Page 39 of The Wrath of Ashes
“It’s a beautiful part of what we are. I’ve told you much of the beautiful things—but there’s bad things, too.” Rath’s mood dropped, a sadness in his expression as he drew Asha deeper down the caverns.
Dread knotted in his belly. “Is it the vow you made? We’ve not violated it. Slath told me about how bad it is to break a vow made…”
“Nothing of the sort. Honestly, I am not regretting waiting for you. I wish to tell you about the sleepers. When a child is conceived and born.” Rath approached a set of double doors and trailed his fingers over an ornate lock. The tumbler spun and clicked into place with a spark of magic. Asha could feel a combination of fire and lightning used, heating one piece and charging another, so the mechanism gave way.
The door swung open, and the low glow of gold woven through the walls cast light over row upon row of people laid out in padded crypts, their faces pale, as still as death. Asha gasped softly.
“This is my brother, Galatan.” Rath strode into the room, picking out a single crypt among a slew of empty ones. It was occupied by a male that looked somewhat similar to Pryd save for a hard set to his jaw, and in his crypt was space for one more next to him, a double chamber. It sat painfully empty, as if another needed to be by him. “He will sleep here until he’s healed. He mourns his Ashen.”
“What happened to them?” Asha had heard it mentioned and had been fearful to ask. The fate would echo his own, it seemed, if the circumstances weren’t ideal.
“She. His Ashen was fragile, and he was too eager to whisk her into our world. Sometimes the families of Ashen do nottreat them well. As you well know, Ashen make the strongest and most powerful dragons, but they are delicate. She—” Rath choked on the words. “She did not spread her wings when she fell.”
Asha had an image in his mind of Heckle slinging him into the sky, his fall, the invigoration he felt. Tears stung his eyes, and he turned to Rath and slung his arms around the male’s chest with a soft gasp. “I didn’t know. I am so sorry, Rath. I apologize. I didn’t know that—”
“It’s no matter. Spread your wings for me, Asha. Love them. Fly for me and do not fall.” Rath kissed the top of his head. In the dim light, Asha glanced up and frowned.
“What is it, my mate?”
“I have loved the sky since I could remember. I dislike that you feared I was fragile. I thought I would be afraid, but I knew Heckle would catch me. I knew you would if he didn’t. My body craves to be in the sky, and in your nest—with you, that is.” Asha tucked a strand of hair behind his ear, fingers slipping as he did so. The shape of them had changed, ear lengthening and pointing a bit. He attempted the swipe again and sighed, giving up when his horn got in the way.
Rath, infinite kindness radiating in his sharp features, leaned in and brushed his fingers over Asha’s cheekbone, righting his hair into place with a few neat tucks. “I do not fear you becoming fragile like that. You’ve known love, and I am grateful. But you must see what is to come.”
Asha followed past the sleeping form of his brother, past many other bodies, asleep, none older than middle age, and some—quite visibly—dead. Their sunken features lay behind veils. “They’re dead…”
Rath nodded, the chains on his horns clinking comfortingly. The gold in their swinging lengths was almost hypnotic. It reminded Asha of something like a magpie, enamored by theshine. It took the sting out of the words to follow. “Sometimes, you go to sleep and do not wake. We go down periodically and check our family. Some sleep for a few months, a few years. The older you get, the longer you sleep.”
Asha stared down the enormous room, following as Rath walked, head held imperiously high. “I’ve not had my first sleep yet. My grandfather hasn’t woken since before my birth. His mate, either. Their father woke for two years with their mate when I was young and went back to sleep. They both passed last year.”
Asha held Rath’s hand as they continued, lacing fingers together. “Do they wake at separate times? Mates.”
“Not usually. It’s not uncommon for one to wake a day or so before the other, but they share a consciousness, a dream. I have ancestors a thousand years back that still sleep, that have not succumbed to death, yet. Their time has not yet come, and their presence still needed, potentially.” Rath rested his hand on the edge of a crypt and stared down at a male in clothes so old they’d worn to threads over his body. A strip of linen had been placed over his groin.
“So, if someone dies after having slept for many years? In their sleep?”
“It means that the path we chose in life, as a country or people, did not deviate into a cycle where they were needed. They were allowed to pass and reincarnate. Whenever eggs are born, we watch the dead to see who perishes. And if one does—we give them that name.” Rath smiled widely, as if waiting for Asha to understand something.
“So, for you and your brothers to—” Asha rested his fingertips over his lips.
“Seven dragons of old passed in their sleep one by one, and the great king of Mezerath passed with his brother, the prince of sloth, soon after.” Rath strolled forward to a more ornatelydecorated plinth upon which no body lay. It had the dark outline of a body that once had laid upon it. “His body was removed for me, because I am him.”
Asha turned his head and stared at the dark outline beside the original king of wrath and touched his finger to the oily mark. It’d been cleaned, and Asha expected to feel revulsion, but only felt kinship. “This was me?”
Rath reached over to press his hand over Asha’s. “That’s a very simple way to say it, yes. According to our traditions, you would be the consort of wrath. You have inherited a title.”
“What was their name?” Asha didn’t glance over toward Rath, didn’t stare him down or tear his focus away from the plinth that called to him. His place of rest to come.
“They were an Ashen male, like yourself. Yasen.” Mezerath bent his fingers, drawing his nails across the smooth stone. It did nothing to dull their sharp tips. In fact, if he’d pressed any harder, he would leave furrows in the stone.
“And he passed when I was born?”
“The third week of spring, the day after the planting festivals, twenty years prior. In 271 of the thirteenth empire.”
Asha frowned. “That was my name-day. I think. We never celebrated much.”
“Well, it will be far more special in a few days.” Rath drew Asha’s attention and brushed his fingertips over the newly pointed ear. “Jeron said your name-day may not be a source of pleasant memories for you, so I set our date out by a few days since the date was close.”
“That was very sweet. At the same time, I feel I should be angry for waiting longer to take you into bed. Feels so strange for this to be normal.” Asha strode around the plinth and hopped onto it, sitting with his legs crossed. “And one day we will sleep here forever?”
