by Tara West
The volcano heaved, filling the chamber with sulfuric smoke. She and the others gagged and coughed, following Alec up a steep slope, slipping on loose gravel. They were running out of options. If they couldn’t escape, she would have to blast a hole through the mountain, which could compromise the entire structure. She swore when she saw the exit had been buried under an avalanche of rocks.
“Stand back while I try to blast through it.” Her throat was more parched and raw than when she and Lydra had gotten lost in the Shifting Sands. She shone a light on the obstruction and was startled when when one boulder moved, a bulbous eye blinking at them.
“Gorpat found friends!” the giant boomed.
“My pearl!” Grim clambered over loose rocks to reach his child.
“Go back, Dada.” The giant’s command echoed through the chamber, causing a wave of debris to fall on their heads.
Dianna turned into Simeon’s arms when the giant’s fist shot through the tunnel, blasting dust and soot all over them.
As she climbed out of the tunnel and into the humid night air, Dianna had never felt more relieved. Alec was alive, and Eris was dead!
Grim wobbled up to his child, holding out his arms. “My sweet pearl!”
She pulled Grim against her like he was a stuffed toy, coating the top of his head in slobbery kisses. Fortunately, the dwarf didn’t seem to mind.
The ground shook, and Dianna tumbled back, landing in a pair of strong arms. “Thank you.” She expected to look up into Simeon’s eyes and was surprised to see icy eyes in a blue face. She struggled to remember his name. Rhine? Rhes? Ryne!
“The least I could do after all you’ve done for us,” Ryne said with a wink. Beneath the light of the nearly-full moon, she hadn’t realized until this moment how striking his features were; a long, straight nose, an angular jaw, and the most intriguing hair, so pale it was translucent.
Simeon loudly cleared his throat. “Dianna, we need to go.”
“Of course.” She pulled out of Ryne’s embrace, absently rubbing her arms where he’d touched her. “Where are Lydra and Tan’yi’na?” she asked the giant.
“There.” Gorpat moved aside, pointing to the two dragons nestled beside an angry stream of lava. Lydra was on her back, her charred wings flat against the scorched earth while Tan’yi’na licked a gaping bloody wound in her side.
“Oh, heavenly Elements!” Dianna gasped, ignoring the sweltering heat that plastered her hair to her face as she raced to her dragon.
There you are. Tan’yi’na looked her over with a deep scowl. We’d almost given up hope.
The mountain shook again, and this time Dianna tumbled into Simeon’s arms, not realizing he’d followed her so closely.
The mountain is angry, Tan’yi’na boomed.
Simeon puffed up his chest, beaming. “Because Dianna killed its goddess.”
Splendid, the dragon said wryly. Only one more goddess to go.
Dianna pressed a hand against Lydra’s charred scales. The dragon let out a low wail.
“I’m sorry, girl,” she breathed, letting her healing magic soak in.
Do not ask me for help, Aletha chided. This dragon served the witch who turned us to stone.
Dianna repressed a groan. “Lydra was under Madhea’s spell. She follows me now.”
’Tis true, sister, Sindri answered. Dianna has proven herself to be a good witch and nothing like her mother.
Warmth flooded Dianna’s chest when Neriphene agreed. “Thank you, cousins,” she whispered.
Very well, Aletha sighed. Let us heal this beast and get out of here.
We must make haste before we’re all turned to ash.
Channeling Aletha’s powers, Dianna was able to rapidly heal Lydra as well as a tear in Tan’yi’na’s wing before the volcano rumbled and spit out a geyser of angry lava.
Lydra howled, ducking beneath Tan’yi’na when a flaming boulder barreled toward them. Tan’yi’na burned it to a crisp before it struck the ground.
Alec raced toward them, swearing and hopping from foot to foot. “We need to go.”
Dianna helped Alec and Mari climb up on Lydra, and they launched into the air ahead of a steaming geyser of lava that singed the tips of Lydra’s wings.
Simeon helped Ryne scale Tan’yi’na’s back. Gorpat put her father on her shoulder and waded into the water. The flood had subsided, sloshing Gorpat’s shins, but the water was mixed with lava, and the giant yelped, racing across the island. She found half of the broken barge floating in the lagoon and fell on it, kicking it into the ocean. Many of Eris’s soldiers were huddled on an embankment, trapped between the flood and erupting lava.
When Dianna saw the other half of Gorpat’s barge stuck in the embankment, she said to her dragon. “Help them, please.”
Lydra swung around and picked up the splintered logs in her talons. Then she flew past the soldiers, dropping the broken barge nearby.
They hollered their thanks and piled on the barge moments before a raging river of lava washed away the earth behind them.
Dianna prayed that wherever the Elements took them, they’d live the rest of their lives honorably, passing on the mercy they had been shown.
Alec peered over Lydra’s wing as they flew over the lagoon. “Could we land on that cliff?” he asked, pointing to a lone cannon. Beside the cannon, a white shroud was illuminated by the moonlight.
A large chunk of mountain slid into the water below. “It’s not safe.”
“Please,” he begged.
She knew why Alec wanted to land. With a groan, she relented. “You must be quick!”
