“What? No, I insist this is foolish—”
Dantress stood up, cutting her sister off in mid-sentence. “To Al’un Dai we will go.” She patted her taller, frowning sister on the shoulder and then swept past her, whispering into her ear. “Father promised to watch over us, Rose’el. Have faith … We can do this. We have to!”
Then she approached Evela and embraced her. “Laura may return soon. And I wouldn’t think a spider bite”—she pointed into the hollow log wherein Levena slept—“can keep her down for long.”
“Don’t worry.” Evela cleared her throat and forced herself to stand straight. “I’ll take care of things here. Just you be careful.”
“And please bury the old woman,” Dantress wiped a tear from her cheek and turned, looking at the pitiful sight. “Poor thing. She didn’t stand a chance.”
Laura woke when the first rays of sunlight struck her nest and the cries of birds filled the forest around her. The birds’ screeches were not soothing; they came as throaty threats from several hundred vultures standing on and about the dragon carcass. She pinched her nose against the smell of putrid flesh and sheathed her sword.
Little remained of the fearsome Glandstine. Shreds of black, scale-covered hide hung from the clean white bones of his rib-cage. For the most part, the ground had absorbed his green blood. Already the birds had stolen his eyes from their sockets.
Still she could not guess what had happened to the creature that had attacked her. She could see its severed head lying between the fallen trees, its body next to it. Only bones remained.
Perhaps another creature roamed these forests. One that could remain unseen and yet still be lethal and cunning enough to slay the beast? She descended the tree and headed north, away from the vultures. She drew her sword and listened to every sound that reached her ears. Last night had been a close call and she did not want a repeat.
Thus she passed through the forest without incident, ever northward until she chanced upon a tree that she recognized as one that she and her sisters had passed the day before. She headed west, retracing the route to the scene of her kidnapping. Her sore body complained, but she paid it no heed; she had to find out what had become of her sisters. Were they still alive? Before she’d been knocked out she’d seen several dragons moving against her sisters. If they had been overcome—as had she … She quickened her pace and tossed stray strands of her long and dark, red-tinged hair out of her face.
MISTRESS OF THE RUINS
Astiff, cool wind blew in from the east. Caritha, Dantress, and Rose’el stood with their backs to it, looking upon the ancient fortress of Al’un Dai as the sun’s rays peeked in and out of the puffy white clouds dotting the sky.
The black metal and stone structure rose from the midst of a vast depression, a hollow bristling with wild shrubbery, vines, and dead, twisted trees. Broken walls of stone crumbled around the structure, and the deep moat that had once formed the outside perimeter was bone dry.
The structure was enormous with jagged towers rising in defiance toward the sky. Large sections of the towers and the fortress walls stood with gaping holes in them. A heap of rubble filled the structure’s center—the remnants of a much larger tower that had once stood there.
The wind howled through the trees behind them and a sudden ringing of metal caused Dantress to glance to her right. Scowling, Rose’el held up her blade and thrust it at the temple.
To Dantress’s left, Caritha took a few steps forward and then bent down to part the fold in her outer skirt and slide her rusted blade from the concealed scabbard. She raised the sword before her eyes, grasping its leather handle with both hands, and looked past its blade to the fallen fortress. “Draw your sword, Dantress.” She glanced at her sideways. “The weapons of the Six must avenge the innocent.”
Dantress started to reach down for her sword then stopped, shaking her head, looking back up at the fortress, its ancient drawbridge lowered over the empty moat. “Violence should be our last resort, my sisters, not our first choice. We are here to find Kesla and persuade him to repent—”
Rose’el growled, “And if he does not?”
“Then”—Dantress said, hesitating—“then he must die.”
“Good.” Rose’el lowered her weapon. “Justice must be served, as Father wishes it to be.”
Caritha lowered her sword also, indicating her approval with a nod.
