"Do you know their names, kind sir?" she asked, unable to hide the tremble in her voice. "Of the red and gray dragons?"
"Ah!" said the merchant, raising a finger. "They are known by many names. The Red Queen and the Brute. The Weredragons of Leonis. Queen Am—" The merchant slapped his mouth shut, and his eyes widened, staring over Fidelity's shoulder. "Oh Spirit."
Fidelity spun around, and her chest seemed to shatter into a thousand pieces.
Oh stars no.
A hundred firedrakes or more darkened the sky, paladins on their backs, flying over the city of Lynport.
"Surrender the weredragons!" shouted a familiar voice from the sky. "Surrender Gemini, the rogue paladin! Bring me the outlaws or this city will burn!"
* * * * *
Fidelity stared up and saw her there, flying on a pure white firedrake with ivory horns.
"Mercy," she hissed.
Footsteps thumped. Cade ran up to Fidelity and grabbed her arm. "Come on! We have to run!"
She shook her head. "No! Cover your face with your hood." She stared at the others. "Be calm. Follow me. Walk slowly."
She pulled her hood over her head, and she walked along the boardwalk. Her heart thudded and her fingers trembled, but she forced herself to walk calmly. Her fellow Vir Requis walked at her side, as did Gemini; the paladin was cursing and hissing, but Domi guided him onward, whispering soothingly.
"We seek four weredragons and an outlaw paladin!" Mercy shouted above. Her white firedrake dived. It glided so close above the boardwalk its belly nearly hit Fidelity's head. The blast of its wings ruffled her cloak, and Fidelity had to grab her hood to hold it down. "Surrender the criminals or your city will burn!"
Fidelity kept walking, leading the others. Many other people crowded the boardwalk, some staring at the firedrakes and pointing, others rushing back to their homes, and a few even knelt and prayed as if the beasts were deities.
A hundred thousand people live in this city, Fidelity told herself, taking a shuddering breath. We'll vanish into the crowd. Mercy will never find us.
The firedrakes screeched overhead, a hundred or more, diving and racing over the city roofs, streaming across the sea, blasting out fire. Their roars were deafening. Their beating wings blasted down storms of air. Debris scuttled across the boardwalk, and fiery streams crisscrossed the sky.
"Surrender yourself, vermin!" Mercy shouted from her firedrake. "Do you hear me, Gemini? Do you hear me, Domi, you harlot? I know you're here! You've been seen, maggots!"
Fidelity turned her head to stare at the others. They stared back from the shadows of their hoods. Fidelity's heart sank. The battle over the beach, kidnapping Gemini, killing his firedrake . . . somebody had seen them in the night, perhaps a fishermen, perhaps a pair of lovers walking along the shore.
"Keep moving," Fidelity whispered, tugging her hood as low as it would go. "We return to the tavern." She looked ahead and saw the Old Wheel only a few steps away. "She won't find us. She—"
Mercy's firedrake dived again, skimming along the boardwalk, and the paladin's voice pealed. "I will burn one house at a time until you emerge, Gemini!"
Her firedrake's wings beat, and the beast soared toward the sun, moving in a straight line. Thousands of feet above, it turned in the sky and swooped, roaring, Mercy clinging to the saddle. The firedrake opened its jaws wide, and dragonfire cascaded down to slam into the Old Wheel tavern.
Fidelity leaped back, the heat bathing her. The ancient tavern, a relic of Requiem, the place where Prince Relesar Aeternum himself had lived during Requiem's great civil war, burst into roaring flames. Sparks showered out, landing against Fidelity's robes. She hurried back, brushing off the sparks, and stared in horror at the inferno.
"Surrender yourselves, weredragons!" Mercy shouted as her firedrake soared again. "Surrender yourselves or the destruction of this city will be upon you."
Fidelity stared at the flames, the heat blasting against her, stinging her eyes, singeing her nostrils and throat. Screams rose inside the tavern. Children leaped out of the windows, burning. A man burst out of the doors and ran across the boardwalk, a living torch. Timbers cracked and shattered, and the screams fell silent.
More death. More killed. Because of us. Fidelity trembled. Because of us.
"Fidelity, we have to get out of here!" Cade grabbed her arm.
Roen held her other arm. "Come, Fidelity. Away from the fire."
