by Olivia Myers
“I saw your wings!”
“These things?” Rhythion looked over his shoulder where the wings had been a moment before. They’d completely disappeared.
“Why do you want to denounce me, anyway?” he said with genuine curiosity. “Maybe I’ve been a bit sarcastic in the past, but do you think that means I ought to lose my head?”
“Because you’re a devil,” Gwythn said. “And we need to clean the realm of creatures like you.”
“Clean the realm,” Rhythion laughed. “Well if that’s your plan, maybe you should start where the taint is the thickest.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean—kill off the most dangerous and conspicuous dragons before going after the harmless ones just trying to live their lives, if you’re really intent on destroying us all. Why, you had your chance today to do the job. He was sitting up on that stage with me the entire time.”
“Don’t you dare talk blasphemy against The Redeemer—”
“Oh, come on!” Rhythion said passionately. “Wake up, princess! Your hero’s a tyrant who’s worked so hard to kill off all the dragons because he doesn’t want anyone to know he’s one himself! Why do you think he spends almost all his time locked up in that castle? Why do you think he’s been so reluctant to let his sons marry? Because they’re monsters as well! A whole family of monsters!”
This was true. No match had ever been arranged for the king’s two older sons.
“But Prince Alwen—”
“The Fairy. Maybe he didn’t get the dragon seed in him when it was going around hot. He had a different mother, after all.”
“This is all blasphemy!” Gwythn waved the issue aside. “The prophecies. The histories—they all point to the coming of the Savior. It was prophesied that he’d be sent from the Nine Heavens to destroy the infestation and lead us to salvation. He’s been touched by the Creator himself!”
“Forgeries,” Rhythion said passively. “Not even good forgeries. I could have written them myself. The language sounds fake from the first sentence. Your king had them drawn up as an excuse to hold power over his kingdom. He’s faked his entire reign, and he’ll fake the reign of his princes too. It’s a dangerous move, princess, to mistake tyrants for saviors.”
“He’s not—” Gwythn began, but at that moment she heard a low growl. “Fafiny, what are you doing?” The dog was growling at something a short distance away, and then it opened its mouth and howled. A form sprang out of the trees and dashed away. The prince.
“What are we going to do?” Gwythn was frantic. “He thinks we’re together! Oh God! I’ll be denounced as an accomplice to a Fugitive!”
But Rhythion did not see her. He stood stock still, eyes closed as though in deep meditation. Suddenly, his mouth opened and he let forth a sound that was a cry neither human nor animal. A sound of thunder.
His wings sprang out to their full span—at least twenty feet. His head twitched and as Gwythn watched him he seemed to grow in volume like a child rapidly aging. He became twice, three times his normal size. His fingers curled, grew long and became claws. His skin glowed, became like ice, and then grew dark and hard and leathery. Horns sprang from his forehead and became at once formidable and deadly.
Then he gave a great leap, and before Gwythn knew what had happened he was in the air, wings beating furiously forward.
He’s going to kill the prince! She dashed in the direction of the fleeing figure. But Rhythion was there before she was. He came down low, wings swooping, mouth snarling with flames.
The prince made a feint but Rhythion spread his wings wide, forming a wall. Alwen was on the ground a moment later collapsed to his knees and cupped his hands, supplicating the dragon.
“I won’t—I won’t—!” he said but couldn’t get out the rest of the sentence.
“No,” the dragon snarled. The voice was not human. “I don’t think you will.”
Two clawed feet stomped closer to the collapsed, trembling body. Rhythion’s mouth snapped open. Rows upon rows of razor teeth gleamed.
“No!” Gwythn screamed. “Rhythion! You can’t!”
The dragon’s head turned suddenly and faced her, eyes fiery. “I can’t?” the voice rumbled. “I think I will.”
Breathless, Gwythn collapsed at the feet of the dragon, hugging them to her breast without giving any thought of danger to herself. “You’re not a monster, Rhythion!” she cried. “You’re not a monster! You don’t have to do this!”
