Chapter 16 #2
I make it to the top and scrunch into the corner. That’s it. Any second now, the wall should crumble, and this ledge should hold.
The seconds tick by. “Come on,” I whisper.
Another scream tears through the air, piercing my heart. I’m afraid to look, afraid of seeing who that scream belongs to. “Why isn’t it working?”
There. I can see it now. The structure is about to give way, but I need to release one last stone. I edge forward, working to keep my footing as the structure rumbles from the roar of a dragon.
I lay down on my belly, wedging the pole into a stone three rows down.
I catch my toe around the lip, gripping the rod with both hands and pull.
When I look up, all I can see is a giant pearlescent orb.
The dragon is so close it takes up my entire world.
If I reach out a hand, I know I can touch it, and I long to do so.
The stones begin to shift. The dragon rears back its head, and I am on my feet, sprinting back to my ledge, sprinting back to safety—
“Oliviana!” Caius screams, and the world falls out from underneath me.
Everything turns dark, pressure builds around my waist, water rushes past me, and yet I remain anchored in the storm, the squall rushing by, threatening to tear me apart, and still I’m unmoving, a boulder at the heart of raging waters.
Thunder rushes in my ears, and smooth scales brush under my palms.
I’m back in the cavern, the one from my nightmares.
A deep pulsing calls me to the ironwork door.
It thuds again and again against its setting, as if the creature on the other side wishes to break free as badly as I long to make it through to the other side.
I’m slammed against the rough carved metal, the scales of the carved dragon door slicing open the skin of my palms. I scream as I rock with the pulsing of the door, and just when I think I will shatter, my body turns from hot to cold, and I am in the water once more.
The rush of the current cools my skin and stings where the flesh has been cut open.
I sob, unable to hold it in, unable to hold myself steady. I feel strong arms tighten around me.
“It’s okay, Oliviana, I’ve got you.”
Caius, suddenly, I recognize that it’s Caius’ arms that hold me steady, clutching me tight. It can’t be. He was across the cavern, clearing the Tǎnkaski soldiers, when the dam fell. Not even he can move that fast, and yet I know without a doubt he is the one who saved me.
Caius shifts, bringing us down the ladder. His movements are slow and calculated. I work to control my breath, hating how undone I am in his presence. The tips of my boots touch the ground, but Caius doesn’t release me. Instead, he holds me tight and whispers into my hair.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” His voice wavers, and the way fear laces his words leaves me stunned. “Don’t you ever do something like that again.”
Violent shivers wrack my body, and Caius holds me tighter.
I stare up at him: shadow consumes his eyes, leaving no trace of their pale green hue.
Behind him, the cavern is a tattered tapestry of destruction, the threads of eons torn and strewn across the cavern floor, strings of smoke tangling with the debris and turning my vision hazy.
I press my eyes closed, trying to focus.
When I open my eyes again Caius’ eyes are a tumultuous green, a storm raging in them.
His black hair hangs limp over his face, dripping water over his olive skin, which has gone a shade paler than it should be, but he looks otherwise unharmed.
I shift my focus to the cavern beyond that lies in utter chaos.
The tunnel that once led out to the freshwater sea is now nothing but rubble.
How is that possible? The cavern walls had been sound.
The release of the reservoir shouldn’t have damaged the cave.
I search the rubble, looking for answers—and gag—large chunks of flesh are woven between the stone, thick steam rising from the scaled carcass.
Charred onyx-colored bones rise up from the mayhem, still menacing even in death.
My stomach clenches, threatening to empty its contents. I double over and force in a breath, which only makes the nausea worse as the greasy taste of burned meat and rancid oil coats my tongue.
Caius runs a hand up and down my back, trying to comfort me, but I don’t want his touch.
I want to wake up from this nightmare. I stagger forward, unintentionally bringing myself nose to nose with the dead dragon.
Silent tears I didn’t know had gathered in my eyes slide over my cheeks.
I don’t know what drives me to do it, but I extend my hand, placing it on the pale lavender scales of the creature’s snout.
