"I will live inside you!" the aborted fetus screamed.
Nemes stumbled toward a wall bristly with blades. He pitched forward toward the spikes. A blade impaled the fetus and blood poured.
"Mother!" the babe cried. "Mother, it hurts, it stabs us! Why does he kill us?"
Nemes stumbled backward, clutching at his wounds. The fetus remained upon the wall, skewered on the blade. The creature writhed. He wept. Suddenly he seemed to Nemes not a demon spawn, but a human child, scared and hurt and dying.
"Mother," the babe whispered… and then his head slumped. He hung still like a slab on a meat hook.
Nemes limped toward a door in the back. His head swam and he trembled with blood loss. He trudged upstairs, holding the wall and smearing blood across it. He entered the fourth floor of the tower.
A choked gasp fled his lips.
No horror—not the obese diner, not the twisted dog, not the fetus in his host—could prepare Nemes for this.
Tears filled his eyes.
"No," he whispered and fell to his knees. "Please, no."
Lying on the floor before him, gasping and bleeding and pale, was his father.
The old man opened his mouth. His teeth were gone. His lips were dry. He tried to speak, sputtered, and whispered.
"S-son." He lifted a skeletal hand. Sweat covered his brow. "Son, please… please save me."
Nemes crawled toward his father and touched his forehead. It was blazing hot. His father was feverish, so frail his skin draped across his bones. His eyes were sunken, and a dry cough rattled in his chest. He wore only canvas breeches and he trembled.
"Father!" Nemes said. He doffed his cloak and wrapped it around the old man. "I'm here. Your son is here."
His father tried to smile, then coughed and grimaced. Blood stained his lips; more speckled his chest. He touched Nemes's cheek with shaking, twisted fingers.
"My son. You must take the key. You must take it from me. You—"
Coughing seized him, and he spat more blood.
No, Nemes thought. His fists clenched. No! This cannot be. Cannot!
"I saw you die!" Nemes said, tears burning in his eyes. "You died in the courts of Requiem. You died with a broom in your hands. The cruel king and princes did not even know; they did not care. I buried you! I buried you myself." He raised his head and howled at the ceiling. "What cruel mockery is this? How dare you show me this illusion!"
Tears burned down Nemes's cheeks. His father wiped them away, smiling thinly. His hair had once been dark and thick; now it was white and wispy, nearly all gone from his scalp.
"I live again," the old man said. "I died; it is true. He brought me back to life. Lord Legion. The prophet of the Fallen. He breathed new life into my lungs, and filled my heart with blood to pump, and placed me here. For you, Nemes. For you. To give you the key so you may free him."
Nemes shook as he held his father. The man felt so frail in his arms, his bones so brittle, likely to snap in an embrace.
"I will take you out of here, Father," he said. "I promise. Once we give the queen the key, she will reward us. We will be powerful, no longer servants. You will never serve again, I promise you." He let out a sob. "You will live in a palace of gold, and King Elethor will serve you, a slave in irons."
Nemes snarled, imagining it. With the gold Solina gave him, he would build a great hall, a palace larger than the fallen court of Requiem. He would build a throne for his father and force cruel Elethor to kneel before it, to clean the floors, to beg for mercy from the whips. He would build a dungeon for Lyana, chain her underground, and invade her body whenever he pleased. He would hurt her—like she had hurt him—and make her beg. The key would give him that.
"Where is it, Father?" he whispered. "Where is the key?"
The old man struggled to speak. Only a hoarse gasp left his throat. His body trembled and his veins pulsed. Nemes could feel the man's heart fluttering like a trapped bird. His father's skeletal hand rose, then pointed down at his belly. He tried to speak again, but only coughed and trembled.
"What is it, Father?" Nemes whispered.
His father pulled open the cloak, revealing his pale torso. He grabbed Nemes's hand, pulled it down, and placed it against his stomach.
Nemes sucked in his breath. His eyes stung.
"Please, Nemes," his father whispered. "Take it out. Cut it from me. Take the key."
Beneath his father's skin, hard inside his belly, Nemes felt the outline of the key.
"No," Nemes whispered. Tears blurred his eyes. "I cannot."
