Earlier, when she’d woken, I saw some horrible revelation in her eyes. Whatever she dreamt of frightened her beyond just a normal nightmare. I wanted to ask her more, but she went right back to sleep and was snoring quietly now.
“Fifty-fifty,” I replied honestly. “Most of what I’ve found on this thing was from centuries ago.”
“This shadow has been around that long? Why do we not know of it?”
I rested back against the cave wall, crossing my feet at the ankles and lacing my fingers behind my head. “No idea. You’d think when something this horrible threatens our world, we’d all rise up to stop it instead of trying to erase it and act like it never happened.”
“Do you think whatever’s driving this did something to our memories?”
“I’d say there’s a good chance, but unless we can find someone who was alive that long ago and ask, we’ll never know for sure.”
The firelight flickered off the sword resting against the wall. Teaching Kate to fight was necessary, and I expected her to be horrible at it. She never held a weapon before in her life until that spawn attacked us. But watching her move as she went after Forrest, there was a strange grace to it, as if she’d been doing it for years.
“Muscle memory,” I whispered.
“Pardon?”
“Sorry, it’s just… the way Kate fought today, I’ve seen that style before.”
“It was strange, how easily she slipped into those stances,” he agreed quietly. “She said she’s never fought before.”
“Not that she could remember.”
It had been impressive to watch the gliding style of swordplay, how she used the air to push her attacks and she did it all with her eyes closed. It shouldn’t have been possible unless she’d done it before.
Forrest was right. We needed to understand who her father was if we were to figure out who she really was. The only other time I’d seen fighting like that was in the inter-realm festivals where fighters would show off their skills in the arena, non-killing of course. The festival was meant to bring peace between the races.
Before I was forced to leave my home, I remembered watching a dragon knight from an ancient line. He was one of the last of his kin, and he fought with such a fluid grace, it left the crowd speechless and his opponent in awe. No other dragon clan displayed such skill, and I never thought I’d see it again.
Until today when Kate suddenly did it as if it was nothing.
“Do you know of a clan that died out?” I asked Forrest. “A clan of warriors?”
“We’re all warriors,” he said dryly, “and sadly dragon clans all come to an end when it’s their time.”
“This one would’ve been recently.”
Forrest’s face wrinkled in thought. “The only clan that has disappeared in the last one hundred years is one we do not speak of. They were traitors, all of them.”
“What did they do?”
“They attempted to assassinate the royal family, my family. They were mad, all of them, claimed we were all going to burn in some horrible fiery end if they didn’t spill the blood of my family to save us.” He rested his head back with a scowl set on his face. “It’s said their ravings didn’t stop until their heads were removed from their bodies.”
That didn’t make sense to me. We all had our crazies, but for an entire clan to rise up and say the end was near? “And no one thought to try and question them once they were secured?”
“My father did, but nothing they said made sense. He couldn’t trust them enough to let them loose, so he had them executed, and the rest were banished, told never to return. They’d already run for it; we never expected to see them again.” He picked up a pebble from the ground and tossed it absently between his hands, seeing a scene from many years ago from the strange look in his eyes. “Shame really, they were the most magnificent warriors. Their wingspan was legendary as were their acts of bravery on the battlefield. I grew up on stories of their accomplishments.”
My stomach sank as I looked to Kate and back to Forrest. “Did someone curse them?”
“After they were killed, their lands became poisoned,” Forrest said. “Nothing has grown there since and it’s said nothing ever will. The curse that it was rumored fell on them was transferred to their lands, and it’s forbidden for any to travel there for fear they’ll be cursed, too.”
I almost didn’t want him to go on, but my curiosity got the better of me. “Has anyone gone there ever, just to see?”
“No, dragons are superstitious, you know that,” he said bitterly.
“And yet something tells me you know of someone who went there anyway.”
He caught the pebble in his fist and crushed it, so dust fell to the ground beside him. “A friend, on a dare. He went and when he returned… he was not himself. He was placed in a cell and has never been released for fear of what he will do.” He met my gaze as he whispered, “He tried to burn me alive. Said I was poisoned.”
“What was the name of the clan, Forrest?”
“No, no we were told never to speak it. It’s bad luck.”
“Because our luck could be so much worse right now,” I said, holding up my hands. “What was the name?”
“Why does it matter?”
“I don’t know, but the more information I can get my hands on, the better.”
He still looked skeptical, and I was ready to wring his neck to get him to spit it out, but then he sucked in a deep breath and whispered, “Darrah. The clan’s name was Darrah. Before my family ruled, they were in charge of our clan, but things happen as they so often do, and power changed hands.” He scooted down the wall, crossed his arms, and closed his eyes. “Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to sleep.”
I nodded and turned to watch Kate.
Her breathing was even as she slept on.
Is that who she was?
A Darrah, one of these cursed dragons?
If she was, she couldn’t let Forrest know. He was too honorable for his own good. He’d kill her on the spot, and I needed her to help me stop this plague.
I thought my life was difficult before; now, now it was becoming damned near impossible to not wind up dead.
