Dragon Aster Trilogy (48 page)

“Lord Kas? Are you alright?”

Kas frowned at his mentor, Jru. He was not getting used to his new title very well.

“So many goddesses, so little time,” one of Helios’ sons laughed from where they continued their trudge through the snow towards the Efereal Mountains. “You have by far the best problems in the world, Master Kas.”

Kas wasn’t sharing the auburn phelan’s amusement by it all. It was one thing to pray to the caels for some help; it was another thing entirely to deal with them directly. He pondered if it might have been easier if they were all males, who didn’t make the simpler things so excruciatingly complicated.

“Lord Kas!” another of Helios’ Pack cried to him. Kas looked his way as a serpent shot up from the snow behind where the phelan ran back to them. Rener was quickly overtaken and pierced with the front canines from the giant snow snake and then dragged into the hole in the ice.

Kas’ Pack ran to rescue him, and he looked around for any more enemies. Serpents were smart enough to not take on a whole Pack of phelan alone. When Helios’ Pack dragged the creature onto the snow and tore it apart, its brutal death was proof to why. But everything was going to go from bad to worse, as the phelan who touched the blood of the serpent began to act odd. Even stranger was how Rener was now attacking them with snaps of teeth like they were the enemy. The blood of the serpent was poisoned with the Aeger, and now it was coursing through the veins of most of the Pack.

Jru quickly took up Kas’ side, as he called the untainted ones from the attack to him. Then he led the run away from the poisoned ones while they were still disorientated. The phelan exchanged attacks for a while between each other, before turning their rage towards where Kas and his uninfected party fled. “Master Kas, what’s going on?” Jru asked in worry.

“The Aeger in the chimera’s blood has poisoned them. We have to outlast it while it burns out of their system.” Kas ran faster, as a large shadow passed by from under the ice. But it wasn’t from one creature, as several snow serpents burst from the ice and directly into their path.

Kas dodged to the side as one emerged from under him. He let out an angry snarl as the serpents surrounded them, seemingly coordinating their next move to happen at once. In the least, it had the effect of keeping the vicious temper of the poisoned ones in his Pack occupied.

“I’ve never seen snow serpents do this before,” Jru panted, as his black phelan form took up Kas’ side.

Before they could count what might be their last moments, a howl went out from the direction of the Efereal Mountains. They looked to where several Custos ran to help them.

Kas sent his teeth for the serpent closest to him, as the Pack collided with the snow serpents. His prey whipped about violently, before Kas had torn enough flesh from the white snake to bleed it to a stop. Another came at him and its tail tripped his legs out from under him, dropping him to the snow. He pulled his black paws under him and scrambled out of the way as its tail came down like a club where he had been a breath before.

The rest of the Pack picked their targets, as their extra numbers helped to drive the maddened creatures off, leaving only the crazed ones of their own to be dealt with.

Kas looked to the Pack that had been poisoned as they began to recover from the tainted blood. He spat out the blood that he had taken from his target to the ground, realizing then that it didn’t seem to affect him at all.

Jru made sure he was alright, before going to the phelan who had come from the Efereal Mountains. “Where are the rest of you?”

“We left them in the mountains, hoping that you would come to escort us and not the other way around. But please tell me that the Caelestis is with you.”

“No, she is not,” Kas replied, but he alone was grateful that she wasn’t in harm’s way.

“There are many chimeras who need to be healed before they resort to killing us like these ones,” the phelan continued. “I think the only reason they haven’t already is because Nephena has taken control.”

Kas let out a long sigh, fearing that his peace made with the Tribe might not exist anymore without Xirel in charge.

The Callers they had brought with them slowly began to restore order to the phelan and some of them resorted to purring to create the calm they wanted. But they went silent when a lion-like roar went out from the direction of the Efereal Mountains.

“Oh that’s bad. I think Nephena is officially and irreversibly pissed,” a brown phelan said with a shudder.

“Nephena,” Kas confirmed. He feared that if she lost the fight against the Aeger, they might never return to Atrum City without the whole mountain coming down on them first.
Just what extent of a mess has my sister made this time?

Gwa was still half asleep when he realized that Sybl was dragging him down the halls of the Atrum by his foot. “Um…Sybl? Have you gotten stronger? Cause I have to be heavier than you…”

“We’re going hunting,” she replied, without so much as looking back at him.

“Wha…? I can’t go hunting with the phelan and dragons—they’ll eat me!” Gwa prepared his pride to cry if necessary to get out of this one.

“No,” Sybl said, setting his foot down at the stairs so he could sit up, “they won’t.”

“Why do you want to go? It’s dangerous, and you remember the last time—?”

“It’s important. Please, Gwa.”

Gwa melted into a puddle of goo when she pleaded with him, before resorting to the obvious excuse to get him out of this. “Why don’t you just ask Cirrus to take you?”

“This is something I have to do without him, and I need your wings to do it.”

