Page 137 of Of Empires and Dust

She pressed her snout into Calen’s chest, blowing warm air over him. Calen ran a hand across her scales. He could feel the tension within her, feel the rage simmering. She and Tivar might not be chained, but they were still prisoners and Tivar was kept under constant guard. Avandeer did not agree with the current state of affairs. The dragon was not locked in this courtyard and yet she had not left, not flown since the judgement. Calenwas unsure if it was a form of silent protest or simply an unwillingness to leave her soulkin.

As Calen stood there, Valerys pulled their minds together from where he waited with Aeson and the others. The world around him shift as the dragon’s senses blended with his own.

A deep protective instinct echoed in Valerys’s mind – their shared mind – as images of Tivar and Avandeer flowed between them. Tivar and Avandeer were their own, their kin. And Valerys would not allow harm to come to them.

In the stories of old, the dragons were legendary creatures capable of levelling entire cities and turning wars on their heads. They were beasts of unequalled power. Every tale told of their fury and their rage, told of their power and their capacity for endless destruction.

But few ever spoke of the great creatures’ compassion and loyalty, of their pain and suffering, of their undying will to protect what they loved. Those were stories Calen wished he had heard, stories he hoped he’d one day have the chance to tell himself.

“It won’t be much longer,” Calen whispered, running his hand along Avandeer’s scales.

The noise that came from the dragon’s throat was akin to a purr accompanied by a series of clicks before she settled her head back on the white tiles.

Calen released a frustrated sigh, then gestured for Vaeril to walk with him towards the cells. They stepped from the open courtyard into a long candlelit corridor that Calen had grown familiar with over the past days.

“Aeson says Coren and Farwen should be here by the time I return from the Burnt Lands.” Calen had never met the two Rakina, but the other Rakina spoke of them in the same breath as Aeson. From the stories Therin had told him, they were two of the fiercest warriors in all Epheria.

“Indeed,” Vaeril said. “But their journey will not be an easy one.”

“How kind of you to grace us with your presence.” The voice was not one Calen recognised, but he knew to whom it belonged.

He turned to his left to see the woman with white hair and the dark-skinned elf standing in the connecting corridor. Hala and Ilyain. Four guards bearing the white dragon on their chests walked alongside the pair, threads of Spirit encasing them in a ward.

Hala raised a curious eyebrow and moved closer, the fingers of her left hand clenched into a fist. “What brings you here?”

“Take another step and it will be your last.” Calen turned so he was square on with Hala, anger flaring within him, Valerys growling in the back of his mind.

Hala grinned, revealing teeth as white as her hair. She tilted her head to the side, her gaze moving from Calen’s head to his feet, then back again. “So confident, so arrogant. You even stand like him.”

Hala took another step closer and before her foot had even touched the stone, the tip of Vaeril’s blade pressed into her chest.

“La’værakanra mahavír, Varíen Nahar.” Vaeril tilted his wrist upwards and pressed so the sword point created a crease in Hala’s tunic.I will not hesitate, Kin Killer.

Hala’s grin faltered at the title.

Ilyain stepped past Hala, keeping his hands firmly behind his back, two of the guards moving with him. Threads of Fire joined the threads of Spirit as they watched his every move. The elf’s face was raked with thin scars, his eyes a milky white.

“You are him, then.” Ilyain stared at Calen as though he could see him. A tense silence held where Ilyain drew a long, rasping breath through his nostrils, then pressed an open palm across his breast. “I am so deeply sorry for the world we have left you.And for the burden we place on your shoulders as we ask you to fix it.”

Those words were not the ones Calen had expected to leave the elf’s lips. Even Valerys’s rage ebbed in the back of his mind.

Hala dropped her gaze to the ground, her shoulders slumping, the tip of Vaeril’s blade still pressed into her chest. Calen knew the look on her face: shame.

Calen made to speak, but then he saw him.

Farda stood some forty feet down the corridor behind Ilyain and Hala, three guards with him, the blended light of the moon and sun drifting over him through an arched window. The man stood still as a statue, his gaze fixed on Calen. The scars on his face were healed somewhat, though the flesh was pale and pink.

The fingers on Calen’s right hand tensed reflexively as he stared into the eyes of the man who had killed his mam. The man who had burned her alive. All Calen had to do was reach out and snap his neck. A life for a life. Surely the gods would find that fair.

Valerys’s fury bled into his own. Calen’s thumping heart rose over all other sounds, his vision seeming to dim and narrow until all he saw was Farda.

“My lord?” The guard closest to Calen stepped forwards tentatively. “My lord, are you all right?”

A hand rested on Calen’s shoulder – Vaeril’s. The elf shook his head, and Calen noticed the purple glow of his eyes reflecting in the guards’ armour.

Calen pulled a long breath into his lungs, exhaling sharply. “Carry on.”

He pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth and turned to leave, but Ilyain grabbed his arm with a grip that seemed made of iron.

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