Fifty Three
Rohan
Memory after memory slams into me at full force.
Her in The Pit, face skinny, collar around her throat.
Her braiding my hair for the first time, her hands shaking.
Her talking with my dragons and telling them to sit.
Her falling into my arms when her collar was off.
Her holding my hair as she slept.
Her lifting up on her tiptoes as far as she could, just so she could kiss me.
Her humming to me while I broke in her arms beside Drogonah’s cage.
And now she bleeds upon the sands of the Enclave because Halen knew of our plan.
Her face is pale, pained.
Her eyes closed.
Chest still.
My own heart lets out a stumbling thump.
This can’t be it.
Not her.
Not like this.
My fingers twitch, not knowing what to do, how to make this better.
Inhale. Exhale.
My mother’s face flashes through my mind, her last words, her limp hands, chest still, much like Alara’s is now and…. and all I can feel is anger.
Fury.
Devastation.
A reckoning.
I drag in a heat-filled breath before letting it out slowly, letting that anger build into something I don’t want to contain.
Inhale. Exhale.
It’s flowing through my veins like lava, overthrowing any other emotion, burning it out.
I’m boiling from the inside out.
Chest heaving.
Inhale. Exhale.
They will feel my wrath.
They will feel a vengeful flame.
Because they hurt her.
Are still hurting her.
And now… she’s… still.
Inhale. Exhale.
Her small body sprawled upon the sands, bloody, bruised.
I turn my heavy head to Drogonah as I step forward, feet heavy.
He bares his teeth, unable to get up, his purple eye the same color as the rings around mine, flashing as our bond tightens, connected in a way no others are, or haven’t been, for a very long time.
Because I’ve been lying to everyone.
He isn’t a Tenebri dragon.
He’s an Immoral dragon, able to do the unthinkable.
A supposed to be extinct dragon still here in the lands of Dracozar right under everyone’s nose.
Because they don’t realize that all extinct dragons have purple eyes, showing them as different from the rest.
Drogonah’s power goes beyond the ability of flame, for he is able to gift me a part of him that no other can. It takes a part of him when he allows it, and it can only happen when he allows it.
The first and only time this happened was when my mother died, and I raged upon the Ebron fields that still smolder to this day.
When the pain was so overwhelming, when I was on the brink between life and death.
I had not slept, eaten or drank in weeks, and he gave me his power to save me. It cost him the sight in his left eye.
This time, I’m not sure what it will take from him, but he gives it to me anyway to save them, to save myself, to save her.
My little ember.
My dragon whisperer.
My everything.
Heat penetrates through my forearms, his flames upon my skin as they burn away the ribbons that try to hide what happened last time. Tried to hide that his own flames burned away the scales that were gifted upon me when I became a Dragonbond.
They all thought I didn’t deserve the title, and maybe I don’t, but when I look at my dragon, his gaze already on me as he finally stumbles to his feet and lets out a roar that shakes the stands…
I won’t waste what he’s given me.
My vision tinges red.
I walk toward her, stopping only when my hand reaches out for the handle of my axe in Karag’s back.
I pull, yanking it out with a thick squelch, and then I bare my teeth, fire at my feet, flames pulsing at my arms, and I move toward them, toward her.
Toward a new reckoning because sometimes, things just need to burn.
And burn they will for touching the dragons, my people, for ever hurting her.
For making her gasp for breath.
For making her bleed.
For putting her through pain.
For taking her away from me.
Her chest is still. Unmoving.
I stop before her, the guards and Declan, moving away from me as I bend down and stroke a bloodied finger down her cold cheek. Not a single flame touching her.
I’m sorry, my brave girl, I want to tell her, but my mouth won’t part, words won’t come, some animalistic form taking over me.
I’ll see you soon.
I stand, and everything seems to move again, like time had stood still.
Declan and the guards stand before me. Dragories seem to rouse from the Nighturn, most of the dragons too, and I…
Inhale. Exhale.
I stalk toward Declan, knocking his sword away as he tries to defend himself, and then I swing my axe, impaling his stomach. He falls and I follow him down, pushing him to his back and then pushing my axe further into him, like he pushed his sword into her.
He screams, and I twist his head to the side and into the sands like he did to her, making him choke on it, barely able to breathe.
He’s crying now, face full of agony as the Enclave seems to come alive around me. I push, the flames on my arms burning him while its burning me from the inside out, catching on his skin, sizzling and bubbling, like it’s doing to my own arms, but at a much faster rate.
Because I also have to pay a cost for this power.
But I don’t stop, won’t stop. Not until he takes his last breath.
I don’t look away as he cries and screams, don’t look away from his jolting body until it stills and all that’s left is his burning corpse.
I stand.
I turn.
Inhale. Exhale.
I see those before me, Dragorie, dragons, guards.
I blink.
Inhale. Exhale.
Dead.
Dead.
Dead.
I look up to the one who caused all of this, who causes this every year. Who hurts, and kills and makes my people and dragons suffer.
He looks different now standing there, leaning over to see what’s happening.
He’s fearful, though he tries to hide it. His children stand at his side, the elves with them, the guards surrounding them.
That won’t save him.
Nothing will.
He has no hold on me anymore.
All that’s left is for it to burn, for everything to burn.
Inhale. Exhale.
I take a step, someone coming toward me, their voice drowned out by the fury in my head.
They can’t reach me.
I don’t want to be reached.
I want them to die.
All of them to die.
Dead.
Dead.
Dead.
And as I reach another guard, I lock eyes with Halen and let the flames eat him alive.
Because sometimes things don’t need to burn to start anew.
Sometimes things just need to burn.
And all of them will.