Nothing. No spark of life, no answering call from the ancient tunnels, no carved iron door.
This magnificent creature was here one moment and then gone.
I feel the heat of his hand before I open my eyes to find Rui at my side, his hand placed next to mine on the dragon.
“Has this ever happened before?” I whisper.
Rui shakes his head. “No, the wards keep even the smallest dragons from entering The Below. I don’t know how a creature this size could have passed through, let alone three.”
I’m surprised at the sadness I hear in his voice.
I thought Rui hated the dragons, the way he talked about Civra and how he would one day get even with the she devil.
But by the way he looks at the felled beast, the gentle touch that trails just behind mine, the reverence in his voice, it’s clear that Rui cares for these creatures, maybe more than he should.
I press my lips together as guilt tears through me at the secret we have kept. I had wanted to believe that Tǎnkaski was far enough away, that what was happening at Bǎodela was an isolated incident, but it was only a dream. The Below is dying, and soon nowhere will be safe for humanity.
Onyx vertebrae press through torn flesh along the dragon’s spine. I want to look away, but I can’t.
“What force could have been so powerful as to char its bones so completely?” I wonder.
Rui inclines his head to the side. “Have you never seen necrotite before?” Rui asks.
I squint at him. “What?”
“Dragon bone, it isn’t charred. Dragon bone is completely black.”
Despite my better judgment, I stretch up onto my toes, reaching my fingertips to try to brush them over the bone. Rui catches my wrist and gently guides my hand away.
“Necrotite is dangerous. Power of the ages is woven into the bone. If you wield something that powerful that doesn’t belong to you, it will claim your soul.” Rui’s face turns serious with the recitation.
“What was that?”
He shrugs. “It’s from the ancient texts. I can show you the tapestry tomorrow. I don’t know if I believe it, but we always handle the material with care. If my grandmother has drilled anything into me, it’s not to ignore the warnings of the past, unless we want to make the same mistakes.”
A gentle hum of energy vibrates over where I trace the scales, near the exposed bone, but not close enough that I might slip and brush the necrotite.
I don’t know if I believe the warning of Rui’s people.
Their fantastical tales of ancient cities that scraped the sky and humans descending from the heavens with dragons.
It all sounds like a fairytale. Life is hard: it is dirt and grime and pain.
It made more sense that we were birthed from the bowels of this world than from the shimmering cosmos overhead.
I feel Caius without turning, his presence pressing closer, strangely comforting when it should be anything but, and that very thought sends a shiver down my spine.
“We should get back. The others will be worried.” His voice comes from close behind me.
I nod and turn to Rui. “If there is anything I can do—”
Rui raises a hand. “You have already done so much. If you hadn’t thought to release the dam…
” Worry flashes in his eyes, and I take in his torn tunic, smeared with blood, his long dark hair, which usually shines like spun silk, matted and dull.
He doesn’t have to say it. They wouldn’t have been able to stop the dragons before they ventured into the city proper.
I push out a sigh, rubbing the back of my neck as I try once again to make sense of the damage. “I’m sorry. I didn’t expect it to do this.”
Confusion passes over Rui’s features before he tracks the movements of my gaze, and a sharp clarity sets into his onyx eyes. “You didn’t do this, Liv.”
“But—”
“The dragon did.” Rui inclines his head back toward the felled beast.
“How?”
“Sometimes their power overcomes them. I have only seen it once before, but their power becomes too much for even them to control and…” His eyes finish what he can’t in words, tracing an arc over the destroyed tunnels.
“Oliviana,” Caius prompts.
“Right.” I turn to leave, then spin back to Rui. “Still, if I can help with any of the repairs, let me know. I’m pretty good at what I do.” A slow smile pulls at my lips, warmth flooding my belly when Rui returns a smile of his own.
“I will. Thank you, Liv, you saved us all.”
The words strike a chord through my soul.
Tears prick at the edges of my eyes. I nod, quickly spin around, and duck my head as I shoulder past Caius for the exit.
I had no idea how much those words would affect me.
