Page 268 of Hunters and Prey

They’d said the “Dragon” entity was fragmented, that pieces of him might be scattered in other worlds, in different forms… which might explain my random-seeming jumps. They said that might explain why I ended up in the places I did.

Focusing on that, I looked for him.

Not for Black himself, not necessarily.

I looked for resonances with him instead, with that seething, churning, grinding, relentless dark light that lived under his feet, that hyper-strong energy of his that made me think of molten lava, of endless stars in infinite night, of the ever-morphing power of a bottomless ocean. I remembered that fire I heard in his voice, that nearly terrifying darkness that could envelope him when he flexed those larger parts of himself.

I remembered the wings he’d unfolded inside that cave on the island of Koh Mangaan.

I remembered how he seemed to command the Earth itself, to bend it to his will.

I’d seen those wings on him again after that, more than once.

Slowly, that feeling emerged out of the dark.

I felt it surround me, growing visible as vibrating, dark-green, purple and vibrant blue strands of living light. Those strands grew brighter as I watched, infused with orange, red and yellow, like a jungle vine wrapped in living fire.

I tried to find a being to go with it.

I looked for its face.

The feeling grew stronger, more intense as it resonated with my light. I felt that light recognize mine. I felt some part of that light reach out for me, craving something in me, just like I craved that dark power in Black.

He was here.

Not Black––Dragon.

Dragon was here.

Some part of him was here, at least.

Connecting those higher structures of mine with that resonance, I tried to find it.

I couldn’t get a face, but I got a whisper of presence, a feeling of his face on this world. He didn’t feel like Black. He felt completely different from Black, but that resonance connected the two of them. It connected this stranger with me, winding into my light like an animal trying to slake its thirst.

He was here.

If he was here, then maybe the Council was right.

Maybe Dragon existed in some form everywhere I traveled. Maybe that was the link between all of these places. Maybe Dragon was the link… I was the link.

If so, maybe I could travel between those places, following him.

Maybe I could use Dragon to pull me to each one of them.

Thinking about that, still holding onto that dark, churning presence, I focused on those higher structures of my light, the ones I’d felt the Council messing with during the ritual.

I focused on them, examining my own light in a way I never had before, certainly not that high up. As soon as I did, I saw a handful of complicated, web-like structures highlighted in the space above my head. They were glowing. As I studied them, I realized they were glowing from recent use. They were glowing because I’d just used them.

I’d used them to come here.

Looking at them again, I stared, sightless, into the dark.

I felt those structures resonate with that night, with the enveloping dark of Dragon. I saw the different threads winding the two resonances together, almost like strands of DNA. I watched them interact, and I couldn’t understand any of it.

I couldn’t comprehend what it meant, not with my conscious mind, but I felt the rightness of it. That rightness was almost organic, like knowing how to breathe, or how to flex my arm… how to make a fist, how to scream, how to smile.

I felt Black there.

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