Crown of Dragonfire

by Daniel Arenson

  Elory stepped closer. "Meliora doesn't need anyone to protect her." She raised her chin. "She led a nation of slaves against Queen Kalafi. She slew seraphim. She gave life to golems, life from her own blood, and created a race of erevim. She's descended from the Aeternum dynasty—as I am."

  Lucem turned toward her and raised an eyebrow, and at once Elory cursed herself. She had rushed to protect Meliora's honor, but had she only hurt Lucem's pride?

  Surely he won't only think me plain now, Elory thought, but also unpleasant.

  Lucem nodded. "Yet even the greatest queen of light needs a guide when walking in shadows." A grin split his face. "Meliora, Princess of Seraph—also a Princess of Requiem. Now there's something I never imagined when I escaped your family, Mel. Can I call you Mel?"

  Meliora gave one of her rare smiles. Elory did not think she had ever seen her sister smile so widely.

  "No," Meliora said, "you may not."

  Lucem matched her grin. "Oh, I see how it is. I'm to call you My Queen or Your Majesty, is it? You are, after all . . ." He puffed out his chest and spoke in baritone. "Queen Meliora Aeternum the First, Sovereign of all Requiem, Slayer of Seraphim."

  And I am nothing to him, Elory thought, hating that feeling that suddenly sprang inside her. Jealousy? Foolishness! How could she be jealous? What mattered now was survival, that was all. Finding the Keymaker. Bringing a repaired key back to Tofet. Raising the dragons and flying back to Requiem. Not a silly, handsome, young hero who had spent the past few hours looking at Meliora and away from Elory.

  And yet her jealousy remained. In the old tales of Requiem, Elory had heard of many lovers—the timeless and doomed love of King Benedictus and Queen Lacrimosa, or the star-crossed lovers Rune and Tilla, forced to fight on different sides of Requiem's civil war. After entering the ziggurat, Elory had thought that perhaps Tash had stirred those feelings in her, with her gentle caresses and warm eyes. Yet now feelings ten times more powerful flared inside her, tingling, warm, intolerable, growing whenever she so much as glanced at Lucem's bare arms or ready grin.

  "Just call me Meliora." The tall haloed woman smiled thinly. "Though I wouldn't object to an odd Your Highness now and then."

  Lucem opened his mouth, ready to say more when a shrill cry sounded in the distance.

  They all froze.

  A chill seized Elory's spine like demonic fingers.

  For a moment, all was silent. Then the screech sounded again, so loud that Elory dropped her sword and covered her ears. Meliora grimaced and her halo cracked, and even Lucem paled.

  "What is it?" Elory whispered when the shriek died.

  Lucem stared into the sky. "I don't know. Not seraphim. I can't see anything."

  Meliora was pale, and she pulled her hood over her halo, extinguishing the flames. "Hurry. We must find shelter."

  They began to run across the hills, hunched over. Shelter? There was no shelter here. Elory saw no trees, no caves. By the Abyss, she barely saw anything at all, now that Meliora's halo no longer cast its night. She stumbled as she ran in darkness, and Lucem grabbed her hand, his grip warm.

  The screeches rose again behind them, closer now, so loud that Elory nearly cried out in pain, thought her eardrums would shatter. Her father had told her that sound was actually ripples through the air, like the ripples on a pond, something Elory had never believed, yet this sound slammed against her with a physical force. She felt it against her chest, in her bones. A demonic cry from another world, a scream of pure hatred, pure malice.

  She stared over her shoulders as they ran. Still she saw nothing. No demons flying. Certainly no chariots of fire. Nothing at all in the night. Nothing—

  Wait!

  It was just an instant. A shadow blotting out the stars, a mere flicker. Again! Another star blinked away for an instant. Something dark flying in the sky. Several of them.

  Then they passed across the moon, and such fear filled Elory that she could barely keep running.

  "Bat wings," she whispered. "Evil with bat wings."

  The shrieks above coalesced into words, the voice of shattering spines, of falling columns, of shards of glass driving into flesh.

  "We smell her, comrades! We smell the half-breed. Find her! Break her!"

  Each word shook Elory's ribs, twisted her heart, churned her belly. She kept running, holding Lucem's hand. Meliora ran alongside, a mere shadow in the night.

