the Dragon Thief.
Why though?
Maybe for the same reason that Gayal had tried to help him.
When he reached the tavern, he stepped inside, looking for Bingham. The tavern was busier than it had been when he’d been here before. Most of the tables were occupied, and several minstrels played near the back wall, a fast-paced tune with ribald lyrics.
He tapped his foot, listening to the song, having heard it in Zarinth a time or two, but was distracted. His mind raced with what he had seen and a feeling of urgency at trying to understand what Albion had told him. He fingered the note, tracing his thumb along the surface, trying to work through the answer, knowing that there had to be one, if only he could piece it together.
Bingham still sat in the counter where they had left him earlier in the day. He had taken to staying at the bar rather than helping them. Of course, he and Eastley had told him not to worry about it.
Ty made his way over to him, taking a seat. Bingham seemed unsteady, wobbling in place, weaving from side to side.
Is he still drunk?
“There you are,” Bingham said. His words were slurred, and he looked around the inside of the tavern before settling his gaze back on him. “It’s taken you long enough. I figured you and Eastley would’ve come back sooner.”
Within the Dragon's Jaw (The Dragon Thief Book 2) Page 20