Page 108 of Beautiful Beast

The library in Skalisméra had been so large it was intimidating. This one felt better. I wandered through the shelves, picking out some human texts I’d read and some I hadn’t. Plenty of books weren’t in the common language. And some of them were in a script I’d never seen before.

Rounding a shelf, I came to a stop. The wall I hadn’t looked at when I entered. Near the door. On it hung a painting so large it almost looked like it was rendered on the wall itself. Beautiful and lifelike. It painted a picture of war I hadn’t seen.

A town in the foothills of some mountains, some of the buildings already burning. People were running for their lives, but with the mountains at their backs, there was nowhere for them to go. So they were risking themselves by fleeing past the dragons who were attacking.

The town and people were ensconced in some sort of mist, making them hazy and hard to see. And in front of them was a white dragon. Not quite white. There was black there, too. Mottled and rolling over its scales. The power flowed from him as he stood against the other dragons with wings flared.

A second later, I noticed the red and blue dragons in the sky, also facing off against the horde of dragons approaching.

“I wondered if you’d find this,” Endre said softly, leaning against the doorframe.

I felt more than saw the way his eyes dragged up my body in appreciation of what I wore. Especially his mark spiraling up my arm.

“What is it?”

“A scene from a very long time ago. When the Elders decided the war was no longer worth their time. They were simply going to wipe humans from the face of Viria, no matter the cost to dragonkind. And we would have lost many. The magic humans have against us is powerful and lethal.” His smile held pain. “Scalefire. It can strip us bare and leave us burning. We would have won, but it would not have been a victory.”

He walked over to me slowly and drew a finger over the white now marked on my skin. The same white that was on his skin beneath his clothes. The same white in the painting in front of me. “It was you?”

All he did was keep tracing the smoky patterns. “I had hoped to spare them. I cloaked the town in fog and mist, allowing them a chance to escape. But the Elders had commanded too many. It wouldn’t have made a difference.”

“We’re still here,” I said, meaning humans. “So clearly you did something.”

Endre turned to look at the painting. The feelings from him were so chaotic and melancholy I couldn’t keep up with them. “By that point both sides had taken heavy losses, and I wanted it all to stop. I wanted the dragons to be safe and I wanted the humans to leave us alone and be left alone. The people in the towns we were burning had nothing to do with the actions of who’d attacked us. So I tried. I created a barrier.”

Dread pooled in my stomach. “What kind of barrier?”

“One straight down the middle of the bowl through Evrítha. To keep our species divided. I couldn’t do anything to control the humans, but I could control the dragons. I didn’t care what it cost. So I made it so no dragon could cross that line without permission from the Heirs. It took… everything.

“Sirrus and Zovai stepped in and lent me their power because it took too much from me. It was killing me. They saved my life, and the barrier held. But I was spent.”

I didn’t dare speak or breathe to break the spell of his story. Deep down I knew where it was heading, but I wanted to hear him say it.

“I bound the magic to the sheyten. Or I tried. It was the only way I could think of to make it so the Elders couldn’t simply rip it to shreds. I begged the sheyten to protect the humans who were innocent, and I could have sworn they agreed. But for them,” he nodded to the villagers in the painting. “It was too late. While we wove the magic, the humans burned alive.”

The sharpness of his grief echoed in my chest. Guilt. Pain. He still felt it like it had happened yesterday, and he would never truly forgive himself for their deaths. I looked at the painting, now tinged with the feeling of his pain.

“Still, it worked,” a new voice said. Sirrus now stood at the doorway dressed in dusty blue that made his eyes glow. “No dragons save us could pass the line after that day, including the Elders. Their rage was something to behold. And because we had used everything we had, we couldn’t fight them when they came.”

Zovai appeared along with a sudden rush of understanding about the emotions I’d projected earlier. He didn’t interrupt, instead taking in the three of us and the mood in the air.

“They bound my power and marked me as a traitor. Promised to let me have my full power back after a hundred years. It’s been three hundred. At this point I don’t expect to ever be what I was until the Elders fade. If they ever do.”

I frowned. “But all three of you did it?”

“It was my action. My decision. They don’t care that the others might have done the same. I am the one who turned against them.”

“That’s not fair.”

“No,” Zovai said. “It isn’t. It’s never been fair. And they’ve spent centuries punishing all of us. Including last night, when they tried to kill you.”

Understanding dawned. It was because I was human, but it wasn’t only that.

I scanned the painting and the sea of dragons approaching the line. A mess of colors that seemed to sparkle in spite of it merely being painted. “Is the barrier still there?”

“After a fashion,” Sirrus crossed his arms and glared at the painting like it would let him turn back time and make things right. “It worked until the humans shattered the sheyten. They were so afraid of the dragon’s sudden absence they were convinced we were coming after them a different way. As soon as it broke, the barrier was not whole. All dragonkind cannot come through, but we are no longer the only ones who can give permission. And because we are beholden to the Elders…”

He let the words hang in the air.

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