Dragon Road

by Joseph Brassey

  Aimee gave him a sideways smile, remembering how he’d spoken of training and impulses tied up with imperatives for which he no longer had any use. “Finding a better use for that social training, are we?”

  He smiled as he watched the pair dancing. “I was taught to read people so I could manipulate or kill them,” he said. “I like this better.” Then, looking back at her, he seemed to remember something, and produced a small blue budded rose from somewhere, and gently slipped the stem into her hair behind her ear. “Forgive me,” he said. “It seemed appropriate.”

  Bold. The impulse boiled up from her, and she stepped in front of him, extending her hand. “Elias Leblanc, if you’re going to go and talk like that, I am afraid I must insist that you dance with me. For your own protection.”

  The warmth of his smile reached his eyes, and his calloused hand closed over her fingers as he gave a gentle bow at the waist. “Who am I,” he said, “to refuse such a demand?”

  Mine, she selfishly thought, without regard to how it sounded in her mind. At least for the next little while.

  His other hand came to rest on her hip, and suddenly they were off, spinning through the dancers. “Any luck reading the room?” he asked. A reference, she at once remembered, to the reception after Amut’s funeral, when the two of them had identified the major power players with whom they now contended.

  “As it happens, yes,” Aimee said. She liked that he remembered. “Of the people in this room, perhaps half actively support one of the three candidates, and of these, Diara and Pentus together command a smaller share each than Yaresh, though together it is bigger.”

  They turned, and his hand left her hip to turn her. She stepped deftly, then moved back into hold. “Diara is slightly more popular than Pentus, but nobody will admit it.”

  “And the other half?” Elias asked. There was an amused look in his eyes.

  “Debauched and bored,” Aimee said. “Afraid because they know somebody killed their captain, and glad to have a night of distraction.”

  A wry look briefly crossed his handsome face as they turned again, footwork in sync, steps sure and careful mirrors across the marble tiles. “I can’t say I blame them,” he said. “It feels as if we know almost less now than when we started.”

  The slight break in his eyes, the look of guilt over perceived failures opening a door to so much worse, pulled a reply out of her, reflexive. She didn’t realize that she was touching his face until she’d already done it. “We know the monster’s name,” she said, “if not the mask he wears, and the names of his servants. We’ve saved lives, even if it wasn’t all of them. We’ve blunted the ambitions of a would-be dictator, and found allies and friends in a strange place.”

  His eyes closed at her touch, and she felt him take a deep breath, as if all the pieces of the broken man were straining to keep themselves together. “Elias,” she said quietly. “We’ve had wins. More wins than losses, so far. So please, take them, and don’t blame yourself. More than a few were because of you.”

  They’d stopped dancing, and moved just off to the side as she’d spoken. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a reflection of the two of them in a mirror panel on the wall. The flower that he had placed in her hair added the smallest accent to her outfit, the one that had been missing at the start of the night.

  Perfect.

  The lights had further dimmed, and a silver light from above lined his face like the moon from behind a cloud. Then he glanced up, and her gaze followed.

  Looking up, Aimee saw a wild starscape spread out above them: a limitless field of diamonds in a whirling mass of black silk. Iseult had positioned itself so as not to be beneath any of the other behemoths in the flotilla, and now they had an unhindered view of stars without number in the vast night sky. She sucked in a breath at the unfurling majesty of it, the beauty, and allowed herself to be captivated. This was what she’d set out for, in part, cast herself on the winds of the infinite skies. This vision: surpassing in its loveliness. There was no way to see stars like this at home.

  “I wish,” Elias said quietly, face inches from her own, “that I had been able to appreciate sights like this the last time I saw them.”

  Aimee turned her head to look up at him, and gave his hand a squeeze. They were still in hold, and very close. “Appreciate them now.”

  He tilted his head down at her as they stood together under a thousand jewels in a glimmering black. Their eyes met, and all of her previous assurances that this was nothing seemed to melt. No platitude came forth, only a burning, intense look, and three words said quietly enough that only she could hear.

  “I will remember.”

