by Shae Ford
Kael walked slowly when he came to her memories of Whitebone desert. His toes curled at the lumpy flesh and grasping teeth of the creatures that must’ve been the minceworms she’d told him about. A picture of Silas and Elena made him laugh, but the next cut his laughter short.
It was a memory of Nadine — crouched, with her arms wrapped tightly about the shoulders of a little girl. Even through the thread, he could read the agony on their faces.
He walked quickly after that. Seeing Nadine’s face reminded him of what would happen if Midlan took back the realm — it reminded him that everything would be undone. The Kingdom would be exactly as it’d been before: full of people living from one day to the next without hope.
The last time he’d seen Nadine, she’d been standing next to Declan on the back of a ship bound for the Endless Plains — an entire horde of red-headed children from the mountains surrounding her. That was the face he wanted to remember: the one that seemed stuck in a glowing smile.
And so he focused himself on the task at hand.
It wasn’t long before he no longer recognized the images in Kyleigh’s mind. He supposed it was because he’d slipped beyond the time he knew her. He was near the middle of the hall when something caught his eye: a wall-height marvel of colored thread, each woven tightly against the next into a beautiful, swirling pattern …
Kael blinked, but nothing changed. Though the colors and the pattern were beautiful, they were … nonsense. They formed no picture, made no words. If he stepped back, he thought he could almost see something beginning to take shape within the pattern.
But when he squinted, it was lost.
Everything in the next half of the passageway was the same. They drew his eyes and brightened his heart at first glance, but he stepped back, frustrated. Even the few trinkets he found stacked atop the shelves had their pieces scrambled until he couldn’t tell what they were. It was all a remarkable, jumbled mess.
Each door was different, from the color of its paint to the grain of its wood. Some of their handles were rusted, some were brazen, others were simple iron rings. There was one that had nothing but a series of bolts all down its side, and Kael thought it looked important.
He slid each bolt away, listening after every click for the rumble of something dangerous inside: Beware the monsters of Fear and Doubt, for they will devour everything.
He didn’t like having Ben Deathtreader’s voice inside his head — especially now that he knew Deathtreader was the one who’d caused the Whispering War, who led the rebel army into battle against the Kingdom. He liked it no more than he would’ve liked Gilderick’s slimy voice inside his head.
But Deathtreader’s Dreadful Journeys had taught him all he knew about mind-walking — and if Kael wanted to stay alive, he had no choice but to listen.
When the last bolt sprang free, he paused a moment more. There was nothing but silence behind the door. He opened it a crack, just enough to see what lay beyond. There wasn’t much.
Water covered the floor: he could hear it slapping gently against the bottom of the doorframe. Light from the passageway spilt in, illuminating its ripples. They popped up here and there — many disappeared before he had the chance to get a decent look at them. But the ones he did manage to see were as scrambled as the tapestries. The ripples were just more frustrating, half-pictures warped by the water’s flesh.
They played across the stone above him in a mirage of ghostly shadows. Whispers glanced his ears, swelling along the lines of light that grew, sharpened. He could almost see the pictures, almost hear the words. And then just as suddenly as it’d appeared, the ghostly light was gone.
He was beginning to understand why Kyleigh was upset. This wasn’t at all like the emptiness of Brend’s mind: the rooms were full, there was plenty of light. But nothing was quite as it should’ve been. It wasn’t clear, it didn’t make sense. He was sorry for all the times he’d rolled his eyes when she said she couldn’t remember.
If he ever made it back to the present, he would apologize.
Kael closed the door and did back its bolts. He had a feeling he would find confusion behind every door, and he had no idea how to set it all straight.
“Hello?” he called into the passageway, hoping someone might answer.
The Secrets called back. He recognized their screeching voices as they tried to lead him to one door or the next, but their words were just as scrambled as everything else. Kael was so lost that he couldn’t even be lured to his death.
His frustration grew with every step. The hallway seemed to stretch forever. At last, he came to its end. He recognized the stairway in front of him immediately: the series of winding steps that — in the present — would’ve led him to the chambers he shared with Kyleigh.
He had no idea where these steps might lead him in her mind. If he traveled too far, he might accidentally go too deep and wind up inside her heart, or perhaps even the house of her soul — her Inner Sanctum. So as he climbed the steps, he was determined not to go too far. Even if the hallway continued, he wouldn’t press on. He would simply open their chamber door and be done with it.
The floor did continue at the top of the stairs — much further than it did in the present. There was an entire second floor that stretched on into darkness. Kael wondered what might lie beyond the door he knew … but in the same breath, he hoped he wouldn’t have to find out.
Their chamber door was small and rounded at its top. He turned its familiar handle without bothering to listen for what lay behind it — convinced that it would be just as empty as the rest.
But he was wrong.
Hello, my love.
Kael nearly fell out the way he came. He hadn’t been expecting to come nose-to-muzzle with a great, white dragon — and his surprise knocked him off his feet.
“Ah, hello?” was all he could think to say.
The dragon’s face was so close that its burning green eyes filled his vision. Her pupils were slitted — not rounded like Kyleigh’s. But other than that, this dragon looked exactly like her second skin. And that was the only thing that kept him from panicking when the dragon’s teeth clamped around his boot.
