"We will walk quickly," she said. "We will head straight to the port. The ship will take you north to the cold, barbarian lands. I don't know what awaits you there. I don't know how or where you will live. But you will be free. You will start a new life." Her eyes stung. "Nobody will hunt you there."
The family stood up, shivering.
"But there are demons outside!" said the youngest child, a girl with tangled brown hair. "They can smell us. They smelled my grandmother's magic." Tears welled up in her eyes. "They ate her."
Issari knelt and embraced the girl. "My amulet will protect you. I will protect you." She kissed the girl's forehead. "You will be brave."
The girl nodded. Issari smiled but trembled on the inside. What if the demons spared her but slew the family? What if the amulet's power could not overcome their lust for weredragon blood? She tightened her lips and began to climb out of the cellar. She had no choice. She had to risk this. The demons had already invaded the pottery shop's ground floor; during the next raid they might find the cellar.
I must lead these people to the sea, and they must sail north. This kingdom is death.
As they stepped outside the pottery shop, the family blinked in the sunlight, momentarily blinded after long days in the dark. The youngest child whimpered and clung to Issari.
"I will be brave," the girl whispered. "I will be brave like you."
They walked down the street, moving slowly, barely daring to breathe. White columns rose around them, and a palm tree grew from a ring of stones, swaying in the wind. The sun was bright, the sky azure. Trails of demon drool gleamed upon the street. Drawings covered houses' walls—some depicted the sigils of the gods, wards against evil drawn by the city folk, while others were demon creations painted in blood, depicting demons devouring the heads of men, tearing off children's limbs, and mating with women. Issari held the child's hand, and the rest of the family walked behind her, their footfalls soft.
When they rounded the corner, Issari grimaced. Several beasts clustered ahead around a well. One demon, a lanky being like a strip of dried meat, was chewing on a dying dog. Two other demons, blobby creatures like dripping tallow, blinked and groaned as they copulated in the dust. A few more demons danced atop the well's rim, skeletons draped in bits of flesh. All turned toward Issari and the family. All sniffed. All let out shrieks and leaped forward.
The family gasped. Issari winced, pulled out her amulet, and cried out, "Let me pass! Stand back, demons of the Abyss. I bear the mark of Taal. Stand back!"
They screamed. The sunlight reflected off the amulet, beaming forward in blinding rays, and the demons covered their eyes.
"Quickly!" Issari said, looking over her shoulder. "Hurry by them. Do not look at them. Stay near me."
They walked, crossing the square. One creature tried to leap at them; the amulet's light slammed into it, knocking it back and tearing off its legs. The other creatures cowered. Issari walked briskly, leaving the square and entering an alleyway between shops.
They kept moving through the city. They passed by a marketplace where once vendors had hawked figs, olives, dates, and freshly cooked meat from tin plates. Today demons rooted through the supplies, guzzling wine and stuffing food down their gullets. Issari and the family kept walking, passing by the old Temple of Taal, a towering building of white columns capped with gold. Priests stood outside the temple's bronze doors, blowing ram horns and swinging incense, holding back the foul creatures who tried to leap, crawl, and slither up the stairs. Street by street, the amulet held out before them, Issari and the family made their way to the port.
The thriving boardwalk Issari had known was gone. No more jugglers, puppeteers, or buskers performed here. No more peddlers hawked dried fruits, salted nuts, or their own bodies. The booths of seers, healers, and games of chance were gone. What sailors remained moved methodically and wordlessly, loading and unloading their wares from the ships that lined the piers. Issari had once found the smell of salt, fish, and sailors unsavory. Today the place reeked of rot, and she missed the old aroma.
At every pier stood a guardian of the Abyss—some taller than three men and lanky as poles, others squat, some dripping, some dry, some hooked and bladed, some wet and soft, some hooded in rags, others naked and glistening. As every sailor walked the planks, stepping on and off the ships, the demons sniffed, groped, drooled, seeking weredragon blood.
"I will be brave," whispered the potter's girl, clutching Issari's hand.
