Dragons Lost (11 page)

She pulled him into the
library and closed the door.

Dust floated in two
beams of light that fell through the windows. The beams illuminated dozens of
shelves that covered the walls and rose like a labyrinth across the chamber.
Thousands of books were here, bound in leather. From what Cade could see, they
all seemed to be prayer books of the Cured Temple. Many were copies of
The
Book of Auberon
, the most ancient, perhaps the most holy of the Temple's
texts; it recounted the first of the Cured, a druid who had healed many
weredragons thousands of years ago. Other books were collections of prayers,
guidebooks to achieve austerity, and books of sheet music for holy hymns.
Tillvine blossoms were etched onto all the spines.

Cade frowned. Was this
the right place? Why would Domi send him, a Vir Requis hunted by the Cured
Temple, to a house full of books dedicated to eradicating his magic? Had this
all been a cruel joke?

The librarian
approached a wooden table. She slammed down the heavy book she carried, raising
a shower of dust. Then she hopped up to sit on the tabletop, crossed her legs,
and shoved her spectacles up her nose. Cade noticed that she had many freckles
on that nose.

"Well?" she said,
glaring. "Who are you and why are you here? Nobody but priests visit here."

"My name is C—" He
cleared his throat. "Caleric. I've come seeking . . . books."

She rolled her eyes. "Really.
Well,
Caleric,"
—she spoke that name as if it were the most ridiculous
thing she'd ever heard—"if it's books you want, we have them all. All seven of
them. In thousands of copies."

Cade looked around him,
frowning. "You have only seven books?"

The librarian nodded. "All
seven books the Cured Temple approves for public consumption. About a thousand
copies of each one." She held out one dusty hand. "Fidelity the Librarian, at
your service. As you can tell, my job here is very fulfilling."

Cade wasn't sure if she
was mocking him, herself, or the Cured Temple. When he hesitated and didn't
shake her hand, she groaned, rolled her eyes, and returned her hand to her
side.

"Do you have any books
about weredragons?" he asked, hoping to pry more information from her.

She raised her hands to
the heavens. "They're all about weredragons! You do know what the Cured Temple
is, don't you? You know, only the religion that rules the entire Commonwealth
and every facet of our lives. If you haven't noticed, the core tenants of the
Cured Temple pretty much revolve around weredragons—specifically, how to hunt
them down and kill them all."

Cade felt sick. He
gulped. "Do you . . . do you believe all that? About, you know . . . hunting
them?"

"What I believe," Fidelity
said, "is that I'm tired, I'm hungry, and you're disturbing me. If you don't
want a book, please
leave
." She hopped off the table, grabbed his arm,
and began escorting him toward the exit.

"Wait," Cade said. When
she tried shoving him out the door, he placed his hand against the wall,
holding himself steady. "I was told to tell you something." He gulped. This
could be incredibly stupid, he knew. But something about Fidelity's voice,
clothes, and rolling eyes told him that she wasn't the strictest of the Cured
Temple's adherents. "It's a word. A secret word."

She groaned. "If the
word isn't 'goodbye' I don't want to hear it."

He gulped and leaned
closer to her. He closed his eyes, and he whispered that word, putting the same
awe, the same secret wonder into his voice as Domi had. He knew this word was a
gift, not to be uttered lightly. A gift to be cherished, to be given only at
the most important of times.

"Requiem."

His whisper lingered in
the following silence.

Fidelity said nothing.

When Cade opened his
eyes, he found her staring at him, mouth hanging open. Tears filled her blue
eyes, magnified and gleaming behind the lenses of her spectacles.

"Who," she whispered, "taught
you that word?"

"Her name is Domi. She—"

She grabbed his collar,
tugged his face near hers, and sneered. "Did you hurt her? If you touched a
hair on her head, I swear that—"

"If anything, she hurt
me!" Cade said. "Fidelity, let me go. Domi is fine. She's unhurt. She—Spirit, I
don't know who she is, or why she sent me here, but she told me to find you. To
say that word to you. She said you can help me." His voice dropped to a whisper
again. "She said you can help a Vir Requis."