She let them drag her away. People were screaming now and running all across the boardwalk and streets. A few leaped into the water and began to swim, only for firedrakes to blast down flames, burning them.
"None will flee this city!" Mercy cried. "None will live unless the weredragons surrender themselves!"
Mercy's firedrake turned in the sky, plunged down, and blasted fire. The flames crashed into a hut, baking the clay dome. The firedrake's claws slammed into the hot clay, tearing it open, and more beasts blew fire into the hole. The flames blasted out of the windows. People screamed inside. Firedrakes flew along the streets, torching hut after hut. Fire exploded across Lynport. Smoke raced along the streets like demons, and the firedrakes kept roaring, and Mercy kept screaming. Burning people ran, screaming. A firedrake skimmed along the boardwalk, claws outstretched, scooping up people and tossing them into the air.
"Gemini!" Mercy cried above, laughing. "Where are you, dear brother? Will you burn with them all?"
Mercy's firedrake dived across a street, roaring out fire. The street burned. People screamed and ran.
Fidelity ran with them. The fire crackled all around her, and cries of pain tore across the city. She clung to Roen with one hand, to Cade with the other. Domi and Gemini ran ahead. The narrow streets burned around her, and huts kept collapsing at her sides, firedrakes tearing into their roofs. Thousands of people clogged the roads, clawing over one another, desperate to flee the inferno.
We'll burn here with them all, Fidelity realized, heart sinking. Mercy will kill every last soul in this city to slay us.
Fidelity stopped running.
The huts crackled around her, and people ran back and forth, screaming. Yet Fidelity stood still, lips tight.
Cade tried to tug her forward, but she wouldn't budge.
"Fidelity, come on!" the boy shouted. "The whole damn street is burning!"
They'll burn the whole city, Fidelity thought. They'll burn the whole world to find us.
"We have to fly," she whispered.
The others stared at her, eyes wide.
"Are you mad?" Gemini shouted. "There are a hundred firedrakes up there!"
Fidelity nodded, eyes burning. "Enough to burn the whole city. Enough to kill us all. A hundred thousand people." She clenched her fists. "My father is alive. So is Amity. I know this. I know it! They're in the south across the sea. It's time to fly. And it's time to find them."
She stepped back, shouted wordlessly, and shifted into a dragon.
She beat her wings, blasting back the flames and smoke, and soared into the sky.
Around her, countless firedrakes screeched, spun toward her, and began flying her way.
Fidelity flew higher, spun in a circle, and blasted out a ring of fire.
"Remember Requiem!" she cried, flew higher, and charged toward the enemy.
She screamed as she slammed into them, as fire washed over her, as claws drove against her. She roared, blasting out fire, and snapped her jaws.
"Remember Requiem!" she cried, battling countless firedrakes, surrounded with scales and steel and dragonfire.
"Remember Requiem!" rose more cries below, and the other dragons soared around her.
A green dragon, Roen barreled into several firedrakes, and his fire washed across a paladin in his saddle. Cade shouted beside him, a golden dragon, and closed his jaws around a firedrake's neck and ripped out flesh. Domi rose too, the heat melting the black paint off her scales of many colors, and Gemini rode on her back.
"Slay them!" Mercy howled, and Fidelity raised her head
to see the paladin flying her firedrake toward the battle. A hundred other firedrakes flew around the paladin, and their riders readied their lances.
This is a battle we cannot win, Fidelity thought. Not yet. Not this day.
"To the sea!" she cried. "Requiem, to the sea! Follow!"
Fidelity could barely make out the coast ahead, only flashes of blue amid the smoke, the fire, and the drakes. She beat her wings, screamed as a firedrake's claws tore at her blue scales, and blasted forth a great river of fire. Cade flew at her side, adding his flames to hers. Roen and Domi joined her, and the four streams wreathed together, forming a gushing torrent of heat. The inferno slammed into a firedrake, melting its scales, melting its rider. The four dragons flew forward, cutting a path through the enemy.
Arrows flew from behind, clattering across Fidelity's scales. Pain blazed across her haunches, and she yowled but kept blowing her fire. Gemini screamed on Domi's back, tearing off his burning cloak, but the paladin laughed and shouted at his sister.
"I'm free, Mercy!" Gemini cried, face sooty, chest shaking as he laughed. "I'm free and strong, and I'll be back, you dog's daughter! I'll be back with an army!"
