Page 32 of Thief of Dreams
"The other princesses are merely distraction." She draws another knife. "I'm not here for them. Nor am I here for you. If you get out of my way, I won't kill you."
"You're here for Keir." He'd said he thought someone had twisted the Other World to their magic, but this makes no sense. "You plan to kill him? Why?"
"Because I need to eat his heart."
Of all the things I expected her to say.... "Old lover? Killed your father? Owes your people a debt he won't repay?"
"This is not revenge," she croons, caressing the knife in her hand.
I step back, watching it carefully. "I thought you didn't have a taste for meat." She's picked at every meal here, eating only that which comes from the ground or the forest.
"This is not about flesh."
With each step closer, Calliope's eyes seem just a little more inhuman. I once thought them akin to an eagle's eyes, but now I'm not so sure. I've seen that amber glow before, as if something primordial looks back at me. Every instinct I own is telling me to flee, but I can't help thinking of the prince.
"The blood of ancient queens runs through my veins," Calliope croons. "I can feel it waking in me, but I'm not strong enough. Not yet. I can't access the reservoir of power within me. I can't Awaken. I need his heart to bloom."
"Easy now, caterpillar. Eating a fae heart is only going to give you indigestion. Especially this one."
If not a fatal sword in the guts. She's trying to bite off more than she can chew.
"Haven't you realized what you're dabbling with yet?" she sneers. "You think the prince is fae?"
"What doyouthink he is?"
"I think he's a myth. I think he's masked himself very carefully over the years so no one suspects the truth. He's the key to my transformation. The power in his heart will Awaken me."
Oh, shit. Someone's been eating the fuzzy mushrooms. "You're not making any sense."
"Why don't you ask him what happened to the dragons? I've spent years tracking down old stories. They say they slumber. They say they turned to stone. All that power, and Queen Mab brought them to their knees. Have you never wondered how?"
"Not... really." If I can keep her talking, then hopefully Keir or Soraya will find me.
"Queen Mab went to the King of the Dragons and proposed a truce between their peoples, forged with a marriage. There was a child," she whispers, "born of both races."
I've never heard this story.
"A daughter who held the power of the stars in her blood, though the dragon was trapped within her. Her father beheld what she was to become and called her abomination, but the Princess Igrainne turned all of that immense power upon him and he fell. Together, she and Mab cut his heart from his chest, and the princess consumed it. With his power combined with her own, she finally had the ability to become what she was meant to be.
"More powerful than a dragon. Fierce and furious and hungry. One heart was not enough. She became afflicted with the need to consume more, and when the dragon race tried to take revenge for their fallen leader, she became their worst nightmare."
"I've never heard of Princess Igrainne."
"You wouldn't," Calliope says bitterly. "The dragons turned to the gods to forge the Cauldron and use it against her. They trapped her in her mortal form, draining the power she'd stolen and filling the Cauldron with it. Igrainne had to flee, a mere shadow of herself. In return, the dragons were forced to honor their pact with the gods. They could no longer walk the world as primordial beings. They had to give up most of their power so it would not lure the princess from the shadows, for she hungered still. Until she drew her last breath, she would always crave a return to power. And then they buried all talk of her name. They choked her in nothingness and killed those who knew the story. Her memory is lost to the world, but her legacy lives on in the line of children she birthed. In me. I've felt it whispering through my veins ever since I was born."
And now she thinks consuming Prince Keir's heart will somehow transform her.
"Dragons don't exist anymore," I say. "They sleep." It's a lovely story, but if it were true, wouldn't I have heard it? No matter how hard you try, you cannot completely bury a rumor. There'd have been some mention of this Princess Igrainne in the history books.
"They don't all sleep," she hisses. "My mother told me that story at her knee. Every night, she would remind me of who I was, and what I was to become. The Cauldron—"
"The Cauldron was a gift from the Goddess."
"You lie!" Calliope lashes out with her blade, and I leap back as it cuts through the air where my abdomen was two seconds ago.
We stare at each other.
So this is the way it's to be.
