Dragon Empress

Chapter 13

There are magics that bind me and secrets I must keep, said Thorion’s voice.

Keriya was still falling, but she didn’t seem to be getting any nearer to the sea. She tilted her head to gaze at the star-strewn sky. Valeasi, the infinite serpent constellation, glimmered above her. Its sinuous pattern seemed to point toward the island.

They say he always points us home.

“They who?” asked Keriya. She was fifteen years old again, sitting on the forested slope of the Naetren Mountains, and Thorion was by her side, sharing tidbits of draconic lore. “Us who? What home?”

“The dragons.”

Slowly, Keriya turned from the twinkling constellation and looked at her bondmate. The scene shifted, seamlessly becoming something else. She and Thorion faced each other on a ridge of the Temariyan Gorge. A splotch of pitch-black shadow hung in the air between them.

“That’s your soul?” she whispered, staring at the tangled web of dark threads.

“It is the shadowed half, so it is not truly me.”

The exorcised half of Thorion’s magicsource, the piece of him they had cut out together, flickered. It dissipated in dark whorls, whisked away by unearthly winds, borne toward Necrovar on invisible waves of power.

“I’m sorry,” said Keriya, though Thorion didn’t react to her words. She was separate from her fifteen-year-old dream-self now, watching the memory of that fateful night as if she were an outside observer. As if her consciousness had been exorcised from her body, her past cut away from her present.

“The clean half is safe, and the shadowed half is no longer poisoning me,” said Thorion.

The real Keriya, the one trapped in her dream, stilled her trembling. Something hovered at the edges of her mind, a piece of the puzzle she’d never bothered to fit into place.

“What happened to the clean half?” she whispered.

Thorion’s form wavered. He looked away from the younger version of Keriya and locked gazes with her present-day self.

“Remember this,” he told her, hope and sorrow etched into the fine scales of his face.

The black sky, the sunken sea, and the mysterious island flashed before her again—visions Thorion had sent her four years ago, when he’d gone on his solitary quest to exorcise the clean half of his soul.

And Keriya realized she’d had the answer all along.

“I remember!”

The cry tore from her lips as she sat bolt upright in bed, panting. Her nightgown was soaked in sweat. Strands of hair clung to her face. Through the window of her room, the first light of dawn brushed the heavens over Noryk.

She covered her mouth with shaking hands. Last night’s wine sloshed in her stomach, making her nauseous, yet certainty gave her strength. Every nerve burned with potential energy. The tragedies of the evening were forgotten in light of the magnificent secret she’d remembered.

“I remember,” she gasped again, ripping aside her bed sheets. “I know.”

Only those who already know the way may find her home.

That barricade had prevented her from seeking the Dragon Empress, but Keriya knew how to reach the Broken Vale. Thorion had shown it to her before he’d died.

But how had Thorion known the way? Keriya’s thoughts whirled as she stripped off her nightgown and yanked on her uniform. They’d been separated after their time in the Naetren Basin, parting ways in their futile search for a darksalm cure. She didn’t know where he had gone before they’d reunited, what he’d done to exorcise the untainted threads of his soul, but . . .

“He had a valestone,” she muttered, seizing Aurelas. “A valestone, filled with valemagic—valemagic, which the Dragon Empress wields. She lives in the Broken Vale, and only those who already know the way can find her home, and I know!”

She sounded manic, unhinged. Forcing herself to stop and compose her thoughts, she drew deep breaths through her nostrils until her heart quieted and her nausea subsided.

“Back straight, chin up,” she muttered. With that, she shot out of her room, racing down the hall of the personal quarters floor.

“Get up,” she cried, stopping to bang on Fletcher’s door. She lunged at Roxanne’s room next, hammering madly. “Fletcher, Roxanne, get up!”

She waited in the carpeted corridor, pacing between her friends’ rooms. Just when she’d approached Fletcher’s room to knock again, his door opened.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, pulling on his shirt and tripping over unlaced boots.

“What’s right, more like,” said Keriya, grinning at his look of bewilderment. Danisan emerged behind him, already dressed, twin silver blades ready in his hands.

“It’s okay,” Keriya assured the elf. “Better than okay!”

“What in the b****y name of Helkryvt is going on?” grumbled Roxanne, yanking open her door. “Necrovar better be attacking the walls again, because if you woke me up this early for—”

“I know how to find the Dragon Empress,” Keriya interrupted.

Roxanne snapped her mouth shut.

“How?” asked Fletcher, his eyes going wide. “I mean, that’s amazing, but—”

“It’s a long story, but before I go, I want to put my affairs in order.” For the first time since she’d woken, Keriya’s confidence faltered. “It’ll be sort of dangerous. The Broken Vale isn’t really . . . on Selaras.”

Roxanne gave her a flat glare. Fletcher looked appalled.

“Please tell me you’re not planning to enter the Etherworld,” he said.

“It isn’t in the Etherworld. But it is in a different dimension—kind of like a parallel universe, but not? It’s hard to explain.”

“I’ll say,” growled Roxanne. “You sure you didn’t drink too much wine and hallucinate all of this?”

“Only one way to find out.” Keriya offered her hands to them. They stared at her dubiously. “I’m not going to the Broken Vale yet. I just need room to work.”

Linking his free arm through Danisan’s, Fletcher grasped her hand. Roxanne sighed and did the same. Embracing her source to find it singing with anticipation, Keriya teleported.

