Chapter 40
The streets emptied two blocks out from the hoard. They always were empty, but somehow, they felt emptier today.
The silence, interrupted only by their footsteps, lay heavier upon him. No group. Not here, not anywhere else. Just him and Luna, like on day one.
Except that before, they had everyone to meet. Now, they had met everyone already.
The cobblestones warmed under their boots. A window shuttered somewhere, and a cat bolted across an alley.
The last building gave way, the hoard suddenly spreading in front of them.
Verathras lay in a noticeably less comfortable position.
He clearly hadn’t slept recently, nor had he bothered to pretend otherwise.
His head rested on the nearest crest of gold, the massive amber eye already open and tracking them from the moment they crested the rise.
Four drakes sat in a tight semicircle at the base of the hill.
Xiir, his brother, and the two guards all postured like dogs who had been promised a treat.
Alsen’s stomach did a small, tired flip.
They stopped at the accustomed thirty paces. Coins shifted under their feet in soft avalanches.
“Here you are,” Verathras rumbled. The sound rolled through Alsen’s ribs. “With just the two of you.”
Alsen nodded. “That we are.”
The dragon’s pupil contracted. The amber iris slid once across Alsen, once across Luna, once across the empty space where the rest of the adventurers were supposed to be. “Where are the others?”
Right. Why would he know? He looked him in the eye. “Dead. The adventurer’s guild was attacked two nights ago. The two of us are alive only thanks to not being present.”
Verathras did not react for quite a moment. Steam rose in thin threads from the gaps in his scales. The nearest drake, Xiir, glared at them, eyes narrowed.
“Mm.” The sound vibrated the coins under Alsen’s boots. “What of the perpetrator?”
“Yet to be found,” Alsen said, sighing on the inside. “Captain Renauld’s men are investigating. We did help with the investigation, though we haven’t found any usable leads.”
“Mmmm.” Another rumble, this one longer. The amber eye slid to Luna, who had arranged her face into an expression of polite, bored attention, as if she were standing in a bread line. “The two of you will have to do, then.”
Alsen opened his mouth to ask about what, exactly, they would have to do. He didn’t get the chance.
“But first.” Verathras’s gaze had not left Luna. “I suppose that is your attendant. She does not seem to be nearly as punished as you promised she would be.”
The drakes straightened. Both of them. In unison. Xiir’s chest inflated. His brother’s tail twitched once against the gold. They had waited three entire days for this.
“Ah,” Alsen said, and felt the conversation begin its predictable descent toward hell.
“You promised me,” Verathras continued, “that she would be disciplined. Strictly. Thoroughly. And yet she stands before me without even attempting to bow, which would be the minimum courtesy.” The dragon’s head shifted by a finger’s breadth, which, at his scale, felt like a mountain repositioning itself. “Explain.”
Luna smirked. “To be fair, he came to me with the idea, but look at him.” She poked his left shoulder, to which Alsen produced a pained grunt.
“What’s he supposed to do with that? He can’t even dress himself unassisted.
How exactly is he supposed to choke me with one hand and spank me with the other? ”
Alsen stared at her, mouth gaping, face paling.
Xiir made a sound that started as a chuckle and turned into an angry hiss as he realized he really shouldn’t be amused.
“Don’t worry, I will see to it that I am properly punished when he’s able. I wouldn’t hold my breath for it, though, because Alsen here will take a while before he recovers enough to be able to appropriately hold me down.”
Alsen pondered the possibility of a spell that would make him fall through the ground. He had to invent that. In about the next few seconds. Or a self-amnesia spell for later.
Verathras’s pupil had contracted to a slit. His mouth’s corner slightly twitched. “Feeble excuses. He can have you tie yourself up.”
“Oh, that would be fun indeed.” Luna snorted. “But it requires the correct state of mind for him. It just doesn’t work when all he’s thinking about is what pain-removing tea he should drink next.”
“As his attendant, it is your duty to find a way to be helpful to his goals. You could find thirty different ways to punish yourself and offer them to him to choose.”
“I have prepared a whole three-week schedule for it. I’ve even started getting tools for it, which wasn’t easy.
The stores are shockingly short on fun, magical items in this city, let me tell you that.
Plus, he’s supposed to punish me. If I do everything myself, which I totally could, would it really be him punishing me?
No, it wouldn’t, it would just be me and the paddle in my sleeping bag, as in many other boring nights. ”
Verathras snorted. “You do seem to have the proper spirit, at the very least.”
