Chapter 32
Rhea
Ifollow Tahranis through the winding tunnels, seething with each step. My failure burns hotter than dragon fire in my chest. A Weaver who can control minds? Not just read thoughts or communicate silently like I can with Zephyros, but actually force someone’s body to obey against their will?
“Keep up,” he calls over his shoulder, not even bothering to look back.
“Go fuck yourself,” I mutter, but I keep walking. Not like I have a choice.
My fingers still tingle where they betrayed me, returning his dagger when every instinct screamed to drive it deeper.
Is this what Weavers are truly capable of?
Nobody ever mentioned this possibility. Not in any of the whispered warnings about my kind, not in the old proclamations condemning us to death.
If I can do this too...
The thought sends a chill through me. Could I have been controlling people without realizing it? No. I’d know. I’d feel it. Wouldn’t I?
I watch Tahranis’s back as he leads me deeper into the mountain. All he has to do is think a command, and my body would comply like a puppet on strings. If he wanted me dead, I’d probably slit my own throat with a smile. If he wanted me to hurt someone else...
“Where are you taking me?” I demand, claustrophobia building.
“Patience, Omneira.”
“Call me that one more time and I’ll find a way to make you choke on your own tongue, mind control or not.”
He laughs, deep and raspy. “Such delightful threats from someone in your position.”
“I’ve been in worse positions.” It’s a lie. I’ve never been this powerless, this trapped.
“Have you?” He pauses at a junction, glancing back. “I doubt that very much.”
I want to scream, to rage, to tear at the walls with my bare hands. But what good would it do? He’d just command me to stop. This helplessness is worse than any prison cell.
“You have questions. I know,” he says. “In time, you’ll have answers.”
“In time, I’ll have your head on a pike,” I promise.
His smile only widens. “We’ll see about that.”
I glare at Tahranis, narrowing my eyes to focus every ounce of my hatred. If I’m truly this Omneira he keeps babbling about, if I have powers beyond what I know, then perhaps...
—Slit your own throat.
I drive the thought outward, a crashing wave rolling through the still space between us. Nothing. Not even a flinch. He just watches me, lips curling with amusement like he knows exactly what I’m attempting.
“Having trouble?” he asks, his voice smooth as silk. “Your gifts aren’t quite working as expected?”
“What did you do to me?” I snarl, lunging forward to grab his furred collar. “How did you take my powers?”
He doesn’t even bother pushing me away, just stands there looking amused at my futile rage. “I didn’t take anything, darling.”
I try again, reaching for his thoughts, searching for that familiar sensation of slipping into someone else’s mind. Nothing but emptiness greets me. It’s like shouting into a void.
“The drink,” I realize suddenly. “Or the food? That’s why you kept insisting I eat.”
He tilts his head, but admits nothing.
Tahranis glances down at my white-knuckled grip on his coat with that infuriating smirk. I release the fabric like it’s suddenly burning hot, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing how badly I want to tear it—and him—to shreds.
He turns without a word and continues walking. I follow, hating each step, hating the fact that I have no choice but to trail behind him like some tamed pet.
The tunnels twist and branch, a labyrinth carved into the mountain’s heart.
As we walk deeper, I catch flickering movements at the edges of my vision—shadows darting across intersections, figures slipping through doorways.
A woman carrying a basket disappears around a corner.
Two men conversing quietly fall silent as we pass.
Are they real? Or am I finally losing what’s left of my mind?
The distant echo of voices reaches my ears. Murmurs, conversations, even... laughter? Children’s laughter, high and clear, echoing in the narrow spaces. Water trickles somewhere, a steady, rhythmic sound that feels oddly comforting in this hellish place.
“There are others living here?” I blurt out, my curiosity overpowering my resolve to stay silent. “Those people at the ceremony—and Fern—I didn’t imagine them?”
The question sounds pathetic even to my ears. Am I so desperate for confirmation of my sanity that I’m asking my captor for reassurance?
