It was deliciously cool, but not so low a temperature to induce shivers. As I waded in, I realized I hadn’t been swimming since… well since I almost drowned myself coming to this world. I missed it. The liquid was so soothing and luxurious as it lapped against me gently, as if nothing in the world could possibly be wrong.
More and more of my stress began to fade, until it felt like I was sifting through a pleasant dream rather than being actually awake. I was weightless, and happy, full of all sorts of warm fuzzies that made me want to sigh in contentment.
I reached the center and my toes just barely brushed the slippery-smooth bottom. Letting myself relax entirely, my body drifted upwards until I was floating effortlessly in the pool.
The Queen was saying something to me, but I couldn’t quite catch the words. It didn’t matter anyway. Everything I needed was here in the water. I could just stay here, forever, without want or need until I finally succumbed to old age.
Then warm, comforting tendrils of water began to gently caress at my back, beckoning me down deeper. I didn’t struggle as they wrapped around my limbs and middle, then began slowly pulling. And, why should I? I couldn’t think of anything nicer e than them surrounding me in the refreshing wellspring for all eternity.
I sighed, and a greenish smoke rolled out of my mouth, filling the air around my body. It took me a moment to absently realize that it was the Dragonfire that I had inhaled so long ago. Had that been in me the entire time? That was certainly interesting.
I giggled slightly as my thoughts supplied a half-wit pun about heartburn, and that was the last sound I made before liquid filled my mouth and I sank below the surface. Some fractured part of my mind knew that this was very much not a good thing, and that I should be fighting drowning, but I didn’t feel all that concerned. I knew I was safe and protected. This water would never harm me.
I reached the bottom, laying still and serene as the water rippled my vision. Above the surface I saw a shadow, then a flash of color and then another, before a clawed foot reached down towards me.
The water rocketed me upward, and when I reached the air I was gently plucked from the liquid and set into the pseudo-grass.
I breathed deeply, calmly, then rolled to my front to see a massive dragon standing beside me.
It was big. Bigger than the Queen even, and several times over at that. It had sparkling, turquoise scales and large black eyes that regarded me with a pleasant sort of curiosity.
“Hello,” I whispered, beginning to feel more like myself and less like a happy hippy on a drug trip.
Greetings child, it answered without answering at all. How was I hearing it? There was no noise, no words that came out of its mouth, and yet I heard what it meant loud and clear. I have been waiting for you to stumble across us.
“You… you’ve been waiting for me?”
Perhaps not in a literal sense. We reside here, whether you seek us or not. But we could not help but notice the shimmering burst of light that has been roaming our bones so freely.
“You’re the great spirit?” I asked, somewhat surprised that this had all been so easy. “The one that opened the mountains for the dragons?”
We are not… one spirit. Not that one either. We are many? Perhaps. We are mostly echoes…weak. Always weak.
“Oh, um…okay then. So, you’re not the spirit then?”
Yes. And no. Who can say what we once were, but merely what we are now.
“And what are you now?”
We are… here.
“Yeah. I got that. That’s not really what I meant.”
Perhaps the question should be why are you here?
“Yeah, I guess that’s a good place to start, then.” The last of the cobwebs cleared from my mind and I felt my task rushing back to me. “Your people are dying, Mr. Dragon, uh, Sir. There are less than a few handfuls of you left and the humans are dedicated to bringing you down. The Queen, Malaika, hoped that maybe I could meet with you and you would have some sort of secret that could save us.”
Secrets? Secrets are cold, biting little rocks of knowledge that burn to the touch. That made about as much sense as a fortune cookie, but I didn’t exactly critique its delivery. We know nothing of secrets. Only of… quiet. So much quiet.
Once we spoke to our children often. We were as numerous as the stars and moved throughout the rocks and boulders, swam through the waters and danced through the ore. But then… we faded. Our children spoke to us less and less, and we grew quiet in their silence.
Now, we are hardly here. Perhaps we are not here at all. It is hard to tell in so many years of sleep.
“So, your power faded as the dragons grew weaker and smaller in number?”
Such a simple deduction for such a complex surrender.
“I know that maybe you haven’t talked to anyone in a few millennia, but you’re not making a whole lot of sense here.”
