Dragon Heart

by Kirill Klevanski

  Nero got up, brushed off his pants, and went over to the lake.

  “I’ll watch over you.” He stopped. It looked like he wanted to turn around. But he didn’t. He quickly brushed something off his face. Probably an annoying insect. “If I see you moping around, I’ll send you a terrible nightmare. I have to go now.”

  “We have to go,” another voice corrected him.

  Serra came out of the mist. She was as beautiful as ever.

  “Take care of my sister, Hadjar. She is stubborn... By the Evening Stars, how stubborn she is! But her heart is kind. Please save her, my friend.”

  Nero and Serra hugged and went toward the lake.

  Hadjar wanted to go after them, but his legs wouldn’t obey him. He wanted to scream, but he didn’t have the strength to open his lips. He could only sit and watch his most beloved people disappear beneath the light of this damned moon, vanishing into the fog...

  “N...” Hadjar’s lips trembled. “N... N...”

  His hands shook, reaching for his sword lying nearby. Suddenly, his blue eyes flashed so fiercely that, for a moment, they overshadowed the moonlight.

  “No!” Hadjar roared.

  He jumped to his feet, grabbed his sword, and rushed toward the lake. The fog creeping underfoot came to life and formed a wall. Hadjar punched it and was sent flying a good ten feet back. This didn’t stop him at all. Drawing his blade, he rained down his most powerful attacks on the wall. A black, torn cloak lay across his shoulders, wisps of darkness oozed out of Mountain Wind, but none of it was able to break through the fog wall.

  Many hours, days, or even years passed as this meaningless battle raged on. The two figures had disappeared long ago. The ruthless moon was still shining. Hadjar, blinded by fury, continued to fight against the impregnable wall.

  “Do you want me to bring them back?” Someone behind him asked.

  Already knowing who it was, Hadjar turned to the sound. A few inches away from him, a little fairy floated in the air. It was a male. Tiny, no larger than his index finger, the messenger of the gods radiated an aura that made Sankesh’s seem insignificant by comparison.

  “This is all just a silly dream,” Hadjar growled and returned to his work — trying to destroy the wall with his blade.

  “A dream?” The fairy cooed. “Think, Desert Wind Blowing from the North, is it really a dream? Just one word from you and the error of the Magistrate will be corrected. You’ll... wake up on the same day that Primus brought you a sword for your birthday. Only this time, he’ll hug you and your mother lovingly. You’ll happily greet your brother and... your aunt. Just say the word, Mad General.”

  During the fairy’s speech, Hadjar saw it all unfold: the celebration, Eren and him playing games. They even slept in beds that had been moved next to each other...

  He struck the wall...

  “Think about it, Hadjar.”

  He hit it once more.

  “Just imagine it.”

  The sword paused before the next attack, which he never launched. Hadjar turned toward the messenger of the gods, the being who was the voice of the Seventh Heaven.

  “What will it cost me?”

  The fairy smiled and spread his tiny arms benevolently.

  “Give up your ambitions. Promise me right now that you will abandon this path you’re on. Then I’ll erase your memory of this life, of all the misfortune and trouble you went through, of the many sorrows and hardships. You’ll start over from scratch. You only need to abandon the quest for Mage City and-”

  Suddenly, the fairy went quiet. Hadjar had gripped him so tightly that he couldn’t speak.

  “How impudent can you be, mortal?” The creature squeaked. “I’m the messenger of the Seventh Heaven! I’m a servant of the gods! I witnessed the births and deaths of stars while your people were still apes running around in forests!”

  “Shut up!” A wild, unbridled roar sounded.

  The fairy stopped talking. For the first time in his life, the ancient creature had fallen silent because of fear.

  Two blue eyes looked at him. The fury that churned in them could’ve flooded the whole world, reached the farthest stars, and overshadowed the radiance of the sun itself.

  Hadjar turned to the lake. There, Nero and Serra stood, embracing.

  Smiling at him, Nero nodded and disappeared. Hadjar answered his friend with a smile of his own and turned to the fairy. Somewhere deep inside, he knew that this might’ve been their last conversation.

