All but one.
A young woman.
Seeking to become an alchemist.
She heard the manor had a library, and so, against the wishes of her family and friends, she traveled there.
At first, Titus turned her away. He wanted to be left alone.
But the young woman persisted. She offered to tidy up the manor in exchange for access to the library.
Titus said no once more.
And so she waited three days and three nights outside his door.
Finally… on the fourth day, the door opened, and Titus allowed her inside.
She marveled at the library, at all the knowledge hidden there.
She took a room at the manor and began her studies, as well as her efforts at restoration.
Days turned into weeks.
Weeks turned into years.
And eventually, the young woman and Titus fell in love.
For the first time in a long time, Titus had opened himself up to another, and together they lived happily.
Then one day the woman left to collect herbs for her alchemy. As she plucked leaves, the High Dragon Elarius and his cohort rode by on their way to the village. Elarius, upon seeing the woman, was mesmerized by her beauty. He ordered her to join him on his journey. He would take her as a concubine, he said.
The woman explained she already had a husband. She would be returning home. But Elarius did not allow it. He ordered his men to capture the woman and imprison her. Until she decided to be his concubine, she would not have freedom.
For three days and three nights she wept in a cell.
On the fourth night, Elarius came to see her.
This was her final chance, he said. She must become his, or suffer the consequences.
The woman said she belonged to no man. And then she spat in Elarius’s face.
He dragged her from the cell, and burned her at the stake for all the village to see.
When Titus heard of what befell his wife, he cried out with rage.
He rode to the village and rallied those who had been friend or family to his wife.
Together, they overthrew Elarius, lord of the land, and burned his body until nothing but ash remained.
In the years to come, Titus would become a great warrior, a conqueror and ruler. But he would never stop being the man who fell in love with a young woman dreaming of becoming an alchemist.
She had stolen his heart.
And taught him how to love.
You will not read of her in the histories, except for her simple role as catalyst in the great uprising.
But she was so much more than that.
She was a person, and her name was Eliana.
I freeze. Memories chilling me to the bone. Memories of my mother on her death bed.
"Eliana. I am scared, my friend. I am scared."
Eliana…
My mother knew her… the Eliana from the story.
And it clicks. Everything in my mind reshuffles, and I finally understand the truth. Not just about Pike, but about myself.
Eliana and Titus had a child.
A daughter.
A High Dragon.
Half human, half dragon.
Me.
My mum kept me safe, but she was not my true mother.
My mother was Eliana, and my father was Titus.
And if she was human.
And he was a dragon.
Then Titus, the first of his name, Emperor of Nirandel, is Pike…
And I am his daughter.
The knowledge slams into my gut like a fist. Everything I thought I knew about myself, my life, it was all a lie. Why hadn't my mother—who wasn't my mother—told me the truth? Why had she let me grow up believing the lie?
I ball my hands into fists and feel my nails pierce the flesh on my palms. I don't have time for a personal crisis right now. My first priority has to be stopping Pike. The rest can come later.
I need to reach Kaden. He or his mother can help me get to the Emperor—to Pike. There's still time.
I stand quickly, my hand hitting my tea cup off the table, and it shatters to the floor.
My knees buckle beneath me.
I grab my chair to stop from falling.
What's happening to me?
My body is sluggish. Disobedient to my mind. I cannot move at will.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
The tapping of a cane.
Master Orcael walks in from the balcony, a cane in his hand that was not there before.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
A cane with tri-colored wood. Tipped with what I now know to be a dragonstone.
"No… " my voice sounds strained. Too quiet. More like air escaping through my lips. I need to stand, but my body grows weaker.
“I am so very sorry, my dear,” says Master Orcael, “but I cannot allow you to leave. A Sundering is upon us, and I have a duty to fulfill. A duty, I suspect, you intend to interrupt.”
He moves closer to me and smiles. “A shame you had to find out this way,” he says, his voice changing as he speaks, becoming rough. "I did so enjoy our nightly talks.”
As I watch helplessly, he begins to transform. His skin reshapes itself, his beard shortens. His gray robes darken until they are black. He pulls a hat from his coat and places it on his head, and in that moment, he becomes the image from my memories. From my nightmares. The enemy I hunt.
Pike.
He's been right here the whole time, and I never knew. We had tea together. Talked. Laughed. Commiserated. I thought him a friend.
Bile rises in my throat, burning the back of my tongue.
The monster before me grins. “You were clever to study the emperor so closely. Not the first, of course. There have been others before you who discovered Titus and I were one in the same, but they are gone now. Like you, they forgot to consider one important factor.” He motions all around. “My home. Did they really believe I would abandon it? That I would not spend my days here any longer?” He taps his cane. “The palace is lovely to be sure, but it will never replace the Cliff. The books. The view.”
I can't just sit here paralyzed while he prattles on. I need to fight. I try to transmute my hand, but nothing happens. My legs buckle more. I am losing control of my body. “What did you do to me?”
