Embers at Galdrilene

by Audra Trosper

  He looked over the boy’s head at a tall, lanky old man with white fly away hair and bushy eyebrows of the same color. The man smiled and Kellinar smiled back before returning his attention to Loki.

  “I’ve been staying at the Universarary,” Loki said.

  The old man spoke, “You mean University. And you are not just staying there; you should be learning as well.”

  Loki scowled at the man and Kellinar asked, “You aren’t learning?”

  “He has refused to do anything until he was allowed to come see you,” the old man said.

  “They wasn’t letting me come and see you. So I told them I wasn’t learning nothing until they did. And I meant it Headmaster Po. You see now that I did, don’t you?”

  Po looked at the boy and nodded. “How could I not see it? Especially when you took to trying to sneak away to see him?” He raised his eyes to Kellinar’s. “Even a junior Spirit mage had difficulties keeping track of him. He’s quite adept at disappearing.”

  “I was learning from Kellinar before we left Trilene. He’s the best. Ain’t nobody ever been able to catch Kellinar when he don’t want caught.”

  Kellinar laid his hand on Loki’s shoulder. “You should take advantage of the chance to learn.”

  “Oh I learned a couple of things. That Spirit mage, she taught me to write my name.”

  Po took a step closer. “I tried to tell him that you couldn’t be bothered for a while, but he would have none of it.”

  Kellinar looked up and met the old man’s eyes, feeling the weight and responsibility of his new position. “Loki is never a bother to me and may come to see me if he wishes.” Loki’s chest puffed out and he turned to give the Headmaster a triumphant look, but Kellinar spoke again, taking the growing wind out of his sails, “But, only if you are applying yourself to your studies. If you wish to see me, send Headmaster Po to me to discuss your studies. If they are going well and you are working hard at them, you will be allowed to visit me.”

  Loki looked down at the ground and mumbled, “Yes, Kellinar.”

  At one time, Kellinar wouldn’t have cared whether Loki learned book studies or not. Kellinar had chosen to learn them on his own and would only have taught Loki if the boy asked. But Galdrilene was a very different place than Trilene and his own place within it just as different. It would not do for a Dragon Rider to discourage learning in a society where it was considered above important.

  Loki looked up at him, his eyes bright in his face again. “Is it true you hatched a dragon? What did you name him?”

  Kellinar dropped his hand from Loki’s shoulder and smiled. “Yes, it’s true. His name is Shryden. Would you like to meet him?”

  “Oh, can I? It’s okay, ain’t it Headmaster? Can I, please?”

  Po nodded. “Of course you may, young man.”

  Kellinar led them across the wide stone terrace and down to the floor of the crater, sending a call to Shryden as they walked. The large blue draclet lumbered across the crater floor. Light from the setting sun rippled across his scales like blue fire.

  The draclet came to halt in front of them and Po offered a graceful bow. “I am honored to meet you, Shryden.”

  Shryden lowered his head to the boy, peering at him with ice blue eyes. Loki backed up a little. “He’s got some big teeth.”

  Shryden asked Kellinar, “This is the boy from your memories. The one you took under your wing and brought with you here, is he not?”

  “Yes, this is Loki. Although I would have to say he brought himself here.”

  “Then he is friend to me and I will help you watch over him.”

  Loki gasped, grabbing both sides of his head with his hands as he sank to his knees. Kellinar and Po were both reaching for him when he looked up at the dragon. “It’s nice to meet you too, but your voice is really loud. You shook my whole head on the inside.”

  Po’s eyebrows rose. Kellinar looked at Shryden in surprise, “You spoke directly to him?”

  “He means a great deal to you and so he means the same to me. I did not realize it would be so loud in his mind. Please apologize for me.”

  Kellinar looked back at Loki, who climbed to his feet with the help of Po. “Shryden wants me to pass along an apology to you. He says he didn’t know it would be so loud to you.”

  Po patted the boy on the shoulder. “It is a great honor to be spoken to directly by a dragon, although not a comfortable one. For those not called by the Dragon Song, the voice of a dragon is overwhelming so they usually talk through their riders.”

