Though I hunt this thing on my King’s orders, I truly hunt it for myself,I say now, knowing my heart on this matter.I want to fuck that creature up and make it pay for killing Maryse. I hunt it for myself, rather than my King.
You have spoken true.She nods, and something eases inside me as I heave out a relieved breath. As I do, something inside me panics, knowing I heaved out a breath underwater, also, as my dragon.
Seriously cutting down my survival time down in the bone-pile—by a lot.
The second point?The ancestral drakaina asks me now as her red eyes sear into me.
That one is true.I nod, knowing my heart on this matter as well.I don’t want to control that big fucker. I want to bring it down. End of story. I have no use for power like that.
You don’t, do you?She whispers now, like a breath of ancient air in my lungs. Though I’m trapped in this mind-space with her, I can feel my real lungs struggling now, deep underwater. Long before Ström runs out of air, I’m going to run out from that massive exhalation I gave just now.
All of us dying in this Trial—because of me.
What about the third point?she asks briskly now, as if sensing I have little time left.Can you swear to me you had nothing to do with your beloved mentor’s death and the manner of her passing?
As I think about it now, however… I know I’ve already failed this Trial. Deep inside, I know I did have something to do with Maryse’s death. I know some ancient resonance between my blood and bones called that terrible, undead creature to the council hall of the Black Dragon Knights that night—and that it responded to my wrath.
I know I’m responsible for Maryse’s death, because the ancient magic of my Bloodwalker ancestor created that terrible Black Dragon. And from our interaction in the council’s hall, I know it still responds to the magic of our bloodline.
As I feel flayed to my very soul now, before one of the ancients who knew it of old.
I killed her. I killed Maryse.I whisper now as I stare up into those searing red eyes and tell my darkest truth.Something in my wrath called that beast right to me that night. Maybe it was already hunting for me, or her… but whatever the case, my furious emotions with the Council provoked that attack. I caused her death… at the talons of the very same creature my ancestor created.
I feel it as this ancient ancestral Blood Dragon stares at me. For a long time, she says nothing—so long, I feel my air blistering in my lungs, as my dragon body beneath the water struggles to hold on to the last of my oxygen and not give up and drown.
But at last, the massive drakaina nods. As she closes her ancient eyes, I see something silver glow upon her forehead, searing through her scales and flesh.
The very same silver stone we all touched, deep in the heart of the pile of bones.
Go, with the blessing of Aesa.She bows her head to me, bringing that rune-worked silver stone right near my hand as I stand before her in ourmind-space.Take my Truthstone as you journey to unmake the Black One, and wear it evermore upon your flesh. For I made it to enhance my deepest perceptions, to magnify my dragon’s instincts a hundredfold, along with my human ones, so I could know what was right in any situation. Take this tool, now. I give it to you. And bring the Black One down—for good.
As I reach out my hand, I understand this ancient drakaina is offering me a great gift. I’m not quite sure what this gift will entail, but it feels right to touch that luminous silver stone now, as it blazes with white and gold runes, swirling in all its glory before me.
My fingers touch the stone of Aesa’s Truth—and it vanishes from her, as I feel it rush right into my very own flesh. The silver burns, even as it feels so right; a magnificent rune from the stone blazes a battle-brimstone red all inside me now as I’m thrust backwards out of the mind-space.
The bright drakaina Aesa disappears as I’m hammered back to awareness inside my dragon body—catapulted up through the bone pile and the water of the lake. As I’m banished from the blazing white mind-space, Aesa’s silvery Truth burns all through me, like wildfire with that blazing red rune.
I’m launched from the drakaina’s dead underwater skull. That searing sensation of Truth rips through the skin over my heart now, like a firebrand as I scream, using up the very last of my air. I’m already being blasted out of the lake, though, right up through the hole in the lake.
Landing in a sodden heap on the ice.
Bjorn and Ström are catapulted out of the water with me. As we cough and splutter, shifting down to human, we find our wounds healed and our bodies renewed.
I feel something burn on the skin of my chest, however. I glance down and my lips fall open, as Bjorn and Ström both exclaim. Because right over my breast bone where my heart chakra is, a luminous silver object has been buried in my skin.
Aesa’s silver Truthstone—embedded now in my chest.
It glows there like starlight and moonlight, etched with ancient BloodDragon runes that write and re-write themselves, blazing with a subtle white light. As they move and change shape, I see gold sear through them. They remind me of that drakaina’s white and gold scales, as I see a rune of red shine through, vivid, just as happened when the object rushed into me.
Scalding me like the truth-knowing power of Aesa’s ancient red eyes.
“Aesa’s Truth…” I whisper, as I touch that intricate silver gem. It quiets until it looks like only a polished silver stone.
Though it’s embedded permanently in the skin of my chest.
The strange silver stone is the least of my concerns now, however, as Jarl Oggi Magnussen roars, side-winding to us fast in his massive dragon form over the ice. Even as he does, though, a second force barrels in—the ten dragons from the Eriksson Clan rushing in before us.
As Ström, Bjorn, and I recover on the ice, Ström’s family spread their lean wings, fast. At their own Jarl’s command, they hammer a hard blow of air at Jarl Oggi Magnussen—that sends him right to his ass as the ten nasty Eriksson dragons lower their heads and hiss.
