Page 470 of Of Empires and Dust

“There is a saying amongst my people,” Vaeril said as he stared down at the flames that burned in the firepit. “Det er il uvían uru anatli il varahín olinivíl til vírna.”

Dann didn’t have to ask for the translation.

“It is the moon that gives the stars permission to shine,” Vaeril whispered. “Calen showed me who I was. Without him… what am I?”

Dann wanted to say something. He wanted to offer Vaeril words of comfort, but nothing came. For the first time in his life, words had abandoned him.

It is the moon that gives the stars permission to shine.Normally, Dann would have to ask Rist what in the gods that meant. But somehow he knew. It was the moon that dimmed the sun’s light, the moon that dared shine in the face of the greatest fire. The moon inspired the stars to become what they needed to be, to light the way.

A silence fell between them. After Haem had left with Valerys, all of them had fallen apart. They’d slept in the ruins of The Glade that night, none of them having the will to stand and walk away. They’d only returned to Salme that morning as the sun rose, and Tarmon had gone to the city to tell the others what had happened. Dann hadn’t seen the reaction, but Tarmon had said that warriors had dropped to their knees in the muddied ground of Salme. That grown men and women who had never even laid eyes on Calen had wept in the streets.

Half of his heart understood their grief, but the other half was repulsed by it. Who were they to weep over a man they didnot truly know? Calen was a symbol them, a symbol of hope and change, a symbol of strength, but he was not their brother. They did not care for him. They cared only for what he could do for them. The thought scratched at him until his eyes were once again raw and wet.

A roar sounded from the city, and Dann jolted upwards. He watched as two enormous shapes rose in the night, the pink moonlight washing lazily over Varthear’s and Avandeer’s scaled bodies.

Vaeril stiffened, looking out towards the dragons. “What stirs them? If they?—”

The elf’s words were drowned out by another roar, one that came from the skies behind Dann. A shiver swept through Dann, his spine tingling at the sight of Valerys dropping through the dark canopy above, clouds swirling about him.

The dragon soared overhead, sweeping around to the left before alighting not a hundred feet from the fallen tree upon which Dann sat.

Dann slid from the trunk, Lyrei rising as he hit the ground. He set off into a run before anyone spoke a word. Shouts rang out from Salme, torches gathering on the broken walls.

Valerys’s white scales glistened pink beneath the red moon. Dust and ashes swirled into the air beneath the dragon’s wings.

Dann stopped some twenty feet from Valerys, the others gathering around him. Both Varthear and Avandeer alighted nearby, Tivar sliding from Avandeer’s back.

Valerys lowered his neck, and in the dark of night, a shape dropped to the ground, dust whipping up around it.

Dann moved closer, lifting his hand to keep the dust from his eyes. As he moved, he saw a man kneeling, the moonlight drifting down from above, casting his face in shadow.

Another crack spread through Dann’s heart at the sight of the man cradling a body in his arms. The pain was a tangible thingthat spread through him, stiffening his limbs and slowing his heart.

He didn’t want to do it. He didn’t want to look at Calen’s body, to see the lights gone from those eyes he’d known for so long. He didn’t think he could.

Valerys lifted his head, and those lavender eyes stared into Dann’s, a soft whine in his throat.

Dann took a few steps, heard sobs drifting on the gentle night breeze.

“We’re here, Haem,” Dann whispered, moving closer again, his heart the only thing causing him to slow.

“I said no…”

The blood in Dann’s veins turned to ice, the hairs on his arms and neck standing on end.

“I said no, Dann… He just… He’s gone…” Calen lifted his head, meeting Dann’s gaze, voice trembling.

Now that Dann stood closer, he could see the body being cradled was not Calen, but Haem, head lolling.

Footsteps sounded about him, Lyrei, Tarmon, and the others gathering in a circle.

Dann began to shake, his body doing so of its own volition. He wanted to speak, but instead he dropped to his knees before Calen and clasped either side of the man’s head, desperately trying to understand if what was happening was real or a dream.

Calen’s skin was warm, his eyes bright and wet with tears.

“How…” was the only word that escaped Dann’s lips.

Calen didn’t answer. He only lifted his gaze so that they stared into each other’s eyes. The loss in his friend’s eyes was like a bottomless well that dragged him in.

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