Destruction's Ascent, page 24
part #3 of Dragon Ridden Chronicles Series
Tate felt like she'd failed her partner by not caring about what she'd lost. It made her feel small and selfish. It made her realize there were times she treated Ilith like an appendage. There, but not really appreciated.
She'd have to do better once this was over. Maybe she’d start by asking about Ilith's world.
"What does it mean?" Tate asked, putting her shortcomings aside for the moment. They needed to focus on understanding what was happening. "And why are you acting like this is the end of the world?"
"This was taken from Jaxon Kuno's personal records," Ryu said after a long moment of silence. "As far as we can tell, he used it to create the rift as we know it today."
"And what exactly is this rift? You've mentioned it several times now." She had an inkling but needed confirmation before she made any assumptions.
"That is a heavily guarded secret," Thora said in a resigned voice.
Tate's eyebrows lifted. "I think we're a little past that, aren't we? Once the Order learns that a bunch of uncontrollable dragons are running around—ones with no affiliations to you and the emperor, they'll have all the proof they need to force you out of power."
Tate was aware of the irony in that statement since she too was an unaffiliated dragon, one not created in the traditional matter.
A thought occurred to her and she looked down at the table. Perhaps she was the reason this was happening now. They could have gotten the idea for this little experiment from her appearance.
"She has a point," Ryu said.
Thora's sigh was heavy. "I know." His jaw ticked. "The rift is where the dragon half of us is born. It is always without notice. Every so often a dragon's essence rises from it. They will die or go back through the rift if left alone. When it looks like one is here to stay, we allow initiates to attempt to bond with them."
Enslave, Ilith hissed, the word containing a thread of anger and hatred Tate had never experienced in her partner before.
What do you mean? Tate sent at her dragon.
Ilith didn't answer, whether that was because she didn't hear or because she didn't want to, Tate didn't know.
"So, you think whoever is doing this took Jaxon's original work, and what? Duplicated it?" Tate asked.
"More like made it better," Ryu said. "This drawing is incomplete, probably on purpose. They wouldn't have been able to replicate what he'd done. They might have used it as a starting point but if there are as many bondings occurring as you think, in that short a time span, it would be more efficient than our rift."
Tate stared down at the table, trying to think through everything. There was a lot here that didn't make sense. Christopher's reasoning behind showing her the portrait, how they figured out a way to open a new rift, why they targeted children, what they needed the dragon-ridden man for. Why, why, why?
Why had they taken Jack? Was it because of his connection with her? She didn't see how. They'd only met once.
Night pawed at her leg. Tell them the last part.
Tate had hoped to forget that part. It sounded crazy, and she had no way of proving it was true.
Tate. Night yowled at her plaintively.
The sound drew the other three's attention.
"What is it?" Ryu asked, his gaze expectant.
She dropped her head. "You could have just told them yourself."
Night gave her a calm look. It sounds better coming from you.
Her sigh was aggravated. She met the others’ expectant gazes with a wary one of her own. "There's one last thing." She bit her lip, still unsure. Ah, well, if they thought it fanciful or her crazy, it wouldn't affect things too much. "I think the people doing this might be responsible for the earthquakes."
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
THERE WAS A long moment of silence after her outlandish statement.
She spoke fast, needing to get the words out before she was shouted down. "Jack—the boy I've been looking for—said that every time they take a boy from the cells for a second time, there's an earthquake shortly after."
Blaise let out a small laugh. A reaction Tate had been expecting. It was why she hadn't mentioned anything before.
What was unexpected was the thought both Ryu and Thora were giving to her words. Both men stared off into the distance as if they were actually considering her wild claim.
Blaise's laugh died, and he gave the two an incredulous look. "You can't be serious. Are you actually considering this?"
"There's precedent," Thora said flatly.
"What are you talking about?" Blaise asked.
Ryu and Thora shared a glance.
"Montara." Ryu sounded like he was announcing the end of the world. He said that name like it had a wealth of meaning, and none of it good.
"That's a myth," Blaise argued.
"It's not," Thora said. "There are eyewitness accounts. One of them is mine."
"What is Montara?" Tate asked, feeling like she'd missed something critical.
"It was a city," Ryu said, leaning forward and resting his forearms against the desk. "One of the jewels of the second Silvain dynasty, when much of this continent was still under their rule."
"I take it that place no longer exists," Tate said.
"You'd be correct," Thora answered. "It was destroyed in a single hour."
Tate gaped at him. What could destroy a city full of thousands of people in just an hour? What sort of horrible thing was capable of such large-scale devastation?
"The creators didn't just fiddle with living creatures. They also made large, destructive weapons and hid them underground, under the very tunnels they called home. When the weapons rise from beneath, they destroy everything above. Montara was the site of one such occurrence. No one in the city at the time of its rising survived. They were buried, along with anything that might have explained what happened." Thora recited his tale with a distant voice, as if he needed to separate himself from the horror of remembered events.
"What happened to the weapon?" Tate asked.
