by Dima Zales
I close my eyes and focus, seamlessly entering Headspace once more.
Good.
It could’ve been mine, not Rasputin’s, power that ran out. I guess I can thank Itzel for my extra reserves. And she’s not going to thwart my attempts this time because it’s not Itzel’s future I want to glimpse.
It’s Nero’s.
I summon my boss’s essence as much as I can, and even contemplate if I should add my emotions to it for good measure—the way Rasputin did when he wanted to see little Sasha’s future.
The problem with using my feelings for Nero is that I find them very difficult to parse. I was ready to act on our mutual attraction, but then he went ahead and pulled that “you can’t handle me” business.
Luckily, I don’t need to figure out how I feel about Nero for this to work—a set of shapes surrounds me based on what I’ve done thus far.
If I had a heart in this place, it would be hammering right about now.
I can tell that these visions will be horrific. But surely nothing bad can happen to Nero, of all people?
Right?
There’s only one way to find out. Using another trick of Rasputin’s, I let my intuition guide my choice of shape and fall into the vision.
I’m bodiless—meaning I’m not there for whatever is to come.
My surroundings look familiar, though.
The flying island in the sky houses the red castle where I’m currently being held. The river of blood is here, and so is the army of soldiers and monks that are guarding the gates.
A masculine figure steps out of the gate we came through earlier today.
I recognize him immediately.
It’s Nero.
A fully naked Nero. Did I fall asleep? Is this one of my inappropriate dreams?
No. This is a vision. Somehow, Nero must’ve figured out that I followed the map from his safe to Rasputin’s location. I guess he lost his clothes on the way. Maybe he’d worn a spacesuit to get through those uninhabitable worlds and has just ditched it?
A few soldiers and monks notice Nero and attack.
Scowling as if his fund is losing money, Nero blurs into motion and turns everyone in his immediate vicinity into papier-mâché of blood, bones, and gore.
Though I’ve seen him do this to the orcs, it doesn’t make the sight any less disturbing.
Once his immediate enemies are destroyed, Nero inhales a big breath, and a blinding burst of energy spews out from his body.
Nero is gone.
Well, not gone.
He’s replaced with something that makes me wish I had eyes right now—because then I’d be able to not believe them.
A terrifyingly majestic lizard-like creature faces the army. It has a maw full of a sword-like teeth, claws that would look too big on a bulldozer, and scaly wings that could carry a giant Boeing jet.
If I didn’t know mythical creatures existed, my first guess would be a dinosaur—a sort of flying T-Rex, just bigger and deadlier.
But I’ve seen enough since my introduction to the Cognizant world to call this what it is.
A dragon.
Chapter Forty-Nine
All this time, I’ve wondered what Nero’s nature is, and he turns out to be a freaking dragon?
Unless that dragon ate him?
No. Those claws remind me of the way Nero’s hands sometimes look when he kills. Plus, there’s no mistaking those eyes—assuming one ignores their current enormous size. They’re the same blue-gray as always, with unnaturally (or perhaps totally naturally for his kind) thick limbal rings.
A dragon.
I thought I was done being surprised when a new mythological creature is thrown at me, but a dragon?
And Nero being one.
We kissed. We almost did a lot more than that.
Wait a minute. Is this why he said I wouldn’t be able to handle him? Does his dragon nature make intimacy extra rough or something? If true, that would be a legitimate concern.
Then something else hits me.
When we debated who might be trying to kill us, Nero mentioned it could be one of his kind. No wonder he thought wearing masks and using weapons would be beneath them.
I don’t get a chance to muse further because the dragon opens its massive maw and produces a booming roar.
There’s something eerily familiar about the way the sound vibrates my inner organs—an extra impressive feat because I currently have no organs.
Then it clicks.
It was neither a bear-dinosaur hybrid nor a giant bird that chased us in the world just before we reached this one.
That, too, must’ve been a dragon.
Also, like the last time I heard the roar, I could swear there are human words in it.
“Give her to me or die,” the roar seems to say.
The human army all pale as one, and the ones on the outer bands of the army skedaddle—along with all of Lilith’s worshipers.
I think if they understood what Nero wants, they would give me to him, but as is, they have no choice but to raise their puny weapons.
The archers act in unison, spraying Nero with a giant cloud of arrows.
The sharp projectiles glide off Nero’s scales as if he were made of tank armor. Not a single one leaves so much as a scratch.
With another, much angrier roar, Nero flies up and swats at the nearest group of monks with his massive claw.
What’s left of the monks looks like it’s been run through a food processor.
Despite what just happened, a brave group of soldiers throws spears at Nero.
Just like the arrows before them, the spearheads don’t scratch a single scale.
They do seem to piss Nero off, though.
With a roar, he swoops down and lands in the middle of the squad. His claws shred the soldiers into baby food for cannibals.
A few swordsmen decide to take advantage of Nero’s landing and charge at him, waving their swords.
His claws swipe around too fast to track, brutally killing each man.
More soldiers swarm to replace the fallen ones, which is when Nero gets bored with their suicidal tendencies and launches into the air with a single beat of his massive wings.
