Page 4 of Burned Alive to Be His
I give Grakar one last look of contempt before turning my back on him. A calculated insult. I can feel his glare burning into my spine. Let him look. He knows who is stronger.
I follow Vorlag away from the training circle, toward the mouth of the Great Cavern where he holds his council. The settlement is a collection of caves and crude shelters carved into the base of Bloodstorm Peak, the air thick with the constant tang of sulfur.
“His ambition will be a problem,” Vorlag says, not looking at me. His eyes are on the horizon, where the vast, grey ocean meets the ash-colored sky.
“He is a pup who barks too loudly,” I reply. “I will silence him if he becomes a threat.”
“A threat to you, or a threat to the clan?” Vorlag asks, his eyes finally meeting mine. They are old eyes, filled with a weariness that irritates me.
“They are the same thing.”
A faint smile touches his lips. “Perhaps. But his words find fertile ground. The clan is restless. The fall of the glamour has left us exposed. We have seen three ships in as many weeks, skirting our shores. They do not see us yet, but they will. The world is coming, Xvitar. And we are dying.”
The words hang in the hot air, an ugly, undeniable truth. Our females are few, their births even fewer. We are a proud, powerful race, withering on the vine. The thought coils in my gut like a serpent.
“We are not dying,” I say, voice a low growl. “We are waiting. We should be raiding those ships, taking their resources, reminding the world that this is our island, our sea.”
“And what then?” Vorlag asks patiently. “We provoke a war we cannot win? We have less than a hundred warriors, Xvitar. Our strength is not in numbers. It is in our blood. In our future. The future that lies sleeping beneath this very mountain.” He taps a clawed finger on the volcanic rock at his feet. “The eggs. The Hearthkeeper’s promise.”
I scoff, unable to help myself. “A promise that requires us to mate withhumans? The weakest, most pathetic creatures on this miserable planet? It is a fool’s hope, Eldest. A legend to soothe frightened children.”
“It is the only hope we have,” he says, his voice firm. “The prophecies are clear. The glamour would fall, and the sea woulddeliver the first key. A mate of the lesser races, with a heart strong enough to withstand our fire. Her union with one of us will be the spark that awakens the first egg.”
I stare out at the sea, my jaw tight. The sea delivers nothing but salt and death. I have seen the wreckage of ships that stray too close, their splintered wood and torn sails a testament to the ocean’s power. I have seen the bloated bodies of their crews washed up on our shores. Weak. All of them.
“I will not pin the survival of our race on a human,” I state, my voice leaving no room for argument. “We will survive as we always have. Through strength. Through will.”
Vorlag sighs, a sound like stones grinding together. “Your will is a formidable thing, Xvitar. But it cannot create life. Go. Patrol the eastern shore. Your temper is as hot as the mountain’s heart today. Cool it in the sea spray.”
He dismisses me with a wave of his hand. I clench my fists, the obsidian scales on my forearms scraping together. I want to argue, to rage, but he is the Eldest. His word is law, even if his mind is addled with age and prophecy.
I turn and walk away, my strides long and angry. I move through the settlement, the familiar sights doing little to soothe the fire in my gut. I see one of the females, Phina, preening by the entrance to her cavern. She is beautiful, in the sharp, cruel way of our kind, and she has made it clear she would welcome my claim. But the thought of mating with her, of the endless political maneuvering and the cloying pride, leaves me cold.
I see the young males, their horns barely budded, watching me with a mixture of fear and awe. They are the future Vorlag speaks of, a future that feels as thin and brittle as cooled lava. They need a leader who will show them strength, not one who will ask them to put their faith in a lesser being.
My path takes me past my own cavern. The entrance is a dark slash in the rock, the interior filled with my hoard. Glitteringsea glass, the iridescent shells of deep-sea creatures, strange metallic ores that pulse with a faint inner light. I have a dragon’s heart. I see value, I see beauty, and I take it. It is the nature of things. The strong possess, and the weak are possessed. A human would be no different. A pet. A trinket. Not a savior.
The thought is so repulsive I quicken my pace, leaving the settlement behind. I follow the winding path down to the eastern shore, the air growing thick with the smell of salt and brine. The black sand is hot under my boots. The sea is a churning mass of grey, its waves crashing against the jagged volcanic rocks that line the coast.
I stand on a high promontory, the wind whipping my long, dark hair around my face. Vorlag is right about one thing. The air feels different. The magic of the island, once a closed, humming circuit, now feels frayed, open to the world. It sets my teeth on edge.
My eyes scan the horizon. Nothing. Just the endless, churning expanse of water. I let the sea spray cool my skin, the roar of the waves a soothing balm to my frayed temper. I will not let Vorlag’s talk of doom and prophecy weaken my resolve. We are dragons. We were born of the Hearthkeeper’s fire and the Warrior’s will. We do not beg for salvation. We forge it.
As I turn to begin my patrol along the beach, a new scent hits me, carried on the wind. It cuts through the salt and the sulfur, sharp and unfamiliar. Blood, yes. But not the blood of any creature I know. And beneath it, the scent of splintered wood and wet sailcloth.
Wreckage.
My instincts sharpen, my senses reaching out. I leap from the promontory, landing silently on the black sand below, and begin to move down the beach, my eyes scanning the tide line.
It doesn’t take long to find the source. A large, curved piece of a ship’s hull is half-buried in the sand, its wood dark andwaterlogged. Other debris is scattered around it—a broken mast, a tattered piece of sailcloth, a splintered crate. The scent of death is heavy in the air, but it is old. Days old. The sea has already claimed its dead.
I kick at the hull with my boot. A trade ship, by the looks of it. From one of the dark elf cities on the mainland, most likely. Another fool who strayed too close to our shores and was devoured by the storms that guard our island. It is nothing.
I am about to turn away when another scent drifts to me. Faint, almost lost beneath the stench of rot and brine. It is not the smell of death. It is the smell of life. Faint, but persistent. And it is… human.
My head snaps up, my eyes scanning the chaotic jumble of wreckage further down the beach. A predator’s curiosity, sharp and sudden, grips me. It is impossible. Nothing survives the storms. Nothing survives the sea.
But the scent is there. Warm blood and living flesh. Hiding.