The look he gave her was dark. "We happened. A dozen dragon-ridden attacked that thing, raining our pain and grief down on it. When it was over, the shining jewel of that time and all the area surrounding it had been razed to the ground. Evidence of the architect of its destruction was buried and forgotten, so that others might not repeat those mistakes."
The room was very quiet after Thora finished speaking, each consumed by thoughts of what that could mean for Aurelia, if the same thing should happen.
"What makes you think that's the case here?" Tate asked.
"The earthquakes," Ryu said. "There were numerous reports in the month leading up to the tragedy at Montara. We always attributed that to coincidence before."
"I thought the tunnels under Aurelia were said to have belonged to the Saviors," Tate said. At the very least, Ai's presence suggested as much.
"That is the common assumption," Thora said. "But they made a habit of re-purposing the Creators’ original dwellings during the era of the First Wars. It could very well be that the Creators left something behind."
Tate rubbed her forehead, none of this giving her a good feeling. As if there wasn't enough pressure trying to save the few she could. Now, they had to worry about the fate of the entire city. Thousands of lives.
Tate had never considered herself particularly caring. Most of the people in Aurelia were strangers. Of those, a good number of them irritated the hell out of her. She found them small-minded and petty. Especially the nobles and Order.
Still, this was the city her friends called home, and there were enough of them that she didn't think she could get them all to safety in time. That was to say nothing of the potential in the rest of the city—people who might have qualities similar to those she cared about. People who would be worth saving.
"How are we supposed to get down there to stop this when our only path has stopped working?" Tate voiced the question on all their minds.
"I'm not saying I believe this," Blaise said. "But if I did, how did you get down there in the first place?"
Night and Tate traded a look. "Through a mirror."
Blaise voice was flat as he repeated her words. "A mirror."
Tate nodded and pointed. "Like the one over there."
They all looked at the shrouded object in question. Someone had thrown a blanket over it since Tate had last seen it. The mirror lurked in the corner, a great hulking disaster waiting to happen.
"Can't we go back through the mirror you used?" Blaise asked.
Tate shook her head. "It's stopped working."
"Convenient."
She nodded. "I thought so as well."
"We're not acting on that line of thought," Thora said in an autocratic voice. "All you have is speculation, not proof. You'll keep away from the temple guardians until this matter has been resolved."
"It'll just keep coming back up until you find the real culprits," Tate said. "What's to stop them from trying again, if you don't stamp out what they’ve started?"
She understood his resistance given the power the guardians wielded, but it all would be meaningless if Aurelia fell, sinking into the earth until it was mostly forgotten like Montara.
"That subject is closed," Thora said with a warning glint.
Tate rocked back, her mouth screwed up in dissatisfaction.
Thora pinched his nose. "It's getting late. There's not much more we can do tonight, and you're exhausted. Let's break here and we can resume in the morning."
Tate parted her mouth to argue. There was no way she was would manage to sleep after these revelations, while knowing Jack and the others were still down there. She'd rest when she was dead.
Ryu sent a warning look her way. "He's right. When is the last time you slept?"
Her mouth snapped shut and she gave him a mutinous stare, even as she considered his words. She wasn't sure. Time in the tunnels tended to blur together. It had been a long while if the fatigue pulling at her thoughts was any indication. Adrenaline only went so far, and hers was wearing off.
Rather than admit any of that, she went on the attack. "I'm fine."
"You're not," Ryu returned. "You're young and your dragon is still drawing heavily on your reserves. You need adequate sleep and food to maintain the bond. Neither of which, it looks like you've gotten in the last twenty-four hours."
His gaze softened when she remained stubborn. "You should rest now so you have the energy you need when it counts."
Tate couldn't argue with logic like that. A glance at Night told her he wasn't much better off than she, his eyes half-slits as he fought sleep.
"Fine, you win. We'll do it your way."
To their credit, Ryu and Thora didn't let any smugness show at having won the little skirmish. Now that she'd given in, she could feel just how tired she was, exhaustion sucking at her. It had been a rough day, and Tate wasn't even sure when she had last eaten. Much as it galled her, the two of them were right. She'd be no good to the children if she showed up but was unable to get them out because she'd collapsed after reaching the end of her rope.
“I’ll show you to your room.” Reading the surprise on Tate’s face, he arched one eyebrow. “You didn’t think we were going to let you go wandering around the city, did you? No, you’re under our care until this is solved.”
“You already admitted that you know I wasn’t lying,” Tate said.
He grimaced as he gave her a quelling look. “Don’t think you fool me, Tate. We both know as soon as you’re out that door you’ll go straight back to the temple. This way we can at least be assured you’re actually getting the rest you need instead of running headfirst into danger.”
Tate glared at him, her eyebrows drawing together as she gave him a disgusted look. Sometimes, it really pissed her off that he knew her as well as he did—especially when she couldn’t say the same about him.
With a sigh, she stood, pausing when Night remained. “You coming?”
He rolled onto his side and stretched his neck out before shutting his eyes. I’m fine here.
She gave him a sour look at his abandonment before trailing after Ryu. He led her down one hall after another, up a curved staircase and through a sitting area before entering a long hallway. Throughout it all, Tate trailed him by several feet, taking in their surroundings through tired eyes.