He roars with renewed ferocity, and his eyes narrow as their limbal rings thicken. Then his chest expands as he inhales enough air to fill up a large movie theater.
Is he about to—
Yep, there it is.
A stream of fire spews out of his mouth. It’s directional, like that of a flamethrower, but with all the intensity of a small volcano.
Flesh sizzles, and hundreds of men scream in unison.
Nero dives and glides over the discouraged army, his maw agape. The fire covers the ground like napalm, causing armor, bones, and stones to melt and burn.
Happy with the damage to ground troops, the dragon turns his massive head toward the floating island—just in time to spot a squadron of solders riding on top of fierce rocs. Both the riders and the giant birds are heavily armored, and have long lances attached to a special holder in the bird’s shoulder—as though they’re about to do air jousting.
Nero swirls in the air, then spews fire at his attackers.
A huge chunk of the squadron bursts into flames, but some scatter.
Nero examines the figures around him, then looks down and spots a large bird and rider trying to flee to the ground.
Claws out, Nero swoops after them with a speed a hawk would envy.
The bird shrieks as Nero’s claws rake its flesh, and the rider screams when Nero’s talons peel his armor as if it were made out of aluminum foil.
The survivors swarm down at Nero, their lances ready.
A lance grazes his thigh. Another hits his shoulder.
The dragon’s next roar sounds like it has notes of pain in it. Did they actually hurt him?
Then Nero’s spiky tail strikes his leftmost assailant’s uncovered face, collapsing his skull into the helmet. The tail then strikes at the rightmost attacker�
�and at the same exact time, Nero’s teeth crunch on another and his claws shred two more.
Meatgrinderfied chunks of bird and human rain onto the scorched ground below. Not surprisingly, the remaining roc riders lose their nerve and attempt to flee.
Nero has other ideas, though. He chases and destroys each one before flying higher, toward the castle.
“Give her up,” the roar seems to say as he flies up to the base of the castle.
No one comes out to defend the structure or otherwise reply to the demand.
Nero angrily claws at the wall of the castle and—to my shock—rips away a room-sized chunk.
The rest of the building shakes as though hit by an earthquake.
Was this what happened to the room where I foresaw Ariel’s torture? If so, I’ve got to question Lilith’s priorities. I’d restore the castle first, torture prisoners later—
Nero sniffs the chunk of castle he’s holding, then tosses it to the ground.
Was he sniffing for me?
As the broken red rocks rain down, I spot at least a hundred soldiers in the rubble, all screaming their lungs out.
Wings beating in the air, Nero flies up and looks around. Zeroing in on one of the spires, he swoops down and rips it off. Sniffing this new catch, he discards it and looks for another piece to carve off.
A small figure floats out of the castle.
It’s Lilith, and she’s holding something in her hand—something like a sword hilt but with no sword.
“You’re trespassing, lizard,” she says in Russian in that heavenly voice of hers. “Did you forget about the accord I have with your kind? You stay out of my world, and I stay out of yours.”
So there’s a whole world of dragons? It must be the one where I was nearly killed by one.
Nero’s reply roar is so intense that it blows Lilith back a foot.
Undaunted, she floats forward.
Nero swats at her with his tail, but misses. He tries to claw her—but misses again.
Is she that fast at dodging, or is she using her powers? I mean, she is a probability manipulator. Can that be used to reduce the chance of getting hit? If so, fighting a powerful trickster like her is going to be extremely challenging, even for Nero in this form.
The dragon’s neck strains as he tries to chomp Lilith in half—but he somehow misses her body yet again.
“Feisty,” Lilith says and extends her free hand at the sky above Nero.
A thousand birds of different varieties swarm at Nero out of a cloud with deafening squawking.
Is that part of her probability manipulation power? I suppose there was a chance the birds would be hidden in that cloud, and an even smaller chance that they would want to attack a dragon.
Nero swats a few birds away, but they quickly cover him from head to tail. Though they’re as small compared to him as mosquitos would be to me, the sheer numbers are overwhelming.
If that many mosquitos covered me, I’m pretty sure I’d be sucked dry.
With another roar, Nero spins in place, causing the birds to fly in every direction. Immediately, they fly back at him.
He sucks in air and spews fire at the birds.
As they go up in flames, Nero directs his fire-breath at Lilith.
She somehow manages to dive under the flames without getting singed.
The dragon lowers his head and shoots her with a new stream of fire, but she flies right above it.
Clearly angry, Nero torpedoes toward the pseudo goddess, but before he can reach her, the same cloud where the birds came from darkens and produces a lightning bolt, which hits Nero square in the snout.
I guess there’s always a chance of lightning when there are clouds, so this might be Lilith’s power again.
Nero looks momentarily stunned, but recovers quickly and resumes his onslaught.
Boulder-sized chunks of hail pummel Nero’s head as he closes the distance to Lilith.
I didn’t think hail ever got that big, but I guess it’s more likely than, say, a cartoon anvil or a Honda Civic falling from the sky.
Ignoring the ice blows, Nero lunges forward and snaps at Lilith with his teeth again—but misses.
