The Silver Sheen Chronicle
A Dragon’s Betrayal
By C.L. Patterson
Edited by Taryn Wieland
Cover by McKenna Cook
Published by Christopher Patterson at Smashwords
Copyright 2019 C.L. Patterson
http://cpap244.wix.com/silversheenchronicle
www.thesilversheen.blogspot.com
Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
EPILOGUE
PROLOGUE
The midday sun scorched the Tessíran desert. Snakes and insects burrowed under the gritty sand to seek shelter from the heat. The tall sand dunes would provide shade in the morning and evening, but at midday, the dunes radiated heat up and over each slope of sand. Small birds sought shelter amidst thorny, wooded bushes and dried clumps of bladed grasses. Within the heat, nothing dared move, not even the wind.
Erith grinned as he walked between the dunes. He pulled the hood of his cloak back, soaking the sun in on his face and neck. Beneath the cloak, he wore his white uniform with the purple stripes down the sides, signifying he was one of the advanced Conduits at the School of the Faye. To him, advanced was an understatement. The birds, who at any other time would fly away from something being so close, only chirped in annoyance before returning to panting, trying to survive the few hours that the heat would be at its worst. To Erith, the heat and animosity of the desert was an ally, as it made for a very private meeting.
He left the capital city of Noiknaer that morning, informing his teachers at the School of the Faye, that he would be off meditating and communing. In actuality, his true master summoned him while he slept the night before, appearing to him in a dream of when and where to meet. It was the first time his master summoned him, though Erith knew who his master was through other visions.
His master sat on the ground within a cluster of browned grasses and rocks. His face was shadowed, though not from cloak being pulled too far over his face. In all of Erith’s visions, he never saw his master’s face. What he knew was that his master was a man who wore the garb of the nomad, a gray tunic and dark pants, with a tattered black cloak. He also wore metal spiked gauntlets and dark metal boots. The master stared back at Erith, amber eyes glowing from under the hood of his cloak. One of his pets, a six-foot lizard with metal hard scales and rows of needle like teeth, laid coiled at his side. The lindworm looked up at Erith and hissed as he approached. The master stroked the back of the lindworm’s neck with his right hand. In his left, he held onto a leather strap that was connected to a vial that was as long as his hand that had a circular mark etched into the glass. A dark purple liquid sloshed within the vial.
“Father,” Erith whispered as he bent to a knee and bowed.
“Rise, my child,” the master said, standing and approaching Erith. “I take it by now, you have learned who I am.”
Erith nodded. “Yes, you are Vilheim. The school has labeled you a traitor and an enemy to all.”
“And do you agree with them?”
“No,” Erith said with another grin. “Life must be tamed. The Faye itself must be governed. It is chaos.”
“Yes, it is chaos.” Vilheim paused to breathe deeply. As he breathed in, the vial in his left hand buzzed and lightning zapped around the container. When the lightning stopped, there was slightly less of the purple liquid within the vial. “What have you learned concerning the Seer and the other teachers that are bound to me?”
At this, Erith bowed again, grimacing, “The Seer has betrayed us, Father. He hunts dragons and corrupts their harvested blood for his own benefit, though not with the same skill or manner as you intended. I will kill him, and those that work with him.”
“No,” Vilheim said calmly, “I have a use for the Seer.”
“Father?”
“The Seer’s betrayal was inevitable. I needed to teach him what corrupted dragon blood could do so that he could properly hunt and collect it on my behalf. He did so for a time, time enough for me to make additional plans. In anticipation of actions, I placed one who is loyal to me next to the Seer and his other allies. This will create a path whereby the Seer will be killed, and another servant born to create for me a new body.”
“Flesh is a simple thing to create, break, or mend.” Erith gestured to the desert and sand around him. “I can make you a body from what is here.” Erith closed his eyes and the sand around him began to swirl from a wind that wasn’t there.
“It would not be enough,” Vilheim replied and stretched out his right hand toward Erith. Erith opened his eyes, and the sand around him fell back to the ground. “The body you would make, or one I would make, would degrade quickly. The Faye tugs and pulls at my soul continually, trying to send be back into the continuum of creation. I have existed long since my time should have passed, and this,” Vilheim held up the vial, “and those I have bound myself to, are what keep me here. A new body, yes, it is a simple thing, but I require a new life, and that is something beyond your strength.”
“Then what do you wish of me?”
“The woman who raised you, do you know of her true nature?”
“I know that she is a dragon who takes a human shape. I refer to her as Mother. She is held against her will to the confines of the city by the same Seer that betrays us.”
“Yes, and her escape is of paramount importance to me. Burn the School and Noiknaer to the ground.”
“And what of the Seer?”
“He will ensure that his cargo of tainted blood is secured before he tries to recapture and bind your mother to his side anew. In time, the Seer’s death will be swift, but it will not be by your hand. I have set things in motion to find the one who will provide the killing stroke to the Seer. When he is found, I will summon you again. After the Seer is killed, his eyes must be harvested. Once we have those eyes, I will teach you what is needed to construct for me a proper body and give me new life.”
