Rise of the Dragons (21 page)

Kyra opened her eyes to blackness,
having no idea where she was. She lay on a cold stone floor, her head
splitting, her body aching, and wondered what had happened to her. Shivering
from the cold, her throat parched, feeling as if she hadn’t eaten in days, she
reached out and felt the cobblestone floor beneath her fingers, and she tried
to remember.

Images flooded her mind, and she was
unsure at first if they were memories or nightmares. She saw herself being
captured by the Lord’s Men, thrown into a cart, a metal gate slamming on her.
She remembered a long, bumpy ride, resisting as the gate finally opened,
struggling to break free and being clubbed on the head. After that all had,
mercifully, been blackness.

Kyra reached up and felt the back of her
head and as she felt the lump, she knew it had not been a dream, but all too
real. The reality sunk in like a stone: she had been captured by the Lord’s
Men, carted off, imprisoned.

Kyra was furious at Maltren for his
betrayal, furious at herself for being so stupid not to have foreseen it. Yet
she was also scared, feeling a cold sense of dread as she pondered what would
come next. Here she lay, alone, God knew where, in the Governor’s custody; only
terrible things could be coming for her. She felt sure that her father and her
people had no idea what had happened to her, where she was; Maltren would
probably lie to them and tell them he saw her leaving the fort for good.

As Kyra scrambled in the dark, she
instinctively reached over her shoulder for her bow, her staff—but all of her
weapons had been stripped. She was defenseless, too.

Kyra saw a dim glow coming through the
cell bars, and she sat up and looked out and saw torches lining the stone walls
of a dungeon, beneath which stood several soldiers, at attention. There sat a
large iron door in the center of it, and it was silent down here, the only
sound that of dripping coming from the ceiling, and of rats scurrying somewhere
in a dark corner.

Kyra scurried up against the wall,
hugging her knees to her chest, trying to get warm even though she could not.
She closed her eyes and breathed deep, trying to imagine herself someplace
else, anywhere, and as she did, she saw the dragon’s intense yellow eyes
staring back at her, as if taunting her.

Strength is not defined in times of
peace
,
the dragon said to her.
It is defined in hardship. Embrace your hardship, do
not shy from it. Only then will you overcome it.

Kyra opened her eyes, shocked at the
vision, looking around and expecting to see the dragon in front of her.

“Did you see them?” a girl’s voice cut
through the darkness, making Kyra flinch.

Kyra wheeled, stunned to hear the voice
of another person here in this cell with her, coming from somewhere in the
shadows—and even more stunned to hear it was a girl’s voice. She sounded about
her age, and as a figure emerged from the shadows, Kyra saw she was right:
there sat a pretty girl, perhaps fifteen, with brown hair and eyes, long
tangled hair, face covered in dirt, clothes in tatters. She looked terrified as
she stared back at Kyra.

“Who are you?” Kyra asked.

“Have you seen them?” the girl repeated,
urgently.

“Seen who?”

“His son,” she replied.

“His son?” Kyra asked, confused.

The girl turned and looked outside the
cell, terror in her eyes, as if awaiting someone, and Kyra wondered what
horrors she had seen.

“I haven’t seen anyone,” Kyra said.

“Oh God, please don’t let them kill me,”
the girl pleaded. “Please. I hate this place!”

The girl began to weep uncontrollably,
curled up on the stone floor, and Kyra, her heart breaking for her, got up,
went over to her, and draped an arm around her shoulder, trying to soothe her.

“Shhh,” Kyra said, trying to calm her.
Kyra had never seen anyone in such a broken state; this girl looked positively
terrified about whoever it was she was talking about, and it gave Kyra a
sinking feeling for what was to come.

“Tell me,” Kyra said, “I don’t
understand. Who are you talking about? Who hurt you? The Governor? Who are you?
What are you doing here?”

She saw the bruises on her face, scars
on her shoulders, and she tried not to think of what they had done to this poor
girl.

As Kyra waited patiently, the girl
slowly stopped crying.

“My name is Dierdre,” she said. “I’ve
been here…I don’t know. I thought it was a moon cycle, but I have lost track of
time. They took me from my family, ever since the new law. I tried to resist,
and they brought me here.”

She stared into space as if seeing her
past before her.

“Every day there are new tortures for
me, new punishments,” she continued. “First it was the son, then the father.
They pass me off like a doll and now…now I am… nothing. I just want to die.
Please, just help me die.”