Before he can get his head away from the tiny figure, she punches him in the snout.
To my shock, the impact causes the huge dragon to fly back a dozen yards. He shakes his head as if to clear it, then uses his wings to slow himself down and go on the offensive again.
With unshakable confidence, Lilith flies at him, uncaring that it puts her within reach of his deadly claws.
Nero swipes at her, his movements too fast to track, but he misses over and over.
He roars in frustration and intensifies his efforts.
In response, she hits him with lightning and hail again, but he ignores it. Somehow, he must hit her because Lilith is thrown back, toward one of the towers.
So there’s a limit to her power, after all. She might’ve used too much of her mojo by manipulating the weather, and thus the odds finally did not go in her favor.
She smashes into the tower, and it explodes into pieces.
Whoa. Could anyone have survived that? Even someone with the power of luck?
As if answering my question, Lilith floats out of the debris, seemingly undamaged.
“What is it that you want, lizard?” She dusts off her clothes. “Out of respect for the lizard king, I’m doing my best not to kill you but—”
This must’ve been the wrong thing to say because Nero charges forward with renewed ferocity and lands another hit on her, destroying a castle wall but still not hurting her.
“Is this personal?” she asks, flying up from the rubble. “Because I’ll have you know I’ve never killed one of your kind.”
Nero doesn’t seem to care and renews the attacks.
“Maybe you need a seer?” she shouts after she dusts herself off again and dodges another series of deadly attacks. “If it’s Rasputin you’re after, he’s not as good as the legends will have you believe. Certainly not worth dying over—”
Nero’s tail manages to strike her in the chest, and she flies backward—but recovers before she slams into anything.
“I can ask Nostradamus to make time for you. He’s much, much more powerful,” she says, flying toward Nero again. “You’d owe me a favor as a result, but he’s worth it.”
Clearly not impressed with that offer, Nero attacks her with renewed intensity and manages to swat her with his tail so hard, she crash-lands into a high tower of the castle—again breaking it into pieces.
“This is beginning to get on my nerves,” she says and presses something on the sword hilt she’s been holding.
A blade appears—a long blue blade made out of shimmering plasma that reminds me of whatever the gates are made from—and lightsabers from Star Wars.
“Leave!” Lilith waves the sword in wide arcs with a loud whoosh. “Last chance.”
Nero’s eyes narrow into slits. He must recognize this weapon.
I wish I had a mouth to tell him to leave. I should be able to figure out how to escape on my own, somehow. And even if I can’t escape, there’s no reason for us both to die on this world.
But he doesn’t leave. Instead, he flies closer to her, and his tail strikes at her sword-wielding hand with the speed of an angry cobra.
She dodges his attack and slices at the same time—chopping off a tip of his tail.
The scaly bit of flesh falls to the ground, and blood pours from the wound.
Nero furiously roars and directs a thick stream of fire at Lilith.
She dives under the flames and keeps flying, going into a skydiving-like freefall. She stops a few feet above the ground—directly under Nero and the stream of blood pouring from his tail. Catching some of the red liquid, she floats away and makes a show of swirling it in her mouth.
“Atrocious bouquet,” she comments after she swallows. “Tannic, rough, vinegary…”
Nero clearly doesn’t like this blood-tasting commentary. H
e dives down, his claws aimed at her sword-wielding hand.
Two things happen almost at the same time.
One of Nero’s talons rakes Lilith’s forearm, and her sword pierces his shoulder.
The plasma blade goes into the impenetrable dragon skin like a hot knife into butter. Then Lilith rips it out, and a fountain of blood gushes from Nero’s shoulder.
Clutching her own injury with her left hand, Lilith lands on the ground.
Growling like a thousand wounded bears, Nero swoops down at a mind-boggling speed, the claw of his undamaged side extended.
His talon catches her shoulder this time, but her sword pierces Nero’s chest.
I wish I could scream or help him somehow, but without a body, all I can do is watch helplessly.
Nero’s claws strike the ground.
She yanks out the sword.
The blood is like a river now. It covers everything—including Lilith herself.
Nero clutches at his horrible wound with one claw, but it’s like trying to soak up a whole lake with a sponge.
Lilith—whose own shoulder and forearm wounds are already closing—flies up and slices off Nero’s right wing.
I can’t bear to keep watching this, but I have no idea how to stop.
With a pained roar, the dragon collapses, the impact of his fall shaking the island like a mini-earthquake.
Lilith leaps on his back with her sword outstretched.
The plasma blade enters Nero’s back.
Lilith pulls it out and runs up his back toward his head.
No. Please no.
Moving sluggishly, Nero tries to swat at her with the tail, but she dodges it as she makes her way to the giant neck.
Time seems to slow.
The shimmering sword makes a wide arc toward the dragon’s powerful neck.
If I had a mouth, it would be gaping in horror.
The blade slices through the neck, and Nero’s head drops to the ground.
Fire and blood explode out of the wound like a gory volcano, and the dragon’s massive body slackens.
Lilith disables her blade, jumps to the ground, and looks over the now-dead dragon. “What a waste,” she says in her heavenly voice.
Chapter Fifty
