"Quick, seal the doors!" cried a burly man in armor, his red beard singed.
Elethor recognized Lord Deramon, father to Lyana and Bayrin. He had never liked the man. A harsh soldier with a face like a craggy cliff, Deramon seemed to always scowl and mutter around him. Elethor's hatred had only grown seven years ago, after Deramon caught him kissing Solina in the forest. The lord had marched to the king, revealed the secret love, and doomed Solina to exile.
"There are still people out there, Deramon!" he shouted. "They're dying!"
The phoenixes scratched at the archway but were too large to enter.
"They're dead already!" Deramon shouted back. His face flushed as red as his beard.
Elethor wanted to run outside, to find and save whoever he could. Had Bayrin made it into the tunnels? What of his father and sister; where were they?
"You don't know that, Deramon!" he shouted and drew his sword.
He watched the tunnel entrance and grimaced. Before his eyes, the phoenixes shrank, twisted, and took human forms. Soon they stood as warriors in bright armor, golden suns upon their breastplates. The sun of Tiranor, Elethor knew. The Tirans drew sabres. The Vir Requis in the tunnel shrieked in fear.
Lord Deramon drew his own sword—a thick, heavy blade of northern steel. Lyana already held her blade before her; it was bloodied and darkened with ash. Flickers of fire still clinging to them, the Tirans ran onto the staircase and blades clashed.
Elethor parried a thrust, grunted, and riposted. He was no great warrior; his father and Orin were the fighters. Today everything his swordmasters had taught him vanished, and he swung his blade with blind fear and fury.
"You will die, weredragons," said a Tiran, a tall man with blazing blue eyes. A crystal hung around his neck, a flame trapped inside it. His sword swung, and Elethor parried, raising sparks. Deramon fought at his side, his thick sword slamming at the enemy's thin, curved sabres. The tunnel was only wide enough for two men to fight side by side.
A dagger flew over Elethor's head and slammed into a Tiran's neck. Blood spurted and the man pitched forward, hit the stairs, and crashed down between Elethor and Deramon. Standing behind them, Lyana slammed down her sword, finishing the job. Vir Requis guards were racing up from the shadows below, drawing their own swords.
"Get down into the tunnels, boy!" Deramon howled at Elethor, swinging his sword. "We'll hold them back."
Elethor cursed and grumbled. "You will not call me 'boy'. I am still your prince, Deramon."
The man growled. "You are a boy, and you will enter the tunnels. Make room for men to fight by my side."
As he parried blows from Tiran sabres, Elethor fumed. He was no warrior, but he was still these people's prince; how could he run and cower among the women and children?
"I'm staying here to fight and die, old man!" he shouted, parried a blow, and thrust his blade.
Deramon slew a man. The body crashed down the stairs into darkness. "I'm not risking your life, not until I know if your father is alive. We're not losing another prince. Down, into the tunnels! Take my daughter with you."
A blade flashed. Elethor parried. Blood spurted and the enemies crowded at the doorway; there seemed no end to them. Nova Vita's survivors wept and shouted behind in the darkness.
"You think I'll run and hide instead of fight?"
"You will do what I tell you!" Deramon shouted, still swinging his blade. "As you like to remind me, you're our prince… not our champion."
Lyana rushed up behind him and grabbed Elethor's shoulder. "Come on, El. He's right. With me, down into the darkness. We have to protect you."
A Tiran broke past Deramon, leaped three steps, and lunged at Elethor. Blades clashed. Elethor grunted in pain. The Tiran's sword sliced his shoulder. Lyana's blade thrust, the Tiran leaped back, and Elethor drove his sword into the man's neck. He stared, gritting his teeth, at the blood dripping down his blade. It was the first man he'd killed.
More Vir Requis warriors, clad in the armor of the City Guard, raced upstairs from the shadows. Their heavy longswords clashed with the Tirans' sabres. Blood flowed down the stairs.
"Come with me, El," Lyana said, voice soft. "You're hurt."
He stared at the tunnel entrance. Deramon and three of his men now fought there. Thousands of Tirans seemed to fill the night outside. With a curse, Elethor tore his gaze away and took several steps down into the shadows. Survivors crowded around him, reaching out to touch him.
