Chapter 15 #2
Finally, the lift creaks to a stop. I gather myself, push open the sliding door, and am hit with a blast of cold air. Fresh air, unfiltered through miles of shafts. Ahead of me is a tunnel, and at the far end of it, I can just glimpse a patch of night sky alight with stars.
I step out of the lift and stop. There’s no good going farther; I explored this tunnel and where it leads days ago. There is no escape to be had that way. But I am high enough now that the connection must be clearer and, therefore, less painful.
“Nyxia,” I call, my voice low and echoing in that tunnel. “I’m here.”
Immediately, she bursts to life in my head once more—a voice, a presence, a roiling ball of living fire.
I cannot see her, but I feel her so vividly, she might as well be standing directly in front of me.
Her voice hisses, thick with dragon smoke: “You’re late, Val-Val.
We’re all so worried about you! Did you go squeamish in the end and forget how knives work? ”
“I ran into a complication,” I answer, teeth set hard.
I need not speak the words out loud, for she can read what she needs in my head.
But the more clearly I enunciate, the more chance I have of controlling the conversation, of preventing her from delving any deeper, down into parts of my mind I would prefer not to reveal.
“Oh?” She sounds on the brink of laughter, as she always does.
“The little dragonette put up a fight, did she? Did you get a boo-boo? Do tell, and I’ll let Mummy know you need me to come rushing in to save the day.
” I feel her smile, though I do not see it.
The cruel twist of her lips, the flash of her sharp teeth.
“I do love a chance to play with humans. I hear these champions are particularly spritely specimens! Do they like to dance?”
“I have matters well in hand,” I answer firmly. “One week. That’s all I need.”
“But what if I don’t want to give you a week?”
My fists clench. I wish my fingers were clamped around her neck even now. “Mhoryga entrusted this task to me. She would not want you to interfere.”
“Oh, Mummy thinks so highly of you, doesn’t she?” Bitter poison laces the words, insidious and dangerous.
“It is my honor to serve the goddess,” I answer.
“Honor be damned. We all know what this is about for you. Don’t think you’re the only one with something to prove.”
I don’t answer. I stand firm, forcing my mind to be nothing more than a steel vault of resolve.
I feel her frustration, prodding at me with insistent claws.
Then, suddenly, an image appears—so vivid, I could almost swear I see her fire-limned form walking toward me down the tunnel.
It’s nothing more than a vision in my head. But it feels real.
She appears clad in her red warrior’s uniform, complete with the black breastplate emblazoned with the same rampant dragon which is burned on my chest. Her footsteps are like a cat’s—soft, silent—and her body moves with sinuous grace.
Bounteous jet hair tumbles about her shoulders, and her golden skin glints with flecks of scale just visible around the cheekbones, the wrists, the jaw.
But it is her eyes which truly give her away.
Those strange, burning, golden orbs. The same eyes as her mother.
The same eyes as Princess Roselle Pandracor.
The image comes to a stop before me, fists planted on outthrust hips. She smiles languidly, looking me up and down. “You’ve gone soft, Valtar.”
I should be thankful. Nyxia is dragon spawn, but she was born too human, without enough fire in her blood to manifest. She cannot wield hellfire, and as such, she is not as strong as a dracori.
But she can still get in the minds of all dracori, can still manipulate them to her will.
This makes her useful to Mhoryga. Until such a time as the Dragon Queen decides to devour her heart.
But as she cannot manifest, as she cannot access her full dragon nature, Nyxia does not possess her mother’s power to root out every secret thought in the minds of her slaves. There are parts of myself that I can keep hidden from her, so long as I maintain control of my emotions.
“I will have the heart in four days’ time,” I say firmly. “And I will meet you in the agreed-upon place a week from today.”
She pouts prettily. It’s a hideous reflection of the princess, so similar and yet so warped with cruelty. “I don’t like to wait a week. I’m getting bored out here.” She smiles then and tips an eyebrow. “Maybe I’ll find myself a nice village to burn, some townsfolk to terrorize.”
“If you do that, word will surely get back to Stromin Palace. You will materially damage my chances of success.”
“You’re such a spoilsport.”
“I’m not here for the sport.”
“No, just the spoils, am I right?” She lifts her head, looking at me down the length of her nose. “You’re hiding something.”
I offer no response.
Another smile twists her lips, and her eyes flash. “Tell me, Val-Val…is my sister as pretty as me?”
“Prettier.”
Her smile freezes. For a moment, she stands there, staring at me, her image still sharp and vivid. Then, in a burst of heat, she lashes out, grasping me by the forehead. Pain explodes through my awareness once again, dropping me to my knees.
When I come to at last—when the pain finally dulls—the vision is gone. Her link to my mind is, momentarily at least, broken.
I exhale a long sigh, then drag in a breath of the fresh air coming in through the mouth of the tunnel. Gathering my feet, I rise, stagger a little, put out a hand to the rocky wall, and stand, waiting for the dizziness to pass. Waiting for the last echoes of pain to recede.
Then I step back into the pulley lift, slam the door, and begin the long descent.