“And what of the Seeps?” Erith asked, though not out of compassion. The Seeps were common to the north, where large sections of earth spanning for miles and miles in any direction, would go black and disintegrate into large chasms. “They are growing and traveling further south. The city of Varlette is gone, and most of the areas bordering the Northern Wilderness are breaking. Thousands die from small villages being upended, and strong creatures of the Faye emerge from them, burning and destroying the whatever is left that the Seep itself did not consume. What if all our allies turn against us out of fear for self-preservation?”
“The Faye is trying to defend itself, but it doesn’t understand what it is trying to defend against. The more the world breaks, the larger the Seeps become, the better it will play into our hand… in time. Go, you have your duty.”
Erith bowed again, and when he looked up, Vilheim and the Lindworm were gone. Erith walked forward, investigating the ground and area where his father sat. The sand was unbroken and undisturbed. Stalks of dried desert grasses were straight and rigid, lacking any bend or crease from being stepped on. Any sign of disturbance
was absent. He plucked a piece of the rigid grass from the ground and twisted it in his fingers. He closed his eyes and breathed, the sand whipping up around his feet. The next instant, the piece of grass caught fire, burned for a second, and the fell to the ground as ash.
Patience was not one of his strengths. Even after his master’s instruction, he still believed it best to kill all those who betrayed his father first, let their burning corpses send a message of the consequence of treachery. His father’s words ‘Go, you have your duty’, ran through his mind again. If he were to act of his own accord, would he be any worse than the Seer and those that turned against Vilheim?
“Let them burn,” he whispered to himself as he turned back to Noiknaer. Fortunately, he was only instructed explicitly to let the Seer and his mother escape. The others would be at his mercy.
CHAPTER 1
The celebration was as large and loud as a thunderstorm. Roaring, snarling, and laughter echoed up from deep within the dragon’s cavern named Moving Mountain. Maerek, a third-generation descendant of the dragon Moving Mountain, from whom the cavern was named, sat perched in a high outcropping and watched silently as his family celebrated the joining of one of its daughters, Raechel, to Tsugo, son of the dragon keep, Roaring Cove. Raechel’s scales shimmered red and blue, in a vibrant contrast to Tsugo’s green and somber black scales. Other members of the family seemed to glitter in the torch light. The steel-like greys and silvers mixed with saturated violets, yellow, and red, blue and even a few purple scaled cousins. Everyone shimmered as they glided, slid, danced, ate and laughed amongst new family.
One of his cousins, Tamera, who had ruby red scales and a slender, lithe figure, weaved and slipped through the crowded keep toward where Maerek perched. She carried a small, brown leather satchel with metal clasps that was strapped around her neck. The other family members had a satchel of their own, but for such an occasion as this, they were stored in a separate cavern within the Keep. It struck Maerek as an odd thing that Tamera, one who favored socializing, dancing, and especially flirting, would carry her satchel in such a setting as this. He anticipated that she, second only to Raechel, would be a center of attention.
As she moved, her scales reminded him of a school of bi-colored fish that would be one color in one angle of light, and a completely different color as they shifted direction. Her true color was ruby red, but as she turned and slithered closer to Maerek’s perch, her scales reflected an iridescent blue.
Maerek smiled as he watched other family members, their scales shimmering as they moved. It was a visual delight compared to the usual dark stone of the cave and the grey light from the seemingly never-ending overcasts. He flicked his tongue, tasting the air, trying to place each new scent in the large family with its owner. Old, raw scents of limestone and smoke from the older generation dominated the air. There was a plethora of subtle and more common smells. The pleasantly spicy taste of cinnamon, the softening taste of rosemary, someone had the unusual, but delightful scent of garlic and honey. Each of those smells, separate and distinct, and at the same time, well mixed in the family gathering.
Maerek wasn’t one to be involved in large social gatherings and didn’t feel neglected or awkward as the Keep filled. He just wasn’t one to socialize. He preferred introspection and silence to socialization and conversation. The drakes, with newfound cousins, were wrestling in an open area just below where Maerek perched. The longer it went on, the more it looked like a tangled ball of dragon tail, wing, and limb. Maerek snickered as hisses and short chirps of frustration sounded from the rioting mess of young play.
That was where Tamera was headed. She must have heard or noticed the rough play from afar and intended to break up the fight. Maerek laughed a little louder when one of the male drakes tried to swipe a sibling across the back with his tale, one of the dirtiest tricks in dragon fighting. Tamera saw the tail whipping around and caught it in her jaw just in time, giving a quick snap of her teeth. Maerek laughed louder this time, thinking back to when his own tail had been bitten, a scolding of sorts. Tamera looked up at Maerek as he laughed and, and after pushing the drakes back to the dining area, flew up to his perch. She exhaled smoke, which surrounded and enveloped her. As the smoke lifted, she stepped forward in her human shape. She was dressed in a grey, full collared and sleeved tunic with brown trousers, with the same black leather satchel now strapped around her back. Her human shape was similar in nature to her true form - thin, slender, seemingly flexible, with red hair and blue eyes.