  “This is my world, you bastard of the Seventh Heaven,” Hadjar growled out. He was almost certain that, in here, he was capable of anything. That he was currently inside his own soul. “I could kill you if I so desired, but I won’t. I won’t! Today, you’ll get to live! You’ll get to return to your masters.”

  “You-”

  Hadjar squeezed harder, and the fairy’s words turned into a squeak.

  “You’ll fly back to them and tell them that you’ve seen the resoluteness of Hadjar Darkhan. You’ve heard my voice and seen my sword. It doesn’t matter when it happens. It doesn’t matter how much of my blood I spill along the way. It doesn’t matter who gets in my way. But I’ll get there! Do you hear me? I’ll climb all the way up to that damned Seventh Heaven! Let the Jasper Emperor send his armies against me. Let all the gods take up weapons and try to stop me. Let all the stars merge together and try to crush me, but I’ll get to the Emperor! I’ll make him answer for all his sins and mistakes! For all the tears that were shed because of his errors! For all the cries of mothers, fathers, and children whose hearts he crushed with his negligence!”

  “You’re insane, mortal! Do you even understand what you’re saying? This is nonsense! There is no justice in this world, and even if...”

  “...there were other worlds, there would be no justice there, either. I already heard that saying from the old forest healer. But even if that’s true,” Hadjar took his sword and thrust it into the ground in front of him, “then this will be the first world where justice will finally be allowed to exist! So tell them! Spread the word all over the Seventh Heaven! No matter what they throw at me, I’ll come! No matter how many tens, hundreds, thousands, millions of years pass, I’ll come! Tell them I’m coming. Hadjar Darkhan is coming for all of them!”

  With these final words, Hadjar threw the messenger of the gods into the sky.

  Who was Sankesh compared to the might of the gods? What was the Empire of Darnassus compared to the Seventh Heaven? Only short flashes in the night. He would overcome them easily. Drawing his sword, Hadjar looked forward. His gaze was clear and his hand was steady.

  Hadjar opened his eyes. He was lying on a stretcher, bandaged, groaning from the terrible pain he was in.

  “Be still, barbarian,” Einen whispered, preparing some medicine in a mortar, “you’ve already-”

  Ignoring the pain, Hadjar rose to his feet, leaning on his blade. Everyone looked at him.

  “I know where the entrance to Mage City is.”

  Chapter 375

  “Are you kidding me right now?” Glen jumped to his feet and threw his dagger to the ground. “Are we really going to listen to this barbarian again?”

  “You yourself are from a barbarian kingdom,” Einen remarked in a calm tone.

  “That’s why I don’t try to get involved in things I don’t know anything about!” Glen retorted angrily. “Just look at him!”

  Hadjar guessed that he didn’t look all that good right now. After his battle with Olgerd, it was difficult to find a spot on his body that wasn’t bandaged or covered in odorous medicine. He stood with great difficulty, often leaning on his sword or his friend’s shoulder.

  “Northerner,” Ramukhan rose from his seat, “I could believe you before, but now you’ve gone too far!”

  “Even an idiot would see through your trap!” Tilis grabbed her staff and pointed it at Hadjar. “You went to the camp of the man who has been terrorizing the desert for almost half a century. You came back alive and now you’re
saying that you know where the entrance to Mage City is! I would sooner believe that the gods themselves will show me the way, barbarian!”

  Salif and the boy silently watched what was happening. Ordinary servants didn’t have a high enough rank to get involved in this kind of argument. Karissa was looking through her book. Apparently, she’d decided to stay neutral.

  Hadjar initially wanted to cut off Glen’s tongue right then and there. He wouldn’t even need Mountain Wind to do so. It would’ve been enough to will the energy of the Sword to do it, since Glen was only thirty paces away. Apparently, no one had taught Glen to keep at least fifty steps between him and Wielders at all times.

  “As you wish,” Hadjar breathed out.

  Turning around, he limped off toward the jungle. Einen, only hesitating a little, picked up his folded bale and his staff, and followed his friend.

  “Where are you going?” Ramukhan growled out.