“We will be,” he agreed.
Even as Dianna asked Lydra to land, she was having second thoughts. More geysers sprang up, turning the landscape into an inferno. Great goddess! Why had she given in to her brother? She prayed she wouldn’t regret it.
* * *
Alec was grateful when his sister helped him lift Mari off Lydra’s back, as his hands were numb from the chill radiating off the dragon. He stumbled when the ground shook, but with a few long strides, he was at the cannon.
“Is that my father?” Mari whispered, her words shaking like a leaf in a winter storm.
“Yes,” Alec murmured. “I thought you’d want to say goodbye.”
Mari cupped his cheek, her eyes brimming. “Thank you.”
Alec set Mari beside her father and pulled back the shroud. He’d hoped Khashka would stir, having miraculously recovered, but his body was already stiffening, just like his parents before he’d buried them.
Mari wiped her eyes, though it did no good. Her tears fell in torrents. “I never got to hold him.”
Alec placed a hand upon her shoulder. “You can hold him now.”
Mari fell on top of her father’s body, sobbing against his chest.
The ground shook again before splitting in two, a large chunk of the cliffside falling into the ocean.
“I’m sorry, Mari.” Alec scooped her up in his arms and ran back to Lydra. “Farewell, Father.” Mari buried her face in her hands.
The cliff split again, and Khashka fell into the sea.
Mari sighed. “I didn’t get to say a prayer for him.”
He held her tight when Lydra lurched into the air. “Grim and I did.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
Alec was too choked up to answer. He looked over his shoulder one last time. Lava gushed from the volcano, and the whole structure receded into itself, melting into the ocean.
* * *
“Dragons nice.” Gorpat leaned over her narrow barge and splashed the water. “Dragons play with Gorpat?”
Tan’yi’na floated aimlessly, shaking water off his wings. I’m too tired to play.
Lydra let out a slow chuckle and sent a flurry of snowflakes at Gorpat, who squealed and smashed the crystals between her palms.
Dianna smiled. Gorpat’s playfulness made her miss Des, and she couldn’t wait to reach Aya-Shay and hold her young brother in her arms again. Ta
n’yi’na had flown ahead, circling back to tell them they’d reach Aya-Shay by the morrow. Thanks to Sindri and Neriphene teaching Dianna how to manipulate wind and water, she’d been able to create a wave strong enough to push the barge across the ocean, with Gorpat hanging on the side and the rest of Dianna’s friends on a small fishing vessel they’d found adrift at sea, preferring the cramped boat to riding on the backs of dragons. They had stopped occasionally to rest and hydrate. Lydra made everyone icicles to suck on, and Tan’yi’na had roasted a few carnivus plants. The plants were not as tasty as venison, but no one complained.
Brrrr. The water is cold. Tan’yi’na shook again, splashing Dianna with frigid water. I thought the air would be warmer here.
“That’s odd.” She leaned over Lydra’s side and dipped her toe in the ocean. “It is unusually cold.” Though the Elements didn’t normally bother her, she was disturbed.
She looked at Alec, who was resting with Mari in his arms. Dianna wanted to be appalled at the way the two were cooing and nesting like love-struck birds, but her brother was content, and that was all that mattered.
She cupped water in her hands and threw it at her brother.
He startled. “By the Elements, that water is colder than your dragon!”
Grim and Ryne dipped their fingers in the water, sharing dark looks.
The dwarf scowled up at Dianna. “Methinks ’tis a bad omen.”
Simeon sat up. “But what could it mean?”
Tan’yi’na leveled Simeon with a look. It means, now that Eris is dead, Madhea has all the power.
Dianna’s innards turned to porridge as she fell against Lydra’s scales. “Elements save us.”
THE END
Dear readers, I hope you are enjoying my fantasy saga. Be sure to download Scorn of the Sky Goddess, the conclusion to my Keepers of the Stones trilogy, April 2018.
Blessings,
Tara West
The Beginning of Time
In the beginning there was chaos, with no division between the land, sea and sky. Only the Elements reigned: air, soil, fire, and water, colliding in discord, making Tehra a volatile, miserable planet. The Elements were unhappy with the constant state of unrest and change on Tehra. Since none of them could exist together in harmony, they knew they needed something stronger and more powerful to rule over them and bring peace to the planet.
The Elements called upon the vast magic of the universe and created the Tryads, immortal keepers of the Elements. Their names were Madhea, keeper of sky and spirit; Kyan, keeper of land and breath; and Eris, keeper of water and life. But the Elements made one fatal mistake. They used magic, and only magic, to create the sisters. The Tryads were not of the Elements and so they had little regard for the safekeeping of the planet, save for one of the sisters, Kyan, who loved her land and the people who inhabited it.
The Elements had believed the Tryads would rule Tehra peacefully, keeping the distinction between air, land and water, and ending all chaos. The Elements, being simple in nature, had not planned for avarice and greed.
Eris, keeper of the fin folk, was unhappy with her station below the surface of Tehra. She did not enjoy living among sea creatures and being tethered to an unsightly fish tail. She felt slighted by her air-breathing sisters who lived above her.
