2. A Death of Hope #2
A moment of silence lingered, followed by a thunderous crack and a pluming cloud of dust. Before the cloud had even settled, Vyldrar ripped past Shinyara and dove towards the city of Vastillion where the rogue traitor had pulled away from the fighting and continued to lay waste to everything that moved.
The roar that escaped Vyldrar’s throat was wrought with fury, grief, and desolation.
In a crimson flash, the last remaining traitor who had engaged with Farda and the others streaked past, following in Vyldrar’s wake. Before a thought could cross Farda’s mind, Shinyara had folded her wings and dropped like a stone.
Down and down again she fell, the wind crashing against Farda as though it were a solid wave.
He took a breath and closed his eyes, allowing his lungs to swell as he let his mind drift into Shinyara’s.
He felt her heart beat, their heart. Felt their wings rippling as the force of the world tried to pull them apart.
Felt the rage searing in their veins and through their soul. They were as one, and they were whole.
Through Shinyara’s eyes, they watched the ground approach, then, as the currents of air shifted, they opened their wings and swooped outwards.
The power of the swing propelled them forwards.
They shifted their wings, and their target came into sight.
The last red dragon trailed Vyldrar, pillars of fire spewing from its jaws.
Further from the city, Helios had pulled away from the fighting with what looked to be the large blue dragon trailing after him.
They need not stare any longer to know Helios’s destination. The dragon descended towards the crater where Carisín’s broken body lay.
With sorrow in their heart, Farda and Shinyara returned their gaze to the crimson-scaled dragon ahead.
The battle was not yet won. Guilt was a monster oh so familiar to them.
A monster that would claw at their heart for the rest of their days, as it always had.
But they would silence it for now lest further death rest on their shoulders.
They stilled themselves, the wind tearing at them as they swooped up towards the crimson dragon who was now only a wingspan from Alvira and Vyldrar.
Not a sound escaped them, not a beating of wings nor a drawing of breath.
To warn Alvira would be to warn their enemy.
And so they arced upwards like the willing hands of death, and at the very last moment, when the other dragon spotted them below – when it was too late – Shinyara hurled her legs forwards and drove her talons into its belly, blood streaming through the cracked scales.
From sheer momentum, they carried the dragon from its flight, wings folding against the wind.
The creature snapped and howled, Shinyara’s talons burying deeper into its flesh.
Farda pulled threads of Air, Spirit, and Fire into his palm, then launched an arc of lightning at the creature’s neck, only to see it skitter away as it collided with a Sparkward.
Astride their soulkin, Farda and the traitor Draleid lashed at each other with whips of Fire and Air while both attempted to push threads of Earth into each other’s bones, threads of Spirit slashing and hacking.
Only then did Farda realize who the Draleid was.
“Why?” Farda roared as they spun, augmenting his voice with the Spark.
Not a word had passed between them until that moment, so swift and brutal had been the violence.
But he had known Daraní since they had both heard the Calling, known her soulkin – Savrien.
He had drunk with Daraní, laughed with her, killed with her.
They were kin. None of this made any sense at all.
The seconds that passed, as the two dragons tore at each other, were like individual stretches of eternity, until Daraní shouted back, “I’m sorry.”
He didn’t get a chance to ask a second question. A bone-shaking roar sounded above him, and Vyldrar crashed onto Savrien’s back and bit Daraní clean in half. Savrien shrieked as his Soulkin was ripped from the world, thrashing between Shinyara and Vyldrar, blood staining the sky red.
And as Vyldrar spat Daraní’s severed corpse into the wind and bit down on Savrien’s neck, the only thing in Farda’s mind was Daraní’s voice.
“I’m sorry.”
The soulkin of the elf he had once called a friend suddenly grew still, and a shiver spread from Shinyara into Farda. Even Vyldrar paused as the three dragons dropped towards the ground. Savrien was not dead, but through Shinyara, Farda felt the dragon’s broken soul simply wither and lose all hope.
Before their very eyes, Savrien’s crimson scales drained to a listless grey.
His eyes faded from a deep, almost violent green to a pale, milky white.
Shinyara could still hear his mighty heart beating, but with each passing moment it kicked against the dragon’s chest a little softer, a little sadder.
Never before had Farda seen such vivid effects of becoming Rakina.
Savrien made no attempt to open his wings.
He simply dropped like a stone, Vyldrar and Shinyara on either side of him.
And despite the battle raging in the city and the sounds of Helios and the remaining traitors tearing at each other, the two dragons guided their lost kin to the ground.
Dust and leaves rose as the two pairs of massive wings struggled against Savrien’s weight, trying desperately not to bring them all crashing down.
The pair had no choice but to drop him the last few feet, his head and limbs smacking against the earth as though Heraya had already taken him into her arms.
The word ‘heartbreak’ would have been meaningless and unfit to describe the torment in Shinyara’s soul as she looked down upon the broken dragon.
She leaned her head and nudged Savrien’s neck with her snout.
A wave of agony poured from her mind into Farda’s, so pure and raw it dragged tears from his eyes.
Savrien had hatched not long after Shinyara. The pair had taken their first flight on the same day. What in all the gods had caused Daraní and Savrien to do this? To turn their backs on their kin, to betray The Order, and to never speak a word of it to Farda?
None of this made sense. So much loss, so much chaos, and for what?
A roar sounded to Farda’s right, and he looked up to see a small, purple dragon fleeing westward across the plains – the last dragon that had been battling Helios. To the left, the traitor who had separated from the air battle earlier continued to pour fire over the city.
Behind Farda, the enormous bulk of Helios still loomed over Carasín’s corpse, and the thought of it bled Farda’s heart.
“Chase them down,” Alvira called from astride Vyldrar, gesturing towards the fleeing dragon. “We will see to the treacherous worm that burns the city.”
“We fly together, Alvira.”
“No. They must all pay for this day.” As Alvira spoke, Vyldrar lifted his head, a deep, primal tremor emanating from his throat.
The dragon spread his wings wide, forelimbs crushing into the ground, frills shaking.
A dragon’s rage was familiar to Farda, intimately so, but what pulsed from Vyldrar at that moment was something more primal, something ancient.
His eyes seemed to shift and blaze like raging fire, and with a roar to rival a godstorm, he cracked his wings and careened through the air towards the traitor over the city.
Farda watched the dragon fly for a heartbeat, resisting the urge to will Shinyara after him.
But Farda’s soulkin was further from him now than she had ever been, her heart cracked as broken glass as she stared down at Savrien who lay listless on the ground.
Had Farda not known better, he would have thought Savrien dead, but the dragon’s ribs lifted and fell ever so slightly, weaker with each breath.
Shinyara unleashed a guttural, heart-rending roar.
A roar that shook Farda to his foundations.
A roar etched with grief and loss and unquenchable wrath.
And as that roar reached its zenith, a familiar pressure rose within Farda.
With her shared soul screaming, Shinyara’s chest swelled with air, and she unleashed a torrent of blazing dragonfire down over the broken Savrien.
As the dragonfire raged, tears streamed down Farda’s face, tears that were barely his own, tears born of the bond. Savrien’s body was engulfed, and Shinyara’s fire didn’t stop until she felt Savrien’s soul fade from the world.
Dragons were born of fire, and many stories told that if in fire they found death, their ashes would drift on the wind for eternity, forever in flight, forever with their wings wide.
Before the flames had settled, Shinyara turned, charged forwards, and lifted herself into the air. The smaller purple dragon had a start on them now, but Shinyara’s heart ached for vengeance, for blood, and she would have it.