Fidelity gasped,
released him, and took a few steps back. "Show me." Her voice shook. "Just the
beginning. Don't slam against the walls or anything. Just . . . show me
something."

He nodded, summoned his
magic, and began to shift.

Golden scales appeared
upon his body. Wings sprouted from his back, and his tail hit the floor. When
his body began to grow larger, to press against the bookshelves, he released
his magic, returning to human form.

Fidelity stared at him
silently, tears on her cheeks. She leaped toward him, and Cade gasped, sure she
would attack him, slay him right here for being a weredragon. But instead she
locked him in a crushing embrace, and she wept against his shoulder.

"There is another," she
whispered, trembling against him, laughing through her tears. "By the stars,
there is another." She sniffed, her eyes red and watery. "Come with me."

 
 
GEMINI

He grunted as he lay atop the naked
woman, thrusting into her. The bed rattled, the headboard banging again and
again against the wall. The woman moaned beneath Gemini, eyes shut, sweat
beading on her brow. The priests had ordered her here, commanded her to lie
with him, to bear his children. She was here for duty, not love. Yet as Gemini
thrust into her again and again, she raised her hips, grinding against him.

She's enjoying this,
Gemini thought, sweat trickling down his forehead. He snorted. They didn't
always enjoy it. It was their holy task to bear his children, the reason they
existed, and often as they lay beneath him, they prayed to the Spirit and
clutched their tillvine amulets. Yet this one was a wild thing, crying out in
pleasure, digging her fingernails down his back. That was good. If the women
the priests delivered to his chamber enjoyed the holy bedding, it made for all
the more fun.

Gemini kept at it,
trying to savor it, to make it last. The woman beneath him was attractive
enough—her hair golden, her lips full and pink, her hips well-rounded—yet as he
bedded her, Gemini found his mind straying to the firedrakes in the pit far
beneath this chamber.

Firedrakes! He sucked
in air and closed his eyes. Magnificent creatures, the drakes. He brought to
mind their roaring dragonfire, their beating wings, their muscles moving
beneath their scaly skin. As he rode the woman beneath him, he pretended that
he was riding a firedrake through the sky, a conqueror, a tamer of the beast.

Pyre. Yes, he liked that
one, the female with scales of many colors. She was wild. She was intelligent.
Rebellious. Just the sort of firedrake Gemini liked to tame. He envisioned
himself riding her through the night, seeking out weredragons to slay, blasting
fire into the darkness. He cried out, pretending to blast his own dragonfire.

Drenched with sweat, he
rolled off the woman. He lay at her side, panting, spent.

She nestled against
him, purring. "My paladin." She kissed his cheek. "I will bear you a great son.
I swear to you. A great, pure son with no magic inside him, and he will grow to
become a great warrior for the Spirit. A hunter of weredragons." She smiled. "Maybe
our son will bring about the Falling."

Gemini snorted. "Unlikely.
I've fathered over a hundred sons by now. What are the odds it'll be your whelp
that slays the last weredragon?"

He saw the pain in her
eyes. Why did they always insist on talking? The priests did not send them here
for conversation. Gemini had been born without any dragon magic inside him,
born already pure; he had never undergone purification with tillvine, had never
needed to. Even his mother—High Priestess Beatrix—and his sister—Lady Mercy—had
been born ill, had needed priests to burn out their dragon disease with
tillvine.

But not me. I was
born superior. Born clean.

Being a pureborn destined
him—destined all those like him—to a life of breeding. The pureborn women, and
there were a few in the city, bore child after child, pregnant throughout their
fertile years. A full half of their babes were pureborns, going on to breed
their own pure children. A pureborn man's life was a little busier. Every
night, the priests sent another woman to his chamber. Sometimes, when Gemini
had been taming firedrakes all day and his appetite was great, he demanded two
or even three women to bed. Many of his babies now wailed across the capital—half
of them pureborn like himself, destined to save the race, to wipe out the
magic.

To bring about the
Falling,
Gemini thought.

He snorted again. He
couldn't care less about the Falling. As far as he was concerned, it could
happen long after his death. As long as King's Column stood and weredragons
lived, the priests would keep sending him women.

