Breath of Dragons (A Pandoran Novel)

by Barbara Kloss

  Ambrose. I'd never trusted him, but apparently my mom had. If Eris was telling the truth. "The headmaster of the Mages Guild?" I asked, unable to hide my surprise. Alex's hand shifted in mine, and I squeezed it harder.

  "The very same," Eris said. "Though I've tried, ah, persuading him to lift it, he resists. However, I do believe I've found the solution without his aid."

  I wondered why Eris had bothered telling me all of this, but then realized it was because he was certain of his victory.

  "You stand there accusing the king of using me for his purpose, but you're doing the exact same thing," I snapped.

  "There is no reason to be angry with me, dear niece." His movements were so easy, so friendly.

  "I am not angry with you; I hate you," I said. "And quit calling me your damn niece."

  He looked amused. "Whether you choose to acknowledge it or not, you and I are blood."

  My hands clenched into fists. "That means nothing."

  "On the contrary, it means a great deal. It is, perhaps, the single great gift of being a Regius. We may not possess the proper inheritance to the throne, yet we've been given the means of attaining it."

  "You already were a prince! But you threw it all away like some spoiled child because it wasn't enough for you. Because you were jealous of the man my father was." A shadow crossed over his face, and I knew that I had struck a nerve. "That's it, isn't it? Everyone loved you, but my father was better and you couldn't stand to be in his shadow. You couldn't stand to be second."

  Eris vanished in a cloud of black and materialized right before me, grabbing me by the throat and jerking me to my feet with unnatural strength. I coughed and choked and clawed at his grip to no avail, while his cold blue eyes bore into mine. His expression was full of pure hatred. "Don't talk to me of the past." Eris's voice was as cold as death. Then he released my throat and threw me away from him. I rammed into the wall behind Alex and slid to the ground. My body ached and my throat throbbed as I coughed, crawling upon all fours, trying to catch the breath that had been knocked right out of me.

  "I'm going to tell you a little story." Eris's eyes pinned me in place.

  Before Eris said another word, I knew I didn't want to hear what he was going to say. I knew it would change the way I saw the world forever, and I wasn't sure I wanted to live with a new perspective. The reasons I knew this, I'll never truly understand. Perhaps it was a truth buried deep inside of me, like he'd alluded to. Or perhaps it was some intuition of mine that I'd chosen to keep suppressed. Whatever it was, when his words came, I found that I could no longer hide from that truth. That truth would forever chase me until I faced it, and it would be nipping at my heels all along the way.

  "The great and magnanimous King Darius," Eris continued in a large and sweeping tone. "How quickly the world forgot all the men and women slaughtered by his supreme command. How quickly the world forgot the cities destroyed, people and livestock burnt alive, their villages reduced to ash. Fire is his strength and he used it then to conquer. No one would stand against him, and those who tried he left their ashes as an example. The people of Gaia called him the dragon lord. The heir of Draconi, returned at last." He said this last bit in mockery.

  I wanted him to stop. I didn't want to hear any more because I was afraid. It was so much easier to make decisions when the world was black and white, but he was painting my world all in gray.

  "I was a boy when the home of the Pandors burnt to the ground," Eris continued. "They would not bow to this usurper. You see, having reign over mainland simply was not enough for him. I was a boy when your mother was brought over the Black Sea in a slave ship. Have you ever seen one of our slave ships, dear niece?"

  I crawled my way back to Alex.

  "Allow me to enlighten you," Eris continued. "Those citizens not fortunate enough to be murdered at the hands of your grandfather were gathered like cattle and crammed into the ships' bellies. The journey itself took almost one month, though King Darius can hardly account for that. There was simply no wind, and there was no one to call upon it back then." Here he paused.

  Once I reached Alex, I pressed my ear to his chest. His heart was beating, but it was faint.

  "The prisoners were packed so tightly," Eris continued, "that they were in each others' laps. Hands and ankles bound with ropes, tied to support beams. In the ever-rocking motion of the boat, in dark quarters, there was nowhere for refuse but the floor. Inches deep in sewage, and when they grew ill—which you can imagine they did—their sickness would mix with all other bodily fluids. The smell was deadly, I assure you. Some of the crew were ordered to carve extra holes in the hull for drainage, but even they were often clogged with excrement."

