Chapter 4 Zephyros
Zephyros
Heratrix approaches, each step a calculated dance of power and grace. Zephyros's muscles grow tight, a low rumble building in his chest. The scar over his right eye pulls tight as he narrows his gaze.
—You dare approach me now? His thoughts crash against her consciousness like storm waves. A thousand years of silence, and now you expect... what? Joyful reunion? Forgiveness?
She stops, her massive form casting shadows across the clearing. The emptiness inside Zephyros's mind where memories of her should exist burns like an open wound.
—My memories of you are gone. He digs his obsidian claws into the earth. Stolen. And who else could reach into a dragon's mind and carve such large pieces away? Only you.
She makes no denial. Her scales shimmer as she breathes, waiting.
—Our offspring died. Our kind dwindled to near extinction. Where were you? Each question feels ripped from his very soul. What could possibly justify abandoning us all?
Behind Heratrix, Rhealyn stands watching, concern etched across her face. The sight of his little one strengthens his resolve.
—I chose her, Zephyros hisses, found solace in her, and you took her from me and hid her beneath a mountain.
Heratrix's eyes hold sorrows deeper than oceans, but Zephyros turns away. No explanation could heal this rift carved by centuries of abandonment.
Slowly, her voice flows like warm honey into his mind. —My absence was not my doing, Zephyros, and neither is the gap in your memories.
The sound of her breaks something open inside him, a crack in time-worn walls he's built around himself. He wants to resist, to maintain his justified fury, but her presence pulls at something primal within him, an echo of things forgotten.
—But it would take too long to explain with words, she adds.
Before he can snarl a retort, she pushes against his consciousness, asking for permission.
Unable to help himself, his barrier opens, though only enough to let her flood his mind, though not with words, but with the dragon-tongue.
Images and feelings cascade through him.
He staggers under the onslaught, a growl catching in his throat.
His eyes widen as lost knowledge returns like a tide.
The memories unfold with savage clarity.
A silver egg cracks, web-like fissures spreading across its gleaming surface. Anticipation surges through his bones as the fledgling within struggles free of its prison.
But this... this is not right. The creature emerging is not male.
Female. A female dragon. Impossible. Unthinkable.
Heratrix rejoices, and her magnificent form curls protectively around the dark-scaled tiny hatchling. And beside her stands Fragor, his chest expanding with paternal pride. Father to a female dragon, the first in an age.
Zephyros's own memories intervene, fracturing what Heratrix shows him into bloody chaos, events that transpired after this new female hatched.
He shows her his own offspring, helpless that day land dragons swarmed the nesting grounds.
His wings beat frantically as he fought, claws tearing through scaled flesh, roars splitting the sky, all while Fragor flew away to fetch help, he claimed. Help that never arrived.
The memory shifts back to what Heratrix wants to show him.
Vestra. That's the female hatchling's name. She grows, her scales remaining dark—neither silver like Fragor's nor shimmering with rainbow hues like her mother's. They're pitch black, in fact. An oddity, yet treasured all the more for it.
He watches through borrowed eyes as the dragons gather in secret counsel, their massive forms creating a living fortress around the small female. Vestra remains hidden from human eyes, guarded zealously in the deepest mountain caverns where no rider would dare venture.
She grows stronger with each passing season. First fire springs from her maw, then water flows at her command. Earth trembles beneath her claws, and wind bends to her will. Like Heratrix, she wields all elements, a true daughter of the Queen.
Hope kindles among the dragons, a dangerous, fragile thing. With another female among them, perhaps their numbers might flourish even more. Perhaps, one day, they need not be bound to human riders to have true power.
Vestra becomes an adolescent, her midnight scales as sharp as her claws and fangs, but the young female dragon becomes something unexpected.
Not the savior the dragons hoped for, but a churning storm of resentment.
Her eyes flash with defiance as she rears up against her mother's gentle corrections.
—Why must I remain hidden? The land dragons fear nothing! Vestra's voice echoes through the shared memory, each word dripping with contempt. You would have me cower in shadows while they breed without restraint.
She becomes wilder with every passing year, more uncontrollable.
She demands a rider, craving the power boost that comes from bonding with humans, even though she's already as powerful as her mother.
