Dragons Lost (9 page)

The Cured Temple
preached austerity, humility, and the nobility of poverty. Across the
Commonwealth, the Temple's flock wore burlap, lived in clay huts, and owned no
jewelry or fineries. They served the Spirit by living a life of modesty,
feeding on simple bread and gruel, sleeping on hard cots, and devoting their
souls to humble living.

Here, inside the
Temple, Mercy beheld a world of endless splendor.

A polished mosaic
covered the floor, a masterwork inlaid with gold, depicting stars and intricate
designs. Marble columns rose in rows, engraved with figures of legendary
paladins, and their capitals were gilded. Above the columns spread arches in
blue, gold, and silver, painted with scenes from the Cured Book, depicting the
miracles of the first druids to have healed the disease. The ceiling was
perhaps more glorious than all; murals of clouds, stars, and firedrakes
sprawled above in pastels, and between them stretched lines of platinum and sapphires.
The precious metals and gemstones gleamed in the sunlight falling through tall,
narrow windows.

All the treasures of
the Commonwealth—its gold, its gems, its splendor—filled this single, holy
heart of the empire. Some said that the Spirit himself dwelled not in the sky
but within these very walls.

Mercy took another deep
breath.

The Spirit and my
mother.

When she spotted a
servant walking by, Mercy snapped her fingers. The girl rushed toward her and
knelt, head bowed.

"Take this baby to my
chambers," Mercy said to the servant, handing Eliana over. "Find her a
nursemaid and have her cleaned up and fed."

The servant nodded,
took the baby, and rushed off. Mercy watched them leave, and a strange
emptiness filled her. She had grown accustomed to the warmth of Eliana against
her. Without the baby, Mercy felt naked, barren, too cold. She had felt like
this before, she remembered. She had felt such loss once, such coldness, such—

No.

Mercy clenched her jaw.

No, that pain had
happened in another lifetime, to another woman. Not to a strong, noble paladin.

She snorted.
I stole
the babe as a hostage, not to become some surrogate mother.
As soon as she
captured Cade, the babe would be useless; she would kill both at that time.

She walked on down the
grand hall. Many priests and priestesses were walking back and forth here, and
when they saw her—their future High Priestess—they turned toward her, knelt,
and lowered their heads. Mercy walked between them. While those around her wore
costly robes of white cotton and gold, her armor was still singed with
dragonfire and coated with blood and ash.

Good,
she thought.
Let them see that I'm a warrior, that I fight through fire and
blood for the Spirit.

She passed through the
grand hall, under more archways, and through many other chambers. Each one was
more wondrous than the one before. Statues of gold, silver, and marble rose
everywhere, depicting ancient druids holding tillvine blossoms. Countless
gemstones gleamed upon the ceiling like stars. Precious metals coiled upon the
capitals of columns. She kept moving deeper and deeper into the Temple until no
more sunlight reached her, and only the lights of lamps guided her way.

Finally, after what
seemed like miles, she reached the doors of the inner sanctum—the Holy of
Holies.

She had to pause and
take another few deep breaths. All the splendor she had passed through—that had
been only the skin. The true heart of what the Cured Temple meant, the very
backbone of her faith, lay here beyond these oaken doors. And she knew that her
mother would be waiting here. Mother was always here these days, lingering,
growing older, praying . . . praying for the day they all awaited.

Mercy tightened her
lips, opened the door, and entered the holy chamber.

As glittering and
detailed as the outer chambers were, this place was simple, austere. While the
outer chambers were only a hundred years old, this place was thousands of years
old. Marble tiles formed the floor. Plain white bricks formed the round walls.
And there, in the center of the chamber, it rose.

King's Column.

It rose hundreds of
feet tall, passing through many stories, rising to the very top of the Temple.
Mercy had to crane her head back to see its distant capital. It was ancient, but
not a scratch marred it. The marble still seemed pure and smooth as if carved
and polished yesterday.

Tears stung Mercy's
eyes, and she whispered under her breath—whispered the old words of this place.