The group arrived in the Smarlands, on a tableland in the eastern Norythian Mountains. Gray light banded the misty horizon. Clouds smeared the sky, obscuring the sunrise.

“Actually, I don’t think any of you can come with me,” said Keriya, moving away from her friends to pace the edge of the tableland. “Based on everything I’ve read, any creature who can’t wield valemagic would die upon entering the Dragon Empress’s domain.”

“That means Khyvette and I could accompany you,” said Fletcher.

Affection swelled in Keriya’s heart even as grief constricted her throat. “No. I need you to stay, in case I don’t return.”

Fletcher’s bemused gaze sharpened behind his glasses. Roxanne’s hands curled into fists. Danisan, famously stoic, blinked.

“Keriya, you can’t be serious,” Fletcher began, but she held up a hand to stop him.

“You’ve always been better than me, Fletch.” She resumed her obsessive pacing, hunting for just the right spot. “If I don’t come home, Selaras will be in your hands.”

“Back up.” Roxanne stomped toward Keriya. “You said this was only sort of dangerous. You made it sound like you knew how to reach it—”

“I do!”

“Then why does it seem like you’re planning your own funeral?”

“Like I said, I’m putting my affairs in order.” Keriya stopped. A tingling in her spine and a whisper in her blood told her this was where she should work. “If I die in the attempt, Selaras is out one Master of Valemagic. So, Fletcher and Khyvette will have to take my place in the war. And Roxanne, you’ll have to finish G’shídrian’s task. It doesn’t matter who frees Valaan, but he must be freed to ensure Allentria is strong when Necrovar returns.”

Fletcher shook his head, aghast. “Keriya . . . we can’t.”

“You can. You’ve come so far. If the Aerians could see us now, they wouldn’t recognize us. Well, maybe they’d recognize me,” she added blithely, “because of the eyes and everything.”

“I still don’t understand.” Fletcher’s voice was no longer horrified. Now it was soothing and soft. “Why do you have to go alone? Why now? How do you know this is the answer?”

“How do you not?” Her words were sharper than intended, but she didn’t want to have this argument. The answer was painfully obvious—so much so that she was kicking herself for not connecting the clues sooner—and it seemed ridiculous that her friends couldn’t see what she saw.

“I’m going alone because I need you to keep Selaras safe. And I’m going now because I’ve already wasted too much time.”

She hesitated in her chosen spot. Then, regretting her harshness, she held out her hands again.

Wordlessly, Fletcher and Roxanne approached. Even Danisan came forward in support, joining the three old friends as Keriya gathered them into an embrace.

“Putting my affairs in order and saying good-bye,” she repeated. “There’s no one I’d rather have taken this journey with. No one.”

Roxanne’s arm tightened around her shoulders. Fletcher leaned back and fixed her with a questioning glare. “What about Viran?”

“What about him?”

“Keriya,” he began in a warning tone.

“Let’s not talk about him.” She shook herself free of the group hug, which suddenly felt stifling. “I’m one thread away from unraveling as it is.”

“Oh, for Shivnath’s sake,” groaned Roxanne. “Is that what this is about? You and Viran had a fight, and your solution is to run away to a different tronking universe?”

“We did not have a fight. We had a discussion, like adults.”

Roxanne snorted. “With you involved? I doubt that.”

“You shouldn’t rush into this if you’re upset,” said Fletcher. “Why don’t we talk to the dragons, take some time to plan this properly—”

“The dragons can’t help, and I’ve spent a year-and-a-half planning this moment.”

Keriya sank deep into her source, delving to the core of her magic. Threads winked into existence. The molecular fabric of the universe became visible, a sparkling rainbow of ultra-fine filaments blanketing the world.

“The time for planning is over.” A heavy sense of duty settled on her. She rolled her shoulders and cracked her neck. “This is the time for action.”

With that, she called upon her ultimate power. For the first time in nineteen months, she dared to wield valemagic.

It was there instantaneously, roaring through her, as if it had hungered for this moment as much as she had. Blood rushed in her ears, pulsing like a war drum. Purple light flooded her friends’ faces, and Fletcher cried out as his own eyes began to glow.

“Keriya—!”

She turned away and faced the empty sky. Raising her hands, she spoke to the universe: “Take me to the Broken Vale!”

A spectral pulse of energy blasted from her. The mountains trembled in awe of her might. She could flatten them if she chose, but she did not choose that. She sharpened her focus, whittling her will to a single, burning wish.

Take me to the Broken Vale.

She concentrated on the vision Thorion had given her, focusing on her impossible destination. The sky shivered, twisting away from her fearsome power, yet drawn to her. The world bent and buckled, spacetime distorting around the gravity of Keriya’s desire.

Distantly, she heard her friends yelling. Something was wrong—it shouldn’t be this difficult. The universe should be obeying, not fighting her. Warm wetness dripped from her nostrils and tickled the sides of her neck. She was hemorrhaging energy, and now blood.

“No,” she whispered. She refused to let this best her. Nordrion had warned her of this: this was entropy in motion. The first symptom of a sickening, imbalanced world.

Keriya’s vision blurred. A maelstrom of magicthreads swirled around her body, gathering at her fingertips.

“This is my birthright.” The words came from a dark place inside her—the place she never dared inspect too closely, knowing she wouldn’t like what she saw. “This is my destiny.”

Finally, the universe saw reason. The threads of reality tore apart. A tangle of purple energy exploded from nothingness, expanding outward, revealing an infinite void. The black portal yawned before her, glowing with arcane power, eclipsing the earth and sky.