"You must." His father clutched his wrist. "Lord Legion will bless you. Cut the key out. Let me die again. My death will free me from this prison; I will die in your arms, knowing that you will rise to glory." Tears streamed down his wrinkled cheeks. "My son—the first of our family to rise to greatness."
Nemes clenched his jaw. His breath shook. No. No! He could not. How could he? To kill his father? The vile court of Requiem had killed his father! The man lived again; how could Nemes kill him for his vainglory?
He howled to the ceiling. His roar shook the tower.
"No! I cannot. I will not!" He shook his fists. "Do not ask me this! Please, Lord Legion. I beg you. I serve you. Anything but this! Do not ask me to prove my loyalty this way."
A low, rumbling laugh rose from the floor, bubbling up from the depths like tar. The walls trembled and dust rained. The tower itself was laughing, Nemes realized; it was a living thing, a demon of stone and dark magic and blood.
"Please," Nemes whispered.
A rumble shook the floor. The bricks creaked. A screech ran through the walls, rising as a voice, a shriek, a cry of endless darkness and wonder.
"You will prove your loyalty, Nemes of Requiem!" rose the cry of the tower, a sound like steam from a kettle. The walls pulsed. Blood dripped between the bricks. "You will slice him open. You will dissect him. Why do you think, Nemes, that you spent years in the forest, spent years cutting open your animals? For this! For this day. To free me. To free Lord Legion and his Fallen Horde. Slice him! Dissect him! Cut the key from his innards and raise it in glory!"
Nemes's breath shook. His hands trembled. His eyes burned with tears. He reached to his belt and drew the Iron Claw, the blade he'd used in the forest so many times.
"Forgive me, Father…"
He sobbed as he drove the blade down.
His father screamed.
Nemes wept as he worked.
When his father lay dead, Nemes stood and raised the bloody key and screamed.
"I passed the test!" His tears mingled with his blood. "I have the key! I am Nemes, a servant of Legion! The nephilim will swarm again, and the weredragons will die. They will beg and weep and I will crush them for their sins!"
He left the chamber, laughing and weeping, key held high. As he descended the stairs, he uttered the Old Words, and the shadows of his lord cloaked him. The smoky serpents writhed around him, a new cloak, a mantle of his glory. Soon the nephilim themselves would flow around him.
He passed the chamber where the mother lay dead, her babe impaled. He passed the chamber where the dog lay crushed and burnt. He entered the ground floor where the obese diner hissed and glared and smacked his lips. Nemes approached the demon, thrust his Iron Claw forward, and sliced the creature open from collarbone to navel. He laughed as bloody snakes fled the beast, leaving its sagging skin like creatures hatching from an egg. Now it was Nemes who feasted at this table. Now it was Nemes who ruled this tower and its secrets.
He stepped outside into the night, laughed, and raised the key. Lighting crashed into it, lighting the desert. Nemes saw Solina, her men, the endless leagues of sand and rock. Wind shrieked, blowing back his hair.
"The key, Nemes!" Solina shouted in the storm. She reached out for it. "Hand me the key and the trophies of Tiranor will be yours."
He stood in the tower doorway, laughing, the wind roaring. The shadows swirled and laughed around him.
"The key!" he said.
"You want the key."
And why should he share it? Why should he, Nemes, give this desert queen her prize?
I can free the nephilim myself! This power can be mine, not hers. Why should I still serve? For years I knelt! For years I groveled. Now Nemes can rule; with the nephilim, no power could oppose me.
"The key, Nemes!" Solina demanded.
He laughed and snarled. "Why should I give it to you? Will you beg me, Solina? Will you kneel and—"
She leaped toward him.
Her blade flashed.
Nemes tried to pull back. She was so fast. She was a streak of gold and steel.
He screamed.
When her blade severed his arm, blood sprayed in a mist. His arm tumbled. His hand still clutched the key when it hit the ground.
"You will die for this!" Nemes screamed, clutching the stump.
Solina knelt by his severed arm. She wrenched the key free from his fingers.
"Chain him up!" she shouted to her men. "Drag him in irons to Irys. He will see the glory of the nephilim before we hang him to die upon the walls."
