"Ben and myself are at risk," I said.
"You think Anton is behind this?" asked Ben.
"It's possible that he knows nothing about it. The Great One could be manipulating him for its purposes, of which we know nothing," I said.
"That's the missing piece. This Great One. The so-called earth dragon," said Rowan.
"Not a dragon by Tugain's words, though we have no reason to trust it either," I said.
"What if we left?" asked Ben suddenly as he wiped beaded sweat from his forehead. "What can the Great One do to Kat besides suppress the prophecies?"
"Which we don't know is true or not," I said.
"Yes, yes, but what can he do to you if you just up and left?" Ben turned to Rowan. "You seem more knowledgeable than the two of us about such bindings. Is this the same as you and your guardian?"
Rowan looked reluctant at first, but then nodded and motioned for me to come near.
"Stand out of the water," she said.
I complied, and the water froze to my skin almost instantly, cracking around my extended nipples. I held my arms around my chest, shivering.
Rowan slid near, before standing up to match my height. She moved her face closer, and I might have been aroused except for the stern face she wore. She grabbed me by the back of the head and jammed her lips forcefully against mine.
Before I could pull away, she started sucking away my soul. It was the most awful thing I'd ever experienced. I felt on death's door, as if I had some fatal disease that stole my energy. If I struggled I was not aware, as she drained me of essence.
Then she was away, coughing and sputtering as if she'd swallowed tepid pond water. Rowan slipped back and splashed her face.
Still partially stunned, it took me a moment to realize I was freezing. Once the water was around my neck and chest, I felt better, though my scalp hurt from the extended exposure.
"That was awful," I said.
"Apologies, sister. I did not wish to hurt you, but I knew no other way to gauge the Great One's hold on you. Unfortunately, its bond is strong. As strong as mine with Harvest, or Neva with Pavel."
The reminder of my son made me wince.
"Did you learn anything about the nature of the beast?" asked Ben.
Rowan seemed to consider the information she'd gained from my essence as if she were tasting a new food for the first time and trying to guess at its ingredients.
"It's not a dragon," she said. "I know that for certain. But otherwise, the only thing I sense is its power. This is not your typical supernatural creature. This thing has power enough to shake worlds."
"But what is it?" I asked, feeling claustrophobic.
"Apologies. I don't know anything more," she said.
"It's settled then," said Ben.
Rowan and I spoke at the same time with the same words. "What's settled?"
"What we must do next. We must make a visit to this Great One, and ascertain its nature. Nothing else matters at this point if we're going to escape this trap," said Ben.
"Trap!" I exclaimed. "That was the other thing I forgot. The wolves of shadow. I don't think they were hunting us before. I think they were herding us. That's why they didn't kill me. Because they're not supposed to."
Rowan nodded slowly. "A trap. That's what this is. I agree with Ben. We must find out what this Great One is before we make any other moves. When shall we go?"
A grin the size of the moon spread across Ben's face. "Why, tonight, of course."
Chapter Thirty-One
Many a conspiracy had been launched in the middle of the night. Ours was a strange endeavor, as heavy winds had blown snow from the surface of the lake and the moon was as bright as a beacon. The frozen sky in the cavern glowed silver. The pillars that held it up turned to cobalt, then icy black by the time they reached the lake bottom.
We crept along the jagged floor, moving in the direction of a black hole in the wall. We'd brought lanterns, but left them unlit until we were safely out of sight.
The sky made faint popping noises, reminding me of Cossacks firing their rifles from astride horses on the plains while Catherine and I watched from a safer vantage point. The frigid air carried the sound like a tightly wound lyre string. The scent-memory of horseflesh rose up, until I could hear the swish of tails over the crunch of my boots.
When we were far enough away from the village, Ben handed Rowan and me a small vial of dark liquid. I sloshed it around the tempered glass, trying to discern its nature against the silvery sky.
"Are you trying to poison me again?" I asked.