More arrows flew, and fire washed across Fidelity's tail. She kept flying, kept blowing forth flames, melting all in her path, bathing the sky with the light and heat of a sun. A firedrake swooped from above, and she flipped over, lashed her claws, and tore its belly open. As its innards spilled, she righted herself and kept flying forward, and her companions flew with her, and they blasted back the last firedrakes and flew across the beach and over open water.
The firedrakes chased them, scores of the beasts. Mercy still howled curses behind, and arrows still flew. But the four dragons kept flying—singed, bleeding, but still crying out for Requiem, still beating their wings.
"Remember Requiem! Remember Requiem!"
Four dragons, one outcast paladin, and a host of firedrakes streamed across the sea, leaving a blazing city behind.
MERCY
Again she had killed.
Again she had slain innocents on her quest for purification. Purification of her empire. Purification of her soul. Purification from her mother's grip that reached Mercy even here, far above the southern sea, gripping and squeezing her heart like an iron vice, like chains that forever bound Mercy to the glittering Cured Temple that rose from her empire like a crystal shard from flesh. The fires blazed behind her, consuming the city of Lynport, consuming any last traces of pity Mercy might have felt for those under her domain.
The blood of infants coats my hands. There is no more compassion in my heart. There is no more cruelty I will shy away from. There is no more mercy for those who harbor the enemy.
Even if she had to burn down her entire empire, lay waste to cities and forests, dry the sea, topple the mountains, build new mountains of bones—Mercy would do these things to catch them. To end this curse. To bring about the Falling even if the world itself fell with it.
The city burned behind her, and the weredragons flew ahead, carrying her brother with them. All those she sought, all her enemies—all flew ahead of her, not even a mile away, yet Mercy knew that she had lost them. She knew that they would cross the sea, escape her again. She led a hundred firedrakes, but strong as the beasts were, they would eventually tire and need to find land. The weredragons could take turns riding one another, alternating between human and dragon forms, able to fly for days on end. They had escaped her this way when traveling to Leonis in the east; they would escape her this way today, flying south to the continent of Terra.
"Turn around!" Mercy said. She tugged the reins, spinning her firedrake around in the sky. "We return north."
Jaw tight, she flew away from the weredragons, heading back to the burning city, to the Commonwealth, to the lands she would someday inherit.
She would need more than firedrakes. She would need a great army, an armada of a thousand ships.
This would not be merely a hunt, she knew.
This would turn into a war.
She flew over the burning city. She kept flying north.
She flew over the village where she had first found Cade, the village she had razed to the ground. She flew over the forest she had burned, the forest where the weredragons had hidden from her. She flew over towns and farmlands where mothers still cried to the heavens, weeping for their slain babes, babes Mercy had killed after the weredragons had burned her tillvine. As she flew, no pity filled her, only ice, only iron.
My babe died too, she thought. My babe died and so I will kill everyone, I—
Mercy gnashed her teeth so hard she almost chipped them.
No. No, she would not let that thought fill her. That life was gone. That life was false. That life was only a nightmare. She was Mercy the paladin, her soul, her steel, her womb dedicated to the Spirit. That was all she was, a sword for the Spirit to wield. Never more a priestess. Never more a mother. Never more one to heal, only one to kill.
They flew for days, crossing the bleeding lands of the Commonwealth, flying over ruin, over graves, until finally they reached the city of Nova Vita, capital of her empire.
The city still screamed.
No tillvine grew this year, and paladins marched across the streets, shattered doorways, grabbed babes and slit their throats. Screams of parents rose. White flags of mourning rose from clay huts across the city, as inside parents grieved.
Let them grieve. Mercy's fists trembled around the reins of her firedrake. Let them grieve like a young priestess once grieved. Let the whole world feel this pain.
Mercy left her firedrake in the courtyard and entered the Temple, walking alone. She passed through lavish halls and sought her mother in the Holy of Holies, but could not find her there. She searched the libraries, the chapels, the gardens, but the high priestess was nowhere to be found.
As she searched, a fear grew in Mercy, and she placed her hand atop her belly, feeling the pain there, the emptiness. She quickened her step, and soon she was running. She raced down marble corridors, priests and servants leaping aside. She ran until she reached her bedchamber, yanked the door open, and barged inside.
