Heraldin shrugged. “Probably a treasure. Maybe a nest.”
“Right,” said Gorm. “So, once Gaist is in position—”
“It’s scared,” said Laruna.
“It should be,” said Heraldin.
The solamancer stared at the dragon as a student might peer at a particularly complex equation. “No, I mean I think it’s scared of losing something. I don’t think that’s just a treasure. It could have fled down to the depths to escape us. Something else is motivating it.”
“So a nest then,” said the bard.
“Don’t think of it like it’s a person,” said Jynn. “It’s really an animal driven by needs like greed and self-preservation in equal measure. I’m sure it gets confused sometimes.”
“Sounds like most people to me.” Laruna returned her gaze to the other heroes. “I don’t think it’s a nest. This isn’t about instinct.”
“It’s a flying fire-breathing lizard the size of a barn!” said Heraldin. “You can’t know what it’s thinking!”
There was almost an audible slap as the same thought struck them all at once.
“Yes, I can!” said Laruna.
“The Eye of the Dragon!” said Jynn, shuffling through his enchanted satchel.
“How does it work?” the solamancer asked as the wizard produced the gemstone.
“The Tandosians just stuck it on a hat,” said Gorm.
“I’m fairly certain that’s not how it works,” said Jynn, looking over the crystal.
“Besides, we don’t have any hats,” said the bard. “None to spare, anyway,” he added when he noticed Gaist eyeing his wide-brimmed headgear.
Gorm pulled the solamancer aside as the others examined the gem and discussed the terms of surrendering a hat. “Lass, I see where you’re goin’ with this. Ye’re wonderin’ what it’s thinkin’, or if it has baby dragons, or some other reason for delay. But that thing killed our friends. It’s tryin’ to kill us right now. If we hesitate… if we don’t do what we need to, we could all go the way of… of…” He shook his head. “I trust ye, but are ye sure about this?”
“No,” said Laruna, and Gorm was surprised to see tears running down the woman’s face. She wiped them away when she caught him looking. “I wish it was simple too, you know. I hate all the cloak and dagger drake spit in the city, and I hated not knowing what we’d face down here. And now we know, and finally it seems so straightforward. That thing killed Thane, and then it killed Kaitha, and I want to kill it. I want it to be wrong, to be evil. I want it to deserve everything I throw at it.”
Gorm had to take a deep breath to loosen his white-hot grip on his axe. “Aye,” he croaked. “I want that too.”
“But I can’t have another Bloodroot on my conscience,” said Laruna, gulping back more tears.
The words were like a lance of fire through Gorm’s heart. He couldn’t speak, but shook his head.
The mage continued, “I want vengeance. I want a way to… to win… for all we lost to not be in vain. But I need to be right about it. And this feels wrong. So I… I can’t give into the fury, Gorm. I don’t know what we should do. I don’t know if I’ll make it worse. But if I stay in control and… and try to feel as the dragon feels, I think I can find the way forward.”
“Bloodroot wasn’t your fault. It was mine.” Gorm’s voice was ragged and labored after fighting past the hot lump in his throat. “I should have suspected what the guild was up to, and I charged ahead into Johan and Handor’s trap, and all them Orcs and Niln and Tib’rin paid for it.”
A firm hand gripped his shoulder. Gorm looked up into Gaist’s eyes, dark and sorrowful and, above all, understanding.
“We all should have seen it,” said Heraldin.
“We all charged ahead,” agreed Jynn. He handed Laruna the gem. “We all fell into the trap.”
Laruna lifted the glittering crystal to her head, faint weaves of fire twisting around her fingers. The gem hung in the air in front of her, every facet alight with a sudden, inner flame. “And we all can be better,” she said.
Gorm nodded. “Go,” he whispered, eyes squeezed shut. “Find us a way.”
“And watch out for the dragon’s fire,” said Heraldin.
Laruna didn’t glance back. “I am the fire,” she said. Then the solamancer walked around the stone and toward the dragon, the gem above her head glowing with enchanted light.
Chapter 25
Thin strands of illumination stretched out into the void, a bridge of blue dusk in an otherwise impenetrable darkness.
Kaitha had expected something like this, though she recalled from temple lessons that there was supposed to be a light at the end of the passage, and possibly flying children with stringed instruments. What she did not expect was the sensation of flaming centipedes ripping up and down her body. For a moment she wondered if this indicated that her soul hadn’t met some sort of metaphysical standard to walk the path, and then the pain became so sweeping that it was all she could do to squeeze her eyes shut and breathe.
After a brief and excruciating interlude, three things became clear.
The first was that she was not dead yet, as evidenced by her labored breaths. The second was that this came with some drawbacks. The third, and this was directly related to the second, was that emergency surgical sprites were in no way as addictive as salve. Emergency surgical sprites weren’t as addictive as self-administering salt to the eyes. Emergency surgical sprites were less pleasurable than the injuries that triggered their frenzied, fiery ministrations. She wasn’t sure they were preferable to the death that they had arguably prevented.
The best thing about emergency surgical sprites, in her opinion, was that they expired with tiny, wistful sighs as soon as their work was done. Yet once they were gone and the pain had receded enough for her senses to come back, Kaitha found herself alone in the darkness with her thoughts and recent memories. A deep heartache rolled over her, pushing aside the agony of her injuries and their treatment. Fresh tears rolled down her face.
Thane came back for her and he died. He looked in her eyes, and never heard her speak, and now he…
He didn’t die so ye could throw yer life away.
The memory of Gorm’s words cut through the crush of grief. She might meet Thane some day in the afterlife, after all, and if she wanted to be able to look him in the eye—or do whatever disembodied souls did to regard each other with mutual respect—she couldn’t tell him that she used the time his final sacrifice afforded her to fall down a hole and starve to death.
Even the thought of moving forward, of a time when something could be different, helped a little. “I don’t want to remember,” she murmured, and opened her eyes.