Ben knocked a strand of blond hair away from his face. "Not immediately. It's a shot of good bourbon. I didn't want to haul glasses and a bottle, so I put them in a few spare vials I had."
"What are we drinking to?" asked Rowan.
"To good fortune," he said, then drank down the liquid with a grimace.
I matched his gesture. The bourbon was rough and made my teeth clench. Rowan seemed unaffected by the liquor.
"At least I'm warm now," I said.
Inside the cave, the lantern turned the walls into a glistening black gut. It felt like we were traveling through the belly of a gargantuan beast. As the slope descended, I found myself holding my breath in anticipation of the Great One, worried about its link to me.
When we reached the bottom, Ben lifted his lantern, spreading light in all directions. The curtain of darkness was pushed back, but I felt like the Great One was going to come rushing out at any moment.
"Is this the place?" asked Ben, not bothering to whisper.
"Yes," I said.
"Are you sure?" he asked, a frown hanging on his lips.
"Certain."
"It was my estimation that the creature would be waiting for you since it's connected through the bond," said Ben.
"That's not how it works," said Rowan. "Assuming it's as Harvest and I."
Ben grumbled as he walked forward with the lantern held high. He shook his head as if he'd been planning on giving the creature a verbal thrashing.
The far wall didn't reveal itself to Ben's lantern, but based on the echoes I suspected the cavern was immense, or at least very long. The echoes seemed to split and travel in each direction.
"I'm not sure we should move too far away from our escape," I said as Ben kept going forward.
He called back. "If the Great One is as large as you said, then I think we'd know if it was here."
"I'm not one for such bold assumptions," I said.
"Well, clearly I am," said Ben.
Eventually I realized he wasn't going to be restrained to the cavern entrance and followed him. Rowan was off to the right, examining the slick wall.
I couldn't sustain the tension and let out an exasperated sigh.
The surface of the rock was gnarled like a rope. It looked as if the hole had been scraped out of the earth and then frozen into place. Pale dust was scattered across the rocks, heavier in some places than others. I rubbed some between my fingers, but its nature didn't reveal itself to me.
"Maybe it's taken its mischief somewhere else," said Ben from ahead.
"Seems unlikely," I replied.
We walked for about five minutes. Rowan was about twenty paces behind us. About the time I was feeling that we should turn around, a breeze ruffled my hair. I felt pressure coming from the front.
"Did you feel that?" I asked, my gut twisting and not just from the earlier whiskey.
Ben had stopped moving. He held the lantern high.
"Unless this cave system is connected to the outside, something would have to be moving through it to create a breeze," he said.
"I think we're well acquainted with the concept," said Rowan, who came even with us.
We stared into the darkness.
"Do you feel anything?" asked Ben.
"Nothing," I said.
I remembered a story about bandits on the rail lines who could tell when a train was coming by listening for the vibrations. I got down on my hands and knees and put
my ear to the stone. It contained a faint tremor.
"If it's coming this way, it's still far," I said.
Another breeze slammed us in the face, this time throwing our hair around.
"Or not," I said.
As I turned to head back, Rowan grabbed the sleeve of my coat. "No time to make it back. The creature is not far ahead."
"We need to find a side passage," said Ben as he ran perpendicular to the tunnel.
As the slope increased, it was harder to scramble over the stone. Moving with the ridges had made travel easier.
A rumble formed at our feet. I thought we'd be trapped until Rowan called out that she'd found a passage.
A crack formed in the wall. Before Ben moved in, he shone his light further up the curve. Pale sticks were scattered across the ridges.
Ben moved to investigate.
"Quickly, Ben. We don't have time," I said.
Ben bent down, examining the items. I sensed the Great One nearing. The wind was almost constant now.
"They're bones," he said. "Human bones."
A horrible grinding came from ahead. The dust I'd found at the lowest point of the tunnel became clear to me now. It was ground up bones from the Great One moving over them.