  Her hands slipped from the hold to the lapel of his coat. A whirl of talk was happening around her, but it was mostly drowned out by the sudden intensity of her focus on the tiny details. There were flecks of darker green in his eyes, and a hint of dark circles about them. Why had she never noticed that before? The last time I was this close, she remembered, I wasn’t thinking.

  You’re not thinking now, her mind chided her. But in a sudden flash, she didn’t care. She didn’t know what was about to happen, but quietly, she mused, part of her really wanted to.

  “Aimee!”

  Vlana’s words cut across her thoughts, and the world slammed back into focus. Aimee and Elias leaped apart. Abruptly, a part of her was suddenly cognizant of the social dynamics aboard Elysium, and she tried to muster a mental defense against an assailment of accusatory questions… but it wasn’t what Vlana said. No sooner had she arrived than the words from her mouth shattered the mood and cut through Aimee with sudden fear.

  “Aimee, Elias,” Vlana said, out of breath. “Harkon is gone.”

  Elias’s hand suddenly gripped her shoulder. “What’s that?” he said, quietly, urgently. Aimee followed his long arm, pointing to a place outside the dome, where sudden bursts of multicolored light were flashing across the night sky at irregular intervals. The fear that had just seized Aimee surged as amidst the intermittent flashes, a familiar, cyclopean eye of light erupted, then flashed closed again with a concussive force that shook the deck beneath their feet. Another followed, and louder. The music stopped, and everyone was now looking at the explosive light show in the sky. “We need to find cover, right now,” Aimee said, pulling both of them along with her. “And find Clutch. It’s a portal storm. This is about to get very, very bad.”

  They didn’t get to the doorway before another random portal exploded into the heavens, much closer this time, ripping across the sky and silhouetting another behemoth. The ship rocked visibly in the sky. The deafening concussive crash came a half second later, and high above their heads, Aimee watched as a crack zigzagged down the center of the dome. A large piece of glass shook loose, split apart. A hail of knives rained down. Without thinking she lunged forward. Her hands whipped through the gestures of the shield spell, widening it, thickening it, and with the releasing word a glimmering disc of translucent force flashed from one end of the room to the other, catching the fragments. The force of the spell’s size and scale drove her to her knees and she grunted with the strain.

  “Don’t just stand there!” she shouted at the people nearest to her. “Clear the dome! Get out, now!”

  She caught sight of the others running towards her. The crack in the dome had destabilized the entire roof of the structure, and it groaned, now, with the strain of its own collapsing weight. She forced herself onto one knee – thank the gods she’d chosen a dress she could move in – and tried to push the shield up. She almost had it. The room was emptying of people. Yaresh shouted at a far wall and ushered people through doors. She glimpsed Pentus at the top of the stairwell, looking over his shoulder before fleeing after someone, shouting, “Wait!”

  She just had to hold it up for a few more seconds. Let the last of the stragglers out. A fraction remained. More pieces shook loose, striking her spell. She felt the impact jar through her limbs, and shouted in defiance and pain.

&n
bsp; High overhead, another crash sounded. Aimee’s face drained of color as the fresh eye of a new, massive portal tore open right overhead and swallowed the sky. She heard someone shout her name, had just enough time to feel the first hint of terror.

  The blast hammered down at them, and the whole dome shattered. Aimee screamed as a rain of debris smashed into her shield, covered it, overwhelmed it. She felt her fingers tingle as the magic started to give way and death hammered down. No.

  An arm seized her around the waist. She felt a surge of magic, and Elias was moving, blindingly fast, carrying her and Vlana at once. Massive glass shards exploded all around them.

  They skidded to a stop in the street. People fled in every direction, order replaced with chaos. Vlana staggered, and Elias caught his balance on a lamppost as he stopped. All Aimee could do was stare upwards, at the still-blazing portal in the skies. They felt a shift beneath their feet, and tension groaned along the spine of the ship as its rear engines blasted to full burn. The wheelhouse was attempting to pull the behemoth away from the portal, she realized. The strain of the blazing engines against its pull set the entire ship to groaning in the black, and at the stern end, Aimee could see an apocalyptic glow as the exhaust vents blasted the full power of its multiple metadrives into the heavens. Aimee watched, helpless in the moment to affect the tremendous forces warring against one another in the sky. “Come on,” she pleaded, hands balled into fists as the fierce wind tore her hair loose. Why isn’t the portal closing?

