Page 44 of The Dragonrider and the Void
“And you’re, what, two-hundred-and-twenty pounds?” Ezra suggested.
Venrick scoffed, “With armor on. I’m only one-ninety-five.”
“Exactly my point. Hardin’s dragon is young, but she’s still over six-hundred pounds. He shouldn’t have been able to manage it with the level of magical manipulation that I’ve seen, although Hardin’s abilities with manipulating wards have gotten exponentially better since he formed the dragon bond with her.”
“With her,” Lark repeated, imagining what it’s been like for Hardin to be navigating their newly formed connection.
“Aye, Quinthara,” he said. “We started calling her Quin for short. But,” he shook his head, “their disappearance isn’t all. We’ve received reports of a new dragonrider ambushing a Lamar heavy force trying to claim Yogo Sapphires from a firestorm near Stormwatch. This new rider seized all the Yogos and fled. Neither Lamar nor Nordraven is claiming it was their rider. The Kings are accusing Gambria, but all accounts we’ve gathered suggest a human dragonrider.”
“A new rider?” Venrick’s brow furrowed in skepticism. “Besides Hardin and Quinthara?”
“We thought it could be true at first, as not all the Hyalites collected in recent history have been tapped into. Rumors of a new dragonrider in Wintermire have been circulating,” Ezra said. “But the description both Vermillion Keep troops and Storm Keep troops gave matches Hardin and Quin’s appearance. The witnesses claim the rider ‘bent’ their wards like they weren’t even there. I should’ve known he was going to try and return to Doran.”
“Hardin’s gone back to break the curse he originally set out to stop,” Venrick said.
“Why didn’t he wait until we’d returned? We could’ve helped him?” Lark said.
“He was going stir crazy being left behind in camp with me and several elves to help with his training. But without dragons, none of us can risk leaving the camp to chase him down. There’s more Knights and Paragons patrolling the forest borders than ever. Once we found out he was gone, there wasn’t much else we could do. I just hope he wasn’t captured.” Ezra shook his head, then gestured for them to follow. “Cheyanne wants to speak with you immediately.”
As they moved through the camp, Lark noted the level of concern circulating in the atmosphere. The soldiers moved like they’d just received new orders, checking their weapons, packing supplies, as if preparing for imminent action. White Eye followed Lark, gaining attention from the bustling rebels as his massive head swung from side to side, tasting the air for threats. Lark suddenly became aware that Ingamar was likely the only other dragon here. A shiver ran through her at the idea of what the two male dragons might do to one another when they met. The two dragons had fought on opposite sides in the battle forcontrol of the Everburning Forest during Lark’s earlier career as Nordraven’s most formidable dragonrider.
Please keep your anger in,she thought toward him.
He responded with a sense of calm, assuring her that he wouldn’t attack unless Ingamar made him defend himself.
Ezra steered them into a centrally located tent. When he pulled back the flap to enter, they found Cheyanne, bent over a table strewn with maps and unrolled scrolls. Her silver-white hair was pulled back in a severe braid that wove down the center of her head stopping in the middle of her back. When she looked up, her elven features hardened at the sight of Lark. For a moment, old suspicions flickered in her eyes before settling into grudging acknowledgment.
“You’ve returned,” she said, straightening. “With information, I hope.”
Lark stepped forward. “More than just information. We know what the rimeshade are working toward, and what they’ve been doing with their stores of harvested magic.”
Cheyanne’s eyebrows rose slightly. “Then perhaps this journey of yours wasn’t a complete waste after all.” She glanced at Yarla, her expression softening. “You look better. The corruption has receded?”
“Somewhat,” Yarla replied. “Enough for me to be useful.”
Ezra closed the tent flap behind them, sealing them in with a sense of secrecy that made the air feel suddenly thicker. White Eye remained outside, but Lark felt his consciousness pressing against hers, monitoring the conversation through her.
“Tell me everything,” Cheyanne said, clearing a space at the table.
“We now know that the rimeshade’s magical surplus was in part going toward freeing the Entity White Eye alerted us to at the hidden sanctuary. It’s how they were able to destabilize the wards to the point of unraveling. We tried stopping it, butnow that it’s free, we believe the Entity is planning something bigger.” Lark removed the dragon-scale-bound book from her pack, placing it carefully on the map. “We found this at the dragonrider sanctuary.”
Venrick stepped up beside her. “Yarla and Lark determined that the Entity that escaped was previously imprisoned there for centuries. This creature is the being who brought the rimeshade into existence. This text refers to the Entity as the Void Drinker and was bound to its prison by the original twelve dragons of Sataran.”
Cheyanne’s expression remained guarded, though her pointed ears wiggled slightly at the information. Lark could see the spark of interest in her eyes as she said, “Go on.”
“The object it stole,” Lark said.
“The Realmstone,” Cheyanne corrected.
“The Realmstone,” Lark continued. “Is an artifact that somehow helped seal the Void Drinker away. It seems that this ancient artifact can also be used to weaken the barriers between realms.”
“Weaken them how?” Ezra asked, scratching the scars on his tattooed head.
Yarla moved forward, placing her hand on the metal pages of the book. “The Flashover is approaching, a time when the barriers between all realms will already be naturally thin. With the Realmstone, this Void Drinker could tear them down completely.”
“Do we know why it would want to do that?” Cheyanne’s voice slipped, losing its edge, now tinged with genuine concern.
“To open our world up to the gates of damnation,” Ezra growled.