  "Drink her blood!" rose a cry above.

  "Snap her bones and suck the marrow!"

  "Feast upon her organs!"

  Elory's breath rattled in her lungs. She glanced up and she saw them now. Oh stars, she saw them. White eyes like stars. Fangs and sickle blades. Bat wings tipped with claws.

  "We see them, comrades!" the creatures screeched. "We see three! Catch them! Break them!"

  "Seraphim!" Elory cried, running across the rocky land.

  "Dark seraphim," Meliora answered, voice shaking. "The cursed one, traitors to Saraph."

  Elory drew her sword. Lemuria, her ancient blade—borne by Kaelyn Cadigus herself in Requiem's great civil war—gleamed with inner light. "Then we fight them. We kill them."

  "No!" Meliora said. "You cannot fight these creatures. Nobody can."

  Lucem stared upward and grimaced. "You might not have a choice, sweetheart." He hefted his spear. "Draw that pretty sword of yours!"

  Meliora had no sooner drawn her blade than the creatures swooped.

  The white eyes blazed around them, slit down the middle with narrow pupils. Serpent eyes. Fangs shone as the creatures laughed, and the wings beat. A sickle flew toward Elory, and she screamed and swung her blade, heart lashing.

  The blades crashed together, sparking. Elory cried out. The sickle's blow was so powerful her arm nearly dislocated again. She kept running, and a creature swooped before her, grinning luridly, and lashed its claws. Elory thrust her blade, parrying the claws, but more claws thrashed from her left, tearing through her side. She screamed. Her blood spilled.

  At her sides, Lucem and Meliora were fighting too, weapons stabbing at the creatures. Amerath, the Amber Sword, swung in arcs, holding them back. Lucem growled as he thrust his spear again and again.

  The dark seraphim flew around them in a ring, a demonic dance, grinning, laughing, screeching, a macabre song. Blood stained their faces. One of the creatures lashed his claws, cut Elory's leg, then licked his fingers.

  "Eat them, eat them, flesh and blood!" they sang. "Bone and marrow, brains and liver, hearts and stomachs, fleshy treats!"

  They're toying with us, Elory realized, blood dripping. They're playing with their food.

  "Keep the tall female alive!" shrieked one of the dark seraphim. "Eat her legs, eat her arms, but keep her alive. Her womb belongs to Ishtafel."

  The dark seraph who had spoken was female, a woman all in black and white. Her breastplate was darker than the night, her sickle a shard of shadow, her wings shadowy curtains of the Abyss. Her skin was white as a frozen corpse, her hair like ice draped across a tombstone, and her eyes were like cold stars, the eyes of a snake, yet hot—searing hot like fire heated until it lost all color. For an instant, even as she bled, even as the creatures danced around her, Elory could only stare at this she-demon, frozen.

  There is no hope, Elory thought. Not before this goddess. We are but playthings to her as mice are to cats.

  "Leyleet!" Meliora cried, raising her sword. "I know you. I know your name! Be gone, Queen of Darkness. I am Meliora of the Thirteenth Dynasty, your mistress. Leave this place and return to your lair."

  The Dark Queen laughed, wings spread wide, sickle raised, and the air seemed to bend around her, and the earth shook. Stones rolled across the hills, a chasm cracked open, and the stars themselves began to extinguish. All the world seemed to fall as the dark seraphim—sixteen in all, the sixteen who had rebelled against the throne of Saraph—laughed with voices like dying nations.

  "I shall be the first to feed upon you, Meliora!" shrieked Leyleet. "Your bloo
d will fill my mouth as wine."

  With a flash of her sickle, Leyleet swooped.

  Meliora pulled back her hood, and her halo crackled to life.

  The flames lashed out, a shock wave of fire, showering sparks, illuminating the night as brightly as red lightning. The fire slammed into Leyleet, and the creature screamed—this time a scream of pain, of fear. Her comrades cried out, covering their eyes against the light.

  "The light of Requiem!" they cried. "The fire of dragons! It burns our eyes."

  Leyleet screamed louder than them all. "Tear off her fire!"

  The dark seraphim swooped again.

  Elory snapped out of her paralysis. She raised her sword and charged.

  "For Requiem!" she cried, blade lashing.

  "For Requiem!" cried Meliora, thrusting her own sword.

