19. Instruments of Magic
Instruments of Magic
They are real.
Creatures I’ve only ever heard about in our history, from the bards gathered about fires, from the books I pored over until the pages turned brittle.
Larger than life, flesh-rippling real.
I thought they had left. Finished their foul deeds and departed.
Why are they back?
I don’t move in the swell of fog. Don’t breathe. I hold perfectly still. Not letting a peep of sound escape.
They chuff noisy breaths, their clawed feet shuddering upon the earth as they shift their great weight and move through the rubble with ease and swiftness. Surprising for creatures of such size and heft.
Although what do I know of these creatures that are not supposed to even be here? That are not supposed to exist?
Afraid to move, I resist the instinct to turn and run. That would only attract notice. I’ve already seen them take someone down who fled. I tremble at that horrific memory. It didn’t go well for her. I don’t want such a fate for myself.
After a few moments I conclude that they don’t see me, and I don’t know if it’s because they can’t see me—if I’m invisible to them. Animals can see me. Would it not be the same with these monsters?
With their sharp eyes and their guttural sounds, it is obvious they communicate with each other to some degree. They are clearly a step above the animals of the forest . . . so maybe I’m as invisible to them as I am to human eyes.
I can only hope.
You’re invisible. You’re invisible. You’re invisible. I tell myself this, letting the mantra run over and over in my mind. My lips move with the unvoiced words.
Invisible. A wraith. An unseeable vapor.
Please, please, please.
For the first time, I’m grateful for my curse and plead to the keepers of magic that it holds fast for me with these monsters.
If they can see me, then they eventually will. I can’t simply remain standing in their midst like a fool, hoping the fog continues to shelter me, waiting for the axe to fall.
I begin inching backward, my feet steady, sliding one after the other, slow as thawing ice. No sudden moves. A nice and easy pace. I only have to make it to the trees.
They continue pacing about, making their rough sounds, their every step jarring on the ground, the vibration reaching me, traveling up my already shaky body.
My focus is so intent upon them that I don’t mind my steps. My left boot comes down on a burnt bit of debris and the crunch is loud—an explosion booming in my ears, reverberating long over the smoky air.
My heart clenches.
I freeze, everything squeezing tightly within me as though I can will the sound into nothingness, into a whisper, into never happening at all.
But it did happen.
My mind races, speeding and catching like flame.
Maybe they didn’t hear me. Maybe they didn’t hear the sound because I’m invisible. Maybe—
No.
That hope is dashed. Their big heads whip in my direction.
All eyes land on me. I am fully visible. As corporeal as the wasteland of destruction around us.
They see me.
They. Dragons.
I don’t know what is more shocking in this moment: being visible, or that dragons still exist. These colossal, winged leviathans that once reigned supreme, living for nigh on centuries, wreaking death and destruction . . . still lived.
Of course I should not be so shocked. Like witches, they are creatures of magic, and I had lived under its poison for years.
Magic.
That ugly word skitters across my mind. That most-hated, powerful, and bitter thing has struck again and ruined my life.
It has taken everything from me. First it took me.
Then Ulrika and Linnea. Now it has taken my father.
Maretta. Even Hilla is dead. They are all gone, and that loss strikes me like a blow, twists and grinds into me like a knife, stuns me and leaves me shaking all over, filling me with such deep and abiding loathing for magic and all its instruments: witches . . . dragons.
Now I am here, no longer invisible, but captive still.
No one moves. For an endless moment, across the distance separating us, our eyes clash. Human and dragon assess each other.
I feel like a bunny caught in the sights of a predator, paralyzed, heart beating a thousand beats a second beneath the thin layer of my chest.
Then they come for me.
They lift off the ground a fraction, clawed feet curled up beneath them as they sweep forward through the soupy air.
Fuck.
And yet I still cannot make myself move. Terror holds me in a vise . . . along with an odd sense of fate.
Magic held me captive these many years. It only makes sense that magic would be the thing to end me now.
I swallow. It’s come to this.
Their big bodies cut cleanly through the miasma like a hot knife through butter. I see them in a haze of dread, rippling brawn in a wild variety of colors and sizes against the smoke and mist. They are as different as one human is from another. Even the smallest one is as big as a building.
They are all big. Too big.
Frighteningly big.
They wing past me, so close the drip of saliva on their enormous teeth gleams.