  Loki approached Shryden. “I’ll do just like Kellinar says and work really hard at the Uninversinty so I can come back and see you. Do you mind if I come to see you?”

  Kellinar smiled down at the boy. “He says he would very much like to see you again.”

  Po laid a hand on Loki’s shoulder and firmly steered him toward the Great Hall. “It’s time to go back to the University now Loki, so tomorrow you can rise early and put your words into action.”

  Kellinar stood with his arm looped over Shryden’s neck and watched them walk away.

  Sadira stood next to the large, four poster bed and glared at the dress the servant laid out for her. A deep green silk with skirts that fell in smooth layers, a beaded bodice and sleeves suitably full at the shoulders and narrowing down to the wrists. It was beautiful.

  She hated it. Made for one of her half-sisters, like all of her dresses, it was another reminder she wasn’t worth spending coin on.

  She grabbed the dress, stepped into it, pulled it up and stood still so the maid servant could button the dual rows of tiny seed buttons that ran up the back. When the maid left, she turned and looked at herself in the full-length stand mirror. Her hair, so deep a brown it was almost black, glistened in the light of the setting sun that poured through the tall windows of her chambers. Her equally dark eyes were framed by thick lashes. She smiled, admiring her features in the mirror.

  Her beauty far surpassed that of her half-sisters. All but one bore too much resemblance to their sow-like mother.

  Her smiled disappeared and she glared at her reflection. She should’ve been the one with suitors falling all over themselves. Not hoping some glorified squire would come save her from spinsterhood. She should’ve been the one planning a massive wedding to a powerful man with an equally large holding and a grand estate within the city of Markene itself. But her weak mother had died giving birth to her, leaving Sadira relegated to something less than royalty. Only the children of the king’s current wife could be heirs.

  Her stepmother, upon marrying her father, became immediately pregnant and birthed a baby every year for nine years like a brood mare. The first one, a girl, was born a mere ten months after Sadira. A wretched thing, so convinced of her own beauty and her own superiority until last year…when Sadira put an end to the taunts of her oldest half-sister.

  Oh, the panic that ran through Markene. Where was the oldest of the king’s daughters? They meant of course, the oldest daughter that counted. Her stepmother wept while her father tore apart Markene in his search for her. They never found her. Sadira smiled at her reflection in the mirror, relishing the memory.

  In the five centuries since the castle of Markene was built, it had been added on to many times with hidden passages built beneath the skirts of its stone walls. Even Sadira found a few ways out. Long, dark tunnels that led beyond the walls of the city itself, their crumbling exits to the world hidden by overgrown weeds and bushes. At one time, they were probably built as escape routes. Now they lay forgotten and discovered by none, save the young Sadira, who stumbled upon them in her lonely wanderings.

  Sadira had lacked enough status to play with her half-sisters, yet possessed too much to play with the servant children, so she’d spent her childhood alone. She didn’t regret this. For if not alone, had Sadira been off with playmates, she would never have found those tunnels. They’d served her so well the night she killed her eldest half-sister. No one heard the muffled pleading and
screams. None would find her rotting corpse.

  Sadira remembered it clearly.

  Deep in the tunnels beneath the palace her sister, Neria, lay in a crumpled heap, her sobs muffled by the gag in her mouth. Sadira watched dispassionately as tears coursed down Neria’s cheeks and the sobs turned to garbled pleading. Sadira ignored her and held the knife up, trying to decide the best way to begin. She’d never killed anyone before and she wanted the experience to last as long as possible.

  She stepped closer and Neria kicked out, striking her hard in the ankle and knocked her down. Anger surged through Sadira’s veins. As she picked herself up, Neria desperately tried to break loose from her bonds.

  Sadira seized her sister’s ankle and felt power surging through her body. Her sister’s eyes bulged. Neria thrashed, a high-pitched scream escaping past the gag. Sadira watched, mesmerized as dark, oily shadows flowed from her hands. They burrowed into Neria. Her skin boiled where they touched.