  At that moment, Hadjar cried out as pain engulfed him. It spread in waves throughout his body, coming from the blue amulet on his arm. With every step that Hadjar took, the pain grew stronger. It squeezed his heart and lungs and made it harder for him to breathe.

  Leaning against the trunk of a strange tree, Hadjar turned to the sorcerer. The man had a wide, smug grin on his face, one that was almost as unpleasant as Sankesh’s had been. Well, the latter had possessed truly monstrous power and hadn’t relied on talismans created by someone else, which still made him far scarier. Damn, Hadjar wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Sankesh had forged his halberd himself.

  “We aren’t slaves, huh?” Hadjar muttered.

  An unkind gleam appeared in his blue eyes. The pain intensified. Ramukhan’s grin widened.

  “When our goals align, you’re not,” the sorcerer nodded. “Now, if you don’t want to test the limits of your pain threshold, answer my question. How do you know where the entrance to Mage City is?”

  Hadjar gritted his teeth. Waves of pain surged through him. They almost made him pass out. His vision blurred... If he’d fought Olgerd at least a week ago, then, no doubt, Hadjar would’ve really tried to find the limit of his endurance.

  “I don’t know where the entrance is,” Hadjar answered.

  “Ha!” Glen exclaimed. “I knew it! The barbarian has completely lost his mind from all the sun. Ramukhan, with all due respect, Paris sent us to find a needle in a haystack, one that is also sought by monsters like Sunshine Sankesh. We must go to-”

  “But I know what to look for,” Hadjar interrupted him. He recalled his dream, in which he’d sat near a lake that he’d never seen before. He’d never had the time to just sit at a lake, and the Moon Army had usually washed themselves and their clothes in rivers. “We need to find the lake that gets foggy at night.”

  “Do you believe that the entrance to Mage City is hidden in that lake?” Karissa joined the conversation. “Sorry, Hadjar, but even I think that sounds silly.”

  “I don’t know, by the demons, I don’t know. Maybe it’s in the water. Maybe it’s somewhere nearby. Maybe it’s in the fog. I have no idea. I only know that we need to find this lake.”

  “There are so many lakes here that we’ll need at least a century to check them all.”

  This time, Ramukhan’s words were quite reasonable. Hadjar didn’t know what to say, and then he realized a truth that was so simple he smiled when it came to him.

  “I’ll know it when I see it. But we need to search for it at night.”

  Noticing that everyone seemed skeptical, even Einen, Hadjar drew Mountain Wind halfway. He ran his palm along its edge and said:

  “I swear that I believe in what I’m saying.”

  His blood glowed, then pulled back into his wound. The edges of the cut flesh came together again, leaving behind another thin, barely noticeable scar. A second passed. Then two, three… and Hadjar still didn’t turn into a living torch.

  “Demons take me now,” Glen slapped himself, “my mother told me: ‘Stay in your father’s house, son. Don’t go beyond that gate, don’t look for trouble.’ I disobeyed my mother and this is what I get...”

  “We should always listen to women,” Salif nodded, starting to pack up his belongings. “Men speak of clever deeds, women speak of wise ones. By the Evening Stars, the wise always get to live longer than those who are just clever.”

  “You’ll see,” Tilis began to gather her things as well, “he’ll lead us into a trap. We’ll all die in this damned oasis.”

  The pain receded, and Hadjar swayed with relief and almost fell again. Einen caught him in time.

  “I believe you, my friend,” he whispered, “but I don’t understand how you found out about this.”

  “My brother told me,” Hadjar answered, feeling like he was plunging into the void again.

  “I thought he died long ago.”

  Hadjar didn’t answer. Even after his death, Nero had managed to help him and take care of his brother. Even though Hadjar hadn’t been able to save him...

  Something invisible, but rather strong, nudged Hadjar’s shoulder. He mistakenly turned toward the jungle. The answer to his unspoken question was the silence and the rustling of the wind that greeted him.

  “Don’t forget that.” Einen nodded toward the wallet lying on the ground. It had fallen from Hadjar’s belt. One of the bracelets had almost fallen out of it, too.

  “Thank you,” Hadjar mouthed and, after bending down painfully to pick it up, tied the wallet back onto his belt.