Their giant heads with their wide, horned frills toss side to side as they move with fluid speed, their dragon eyes slitted and flashing, taking in everything, missing nothing, seeing me. They’re toying with me, an ant in their midst.
A dry croak escapes me as I command myself to move my legs. To run.
Stop standing here like a statue, meekly submitting to your death!
And yet I could still see that woman from earlier being devoured. Bile rises in my throat. Was that hours ago? Or a lifetime?
The image finally prods me from my paralysis. I turn and run.
At this point, it’s a hopeless impulse, but instinct.
The thing you do when monsters come at you.
Even as I know I can’t outrun them, I still try, desperate to escape.
I make it a few pumping strides, and then I’m face down in ash, gasping, the pain in my back so bright and burning and astonishing, I choke, my arms flailing, hands scrabbling in the dirt, grit sliding deep beneath my nails.
I can’t move, can’t get up.
My voice catches in my throat, trapped there. I work to spit out words, twisting my neck, craning for a glimpse behind me to confirm the unbelievable. The impossible. The no, no, no, no, no of it.
A dragon looms above, its massive, clawed foot pinning me to the earth while it glares down at me, head tilted, one elongated eye, with its vertical pupil dark and shuddering around its silvery iris pulsing like a heartbeat.
I see myself there, in that demon eye. My reflection as caught and trapped as I am beneath its crushing weight.
Comprehension chugs through me.
It sees me with sharp intelligent eyes.
Sees. Me.
It’s shocking to absorb.
My village razed. My people dead. Dragons real, and not only that. They see me.
I scream.
Finally, what I’ve most wanted, what I’ve desperately craved—to be seen, to be visible, to be heard, to be known again—is a reality. I finally get my wish, except it’s not my family or friends seeing me. It is this predator. A monster.
Everything inside me squeezes, waiting to be devoured. Two others emerge, crowding behind the one holding me down.
“Let me go!” I cry as though they can understand my words—or care to honor my request. Blood stains their talons, but I think they might spare my life?
Bitterness pierces me like a lance. The pressure on my back eases and I scramble away, jumping to my feet, facing them, not daring to present them with my back again. Whatever is coming, I will confront it. I will not turn and run and die with my spine ripped from my body.
They surround me, three towering beasts.
I brace myself, waiting for the inevitable, for the end.
“Go on,” I fling out, defiantly lifting my chin as the hulking giants circle me, closing in. I reach for the sword strapped to my side, unsheathing it in a fluid move.
They huff and stomp the ground with their great weight, looking from one another to me, making low, guttural sounds.
At least it will finally end. The last ten years. The monotony. The loneliness.
I’ll join Da and the others. Cold comfort, but I wrap myself in it, my death shroud.
They growl, lifting and tossing their immense heads, continuing to communicate with one another in their rasping tongue.
Not one of them could I battle successfully, but I hold my sword out in front of me in a tight, bloodless grip.
“Come on, then!” I challenge, with far more bravado than I feel.
I will go out fighting, and who knows? Maybe I would injure one.
I’m not so delusional to think I could defeat them but hurting even one would give me great pleasure in my last breath.
The large silvery dragon who held me down, its skin iridescent as a pearl, steps forward and bends its head, snapping its jaws menacingly close to my face.
I flinch but hold my ground and swipe my sword at the beast, refusing to dwell on just how puny the iron blade appears next to this creature.
Its eyes sweep over me with the fury of a storm.
There would be no sparing me.
I’m not so strong and fearless that I don’t fear pain. Please, let my end be quick. Let it not hurt too much.
Another dragon, this one a deep green, lunges forward with a loud snarl and snaps at the silver dragon, clearly objecting to its behavior. I blink, bewildered by the action, which could be interpreted as protective. Of me.
Then they’re all snapping at each other.
I take a sliding step back and then another and another, using the distraction of their infighting to retreat.
I manage several strides before I collide into a wall. A great immovable mountain. That makes no sense.
I whirl around.
Another dragon looms above me. A new one. A fourth one. The biggest and scariest of them. A mountain overshadowing me. Several glinting horns jut off its face and frill. Its flesh glints and flashes like the iridescent wing of a crow.
I lunge back and my heel catches on something. I fall, gawking at the looming monster. My sword skitters free, lost somewhere beyond me, obscured by fog.