When denied, her tantrums shake the mountain caverns, stalactites crashing down around cowering elders.
—You are not my keeper! she screams at Heratrix during one of their vicious confrontations. You are my jailer!
Fragor attempts intervention, but Vestra's hatred only intensifies, her eyes filled with something beyond mere rebellion.
This was no simple adolescent defiance, Zephyros realizes with growing dread. Something twisted lives inside her, something evil.
The scene changes to mother and daughter soaring above the Flametop Mountains, their shadows racing across jagged peaks that have sheltered Vestra since her hatching.
The black dragon's wings stretch wide, reveling in this rare freedom.
Heratrix watches her offspring with cautious pride, hoping this hunt might soothe the rage that burns eternally in her daughter's heart.
But something itches at the back of Heratrix's mind. She continues flying, barely aware at first, then her wingbeats falter. A voice whispers through her consciousness. Soft like the lick of a tongue.
—You are weak. You have always been weak. The voice is barely discernible from her own thoughts at first. The Dragon Queen shakes her head, trying to clear it, but the whispers continue, compelling and insidious.
—You failed our kind. Failed your daughter.
Horror dawns as she understands. Her daughter is attacking her, though not with fang or claw but with her mind.
Vestra circles closer, her black eyes gleaming with unnatural focus.
Their minds remain connected as hunting pairs sometimes are, but the connection has become a weapon.
The violation is worse than any physical wound.
—Vestra could rule better than I ever did. The whispers dig deeper, scraping against Heratrix's innermost thoughts.
—What are you doing? Heratrix's voice thunders.
The black dragon's response is a mental assault that intensifies like a gathering storm. Vestra's midnight scales gleam with unnatural energy, her obsidian eyes reflecting nothing but cold calculation.
—Taking what's mine, Vestra hisses, her mental talons digging deeper.
Heratrix thrashes in flight, wings faltering as she attempts to push the invading consciousness from her mind. Once, twice, three times she rallies her strength against the violation. Each attempt weaker than the last.
By all the stars, the little black serpent is too strong. Zephyros feels rage build within his chest as he witnesses this betrayal. The arrogance, the entitlement of this hatchling. His growl rattles the ground beneath him in the present as the memory continues to unfold.
—The rocks below look welcoming, don't they? Vestra's voice drips with false sweetness. So jagged and sharp. Fly down to them. End this pathetic reign of yours.
Panic swells as Heratrix's massive form begins to angle downward, her wings folding slightly as the mountain's cruel peaks rise to meet her.
The compulsion wraps around her thoughts like iron chains.
But something snaps inside the Dragon Queen, a fierce instinct for survival.
Her wings suddenly extend, catching an updraft that carries her away from certain death.
—No! she roars, both mental and physical voices merging into a wall of sound.
Desperately, she tries to reach her daughter, to take hold of her, subdue her, stop this madness before it consumes them both.
But Vestra is nimble, darting just beyond her mother's reach, maintaining the perfect distance to continue her mental assault while avoiding a physical confrontation she could never win.
Exhaustion seeps into Heratrix's limbs as she focuses solely on defense, constructing mental barriers that crumble almost as quickly as she can erect them. Her breaths come in labored gasps, and her magnificent scales dull with each passing moment.
The realization strikes with savagery. If she continues this way, death is inevitable. She would sacrifice for Vestra, but there are so many more she needs to care for. The entirety of the sky-dragon kind depends on her.
—Forgive me, daughter, she whispers.
Then her mind transforms from prey to predator. The Queen's consciousness expands, gathering centuries of power that had seemed dormant until this moment of desperate need.
She strikes back ruthlessly, her mental assault like lightning through a clear sky. The counterattack catches Vestra unprepared, her arrogance having blinded her to her mother's true capabilities.
A roar tears through the landscape, a sound of pure rage rather than pain. Vestra's black form tumbles through the air, momentarily disoriented by the force of her mother's mental blow. She never expected resistance. Like all tyrants, she mistook kindness for weakness.
Wings snap open as Vestra recovers, her body arcing through the sky with serpentine grace. She rallies fast, as strong as her mother.