Tahranis doesn’t bother turning around. “They do,” he says simply, as if answering whether the sky is blue.
I want to grab him again, shake him until answers fall out like coins from a torn purse. But before I can act on the impulse, he stops at a massive stone door etched with the same symbols I saw in that strange room.
Tahranis steps through the doorway, his movements smooth and practiced. I follow, still seething, still plotting ways to end him despite the impossible odds. He walks several paces ahead, then stops at what appears to be an opening in the tunnel wall.
“Look,” he says, beckoning me forward with a casual flick of his fingers. The command in his voice makes my feet move before I can even think to resist. Was that his mind power? I don’t even know.
I approach cautiously, half-expecting some trap. When I reach the edge, I realize we’re standing on a kind of stone balcony jutting out from the tunnel. The drop below is dizzying. A massive cavern opens beneath us, stretching so far the other side lies way beyond the dim, flickering torchlight.
Then I see it.
My breath catches in my throat, the air suddenly trapped in my lungs.
A dragon.
Not just any dragon—the largest I’ve ever seen, dwarfing even the oldest of our Sky Order mounts.
His scales shimmer with an iridescent quality I can’t quite place—not silver like Zephyros, not gold or bronze or any color I recognize.
The creature lies curled around himself, tail wrapped protectively around his massive body.
His face rests on his front legs, huge silver claws shining like treasure.
For a terrifying moment, I think he’s dead. Then I catch the almost imperceptible rise and fall of his sides, breathing so slowly it might as well be frozen in time.
“What is he doing here?” I whisper, unable to tear my eyes away. “What have you done to him?”
My fingers grip the stone balustrade, nails white with tension. Something about this sleeping giant calls to me, pulls at something deep inside my chest like a hook through flesh.
“Not he, but she,” Tahranis corrects, his voice dropping to a reverent whisper.
A cold finger traces down my spine. Something in his tone makes my heart stutter.
“S-she?” I repeat, the word catching. My gaze sweeps over the enormous dragon again, taking in details I missed before. The elegant curve of the neck, the delicate edge to the jaw despite the massive size.
A laugh bursts from me, too high and brittle. “What are you saying? That this is Heratrix?” I shake my head, trying to dispel the thought. “I’m not an idiot. That’s not her.”
The Goddess of all dragons, mother to every scaled beast in the skies? Vanished for a millennium? Impossible.
“Does she look like any dragon you’ve ever seen?” Tahranis asks quietly, watching me closely.
I don’t answer. I can’t. Because, indeed, the creature doesn’t look like any dragon I know. Not even close.
“Besides, why would I lie about this?”
I turn to him, fury surging through me. “Why would I believe anything you say? You’ve drugged me, imprisoned me, and controlled my body against my will. This is just another manipulation.”
His face remains maddeningly calm. “And what about that?” He points to a spot past the dragon. “Also a manipulation?”
Reluctantly, I return my gaze to the cavern, forcing myself to look beyond the sleeping dragon. At first, all I see are shadows and stone. Then my eyes adjust to the dim light, and I notice shapes arranged in neat rows behind the massive creature.
My breath stops completely.
Eggs. Hundreds—no, thousands of dragon eggs, perfectly preserved, glowing with faint inner light. They look exactly like the Scions I saw during the Rite of Flight, only there are more here than I ever imagined could exist.
“That’s impossible,” I whisper, but even as I say it, I know it’s real. The enormity of what I’m seeing hits me like a punch to the gut. “Those are...”
“The future,” Tahranis finishes for me. “The dawn of a new era that you and I will usher.”
No. I shake my head so hard I lose my balance. I refuse to believe this. It has to be a trick, a manipulation of some kind.
Tahranis comes closer, lips moving. He’s saying something, but I don’t hear him. I won’t play his game, won’t swallow his lies. I take several steps back, and with a cry of refusal, I claw my way out, breaking out of the vision.