  "That's enough…I don't want to hear any more," I said.

  "Your mother was down there with her people." His voice was a whisper. "Do you know what crew members did to women when they grew bored at sea?" He paused—there was so much anger in his voice. "Do you?"

  It was at this point in his story that I looked up from Alex. I wanted to believe Eris was lying, but looking at him, I knew that he wasn't. He was many terrible, terrible things, but he was not lying. Not about this.

  When Eris continued, he spoke through clenched teeth. "No, I don't suppose anyone has ever told you that story. About how your mother was bruised and dying when Alaric first saw her. She had suffered great internal bleeding."

  "Stop it!" I screamed. "I don't want to hear any more!" I shut my eyes, trying to mute the words, but they would not be silenced.

  "One of the key components to ruling is understanding that there are two sides, Daria Pandor Regius. There are always two. To act on only one is short-sighted; the second will never hesitate to expose you, and you will be running from it for the rest of your life."

  My next breath trembled. "King Darius may have done wrong in the past, but it is his wrong. Not mine. I will not help you rectify his wrongs with more evil."

  "Evil?" He frowned. "How is justice evil? Does he not deserve to pay for what he has done?" And then he waved his hand at the air. "I do not need to discuss my reasoning with you. Suffice it to say that you don't have much choice in the matter." He looked pointedly at Alex. "I need your help and you need your Aegis's life. You would make out quite well in this arrangement. I would ensure that you held on to your title and in that, you might find you have more power than you currently hold. You can make this easy, or very painful. It is your choice."

  Choice.

  All I'd ever wanted was the freedom to choose, and ever since I'd taken that freedom, I'd hated almost every choice I'd had to make. Alex suddenly coughed, then gasped my name. It was a voice of clarity, and it gave me a sudden wisp of courage. Very slowly, I stood tall, facing Eris directly, my fists at my sides. "I will not help you."

  Eris studied me blankly, thin lips turned down. "I will only offer this choice once."

  "This isn't choice," I spat. "You are threatening to destroy everything I hold dear if I don't do exactly what you want. You abhor your father's tyranny, yet you are no better. Power is never enough for you—this entire world would never be enough for you because you hope to use it to hide the pathetic and weak man inside. All the power in the world won't make you half the man my father was, and I hope the memory of his greatness haunts you for the rest of your life. You aren't man enough to earn respect like my father did, so instead you resort to bullying people into giving it. And for that I say you're a coward, just like King Darius."

  Eris's control flickered. Flashes of the monster inside broke through, distorting his face in a way that was horrifying and demonic. Then he extended his arms and a blast of hot air seared through space, landing on Alex. Alex cried out, his body jerking and spasming on the ground, and pain exploded in my body, from him.

  I dropped beside Alex. "Stop it!" I yelled. "Leave him alone! He's done nothing…"

  Alex had curled in a ball, heaving. He grabbed my ankle weakly, gasping. "Daria…don't…"

  His body jerked b
ack again, much more violently, and this time he couldn't hold back the scream.

  "Stop! Please, stop it!" I cried, tears streaming freely down my face as I was acutely aware of the life draining from Alex's body. "You're killing him!"

  But Eris was not stopping. He was going to stand there and drain every ounce of life from Alex if that was what it took to convince me. Oh, I could not take this anymore! "Fine!" I screamed. "I'll come…just stop…" I collapsed beside Alex, sobbing. "Please…stop…" Alex's eyes were shut, his skin ashen, and I might have thought him dead if it wasn't for his faint heartbeat.

  But Eris had stopped.

  I hated him. I hated him with a passion that trumped any emotion I'd ever felt in all my life. Eris had won this day. Eris had forced me into his hands against my will by harming the man I loved more than anything. But so help me with Gaia as my witness, I would wait patiently until the time was right, and then I would kill him.

  "It is time." Eris's tone was cold.

  "Take the poison out of his body," I demanded, my hand still on Alex's deathly cold forehead.

