by Meagan Hurst
Z smiled at the tease, but glanced at Nivaradros and evaluated his condition. He had been wounded at one point or another, but like her he appeared to be ignoring his wounds. Unlike her, no one was trying to point this out and that both annoyed her and amazed her. Nivaradros, however, noticed her eyeing him and raised a brow before nodding in silent understanding.
“I assure you I am alright.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“Notice who is supporting whom.” He reached up to touch her face with his free hand while around them both sides continued to argue his fate. He was, she knew, far angrier than he was letting anyone know, and she worried his determination to keep his temper hidden would harm him later on. He chuckled darkly. “I am working on my restraint. If I can keep from lashing out here, there is a high likelihood I will manage not to eat the mortals who use their mouths foolishly in your presence.”
She opened her mouth to respond when turmoil broke loose around them. Nivaradros roared his fury as the ground began to shake from the force of magic that was thrown at them from above. Shields began to appear around various members of the group, but some of them shattered almost instantly. Knowing they needed to have a plan, Z took control without thinking.
“Back—get back—back up!” she shouted as her magic came when she called. She pulled a shield together, but something happened before her that caused her to drop her concentration completely; the Mithane was wounded. Worse, he was not just wounded he was down.
She would have moved to his side, but moving wasn’t her best function. At her soft cry, Nivaradros saw the Mithane was down. Fire, wind, and the occasional spell was being thrown at them, but Nivaradros handed her to Crilyne and moved forward despite the danger outside of the shield she had managed to keep from losing. Lifting the Mithane with ease, he left his life in the hands of the immortals that had come to defend him, as he moved back into the protection of Z’s shield.
Once he was beside her, Nivaradros left the majority of the fighting to those around him, including Wyenrtros and the few other Dragons who had been swayed to his side, and knelt to lower the Mithane to the ground before her. Her shield was holding, but often those within it left to attack the Dragons who were now bringing on a full assault against their ‘guests.’
“He lives,” Nivaradros assured her as she let Crilyne help her over to his side. “But he needs help. Zimliya, you will have to heal him if there is any chance of saving him. He is bleeding from a jagged hole in his side, and I believe it is deep enough to have reached his heart.”
He was right, but the damage was worse than that; she could feel it from here. Clearly the Dragons had decided to retaliate against the Mithane’s earlier actions and focused the brunt of their attack against him. Kneeling beside Nivaradros, she closed her eyes to block out the flashes of light from the fighting around her. She wanted to worry about everyone—she was worrying about everyone—but if she focused on what could happen she would lose the Mithane. He had healed her without pause even when she had barely been willing to allow it; it was her turn to return the favor.
It didn’t require contact. It didn’t require being in the same room, but all healers eventually fell prey to some sort of connection, and she had never attempted to separate herself. Likewise, if the Mithane had once been against contact, he had changed his opinion over time. He seemed to enjoy contact and she knew it helped reassure him he wasn’t doing anything that might harm or endanger the being in his care. Placing her hands on the Mithane’s chest, she concentrated on the damage he had undergone. There was a large hole in his chest.
His lungs and hearts had taken the brunt of the damage, but everything else around them was weakened. Shivering as she began to focus on the rebuilding of veins, muscles, bones, ligaments, organs, and flesh, Z struggled to keep from losing control of this magic. It was easy to heal—any healer would admit to that. Once you had experience or training, all that was needed was the talent to heal and control over it if you wanted it, although control wasn’t required. But Z wanted control. Her magic did what it wanted when it wanted, and that out of control feeling frightened her.
And it wasn’t enough. She could feel Evieck slipping away from her. Eyes closed, she struggled to hold onto him; realizing his loss this way would cripple her—cripple the world. She needed him. Because he cared for her. Because he loved her.
“Stay with me,” she whispered. “Mithane, Evieck, Father…” the last she barely managed to say, but she said it aloud in the hope that he would hear her. If he did, it changed nothing; he remained unconscious and almost unresponsive to her magic. She felt a hand touch her cheek and flinched—opening her eyes to meet the neon ones of her Dragon.