  “It shouldn’t still be open!” she shouted over her shoulder at the others. “Portal storm apertures don’t last this long!”

  Slowly the direction was reversing. The ship was pulling away. “We need to get back to Elysium!” Vlana screamed. Across the streets, Clutch came running towards them. “Get your asses back to the villa, now! Wait, where’s Hark?”

  Before anyone could answer, the entire ship shook and the sound of a muffled detonation sounded somewhere deep under their feet. Aimee felt the whole vessel lurch, and looking sternward again, watched as the glow of the exhaust vents suddenly dulled. A moment before pulling away, with an oddly quiet creak, Iseult began to fall towards the portal.

  “Clutch is right,” Aimee shouted. “Run! If we’re outside when the ship goes through that thing, we might never be found!”

  They fled. Across city streets, as the baleful glowing eye painted everything a kaleidoscope of reds and purples. The fitful roar of the struggling engines filled Aimee’s ears as they tore over the streets towards the nearest building they could find. She felt the thrum of terrible interdimensional magics overpowering her ability to sense anything else. Elias reached the door and tore it open with a surge of strength. “GET INSIDE!” he screamed. Aimee looked over her shoulder as the rear of the ship entered the portal. A wall of blazing chaos-light surged up the street behind them. She dove through the door after all the others and landed on her back. Her hands furiously filled the doorway with a shield spell. The light washed over their sanctuary, and everything was noise. She held onto her spell with every ounce of will, as the chaos outside fought to get in. Her teeth set. Sweat stained the back of her neck, and she strained.

  I am a portalmage.

  I am a portalmage.

  I AM A PORTALMAGE!

  The last thing Aimee remembered was screaming against the black.

  She was in a place that was dark and cold. A dim awareness of rushing sights and sounds came to her, visions in an ocean of mist. Her mind reeled in the fog of her senses, unable to form coherent thoughts. Somewhere under it all, she heard a faint music.

  “You are alright,” she heard a voice say, and turning, Aimee beheld the Oracle, resplendent in a nimbus of light. “This is a place between. You remember your dimensional principles.”

  “In a portal,” Aimee replied, half to herself, “time behaves differently.”

  “And you are behind a shield spell, not within the safety of a skyship with its chaos dampeners,” the Oracle answered. “In a few moments, it will end, but I can reach you here. Now. Your teacher is in terrible danger. All of you are, and it falls to you to save them all.”

  In the distance, Aimee heard yelling. She turned, and a figure of mist faded from view.

  “I’m sorry,” a familiar voice wept from the misty form of a cloaked figure at the edge of the bed. “I am so sorry, I had no choice.”

  “You…” the bedridden figure croaked. “You let… him…”

  “Not fast enough, Amut. Not fast enough.”

  “Aimee,” the Oracle’s voice was growing fainter. “He is here! Hold on. Hold on!”

  Her teacher’s face formed in the mist. Harkon seemed to see her, and she heard his voice echoing from far away, only every few words legible. “…Never ended… Mask of flesh!”

  Aimee swept her hand towards the apparition. It dissolved, and in its place suddenly rose a towering, robed figure. Its cowled head turned towards her, an empty darkness in place of a face fixed upon her, and a sepulchral, hissing voice rasped at her in the darkness. “WHERE IS THE LION?”

  Nothing again. Then a tiny ray of light. Slow, creeping awareness of her own body. She heard her breathing coming in a slow, even rhythm. The light became a warm glow. Then coalesced into a fire burning in a hearth. She blinked several times. Warm bedclothes. A canopied bed frame around her. Slowly, she stirred, only to wince at the familiar sensation of overclocking exhaustion.