  After some thought, Sadira figured out how to draw the shadows back. She studied their effect on her sister. The skin was blackened and blistered. Neria trembled, her body racked by sobs. Ignoring her sister, Sadira spent some time working with the shadows. She was particularly pleased to find she could set them and tie them off. If she moved too far away, they dissolved. But as long as she stayed close…

  Reaching out again with the shadows, she carefully circled each of her sister’s wrists and each of her ankles. She cut the rope bonds with the knife. Sadira looked down at the weeping woman and smiled. “Now, dear Neria, you have a choice. You can hold really still while I practice on you with these shadows, or you can struggle. The bonds that now circle your wrists and ankles, will only sink into your skin if you struggle. When you stop struggling, they will retreat. Let us see how still you can be, shall we?”

  Under the torture of the shadows, Neria hadn’t been able to stay still. Sadira drew it out for as long as she could, but just before dawn, her sister had died. Even now, a year later, Sadira entertained herself with the memory of her sister’s screams.

  She’d spent the year practicing what happened by accident the night she murdered her sister. Now, she commanded the shadows as if they were an extension of her body.

  Sadira allowed the shadows to flow from her hands and they coiled about her head and neck like oily black snakes. Soon, she would use them, her pets, against her father. She would bend him to her will and take her place as the rightful heir. Not just a woman to marry off with a large dowry, oh no, Sadira was beyond that now. She wanted right of succession. Markene would have a queen and the old king would die by her hand. The remaining half-siblings and their cow of a mother would grovel at her feet, begging for mercy that wouldn’t come.

  Her heart raced as a thrill shot through her at the thought. They would pay. All of them would pay for relegating her to nothing more than an obscure baroness when she should have been princess. She called the shadows back and watched them disappear. Soon.

  The door to her chambers swung open as Drisa walked into the room. Her long, narrow face was dominated by her broad nose. Her thin eyebrows were drawn down in a severe scowl over muddy brown eyes set too close together.

  “Sadira, aren’t you ready yet?” Her shrill voice grated in Sadira’s ears. “Honestly, I don’t know why you even bother dressing up, it’s not like anyone is going to notice you. This is Kalila’s coming out ball. Goodness, even the servants at least have a reason for being there. You are just a useless waste of space at an engagement such as this.”

  She brushed past Sadira and looked at herself in the mirror, preening and smoothing her dingy blond hair. “Why father didn’t make arrangements for you a long time ago, I’ll never understand. You are pretty enough, even if you haven’t any worth. Surely there is an up and coming squire somewhere in the nation that would have you, but then perhaps not. Even they dream of wealth and power...and well, you aren’t going to help anyone gain that.”

  “What do you want, Drisa?”

  She turned and looked at Sadira, the scowl returning to her face. “Mother says you had better hurry. She is not about to delay Kalila’s coming out on the account of you.”

  Kalila poked her head into the room. “Drisa, stop. Sadira is our sister and should be treated as such. Leave her alone and come with me, mother needs you.”

  Sadira glanced at Kalila. Rich golden hair framed a heart shaped face. Kalila smiled at her and she saw sincerity in her sister’s deep blue eyes. She glared back. How dare this girl-woman be nice to her. Jealousy stung like a wasp. Her beauty matched Sadira’s and she had the station to go with it. She could have any man she wanted.

  Drisa snorted and rolled her eyes. “There is nothing wrong with the truth, Kalila.”

  Sadira watched as her sister flounced from the room. Soon, very soon.

  As she started to turn back to the mirror, another figure came through the doorway. This was no sister, or anyone else she knew. Cloaked in black, the figure flowed into the room like a shadow and came to a stop in front of her.

  She regarded it carefully. “Who are you and what do you want?”

  “I am Alden and I am here for you, magic user.”