Then consider that your narrowly defined sense is too confining to discover the answers which you speak.
I let out a grumble. I hadn’t meant to get short with the massive beast that was in front of me, but it was just stringing along words that sounded mildly related to each other rather than anything even mildly understandable.
“How is that even supposed to be helpful? Do you guys really want your first conversation with someone in generations to be more riddle than reason?”
Riddle you say? We know a riddle of a girl from nowhere who saves all of us here. With hair of the night , and dreams of the day, she walks among those who cannot be real and yet are.
“Are… are you talking about me?”
She spits at her own, and strikes down the greedy. With two lives within her, she bows neither way.
“What does that mean? Is that me? Isn’t it?”
Is it?
My eyes rolled so far back I was worried they might get lodged in my skull. “What’s with the answering questions with questions say? Isn’t that passé at a certain point?”
It held out it’s shimmering, perfect hands, black talons easily the size of my entire palm.
Time is not how you perceive, and therein lies the answer. We can show you, should you trust us.
“Trust you? I don’t even know who you are. You haven’t given a solid answer to a question since we’ve met.”
The choice is yours.
“This is ridiculous.” I stared at the offered limb before sighing and placing my hand between the three taloned fingers. As soon as we made contact, I was rushing out of the strange place we were in and across time and space. Everything swirled into nothingness, and then I couldn’t see anything at all. I didn’t have time to panic, or scream, because then I was being dragged back towards a swirling miasma of color…
I arrived in an elaborate room, everything covered with saturated colors of expensive fabrics. A lush bed dominated the center of the room, and I saw a vanity as well as several seats upon which to recline. I had never been here before, and yet it had a vague familiarity to it that tugged at my mind insistently.
I looked around, the dragon that I had just been talking to nowhere to be seen. But what I could discern was my rounded, protruding middle.
“Oh.” I murmured, my voice lilting and echoing like a dream. Was this a dream? Or was this real? I could feel and taste and sense and touch, but there was a halfhearted sort of echoing sigh to everything. Like an afterthought that went on a bit too long before fading into nothingness.
My hands went to either side of my bulging tummy and I marveled at how warm it was. I was naturally a fairly cool person, so feeling my skin so heated to the touch was distinctly mesmerizing. It was there, with my fingers gently exploring, that I felt a responding thump from within me.
I yelped before a giddy sort of laugh escaped my throat. It had kicked! My baby had kicked. I stood there, in utter wonder as the being inside of me stretched and pawed around.
The door opened and I looked to see Gael enter, glowing with a vibrancy that could only come from pure joy. Potential fatherhood seemed to serve him well, from the top of his golden crowned head to the soles of his feet, he radiated confidence and contentment. I found myself echoing his expansive smile before he strode forward and swept me up in one of his spinning hugs.
“Careful! You remember what happened the last time you whirled her too much.”
My eyes widened as Myrik slipped through the door as well, still decked in his dark robes but minus his normally surly expression.
“I know how to treat our mate.”
Wait. “Our” mate? Had I really just heard that?
“You say as much, and yet I distinctly remember her violently vomiting into a chamber pot.”
My stomach churned at the imagery. “Hey, could we not talk about any sort of upchuck right about now? Or ever?”
“Of course!” Gael said, setting me down and pressing a tender kiss to my forehead. “Anything for my queen.”
Then, just as suddenly as it had burst into being, the room snapped out of existence. I was standing in the strange holy place with the turquoise dragon again, breathless. But, before I could ask a question, or even begin to think of which question I wanted to ask, we were spiraling off again.
This time I arrived in a similar room, but in open air, a breeze billowing the azure curtains. But that wasn’t right. All of the dragon kingdom was safely housed within the mountains. The only rushing breezes that came through were channeled through the upper layers of the cave, and they never billowed at all.
A cloying cry ripped through the blissful moment, and I whirled fast enough to give myself whiplash, alarm flooding every bit of my system. Without thinking, I ran over to the source of the appalling sound where I found two babies neatly swaddled in a very old-fashioned crib.
I didn’t need an explanation to know they were mine. They were paler, but their complexions held that tell-tale gold and coral that ran so strongly in my family. One was practically bald, with big blue eyes and cheeks that I wanted to pinch more than anything else in my life, and the other had a thick shock of black hair with eyes that were so similar to mine that it was like looking into a tiny mirror.