I will be brave, Issari thought, chin raised, as she walked along the wet cobblestones.
The boardwalk took them along the canal that thrust into the city. Without the usual chants of sailors, cries of peddlers, and bustle of merchants, the place seemed eerily silent. Even the gulls had fled. Issari and the family walked by a towering, tree-like creature, its many eyeballs blinking upon fleshy branches. Each of its fingers sprouted its own hand, twitching and sporting rotten claws. Issari forced herself to keep walking calmly, ignoring every demon they passed.
Finally, at the edge of the canal, the scent of open sea filled her nostrils, some relief from the stench of the Abyss. There she waited: the Silver Porpoise, a long ship of many oars, her canvas sails wide. She was a ship of traders; she had brought Eteer many fur pelts, barrels of tin ore, and salted meats from the lands across the sea. Now the Silver Porpoise sailed north again—with bronze tools, soft cotton, southern Eteerian spices . . . and hidden life.
"This ship will take you into the sea," Issari whispered to the family around her. "She will take you to the cold north. She will take you to hope, to new life."
A towering, demonic spider guarded the ship, human heads speared upon each of its legs, their eyes still moving, their mouths sucking in air. The creature tried to clatter toward Issari, and the severed heads opened their mouths wide, revealing metal teeth. At the sight of the amulet, the spider hissed and darted back, cowering against the ship's hull.
"These are sailors," Issari said. She forced herself to glare at the spiderlike demon, though her insides trembled. "You will let them pass, and you will not speak of them, or this amulet will burn you."
The demon squirmed and hissed, and the family members began to board, walking up the plank one by one. Issari hugged the young child.
"You will be brave," she whispered.
The girl nodded and touched Issari's cheek. "You will be brave too. You need bravery more than I do."
With that, the child ran onto the ship.
Issari climbed the city wall, and she stood between the battlements for a long time, watching the ship sail away. The family stood at the stern, looking at her, and the little girl raised a hand in farewell. The distance swallowed them until the ship was just a speck . . . and then was gone.
Issari lowered her head. The stench and laughter of demons wafted from below, and she wished that she too could sail away, she too could leave this kingdom behind. But she must stay. She had more to save. She must save whatever weredragons she could, whatever brides the demons wanted to claim, and whatever remained of her kingdom's light.
She turned around and faced the city again. Across hills of homes and shops and winding streets, Issari saw it rising—Aerhein Tower. In that cell he languished—her brother.
"And I must save you too."
Wind blew, scented of rot and blood. A distant scream rose—the demons claiming another bride or perhaps slaying another weredragon. So much death, so much pain; how could she stop this?
"My father is in the north now, hunting Laira," she whispered to herself. "Taal . . . please. Please let Laira kill him." She found herself clenching her fists. "Let my father, King Raem Seran, die in dragonfire."
The thought horrified her, and she gasped and covered her mouth. She was his daughter! She was Princess Issari Seran, heiress to the throne!
She tightened her jaw. Her knees shook. She reached into her robes and clutched the hilt of her dagger. She pulled her hood low, climbed off the wall, and walked home in silence.
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LAIRA
When dawn broke, Laira felt so cold, hurt, and weak that she wasn't sure she could rise.
She lay under the pile of leaves, her breath frosted. When she touched her hair—short, ragged strands Zerra had cut himself—she found it frosted into hard spikes. Fingers numb, she parted the blanket of dry leaves covering her and gazed up at the forest. Mist floated, and the boles of maples and birches seemed black in the dawn, rising to an orange canopy. A murder of crows sat upon the branches, staring down at her with beady eyes.
They're waiting for me to die, she thought. But I won't.
She rose. Naked and trembling, she approached the branch where she had hung her patchwork fur cloak to dry. It was still wet. Laira hugged herself, shivering, teeth chattering. She should never have washed the garments in the river; she should have let the dung dry, then shaken off the flecks. Now the cold would kill her just as readily as the rocs or her wounds. She examined those wounds and winced. The welts on her feet were swollen, and one seemed full of pus.