“What I did to the others,” he says. “Moonshade, a very powerful herb, capable of causing temporary paralysis. Easy to blend in to tea.” He pauses, his eyes distant, somber. “My wife taught me of Moonshade, you know. We’d pick it together in the gardens. But that was long ago. I was a different man then.”
I want to dismiss him as a madman—and he is, to be sure—but the sadness in his eyes is genuine. If I can’t fight him, maybe I can persuade him. “I know about you and Illian. I know about you and Eliana. The world betrayed you, I understand. Illian wanted you to give up your life. Wanted you to die, though she was your friend. Eliana was taken from you. Killed for being who she was. All those you held dear are lost to you. But—”
“But what?" He sneers at me, his face losing that placid facade he usually maintains. "Should I return my sacrifice to their home and let the world burn instead?” He shakes his head. “Everything I have done, everything I do, is necessary. Without me, dragons would consume Nirandel and all the Nine Worlds. Without me, the corrupt High Dragons would still rule. Don’t you see? I make this world bearable. I, alone.”
“It is our friends who make this world bearable,” I say, remembering Bix, Landon, Mabel, Zev, Enzo and Raven, and the night we swore we would never leave each other. “It is those we love who make this world bearable.”
“Those who I love are gone,” says Pike. “The world took them away. It will do the same to you in time. It always does.”
I feel my energy spent. I am about to collapse, my body unable to move while my mind still works. I need a burst of strength. I need… a dragonstone. If I had one I could…
I remember Orcael’s—Pike’s pen—the decorative stone at the top.
> I see it on the table.
“Now,” says Pike, “it is time we go somewhere more comfortable. Somewhere you cannot interfere.”
He steps forward.
With my remaining strength, I reach for the pen, and clasp onto the dragonstone.
And I shatter it.
The dragonstone explodes, along with the pen, and energy surges through my body. I stand tall, facing Pike.
His eyes go wide. “How is this possible?”
He seems stunned. No one else would have been able to break through the effects of the Moonshade. Not without dragon blood and a dragonstone.
This is my chance.
This energy will only last a moment. I can already feel the effects of the drug resurfacing.
I have to make the right choice.
Fight?
Run?
What do I do?
I can't afford to think. I must just act.
So I do.
I blink and appear at the balcony, using my powers.
And then.
I jump.
I fall.
I try to transmute my wings, but the power is already fading. I have no strength. The paralysis returns.
My eyes close.
When I hit the ground, my body will break. I will regenerate in Sanctuary. But Pike will find me.
Still, there is hope. Maybe one of my friends will find me first.
I think of my squad. Of Kara. Of my boys back home. Of all the things I have to live for.
I think of the life I've had. The good and bad. The misery and the joy. It is the bitter that makes the sweet palatable. I've come to see this. To see that we would not want a life that had no challenge. That did not push us and test us and polish us. We are meant to be more than what we pretend to be.
Blake told me that once. I believed him then.
I believe him now.
I have not given up hope. Even now.
A lightness fills me, and I surrender to what is.
And then, arms wrap around me. A warm embrace. Someone holding me close.
We glide through the air.
I'm no longer falling.
Someone came.
Someone saved me.
Kaden?
I peel my eyes open.
And then I see her.
Holding me.
Saving me.
Her masked face above me.
The Outcast.
I fall into dreams.
Into a field of grass.
A silver tree.
And two stone graves.
My Sanctuary.
I sit amongst the flowers, their smells playing with my nose, and then I sense it.
A presence not my own.
Pike steps out before me, his black cloak drifting in the wind. His eyes scrutinize me. “You are High Dragon,” he says, perplexed. “But I killed them all. All of them except…” There is panic in his eyes, and fear. “No… you cannot be…”
“I am,” I say softly. “My mother was Eliana and my father, the man called Titus, the man called Orcael, the man called Pike.”
“No… you were stillborn. You were dead. I saw it. I felt it. All my hopes. All my dreams for you. They died that day. We could never conceive again. I was going to raise you to rule the worlds. But you died, as did my dreams that day.” He smashes his fist against the tree and leaves fall.
“I was dead,” I say, the pieces falling into place, “but somehow, I already had my Spirit. My body regenerated. My mother hid me from you, gave me to her friend, the woman who raised me." I cock my head to look at him, as I think back to what it must have been like for my birth mother. "Perhaps Eliana saw you for what you truly were. What you truly are.”
Pike shakes his head. “I saw you. You were dead.” He pauses, looking at the flowers. “Do not look for me in the coming hours. Do not interfere. Once the Sundering is finished and the sacrifice given, I will find you. Perhaps… perhaps we can start again.”
He fades away, disappearing.
And then I wake.
Forty-One
Na’razim
My eyes peel open, the world a blur coming slowly into focus.
A familiar face leans over me. Their black short hair curling around their cheeks.
Naoki.
“Good to have you back,” Naoki says.
They hold a mug of something warm at my lips and support my head as I sip at it. The bitterness of the brew zings at my mouth and I cough.