For all her size, she was surprisingly gentle. Kael tried not to squirm as she dragged him through the doorway. I heard you calling for me, but I couldn’t answer. I knew you would come to me on your own. I knew you’d find me.
“Really? I wasn’t sure I would. It’s … strange, here,” Kael said as the dragon leaned over him again.
Her eyes closed when he pressed a hand against her face. The white scales were smooth and warm. She leaned heavily against his palm. You’ve always been so kind to me, no matter what shape I wear. Few humans tolerated me. Some feared me. Most hated me. They saw the other half of my soul as Abomination — a corruption of the thing they hold most dear.
“What thing is that?” Kael wondered.
One of her eyes cracked open. Beauty, she murmured. All humans love beauty. They long for what pleases their eyes, waste their short years searching for this faint pleasure — all the while unaware that were they to reach out, these beautiful things would crumble to dust beneath their hands. Beauty is as passing and frail as humans. Perhaps that is why they seek it out. Even you are vulnerable to it.
Kael’s face burned as the dragon’s eye closed once again. “I do think you’re beautiful,” he admitted quietly.
It was something he would’ve never said aloud to Kyleigh’s human half. For some reason, he’d always been more comfortable talking to the dragon. Though he knew Kyleigh loved him, a small part of him worried that if he told her how beautiful she was, if he tried to speak the words his spirit whispered when she kissed him — if he dared to tell her that she held him completely captive by the strings of his heart …
Well, he was afraid she might think him silly for it.
The day I revealed my second half to you, I knew my soul would break if you hated me, the dragon rumbled. It was the most terrifying moment of my life, t
he most perilous height I’ve ever climbed. My heart lay exposed and beating at your feet. But … the dragon’s eyes opened slowly, you did not crush it. You treated me no differently than you had before. And for that, I will be forever grateful.
Kael didn’t know what to say. Kyleigh had never spoken to him like that.
They often talked late into the night — about their battles, their adventures. He loved her stories about the Whispering War; she loved to ask him questions about life in the mountains. In the short season they’d been together without any sort of trouble hanging over their heads, he felt he’d learned a lot about her.
Now he realized there was a whole other side of her he hadn’t even spoken to yet — the side she hid behind her laughter and her grins. This was the part of her she guarded, this dragon half that spoke so deeply … the part of her that was every bit as vulnerable as him.
Now, you’ve come here for a reason, have you not?
“Yes,” Kael said — trying to focus on the task at hand even though there were at least a hundred questions bouncing around inside his head. “You don’t happen to know your old name, do you? The name you had before you bonded?”
The dragon shook her head. The only names known to me are Emberfang and Kyleigh. Though the human leads us, I am always here. We’ve been one creature for as long as I can remember. But … there is a way to find your answer.
“How?”
The dragon gave him a long look. Then she bent and snagged his boot again. Kael held onto his middle as the dragon lifted him over her shoulder — as if that might somehow keep his innards from sloshing. She turned slowly, though the room was stretched inside Kyleigh’s mind to the point that three dragons could’ve moved about it easily.
Perhaps it was reluctance that dragged her claws.
Behind the dragon loomed a great stone wall. Kael followed it upwards and saw it disappear into darkness — as if the ceiling was so high that not even the light could reach it. Hanging upside down from his boot meant he had to crane his neck backwards to see the floor. He was trying to focus through the swinging of the room when he noticed the windows.
In the present, their chamber had only one window. But in Kyleigh’s mind, there were two. They were small and identically plain. Badly-worn shutters clamped tightly over their mouths. Iron latches held them shut, and from each latch hung a fist-sized lock.
These are our pasts, the dragon murmured as she set him down. They’ve been shut away since the beginning of my memory, and I have been their guardian. You’ll find every answer you seek beyond these portals.
Kael crept over to them, his heart racing.
This wall reminded him of the one he’d destroyed inside his Inner Sanctum — the wall that’d held his Fear. Was that what lay behind these windows? Was Kyleigh afraid to learn her past?
“How do I open them?” Kael said.
The locks will fall open in your hands, my love. There is nothing I have, nothing I am or might someday be that I would deny you.
There was a considerable amount of heaviness in the dragon’s voice. When Kael turned, he saw her eyes were fixed unblinkingly upon the windows. “What’s going to happen when I open them?”
I’m … not sure. Neither of us remembers what became of our pasts. There’s no way to know what you might see beyond them. Her foreclaws scraped against the floor as she tucked them beneath her, and her eyes slid back up to Kael’s. But if you throw them open, we will remember. And I … that troubles me.
“You’re afraid that if you remember who you were before, you won’t be Kyleigh anymore,” Kael guessed, searching through the worry in the dragon’s eyes. “You’re afraid the truth might change you.”
She nodded. Perhaps for the better … perhaps not. But you must open them, my love. This is the only way.
Kael thought carefully. “What if I only opened them a bit — just enough to look inside, but not enough to let anything out?”
The dragon’s scaly lips twisted into a smile. You could try.
