Chapter 10 #3
The possessive thought startles me even as it forms. Cannot be mine. Yet something primal and undeniable has taken root in my chest, a fierce protectiveness that defies logic and centuries of hatred between our kinds.
"You are right," I concede finally, the words rough with suppressed fury. "We need distance between us and this place."
Relief flickers across her features, her shoulders dropping fractionally with the release of tension.
Only now do I notice how she holds herself, back straight despite the exhaustion evident in every line of her body.
Pride swells within me at her strength. Most humans would have broken under what she endured.
Most would be weeping, hysterical, unable to function.
Yet here she stands, thinking clearly, making decisions that prioritize survival over sentiment.
She releases my arm but stays close as we continue down the tunnel, away from the chamber of her suffering.
The passage stretches onward, each bend and fork identical to the last as we move farther away from the TrueCoils’ labyrinth.
I recognize the signs of desertion. The keh’shalin grows thinner with every dozen yards, starved of the collective essence that feeds them.
No naga have traveled these forgotten paths in decades.
The sentient glow recedes until darkness presses against us like a physical weight; the radiance is nothing more than scattered pinpricks against the stone, stars drowning in an ocean of shadow.
I halt, and Serin stops immediately beside me.
"We need a different light source," I explain, my voice low.
I unsling the pack and reach inside, fingers closing around the cool, crystalline surface of the heartglass.
It feels both smooth and subtly textured beneath my palm, like water frozen at the exact moment of rippling.
At my touch, it warms in quiet recognition, and beneath the surface, a molten core begins to churn slowly.
Fluid and alive, sapphire and emerald light drift within it like smoke suspended in liquid.
"What is that?" Serin asks, leaning closer to examine the translucent crystal in my hand.
"Heartglass," I reply, holding it where she can see.
Serin's lips part in wonder as the glow strengthens, turning her pale skin to sapphire, catching in her eyes like tiny flames. "It's beautiful," she breathes. "Your biotech is incredible. I've only read about it in books I snuck out of my father’s study, but seeing it is... different.”
I cannot help my soft snort. "Biotech," I repeat, the human term foul on my tongue. "That is what your kind calls it. A way to make sense of what you do not understand."
Her eyes flick to mine, curiosity replacing wonder. "What do you call it, then?"
"Magic,” I say simply. "If you were to sum up a naga’s ability to commune with the earth, I suppose that would be it.”
I begin moving again, holding the heartglass aloft to illuminate our path.
"How does it work?” Serin asks, falling into step beside me. "The books I’ve read only give a vague explanation of how your magic works. It says it uses some kind of advanced machinery.”
I shake my head at her human terminology.
"There are no mechanisms involved. It is a communion between naga and stone.
" I slow our pace when I notice her subtle wince.
"The heartglass responds to my life energy.
My essence. I offer, and it accepts, giving back in return.
" As I focus on the crystal, a familiar sensation flows from my core in the form of a gentle tug, like an exhale I can feel through my scales.
The stone brightens in response, its blue-green glow an imperceptible pulse that keeps time with my heartbeat.
"Feel how it warms," I say, holding it closer to her.
"Not from flame, but from connection. The stone gives back what it takes, only transformed into heat and light.
“The keh'shalin, the veining light we no longer see winding through the stone, means these tunnels have not been traveled in a very long time. It no longer glows with the essence of my people, a good sign we have left the lair of the TrueCoil.”
Serin absorbs this in silence, her mind clearly turning over the implications. Then, with the directness I have come to expect from her. "Why tell me this? Isn't that forbidden? Teaching humans about your magic?"
"When you left Clavenmoor to warn my people about the planned attack on Vessan-Kar, you chose a side. Your father will see only betrayal. There is no returning to your old life now." I hold her gaze steadily. "Vessan-Kar is your home now.”
"I know," she says softly. "I knew when I closed the trap door to the tunnel, there was no going back.”
We continue in silence for several minutes, the only sounds our breathing.
I find myself hyper-aware of Serin's presence beside me.
The slight hitch in her breath when she places weight on her right leg, the way her fingers occasionally brush against the wall for balance, the subtle scent of her humanity mingling with blood and determination.
"Tell me again about the key," I say as we navigate another fork, choosing the path that angles upward. "About the female who freed you."
"Russet scales of a deep copper-red. Amber eyes. She looked older, but not ancient." Serin glances at me, her hands lifting to gesture the height and build of the female. "She said she owed my sister a debt because Leira saved Varok's life. Said Varok was like her own flesh and blood."
I falter mid-glide, the heartglass flaring as the air around me compresses and releases in a wave that makes my scales lift and settle in rippling succession down my length. "Severa."
"You know her?" Serin asks, hope brightening her exhausted features.
"Varok's den keeper," I confirm, my mind racing with the implications. "She served Varok’s family from the time he was a hatchling. After the Sundering claimed both his mother and sire, and Severa’s own kin, she remained at his side, keeping his den, guarding him through grief and war, and becoming the one constant in his life. Varok is not her blood, but he is the closest thing to family.”
The full weight of realization spreads through my veins like venom from a bite I never felt. "I never would have guessed Severa is TrueCoil." So close to Varok, so perfectly positioned to gather secrets.
"TrueCoil labyrinth is what the female called this place. What is TrueCoil?"
I study her face in the heartglass's cerulean glow, weighing each word carefully.
"TrueCoil believes our blood is sacred. They see humans as a contamination, I say, watching her reaction.
“A disease that weakens our connection to the elements. They orchestrated the collapse of every treaty between our peoples, igniting the Sundering.” My voice drops lower.
