Chapter Forty-Five – Kris

 

I circled the temple below me, my wings spread as I drifted on the thermal drafts coming up from the ground below. Flying during the day was so much easier than at night.

The SUVs I’d seen earlier were definitely pulled up out in front, and activity was as thick as ants in their colony, with a multitude too busy to even look to the heavens above. The temple grounds themselves weren’t particularly expansive, except for the main rock structure itself, which had a large open roof area about the size of an Olympic swimming pool where I could see a figure wearing all white directing the orchestration of humankind’s destruction.

As I did one last turn before beginning my corkscrew descent, I thought of Hunter. Beaten, unconscious, being carried out to that bastard’s SUV. A gout of flame erupted from my mouth unbidden, trailing fire behind me as I descended in a tight spiral, my wings pulled back as I accelerated my dive.

“I have you now, Cid,” I roared as I came plummeting through the roof like a meteorite or comet, plunging to the earth with flames all around me. As I descended, fire trailing behind me, fangs bared, the man in white simply stood there, gazing up at me with a smug little smile on his face as if he knew how this was all going to end before it had even begun.

The stone roof rushed past me in a flash, and I slammed into the hard stone of the platform in the center of the room, the earth trembling, and dust and dirt rising around me.

Men and women to either side of me screamed in panic and ran from the room as rocks fell from the ceiling, brought down by my sudden arrival.

I beat my wings violently, trying to clear the dust from my vision, to drive it away.

Standing there in the center of my vortex was none other than the man in white, Cid. Beside him stood a young girl, no older than eight, wearing some kind of red, blue, and yellow dress with a strange golden mask on her face.

“Hello, Coal,” Cid said, peering up at me. He squeezed the young girl’s shoulder. “It’s never too late to join the winning side, you know. Even now, the mask is taking root within her. She’s the last of her blood to be able to wear it, Coal, and no one may touch it besides them. When it’s done, and it’s taken over, we’ll bring the Goddess back. The Nameless One.”

“Oh, fuck off,” I growled. “Where’s Hunter?”

“Off somewhere, I imagine, with Simmons. A shotgun pointed at his head, no doubt.”

“So the girl is the blood?”

“Of course she is. We all know that. It’s at the core of the White Feather, now. The blood must survive so she may take her rightful spot. Her ancestor is the one who imprisoned the Nameless One, so her blood must be the one to free it. Only she may touch the mask, and only she may bear it.”

I flared my nostrils, allowing the tendrils of smoke to come flowing out.

“So kill her, if you’d like. That’s the only way to stop this. To take the life of an innocent.” He paused, smiled. “I know I could. But, I wonder, do you have what it takes?”

“How about,” I asked, narrowing my eyes, “I just kill you, instead?” I lunged forward, shot a line of flame small enough not to hit the girl. It shot out like water from a fire hose. Thin, directed, surgical even.

With the stone floor she was standing on, it wouldn’t spread any farther than the immediate area around Cid. I wasn’t sure what he was, but there are few creatures able to stand the flames of a dragon.

The flames sprang to life as they consumed Cid. They coiled and rejoiced as they found his flesh, as they destroyed him. As they cooked him down to the bone. His scream rose and fell as I continued to pour on the flame, the whole while the girl standing perfectly still.

I cut the flames as his screams rose, the rush of the fire dying in my ears.

And that was when I realized he was laughing. Not screaming.

As my smoke and flame cleared, Cid stood there still, scraps of burning white cloth still stuck to his dark body. The stone at his feet was scorched. Meanwhile, naked, he held his belly as he bellowed his laughter to the stone ceiling and the world beyond.

“You still have no idea what I am, do you?” Cid asked as he wiped a tear from his eye. Suddenly, though, his glare turned stony as he looked up at me. He took a step forward. “Do you?” he growled.

“Shit.”

Just as suddenly as any time I’d changed, Cid did, too. Faster than I could realize what was really happening, he was filling the void in front of me with his great, serpentine body covered in white and gold and blue feathers. Easily the length of a soccer field, his great, feathered dragon body filled the temple.

I’d never seen a dragon this big. I’d never even imagined I would.

He bore down on me, his mouth full of needle-thin fangs as he seemed to grin into my face. “Now, Coal, you will know the true meaning of what a dragon is.”

I didn’t even see his first strike coming. I just felt it, and then the stone wall I slammed into. I wasn’t sure if the snapping crack I’d heard had been the slab I’d hit, or one of my bones. But, with my adrenaline pumping the way it was, it didn’t matter which. I picked myself up from the floor, and spun to face Cid, who was nearly three times my size.

“Now you’ve got me pissed,” I growled as I rushed forward.