Kyra looked back at her, horrified.

“Don’t say that,” Kyra said.

“I tried to take a knife the other day
to kill myself—but it slipped from my hands and they captured me again. Please.
I’ll give you anything. Kill me.”

Kyra shook her head, aghast.

“Listen to me,” Kyra said, feeling a new
inner strength rise up within her, a new determination as she saw this girl’s
plight. It was the strength of her father, the strength of generations of
warriors, coursing through her. More than that: it was the strength of the
dragon. A strength she did not she had until this day.

She grabbed the girl’s shoulders and
looked her in the eye, wanting to get through to her in her hysterical state.

“You are
not
going to die,” Kyra
said firmly. “And they are
not
going to hurt you. Do you understand me?
You are going to live. I’m going to make sure of it.”

The girl seemed to calm quite a bit, to
draw strength from Kyra’s strength.

“Whatever they have done to you, that is
in the past now. Soon you are going to be free—
we
are going to be free.
You are going to start life over again. We will be friends, and I will protect
you. Do you trust me?”

Dierdre looked at her, clearly shocked.
Finally she was calm.

“But how?” Dierdre asked. “You don’t
understand. There is no escape from here. You don’t understand what they’re
like—”

Suddenly they both flinched and wheeled
as the iron door slammed open and in walked the Lord Governor, trailed by a
half dozen men, and joined by a man who appeared to be his son, his spitting
image, with that same bulbous nose and smug look, perhaps in his thirties. He
had his father’s same sneering stupid face, his same look of arrogance.

They crossed the dungeon and walked up
to the cell bars, and as they did, his men approached with their torches,
lighting up the cell. Kyra looked around in the bright light and was horrified
to see her accommodations for the first time, to see the bloodstains all over
the floor. She did not want to think of who else had been here, or of what had
happened to them.

“Bring her here,” the Governor ordered
his men.

The cell door was opened, in marched his
men, and Kyra found herself hoisted to her feet as she was grabbed by several
men, arms yanked behind her back, unable to break free of their grip as much as
she tried.

They brought her close to the Governor
and he examined her, looking her up and down like an insect.

“You thought you could defy me, did
you?” he said softly, his voice low and dark. “Did I not warn you?”

Kyra frowned.

“Your law only allows you to take unwed
girls as wives, not as prisoners. You violate your own law to bring me here.”

The Governor exchanged a look with his
son, then they all broke into hearty laughter.

“Do not worry,” he said, glowering at
her, “I will make you my wife. Many times over. And my son’s, too—and anyone
else’s whom I wish. When we’re done with you, if we haven’t killed you yet,
then I’ll let you live out your days down here.”

He grinned an evil grin, clearly
enjoying this.

“As for your father and your people,” he
continued, “I’ve had a change of heart: we are going to kill every last one of
them. They will be a memory soon enough. Not even that, I’m afraid: they will
be erased from the memory books. As we speak, an entire division of the
Pandesian army is approaching to avenge my men and destroy your fort.”

Kyra felt a great rage and indignation
bubbling up within her. She tried desperately to summon her power, whatever it
was that had happened to her on the bridge, but to her dismay, it would not
come. She writhed and bucked, but could not break free.

“You have a strong spirit,” he said.
“That is good. I shall enjoy breaking that spirit. I shall enjoy it very much.”

He turned his back on her, as if to leave,
when suddenly, without warning, he wheeled back around and backhanded her with
all his might.

It was a move she did not expect, and
Kyra felt the mighty blow smash her jaw and send her reeling back down to the
floor, beside Dierdre.

Kyra, stung, jaw aching, lay there and
looked up, watching them all go. As they all left her cell, locking it behind
them, she saw the Governor stop on the other side, face against the bars, and
looked down at her.

“Take the night off,” he said. “I will
torture you tomorrow.” He grinned wide. “I find that my victims suffer the most
when they are given a full night to think about the hardship to come.”

He let out an awful laugh, delighted
with himself, then turned with his men and left the dungeon, the massive iron
door slamming behind them like a coffin slamming on her heart.

Merk hiked through Whitewood at sunset,
his legs aching, his stomach growling, trying to keep the faith, to know that
the Tower was out there somewhere, that eventually he would reach it. He tried
to focus on what his new life would be like once he arrived, how he could start
fresh, become a new person.