Instantly my heart shattered into a thousand pieces, then reassembled itself bigger than ever. My children. My precious children.
I pulled them to my bosom, crying and laughing. If I thought I had felt joy in the previous scene, it was doubled over now. Bubbling, rushing, soaking every inch of me in pure happiness.
What were their names? What were they like? Did they sleep well every night or were they naughty little boys?
“I thought Dwyllverys had you on bedrest.”
My eyes flicked to the door to see Myrik standing there, looking content as his gaze roved over me.
“As if anything could keep her from our sons.” Gael said, pushing past his dark-haired rival.
There was that word again. ‘Our’. Were they saying what I was thinking that they were saying?
“It was your child who was crying,” Myrik answered back. “Its clear dramatics are hereditary.”
“And your son says nothing but watches everything. Obviously, he’s already plotting.”
“Of course, he is. He takes after his father, after all.”
I stood there, a bit in shock from it all. Was this reality? Was whatever this vision was trying to tell me that I was going to bear children to both dragons? I supposed it was possible. Delayed egg release and what not. I had heard of women getting pregnant while they were pregnant, but it had been in some obscure ‘did you know’ article. Those things didn’t happen to real people!
And yet here I was. Standing in a room that wasn’t possible with babies that were possible and filled to the brim with undiluted happiness.
Then, just as before, the world clapped out of existence and I was swirling back to the edge of the pool with the great dragon.
“What was that?” I gasped.
Listen.
I wanted to tell him I was. I wanted to tell him that all I was doing was listening and seeing and I just wanted to know what it was I was envisioning. Was this the future? Was it like the scenes that Perin would play from me? Were these of what could be or what actually would be? Was this if I did everything right?
As usual, there was no answer, and I whirled right back into that same room. Only this time, it wasn’t daytime, with the curtains gently wafting in the breeze. Instead it was night, stars twinkling just beyond the open portals.
A hot and rough tongue laved up my neck, drawing my attention away from the open portals. I realized I was pressed against a warm, bare chest.
“Myrik?” I questioned breathlessly, his hands sliding the straps of my airy dress from my shoulders.
“Yes?” He purred, his voice vibrating through my neck as he continued to nip at me.
“I…”
“What is it, my love?”
My eyes went wide. That was definitely not Myrik’s voice.
Strong, broad hands came from behind me to wrap around my middle, kneading at the skin they found there. Unless the advisor had suddenly grown a second set of limbs, we were not alone.
I craned my neck backwards to see Gael, face flushed and eyes hooded with absolute want.
“Oh…” I murmured, understanding finally dawning on me.
For the briefest of moments, I felt embarrassed. After all, it was a strange dragon spirit on holy ground that was showing me this. Were they watching? Did they think I was disgusting?
Those worries quickly faded from my mind as Gael pulled me back against his form, arching my back so that my breasts were thrust into Myrik’s adept fingers.
My body was almost instantly alight with raw pleasure, burning synapses in my brain in the most wonderful way possible.
Was this what I had always wanted? To be pinned between two perfect specimens of masculinity and at the utter mercy of their desire for me? It was hard not to feel like a goddess, pressed against their sweat-slicked torsos.
I was pulled back further, and I could feel Gael’s straining need against the curve of my bottom while Myrik’s fingers dug into my thighs, parting them so he could move closer.
Razor sharp, his teeth scratched at me while his tongue laved over the wounds later in a coy move at forgiveness. I let my head loll back only to have my golden Prince capture my lips against his own.
My breath was hitching and I could feel sweat beginning to trickle down my forehead, but I didn’t care. Myrik was continuing on his path downward until he found my center once more.
Now I was really breathless, and my hips lifted upwards to meet his expert ministrations. Gael did not sit idle either, his hand coming up to cup my breasts, rolling the nipples between his deliciously calloused fingers.
The counterpoints of pleasure were staggering, and I could hardly see over the ecstasy drenching all my senses. There was an entire world out there, but none of it seemed to matter beyond the two men pressing so ardently into me.
My own hands scraped down Myrik’s back, biting into his skin before I buried my fingers in his hair. To his credit, he rode out my bucking and mewling with ease, never missing a beat. I felt that delirium inducing wave rolling towards me and it consumed me with a furor like none other.