16
Kate
We set out early, or I guessed it was early. There was no night, or morning in this world. No way to tell time and it bothered me. I wanted to know how many hours I’d been away from Mama Lucy and if she was alright. If the kids were unhurt.
I itched to get back home and figure out if Forrest was right and I did have a role to play in whatever the hell was going on.
Or I was crazy, this was all inside my head, and I was currently living out this fantasy in an asylum. Both were possibilities as far as I was concerned.
I carried the sword since I refused to remove my bangle yet. Craig had relit his torch with the potion before we left the cave, and Forrest brought up the rear of our trio, traipsing as quietly as we could through this dying world.
I had no idea how far we walked. My mind was too cluttered with denial of who I was and what I remembered my father teaching me so many years ago. Why would I need to know how to fight?
But those men who came to the cottage… they weren’t men at all. Carefully, I shot a glance over my shoulder, but Forrest was too busy watching our surroundings to see me watching him.
Dragons.
Dragons had killed my dad and probably my mom, too.
“There it is,” Craig uttered, and I tripped over my feet trying to stop, running right into the back of him.
Forrest reached out to steady me with a worried look, and I flinched away from him.
Craig’s brow arched at it, but he didn’t say anything about it. “It’s more rundown than I thought and completely out in the open.”
I turned to see where he pointed and my blood ran cold as a strangled noise escaped my lips.
“Kate?”
My eyes darted to Craig, but I still couldn’t get the words out. The temple, or what was left of i
t, had clearly been part of a much larger structure, like a castle perhaps. The same castle and surrounding landscape I saw in a vision.
“We shouldn’t be here,” I managed to whisper.
“We have to, we need to get home,” Craig insisted, but I shook my head harder and backed away again.
“No… no, we can’t be here. Do you have any idea what this place is?”
I blinked, and all I saw were the dead bodies scattered across the ground, bloodied and broken. The screaming intensified and when I blinked again, dragons flew in the skies, fire raining from their mouths against a shadow that only grew more and more despite their fierce attack. The rain that fell wasn’t rain. Oh no.
It was blood. I felt it hit my skin and rubbed against my arms, desperate to wash it off.
“How do you know what this place is?” Forrest asked sternly.
The beast he said lived within me reared its head, and I snarled at him, a fiercer growl than before, vibrating through my chest. His lips thinned, but he took a half-step back warily.
“I’ve been here before,” I snapped.
Craig half-smiled until he realized I wasn’t kidding. “You can’t have been.”
“I was, or I saw it,” I said and rubbed harder at my arms, but the vision of blood was gone, as were the bodies and the aerial attack that had been so vivid only moments before. “Dead, so many dead and the shadow. It was here.”
“You mean it is here,” Craig said, but I knew what I’d seen. “You’re not making any sense. How do you know all of this?”
I didn’t want to tell them, but maybe it would convince them we couldn’t go there. We had to find another way to get home, any way that did not involve being here where so many violent ends to life occurred.
“I saw a battle here,” I whispered, as if afraid somehow I’d get sucked right back into that moment. “I touched a dagger in that witch’s shop, and I saw this place, but it wasn’t destroyed, at least not completely.”
“You had a vision?” Forrest asked confused.
“No, maybe? I don’t know, alright! All I know is I saw this place and the shadow, plague whatever… I’m pretty sure it destroyed it.” I chanced a glance back towards the ruins and inwardly sighed in relief when no more dead bodies appeared. “There were people running and screaming as they died and an army of dragons in the sky trying to fight it, but we… we couldn’t.”
“We?” Craig asked with a worried look to Forrest. “What do you mean, we?”
I tilted my head as I whispered, “I was in the body of one of the dragons.”
“Wow,” Craig said, shaking his head. “This just hit a whole new level of insane.”
“You saw the final battle that ended this place? How is that possible?”
I ignored Forrest and only focused on Craig. “I don’t know. But I know that shadow was here, and it killed everyone. I didn’t have to see the end of the fight to feel that.” I rubbed my arms to try and chase away the sudden chill, but it lingered.
Forrest reached out as if to drape an arm around me for warmth and I pulled away.
“Don’t touch me.”
“What’s wrong with you?” he snapped. “I am your kin, and yet you show anger and fear towards me yet friendship towards the demon!”
“I have my reasons.”
“Like what?” he challenged, smoke trailing from his nose.
“It doesn’t matter. We’re going to get back home and then you both are going to disappear from my life.”
Craig cringed. “Not sure it’s going to be that easy.”
“And why the hell not?” I wanted to stomp my foot, but resisted the urge. I wasn’t five, but decking them both for the hell of it, that sounded like fun. Sadly, I resisted that urge, too.
“That shard I have? You’ve got a strange connection to it,” he told me, “and the vision you told us about… I don’t think your part in this is close to being over. Whatever’s coming for all of us, it won’t just stop at the demon world. It’ll come after the humans, too.”
I ran my hands through my hair, messing it up as I paced around in a tight circle. How did I get dragged into this mess? “Fine, fine, I’ll work with you,” I finally said and pointed to Craig. Then I pointed at Forrest. “But not you.”