  The fire blazed, and the weapons flashed, and the dark seraphim slammed against them. All amusement was gone from their eyes now. Their claws tore at Meliora, ripping open the old wounds on her back, and her blood showered. Another creature grabbed Elory, tugging at her arm, and she swung her blade, screaming as her blood spilled.

  Her blade slammed into the dark seraph's armor, doing him no harm. The dark deity laughed and swung his sickle again.

  Blood.

  Searing pain.

  Elory screamed.

  The side of her head burned, melted, shrieked, cracked, died. She yowled. Her blood gushed. She raised her hand to her left ear and found it gone. Her hand touched nothing but a wound, burning, ringing, screaming, white, searing through her. And still the dark seraph laughed, and his sickle swung again.

  "Elory!" Lucem shouted.

  He leaped forth, spear lashing, and suddenly this young man was the hero again—the fabled Lucem, legend of Requiem. Face twisted with rage, Lucem vaulted upward, and his spear slammed into the dark seraph, knocking the sickle aside, driving the creature back.

  "Elory!" he cried again, turning toward her.

  She could not even reply. She could barely stay standing. The fire spread from her missing ear, driving through her head, down her spine.

  It ends here. We die here. Our quest failed.

  "Elory, I think I know where we are!" Lucem shouted, still lashing his spear, holding more of the creatures back. "I saw it when Meliora's fire flared. Follow me to safety!"

  The young man leaped onto a boulder, vaulted through the air, and swung his spear, knocking a dark seraph aside. He began to run. Swinging her blade, Meliora followed, her halo of dragonfire casting out flames, lighting the darkness.

  "Elory, come on!" they cried.

  She ran too. The hole on her head where her ear had been screamed in agony, and her head spun, and the pain was beyond anything she had thought possible, but she ran too. She lashed her blade, holding the creatures back. Claws slashed at the companions, bat wings beat above, the sickles flashed, but still they ran onward, bleeding, falling, running again.

  "Down this way!" Lucem cried, leaping into a chasm that had appeared in the hillside—a narrow ravine, barely wide enough to enter. Elory leaped into the chasm too, twisting her ankle, and ran after Lucem with a limp. Walls of stone rose at her sides, and Meliora leaped down behind her. The dark seraphim still flew above, and the companions ran with blades raised, swinging their weapons, knocking sickles aside.

  The canyon opened up into a valley, and there ahead Elory saw it—a cave in the hillside ahead.

  "We'll never make it!" she cried over the ringing in her ear.

  Lucem grabbed her hand. "Run with me. Run!"

  They burst out into the valley. Without the protection of walls around them, the dark seraphim attacked with more vigor. A sickle flashed, cleaving Lucem's spear. Claws thrust at Meliora, tearing her cheek. One dark seraph swooped, landed before Elory, and she swung her blade, knocked him aside, and ran around him.

  "Cut them down, cut them down!" Leyleet shrieked, soaring above. "They're heading for the cave, cut them down!"

  Elory ran as fast as she could. Only twenty yards separated her from the cave, but Leyleet was swooping, her wings opened wide, her laughter rolling.

  I will fight as the heroes of Requiem did, Elory thought, running with all her speed. I will never stop fighting for my stars.

  She leaped into the air and tossed her blade.

  Lemuria flew, a shard of silver, and slammed into Leyleet's leg, sinking into the flesh.

  The scream tore across the land, shattered stones, sent boulders tumbling, a sound that was deafening, blinding, a living thing. But still Elory ran, and Meliora and Lucem ran with her, and as Leyleet soared in her agony, they leaped into the cave and plunged into darkness.

  A tunnel stretched before them, leading to shadows. Meliora's halo lit rough stone walls. Elory spun toward the cave entrance. Dark seraphim flew outside, storming toward the cave, their cries echoing.

  "We'll be trapped in here!" Elory said. "They'll fly in!"

  "No, they won't." Lucem gritted his teeth. "Move deeper. Go!" He reached up, grabbed a stone that jutted from the cave ceiling, and yanked it loose.

  Dust rained.

  A dark seraph streamed through the entrance.

  Lucem grabbed Elory and pulled her backward, knocking into Meliora, stumbling deeper into the cave.

  The entrance collapsed.