Trying was his only option. He doubted there was a room inside Kyleigh’s head that would’ve made more sense than this one. And if the dragon said looking through the windows was the only way, then he believed it.
The woman might’ve been a bit mischievous, but he trusted the dragon completely.
Kael stepped up to the left window first. It rattled when he reached for it, as if a great wind roared behind it. No sooner had he touched the lock than it fell open inside his hand.
The bolt thudded hard against the shutters as the wind roared. He could practically hear the iron groaning to hold its own against the gales. Kael braced himself against one shutter and planted his elbow firmly atop the pane of the other. He slid the bolt back fractions at a time — his warrior half swelling to match each thrust of the wind.
When the bolt slid free, he let the shutter push his arm back. It opened just enough to form a hairline crack into the world beyond, and Kael peered through it carefully.
*******
Fire burst across his eyes — furious tongues of yellow flame. They blinded him, enraged him. He slung one of his claws into the heart of the fire and bared his teeth as they tore across flesh.
He tucked his wings and fell in the direction of an agonized screech. A small white dragon was bolting towards the earth — towards the high walls of an enormous city. Its spires glowed with the evening light. Every pale brick was stricken with the sun’s fire: it roiled inside a cradle of green, the whole thing made molten by dusk.
Anger burst inside his chest at the thought and his great wings beat against his sides, ripping him towards the white dragon.
Her head slung around and her strange, blue eyes widened with fear. The mark of his claws were drawn in scarlet lines across her chest. “Please — enough!”
These words meant nothing to Kael. There was no enough. Nothing would ever be enough. These monsters would never stop slaughtering his people. They’d slaughtered dragons for hundreds of years without mercy, without any thought. Not even when the hatching grounds fell cold did the Halved Ones stop their killing.
Now when he slept, he dreamt of the end of dragonkind.
No, they would find no mercy from him.
Kael dug his claws into the dragon’s back. The wind’s howl filled his ears as he plummeted from the sky like a rock. He slammed the white dragon’s body into the earth, reveling in the snap of her bones.
Her blood poured across his claws — each drop broiling with her inner flame. It slid into the cracks between his scales and seared the flesh beneath them. His eyes blurred against the pain, but he forced himself to dig in, to snap more of her bones and draw more of her blood.
Kyleigh’s voice filled his chest and burst with angry words: “Give up your hatching grounds, Halved One! Tell me where they are, and I will kill you quickly.”
Angry screeching filled the air above him. Kael could feel the shadows of his enemies falling towards him, swarming to save their companion from his grasp. They would rip his flesh from its bone and his heart from its cage. They would tear him apart so swiftly with the force of their numbers that he would have no chance to fight back.
But he didn’t care.
Let them come.
“… don’t know … hatching grounds …” the Halved One whimpered from beneath him. “We don’t … don’t …”
“Argh!” Kael thrust forward with all of his weight and snapped the Halved One’s neck. He dragged his claws against the dirt to staunch the burning of her blood.
The shadow of the swarm was falling upon him: females, males of every color — they wore the skins of those he’d lost. They made a mockery of his friends. He could see the fury wrought in each blue line of their eyes, but he felt no fear.
There was only rage.
The sky between them disappeared as he charged into battle. They had the force of the earth behind them. The Halved Ones would pummel him in a swarm and thrust his body into the ground. They would snap his neck jus
t as he’d done to their companion.
Still, Kael’s pace never slowed. He would crash straight into their middle and drag as many as he could against his belly. Their corpses would break his fall —
A roar pierced the clouds, shook the skies. Kael’s wings beat with a new speed as a monstrous black dragon burst through the Halved Ones’ swarm. His claws hewed their wings. Their throats split against his jagged teeth. With one powerful swipe of his tail, he flung their shattered bodies from the skies.
But there were more.
A strange sound came from the molten city: the clang of metal forced into the shell of a song. Kael had come to hate the noise, and to fear it. This sound meant the Halved Ones’ Great Swarm was coming — led by a human who wielded a terrible fire.
“Flee, the battle is lost!”
Kael’s ears hardened against the black dragon’s voice. A blinding white light had appeared inside the city’s middle. It bounced with the sprint of the man who carried it. Even from a distance, Kael could see his eyes were set upon him — and his mind clouded with the thought of blood.
Thousands spilled from the city behind the man who carried the light, twisting and bursting into their stolen skins. The man leapt astride the largest Halved One and the Great Swarm followed the blinding arc of the fire he carried.
Let them come!
Kael wanted nothing more than to slaughter every last one …
“My heart’s bond!”
The words tore Kael’s eyes from the Great Swarm and to the black dragon hovering above him. He saw all of his pain, all of his anguish reflected inside the dragon’s eyes. Blood burned between the cracks of his scales. His once-proud head sank low with exhaustion. He knew the weight of Kael’s pain. He’d entrusted it to him, asked him to bear it wisely.
But this time, he’d failed.
He remembered it, now: the black dragon’s anger had carried him across the seas into the heart of the Wildlands. It’d driven him to start a battle he couldn’t win.
“Please, my heart — I couldn’t bear it if you were slain even a moment before I. There will be a time to fight the Halved Ones. But for today, the battle is lost.”