  “Come, my friend,” Einen dragged him back to his camel, “Because of you, we now have a long way to go.”

  The islander helped Hadjar climb onto the animal’s back. He clutched the camel’s hump and tried to stay conscious.

  “By the gods, Einen,” Hadjar muttered, “you’ll regret staying by my side.”

  “We all end up regretting something,” Einen shrugged. He tied Hadjar to his mount with wide straps. “The important thing is not what we regret, but what we desire. My father taught me that. May the forefathers be merciful to him and his rebirth be a happy one.”

  Before the darkness claimed Hadjar again, he managed to notice a slight expression of grief on his friend’s face. Einen almost never spoke about his past. All that Hadjar knew was that the islander’s father was a rather successful slave trader, and his mother was a dancer. Only now, after this revelation, did it become clear why he’d rarely talked about them. His reason had been the same as Hadjar’s...

  Darkness cut off Hadjar’s thoughts. He plunged into it, falling from the edge of reality. The flight was short and ended in the already familiar meadow. Fluffy clouds floated in the clear, blue sky. The wind created the illusion that the grass was an emerald-colored sea.

  Hadjar stood on a low hill, without any bandages or pain, breathing freely and with his sword sheathed at his belt, wearing his old, simple clothes.

  “You are progressing faster than I thought you would, disciple.”

  Without hesitation, Hadjar knelt down and placed his forehead against the cold earth.

  “Hello, Master.”

  A tall, stately man was sitting on a stone wet with dew. His silk robes and long hair fluttered in the wind. The only thing that revealed his inhuman nature were the long horns on his head.

  “Only two years have passed since we last met,” Traves continued. “And now you’ve come to see me once again.”

  Chapter 376

  “I have so many questions for you, Master.” Hadjar didn’t stop bowing. With every day he’d spent on the path of cultivation, he’d felt his respect for the ancient dragon increasing. What a strong will a person had to have to walk the same path Traves had taken! “Do you know anything about the true path of cultivation? What levels of sword mastery are there after the Wielder level? Can a person achieve true immortality? What is the essence of rebirth? Have you heard about Mage City, which once stood where the Sea of Sand is located now? How can I defeat a Spirit Knight? What can you tell me about the gods and the Sevent
h Hea-”

  “Shut up, Hadjar.” Traves’ tone was so harsh that it could’ve split the stone he was sitting on in half. “I understand that each of our meetings doubles the number of questions that bother you. But you have to realize something: I’m not even a proper Shadow, just a tiny fragment of my consciousness left behind to tell you what your part of our deal is.”

  Hadjar sighed and sat upright, assuming a lotus position. He understood perfectly that what Traves had just said was the truth. That was why he’d never asked the questions he’d voiced a moment ago until now. However, after so many trials, he’d hoped that he could find an easier way. The damned gods, apparently, loved to mess with him and he would have to keep struggling every step of the way.

  “As for the gods,” Traves’ words made Hadjar’s heart stop and he became all ears, “you shouldn’t mention them. You shouldn’t even think about them, my disciple. Now, since we are at the junction of your soul and mine, they aren’t able to hear us, and I can safely tell you a little secret. Every time you mention them, whether in anger, or even just for the sake of a beautiful phrase, you attract their attention. You give them bits of your power and faith.”

  “And when millions of entities do this, their power grows,” Hadjar concluded.

  “Exactly,” Traves nodded. “Growing up in your little kingdom, you didn’t get a chance to see their priests. You won’t see them in Darnassus, either. You may get lucky enough to hear about them from the organization that stands behind the so-called ‘great power’ of Darnassus, but I doubt it. I saw a priest of the gods once.”

  Hadjar couldn’t believe his eyes. By the Evening Stars and the Great Turtle! He’d seen fear in Traves’ amber eyes. The dragon who had killed a dozen soldiers of the Dragon Kingdom’s Army back when he’d been just a shepherd was actually afraid of someone.

  “I saw the priest in the Land of Immortals,” Traves continued, “and their power, Hadjar... It’s different. It isn’t like ours. They don’t draw it from the spirits or the World River. It’s something completely different.”