Page 272 of Of Empires and Dust
As the dragon whipped past overhead, many stumbled in the force of the gust that followed, two of Aryana’s men hitting the stone.
“Fuck me…” Aryana held an arm out to keep her balance, her gaze fixed on the sky, watching as Varthear twisted and turned, all beauty and grace. The earlier composure in the woman’s voice cracked. “That’s a dragon – arealdragon.”
“Did you think we were lying?”
“No, I…” Aryana stood to her full height, still staring after Varthear. “I just never really thought I’d see one.” The woman stepped past Ella. “There are two?”
“Two?” It took Ella a moment to process Aryana’s words, but then images of two dragons swirling in the sky pushed themselves in from Faenir’s mind. One blue, one white.
Gooseflesh swept over her skin. She spun and stared slack-jawed at the white dragon that had emerged from the clouds and now wound through the sky with Varthear. “Calen…”
“So, he has returned,” Aryana said, following Ella’s gaze.
Ella looked to Gaeleron, who had paused just behind her. “Take Aryana and her retinue to Mythníril.”
“Where are you going?”
Ella had broken into a sprint before the elf had even spoken the words.
Chapter 63
Ghosts of a Time Long Dead
20thDay of the Blood Moon
River Makeer, west of Achyron’s Keep – Winter, Year 3081 After Doom
“Easy, girl.”Dayne ran his hand along the neck of the bay mare he’d taken from the camp. The magnificent creature had carried him through the night and into the morning with little complaint. Ahead, the light of the rising sun sprayed over the Rolling Mountains, glistening in the mist of Dayne’s breath, winter still holding its grasp on the world.
The horse came to a stop in the middle of an open glade, snorting, the river ahead. Dayne laid his spear across his lap and patted the creature’s neck. He gave a tap with his heels, and the horse walked forwards.
The River Makeer had three points of crossing where the water was shallow enough. Dayne stood before thesouthernmost crossing. The old fort sat about a mile back from the far bank, nestled against a thicket of trees.
Fort Lukaris, named after the great Valtaran general Alexin Lukaris. It was here that Alexin fought the Battle of the Bleeding River against the Karvosi invasion back in the Age of Honour, around the year one-four-three-six After Doom. It was said that the Karvosi casualties were so high it had taken months to clear the bodies and the river had run red all the way to Myrefall.
Dayne’s mother had told him the story a thousand times when he was a boy. Alexin was known as the greatest military leader in the history of Valtara. A man who’d never lost a battle. Not a single one. The skulls of three Great Horns were still mounted on the walls of Macidea, the ancestral home of House Lukaris, just south of Skyfell. Dayne had never seen one of the creatures alive, but the skulls were easily as long as he was tall, the enormous horns the same length.
Staring out at the river, Dayne found himself longing for those days when his mother let him and Baren stay up long past the setting sun and into the early hours, the fire roaring, her strong voice spinning stories of all the ancient battles and generals of Valtara. His mother had always had a love of history and the blood spilled to accomplish the present. Knowing your past allowed you to appreciate the gifts you’d been given, or so his mother had always said.
The Battle of the Bleeding River, the Broken Isles, the Weeping Wood, The Battle of the Shattered Spears, The Burning of a Thousand Ships. All some of Dayne’s favourites.
That was all before he’d fought a battle himself. Before he’d truly known the stomach-turning sound of snapping bones, or the way skin crackled as it burned, or the particular scream of a man being eaten alive.
He still appreciated the genius of minds like Alexin, even more so than he once had. But now he knew well enough notto yearn for the glory of battle. Death would find him anyway, wherever he went, as it always did. But there was nothing noble about watching a man shit himself with a spear buried in his gut. Nothing righteous about walking waist-deep through a river turned red with blood and floating corpses.
He was already too far gone. There was no good deed in the world that would clean his hands. But he would end as many lives as he needed to if it would keep his child’s hands from bearing the same stains.
His child. Such a strange notion. In his arrogance, he had thought he’d understood the grief Alina had gone through when her son was taken from her. But as soon as Mera had told him of the child growing in her womb, he knew how wrong he’d been. That child was barely formed, a shell not yet ready to protect the soul within, and yet he would die for it. He would crawl across a field of shattered glass, let the flesh be burned from his bones, blacken his soul to the point that even the void would turn him away – all this he would do to protect that child. A child who had not yet taken a breath, a child who, if taken, he would bathe himself in blood to find.
Dayne took a moment, allowing the sounds of the river to drift to the back of his mind – a brief peace – then signalled the horse to cross. The water at the crossing point barely came up past the horse’s knees, in contrast to the deeper sections where the river would have swallowed the animal whole.
He led the horse on a slow walk towards the fort, which now lay in disrepair. The remains of the limestone walls were dank, grey, and webbed with vines. Cylindrical towers intersected the wall at each bend, topped with crenelated battlements. The keep rose about a hundred feet into the sky, sections of stone missing where they had been chipped away across the centuries. As Dayne rode closer, he could see the temples to Neron and Achyron through the gaps in the walls. Once, those templeshad been finished in the finest Valtaran marble mined near Ironcreek. But that had long been stripped by House Koraklon and repurposed in the temples at Achyron’s Keep. That thought alone caused Dayne to grate his teeth. Temples were sacred things, and for a great Valtaran House to defile them as such was – to Dayne – an unforgivable thing. But the gods, as of yet, had not seen fit to punish House Koraklon. He would be happy to do it for them.
If this war ever ended, he would ensure Fort Lukaris was brought back to what it had once been, the temples restored, the walls rebuilt.
Dayne dismounted and led the horse through a gap in the wall, climbing over chunks of moss-covered stone that had long since become part of the earth. He walked through the ruined fort and stopped at the base of Neron’s temple. The statue of the god was one of few things mostly intact. The Sailor’s left arm was missing, a chip taken from his cheek.
Dayne tethered the horse to a stone post, then knelt at the base of the statue, placing his spear on the ground, his eyes closed.