  "His life will be in the hands of Gesh's healers, but he will not die," Eris replied flatly.

  "Then send him back now so he can get help!"

  "You do not command me." Eris's expression was like stone. "I can be merciful, dear niece, and I hope that in time you will understand and value my discretion."

  I bit back my cutting remarks. I bit back my hatred and disdain. Today wasn't the day, but my day would come. It would come with the fury of Hell behind it.

  I bent over and kissed Alex lightly on the lips. They were cold, so cold. "Alex, I'm…" I touched his hair. "I'm so, so sorry," I whispered. "I love you."

  "Daria." Eris's impatience was acutely felt.

  I stood, my knees shaking beneath me, and with a shallow breath I dragged my legs forward. I couldn't believe I'd been so easily reduced to this—doing exactly what I had been fighting so hard to avoid. I was walking away from everything that mattered, everyone I loved, and everything I had been fighting for. I was betraying myself. But I suddenly understood my father's sacrifice. What I wouldn't do to save Alex's life.

  "Daria, get down!"

  It was sometime during my unusually slow fall to the ground that the voice registered as Vera's. Shocked, I glanced back, and there she was, standing there with a bow in her hands. The arrow was drawn, her eyes narrowed down the shaft—at Eris. With a quick snap, she released. Eris's eyes widened just before he evaporated into a column of smoke, and the arrow sank with a snick into a wall of vines right behind where he'd been standing.

  Vera cursed behind me.

  I was so happy to see her I could've thrown my arms around her and kissed her. And then Mercedes suddenly appeared, followed by Hawk and a whole slew of guards from Mosaque. In fact, I would've gladly kissed all of them. Mercedes glanced at me but just enough to note Alex's and my position, and then her gaze swept the cathedral as she yelled something in Saqai. Eris had materialized farther away and more guards began to emerge from the shadows—more Mortis followers.

  And then there was chaos.

  Shouts and cries, the clatter of metal and the thud of impact reverberating in the nave of the huge cathedral. I scrambled back to Alex, shoved my hands beneath his arms and started dragging him back and out of the way. He was so heavy! I grunted and strained with every pull, being forced to stop intermittently to ward off a guard or duck as an arrow whizzed by. Magic bounced inside the chamber, scorching everything in its path as if someone had set off the Fourth of July finale inside of the cathedral. Debris crumbled from the ceiling, and I draped myself protectively on top of Alex until the dust settled before moving him along.

  A wet gurgle sounded right behind me, and I turned just in time to see the tip of a blade poking out from the neck of a guard, blood spluttering everywhere as he choked. Bile rose in my throat as he slumped to the ground, and then I noticed Vera standing a little behind him. I met her gaze; her expression was grim and then she went back to fighting. I pulled Alex forward, trying not to dwell on the fact that his skin was beginning to look a little translucent and that his lips were turning purple. There had to be something I could hide him behind. Somewhere out of the line of fire. And then my eyes settled on a newly broken column, compliments of the indoor fireworks.

  I dragged and grunted and jerked and pulled and said words I'd never said before, but somehow they helped me find the strength to get him there. Once he was safely behind the huge chunk of marble, I gasped to catch my breath while squeezing his shoulders. "Alex!" I grabbed his face in my hands. "Alex, can you hear me?" His face was cold as death. "Don't you dare leave me!"

  I peered around the column and desperation set in. Anyone who might be able to help him was much too busy, and we were completely outnumbered. And as I watched that hopeless battle, time decided to assert itself like it was so inclined to do, and everything suddenly progressed with the speed of molasses.

  Vera stood, swords raised, facing enemy guards, the side of her face smeared with blood. I didn't know if it was hers. But there was one guard behind her—one guard bringing an axe down upon her head. Hawk stood in a corner near her, like Tarzan defending his Jane. There were a few Mosaquian guards engaged in battle, but many more had fallen. Hawk spun just in time to see Vera's plight, and even in the stillness of time I could see the dawning realization in his gaze: Vera would not survive the blow and he could not reach her in time. He could never stop the axe from bearing down upon her head.