"Our prince," whispered an old woman, hands patting his shoulder.
"My lord," said a child, bowing his head.
They filled the darkness around him, burnt, bloodied, and weeping. Their arms reached to him and their eyes shone. The stench of burning flesh and blood and fear filled the tunnels.
Lyana held Elethor's arm and led him deeper into the darkness. "This is where the people need you, Elethor. They need to see you, to know that you lead them. You need to be their leader, not their soldier. You will be our king."
He froze, grabbed her arms, and stared at her. "What do you mean, Lyana?" he said through clenched teeth. "My father is king." His voice shook. "King Olasar, son of Amarin, descended from Queen Gloriae herself." His fingers shook around her arms.
Lyana lowered her head. "Elethor," she said softly. "Oh, Elethor."
She embraced him, this girl who would steal his toy swords when they were little, who once peeked into the bathing chambers as he undressed, who always looked down her nose at him and Bayrin and scolded them for being immature, good-for-nothing layabouts. Today this girl, now a woman stained with the blood and fire of war, placed her head against his shoulder, shed tears, and whispered into his ear.
"I'm sorry, Elethor. I'm so sorry. He fell." She touched his cheek. "Your father is dead."
The flames roared outside. Steel rang and the screams of dying echoed. Elethor closed his eyes. A tremble took him and he could not breathe. It felt like a vise clutched his head, twisting and cracking his skull. He forced himself to breathe. His head spun and he had to hold the tunnel wall for support.
Calm down, he told himself. Don't panic yet. Not when these people need you… when Lyana needs you.
Breathing through clenched teeth, he opened his eyes, still holding Lyana. She looked at him with huge, damp eyes.
"I'm sorry too, Lyana," he said. He tried to sound strong, comforting, a powerful man who could protect her—but his voice cracked. It sounded to him like the voice of a frightened child. He took another deep breath.
The survivors in the tunnel jostled and moved aside. Bayrin walked through the crowd, heading upstairs toward Elethor and Lyana. Burn marks covered his arms, and his face was damp and red. He stared with cold eyes.
"I found Mori," he said. "She's in the wine cellars. She's banged up and a little singed, but she's alive."
Elethor inhaled shakily—a breath of such relief that his knees shook and he nearly collapsed. Thank the stars. His eyes stung. My sister is alive. Not all our family is dead.
"Thank you, Bay," he said, voice choked.
Bayrin stared back solemnly. "And El… my mother is waiting for you. Come with me. She's going to crown you."
Elethor couldn't help it; he made a sound halfway between gasp and guffaw. He stared over Lyana's head at her brother, his best friend since childhood.
"You've gone mad, Bay," he said. "Adia wants to crown me? Now, here?" He shook his head wildly.
Lyana held him and stared at him. A fire blazed in her eyes.
"Yes, now and here," she said, voice stern. Curls of her red hair clung to her face with sweat and blood. "The people need a king, Elethor. They need a leader." She sighed. "You might be a blockhead, but you're all we've got now."
He laughed mirthlessly. "You've both gone mad! Both of you. My father… my brother…" His voice cracked. "Oh stars, we haven't even buried them. I don't want a crown. I never wanted to be king. Find somebody else." He looked back over his shoulder at the fighting. "Get your father down here! Crown him; the peop
le love Deramon."
He sounded like a child, he realized and cursed himself. But what else could he say? He had never served in the army like Orin. He had never dreamed of the throne like Orin. He had never gone to countless ceremonies and feasts and met with foreign kings. He was just Elethor, the younger brother who'd count the stars, or sculpt, or walk for hours through the forest with Solina, or…
But those days are gone now, Elethor, he told himself. He clenched his fists. You must do this. They're right. You can't abandon your people. They need you.
As soldiers raced up the stairs and blood spilled down, his friends pulled him deeper into the tunnels. The shadows spun around him. Everywhere hands reached to him, the wounded lay moaning, and the stench of death spun his head. He moved in a daze, eyes burning.
My father. My brother. Gone.
Mother Adia, Priestess of Requiem, rose from the darkness toward him. A tall woman, she looked nothing like her red-headed, light-eyed children. Adia's hair was black and smooth as the night sky. Her eyes were pools of darkness. She could have been one of Elethor's statues—pale, beautiful, her skin like marble. Ash and blood stained her white robes.