“Are you going to stay back there the entire time?” Ryu finally asked.
“Is it bothering you?” Tate asked.
He let a harsh exhale. “Yes.”
“Too bad.” Tate couldn’t find it in herself to care. She’d gotten caught up earlier in her relief that Thora and Ryu believed her wild story, but now she remembered why she’d gone down there alone in the first place. Because Thora said ‘jump’ and Ryu asked ‘how high’.
“You’re acting like a child,” he said, his voice harsh as he came to a stop and turned to face her.
Tate shrugged, keeping her face blank. She might pretend she didn’t care, but she did. When he’d shut her out, treated her like he would have when she was just one of Jost’s crew, it had hurt. It reminded her that though she might be dragon-ridden, she wasn’t one of them. Not really. She was just the stray they’d picked up and been forced to keep.
“What exactly is it you want from me?” Ryu asked with exasperation. “At times, it almost seems like you care—about our kind, about me—but then you head off by yourself and take stupid risks.”
Stung, Tate defended herself. “I had no choice. You and his grumpiness decided those children weren’t worth taking a risk for, that their safety wasn’t worth upsetting the guardians over. I did what had to be done.”
“You took the easy route,” Ryu barked. “Had you waited or even shown a little bit of faith, you would have known there was a plan. A way to get what we wanted without putting everyone in jeopardy. You were stupid and selfish, showing little consideration for anyone but yourself.”
Tate’s chest heaved, and it was a struggle to speak without shouting. “I didn’t know any of that, now did I? You talk about faith, but it’s you who doesn’t trust me. Instead of dismissing me with a pat on the head, you could have said something about this great plan. You left me knowing nothing, and not just about this.”
Things she had kept buried were starting to raise their ugly little heads. She touched Ilith’s back with a gentle caress. “Do you know I thought I was crazy when she moved for the first time? Every day I questioned my sanity, wondering if that was the day I was going to lose it completely, when I’d disappear into the abyss, never to return. If maybe there was a reason I couldn’t remember anything, and that reason was me. Do you know what that’s like?”
Ryu’s gaze shuttered as his jaw popped from how hard he was grinding his teeth. “Trust has to be earned.”
She gave him a twisted smile. “Yes. It does.”
He flinched. It was a small movement, and she would have missed it not too long ago. That she saw it now was cold comfort.
They spent a long moment in silence, Ryu’s face guarded and his jaw tight from suppressed emotion as he stared back at her. When she couldn’t bear it anymore, she cleared her throat and said, “Are you going to finish showing me to my room or am I expected to find it myself?”
He watched her for a long moment, his gaze intent. Then he reached over, grabbed a knob and threw the door open.
She glanced inside at the opulent room, nicer than anything she’d ever stayed in.
“I’ll send food up shortly,” Ryu told her as she walked past him. “Make sure you eat it.”
She didn’t answer or look back as she slammed the door behind her.
*
Her sleep that night was restless and full of nightmares. The comfortable bed and smooth sheets did nothing to alleviate them, and she woke with a feeling of pressure in her sinuses and a mild headache brewing at the back of her head.
The light was barely beginning to stream through the curtains when she crawled out of bed feeling almost worse than when she’d gone to sleep.
The food from last night still sat on the dresser she’d set it on. She paused next to it after she’d dressed, taking the bread and a piece of fruit to nibble on before leaving her room. It wasn’t enough to fill her up, but it would tide her over until she could find more.
She had no doubt Ryu wanted her to stay there until someone was ready to retrieve her, but she couldn’t stay shut away any longer. Not given what they now knew. She wanted to be out there, finding a way back down to the tunnels.
She sighed as she wandered past a wide expanse of windows overlooking the palace with the morning sun just beginning to crest the cliffs. The view drew her as she continued to take small bites of her food, almost hypnotized as she watched the sky turned varying shades of pink, purple and orange—an ever-shifting artist’s palette that would never be duplicated successfully. Not even by the greatest painter who’d ever lived.
“This is one of my favorite views in the city,” Ryu said from behind her.
Tate’s eyes closed. Of course, he would find her. He probably had some invisible person watching her room for signs of activity.
She sighed and went back to watching the sunrise, too tired to resume their argument from the night before.
“You didn’t eat dinner last night,” Ryu observed, noting the food in her hand.
“Don’t,” Tate said.
“Don’t what?”
“Pretend you care.” Just like that, her sinuses felt tight again.
She’d done a lot of thinking last night before sleep had claimed her, and she’d come to a few decisions. One, being that she was tired of this odd dance she and Ryu were doing. She knew some of their issues were her fault—perhaps most of them—but she didn’t care anymore. She just wanted to save Jack and the rest, then go back to avoiding Ryu.
“I never said I didn’t care,” Ryu told her, sounding troubled. “In fact, I probably care too much.”
Tate flicked a look at him. “Why?”
He lifted an eyebrow at her. “Why?”
“Yes, why this interest? We both know I’m difficult, arrogant, argumentative simply for the sake of arguing, and impatient. I’ve seen the women you’ve kept company with. My looks are good enough, but they don’t compare to your normal type.”