  Sadira drew herself up, how could anyone know about her abilities? She’d kept the secret close to her heart. A small thread of fear wormed its way through her body. If she was found out, unless she could get away, she would die. Even if she got away, becoming queen of Markene was out of the question. Whoever this Alden was, she would have to kill him.

  Oily shadows rolled off her hands and coiled about the cloaked figure, seeking beneath the material for the skin below. But instead of sinking into skin and making it boil and rot from the inside out, instead of flowing into a mouth to muffle the screams that should have issued forth, the shadows simply melted away.

  Who was this that her magic could not affect? A sheen of cold sweat broke out on her brow.

  “You are not the only one, dear Sadira, who can use magic. You are nothing more than a fumbling infant to me, child. But you could be more,” Alden said.

  “I will be more, I will be queen of Markene,” she said firmly, hoping the shock and fear of her shadows melting away didn’t show on her face.

  “Queen of Markene?” Alden’s tone turned mocking as he flowed farther into the room. “Is that as high as you can reach, child? Can you think no further than the boundaries of your pathetic little nation? Come now, surely you can dream beyond the horizon you can see.”

  Sadira hesitated, uncertain of this Alden’s intent. “What do you mean?”

  The shadowed face seemed to smile. “If truly you want nothing more than to become queen of this place, then I will leave you to your wishes. But I can offer you much more than that. I can offer you the world and power such as you have never imagined.”

  “What do I have to do?” she asked, wary of the offer and yet pulled by the temptation of it.

  “Come with me, of your own free will, sister killer.”

  She gasped. “How do you know about that?”

  He moved closer to her “I know a great many things child, and I hold the key to longevity of life and ultimate power.”

  “What power do you speak of?”

  “Dragons! Black as the deepest night.”

  Sadira shook her head in disgust. For a moment, she’d thought the offer was real. “There are no dragons anymore.”

  “On the contrary, there is a black egg just waiting for the right person to lay a hand on it. Waiting for someone willing, and strong enough, to make the sacrifice to hatch it. Are you her? Can you imagine what you could do with a dragon at your command? Do you still wish to be ruler of this one silly nation or do you wish to have the world bowing at your feet and praying for your mercy?”

  She eyed him sideways. “All I have to do is come with you?”

  “Of your own free will, yes.” He extended a hand that was nothing more than bones with skin like gray parchment stretched over them. “Take my hand and I will s
how you power. I will lead the way to a greater destiny, one that dwarfs the powers of a mere queen.”

  Had her magic driven her insane already? Was she imagining all of this? All at once, she didn’t care. She reached out and grasped the hand.

  The world around Sadira stretched, pulling farther and farther until, like a spring pulled too far, it snapped. Darkness enveloped her. Only the crushing grip of the cold, bony hand on hers let her know she was still connected to the world in some way.

  Then the darkness was gone and she stood in the middle of a vast desert. The rim of a wide, deep canyon lay at her feet. In the west, storm clouds boiled while a sullen sun sat heavy on the horizon. Molten red, it glared from beneath the black clouds like a baleful eye. In the east a full moon rose into a darkening sky, its face cast in pale red as it reflected the light of the sun.

  Around the edge of the canyon, a sparse forest of towering black rocks rose up, their jagged tops like broken teeth against the fading red light. Shadows shrouded the canyon below. In the distance to the south, the canyon floor rose to meet the desert. To the north, it ended in a vertical wall and the open maw of an immense cavern. Above the cavern’s mouth, a mountain reared up out of the desert floor.

  A hot wind blew the layered skirts of her dress around her legs. Sweat beaded on her forehead and dried immediately. She had been taken far from her home by a skeletal man who could use magic, yet she felt no fear. Perhaps she was already insane.

  If she was, she didn’t care. She looked at the cloaked figure next to her. “Where have you brought me?”

  “The Shadderack Desert. This is Kormai, home of the black dragons.”

  “I thought they were all gone.”

  “All but the eggs,” he said.

  “How many eggs?” she asked.

  Alden looked at her. “Eight.”

  “So there are going to be others coming to hatch the other eggs.” She wasn’t sure she liked that.