Chapter 24 #3
“If I’m right, then it’ll be more like you’ll be running from me. And when I catch you, well, I’ll need to do my best to convince you to be mine.”
She stuttered to a stop. He paused with her.
“Is…this ritual is sexual?”
Did he detect a note of interest in her voice? He certainly hoped so.
“It might be.”
“Might?”
“When we get to the monolith, you’ll understand.” He tugged her along.
“It won’t be public, will it?”
“No. These rites are sacred mysteries, passed down by clerics of the elder gods. They are not public spectacle.”
He suspected that was more tradition than doctrine. After all, if every noble knew the rites of the monarch, they could all complete the rite and declare themselves ruler. Not every king or queen had heard the heartbeat before they’d been crowned—only afterwards.
Aurora sighed with relief and shivered. He pulled her closer to give what he could of his body heat. The air had grown colder, the angle of the corridor gently sloping all the while. By now they would be well below even the level of the dungeons.
But as they neared their destination, the heartbeat grew louder.
“Theron?”
“Almost there,” he said, rounding the last corner. “Close your eyes.”
Between one breath and the next they entered the chamber. The frigid air was replaced by warmth and the impenetrable dark by a brightness to rival a sunny day. No longer was the floor cold, hard stone. His feet sank into rich, soft earth, his ankles tickled by grasses and wildflowers.
“What is this?” Aurora asked, stunned.
Slowly, he opened his eyes, adjusting to the abrupt change in the light.
“This is the beating heart of Altanus,” he answered.
Impossibly deep beneath the palace was a pocket of the world above.
It stretched out as far as the borders of Aureum, mimicking the ancient landscape before his people began building monuments and permanent settlements.
Before them lay a ring of stones as tall as his hips, and in the centre, the monolith.
Shaped like a heart, sparkling like pure gold and veined in blue, it jutted out, taller and wider than any temple.
Here, the heartbeat wasn’t so much a sound as a feeling that could shake one’s very bones.
On its surface were etched the scenes of the great dragon’s life.
“How is this possible?” Aurora asked, drawn inexorably to the monolith.
Theron let go of her hand as she approached it with awe and reverence. If he was right, she would be drawn to the scene depicting the unicorn’s abduction, confirming that her dream had been divinely sent. He watched her, smiling as she made directly for that very scene.
Aurora reached out a hesitant hand towards the carving, gasping when her skin made contact.
She was absorbed as any child when called by a wellspring.
Like him, she would now be reliving that same dream, confirming how her rite was to be performed.
Theron approached the monolith and pressed his own hand to it, just to be certain.
A scene flashed in his mind, but instead of being the unicorn fleeing the dragon, he was the dragon, hunting down his bride.
It seemed his adventurous wife would get her wish of being chased by him sooner rather than later.
Aurora stumbled away from the monolith.
“I saw…my nightmare. But this time…”
“It wasn’t frightening?” he guessed.
She shook her head, blushing. When she looked up at him, it was with eyes darkened by lust. It was a look that went from his eyes straight to his groin.
He almost wished he could take her right there and then, tempting little fairy that she was.
But the heartbeat hummed through him in a familiar way.
Aurora’s coronation would need to wait one more day, by the feel of it.
“Do you feel the thrum of the heart?”
“Yes,” she said, just now taking in the rest of the landscape. She approached one of the stones ringing the monolith, walking around it and staring as though it presented some puzzle or other.
“It means a wellspring will soon appear nearby. As much as I would love to let you explore to your heart’s content, that will need to wait until tomorrow.”
“How do you know?”
“Over the years, I’ve grown accustomed to how the heartbeat feels here. Come, I’ll show you one of the best parts of being called by Aureum,” he said, offering her his hand.
She seemed sad to be leaving so soon, but as king, he had preparations to make for the benefit of his youngest citizens. They left the monolith room and began the trek back to the upper palace.
“I’m surprised you can navigate the labyrinth. I didn’t think you could see the markings in this darkness.”
He stuttered to a stop.
“There are markings?” he asked, surprised.
“Isn’t that how you’ve been leading us?”
“Erm…no. I had to memorize the way, as have all the clerics who worship here.”
“I wonder if maybe the original builders were fairy-born. Wouldn’t that be something? Just imagine, the first monarch was likely even shorter than I am. They’d be shocked to find out what their descendants look like!” she chuckled, pulling him along.
“Shorter than you? Are you not fairy-born?” He raised a brow.
“Well, yes, fairies came in large numbers to Trisia long before I was born, but I’m descended from the giants too. From what I recall of my history, the fairies were generally shorter than I am now.”
Theron bit back a smile. He would be shocked to find she had even a drop of giant’s blood but decided to keep that to himself.
“I take it you’re convinced now?” he asked.
“I…yes. The moment I touched the monolith, I stopped being afraid. It felt like being…cherished. I don’t know how else to describe it, except maybe how I’ve felt in my mother’s arms. I felt…”
“What did you feel?”
She didn’t answer him for some time as they ascended.
“Like I was home,” she said, her voice wavering. “I don’t know how to feel about that.”
“Is it so strange that your home could be here?”
“But wouldn’t that mean never going back to my own time?”
“I don’t see why not. Who knows, with the magic you gain from Aureum, travelling back and forth might be possible far sooner than it would otherwise,” he reminded her.
“But I’d be abandoning Aureum.”
“No, you wouldn’t. Whether you sit in the throne room or at your family’s side matters not.
You will always be a monarch of Aureum and a cleric of the elder gods.
The position of king or queen these days means you carry sacred, administrative, and martial duties, but in truth, a monarch’s most important duty is as a cleric.
If you stripped away all the rest, that is all that matters, and you can be a cleric here with me as well as you can when we see your future world together. ”
“I see.”
As the air lost its chill, he feared her silence was one born of apprehension towards her new calling. Perhaps a little hope was what she needed.
“You said Aureum is a desert in your time, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“After we have slain Drakon, when we travel to your time, if it is still a desert, you and I will transform it back to its former glory. We will bring back the rains, the plants, the animals, the spirits, the people—all of it.”
They emerged from the darkness, and Theron was glad to see a sly quirk to her lips.
“You propose to turn a desert into a fertile landscape?”
“I told you I know how to solicit rain.”
“You just keep believing that.” She laughed, and his heart felt lighter.
“Cheeky. How about a new bet then? If I can make it rain using sacred rites, you will submit to me tomorrow before the coronation rite.”
“And if you can’t?”
“Then I’ll submit to you.”
“I do like it when you grovel.”
“And I so enjoy your sweet begging.”
“Deal.”
They walked hand in hand to the gardens where Theron told the attendants to fetch his advisors and urged Aurora to find a seat. The sun was high in a cloudless sky. It was the perfect time to begin.
“Do you suppose it will rain in the next hour, dearest wife?”
“I find it unlikely.”
“Then watch and learn. One day soon, I will teach you this dance.”
Theron took a cleansing breath and made his first step with intention, and the next with purpose.
The dance was a sensual supplication to the deity of the sky, every movement meant to entrance the eyes of the divine.
Aurora had begun the dance with a brow quirked and a posture that loudly expressed her disbelief, but soon enough she was made captive by the movements of his body.
Before the spire had been built, he’d rarely performed this rite.
He was more used to moving his body with the intent of a warrior, not the sensual undulations of a dancer.
But since the blight, he’d performed this rite more and more.
One day, Aurora would perform it at his side, a dance made even more erotic with a counterpart. He couldn’t wait.