"It's infected," she whispered, every word sending out puffs of frost. "I need healing herbs or the rot will crawl up my leg."
She wondered if she could find another tribe; others wandered the plains and forests, hunting and gathering and sometimes battling one another, and they had shamans of their own, perhaps less cruel than Shedah who would only scorn, strike, and spit upon Laira whenever she asked for a poultice. Yet Laira remembered the few times she had seen the other tribes, nomadic groups bearing their own totems—bronzed skulls of beasts, gilded buffalo horns, and even one tribe that bore the mummified body of a goddess child. Whenever Goldtusk would come across another tribe, arrows flew, spears thrust, and often lives were lost.
"If they find me, they'll know I'm a stranger," Laira said through chattering teeth. "They'll kill me or worse—capture me to be their slave. They will not heal me."
But . . . they could heal her.
The thought filled her with both hope and fear—hope for finding others like her, fear that others were only a myth. Perhaps in all the world, Mother had been the only other weredragon. Perhaps Laira was the last.
"But if that's true, let me die in the wilderness."
She shoved her frozen hands under her armpits and hopped around for warmth. She considered donning her wet cloak but decided it would only chill her further. After a moment's hesitation, she lay down and rolled around in the mud along the riverbank, then in piles of dry leaves. When she rose again, she wore a garment of the forest. It was an ugly thing, but it would keep her warm and provide some camouflage. She lifted a fallen branch, slung her wet fur upon it, and carried the bundle over her shoulder. She kept limping through the forest, heading north, her burnt feet aching with every step. Despite the pain, she dared not fly. Here under the canopy she was hidden; in the open air, she would be seen for marks around.
Today she heard no rocs; perhaps they had abandoned the search or were searching too far away. As she walked and the sun rose, some of her chill left her, and a new discomfort arose—hunger.
"If it's not the rocs, my wounds, or the cold, hunger can still kill me," she said to herself and looked around, determined to find a meal.
She saw no more mushrooms, no pine cones, no berries. The canopy was thicker here than farther south, letting in less light; less grass, brambles, and reeds grew from the forest floor. That floor was a crunching carpet of dry leaves, fallen boles, and mossy boulders. Mist floated between the trunks and birds called above, too far to grab. If she still had her bow, Laira could have tried to hunt them, but now they were morsels beyond her reach.
She lifted a fallen branch and spent a while sharpening it against a shard of flint, forming a crude spear. It was noon when she finally saw a rabbit, tossed her spear, and missed. The animal fled into the distance. Her belly growled, and she thought it would soon stick to her back. Thirst dried her mouth. She had left the stream behind, for it traveled west while she moved north, seeking the fabled escarpment.
When it began to rain, she was thankful for the water—she drank some off flat leaves—but it made her colder. The downpour washed off her garment of mud and leaves, and strands of her hair hung over her eyes. At least the rain brought out some worms. She managed to catch three. She stuffed them into her mouth, chewed, and swallowed before her disgust could overwhelm her.
Resigned to being wet, she dressed in her drenched tunic and cloak. The rat fur clung to her, clammy and still foul; she doubted the smell would ever leave it. The rain kept pouring, and her spirits dampened with it. She could not stop shivering, but still she walked on.
It was afternoon and her belly was rumbling when she finally saw the bush of blueberries. Her mouth watered. The rain was finally easing up and a real meal waited ahead.
"A little gift of hope," she whispered.
Swaying with weakness, she walked toward the berries, already tasting the healing sweetness.
A growl rose.
Laira was only steps away when the bear emerged from behind the trees.
Shaggy and black, the beast placed itself between her and the berries, rose upon its back feet, and roared.
Laira froze.
She held only her pointed stick as a weapon. She was a small, scrawny thing, barely larger than a child. Before her bellowed an animal that could slay her with a single swipe of its claws.
Stand still, Laira, she thought. If you flee, he'll see you as prey. He'll chase. Stand your ground.
The bear fell back to all four paws, snorted, and turned toward the berries. It began to eat.