“You’re crying,” he murmured, worried as he looked from her back to the Mithane. When she didn’t reply, he said nothing more and added his own magic to her shield—making it a shield of fire. He was cautious here, and she couldn’t blame him. The more he withheld from his people, the safer all of them would be. Not to mention she had no idea how everyone else would react to the knowledge of Nivaradros’s extensive magical talents.
The world around them was a battlefield. She could tell none of hers were dead, but the Dragons had lost several. She counted at least ten bodies that were not the Dragons killed by her or the Mithane. The Islierre, Shalion, and Dyiavea were all injured, but she couldn’t help them. Splitting her attention and magic was doable, but she felt it would be an injustice to the Mithane, and no one else was in immediate danger of perishing from their wounds.
“Stay with me,” she whispered as she turned her full attention back to the Mithane, closing her eyes again. The words were not lost on her; he had said them over and over to her when she had been mere inches from dying—and then had died—after her run-in with the creature that had left her with scars and lightning. The Mithane’s wounds were almost healed, but she could barely find signs of life. His lungs had taken the longest to repair and they scarcely seemed to move. His heart was still being repaired and it was skipping beats. “Please,” she pleaded. “Evieck, stay here.”
No response. Struggling to hide her growing fears, Z let her magic continue to work while her mind began to run. What would she tell his people? What would she tell Shevieck? How would the Mithane’s death while helping her—helping Nivaradros—be viewed by those around him? She felt her magic end abruptly and froze, knowing she would have to face all of those questions and more. Eyes still closed; she felt the tears fall, feeling like she had managed to do nothing but let the Alantaion down.
“Z…is…?” she felt the Dragon shift beside her and knew he fell silent because he could feel the anger building within her. That and he knew the answer to his question.
Opening her eyes, she stood in a rush and let the anger that was slowly, but steadily unfolding inside her help keep her on her feet. She didn’t need Crilyne’s offered aid. Turning it down with a curt word, she let her shield fall and pushed past everyone until she stood between the fighting Dragons who were too cowardly to leave their seats and the people who were defending Nivaradros with everything they had. It had cost her a life. She refused to let it claim a second. Anger was something she didn’t let overcome her; had she Midestol would have won ages ago. But she wasn’t facing him, and she was past being angry about everything she had been forced to endure for the past year. Between Kitra’s demise, Veilantras’s betrayal, and having failed the Mithane, Z no longer wanted to toe the line of diplomacy.
Nivaradros wasn’t asking for a place here. He didn’t care for his people. He had only sought to show he was willing to interact with them if it was needed, but all it had brought was a battle in the middle of the Dragons’ Isle. A battle she intended to end before it became a war. Without giving the Dragons any warning, Z did the unthinkable; she brought the Hall down through the mountain.
It would, she knew grimly, destroy the mountain, but she didn’t care and she felt they deserved it. Battle cries changed to cries of fear and several o
f the Dragons tried to take flight as she sent herself, everyone else, and the Hall crashing down through miles and miles of stone, dirt, and other components that had once made up a mountain. A good third of the Dragons tried to take to the sky, but she wasn’t done with them, and she refused to release them. Binding their wings to their sides with a thought, she continued to bring the Hall through the mountain—taking her time despite the speed of the fall.
She was far more dangerous than she had been when Midestol’s mages had tried to drown Arriandie. Her anger was deeper than it had been on that day when the deaths of his thousand mages had been so easy to bring about. She had no remorse, no regrets, and no restraints on her power and she no longer cared whether or not she frightened anyone with the enormity of what she had at her beck and call. They would stop fighting; they would do it now.