"As the leaves fall
upon our marble tiles, as the breeze rustles the birches beyond our column, as
the sun gilds the mountains above our halls—know, young child of the woods, you
are home. You are home. Req—"

She bit down on that
last form. A forbidden word. A word she dared not utter, not even here.

A figure, all in white,
stood before the column. A white robe and hood hid the figure, and a voice rose
from within the garment.

"Yes. That was their
prayer. The prayer of the weredragons. Yet no more leaves fall here; the trees
have been cut down. No more sun gilds the mountains; our walls shield its
light. And no more children find their home here, and never more will the old
name of this place be uttered."

Mercy nodded and lowered
her head. "The name will never be uttered."

The figure turned
toward her, revealing the face of a woman. High Priestess Beatrix looked much
like her daughter. Her skin was pale, and only the first hints of wrinkles
tugged at her mouth and eyes. Her eyes were cold blue shards, calculating,
all-seeing. She pulled her hood back, revealing her head—half was shaven, and
the other half sported a white braid. A tillvine blossom formed of silver and
diamonds gleamed around her neck.

"We have a new prayer
now, daughter." Beatrix raised her chin. "When all dragons fall, when all
illness is cured, when all evil is cast out, the column will shatter. When the
marble falls, the Spirit will descend. With every breath, with every heartbeat,
with every hurt I heal, I pray for the Falling."

"I pray for the
Falling," Mercy whispered.

Beatrix walked closer
to her. Mercy was a tall woman, but Beatrix stood taller. Even in her armor,
Mercy felt fragile by the High Priestess, a mere child. Her mother's eyes bored
into her, emotionless, shining blue.

"I hear fear in your
voice," Beatrix said, "not the devotion the Spirit demands from his followers.
Why do you cower before me like a pup?"

Mercy bared her teeth
and gripped the hilt of her sword for comfort. "There is a weredragon. A living
weredragon."

The thinnest of smiles
touched Beatrix's lips. "If there were no weredragons, daughter, King's Column
would not be standing before us, and the Spirit would be flowing among us,
cleansing the world of all pain. Yes, I know there are living weredragons. But
unless you bring me their corpses, what use are your words?"

Mercy found that her
jaw was shaking. She forced in air. "I saw one. A real one! A boy. A baker's
boy. I . . . I chased him. He slew one of my men. I—"

"And you bring me his
corpse?" Beatrix asked calmly.

Mercy lowered her head,
eyes stinging. "I need more men. I left nine to seek him in the mountains, but
I must fly out with a hundred more." She dared to raise her eyes and meet her
mother's gaze. "I will uproot every tree, upturn every boulder, raze every hut
to the ground, and I will find him."

Beatrix turned back
toward the column. For a long time she did not speak. Finally a whisper left
her throat, trembling with rage. "You saw a living weredragon . . . and you let
him get away."

"He was flying too
quickly, Mother! He was a vicious beast, a—"

"And what are firedrakes?"
Beatrix shouted, spinning around. The calmness was gone from her face, and her
eyes blazed with mad rage. "What are they if not vicious beasts? What are you
if not a vicious beast?" Beatrix struck her, driving all her strength into the
blow, nearly knocking Mercy down. "I thought you were a paladin, a trained
warrior of the Spirit. And a baker's boy escapes you?" Beatrix barked a
mirthless laugh. "And you dare return to me, stinking of the flight, begging me
to aid you?"

Mercy wanted to shout
back, to argue, to explain, but she only lowered her head. She stared at the
floor. "Forgive me, Mother."

"No." Beatrix's voice
shook. "You will not do this. You will not beg for forgiveness. It is not me
you must beg forgiveness from but the Spirit himself. You will chastise
yourself now, daughter. You will purify yourself in my presence."

Mercy sucked in breath.
"I am no child!"

"You are nothing but a
child!" Beatrix reached into her robes and pulled out a white lightning lash. "You
have sinned before the Spirit. You must purify yourself now here, in this
chamber, as he and I watch."

Mercy ground her
teeth. She had not undergone this ritual for years, not since she'd been a
rebellious youth. But she had no choice; Mother was High Priestess, her word as
commanding as the Spirit's voice itself.