"Elethor," she said, voice as deep and solemn as her eyes, and took his hands.
She whispered prayers to the stars in a shaky voice. Around them the people answered her prayers, reaching to the ceiling. Elethor did not know if starlight could ever glow here—or in the world again—but he answered the prayers in a hoarse, low voice.
They had no crown to place upon his head, no holy oil to anoint him with. There were no lords and ladies, no songs, only this stench of burnt flesh and sweat and nightsoil and death.
"Requiem!" Adia called, voice rising and shaking. "May our wings forever find your sky."
The words of their fathers, their people, their life. Those were the words the first kings had spoken when building temples in King's Forest. Those were the words the legendary Queen Gloriae had shouted in battle against Dies Irae the Destructor. The survivors in the tunnels repeated the prayer. Elethor spoke with them, his voice finally finding some strength.
"Requiem! May our wings forever find your sky."
Mother Adia turned to the crowd in the tunnels. Voice trembling, she said, "Kneel before King Elethor Aeternum, Son of Olasar."
Those who could, knelt, and Elethor looked over the survivors, his eyes dry. They filled the narrow tunnels, disappearing far into the darkness. Lyana knelt before him, holding her sword drawn, her eyes lowered. As Elethor looked at her mane of curls, he realized that by the law of the land, he had inherited not only his father's throne, but his brother's betrothed. If they survived this war, Lyana and he would be wed.
"Rise," he said to the people. They rose and wept, blessing his name.
Lyana looked at him, eyes huge and haunted. "My lord," she whispered, the first time she had ever called him that. "There is something more you must know."
Elethor stared at her, silent. His father and brother were dead. He had inherited the throne, and he was now betrothed to the girl who would torment him throughout his childhood. His city burned above him, and hundreds—likely thousands—were dead. What more news could she give him?
"Speak," he said.
She stared at him steadily, holding his arm. "Elethor… the leader of the phoenixes, and the one who killed your father and brother, is Solina."
He stared at her. The memories of Solina pounded through him: her kisses, her naked body against his, their forbidden love in secret forests and chambers. His world burned. He saw nothing but fire.
He spun around and began marching upstairs to the tunnels' exit.
"I will speak to her," he said, voice strained, fists clenched to stop them from trembling.
For the first time in seven long, aching, lonely years, he would see her again. He had dreamed of this moment. Today it chilled his belly and filled his throat with bile.
SOLINA
The city of Nova Vita, fair capital of Requiem, burned below her.
Solina flew above the carnage, woven of fire. The marble columns and towers undulated in the heat waves. With every thud of her wings, sparks flew and light flared like the beat of her flaming heart. The sound and fury pounded through her, crackling, buzzing, roaring for eternal pain and glory. She had been burned. She had lain for days in a temple, bandaged and crying for vengeance. She had tamed her fire, and now she soared through it, a goddess of inferno.
Bodies littered the streets below, the fire stripping flesh from bones, leaving blackened skulls that gaped. A scattering of dragons still flew, only for her phoenixes to hunt them, tear them down, and feast upon them. The rest huddled in the tunnels below, but Solina knew she would burn them too. She knew every twist and cavern in those tunnels. She had spent so many hours in their darkness, stoking her fire with Elethor.
Do you hide there now, my prince of tears? she wondered. Will we meet again this night, after all these years?
Elethor. The very name sent pulsing memory through her. She still remembered his birth. She had been only five, an orphan raised in the king's court, a timid girl still so scared of the world. When King Olasar let her hold the babe, she vowed to forever love him.
And I love you, Elethor, she thought. I loved you when I held you as a babe. I loved you in our youth, when our lips touched, and our hands felt, and our naked bodies pressed together. And I still love you now, even as I burn your home.
She dived toward the palace. It shimmered between the flames, its columns like bones. Her claws hit the cobblestones, splashing fire. She shifted, sucking the flames into her. Her wings drew in, forming arms. Her fire twisted, formed flesh and bones, and soon she stood upon human feet. The last tongues of fire pulled into the firegem around her neck, where they danced. She clutched the amulet and smiled, looking around at her old prison.