Madhea bemoaned spending her days among the sky creatures, peering down at life below. Her land sister lived with beings called humans who had built a shrine in her honor. But the bird folk gave Madhea no such special treatment. Thus, she wished for nothing else than to shed her wings and take her sister’s place as ruler of the human world.
Kyan, keeper of the land, felt no such resentment toward her sisters. She had fallen in love with Orhan, a handsome mortal. Together, they had conceived six daughters, each one the exact likeness of her mother and bearing magical powers. Kyan knew of her sisters’ envy, but did not fear them because, along with her daughters, she was more powerful than Madhea and Eris combined.
If Kyan had one weakness, it was her love for Orhan. Though he had wealth, power, and love, he was still unhappy with his lot in life. He desired sons. Kyan, as a daughter of Elemental magic, could only conceive a likeness of herself. In order to give him sons, she would have to use a different magic, a dark magic — one that came not from land, sky or water, but from the darkest recesses of the soul.
Kyan loved her husband and could not deny him his ardent wish, so she birthed him twin boys, Dafuar and Odu. But something changed within Kyan after she’d called upon the dark magic. Her soul had been compromised and her powers weakened. Her daughters’ magic had been tainted as well.
Madhea was the first to seize upon her sister’s weakness, flying fast from the heavens and striking Kyan and her daughters with great thunderbolts, sending their souls into the great abyss and reducing their human forms to mere stones. Heartbroken and distraught, Orhan fled with his young sons to the shelter of the Shifting Sands.
When Eris learned of Madhea’s treachery, she rose up from the waters, demanding her fair share of the land. Madhea refused, and thus began a war between the two sisters. Madhea pelted the waters with thunderbolts and hurled great gusts of wind. Eris retaliated with monstrous waves that eroded the soil and swept away entire villages.
All the while, the Elements mourned the loss of Kyan and the ongoing destruction of their planet. The world had become chaos once more — something that the Elements had sought to prevent by creating the Tryads. Now they had to act before Tehra was lost forever.
As each sister was consumed in destroying the other, the Elements manipulated wind and water and pollinated their wombs. Eris and Madhea each bore six daughters, the Elementals, who grew into adulthood before the first full moon. And though the Elementals had inherited their mothers’ magical powers, they were children of the Elements as well, and owed their loyalty to them, and thus to restoring peace and tranquility.
The Elementals forced their mothers to sign a truce. Eris was made keeper of the sea, as well as all of the islands and shorelines. Madhea would rule the sky and the mountains. The land in between was given to Dafuar and Odu. But though Kyan’s sons were immortal like their mother, the dark magic used to conceive them had robbed them of their inherent magical powers. They feared they would not make good keepers.
The Elements presented Dafuar and Odu with seven sacred stones; each stone had once been the body of their mother and sisters, and they possessed great power. Through these stones, Dafuar and Odu could rule as keepers of the Elements. But soon it became evident that the sons had inherited their human father’s weaknesses, for though they lived forever as immortals, they aged as men. Their bodies became more weathered and decrepit with each passing year, and their memories began to fade.
The Elements, fearing Eris and Madhea would find a way to seize the stones from Dafuar and Odu, stole the stones, hiding them in the darkest recesses of Tehra. The Elements then divided the remaining land between Madhea and Eris.
Dafuar and Odu left their homes and wandered the land for ages, searching for something they’d lost, not remembering it was the stones they sought. They lived a cursed life, wise but unwise; immortal, but old and frail.
Although Madhea and Eris were tethered by the Elementals, their powers grew. Displeased with the shrines built to her by the mortals, Madhea built one to herself; a giant palace of ice, rising up from the ground and reaching as far as the heavens. Eris built a palace out of fire, which rose up from the ocean; a towering cylinder, shrouded by plumes of smoke and guarded by molten lava.
The two sisters had become so transfixed in building their shrines and strengthening their magic, that they had forsaken their duties as keepers of The Elements, paying little heed when ice storms and cyclones ravaged the land and people. The Elementals, likewise, had no time to manage sky, land and water, as they were most often preoccupied with their mothers.
Slowly, once again, Tehra began to crumble. The ice melted, the wind howled and the land shook. The Tryads and the Eleme
ntals had failed to protect the Elements from chaos. Now, the people’s only hope of saving their planet lay in hiding, within the powers of the sacred stones.
Books by Tara West
Eternally Yours
Divine and Dateless
Damned and Desirable
Damned and Desperate
Demonic and Deserted
Dead and Delicious
Something More Series
Say When
Say Yes
Say Forever
Say Please
Say You Want Me
Say You Love Me
Say You Need Me
Dawn of the Dragon Queen Saga
Dragon Song
Dragon Storm
Whispers Series
Sophie’s Secret
Don’t Tell Mother
Krysta’s Curse
Visions of the Witch
Sophie’s Secret Crush
Witch Blood
Witch Hunt
Keepers of the Stones
Witch Flame, Prelude
Curse of the Ice Dragon, Book One
Spirit of the Sea Witch, Book Two
Scorn of the Sky Goddess, Book Three (April 2018)
Visit Tara’s Amazon page here: http://amzn.to/2mCjR9T