“I want to do this.” One foot lunged forward. Gwythn held tightly to the other.
“Then you will kill me with him,” she said through her tears. “I will die with my husband.”
The prince scrambled back on all fours, away from the danger of the leering dragon fangs. His skin was already as pale as snow, but now his face looked like a dead man’s.
“I don’t want you kill you.” Now the voice had changed. There was a human quality in it again. It was not the steel cold voice of a heartless monster, but the voice of a man who was coming out of his anger back into rationality.
“Please Rhythion,” Gwythn sobbed. “Let him go. He has no other witnesses. They will not condemn you on the authority of one. Please Rhythion. Please…”
Gwythn buried her head in the dragon’s foot and lost herself in sobs. She was unaware of any time passing around her, of any presence but that of Rhythion.
The moments stretched into minutes. Then she felt the leg beneath her hands begin to grow warm and soft.
And then, Rhythion was returning to his flesh. The luster of his body was gone, along with its steel-edged hardness. There was no sign of wings. Even his eyes had lost their blaze. He stood, hunched and weary, captured in her embrace.
“Never, never,” whispered Rhythion. Gwythn still shook with sobs. “Nobody has ever done that to me before,” he said, breathless and unbelieving. “Gotten me out of the element.”
He bent his head down and looked at Gwythn. “I just want you to know, princess, you’ve entered a world of trouble.”
*
By nightfall, most of the sounds of merriment had died away. Drunken revelers still paraded through the streets, the songs of the country on their wine-wet lips. But even their voices could not disturb Gwythn as she lay in bed, strange thoughts mixing in her head like storm clouds.
Everything had been so different this morning. Her life had such promise. She had been the daughter of an Architect. Now, she was protecting a Fugitive. And yet, it was worse than that, for a strong feeling had awoken deep within her—a feeling she had never felt before, not even when the idea of marrying Prince Alwen had given her such joy. A feeling of desire. Desire for Rhythion.
Even now she could hear his voice, could feel his hands on her, could feel the intensity of his eyes scorching her as if they were staring at her now through her open window. Almost a physical intensity, as near to her as if his presence as her own beating heart.
Oh Heavens. Grant me strength.
The sounds of the world swirled about her: the flap of the wind, disturbing her hair but not her thoughts.
A thick, muffled sound came from somewhere far away. She rose by instinct, and followed where it led.
*
Artyr was sitting with his pipe by the dying fire when he heard the knock against the door. Revelers with no place to go, he thought as he rose to answer it.
But it was not a band of revelers he found.
In an instant, a hand pinned him against the wall like a doll. Three figures masked in dark armor flooded into the house. The fire threw their shadows on the walls: horrible, dancing shapes.
“What is this?” Artyr asked, dazed. “What’s happening?”
Dimly, he saw blazing from their breastplates Blethen’s insignia: a dragon, mouth opened in a scream and a spear piercing through from mouth to tail.
“Artyr—Esquire,” a voice said from behind the visor of its helmet. “You are hereby under arrest for assisting a Fugitive. Justice will be done in the name of
King Blethen the Redeemer.”
“A Fugitive?” the old man stumbled over the word. “I know nothing about this. I have done nothing.”
But the soldiers ignored him. They were a flurry of movement stripping the house, throwing over the carefully arranged furniture, ripping open his chairs, tearing the embers from the grated fire.
“Have I done something wrong?” his voice was weak and pitiful. “What’s happening?”
“The details of your crime will be made known to you at the trial,” the voice went on. “But now you will tell us where we can find your daughter.”
“My daughter,” he whispered. “My daughter has done nothing! My daughter is innocent!”
Anything more he might have said was silenced suddenly by a thick punch in his stomach. Artyr doubled over, gasping, but the hand held him tight. The man who’d struck him looked almost bored. This is impossible. Artyr thought. What world is this? How can you hit a man without anger?
Then another voice spoke, twisted by the visor. “Upstairs, milord.”