Xiir exhaled a thin line of smoke through his nostrils. “Your majesty, you cannot let her get away with it.”
“I’m not getting away,” Luna almost shouted back.
“If anything, I’m trying really hard for it to hit me just where it’s supposed to.
But with the broken arm and dead friends and all that, it’s a real struggle to get any attention.
Much less a proper punishment session. And believe me, I have even tried to drug him up. Multiple times.”
“Your majesty,” Xiir repeated, “with respect—”
“Silence, Xiir.” Verathras snorted. “The attendant’s punishment will be carried out in full once her master’s arm is restored to function. The matter is tabled. Not forgiven.” The eye slid back to Alsen. “Do not mistake the delay for leniency.”
Alsen didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t say anything. He could only rub his face with his palm, nodding.
The dragon huffed once through his nostrils. The gust lifted Alsen’s hair and flattened it back down, warm as a forge’s breath. Alsen exhaled very slowly and reminded himself that he had, in theory, come here to receive a mission.
“To business, then,” Verathras said. The amusement drained out of the rumble like water out of a cracked cup. “My drakes have found the location of a temple I have been searching for for years.”
Alsen’s spine straightened, all focus regained. He knew exactly which one he meant.
“They discovered a map in a raided temple of the spiral,” Verathras continued, “one that leads to the location of the main temple of the Spiral in the region. The only temple we hadn’t found.
” His eye moved, settling on the middle distance beyond the city walls.
“I summoned the adventurers to send them all there to finish the job.”
Alsen formed a faint smile. “I alone am more than enough for that. Plus, I’ve got my attendant with me. That’s already an excessive force for any lost temple.”
Verathras huffed. “Of course you are. But, you are also the group that raided the temple my drakes had scouted, without reporting the discovery of that map.”
“We aren’t from the region,” Luna quickly answered. “It was just a carving on the wall that told me nothing. There was no bounty for it on the notice board, no sponsored quest at the guild, so we couldn’t have known anyone cared.”
“Our companions didn’t either,” Alsen added, leaving aside the morality of pinning the blame on the dead for now. “We raided the temple with a local group, with Theron and Marena, and they didn’t know it was important either.”
“Excuses,” Verathras rumbled. “I will send you two. But…” his entire form turned into flame. In a twist of an inferno, his form collapsed upon itself, compressing, reforming into the shape of a man.
In a flash, the new shape took physical form.
At the top of the hoard now stood Verathras in the shape of a man.
About ten feet tall, with crimson hair and eyebrows, lizard-like eyes, and patches of scales on his pale skin, he stood dressed in a reinforced robe, two massive drake-like wings stretching out from his back. “… I will also come myself.”
Well, fuck. Even Luna froze for a second.
Alsen’s plan was painfully simple. Get to the temple, recover everything he needed, collapse the place, and report that he found it collapsed.
That didn’t work if the dragon came with them.
“We will fly there right now,” Verathras said, motioning toward the drakes with his hand. “Mount the drakes. Xiir and Vress will carry you.”
Xiir’s face stretched into an expression of utter betrayal. He didn’t manage a word.
With a wicked grin, Luna was already at him. “Hah, time to ride my favorite mount, again. I hope you’ve kept your ridge spikes clean.”
In a burst of panic, Xiir snapped with his mouth after her. She slid from the bite with effortless ease, caught him by the neck ridge, and pulled herself onto his back in one smooth move.
“There we go.” She patted his side with venomous tenderness.
Xiir, eyes wide, threw a pleading look at Verathras. “My lord, this cannot be happening.”
Luna reached into her backpack and pulled out a long, leather whipping cane. She raised her hand and swung. It swished through the air, smacking Xiir on his ass so loudly it echoed through the area. “Stop whining. You’re making me look bad.”
Verathras snorted, quickly correcting his expression.
The other drakes stared at Xiir, mortified. He looked ready to implode into nothing.
Luna glanced at Alsen. “Why are you staring, Master? I told you I got the equipment. And we’re going to have a lot of fun with this one after you get better.”
Alsen didn’t reply. He had nothing to say. Instead, he simply walked toward Xiir’s brother, Vress.
This one didn’t fight. Still mortified, he only bowed his head so that Alsen could mount him.
Alsen climbed up one-handed, with more difficulty than he wanted to show, and settled into the hollow between the shoulder blades. His left arm screamed. He ignored it.