Page 137 of Crown of Wrath

Moments pass, and I don’t push as the Darkness considers my proposal. I know what it will eventually say, though. With our current agreement, it can’t force me to show it anything. No matter how many questions it asks, I don’t have to give it the key to entering Valinar.

That would make any number of questions worth the trade.Why would you make this offer? Two questions? This is not very much.

“Two separate questions you answer simply and with as much detail as I need.”

I agree.

Just like the songs of power and my wedding, I feel the magic pulling at me, wrapping tightly around me and connecting me to The Darkness. The magic binds The Darkness just as much as it does me, though.

“Where do souls go when they die?” I ask without hesitation.

The face of the eel shifts slightly.A child’s question. You do not know this answer already?

“Simply and with as much detail as I require,” I repeat, not giving an inch.

The Darkness seems to sigh with annoyance.Souls are all different, and all go to different places. What specific type of creature are you talking about? That matters more than anything else.

“A High Fae. Someone like me. My husband.”

I feel something strange. Shadows. The Darkness is touching me, and a shiver runs through my body.You are not a High Fae, Daughter of Stone. You have a human’s soul and a High Fae’s body. But pieces of your soul are not human. Pieces of you are… not yours. You were bound to another?

“I was bound to the one I am looking for.”

The world is built on promises, little one. The first promises on this world you call Nyth were not made to High Fae. They were made to humans. It was only after the dragons came that new promises were made to humans who were changed. But, little one, the promises to humans were first. Those promises are the strongest.

A smile creeps across my lips. I knew it. “High Fae go to the void, don’t they?”

Yes. Their magic returns to the world, but their souls fill this place.

“Thank you,” I say. “My next question. How does one kill a dragon?”

The previous question had annoyed The Darkness, but this one seems to interest it.Why would you like to know this?

“It doesn’t matter. You agreed to answer my questions, didn’t you?”

I can feel The Darkness’s annoyance fill the space between us. It doesn’t want me to be so disrespectful. I don’t care.

There is no way for you to attempt to kill a dragon with any real chance of success. The High Fae were modeled after them, so just like a High Fae’s weakness is its heart, a dragon will die if you pierce its heart.

I pause for a moment. “How wouldyoukill a dragon?”

An even longer hesitation follows, and I can feel the annoyance change into reservation. The Darkness doesn’t want to tell me anything about itself, but the magic that binds it requires that it not speak in riddles like it normally would.

I would siphon its power. What you call the void is my realm. I am at home here, but dragons are not. In fact, there are very few dragons who can swim through the gateways here. They are like you or even weaker. There are exceptions like the one who created the original arrangement. When I made that arrangement, I knew nothing about dragons. I was younger, and they were new to me. It took many conversations with Vyran to understand them.

My smile widens as The Darkness’s body jerks. Immediately, it says, “I am being thorough, not complicated.” A snarl follows, but it continues. “Dragons die after their power is stripped from them. It is how the ones they refer to as the hunters could kill them. It just so happens that I also can siphon a dragon’s power.”

I nod. “So you wouldn’t have any problem killing a single dragon if it were here in the void?”

“I would not.”

Exactly as I’d hoped. “Thank you, Darkness. Your side of the agreement has been fulfilled. Now, let me take you to Valinar.”

Chapter 70

Maeve was a jackass. And lucky. Being a lucky jackass is still being a jackass, though. Spend more than a week planning because you’re probably not that lucky.

~Rhion Rahn, The Future of Magic and Dragons

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