But he couldn’t focus. Ever since he had
met that girl, heard her story, it had been gnawing away at him. He wanted to
push her from his mind, but try as he did, he could not. After all, was he not
turning away from a life of violence? Wasn’t that the whole point of becoming a
better person? If he went back for her as a hired hand, when would the killing
ever end? Would there not be another job, another cause, right behind that one?

Merk hiked and hiked, poking the ground
with his staff, leaves crunching beneath his feet, furious. Why had he had to
run into her? It was a huge wood—why couldn’t they have missed each other? Why
did life always have to throw things in his way? Things that were beyond his
understanding?

Merk hated hard decisions, and he hated
hesitation; his entire life he had always been so sure of everything—that he
had regarded as one of his strong points. He had always known what he was: a
hired hand. But now, he was not so sure who he was. Now, he found himself
wavering.

He cursed the gods for having him run
into that girl. Why couldn’t people take care of themselves, anyway? Why did
they always need him? If she and her family were unable to defend themselves,
why did they deserve to live anyhow? If he saved them, then sooner or later
some other predator would just run into and kill them?

No. He could not save them. That would
be enabling them. People had to learn to defend themselves.

And yet, maybe, he pondered, there was a
reason she had been put before his eyes. Maybe he was being tested. He looked
up at the skies, the sunset glowing, barely visible through the wood, and he
wondered at his new faith. His new sense of something bigger in the world.

Tested.

It was a powerful word, a powerful idea,
and one he did not like. He did not like what he did not understand, what he
could not control, and being tested was precisely that. As he hiked, Merk felt
his carefully constructed world collapsing all around him. Before, his life
purpose had been easy; now, he could no longer see it. Being sure of things in
life, he realized, was easy; questioning things was what was hard. He had
stepped out of a world of black and white, and into a world filled with shades
of gray, and the uncertainty, the lack of any definite answers, unsettled him.
He did not understand who he was becoming—and that was what bothered him most
of all.

Merk crested a hill, leaves crunching,
using his staff, breathing hard, but not from exertion, and as he reached its
peak, he stopped and looked out, and for the first time, his heart quickened.
He almost could not believe what he was seeing.

There it sat, on the horizon, not a
legend, not a myth, but the real thing: the Tower of Ur.

Nestled in a small clearing in the midst
of a vast and dark wood, it was an ancient stone tower, circular, perhaps fifty
yards in diameter, and rising straight up to the treeline. It was the oldest
thing he had ever seen, looked older, even, than the castles in which he had
served. It rose up perfectly, and had a mysterious aura to it. Even from here
it felt impermeable.

He breathed a deep sigh of exhaustion
and relief. He had made it. Seeing it here, in the flesh, this object of his
fantasy, was like a dream. He would have a place to be in the world, a purpose,
a chance to repent. Finally, he would start life anew and become a Watcher of
the tower.

Merk knew that he would normally be
ecstatic, would double his pace and set off on the final leg of the journey
before nightfall. And yet, try as he did, he could not take the first step. He
stood there, frozen in place, something still gnawing away him.

Merk turned, able to see out over the
woodline here, able to see the horizon in every direction, and in the far
distance, against the setting sun, he saw black smoke rising. It was like a
punch in the gut. He knew where it hailed from: that girl. Her family. All of
them being attacked, the murderers setting fire to everything.

Yet as he looked carefully, he saw her
farm, and saw they had not reached it yet. The smoke was a trail, a warpath
leading to it. Soon enough, they would reach it. But for now, for these last
precious minutes, she was safe.

Merk twisted and cracked his neck, an
old habit when he was at his wits’ end. He stood there and shifted, filled with
a great sense of unease, unable to go forward. He turned and looked back at the
Tower of Ur, the destination of his dreams, and he knew his journey was over.
He had arrived, and he wanted to relax, to celebrate.

But for the first time in his life, a
desire welled up within him. It was a desire to set wrongs right, to act purely
for justice’s sake. Not for a fee, and not for a reward. But just because it
was the right thing to do.

Merk hated that feeling. He wanted
desperately to erase it.

He leaned back and shouted, irate, at
war with himself, with the world. Why? Why now of all times?

Merk found himself turning, though,
despite every ounce of common sense he had, away from the Tower, towards the
farm. First it was a walk, then a jog, then a sprint.

The Tower could wait. He was going to do
right in the world—and it was going to start with this girl.

As he ran, he began to feel a great
sense rise up, something he had never experienced before. Finally, he realized,
something deep within him was being set free.