They made their way into the hollow along a beaten path, Dantress leading. The path took them between scraggly trees and under the limbs of broken and dead trees. Many of them stood out stark white, stripped of their protective bark. Strewn in ghastly fashion between them, lay helms and shields, halberds and spears, chain mail and solid breastplates, tarnished and rusted—enough weaponry to arm a sizeable force.
“Spooky,” Rose’el whispered. She tiptoed past a complete suit of body armor half-buried at the base of a dead tree as if afraid to disturb the dead man’s ghost. “I wonder why there aren’t any bones.”
“Who knows,” Caritha said, “this battle probably took place a very, very, very long time ago. The skeletons probably turned to dust ages ago.”
Rose’el stepped over an exposed tree root and raised one eyebrow. “Have you ever wondered how old Father is? I mean, look around! He was here when this place was undamaged, right?”
“I suppose so,” Dantress interjected. She contemplated the dark structure ahead. Only a few hundred yards to go and they would reach the drawbridge. “Father is very powerful and very wise, Rose’el,” she said. “We all know that. But I believe there are some things we will never understand about him. His age?” She took another step. “I doubt we are meant to know that. What matters now is finding out if that man—Kesla—is still here. Then, we can go home.”
Stooping to examine a breastplate near the path, Dant-ress swept the grime from it with her hand. The figure of a white dragon spewing fire from its mouth gleamed back at her. Beneath the dragon’s feet flames twisted up, entwining its legs. Thick black smoke billowed around it as if it walked, unscathed, upon the surface of a lake of burning oil.
Though the image on the breastplate must have been ancient the colors appeared vivid, fresh even. Bits of the image had started to flake off, but overall it seemed unaffected by the countless years sitting out in the open air, exposed to the elements.
She walked on a little farther, in the direction of Al’un Dai, then stooped to grasp the edge of a round shield. The same image—the white dragon spewing fire and walking on a lake of burning oil—met her gaze.
The colors, the mystery behind the depiction, the magnificent creature, all intrigued her beyond anything she had thus far seen, except perhaps her encounter with the sword that had spoken to her. If the dragon shown in this painting was the great white dragon that she knew, then what story lay behind it? It was her heritage, her past … it should be a part of her future.
Her sisters peered over her shoulders until Caritha bid them stand. “We must move on,” she said, pulling Dantress to her feet. “Come on, let’s find out what’s inside the temple.”
The cold metal of the drawbridge plates crept through the soles of Dantress’s leather shoes, and an equally cold chill ran up her spine when she saw what should have been impossible. The towers of Al’un Dai stood as they had in ancient times; whole and unmarred. Gratings now covered the multitude of windows set in the black stone towers that had been in ruins. The fortress’s outer wall rose a hundred feet high. Its iron gates, made to look like giant, feathered wings, were closed and bound to each other by chains fashioned in the forms of enormous cobras.
They had almost crossed the drawbridge. The chains were rising slowly from the dry moat and clattering into position as they stretched from the drawbridge’s end to the temple’s outer wall on either side of the gate. But suddenly the chains rattled faster along their runs and the drawbridge rose under the sisters’ feet.
Dantress fell forward onto the ground, and Rose’el tumbled off the side of the draw
bridge. Because she too had fallen, Dant-ress could do nothing. She bit her lip. Tears of frustration burned in her eyes.
Caritha fell beside her and returned her gaze for a moment, then she looked back at the drawbridge. She bolted to her feet, ran to the moat’s edge, parted the fold in her garment, and drew her rusted sword.
A giant serpent rose from the moat and leered down at them. Its blood-red eyes gleamed. It did not open its mouth, but two fangs dripping thick, clear liquid protruded from its upper jaw. Its eyes narrowed to near-slits.
Atop the serpent’s gray head, Rose’el struggled not to fall off. The serpent bucked. Rose’el grunted, her hands holding desperately onto the creature’s scales. “Are you—two—going— to—help me?” she asked through clenched teeth.
Let her down! Dantress knew as soon as she communicated her thought to the serpent that it had heard her. It jerked its head to look at her, eyes wide and Rose’el fell off.
