Chapter 1
748 Words
1
Year 511 D.A.
Zaviana watched the red sunrise as it broke into the horizon, casting a purple-and-orange glow into the sky. It was winter. She would miss the orange sun. Only the red sun showed its face during the winter. Its heat, somehow, was less than its orange twin’s. Zaviana struggled, jerking her arms forward. Nothing. Her wrists hurt. She clenched her teeth. How did she go from being a prisoner to being a prisoner?
“You won’t escape those chains, my love,” Derkas said.
“If you really loved me, you wouldn’t have me chained to a tree!” she snapped.
“Would you rather be chained to my dragon?” he asked.
Zaviana snarled. “I’d rather not be chained at all.”
Derkas raised an eyebrow. “If I unchain you, do you promise to not run away?”
She scowled.
Derkas smiled. “I thought not.”
“Why am I your prisoner?” she asked.
He tilted his head. “Would you rather be back with the emperor? In his prison?”
“No,” she whispered.
“What did they do to you in there?”
She clenched her teeth. “Experiments.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know they captured you until it was too late.”
“You didn’t come for me. How can you claim to love me?”
“What can I do against the entire Dragonia Empire? I had to wait until I had enough leverage for a trade.”
“A trade,” Zaviana scoffed. “What could you possibly have had that they’ were willing to trade me for?”
“The resistance.”
Zaviana’s eyes glowed. “The resistance? They’re real then?”
“Yes, though they won’t be for long.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I gave the emperor their hidden location for your freedom.”
“My freedom? This isn’t freedom. You exchanged their secret for my slavery. I am still a slave.”
“What more do you want from me?” he asked. “I stopped that dragonrider from enslaving you when we first met. Now I’ve rescued you from the emperor.”
“The emperor whom you let capture me.”
“I did not let the emperor capture you. You ran away, straight into the arms of the empire.”
“I ran away because you planned to hand over that man to the empire. I wanted to warn him.”
“That man betrayed the Dragonia Empire. He fed information to the resistance. That is treason! He got what he deserved.”
“No one deserves what the emperor did to him. No one.”
“I didn’t know …”
“Of course you didn’t know!” Zaviana snapped. “The emperor wasn’t going to tell you he was going to skin him alive!”
“If I could go back ...” Derkas brushed his hand through his hair.
“You’d do the same thing over again,” Zaviana said. “You mercenaries are all the same.”
Derkas took two steps toward her. His face twisted in a snarl. He inhaled, loosening his expression, then brushed his hand against her cheek. It lingered for a moment before running through her hair, pressing it behind her left ear.
“I thought we had something,” he whispered.
“You thought wrong.” Zaviana shivered at his touch. “I thought you were different, someone I could trust. But I only fell for you because you saved me from that despicable dragonrider. You are no different.”
He jerked his hand back, clenching his fist. His teeth ground together. He closed his eyes, exhaling slowly. When his eyes opened, he was fully relaxed once more.
“I am different.”
Zaviana raised her brows. “Prove it.”
“How can I prove this to you?”
“Let’s warn the resistance.”
His brow crinkled. “We can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Going against the Dragonia Empire is foolish. You should know that. Don’t you remember what happened to your family when they defied the empire?”
Zaviana clenched her eyes shut, fighting back the tears that threatened to come. “Foolish it may be, but the empire is wrong. They were wrong for doing what they did, and they are wrong for everything they still do to threaten the people of Kaeldroga.”
“It doesn’t matter if what they do is moral or not. Who are you to judge? Even the creator hasn’t stepped in to stop the Dragonia Empire. They are too strong. No one can stop them. Stop believing in the illusion that this so-called resistance will be able to stop them. They will be crushed like everyone who has tried. The best thing we can do is stay out of their way.”
Zaviana glared at him. “You know as well as I that staying out of the way isn’t good enough. Even if you don’t defy them, if they believe you are standing in the way of someone who is … they’ll crush you.”
Derkas grinned. “That’s why I’m stepping out of the way.”
“I refuse to hide,” Zaviana said.
“And that is why you are still in chains. It is for your own good.”
- Writer