The Dragons decided it would be a wise idea to attack her. She corrected that idea quickly. Calling in the element she used the least, she denied everyone else in the room the ability to use magic. Keeping her power tightly coiled to ensure the area around her wouldn’t be unmade, she displayed the element that countered everything, and all without uneasiness. She likewise summoned shadow. Around them, the mountain was falling to pieces and those pieces would endanger the Isle if she wasn’t careful. She wanted to make a point; she didn’t want to cause any more injury, death, or damage than she had to. She sent the pieces—though some of them were larger than an adult Dragon—to a shadow world.
When the Hall finally hit sea-level, Z let her power end—on that front—and stared with fury at the Dragons who were still pinned to their locations. “How dare you,” she said in a voice that was barely above a whisper, but one she knew they would hear. “We came here with a simple question, and in order to get the answer we were willing to listen to your accusations. All of us. You have questioned us, but it made no difference to you whether we spoke or not.”
She moved from the center of the stage to the left side of it—away from her allies and instead closer to the Dragon she had slain. “It’s cost you lives. It’s cost you the mountain this Hall was placed upon. I wonder how much more you will lose before you understand we came here for diplomacy. We don’t give a rat’s ass whether or not you approve of how things are moving. I don’t give a rat’s ass whether or not you accept Nivaradros as one of your peers. He is a Dragon, but he is mine. If you think attempting to kill him is a wise idea, I see no problem returning to destroy the Isle if that’s what it takes to convince you to back off. He’s not after your precious Isle; he couldn’t give a damn whether or not any of you exist!”
Nivaradros stayed where he was, but she could tell he wanted to be beside her. It wasn’t a strong enough impulse to abandon the Mithane’s body, but she knew he was well aware of just how far the Dragons had pushed her. She was shaking with her anger.
“You set him up to fail,” she snapped. “Everything you did from the second he was born was setting him up to fail. You let him survive strictly because you assumed he would perish as a hatchling. When it became clear he was a survivor, you decided to try and assassinate him.”
A cold smile touched the corners of her mouth and Z was grateful for the lack of reflective surfaces available to her; she knew what colors her eyes would be. “How’d that work out for you?”
Silence met her words and Z glanced over at her small group. Shalion knelt beside the Mithane—his features drawn and tight with anger. The Islierre’s wounds wept blood, but he was standing and speaking with the Dragons who had been able to put aside the stories their kind told of Nivaradros in order to give him their much needed support. Dyiavea spoke with Dyslentio, and Z was relieved to see the Kryhista had survived the Dragons’ attacks, although he was wounded, and it was unlikely he would be able to heal anyone for a few hours. Crilyne was beside Nivaradros, who was standing watch over Shalion. For once, the Shade and Nivaradros didn’t seem to be aware of their disagreements. Zyrhis, however, approached her. Sabaias decided to follow him.
“Z…?” Zyrhis called as he closed the distance between them. His eyes were worried and flashed as he offered his hands palms out to display his lack of a weapon.
“I am not about to attack you,” she growled. Her eyes met Sabaias’s and he offered her a kind smile. Like Zyrhis’s it was worried, but unlike Zyrhis, he didn’t attempt to disarm her anger. Instead he reached her side and gently wrapped his arms around her shoulders and drew her close.
He seemed shocked when she didn’t attempt to attack him. Instead she allowed his silent support while Zyrhis stood on her other side. His eyes moved to the trapped Dragons and he straightened. “Shalion, why don’t you show the Dragons what you showed us about Nivaradros. It will give Z a minute to…breathe.”
Shalion nodded and stepped away from the Mithane to join them. He didn’t, unlike the rest of them, speak to her as he reached her side. He did nod once in her direction before pulling a small bit of flat magic out of his pocket. Tossing it into the air the Ryelention released a part of his past with Nivaradros; the past she herself had recently learned about.
She watched as Shalion gave the Dragons’ more information than she had been offered. It started with Nivaradros’s approach to request information about how to work around her…difficulties. She managed to stand quietly as the images of Nivaradros’s past were revealed. It showed how he planned to become someone she trusted, but it also showed he could get along with others when she wasn’t around.
Eventually the images died, and Shalion’s attention moved from the Dragons to her. “You call it,” he said quietly.