The serpent narrowed its eyes again. Dantress thought she spotted a line of ridged hairs rise on its neck as it slipped into the murky water of the moat.
She stood. Rose’el, with Caritha’s help, struggled to her feet. Dark red blood ran from several minor cuts on Rose’el’s hands where she had gripped the serpent’s scales.
A cold, like the one she had felt while walking the drawbridge, crept into her back, only this time she knew it was a cold not born of temperature … but of something else.
A quick spin brought her to face the wing gates. They were still closed but now a rough-stone path could be discerned beyond them. A silent human figure cloaked in blue-gray cloth stood in the way. A narrow band of gold ran down the cloak’s front. Long, curly blond hair showed beneath the black fur-lined hood.
The cold … was it coming from this … this person?
“Well what do you think of that?” Rose’el said.
Dantress had nearly forgotten her sisters, so intent was she on studying the stranger.
“Well, well, well. How do you like that? Here we are in the ruins of Al’un Dai, temple of a long-gone wizard, and it looks as if he built it yesterday.” She harrumphed. “Ruins indeed! This place is spotless. Check out the elaborate design work—”
The pause lasted long enough to tell Dantress that her sister had finally noticed the stranger.
“What have we here?” Rose’el stepped up to the gates. Blood dripped from the tips of her fingers, landing on the stone pathway at her feet. She either did not notice this or did not care. “Hello there,” Rose’el began, “care to open the gate for us?”
The stranger still stood there, silent and unmoving as if frozen in time, then flipped back their hood. Slender, tall, athletic, a blond haired woman of enviable beauty fixed her sapphire eyes upon the sisters before turning and walking to the base of a gray marble stairway. The steps wove up to the recessed wooden doors in the main tower.
There she stopped, looked back and smiled. About-facing, she ascended the stairs. The doors opened inward to admit her— revealing a long, dark corridor inside the structure lined with red columns and gray banners—and the doors closed behind her without a sound.
“We’ll have to let ourselves in,” Caritha said.
Whipping out their swords, Caritha and Rose’el struck at the great chain across the wing gates. Bits of rust flew off their blades, falling to the dirt beneath their feet. Their efforts did not even leave a scratch on the chains.
Dantress gazed up at one of the dark towers, considering the situation. A vulture flew, not above the tower, but toward it. The bird glided, undeterred by the walls of stone, heading straight for the tower. She cringed, expecting to see it collide with the wall of stone. But the vulture passed through it, emerging unharmed on the other side, and angled for a slow descent. She watched it shrink out of sight into the northern borders of the forest.
Her sisters still beat at the chains, blades clanging. Caritha, her long hair askew, her face beading sweat, stepped back, holding her hand up, palm outward. A feeble burst of blue energy shot against the gate and vaporized harmlessly against it.
The vulture … it had gone through the stone … as if it were not even there. As if it did not truly exist. What if the tower did not really exist, could it be an illusion?
This temple, Al’un Dai, had fallen a long time ago. The great white dragon had told her so. Yet it appeared whole, standing as mighty as the day it had been built. But she and her sisters had seen it in ruins only a short time before. Could they be under some kind of spell? Were they trapped in an intricate deception? She could think of only one way to find out.
“Wait.” She grasped Caritha’s sword arm with one hand and held Rose’el’s shoulder with her other. “I don’t think that will do any good.”
“No?” Rose’el pulled away. “Do you have a better idea?”
Dantress smiled, releasing Caritha’s arm. “If I am right, then none of this is real. It is all an illusion created to keep us away.”
“An illusion to keep us away from what?” Caritha shook her head. “You’re not making any sense, Dantress.”
Dantress eyed the wing gates, the chains binding them gave Caritha’s question merit. What would be the purpose to creating an illusion as complicated as this one? Unless to hide something? Or, some one?
They must be on the right track.
“That’s it!” she said. “The illusion is meant to keep us from finding—not a thing, but a person—the man who was once a member of the Six, the man we have come to find!”