Something massive growled in the darkness, spurring Ben to action. He scrambled over the rock to the crack in the wall. We slipped into the space and hooded our lanterns.
"Katerina Dashkova," said the Great One. "Have you come to beg for forgiveness for your failures?"
I couldn't see the creature, but its booming voice gave away its position. It had stopped about fifty paces from our hiding spot.
"I come for truth," I said.
"Truth? You came to me for healing. I offered succor in exchange for servitude. What does truth have to do with that?" asked the Great One. Sulfuric airs made breathing hazardous, tickling my throat to cough.
"Why do you wish Tugain dead?" I asked, holding a forearm over my mouth.
"Why doesn't matter, little one, only that I wish it," it said.
I was standing at the front of the crack. I felt Ben slip past me, a whisper of fabric brushing against mine.
"Did you bring gifts?" asked the Great One.
"I brought no gifts. Only questions," I said.
"You brought gifts," it said.
I realized what it meant, and where the missing villagers had gone. The Great One had eaten them, leaving their bones to be ground to dust.
Before I could say anything else, Ben's lantern bloomed like an explosion, revealing the creature before us. The similarities to the dragon Tugain began and ended with the scaly snout. Black eyes reflected the orange flame of the lantern. Huge, arched, snot-filled nostrils flared with menace. Rather than a sloped neck that extended into wings, the Great One's body was long like a snake. It went beyond the light. Orange-black scales like dappled rust showing through an iron pipe had notches and scars from constant battering.
As it surged forward to snap at Ben, I felt the size of the creature through the heel-slapping vibration in the earth.
I was so transfixed by this that Rowan had to yank me back into the gap so the Great One wouldn't bite me in half. The creature's snout slammed into the stone, turning black granite into dust. We were thrown onto our rears. Chips of stone sprayed across our faces. It was a miracle we still had our sight.
The Great One pounded against the crack. I found myself crawling forward, tugged by an invisible cord.
Rowan screamed in my ear and pulled against the Great One's hold on me. I was aware of the struggle but could do nothing to stop it.
Then something burned my arm, and I stopped fighting Rowan. As dust and rock snowed around us, I blinked to awareness. Ben had burned me with the hot lantern. The desire to climb into the Great One's mouth faded with the pain.
"Come on!" he yelled, hair gray with rock dust.
The crack formed a narrow triangle. We scrambled over the falling debris to escape the Great One's anger. It was smashing its body against the rock. Each step, I bounced against the wall. Ben had blood soaked into his hair.
The crack went into the earth another twenty meters, sloping up. I was almost at the end when the bottom fell away. The Great One's constant hammering had shifted the passage until it had collapsed.
I saw lights spin around my head as I slipped downward, arms pinwheeling, scraping stone. There were screams, and the grinding of the earth.
When it finally subsided, I heard nothing but the beating of my heart. A quick check of my surroundings using my hands revealed I was trapped in a hole by myself. Though I'd seen the others fall, I could not feel them or hear their cries. I was alone, trapped deep in the earth with no way to escape.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Surrounded by a granite cocoon, it was not my eventual demise that filled my thoughts, but the nature of the Great One and how it had come to be.
Rather than an earth dragon, as was initially suggested, the Great One was the beast named Jörmungandr by the northern peoples, or the Midgard Serpent. The one Thor was meant to slay at Ragnarök.
The creature was the harbinger of the end times. The ouroboros—a serpent eating its own tail—of legend past. I knew this not from the many books of myth I had consumed in my research, but from Russia's dealings with the Scandinavian countries.
When Catherine first had dealings with Finland, as the lake-lands of Karelia constantly passed between the two countries, she'd wanted to understand their moods and ways so she might outmaneuver them. Together, in the winter when the drifts could bury a cottage, we huddled in bed, reading by candlelight, discussing the customs. Catherine hadn't understood the ouroboros until I sliced off a length of golden rope from the curtains and curled it upon itself to symbolize the tail-eating serpent.
