Page 10 of Swift Wings Shadowed Heart
I’d like to breathe a sigh of relief, but I fear it would be premature. The one thing we know with certainty is that only eleven candidates will be chosen. There are two dragons per elemental gift available, except for Skybolts. There’s only one of those. There are still more than that left here. They need to weed more of us out. But how?
Closing my eyes, I force my breaths to slow. Carefully, I reinforce the barriers I’ve placed against my heightened wind ability. It’s harder than normal to keep it in check, but nothing I can’t handle. Control over our elemental gifts is innate, something we know how to do by instinct. It wouldn’t bode well to have toddlers running around setting things on fire or blowing their father’s important documents off their desks. In fact, it’s this inherent ability which helped me suppress my Weaver gift completely after Neutro Cindergrasp failed to butcher me.
I hid those psychic gifts so deeply that all further tests by other Neutros were unable to detect them. Not only that, after theinevitabletragedy—as they dubbed it—they gave Cindergrasp a pat on the back for a job well done. Never mind the pain he caused my family.
In truth, I hid it all so deeply that I fancied myself cured.
Those gifts are the reason my mother died. They’re supposed to be locked away. Gone. Yet… they’re still here.
I open my eyes, refusing to examine my dual skill closer, even though this place awakened it with such ease. I hate that side of me and will not acknowledge it. Not today. Not ever again.
Besides, the voices are gone, the damn gift clamped shut, exactly where it needs to be.
“Primes,” the Commanders says—one word carrying an implicit order.
The Primes step forward. With practiced motions, their hands weave through the air, and in an instant, the chamber goes eerily still. More than that, the force exacerbating our powers goes away. We all take a collective sigh of relief.
“For the next stage,” the Commander says, “form lines based on your gifts. Notice the emblems on the floor and queue up accordingly.” She points toward the back of the chamber. “What are you waiting for?” she demands when no one moves.
We all jump to attention and shuffle toward the back. Phoebe’s ahead of me and peruses the markers on the floor, craning her neck around the other candidates until she spots the right one. She stands in front of a carved tile etched with a compass rose in the middle and gusts of winds whipping around it. I stand behind her, peering at the emblem that represents Skysingers. The legend underneath readsOur Songs Shape the Storm.
I glance at the tiles to our left and right. The candidates who queue behind them are fire and metal elementals. Their emblems have a flame and a sword, respectively. The first motto reads:Our Will Forges the Flame. And the second:Our Will Bends the Iron.
On the far left, I notice an indent in the floor, an empty space where I imagine the Weavers’ emblem used to lie before they were declared enemies of Embernia. My mouth goes dry at the thought. I wonder what their motto used to be. I shake my head.
My gift is wind. I have no other.
When I look up, I find Vaylen Stormsong looking at me, his blue gaze piercing, inquisitive. He noticed my reaction. I straighten my back and don my usual aloof armor, reassuring myself that all he saw was the natural nerves that any candidate would display. There’s no way he can fathom the real reason for my trepidation.
Once we’re all lined up behind our respective tiles, the Commander says, “Now, you will follow your Primes and may the best and true elementals be chosen.”
True elementals? What does that mean? New thoughts and nerves threaten to overwhelm me, but I prevail over them by digging my fingernails into the palms of my hands.
Behind High Prime Vaylen Stormsong, a section of wall retreats with the grinding sound of stone. Without a word, he turns and enters a narrow tunnel, which is illuminated by an ethereal glow from above. We follow, Phoebe leading the way with five other candidates behind me. After a five-minute walk, the High Prime stops.
“One at a time from this point on,” he says, then meets Phoebe’s gaze. “Follow me, Singer.”
They disappear down the long tunnel, leaving the rest of us standing there.
“Fuck, this is nerve-wracking,” Gilbert Drifttown says behind me.
“You aren’t kidding.” I press my back to the wall and slump against it, closing my eyes.
Several minutes pass without another word, only our agitated breaths fill the space. At last, High Prime Stormsong returns, his face cast in sharp angles by the dim light. Phoebe isn’t with him. Was she chosen? I find myself hoping she was. We could become friends during our final training.
“You’re next, Singer,” he tells me. “Follow me.”
I do as he says. Several paces ahead, he pushes a heavy metal door open and leads me into a third chamber, this one smaller than the previous two. He walks farther in and faces me, framed by two torches affixed to the wall behind him. As my eyes adjust, I try to discern what’s behind him. When I do, I gasp.
It’sThe Cradle, yet another important symbol, one that graces Embernia’s flag. Except it’s not just a symbol. It’s really here.
I exhale in awe.
“Sevendragon eggs, the Scions, rest in The Cradle,” High Prime Stormsong says. “One for each elemental power granted to us by our Goddess Heratrix. Behold our hope, our legacy.” He steps aside with a sweeping gesture toward the large eggs ensconced in a cradle made of black marble, veined with shimmering gold.
Seven. Not six. Why?!
They rest in a concave depression that leaves the large eggs half exposed. Their surfaces are a tapestry of ivory-colored scales, intricately veined with gold and copper. The rough, textured shells hint at the creatures slumbering within, forever unhatched without Heratrix to tend to them. She is the mother of all Embernia’s dragons, a mate to all the males. With her gone—vanished from the land without a trace or hint as to what happened—no new dragons have been born in centuries. With her gone, their numbers, already dwindling, will only continue to decline.