"They would rather see the last naga die pure than survive alongside humans. "
"But if she's TrueCoil, why would she help me escape?" Serin's question mirrors my own confusion. "Why not just let them kill me?"
“Perhaps she truly does feel a debt to your sister,” I mutter, my thoughts churning.
“You mentioned Leira burned a man to ash who would have struck Varok in the back with an arrow.
During the Sundering, Severa nearly died protecting Varok's clutch brothers. Such loyalty recognizes itself across species. The debt makes sense.”
Although Severa’s involvement with the TrueCoil does not.
Memories of another traitor rise unbidden.
Jarik. A Talon sworn to serve Naryth, and secretly one of his worms. Nameless, faceless spies once believed to be the Sovereign Crown's most loyal servants.
None knew their identities, only that they answered to Naryth alone.
We trusted them as our ruler's vigilant eyes and ears until the truth emerged in fire and rubble when these clandestine serpents had turned against us, orchestrating the explosion that destroyed the palace's great hall while our ruler dined.
Worms and TrueCoil burrow deeper than we ever suspected. How many more of these fanatics tunnel through the foundations of our society, waiting to collapse everything from within?
"We are surrounded by enemies," I hiss. "Some wearing the faces of allies. Trust has become a liability."
Serin's hand brushes against my arm, the touch so light I might have imagined it. "Not all trust," she says softly.
I look down at her, this small human female who has twice saved my life when she could have left me to die. Her hair hangs in tangled waves around a face marked by exhaustion and pain, yet her eyes remain clear, unflinching.
"No," I agree, surprising myself with the certainty in my voice. "Not all trust."
The irony is not lost on me. Here, in the heart of danger, surrounded by the treachery of my own kind, I find myself placing faith in a human. The very species I was raised to despise has given me the one person I trust without reservation.
I adjust my grip on the heartglass, feeling it pulse in time with my heart as we press onward through the shadowed passageways, guided by its cerulean light and the quiet determination of the female at my side.
The tunnel changes around us, subtle at first, then unmistakable.
Rougher stone gives way to deliberately carved surfaces, ancient glyphs worn smooth by centuries etched into the corners where wall meets ceiling.
These are not just any forgotten passages.
I know these corridors, not from maps or patrol routes, but from memory.
From a time before human weapons scarred stone with blood and fire.
"What is it?" Serin asks, her voice hushed with concern. She steps closer, her shoulder nearly brushing my arm as she studies my face.
"I know these tunnels," I whisper, running my free hand along a series of carved symbols, each touch awakening echoes of childhood wonder. "These are ancient passages, as old as Vessan-Kar itself."
These stone passages awaken memories from my earliest years. A time when my scales still gleamed with youth's luster, and I slithered through these very tunnels, heart racing with the forbidden excitement of venturing where my mother had expressly forbidden.
"How?" Serin's question pulls me from the past. "How do you know them?"
“I explored them as a youngling after my clutch-sister, Lysara, was killed," I admit, continuing forward with renewed purpose.
"Before the war collapsed half the mountain, it was an escape from the harsh reality of the Sundering.
I would slip away whenever my mother turned her attention elsewhere, mapping passages she had forbidden me to enter.
" The memory pulls my lips into a smile, wistful and sharp-edged.
"She would catch me covered in dust, scales dulled from crawling through forgotten tunnels. Her punishments grew more creative with each escape, but even her most severe discipline never kept me from these tunnels for long.”
The passageway widens into a chamber I recognize, despite centuries of erosion and neglect.
Massive columns rise from floor to ceiling, carved to resemble coiled serpents supporting the weight of the mountain above.
Between them, eroded basins that once held luminous water now stand empty and cracked, their channels long dry.
I called this the Chamber of Echoes as a youngling," I murmur with a soft rumble in my throat, surprised by the memory surfacing after so many years. "Water used to cascade from channels in the ceiling, and I would lie here for hours, convinced each droplet whispered ancient secrets as it fell."
Serin's gaze lifts to the ceiling, her eyes tracing the ancient channels. "What secrets did you hear?" she asks softly, and when I look down, her expression holds no mockery. Only a gentle curiosity that makes something in my chest constrict.
"That the mountain breathes," I answer, my voice dropping to match the chamber's hushed acoustics. "That my sire and Lysara watch over me from beyond the veil.” My tail shifts against the stone floor. "A youngling's fantasies, but I believed them then."
"Maybe the water wasn't wrong," she says, her smile soft but tinged with sadness. "I believe my mother watches over me from beyond the veil. Perhaps she's there with your sire and sibling, and they guide us together."
I tilt my head, studying this human female who speaks with such conviction about souls and spirits. "You believe our kind shares the same afterlife?"
"Why not?" Her eyes meet mine without flinching. "Tails or no tails, we all have souls."
"That's rather profound coming from one so young," I say, surprised by the wisdom in her words.
"I'm twenty-three," she replies with a wry twist of her lips. "Hardly a child."
No, definitely not a child. My gaze catches on the gentle curve of her neck, the determined set of her shoulders. I've been trying not to notice how her form draws my attention, even exhausted and dirt-streaked as she is.
"How old are you, Lurok?" she asks, breaking into my illicit thoughts.
"A little over a century."
Her eyes widen comically, and I cannot help the low chuckle that escapes me.
"Well," she says, recovering quickly, "you've aged remarkably well."
"You admire what you see, human?" The question slips out before I can stop it, my tone more challenging than I intended. "A creature from your nightmares?"
Her cheeks flush a delicate pink, but she doesn't look away. "Not all nightmares are terrible to look at," she whispers, and something electric passes between us in the ancient chamber.