The guards stepped toward him, chains in their hands. Nemes hissed and turned to flee. He fell. His blood spurted. Hands grabbed him, yanked him up, and Nemes screamed before his eyes rolled back and darkness spread across him.
My glory… my power… I promised it to him.
"I'm sorry, Father," he whispered. "I'm sorry…"
Demons laughed, and dark claws grabbed him, and his soul sank into a long black night.
TREALE
"Pomegranates, fresh pomegranates, grab one to eat!" cried the boy.
He stood upon the banks of the River Pallan, a scrawny thing with deep golden skin, holding a basket laden with the red treasures.
"Grab a pomegranate, a copper a fruit!" he shouted.
Around the boy, a dozen other children stood upon the boardwalk, hawking their own wares from baskets. Behind them, longships rowed up and down the river, laden with more baskets and crates of goods.
"Carobs, dried carobs!"
"Fresh oysters, grab them while they're fresh!"
"Seashell bracelets for fertility! Wear them in bed for healthy babes!"
Treale stood upon the cobbled boardwalk, shaded under the awning of a chandlery. She wore her dark cloak draped around her and hid her midnight hair and eyes—foreign in this land of platinum hair and blue eyes—under her hood. The scents of the foods filled her nostrils. Her stomach growled and her mouth watered. She had not eaten in… how long had it been? She could barely remember; certainly she had eaten nothing since landing in Irys yesterday. Fingers trembling with hunger, she reached into her pocket, fished around, and produced a single copper coin. It was all the money she had in the world—not enough for a nice fish or crab, even if she had a place to cook them—but perhaps enough for a pomegranate.
She walked onto the boardwalk, leaped back as a peddler came trundling down upon his donkey-drawn cart, and kept moving. When she reached the boy hawking pomegranates, she held out her coin in her palm.
"I'll have one if you please," she spoke from the shadows of her hood.
The boy took the coin, squinted at it, and Treale felt faint. This was a coin from Requiem; she had smoothed its surface, effacing its image and lettering, but would the boy still recognize its origin? Would he sound the alarm and shout "Weredragon, weredragon!" for the city to hear?
"It's good copper," Treale said. "An old coin, but solid metal and pure. Feel its weight. That's worth two pomegranates. You have to sell me two."
Her legs trembled with hunger as the boy squinted at the coin. Treale had never felt so lowly. Only moons ago, she had been a lady of Requiem's courts, and now… now she trembled before a boy half her age, so weak with hunger she nearly wept.
Finally the boy nodded, pocketed the coin, and offered her the basket of fruit. Not a moment later, Treale crouched between a brothel and a shoemaker's shop, scooping seeds from a split pomegranate and eating so fast she nearly choked. When her meal was done, she stuffed the second pomegranate into her cloak's pocket. Though her stomach still rumbled with hunger, she would save the second fruit for later.
"It might be a while until you find more food, Treale Oldnale," she whispered to herself. "The days of feasting at the side of kings are over."
She rose to her feet, pulled her hood low, and began walking down the street. People crowded around her: loomers bearing baskets of fabrics, barefoot children scuffling with wooden swords, mothers nursing their babes, and bare-chested masons lugging packs full of bricks. Shops and stalls lined the roadsides. A child on a donkey knocked into a stall, spilling a thousand live crabs that scurried across the cobblestones. The crabmonger shouted and began a futile chase for his catch; Treale managed to grab one crab and stuff it into her pocket for later. The clang of hammers on anvils rose from smithies, laughter and grunts rose from brothels, and screams rose from surgeons' shops where tongs pulled teeth and needles stitched wounds. The sun pounded the city; the air felt like thick soup rank with the scents of fish, oil, tallow, and dried fruits.
Treale's head still spun to see so many people; they seemed to her like ants scurrying through tunnels. She missed the open spaces of Oldnale Farms: the rolling fields, the sunset over the forests, and the clear skies where she would fly with her brothers. And she missed Nova Vita, capital of Requiem where her friend Mori had lived: its wide streets, its marble columns that soared between birches, its music of harps that rose from silver temples.
That land is gone, she thought and her eyes stung. The farms have burned, and the city has fallen, but you still live, Mori. There is still some starlight in the world.
She made her way through the crowds, her black robes searing hot and swirling around her, until she reached the mouth of an alley, and before her spread the Square of the Sun.