High Priestess Beatrix stood within, holding baby Eliana in her arms.
Mercy froze.
She reached for her sword.
"Put her down," Mercy hissed.
Beatrix stared at her, and a smile stretched across her face, though it did not touch her eyes. "Welcome home, daughter! I was just putting the babe to sleep. One cannot trust servants to do all child rearing. Eliana is like a granddaughter to me now."
Mercy would not release the hilt of her sword, ready to draw the blade. "Put her down. Never touch her again. I would burn the world for her."
The High Priestess sighed, rocking the sleeping babe. "It seems that you've already burned the world. The forests burn. The city of Lynport burns. And still . . . no weredragon corpses. No sign of your brother either. Fire and death and nothing but defeat." Beatrix tsked her tongue. "All your battles, all your flights, and still you fail me." She raised her eyes and stared at Mercy. "This babe has softened you."
Amity took another step closer. "Put. Her. Down."
Beatrix stared at her, eyes hard, burning cold, and her fingers tightened around the babe. One hand strayed toward Eliana's throat, a menacing caress. "This child is a privilege for you, Mercy. Not a right. I would not hesitate to steal this prize from you, just as you've stolen babes from mothers across this city."
"I did as you ordered me!" Mercy shouted, rage and pain blinding her. Eliana woke up and wailed. "I killed them for you! I killed them because you ordered me to kill! I killed them like he killed my son, like—"
Mercy froze, trembling wildly. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't speak. She couldn't weep. She could only stand, frozen in horror. No. No. No, that was only a dream, only another life, not real. Not her. Not her life. Not her past. And yet she had spoken of it, made it real. She fell to her knees.
"Please," she whispered. "I be
g you, Mother. Please."
Beatrix glared at her just a second longer, eyes blazing, and then her face softened all at once, as quickly as if she had placed on a mask. She knelt, laid the wailing Eliana on the floor, and embraced Mercy.
"Of course, my child!" Beatrix patted Mercy's back. "Of course, my sweet daughter. Mother didn't scare you, did she? I would never hurt your adopted daughter. I know that you would do everything in your power to make this world safe for Eliana, to bring about the Falling."
Mercy lifted her daughter and held her close, rocking her until she calmed. She stared over the soothed baby at Beatrix. "Mother, the weredragons have fled to the Horde. Not just the island outposts but to Terra itself. Weredragons lead the Horde now. The Red Queen Amity rules both the mountains and coast, and they say a million souls flock to her. It must be war. Allow me to summon the armada. Give me a thousand firedrakes and a thousand ships. The time for war has come, a time for fire to engulf the world, for the light of the Spirit to crash through the heathens and shine upon even the southern continent."
Beatrix rose and stepped toward the window. She stared out into the night, and the soft breeze rustled her white robes. She spoke softly, and for the first time that Mercy could remember, perhaps the first time in her life, it seemed like some humanity filled Beatrix's voice, some emotion, not just calculating sweetness or cold cruelty but true doubt, true fear.
"For long years I've feared this day," Beatrix said, gazing out onto the city. "For long years, I stood at my windows, gazing into the darkness of the night, and I felt a chill not of the wind, not of winter nor early spring's frost, but a chill that comes from the great, hot land overseas, the deserts and stony mountains, the fire of a mob gathered from many nations, from all those heathens we failed to bring under our light. The Horde has been gathering for many years, throughout my reign, throughout the reign of my mother, forever a thorn in our sides. Yet now they're no longer a thorn." She turned toward her daughter. "Now they are a spear aimed at our heart. Now weredragons fly with them. Now weredragons lead them. Now they would seek to supplant us, to crush this Temple, to undo the Commonwealth and bring back the heathen kingdom of Requiem. We cannot sit in wait while our enemy rises. When an enemy rises to slay you, you must slay him first. History is full of fallen empires, of kings and queens lost to memory. Survivors strike first. Survivors cut down all who would rise to slay them. And so we will strike first. War is upon us. We will muster the fleet. We will summon the firedrakes from across the empire. And we will strike. And you will lead our forces south. You will return with your shield, or you will return upon it. You will return victorious, or you will not return at all. You will bring the lands of Terra under our dominion, or all light will go dim in this world."
Dragons Reborn Page 14