Laira found herself growling. Hunger and weakness gave her the courage she'd normally lack. That was her meal. Three worms were not enough. Without these berries, she could die.
Pointed stick raised, she took a step closer to the berries. Maw stained blue, the bear turned back toward her and growled.
"Away!" Laira waved her stick and bared her teeth. "Go, go! My berries!"
It reared again, several times her size, and lashed its claws. Laira leaped back, waving her stick.
"Go! Go!"
It swiped at her again, and she stepped backward, tripped over a root, and fell into the dry leaves.
The bear drove down to bite.
Laira winced, reached down deep inside her, and grabbed her magic.
The bear's fangs slammed against her scales.
Wings grew from her back, pushing her up. Her own fangs sprouted. Her tail whipped, cracking a tree, and her face lengthened into a snout. With hunger and fear, she lashed her hand—only it was no longer a hand but a dragon's foot, clawed and scaled. It slammed into the bear, knocking the small animal down; the beast now seemed smaller than a cub. Laira leaned down and bit deep, tearing through fur, ripping off flesh, tasting hot blood and sweet meat, and she knew nothing but her hunger and craving and the heat of the meal. She feasted.
She ate the bear down to the bones.
When her meal was done, she lay on her scaly back, smoke pluming from her nostrils. She was no longer hungry. She was no longer cold. Her wounds—agonizing to her human form—seemed like mere scratches now.
"I can lie like this for a while," she said softly. She was surprised to hear that her voice, even in dragon form, was the same. "I haven't heard rocs since this morning. I will lie a while and digest."
She wouldn't even consider returning to her human form with an entire bear in her belly. That could not end well.
Her furs were gone. She had taken them inside her when shifting, and yet her pointed stick lay beside her. She wondered why clothes could shift with her—they had reappeared last time she had returned to human form—and not the stick.
"If I ever do find others, maybe they'll know how the magic works."
She tilted her head, scales clanking. Magic? For so long, she had thought this a curse, a reptilian disease. Yet lying here, her belly full and warm, it was hard to think of shifting as a curse.
"Maybe it's a gift," she said to the rustling autumn
leaves above. "And maybe others like me are out there, alone and afraid. I have to find them."
As she lay digesting, she thought she heard a roc once, but it was distant, possibly only a crow. When the sun set, Laira rose to her clawed feet. Her body pressed against the trees, and fire sparked in her maw, raising smoke.
Tonight she would not sleep in a hole, small and afraid and hurt. Tonight she would fly.
She crashed through the canopy, showering autumn leaves, and into the sky. The stars spread above her, an endless carpet. The Draco constellation shone above, brightest among them, cold and distant but warming her soul. She beat her wings, bending trees and scattering leaves below. For so many years, she had felt weak, miserable, and worthless.
"But now, in this night, I am a dragon."
She clawed the air and flew north, gliding on the wind.
ISSARI
When Issari returned to her bedchamber, she found the witch waiting inside with a bucket of leeches.
"Hello, princess," said the crone, hissing out that last word like a taunt. She smiled, revealing toothless black gums, and sniffed loudly. Her bulbous nose quivered, the hairs on its moles twitching. "Yes, yes, I can smell it. Smells like ripe fruit." She smacked her lips. "The blood of a princess—a more powerful elixir than the ichor of gods."
Issari stood at the doorway. Instinctively, she pulled out her amulet and held it before her. "Leave this place!" Her heart pounded, and cold sweat trickled down her back. "You are not to enter my chambers again, old woman."
The crone cackled—Shedah was her name, Issari remembered. "Your amulet cannot work on me, sweetling. I have no demon blood. Old I am, and ugly I must appear to you. Yes, you are young and fresh and delectable." She licked her lips, reached into her bucket, and plucked out a squirming leech. "Yet I am no barbarous brute. I crave not your high breasts, your soft skin, or the warmth between your thighs. I seek a greater prize—the blood of a princess for my potions."
Requiem's Song (Book 1) Page 16