“My daughter is innocent!” Artyr fought a cry out from behind the hand holding him. But his protests were no use. The soldiers were already tearing upstairs, and then there was a loud crash and muffled shouts.
“She’s done nothing!”
Another moment and the soldiers were back downstairs. Gwythn was not with them.
“She is not here, milord,” the soldiers reported.
“Let him go,” the man in command said. “I can sense he’s telling the truth—he knows nothing. The King would rather he be spared, for his talent is great.”
Artyr’s head sank, partially in relief, partially in fear. Accomplice to a Fugitive, the thought sank into his mind with horrible clarity. Oh my child, what have you done?
*
The air was clear and cold, and the trees so dense that the blackness of the night seemed even blacker than Gwythn had ever seen it before. They’d made it to the woods, to the very lake where that afternoon Gwythn had learned Rhythion’s terrible secret.
“I need to rest,” she tugged at the arm that led her.
Rhythion saw the exhaustion in her face and agreed. They stopped at the edge of the lake where above the waters a dense fog curled and curtained, white as cloud. She sank to the ground and immediately wanted to sleep.
“We cannot rest long,” Rhythion cautioned. “They will be here soon. We must keep going.”
“I cannot take another step. I feel like I could die here.”
“You’ve had a shock. But you must fortify yourself. You must become stronger. You will never survive otherwise.”
“You don’t understand. How could you understand? You’re a dragon.”
“But I can feel you,” he said. “Even now, I feel you. Your exhaustion is mine. We share it now. All that you are—your fears, your desires, your fate—they are mine to bear. Your humanity is mine.”
“Then give me something of yours,” she pleaded. “If you will share me, then I must share you. If we are in this together—then we must belong to each other. It cannot be just me who belongs to you. Please, Rhythion.” Her voice was naked and weak.
“Something of mine,” the dragon whispered. He came closer to her, held her in his arms. “If you have the strength, if you can bear it as I can bear you, I will do what you say. But it will not be easy. You will have to learn. Do you have the strength? Do I ask too much?”
“Nothing more than what I will freely give of myself,” she whispered. His arms tightened around her. His breath came hot on her neck. “Give it to me, please.”
He lay he down on the sands and devoured her with his a kiss. But it was not the kiss they’d shared in the lake earlier in the day. It was not her trying to overpower him, but he sharing his strength with her. And it was not just power that she felt, but tenderness and warmth.
As his tongue lingered inside her mouth, his free hand travelled down and opened the buttons of her blouse. The air was cold on her skin but it brought Gwythn into shivering wakefulness. She took his hand and placed it on her breast. He cupped and massaged her, and then let his kisses travel down her throat until his soft lips had embraced her nipple.
“Rhythion,” she gasped. “More, I need more.”
His hand was warm and powerful as it slid further down her body, past her waistline until it softly buried itself beneath her undergarments. His fingers played delicately against her warm, wet folds, sending her into shivers of gasps.
Like a shadow he came on top of her, weightless yet apparent. Her hands hungered for him, pulling down his trousers, revealing his fully erect stalk like some gorgeous gift.
They melted into one another, became one. He slid slowly forward, penetrating her with just the tip of his stalk and then teasing himself away, into aching oblivion. When she thought she’d lost him he came back again, forcefully, entering her with a satisfaction that was like a long breath after being submerged underwater.
Her breaths quickened until they fell into the rhythm of his moving thighs, submerging his manhood more fully into her waiting embrace.
Again and again, each time with more strength, more will, he entered her. Her head pillowed against the sand of the beach, she closed her eyes and gave herself away to the aching pleasure. She could die with him inside her. She could give herself up to the fantastic force, and become nothing.
And now she felt something entering her, something beyond his mere physical presence. A strength entered her from some place obscured and far away, not a human strength, but a kind of inspiration. She felt as though she was glowing, as though she were shedding her human form and becoming a creature altogether different, without weakness.
“More, more,” she gasped. “Come inside me, Rhythion. I need you.”