“Myrik!” I cried, clenching my thighs about his head as my body lost itself to the spasms of pure euphoria.
He let my ride out the rest of my climax with the patient of a saint. When I finally came down from the full-body high, I was panting and wanton more than ever.
And he seemed happy to comply. I felt his hands wrap under my thighs and shift my hips upwards, allowing Gael the access he needed. Smooth and hard, the golden prince slid into me with no resistance.
I gasped, and Myrik claimed my lips to swallow the sound. I could feel his own need against my stomach as his mouth moved against mine, and it excited me to the bone.
Hands were everywhere, kneading, pinching, searching. I felt as if every part of my body was being lavished with a type of worship that most only dreamed about. What made these men so completely enraptured with my being? And how did I get them to never stop.
Gael shifted his hips, allowing him to hit an angle within me that made stars rush across my eyes. I let out a cry of passion and Myrik happily swallowed that as well.
And then the Advisor was moving, aligning himself so that he could slide his obvious want against that sensitive bundle of nerves that was so adept at making me come undone. Once more, I felt sensation and pleasure swallowing me between the two men’s work, and I didn’t fight it for even a moment.
That brilliant wall of perfection was rushing towards me again, and I barely had time to enjoy the buildup before it was crashing over my head in a mind-numbing torrent of release. This time, as I cried out, Myrik let my keening go unchecked, instead burying his teeth into my neck.
I was still in the throes of my climax as I felt and heard my lovers find their own end. Heat and contentment filled me before we all sank into a happy pile on the luxurious bed.
“Happy day of birth,” Gael whispered reverently, pulling me into a hug.
“Happy day indeed,” I agreed as Myrik pressed into my back.
I couldn’t imagine a better moment than just lying there in the after-bliss, but then the world snapped away again and I found myself back in the same holy place, with the same dragon.
“Uh, did you see that?” I murmured, cheeks blazing red.
We see all. And many times, not enough.
“Ah, right. We’re back to this again.” I sighed and pinched my fingers to the bridge of my nose. My thoughts were churning and I was suffering some serious mood yo-yoing, so I needed to get my mind straight. That was difficult, however, considering I could still feel the warm chest of Myrik as it pressed against me, and the heated puffs of Gael’s breath against the back of my neck.
I took several deep, calming breaths, and forced myself to focus. Trying to avoid the end of this world. I just had to think about that and then I could rehash that illicit scene at my own leisure. “Let me see if I have this straight. You’re not one particular being, but rather an amalgamation of all the spirits that remain that have bonded together in the hopes that it will keep you here longer. Am I on the right path here?”
The worlds you speak are true.
“Okay, good. Good to know I’ve still got a knack for deciphering unnecessarily cryptic speech.” Too much time reading fantasy mystery novels when I was younger and not enough caring about the ‘real’ world. “So, you all need your children, the dragons, to believe and interact with you to give you energy, and right now there’s not enough of them to keep your existence going for much longer.
You showed me that vision because you know what Dwyllverys -- that’s the healer, I don’t know if you know names or not -- gave me and it would be in your best interest if I kept what’s inside of me. Two more dragons increase the entire population by two percent. And I assume that last scene was the prequel to me being set up with another baby, which would be three percent. Who knows how many might or might not come after that.
You’re showing me how I can save your people long term, and while it’s manipulative as hell, I understand that. But what you’re not understanding is that there is something that is threatening us right now and unless you help me deal with it, that pretty little scene in that pretty little bedroom is just not going to happen!”
Can you blame us for protecting the new age within you?
“Yes,” I snapped. “It is my choice, no matter what kind of great destiny you see. What I need for you to do is stop this nonsense you’re pawing at and tell me something about the humans, or Perin, or my Grandmother that will help me stop the human royals and get this world back on the timeline it’s supposed to be on!”
And what would you have us do if such a thing were not to exist? A puff of smoke, a gasp of surprise, how can we present what cannot be seen?
“First of all, smoke can be seen. That’s why it’s called smoke. Secondly, there’s gotta be something! Come on! Your children are depending on this, so what are you so afraid of showing me?”