Nodding she turned to their audience once more. “I hope you’ll reconsider your positions before we leave, but we are leaving whether or not you grant Nivaradros the right to. Try and follow us or fight us and you will find this day hasn’t even begun to get started.” And it was a new day. Their meeting had taken over three days just to get this far, and she wasn’t satisfied with any of it. “Wyenrtros?”
Looking as though he had decided Nivaradros was definitely not the one to fear, the elder Dragon approached her slowly—still in mortal form—and eyed her with concern. “You should,” he stated when he seemed to decide she was safe enough to be around, “get your wounds healed.”
She flinched at his words but forced herself not to lash out at him. She managed not to ask him how he intended for her to do that when his people had killed the Mithane. She didn’t—couldn’t—trust anyone else. Turning away from him, she barely heard him ask his people again what they thought. Z expected no change. Dragons were stubborn, and not even the full display of her power was likely to get them to admit they were wrong. But she found herself turning to look as the fires once more began to light. And this time most of them were orange.
“The choice has been made. Nivaradros, you are free to go.”
It wasn’t Wyenrtros who spoke, but Veilantras. Her voice shook slightly, but otherwise she looked unfazed by the destruction and death that surrounded her. Her eyes found those of her former student and she managed a tired smile. “I have room for you all in my lair…” she began.
“I believe it is for the best if I decline,” Nivaradros interrupted. “Z?”
She wouldn’t have moved had Sabaias not. He started walking, and since his arm was still supportively around her shoulders, she went with him. Which was a good thing. Her anger was fading and with its retreat, her injuries were making themselves known. By the time she reached Nivaradros, she was being supported by the Nialtian before he handed her off to Nivaradros. The Dragon who had at last won some sort of peace from his people.
Nivaradros’s eyes were a mixture of shades. He exhaled sharply and glanced at the Dragons still in their stations. “You may want to release them,” he murmured to her as turned his attention to her wounds. She did as he asked, and the air was immediately filled with Dragons. Very few remained when the air settled. Those Dragons, however, began to make their way down in mortal form to the stage, or what was left o
f it. It had taken a bit of a beating in her decision to smash it through the mountain.
“I am willing to entertain your questions,” Nivaradros told them as they approached. “But at a later time. My allies and…friends,” he spoke the last word as if it was unfamiliar, but he managed to keep from making a face, much to Z’s relief, “are wounded, tired, and upset. I do not wish to turn what remains of this day into anything darker than it has already been.”
To Z’s astonishment, the dozen Dragons nodded in silent understanding. Their eyes moved to her and seven of them bowed. It was a very low and respectful bow which caught her off guard. “Our apologies, Zimliya,” one of them said after a clear hesitation. “We were in error. You are not Nivaradros’s pet. You are also not his equal; you stand above him.”
“She does,” Nivaradros agreed. “And I have no quarrels with that. I seek nothing from this relationship that our people should fear.”
“That is good to hear. Safe trip home to all of you.” Turning, they left as one and Z watched them until they were gone.
“Karlitras, I have no way to thank you,” Nivaradros said to the Dragoness who was still a part of the group. Her back had been towards them, but she turned as Nivaradros spoke; she was crying.
No one moved. Z had thought her tears were alarming, but the Dragoness let hers fall unheeded. “You owe me nothing, Nivaradros,” she whispered. “I am sorry…I saw the attack…”
Guilt then. Z struggled to gain height. “No one blames you,” she murmured.
Karlitras shook her head and turned her attention to the six Dragons she’d flown with. “We should go. We’ll keep a watch for danger,” she added. “But I think it’s time all of you had some peace to discuss things without any other Dragons keeping watch.”
Nivaradros thanked his Dragon allies but made no request to keep them around. Once they had shifted and taken off, Wyenrtros did the same, leaving only one Dragon in the Hall, and Nivaradros picked Z up and cradled her close. “Let’s get you somewhere I can tend to those injuries—unless you will let Dyslentio heal them?”