Its existence, swimming through the earth in tunnels made by its own efforts, suggested other mysteries, though none more important than my imprisonment. The Jörmungandr had shown its mastery over me when it tried to lure me from the safety of the side passage and into its ashy mouth.
But that link was meaningless if I could not escape this tomb of earth. I was mostly uninjured, except for a few bumps and sore spots that mostly reminded me that I was still alive.
I called out a few times, first for Rowan then Ben, but heard no responses. I feared they were buried beneath the fallen rock. The tunnel had caved in, and only through sheer luck had I been pitched into a gap.
Eldritch light sprung from my hand, casting purplish glints across the stone. I lay within a shattered well, open space going up into darkness, suggesting a possible way out. One wall was a pile of stone. This place appeared to be a lower passage that had been crushed when the tunnel we'd been in had collapsed.
Breath listed out of my mouth. It wasn't as sharply frigid as the outside, but it was still winter in Siberia, and the cold went deep.
The broken wall provided handholds, which made climbing manageable, even with my shortened fingertips. Halfway up, I found a hole that went perpendicular. I flared my light upward, hoping to see the passage continue, but it ended in a dome of rock.
I thought I heard yelling.
"Ben! Rowan!"
The loudness of my voice made me cringe, fearing the walls might further collapse.
When I heard muted replies, I knew I was on the right track. I crawled into the side hole, keeping my head low to avoid bumping it against the rough stone, following the reverberation of their voices.
After four or five meters, I was blocked by a slab of stone that had fallen across the passage.
"Ben? Rowan?" I said, pressing my lips into the gap.
"Katerina!" said Rowan, from somewhere through the hole and below me.
"Where's Ben?" I asked.
"He's with me, but injured. He took a blow to the head in the fall," she said.
"Why haven't you healed him yet?" I asked, and the answer came back as tense silence.
"You don't want to waste your strength on him if you're trapped an
d he's going to die anyway," I said, the accusations spitting out of my lips.
"No! Not that," said Rowan, wounded, but I knew it was true.
"I'm sorry, Rowan, that wasn't fair of me," I said. "You're just being practical."
"In truth, it's worse than you think," she said, and I wished I was there to hold her in my arms and gently crush away the pain in her voice. "If I cannot get out of this earthly tomb using physical means, then I can recall myself to the hut, ending my turn. But that would leave Ben to die, and I had decided that it would be a waste to let him expire without harvesting his energy to be used for the hut's repair."
I let the silence be my answer for far too long. Even though I knew I would have considered the same thing, the cold calculation was difficult to hear. Sometimes thoughts were better left unspoken.
"You think me a monster," said Rowan.
"Not at all," I lied. "It was the realization that we might not be able to get out that stayed my tongue."
"Does that mean you have no easy way to reach us?" said Rowan.
"I don't even know if I can get out, let alone reach you. Are there other passages from your location?" I asked.
Soft light bloomed in the hole, making me squint. At the bottom of the pit, Rowan peered up at me, her raven hair gray with rock dust. The slumped form of Ben Franklin lay at her feet. A quick review revealed that if I tried to shift the stone, it would likely crush them both.
The light died, and I declined to fill in its absence with my purplish sorcery. Instead, I lay against the cold stone, wishing its pain was sharper.
"I never finished my story," said Rowan softly, like a little girl asking for another cup of tea.
"What story?" I asked, wondering if I'd missed something.
"Before we met the Yaran peoples, when we were headed south, just the two of us on our adventure," she said, the memory of that time a smile in her voice.
"I'd forgotten," I said.
"I hadn't," she replied. "I've never told anyone about that part of my past, and I'd decided that you would be the first. That I never finished has been an ache in my chest."
"Why don't you tell me now while we wait for Ben to wake up," I said.
I settled in a comfortable position with my head resting on my arms, ear turned to the hole in the stone.
Dragons of Siberia (The Dashkova Memoirs Book 7) Page 15