It is not fear. The dragon sat up straight from its previously relaxed position, and if I didn’t know better, I would say it was agitated. You ask questions for paths that we do not tread. Gazing upon these possible paths takes energy, and there is so little of that left. What use is there in losing ourselves to branches coated in sickly darkness?
“That’s it? That’s the big reason? You guys don’t know because you don’t want to spend your energy looking at depressing options? Really?”
…yes.
I gripped its paw more tightly as my temper flared, and I willed all of my bubbling irritation into it. “Then take mine. I’m not from here, right? If you need someone to believe in you to exist, or offer their prayers, then consider yourself worshipped.”
It is not so easy…
“It is that easy! So, show me what I need to see or you’re going to live just long enough to see all your precious descendants, congregation or whatever the hell you want to call them get wiped out!”
I didn’t know where I got the cajones to yell at spirits that were potentially older than the earth I came from, but I didn’t back down. I stared at that glittering, turquoise dragon with a look in my eyes that said there was no plan B. They were going to help me, or we all died.
Unsurprisingly, the spirit’s resolve crumbled and they lowered themselves to the ground with a sigh. There, slowly, they shrank and shrank until they were a bioluminescent version of a young human girl.
She couldn’t have been more than a couple of years my junior, and was just nondescript enough to not be of any obvious race, but familiar enough not to wander into the uncanny valley. Minus the whole glowing part, of course.
“What’s with the sudden costume change?”
The path which you seek is narrow and winding. We will travel easier in a form more like your own.
“I’m getting confused on how much this whole vision thing is affected by real world physics. Does your size actually effect how well you can show me what may or may not happen?”
It is… complicated.
“Of course, it is.” I looked down to see our hands were still wrapped in each other, her fingers much more like my own now. “Well, let’s go. Take me down the rabbit hole.”
We do not understand.
“Never mind. Just show me the thing.”
A moment. It takes time to clear the brambles and find the road we seek. It is not well traveled, and buckles on the wind.
“Naturally.” I was trying not to be saucy, really, I was, but there was something about the high-concept vagary that drove me nuts. Also, I was still a bit pissy that they hadn’t let me enjoy my afterglow for at least a few minutes before ripping it away.
But then the grass was whisking away and I was yanked down into the nothingness. For a moment, it was as if I didn’t exist, then the rubber band of reality snapped and I was hurtled into a new scene.
Like usual, my vision took a few seconds to clear and solidify. The first thing I could make out was cubic, crudely hewn stone with some sort of gray mortar between the large bricks. Then sconces. Then thick, velvet curtains that absorbed almost all of the sunlight that was trying to fight through the large window at the other end of the room.
I heard voices. Slightly familiar but layered with both rage and irritation. They were frustrated. There were… three of them? Maybe four?
And then finally my body finished aligning with the vision and I could see and hear clearly. I almost wish they hadn’t, however, as I realized I was back in the human palace once again.
My breath hitched and my stomach gave a distinctive roll as my eyes landed on none other than Prince Julian. He had grown a beard since I had last seen him, but that only seemed to exaggerate the insanity I now saw so readily in his eyes.
“That’s not enough! None of this is enough!” He snapped at the men surrounding him, eyes wild with his anger. “They humiliated us! Somehow a simple woman was able to escape us twice and took our greatest prize with her. We cannot let this stand! She is a seer, and it is only a matter of time before her dangerous visions reveal something about us that will either save their disgusting hides again, or reveal some weakness of ours that we have not yet anticipated!
“I want her head on a pike- No. I want her alive! I want her to see me destroy and violate everything she loves before breaking her apart piece by piece.”
That was less than encouraging. I couldn’t help but fear that an any moment his head was going to snap in my direction and I was going to be dragged away by guards, but I had to remember that this wasn’t real. This was a shadow of things that could potentially happen. My glimpse into the enemy’s stronghold without risking the instability of my dreams. Besides, I was still figuring how much of my own visions were just a side effect of Perin’s influence, and how much were my own searching for answers.
“What would you have us do, your Majesty? We have narrowed their possible new hiding hole to two mountain ranges, but our preliminary scouts can find no entrances like the other. Even with the most potent scrying crystals, they have all returned empty handed and information less.”