The man above her—man or beast she did not know—became firmer and larger, as she’d seen him grow earlier that day. He expanded inside her, and she expanded with him. She became more. She was emerging into a place beyond herself, into a place where only she and he existed, coupled in strength. No fear existed now. Fear was something of the past and here belonged only the glorious, the blazing moment of the present.
And then she felt something warm and lucid flow through her, like a river suddenly bursting from the ground. Her mouth opened in a cry of delight. She hugged him closer with her thighs, refusing to surrender him, refusing to let him go.
Clasped one to each other, they lay paired on the beach, gasping their excitement into the air grown cold about them. Yet no world existed outside of the world they’d created for themselves: a world where kings and soldiers were eclipsed by the shadow of the sun that set and rose for them alone. Together they’d created their world, and together they would enter it. Rising together, they flew in each other’s arms toward the horizon, to the new world of their making. Not a world for man or beast. A world for Fugitives.
THE END
Love Invasion
I was already having a bad day before New York fell. The morning was full of anticipation, excitement and nervous energy as I woke up early to get to the exercise room in the building. Consisting of two old treadmills and a few mismatched free weights, it wasn’t much to brag about, but it was enough for me.
When I finished, I jogged to the coffee shop around the corner on 5th Avenue, and I remember wondering if it was going to rain because the sky was still so dark at seven, but considering today I was twelve weeks pregnant, and I couldn’t hide it forever, I was more preoccupied with how I was going to break the news to Neil.
His favorite mocha with extra whip and a cinnamon roll couldn’t hurt to soften the blow. Decaf for me. Non-fat, no whip, and a parfait. That was healthy for the little one, right?
Neil still lay in bed, snoring softly when I got back to the apartment. I loved the way his hair fell over his eyes when he slept. But it was time to tell him and if I woke him then, he wouldn’t have the “rushing to work” excuse not to hear me.
“Babe,” I said, jiggling his arm.
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I waited till he sat up, stretching and blinking, to hand him his breakfast.
“What’s the occasion?” he asked, smiling. I loved his slightly crooked bottom teeth and the dimple in his left cheek.
I sighed. It was time.
“Neil, I have to tell you something. I’m pregnant.”
He froze, pastry forgotten halfway to his mouth.
“Well?” I pressed. “Aren’t you excited? I mean I know we said we couldn’t afford to get married, let alone have a family yet, but these things happen for a reason. We’ll make it work. I’ll make it work. I’ve already been job hunting and I found this app that lets you sell all your old—”
“Stop.” Neil jumped out of the bed faster than I’d seen him move since he dropped out of school. “Just. Stop.”
My mouth snapped shut and I fought the tears that threatened to form. Damn hormones. He was surprised, that was all. He needed time to adjust. This was huge and I’d already had like six weeks to get used to it.
“We can fix it,” he said, smiling. “It’s still early enough to get it taken care of.”
I grabbed my stomach, instinctively. “Actually I’m twelve weeks today. It’s my second trimester and I’m not having an abortion. I’ve seen her, Neil. Her little hands and her heart beat. You’ll see it too…”
“No. I won’t. Rachel, baby, I’m not ready to be a dad. You’re not ready to be a mom. Look at you.”
I looked down at myself. What was he referring to? My body? The fact that I didn’t have a full time job? Neither did he. This time the tears came anyway.
“Oh, Jesus, Rach. How am I supposed to have an intelligent conversation if you start crying? Shit. I was going to tell you anyway.”
“Tell me what?” I asked.
“That it’s over. Rachel, I’m moving to LA. I’m going to follow my dreams. I was invited to join a band.”
“A band?” My mind worked overtime trying to catch up. “That’s wonderful! We can go to LA together. Who invited you?”
Neil rubbed his hands down his face like he was dealing with an idiot. “It was this street band – but they’re awesome. They’ve got this sound that… well, it doesn’t matter. The thing is I was invited. Not us. Okay? Do you get it now? I’m sorry to be mean, but you kind of forced it out of me, didn’t you? I was going to break the news nicer. I don’t know, I was going to buy you a going away gift or something. Shit.”