Naoki smiles apologetically. "Dragon's Breath. It grows on the mountains during winter. Horrible tasting, even with honey added, but is known for helping rebuild a person's constitution. It's particularly useful when someone's been poisoned."
With Naoki's help I prop myself up enough to look around. I'm in a simple room carved from rock, almost like a cave. I lay on a mat on the floor with a wool blanket tucked around me.
My memories come back slowly, sledging through my mind.
The Cliff.
The Sundering.
Pike.
The Outcast.
I sit up straight, my heart pounding faster in my chest as the urgency of the situation returns. “Where are we?” I try to stand, but fall back down, my body still weak from the poison.
Naoki catches me, making sure I don’t bang my head as I lay back down. “You must be careful,” they say. “You were passed out for hours. You are still recovering.”
Only hours. Good. I haven’t missed a day. There's still time. “I need to get back.” Back to my friends. Back to Pike. I need to stop him. To stop the Sundering.
“Soon,” says Naoki. “But first you must rest.”
“Where is the Outcast?” I ask, scanning the room. She saved me—twice now—but still I don’t trust her. Not after she killed Kaden’s friend.
“She is close,” Naoki says. “She will be glad you are awake.”
“Where are we?” I repeat again. If Naoki is working with the Outcast, I don’t trust them fully either. I need to figure out what’s going on, and then find Pike.
“Please, Sky, you must relax. I know this is disorienting, but the more you see, the more you will understand.” Naoki eyes plead silently with me.
I remember the day I saw the Watcher whip Naoki, how broken and alone they looked. The day I saw the what it means to be Charred. The memory softens my response.
“Where are we?” I ask again.
“Na'Razim,” Naoki says.
My gasp is audible, and something like excitement and fear bubble up inside me. “But I thought that was just a story.”
“It is real,” says Naoki. “A place where people live beyond the Wall. The place I grew up.”
Grew up? “So are you… are you a Worshipper of the Wall?”
“Yes, but my father is the priest. I just believe in the teachings.”
“But… if you lived beyond the Wall… how did you become an Ashling? How did anyone find you?”
Naoki straightens their back, their tone proud. “I came to the Cliff myself. I volunteered.”
“Volunteered?”
“To become a Twin Spirit. I spent three nights in the Ashlands alone. The experience broke me, and I gained a Spirit. Then I snuck past the Wall and arrived at the Cliff. I joined the Ashlings. And then I failed the first test to become Charred.”
“You mean… you failed on purpose? Why would you do such a thing?” I can't keep the incredulity from my voice. I've seen what Naoki endured. To do so by choice seems… mad.
“The path of an Ashling did not concern me. As Charred, I had instant access to many parts of the fortress you have probably yet to see. I heard and saw things that the Ashlords kept secret. No one notices the Charred cleaning their chamber pot or refiling their water, even as they discuss battle plans and strategy.”
“You’re a spy? Why? For who?”
“For this city,” Naoki says. “I deliver information to help prevent the killing of hatchlings. I hear things in the fortress, which gates are manned, w
hat patrols are heading out.”
“But how do you leave the Cliff? The Charred are never supposed to leave.”
Naoki nods. “It is true. We are not. They fear we will remove our braces.” She rolls up her gray sleeve, revealing a brace around her wrist, covering her Spirit Mark, much like the armband I used to wear.
It makes sense now. “So the Ashpriests don’t actually burn out your Spirit. They just contain it. That is why they can’t simply let you leave.”
“Yes. If we were to take off our bracer, we would be as dangerous as any untrained Twin Spirit. So they watch us closely, very closely. But I know how to make a drink that makes one very sleepy, and I give it to my Watcher every night. And I know a passage in the fortress, through the catacombs, that leads out past the Wall.” Naoki pauses. “It is small. Too small for dragons. But perfect for me.”
I try to process all this information. A disturbing thought comes to mind. If Naoki spies for the Outcast… “Are you the reason we were attacked beyond the Wall three years ago? The reason we almost died?”
Naoki bows their head. “Yes. I had heard of the hatchling catch and the path that might be taken." Naoki looks up, tears in their eyes. "I am sorry. I did not know it was your squad that would go." Their face tenses, as a resolve replaces the grief. "But even had I known, I would not have done differently. But then things changed. The Red Queen, she told us everything. She told us what you are."
“The Red Queen?” I ask.
“The one you call the Outcast… she was there… atop the red dragon,” says Naoki.
Pieces begin to click together. It makes sense she would have been atop the red dragon then. She would have seen me shatter the dragonstone. She would have realized who I was. A High Dragon.
“She said you would want to help us," Naoki says, a new light in their eyes.
"Help you do what?" I ask.
"Help bring peace between dragon and mankind,” Naoki says, as if it's obvious.
Because I am half dragon, they think I will fight for the them. But… "The dragons are beasts,” I say. "Monsters who would kill all men and Spirits.”
Of Dreams and Dragons Page 34