Let the
Falling never come,
he thought.

"Get out," he said to
the woman. "Get out and never come back. I never want to hear from you again.
You will not ask for money for your child. You will not loiter around the
Temple, asking me to be a father. Get out. Return to whatever hole the priests
dragged you from." He shoved her. "And for the Spirit's sake, learn not to
scream so loudly in bed. My ear still hurts."

When she had left,
tears in her eyes, Gemini rose from his bed. He walked across the room, naked
and sweaty. It was a large chamber, lavish, the floor tiles carved of marble
inlaid with gold and silver, the walls bright with gemstones, the ceiling
painted with scenes of crusty old druids. Ignoring these fineries—he couldn't
care less about them—Gemini approached the mirror and stared at his reflection.

As always, he liked
what he saw. A tall young man. Slender but well built, his cheekbones high, his
lips thin. His eyes blue as sapphires, his hair bleached white as milk. He
looked like the masculine version of his sister, a young man in his prime.

My children are
blessed,
he thought,
to inherit such good looks.

He looked back at the
bed, considering sleep, but he felt too hot, too excited after his time with
the woman.

Firedrakes.
Pyre.

He pulled on
some clothes—a pair of breeches and a tunic of white cotton—and left his
chamber. He wanted to see her again. His firedrake. The most special one among
them. His pet.

"My Pyre," he
whispered, walking down the corridors of gold, marble, and gems.

Ever since he'd
been a child, born to the High Priestess herself, Gemini had been fascinated
with firedrakes. They were creatures of such strength, some grace, such might.
They had been born human—regular babes from human wombs—cursed with the dragon
magic. But while most babes were cured, these babes . . . they were destined to
a greater fate. Gemini had once watched the ceremony, enraptured as the babe
had burned in the fire, how the tiny skeleton had fallen apart, revealing a
shining egg—an egg to hatch a wild dragon, mindless, no human form to it, a
weapon of the Temple.

But Pyre . . .
she was not mindless. No. Gemini had been watching her all year, had seen a
cleverness in her eyes, an almost human perception. The old caretaker had
missed it, had thought Pyre just another beast to spoil with plenty of food,
long flights in the open air, and even scratches behind the ear.

"Fool," Gemini
spat.

Now you are
mine, Pyre.

He stepped
outside the Temple. He walked down the tunnel that delved beneath the palace,
eager to see her, to ride her. Torches crackled at his sides, and he grabbed
one and carried it with him. Bedding the woman had felt good, but nothing in
the world felt as primal, as intoxicating, as erotic as riding a firedrake. The
tunnel kept sloping downward, sinking deep into the belly of the earth.
Finally, in the cold darkness, he reached the chamber where they slept. Many
cells lined the walls, barred, revealing views of slumbering firedrakes. Gemini
made his way toward the cell at the back—Pyre's cell.

As Gemini
approached, he frowned. It seemed to him, in the dim light, that her cell was
empty. He could not see her scales or hear her breathing. He marched closer,
wondering if somebody had let the firedrake free.

He heard an
inhalation of air. Scales clattered. Large green eyes opened and stared at him,
and her snout pressed against the bars.

Gemini smiled.

"There you are."

He reached the
cell and stood, admiring the firedrake. Such a special beast. Unlike the others
whose scales were monochromatic, this firedrake had scales of many colors:
reds, oranges, and yellows in all the shades of fire.

He grabbed the
lever and tugged the portcullis open.

"Come, Pyre,"
he said. "To me."

She stepped out
from the cell, scales clanking. Thin plumes of smoke rose from her nostrils. He
stroked her snout.

"I'm sorry I
hurt you," he said. "I had to teach you discipline. I hope I won't have to hurt
you again. You're a special firedrake. You're mine. My pet. Come with me now.
We will fly."

He led her
through the tunnel and outside into the night. The Temple rose behind them, its
crystal spikes rising toward the stars. The Square of the Spirit sprawled
before them, a vast expanse, large enough for armies to muster on. Beyond
spread the thousands of city homes and workshops, humble huts of clay. Gemini
had still not outfitted Pyre with a new saddle; he mounted her and sat bareback.