  It took her a few more moments to muster the energy to move again, and she sat up. She wore full-length pajamas, warm and comfortable, and a cursory touch told her that her hair was in the same disheveled state it had been when she fled the dome. The logs in the hearth snapped beneath the flames.

  In a chair on the other side of the room, slumped against the wall, was Elias. He was still dressed in his Grand Ball outfit, though his left arm was tucked inside his coat, wrapped in a sling. There were bandages on his face, and his right hand had a death-grip on the hilt of his drawn sword resting across his lap. A faint glow emanated from the blade. His eyes were closed, and his chest rose and fell with the lilt of a light sleep.

  When she cleared her throat, he opened his eyes. His eyes fixed on her, and a series of emotions passed through them, too quick to read. “I promise,” he started to say. “All I did was carry you back–”

  She was slightly taken aback at the bluntness of the concern. It’s fine, she meant to say, but when she opened her mouth, the sound was a croak that immediately degenerated into a coughing fit. Instead she rasped, “Water.”

  He was by her side quickly, handing her a glass. Once her throat was soothed and she could talk again, she sank back. “Gods,” she murmured, closing her eyes. “Alright, so we’re clearly at Rachim’s. Yes?”

  “We are,” he replied.

  “How long?” she asked.

  “Better part of a day,” Elias said. He straightened back up, putting the glass on a bedside table. “Your spell held just long enough, and when we came out the other side, we brought you here. Rachim had access only to chirurgery, so it was mostly about making sure you got water in you and were still breathing.” He sighed. The sound was labored. Weighted. “Others weren’t so lucky.”

  He looked down at her for a moment, silhouetted by the firelight. There was an unease, a reservation in his eyes.

  “You’re not telling me everything,” she said, gentle, but blunt. “Please. I know the danger of a portal storm, and if it’s been a day, Clutch will have done her calculations. She’s too smart not to. Where are we?”

  Elias looked back at her. His expression assessed her for a moment, and she was struck by how often she’d seen that look on men’s faces before they told her she needed to rest first, calm first, eat first, get her head on straight, settle her nerves, do literally anything but hear the truth when she wanted to hear it.

  “We’re in the Tempest Crescent,” he said, unflinchingly honest. “And as soon as you think you can move on your own, we need you: Harkon is still missing
.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Deeper into Night

  “You should wait longer,” Bjorn grunted. “This is too quick.”

  “I can’t, you heard what Vant said,” Elias answered, buckling his sword about his waist. “The explosion was deep within Iseult. Combined with what we’ve heard from the downlevelers, that means the metadrive chamber. We’re going, before things get worse.”

  It was a small group of them. Vant, Aimee, Elias. Belit and Rachim. In the twenty-four hours since the portal had thrown them into the Tempest Crescent, the ship had already started to fracture. There was havoc below, he was hearing. Pentus hadn’t been seen since he fled the Grand Ball. Diara was struggling with her fellow astronomers to help the wheelhouse put Iseult back on course but – a quick communication Rachim had been sent revealed – they couldn’t do that until they knew what had happened in the metadrive chamber, and communication with it had been lost.

  And Yaresh was only concerned with rallying his armsmen – and those officers who would listen – to maintain the ironclad security of the upper level.

  Elias grabbed one of the packs that the older warrior had assembled from Elysium’s emergency supplies, testing his left arm, feeling functional again after Aimee had mended the broken bone. It was still tender, but it would have to do. “We’re going.”

  A small smile creased the corner of Bjorn’s mouth as Elias shouldered his pack and headed towards the ramp. “Elias,” he said, and that made the young knight stop. Bjorn seldom – if ever – used his name. He turned his head, watching the old mercenary he’d once nearly killed, and since fought beside, standing in the dark behind him.

  “I don’t know if the others’ll come around. They’re stubborn, see? Been hurt. We all come from bad places of one sort or another. So… I’m sorry, for not seeing at the outset that you’re no different than the rest of us. So you fucking take care of yourself out there, aye boy? No more walking to the edge. No more knives in your hand. You’re one of us.”