With stiff fingers, Mercy
unstrapped her breastplate and let it clang to the floor. When she took the
lash from her mother, its tip blazed into crackling life, sizzling, lightning
blue.

Mercy slung it across
her back, then grimaced and nearly screamed as the tip cracked against her
back, hotter than fire, cutting through her tunic and burning her flesh.

"Again," Beatrix said. "Twenty
times for the Spirit. And hail his name with every blow."

As Mercy slung the lash
again and again, chastising and purifying herself, she prayed to the Spirit,
but she thought of Cade. He had caused this. When she found him, he would be
the one who hurt, who screamed. And she would find him. And she would break
him. She swore this with every lash—to the Spirit and to herself.

 
 
CADE

He flew through the night, a golden
dragon lost in clouds and shadows, lost in grief and memories.

The night was dark.
Rainclouds hid the moon and stars, and rain pelted Cade's scales. He had not
shifted into a dragon since battling the paladins, but he dared fly now, hidden
in the storm. The raindrops ran down his scaly cheeks, and the pain clutched
his chest. In the clouds around him, he kept seeing it again and again: the
village burning, the smoke rising, the ashes of the dead falling like snow. And
always they seemed to stare from within his memory: the blackened skulls of his
adoptive parents, their jaws open in silent screams.

"You killed them,
Mercy," Cade said into the rain. "You murdered them for no reason." His voice
shook. "I'm going to find you someday. And I'll make you pay for your crime."

Just as real as the
grief was the worry for Eliana. She was the only family Cade had left, and he
didn't even know if she was alive or dead. Had he missed her small, frail body
under the rubble? Had somebody smuggled her out of the village in time? Had the
paladins themselves kidnapped her? Cade was fleeing now—fleeing for safety, for
answers—but he swore that he would not rest while Eliana was missing.

"I'll find you, my
sister. I swear it. I will never forget you."

Dawn rose ahead. A haze
of silver glowed upon the horizon, and soon rays of golden light broke through
the clouds, celestial columns. The rain gleamed like dew on cobwebs, and the
storm scattered, the warmth of the sun casting off the clouds. And there in the
east, Cade saw it—the sea. The sun rose from beyond the water, casting a
gleaming trail all in gold and white toward the shore. There on the coast it
lay, sending pale towers toward the sky: the port city of Sanctus.

"Answers," Cade
whispered.

He shook off the
raindrops, glided down, and landed in a field of grass, white stones, and
heather a couple of miles away from the city. He released his magic, returning
to human form. When he looked down at his body, Cade sighed. He had never been
in such rough shape. His burlap tunic hung in tatters, barely covering his
body. That body seemed just as tattered: a hundred scrapes, bruises, and welts
covered it. He had barely eaten in days, only a handful of wild hares he had
hunted in dragon form. He had barely drunk. Already he looked thinner than he'd
ever been, and whenever he tried to clean the dirt off his face, he only seemed
to smear more across it. If he wandered into the city, he thought, he was
likely to be arrested as a drunk vagrant, tossed into some prison cell, and
forgotten.

But he had to advance.
What choice did he have? A life in the wilderness, hunting in the nights?
Sooner or later, the paladins would catch him; he still saw firedrakes scouring
the sky every hour or two. He supposed he could leave the Commonwealth
entirely, travel south across the sea, and seek a home among the Horde—that gathering
of motley tribes that had banded together in the lands of Terra, forming a
crude army to fight the Temple. Yet if he traveled there, he'd learn nothing of
Requiem, nothing of Eliana. No. He had to continue to the city of Sanctus, the
eastern bastion of the Commonwealth.

Seek the library,
Domi
had said.

At the memory of Domi,
Cade felt some of his anxiety fade. She was a wild beast. She served the paladins,
a mount to Mercy herself. She had tied him down, preventing him from saving his
family; perhaps Domi was as much to blame for their deaths as the paladins. And
yet, when Domi had embraced him, had whispered "Requiem" into his ear, there had
been no malice to her. She had blessed him with that word, giving him a
precious gift, a holy prayer to cling to.

"Requiem," he whispered
here in the field. He raised his chin. He would do as Domi had said. He would
seek the library. He would find what this word meant.