The cobbled expanse stretched out like a sea of stone. Columns surrounded the square, and upon each capital, a wyvern perched and snarled. Soldiers marched here, their helms shaped like cranes and falcons and eagles, their breastplates glimmering with golden sunbursts. Their spears clanked against the cobblestones and their songs echoed inside their helms. Beyond the soldiers rose the monuments of Tiranor's glory: the great Queen's Archway, two hundred feet tall, its limestone engraved with sunburst reliefs; the Temple of the Sun, its columns capped with platinum; the great statue of Solina, fifty feet tall, from whose pedestal Treale had watched Mori beaten; and the Palace of Phoebus upon a great dais, its doors flanked with stone guardians, its glory tapering into the Tower of Akartum, the tallest steeple in Tiranor and perhaps the world.
Treale swallowed. This is the most dangerous place upon this world, she thought. This is the heart of Tiranor's wrath and might. This is where I must walk.
She took a deep breath, wrapped her cloak tight around her, and entered the square.
After only three steps, she held her breath and looked around, ready to scurry back into the alley. Yet the soldiers kept marching, and the wyverns kept their vigil upon the columns, and crows circled above and cawed as ever. Treale swallowed again, reached under her cloak, and grabbed the amulet she wore—a golden sheaf of wheat, the sigil of her house. That house had fallen, but Treale was still an Oldnale, and the touch of the gold soothed her. She kept walking.
She moved along the outskirts of the square, staying near the columns that ringed it. She tried to keep staring ahead toward the palace, but couldn't help it; as she passed near a column, she peeked up at the wyvern that perched upon its capital. The beast glared down, and a glob of its drool fell to burn a hole into the ground. Its tail flapped, but its wings remained still.
Sweat dripped down Treale's back. She remembered those wyverns swarming across Nova Vita, felling dragons from the sky. She wanted to shift into a dragon, to burn them, to kill as many as she could before they took her down.
Requiem will have its revenge, she swore. She clutched her amulet so hard it nearly pierced her palm. That I swear to you, Solina. I
will not forget your crimes. But not now. Not this day. Today is for Mori.
She was halfway to the palace when the guards spotted her. Falcon helms turned toward her, creaking together. Spear shafts slammed against cobblestones. Perhaps sensing the men's unease, the wyverns atop the columns shifted and ruffled their wings. Treale froze, hood pulled low. Her heart thrashed and she clutched her amulet tighter.
Be brave, Treale, she thought. Her throat constricted and she could barely breathe. Be brave like King Elethor. You fled the last danger; today you will be strong.
A guard detached from his phalanx and came marching toward her. He bore a round shield, and a red cape fluttered behind him. Treale fought down the urge to flee, though her knees shook and she had to force her breath through clenched teeth.
"What do you seek here?" the guard called.
Treale curtsied in the manner of Osanna. "I seek the weredragon, my lord." She spoke with her best Osannan accent, knowing she would never pass for a Tiran. "I come to see the beast."
When the guard reached her, he tugged her hood back. He cursed, and behind his falcon visor, his eyes narrowed. Her black hair, olive skin, and dark eyes were as foreign in this land as hippopotamuses—beasts that filled the Pallan—would be in Requiem.
"Osannan dog," the guard said. "You scum have been washing up on our shores and swarming our streets."
Treale let out a shaky breath. Thank the stars. Her accent had fooled him; he thought her a daughter of Osanna, that war-torn land of eastern men, and not a child of Requiem. Tirans perhaps hated the former, but they slaughtered the latter.
"My lord." She gave another quick curtsy. "I might be scum from the sea, but even scum hates the wretchedness of weredragons." She forced a snarl. "The weredragons burned my village in Osanna. They killed my father. He was a jailor in our land. Now I seek to be a jailor too—not in the ruins of my Osannan town, but here in this land of southern glory. You keep a weredragon imprisoned beneath the palace; I saw it chained and whipped yesterday. If you'll have me, I will join your rank. I will help you guard the beast, shackle it, and whip it too." She clenched her fists. "I would enjoy beating it bloody."
A Night of Dragon Wings (Dragonlore, Book 3) Page 8