  Horror bubbled in my gut, as well as something else, some power that filled my entire body, and I was shaking uncontrollably, like my skin was a dam holding back a raging sea. And then it burst forth, flooding down my arms and through my fingertips, a hot vortex of steam, ripping across the floor and heading straight for the guard. It slid right through Vera without effect, but when it hit the guard, it ignited in a blanket of flame, wrapping itself around him. The guarded screamed as he caught fire, and within seconds he'd turned into a pile of ash. His axe clattered upon the floor on top of the ash pile.

  Vera stood pale as a ghost. All fighting ceased and Eris stood still as a pillar. And in their hesitation, I redirected all of my fury toward Eris.

  He vanished just in time, fire licking at the tiles beneath his feet, twisting and curling in the air like orange snakes. But my fire did not go away. It seemed to have grown a mind of its own, guided by the wind, and it was jumping from guard to guard, quickly setting them aflame. They ran and screamed, frantic to put out the fires, as the air filled with the scent of ash and burnt flesh.

  I swallowed the bile back down. I had…I had killed a man, and quite possibly more than just one. With magic. I didn't have any more time to consider this, because Vera appeared. She stood over me and when she saw Alex, she paled.

  I pulled my heavy thoughts from the burning men. "Eris poisoned him with dragon's bane. I gave him some of the tonic from his bag, but it's done nothing. Can you do anything for him?"

  But I already knew the answer. I'd seen the fear well in her eyes the moment I'd said the words "dragon's bane."

  "Veranna!" It was Hawk. He shoved off a couple enemy guards and towered over us. He looked at Alex, and I could tell that Hawk didn't think Alex was going to make it.

  "Hawk, it's dragon's bane. Is there anything you can do?" I asked.

  "No time." His lips tightened. "The portal is open."

  I blinked in surprise. "It is? Good, because we need to get Alex to a healer…"

  Hawk shook his head. "You must hurry."

  I exchanged a glance with Vera, and we were both bending over to pick up Alex when Hawk swept Alex in his arms and threw him over his shoulder.

  Okay. That worked, too.

  "Thees way!" he yelled and charged right into the cluster of fighting.

  There was a faint shimmer near one of the walls, like some kind of celestial door, and Vera and I ran ahead of Hawk and Alex to help clear the path. I fought with one sight in mind—t
hat shimmering window. Nothing else mattered except getting Alex through that window, to Gesh. Then he might actually have a chance. I didn't know how they'd opened the portal, but they had. It was the only bit of hope I had left.

  I thought I heard Mercedes yell something—good luck? Vera and I worked together wordlessly, pushing the remaining guards back. And when we reached the shimmering window, Hawk threw Alex through it, and Vera and I jumped through after.

  And I kept falling…and falling…

  Part Three:

  Pendel

  "By blood, an oath; with blood, defamed.

  A breath, restored; the promise, reclaimed."

  ~ Excerpt from Songs of the Bards,

  volume XIX.

  Stefan

  In my opinion, the northern wall was a symbol of man's arrogance. Gaia had created a world with natural boundaries of mountain and chasm, great lakes and forests, but man had decided he didn't agree with those boundaries, thus creating one of his own.

  It had been built in an attempt to separate the Icelands from the mainland, divide winter from mankind, and keep out the vile creatures that had dwelled there ever since the Great War from Galahad's time. The mystical realms of the Icelands had become a refuge for the dark, a sanctuary for evil, where even the code and decrees of my grandfather could not reach.

  We did not know what evils brewed behind the wall, nor did we care. The wall was a great and magnificent structure that reached toward the heavens and spread in either direction like some invincible shield against Mortis himself. Nothing could ever pass through without our sanction. We had built this, and it was our pride.

  No, we did not care what lurked behind it.

  For centuries, the men and women of Alioth patrolled this triumph of mankind. There were nine watchtowers all along the perimeter, though only three of them had gates. Men like to build walls. Men like to place perimeters around all they hold dear so that they may dictate who, or what, passes through. It gives them a sense of control—a sense of power. They show only what they want others to see and hide all the rest behind walls of insecurity.