Into The Deep: Dragon Heart
The swirling fire traveled to find her heart, shining through the dark cavities of her body. Shadows danced against her scaly skin as her spindly veins reached out, grasping at their life source.
The swirling fire traveled to find her heart, shining through the dark cavities of her body. Shadows danced against her scaly skin as her spindly veins reached out, grasping at their life source.
I placed my hands on the smooth scales of Sayeh’s back and took a deep breath. As I let it out, I tried to call back the stone that ran over her body, but it resisted. I pulled harder, fighting against an unseen force. Her body had been wrapped in the stone for too long, and it didn’t want to let go.
It looks like a firefly, and it pings around the cave like a pinball machine, and then flies straight at me and disappears into my abdomen. Fire burns inside of me. It runs through my veins like lava. The pain is excruciating, and I’m sure I must explode. My eyes bulge, my muscles tense, and my bones strain as my body fights against the invasion.
Reacting to the flame’s loss, several geysers burst open at once, raising the temperature within to melting point. Thunder and rumbling reverberated off the walls. Cracks grew across the bridge and the ceiling as liquid earth simmered and roiled around us.
I heard the sound of my heart shattering, taking with it the last glint of hope. I fell to my knees, letting out a howl from the depth of my soul. Selene cradled me in her arms as we rocked back and forth together. Sayeh was lost to me forever.
The bane of a curse affects both the bearer and the one who laid it. It is too much of a burden to bear. Equivalent to burning yourself to spark the fire of destruction.
“This is one of the dumbest things Tooth has ever done,” he said. “Shanghaiing an immortal.”
“And if you don’t, then not only do I lose you forever, but I will have to live the rest of my immortal life with the weight of your death through my hands!” Selene paced back and forth on the shore.
I turned to leave as a cool breeze blew through the cave with a haunting howl, sending a violent shudder through me. The curse. The curse is now mine to bear, I thought as I made my way back up and out of the cavern.
As I retreated from her, I heard her dying breath curse the pearl. That anyone who possessed her precious gem shall perish. The curse would remain until it was returned to her.
The things I did for my family. That made me remember the words burned on Tuttook’s hind leg. Words I’d seen before on an ancient scripture. A truth I’d come to learn since my return to the Pantheon. A truth we’d need to remember to finish our quest successfully.
They still saw the illusion, and I had a feeling no matter how many times they walked across the bridge, they’d end up at the beginning. “You have to trust me. I think this is part of a test. We have to trust each other and have enough faith to get through each challenge.”
It was me, my flawed pride, the force that burned and destroyed everything in its wake. I’ve become the largest danger and the greatest enemy of those I was born to protect
Why shouldn’t I have it? I’ve been through so much, didn’t I deserve a little good luck and fortune for a change?
You’re supposed to be the steady one, the one who dreams. But in those dreams, you’re focusing your attention on improving the world, and the heavens above. Heavenly spirit. Anime mundi…the world soul.