Forrest’s hands curled into fists at his sides, and his eyes glimmered in warning. “Explain.”
“No,” I shot back and crossed my arms. “I don’t owe you anything.”
“As far as you know. You might be part of my clan, and if that is the case then you are defying a direct command from your prince! That is treason.”
“Just drop it,” I seethed, but he glowered right back, closing the distance between us. “Back off.”
“No, I want to know right now why you hate your own kind so much.”
“Guys, maybe this can wait for another time,” Craig said in an attempt to break us apart, but Forrest growled at him fiercely.
“Don’t you dare go after him.” I shifted, so I blocked Craig from view.
“Stop protecting the demon! Tell me what you’re hiding! Tell me who you are!”
“Why? So, you can kill me too?” I yelled at the end of my rope. The words slipped out, and I couldn’t take them back now.
Forrest’s glare went from enraged to confused in a few seconds.
He stepped back. “I don’t understand. I would not harm another dragon.”
“Tell that to the dragons who killed my parents.”
Forrest looked as if I slapped him.
Craig’s jaw dropped. “Kate, are you sure?”
I nodded firmly at Craig and waited for Forrest to explain himself now. “Tell me why. Tell me why you would destroy a family, tear it apart. What did we ever do to you?”
“It’s not possible,” he whispered. “You must be mistaken. Someone else was responsible,” he tried, but I was already shaking my head. “Kate, please, we would not attack a family for no reason. It’s not done.”
“Ten years ago,” I told him fiercely, “people found me and my dad. I was told to run, and I did, hiding in the woods until morning and what I saw that night… what I heard… there was nothing left of my home. No dad, no body. No house. Nothing. It was obliterated in a bright white light accompanied by roars. Dragon roars.” I poked him in the chest hard enough to make him back up. “You tell me why you would kill my father. Why?”
Forrest’s mouth worked as he struggled to find words, but before he could say anything, Craig cursed and grabbed us both, dragging us to the ground.
“We don’t have time for this,” he whispered as the chill I thought was from my memories increased, making it so cold my teeth chattered. “It’s getting closer, and we’re running out of time.”
“Kate, please,” Forrest said in my ear. “I swear to you we did not kill your father, but I will help you find out who did. I won’t rest until they are avenged.”
I wanted to believe him, but a voice in my head told me I couldn’t trust him. I couldn’t trust any of our own kind. I grimaced at that sentence. I was clumping myself in with the dragon crowd now like it was the most natural thing in the world to do. I needed to get home before this got any weirder.
“I promise I won’t try to kill you, yet,” I replied. “Happy?”
“No, but it’ll do, for now.”
We looked to Craig who merely blinked and mumbled in some guttural tongue under his breath. “Great, this just keeps getting better and better.”
“What’s the plan?” I asked, hoping to get us moving again. I didn’t like sitting here, but getting to the ruins meant crossing through an open field where we’d be completely exposed. If the shadow was nearby, the chances of it seeing us were high. I thought about the beast I saw in my vision, rising up like a swarming mass over the land and a shiver shot down my back. There was no way we could fight against it, not if an entire army of dragons failed at bringing it down.
They were weakened, Dad’s voice whispered through my mind. Weakened and betra
yed.
I scowled at the ground, needing the voice to stop. Now was not the time to take a trip straight into crazy-ville.
“Get to the temple without being seen. Once we’re inside, I doubt we’ll have long to find the portal and get it up and running before it comes for us.”
I rolled my shoulders as the beast inside me shifted again, lifting its head as if to say now was the time. The bangle glowed brightly on my wrist, but I quickly covered it with my other hand.
I noticed Craig glance at it, but he turned back to the ruins.
“When I say, we make a break for it,” he told us. “Stay low and keep moving, no matter what.”
Forrest and I nodded as the three of us pushed up and made ready to sprint for our lives.
My heart beat out an unsteady, painful rhythm in my chest as I attempted to keep my breathing regular and failed.
Craig peered around the clearing, and I heard him count out to three. He took off, and I followed, Forrest right on my heels.
I worried I wouldn’t be able to keep up with them, but the knowledge of potential death awaiting me if I stopped was a good motivator.
I pumped my arms, sucking in painfully cold breaths of air. The ruins grew closer, but the plain stretched on much larger than it first appeared.
Gentle hills rolled beneath our feet, and I tripped, skidding into the rocks we’d been crunching over.
But when I glanced down, it wasn’t a rock I came face to face with.
It was a skull. I scrambled away from it in a panic only to see more. The field wasn’t filled with rocks.
It was covered with bones. Piles and piles of bones.
17
Forrest
I expected Kate to scream at the sight of the undead surrounding us, but she bit it back, biting her lip hard enough to make it bleed.
Craig and I dragged her back to her feet.
“Don’t look at them,” Craig ordered, and taking her hand, pushed onwards.
I glared at their linked hands. It should be me she drifted towards. We were of the same kin, but she didn’t trust me, and now I knew why.
Rivals (Dragon Reign Book 1) Page 10