“That is absurd,” Rose’el replied, raising one eyebrow.
“Really?” Dantress looked at her. “Why?”
The question hung in the air for a moment. Rose’el pointed at the wing gate. “Tell me,” she said, “that you aren’t suggesting my sword struck an illusion.”
“Would it surprise you?” she replied, inching near the black iron bars. “If I am right then I can walk through this … If not then I will not be able.” She took two more steps and drew in her breath. The metal was so close to her skin that she could feel its cool surface. No! It was an illusion!
She closed her eyes, walking forward. When she felt certain she’d passed the gate, she dared open them. The towers of the temple were crumbling around her. They reverted to their dilapidated state, charred and broken. Piles of rubble rose ahead of her, with the largest pile of all where the mighty central tower had once stood. Partial walls, some with windows and doors, stood amidst the rubble. A few still supported thick roofs tiled with what appeared to be smooth metal plates worn by untold years of wind and rain.
It amazed her that some of the towers still stood after so much time and such pervading destruction. The wind howled through the ancient structures, an eerie reminder of the terrible battle once fought over this bit of land.
“Dantress! H-how did you … how did you do that.”
She turned at the sound of Rose’el’s voice. Her sister stood pointing at her with eyes open wide, “how did you do that?”
Dantress had been right. She let herself smile. Caritha and Rose’el were standing in the ruins too, their eyes darting from towers to rubble and back at her. “It was nothing more than an illusion created to keep us away,” she said. She absently kicked aside a metal plate on the ground. Under it a boomerang lay. She picked it up, but it drew blood from her finger and she immediately dropped it.
Caritha reached down and picked up the boomerang. She blew dust off its silvery surface. “Strange.” She twirled the object with her wrist then held it out to Dantress. “The elbow is leather,” she said as Dantress took it, “but be careful, its wings are outfitted with blades. I believe it is a weapon.”
Tucking the blade boomerang under her belt, Dantress walked toward the place where she had seen the woman walk into the nonexistent central tower. She could sense something nearby, a presence. Pain, sorrow, anger … Someone was waking, someone whose bitter memories were strong enough to enter her young mind.
The shadows of her two sisters joi
ned her own. We are here, Dantress. Tell us what you are thinking.
She jerked around, searching their faces. Caritha, was that you? Did you just—communicate—using your mind?
But the eldest daughter of the dragon looked beyond her, and Dantress heard nothing more. If Caritha had communicated to her with her mind then she was holding herself back, unwilling for some reason to continue using that form of communication. Was there more to this sister than the dragon had said?
Silencing her own questions, Dantress gestured for Caritha and Rose’el to follow her as she sidestepped a large block of stone and proceeded toward a hole in one of the temple’s standing walls. She thought she heard a wail, as of a child, echoing faintly from somewhere inside the wall. But she could not be certain.
She entered the wall and searched until she noticed a large, flat stone that stood out in the debris because it appeared clean and unbroken. Approaching, she called her sisters’ attention to it. With their help she slid the stone to the side.
A circular hole gaped beneath it, like a well, with stone steps set in its walls and a railing. It led down into darkness.
A draft of warm air rose from the darkness below and passed over her face. She grasped the cool surface of the rusted iron railing, held up by support bars fashioned like king cobras, and gazed into the darkness.
For an instant she caught the scent of smoke in the air but the perfumed essence of flowers replaced it. Roses, lilacs—she couldn’t be sure what kind of flowers they were because the smell tinged the air as a mere sampling, no more than a whiff or two.
Drawing in a deep breath, she reached down, parted the fold in her outer skirt to reveal the hilt of her weapon. The rusted blade protested as she slid it from the sheath. “Come on,” she said, keeping her voice low so as not to alert anyone except her sisters to her presence, “he’s down here.”
She turned. Caritha had drawn her sword and stepped around her to start down the stairs. Rose’el squinted at Dantress, her dark eyes boring into her.
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