“Then do more! That is why I pay you more than enough in titles, gold and land. You do realize that should this kingdom crumble, your wealth will disappear just as quickly, right? Or are you all even more moronic than I took you for?!”
“None of us are morons.” A cooler voice countered. My head turned to the corner of the room where a young lord sat with his legs up on a table. He had bright, copper hair, and a beard that was just as glorious. I had never seen him before and yet instantly my skin crawled with recognition.
Perin.
I could see his face this time, and make out his features clear as day. Perhaps that was because it was the dragon showing me this possible future rather than the two of us meeting in that strange in-between worlds place, or maybe because I could tell that his visage was faker than the breasts on a plastic surgeon advert. He was glamored somehow, or wearing a brilliant disguise, because every part of my brain was telling me that this was not how he looked.
Also, I assumed Prince Julian knew what his supposedly treacherous tailor/cook looked like and wouldn’t have invited him to give input on what obviously was a heads of war meeting.
“Come again, Brelryk?” Julian’s voice was low and dangerous, more of a growl than actual human worlds.
“We’re not morons. I mean, individually, perhaps, but not collectively. Otherwise we would be useless, and we all know how much you don’t tolerate anyone who’s useless.” The man stood and I flinched back automatically. “If we can’t find the dragons in one mountain, then we raze them both. We’ll destroy every single range we have to until they are piles of rubble and dragons are no more.”
“And how do you suppose we accomplish such a feat?”
“That is outside of my purview. I’m here to be a siege expert, not an excavator.”
“Remind me again of why you haven’t died in a tragic hunting accident?”
“Because you’ve been pleasantly distracted by all your failures.” I watched as the Prince’s face grew red with barely checked anger. “But although I may not be the demolitions expert which you need, I might have an idea of where you could find one. That is, if you’re willing to meet someone so below you.”
“What are you talking about?”
“What I’m talking about is a sorcerer. A couple, actually. Old and hidden, cowering in some cave after your father wiped out their brethren. Offer them safety, perhaps even some solace, and they might be willing to help you.
“Of course, I can guarantee nothing. I’m simply a moron, right?”
“Are you suggesting I align myself with the inferior, corrupted flesh of willing magic users?”
“You were willing to align yourself with a seer. I see little difference. And if it brings about victory, doesn’t that justify the means it took to get there?”
Julian sat back, his anger seeming to fade as he considered the other man’s words. “You think they might have a spell or powder that could aid us in our goals?”
Perin nodded slowly, a sinister smirk spreading across his face. “I’ve seen them toy with a powder that carried fire on its own and obliterates objects from existence. I have no doubt that they have more than enough power to bring your enemy to their knees.
And then, when the dragons are decimated and their scales line your shields and halls, you can kill the sorcerers. Then the last of magic and old spirits will drain from this world, leaving us as the clear rulers of all. And after you’re able to celebrate your true victory, we can send feelers out to the new land our scouts have discovered across the eastern ocean.
You, Julian, could be the true king of all if you play your cards right. But first, you must eliminate these winged beasts, or they will bring about your downfall.”
There was silence for a very long moment before Julian finally leaned forward, his tone careful and refined once more. “Tell me more of this powder.”
The scene snapped apart and I was dropped down into darkness before landing right back in the grass next to the girl. She didn’t stay in that form for long, instead growing once more back into her dragon form.
Did you see what you needed? It asked, voice both resigned and weary.
“Yes, actually. I did.” My heart was still pounding fairly insistently, telling me that I should be running and not sitting here in a peaceful glen. “Perin is going to use these sorcerers, if they even are sorcerers, to introduce gunpowder to the royals. I’m sure their version is going to be a lot more refined than the jimmy-rigged concoction I made, and I don’t think we’ll be alive much longer after that.”
And you will stop them, young woman from another world?
I nodded my head. “I’ll do my damnedest.”
Good. We need to sleep now. We hope that we will be able to see you victorious.
“Sleep, is that a bad thing? Are you dying?”
Dying is a finite term for an infinite life. We are neither here, nor not here, but must rest to remain.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Despite my words, I pressed my forehead to the scales at its side. “Soon you will have many children again and they will all come and speak at your pool.”
Such a pleasant thought. We hope it to be true.
“So do I, great spirit. So do I.”