Requiem's palace. The place where they raised me… and where they burned me. She ran her finger across her line of fire, the scar that snaked down her face, between her breasts, and along her thigh. But their fire can no longer hurt me.
The columns rose around her, two hundred feet tall, carved of white marble. Between them, the birches blazed and crackled. When Solina was young, these columns had seemed so large to her, colossal monuments kissed with starlight that would never bless her. Orin and Elethor, like brothers to her, could become dragons, fly above them, soar so high the columns were as mere twigs to them. They had offered to carry her upon their backs, but Solina had always refused.
To ride you would mean I'm a cripple, she would think, fists clenched. I am a proud Tiran, a desert daughter, a princess of the ancient Phoebus Dynasty. We do not ride dragons.
"We kill them," she whispered.
Several phoenixes landed beside her, flaming and shrieking, their fire pounding the cobblestones. They shifted, flames pulling into their firegems, and soon stood before her as men clad in pale armor. They saluted, slamming their fists against their breastplates. Acribus stood among them, chief of her warriors, his armor bloody and his arm bandaged.
"My lady Solina," he said and bowed his head.
She stared at his blood. "The wound Princess Mori gave you is still bleeding. You need it stitched."
He bared his chipped, yellow teeth. "Princess? You mean a lizard whore. She will bleed worse when I catch her."
Solina shrugged. "Call her what you like. Hurt her how you like. You can cut off her freak finger, if it pleases you. Just don't bleed to death first."
Seven years had passed since she'd set foot in Requiem, but Solina had never forgotten Princess Mori, or the Lady Lyana, or any of the other girls who would torment her.
Mori was only a child then, Solina thought, but I remember how she'd pity me, a mere Tiran who could not become a dragon.
Lyana, meanwhile, had been only a snotty youth, a bookish girl whose nose was always upturned and whose father—Captain of the City Guard—would pamper her. Lyana too always looked down upon me, Solina thought. She saw only an orphan,
an outcast, a cripple.
She clenched her jaw. Acribus will hurt them well. They will hurt like I hurt. We'll see how they pity me when Acribus thrusts inside them, when he cuts them, when he feeds their fingers to the dogs.
As if he could read her thoughts, Acribus licked his lips with that ridiculous white tongue of his. It always looked to Solina like a snake nested in his mouth.
"My lady," he said, "the weredragons have crowned a new king. He fights at the entrance of a nearby tunnel, and he wishes to treat with you." He laughed, a sound like snapping bones. "Would you like to hear this boy king beg for life before we kill him, or shall I gut him now?"
Solina felt like a bellows blasted hot air against her. She froze, fingers tingling, sweat dripping down her forehead.
"Elethor," she whispered.
Acribus barked a laugh. "Yes, that was his name. A soft boy; looks like he never swung a sword in battle until today. I will break him. I will shatter his spine. I will crush his limbs with a hammer, sling them through the spokes of a wheel, and hang him to die upon the palace walls."
She glared at him, baring her teeth. "You will not touch him, Acribus. If you do, you will be the one broken. Show me to the weredragons' new king. I will speak to him."
They marched down the streets, leaving the palace behind. Ash swirled around their boots. Trees and bodies burned at their sides, raising black smoke. Phoenixes soared and screeched above; the sky itself seemed to burn. The sounds of battle came from ahead: swords clanging, battle cries, and the shouts of dying men calling for mothers, lovers, or the mercy of death.
Soon Solina saw an entrance to a tunnel. The stone archway rose ten feet tall, its keystone engraved with dragon reliefs. The bodies of Tirans and weredragons littered the cobblestones around it. Living soldiers fought above the bodies, clanging swords. Blood puddled and flowed toward Solina's boots.
A memory thudded through Solina, aching in her chest. Come on, Elethor! she had cried, laughing, and pulled him down the streets. She had been twenty, maybe twenty-one, a young woman blooming into her beauty. He had still been a youth, awkward and gangly, but she was determined to make him a man. They explored the tunnels that day, moving between wine cellars, libraries, silos, and finally finding a nook full of rugs where they made love—fiery, passionate love that made her scream and scratch her fingernails down his back. We returned to these tunnels most nights after that, she remembered.
A Dawn of Dragonfire (Dragonlore, Book 1) Page 7