To be seen as a hero instead of a villain, a savior instead of a traitor.
I had been nothing but loyal to Bǎodela, yet I would bear the burden of my father’s sins until the day I died.
But here in Tǎnkaski, in less than a phase, I had found acceptance.
The emotions war inside me, hot and cold, tangling together, clashing and burning through my insides.
“Oliviana,” Caius’ voice comes to me as if he’s shouting underwater.
I don’t slow, instead hurrying across the rope bridge, drowning in my thoughts.
I didn’t spare a single one for my fear of the damn thing.
I was elated and angry. Those words meant everything to me, and yet they scalded me, highlighting the fact that I would never hear them from my own people.
Even if I finished this asinine quest and brought a dragon to defend our land, even if we found a way to save The Below, Bǎodela would never embrace me as one of her own.
I knew this down to the very marrow of my bones; I ached to be wrong, but I would be a fool to believe it.
I rush into my room, sliding the paper door shut behind me, and collapse to my knees on the cot. Tangling my hands in my hair, I curl in on myself and let the sobs wrack my body. I need this feeling out, gone, expelled. I cannot change the past. I cannot change others, I cannot—
“Ollie?” Dom’s voice pierces the thin door.
“Go away, Dom.” I try to keep my voice even and fail.
“Ollie, we need to talk.”
I inhale deeply through my nose, struggling not to choke on the snot. I try to brush away the tears, but my sleeves are soaked, and I realize it’s all a lost cause.
I pull open the door, hanging my head so I don’t have to see Dom’s shock at the state I’m in.
“Ollie,” he whispers.
I turn and throw myself onto my cot, wrapping my arms around the pillow and burying my face. “Just say what you need to say, Dom.”
I hear the scuffle of boots, more than one pair, and my door sliding shut once again.
“What happened to you two?” Cressida asks.
“Dragons breached the northern reservoir.” Caius gives the update with no emotion, a battle report, nothing more.
“That’s impossible,” Dom says. “They can’t breach the wards.”
Caius’ soldier routine cracks. “Oh, you’re right. I guess I just climbed the reservoir and kept Oliviana from being swept away by a flood because I thought it would be a lovely way to wrap the evening.” His tone drips with sarcasm.
“You did what?” I know Dom is talking to me.
“I collapsed the reservoir wall to save the city from three dragons,” I mumble into my pillow.
The floorboards shift as Dom plops down beside my cot. “Guārgia guide us,” he whispers, then more loudly. “This is so much worse than I thought.”
I turn my head to the side, face still half smashed into the pillow. “So, what did you want to talk about?”
“The Below, it is falling everywhere, not just at Bǎodela,” Dom says.
“Thanks for stating the obvious. I couldn’t tell what with dragons trying to eat me in the tunnels this evening,” Caius quips.
Dom presses on. “No, it’s not just Bǎodela, and it’s not just here…
Cress and I met a woman in the gardens today who had just returned from the Southern Collective.
Her father was a researcher, working on a joint project to try to battle the dimming glow moss that has struck down there.
But people from the city started going missing, and once a few of his colleagues disappeared, he packed up his family and brought them back to Tǎnkaski… All of The Below is dying.”
“Nowhere will be safe,” Cressida says in an eerily cheery tone.
Silence settles over our party. Everyone is thinking the same thing, yet not one of us wants to voice it. It’s time to go.
“I’ll scout out our exit.” Caius goes straight into captain mode.
“Cressida, figure out where we can procure supplies without drawing attention.” From the corner of my eye, I see Cressida give her brother a sardonic salute.
“You two be ready. As soon as I see our chance, we are going to need to move quickly.”
Arguments race through my mind, but I’m too tired to voice them. “Whatever you say, Fox.” I watch just long enough to see the muscle in his jaw feather before I turn my head in dismissal. I have nothing left to give.
“Do you need anything, Ollie?” Dom places a gentle hand between my shoulder blades.
“I just need sleep.”
“Okay, I’m just a door over if you think of anything.”
I hear boots padding across the paneled floor. The door slides shut, and then there is silence at last.