  Stones rained, then a great boulder fell, slamming against the ground, cracking the walls. More stones tumbled, burying the dark seraph who was entering the cave, crushing his body, then his head, leaving only his arms exposed. And still stones fell.

  "The whole cave's collapsing!" Elory said.

  Lucem shook his head. "No. Just the entrance." He wrapped his arms around Elory, who was now shivering madly. "Look. It's all right."

  A few last stones fell, and the dust settled. Where the cave entrance had been, now a pile of rocks rose, solid, blocking the exit. Only Meliora's halo now lit the shadows.

  Elory took a deep, shuddering breath, her head spinning. Her legs would not stop shaking. The screams of the dark seraphim still sounded outside, and the boulders shuddered as the creatures slammed at them. Dust flew but the barricade held. Elory had to lean against the wall, and blood dripped across her shoulder.

  "It's all right." Lucem held her close and kissed her forehead. "We're safe, Elory. We're safe."

  Meliora stepped forward, eyes grim. Two ugly scratches ran across her cheek, dripping. "We're trapped, that's what we are. Unless this cave has another exit somewhere. Does it, Lucem?"

  He bit his lip. "Not sure. I built a few of these booby trap doors years ago, back when I was hiding from the seraphim. Never had to use one until now, but I built at least . . . four. Maybe five. Might be they're connected underground." He flashed a grin. "Guess we'll find out."

  Elory pulled away from his embrace, stepped toward the crushed dark seraph—only his hands were still visible—and wrenched his sickle free.

  I lost an ancient blade of Requiem, she thought. So I will bear a blade of evil. I—

  Her head spun madly, and she fell to her knees. Lucem knelt beside her, looked at her missing ear, and winced.

  "At least you'll save money on earrings, right?" Lucem winked. He opened his pack and pulled out some large, flat leaves. "I always carry these around. Silverweed leaves. Good for healing even the worst of wounds. Hold this against your wound. It'll soothe you."

  Elory took one of the leaves, and she winced when she touched it to her wound, expecting a blast of pain. But Lucem was right; the pain dulled, and coolness spread across the flames. Meliora took another leaf and held it to her wounded face.

  "Break it down!" rose a screech outside.

  The boulders shook. One stone—the size of a fist—came free and tumbled from the barricade.

  "We have to move." Meliora touched Elory's head, her fingers gentle. "Can you walk, sister? We have to go now. This barricade won't hold for long."

  Elory nodded. Holding the leaf to her wound with one hand, her sickle in the other, she rose
to her feet. "Let's go see if Lucem doomed us to a slow death in darkness."

  He gasped. "Oh, my dear heart! Never thank the hero." He sighed. "Let's go explore. Meliora, the human torch, would you be so kind as to lead the way?"

  Meliora sighed. "I liked him better when he was a hermit." She began to walk, heading down the tunnel into the deep blackness. As the screams still rose outside, Elory and Lucem followed.

  VALE

  In the dawn, they crossed the last rivulet, reaching the end of the delta. Behind them spread lush lands of fresh water, fruit trees, and wildlife. Before them stretched the coast, snaking into the horizon, nothing but sand on the left, sea on the right.

  "Well, dear boy." Tash nodded. "Not much water or food ahead, and according to my map, it'll be another two or three days of walking. We need some water for the road."

  Vale stared ahead at the coast. As lush and green as the delta was behind him, the land ahead was barren, nothing but golden and blue sea, no freshwater or fruit trees to be seen.

  "It might not be seraphim, zamzummim, or gold-laying centipedes that kill us then." He smiled wryly. "It might be thirst. We'll have nothing but seawater for the rest of the journey. Unless you want to sneak into town and steal a few canteens."

  "No need, my boy!" Tash flashed him a grin. From her leather pack, she pulled out a second treasure—the glass bottle she had found in the centipede's lair. The deep golden whiskey swirled inside. "We've got a bottle."

  "Good." Vale reached toward it. "Spill out the whiskey and fill up water from that stream. Last freshwater we'll see for a while."

  Tash gasped, eyes wide. She pulled the bottle to her chest. "You did not just say that."

  He groaned. "Tash!"

  "Don't you Tash me!" She cradled the bottle against her chest as if it were a babe. "This is precious stuff. We can't just spill it away." She bit her lip, and a wry look came into her eyes.