“Enjoying the view, Maerek?” Tamera asked. There was a little bit of spite in her tone. She had always pestered Maerek with an unyielding persistence to be more involved in social gatherings. Maerek rolled his eyes and continued to watch his family. “You know it isn’t every day that we get to see a union and the groom’s family. Usually, the younglings need watching, and with the humans being as watchful as they are, usually we all can’t go out at once! You should go down and socialize, get to know them a little more, a lot more actually, anything more, really, than just sitting up here and being a gloomy spectator. You look like you are the only one that isn’t enjoying himself.”
“And who says I wasn’t enjoying myself?” Maerek responded softly, without looking up. “When you sing about this occasion to your generations, they will only see what you have seen and feel what you have felt, experience all that you have experienced. This way, I can see everything, all the interactions, keep a more thorough and accurate history.”
“You won’t have anyone to sing to if you stay up here. Who knows, perhaps your mate is down there, right now, socializing with one of your cousins.”
“Then let her socialize I say. If my mate is truly down there, I will find her in time.”
“Time waits for no dragon, Maerek. Even if we are—”
“Shush!” Maerek interrupted. “Look, Tsugo is about to give his song, I want to know this!”
Tsugo looked over at his new mate and nuzzled her neck gently. He then stood on his hind legs and spread his wings fully, catching everyone’s eyes. His deep gray scales glimmered like diamonds in the torchlight. Tiny gems seemed to glisten from within the membrane of his wings. The smell of ginger and cedar, the scent of his musk, soaked the cave. He looked magnificent, so much so that Tamera hushed her rebuttal, mouth hung open in the middle of a stopped retort.
The dragons stopped laughing, the children stopped wrestling, and the rest of the family stopped eating at the sight and smell of Tsugo. Everyone was silent save for the male’s deep breathing. After a few moments of silence, he began to sing. His voice was like a warm velvet blanket that caused even the younglings to lie down and smile dreamily. After the third note, the memories and feelings of Tsugo and his courtship began to flow in Maerek’s and every other dragon’s mind.
It was toward the end of a recent mating ceremony hosted in Roaring Cove, located on the coast between Port Rasmú and Jettismore. Tsugo was seeing off one of his cousins after the union and caught a whiff of his mate’s scent, roses and maple sap. He couldn’t leave her be. He searched all around the cave, but there were too many others, and the scent was lost in the crowd. As new family and friends began their journey home, Tsugo caught the smell again, and tracked it to the exit of the Keep. He wasn’t going to let her go, but again, he was too late, and she was gone.
He tracked her across the desert, into the northern wilderness, westward to the coast, south, and then east to Port Rasmú. He feared that he had tracked incorrectly, seeing that he was near where he started and the scent was weakening. At first, she was but a few hours ahead, and now, as the journey went on, she was getting further and further ahead. Her scent markers seemed to be about a day old. It was while he was walking across a bridge in his human form that he noticed a note, nailed to the handrail wrapped in a red ribbon. His name was one the note and it was from her. Her scent was all over it.
“I know you are seeking me, and I have led you about. I will travel by barge around Caite and up to th
e Wild Lands to be with my keep. Find me if you can.”
Tsugo sang little about the trip, and how his mind was only filled with thoughts of her. When he arrived at the Wild Lands, the scent was as a strong as it was on the note, and he tracked her to the town of Ruiska, where she waited next to a fire.
Each of those memories, through song, became a memory for each of the family members, as if they themselves had lived that experience. Each felt the rush of excitement in tracking down Raechel, the disappointment on reaching Port Rasmú, the eager anticipation while on the barge to Ruiska, and the nervousness at seeing her by the fire. Tsugo’s song was now part of the larger song of Moving Mountain. And as the song of Moving Mountain was sung, each of the memories would become each of the individuals.
After the song was sung, the family gave a light applause, still wrapped in the drowsy sensation Tsugo’s voice. Tamera dug her elbow into Maerek’s side.
“See, it isn’t that hard.” Maerek huffed and turned his head as laughter and conversation started again. “I am only trying to encourage you to socialize a bit more. Our history has been well remembered without a gloomy overseeing cousin.”
Maerek didn’t respond, hoping that Tamera would take a hint. He focused on the large spread of meat that was set in the dining chamber. Dressed carcasses of elk, deer, boar, mountain goat and other large game were piled in hall. Dragons sniffed for a preferred portion of meat, and then bit off a chunk, tearing the flesh, pelt, and bone from the body.
“Your love for memory keeping can’t be the only reason you don’t like to socialize? All the other cousins are at least attempting to be social or court someone. Why not you? You are one of the oldest of Vaalkún's grandchildren and should be setting an example.”
“You know why Tamera,” Maerek said softly. “You’re smart enough to see it, especially considering you just fed. You just want me to vocalize it, perhaps give the reason some physical or tangible understanding rather than a logical one.”
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