Gwa got to his feet and brushed the dirt off his butt from being dragged along the floor. “Alright, whatever, you’re the boss. But if your dragon kills me for doing this, I’m coming back to haunt you for like—forever.”

“Deal.”

Sybl smiled and it had the effect of making him even more uncertain. He led the way downstairs and outside, before somning into his griffin form. Gwa crouched down so that she could climb on, but instead she just stared at him.

Gwa looked himself over on all sides, fearing he was missing some feathers somewhere. When he was sure that he looked like he always did, he brought his face closer to her and tried to figure out what her eyes saw. It was when he tilted his head on not seeing what Sybl was thinking that she moved again. Gwa was getting concerned by how she was acting and pondered calling her Bond for her. But it was hard enough to spend some time with his favorite friend because of the dragon, so he decided to take full advantage of the time given to him.

She climbed up behind his neck and in front of his wings, and he spread them and took to the air, before the phelan guards could stop them.

“This Hunt isn’t going to include any bears this time, I hope?”

“No bears. At least, I don’t think there will be any bears.”

Gwa flicked an ear in worry. “So are you going to at least tell me what this is about?”

“When I was born, and just before they sent me to Earth, they took a bunch of my memories from me. But they didn’t just break them, as they would have healed by now. They tied the Threads to someone else.”

“And you think the kyrie has these Threads?” Gwa asked.

“It won’t come to me because it’s trying to keep those memories from me. But at the same time it has to, because it’s the only way it has been able to manage the Aeger it’s infected with. So if it is completely infected with the Aeger, that gives us a chance to snag him.”

“So we catch him, get the festra and memories back and go home, right?”

“And there is the plan.”

“Alright, Beautiful.”

Gwa flew a few miles more before setting them down on a solid sheet of ice. “I should have brought a blanket.”

Sybl climbed down from him and patted his neck, and he puffed out like a giant feather duster.

“Aren’t you cold?” he asked in worry, before sitting his chest feathers down on her like she was an egg.

She giggled and then sneezed from the fluff of white feathers she was now covered in. “I’m great, really. But stop looking at me and find Sial.”

“Right right,” he said and began to scan the snowy landscape for their target, turning his head like an owl might in search of a mouse. “Soooo…is everything between you and Cirrus okay?”

“Yeah, why do you ask?”

“Just curious. I can’t help but get the feeling that these missing memories might have something to do with him.”

“The last thing Asil remembered was Moon killing her. In case these memories are just that, I don’t want to be near Cirrus in case I lose it for a moment.”

“What if these memories are all your warring qualities? You won’t kill me, will you?”

“No, Gwa. I couldn’t kill you if I tried. Asil had a weakness for cute, too.”

Gwa puffed up even more and continued his scan for the kyrie with more enthusiasm. “Okay, but Sial is avoiding giving these memories back for a reason. He’s what? Three hundred years old plus his previous existence on the first Aster? That’s old enough for an Ancient to grasp common sense.”

“I think they’re memories of Damek.”

“Good memories I’m assuming?”

“I won’t change my mind,” Sybl assured him. “He has to be stopped, regardless of my past with him.”

“Well, Sial is here. I’ll be higher up while you lure him in for the tackle.” Gwa quickly checked the sharpness of his talons, before springing into the air.

Sybl looked around and it was clear that Gwa’s eyesight was ten times better than her own, as it took a few minutes for the kyrie to be visible to her through the snowdrifts. Sial was limping, and she walked towards him at the same time. When they were within meters of each other, she could see that Sial had become something out of nightmares. His skin sagged around his purple eyes. On other parts of his body, his flesh was missing right down to his bones. Sybl held her mouth to stifle a scream. Sial suddenly lunged forward, only to collapse to his knees in the snow as his blood spread around him.

Gwa didn’t descend to attack the creature and landed next to her in disbelief of the same sight. “I’ve never seen an Aeger like this.”

The kyrie collapsed to its side, breathing irregularly through lungs that just barely held any air within.

“Sial.”

“Must…not remember. It is…what Damek wants. It…is what he needs.”

“I don’t understand. Sial, what of memory are you keeping from me?”

“Must…not remember.” Sial closed his eyes then, and his breathing stopped.

“You sure you still want to do this?” Gwa asked in worry.

“There is nothing that can change my mind about Damek.” Sybl went over to Sial and touched the festra of his horn, before pulling it free in one swift movement.

Gwa looked more closely at her.

“See? Nothing to worry about,” Sybl said, as she didn’t feel or remember anything new.

He looked back at the kyrie. “Poor bugger. So this means I win the Hunt, right? What do I win, anyways?”

“I have no idea. The Caelestis for a day, I guess?”

“Accepted.” Gwa watched as she tucked the festra in her white sash behind her. He crouched down so she could climb onto his back. Then he clutched the kyrie in his talons to carry it back. “It won’t hurt my bragging rights if I look like I caught this.” Then Gwa sprung into the air to fly back to the Atrum.

“Asil, what are you doing here alone?”

Sybl opened her eyes to find herself in a Dream of what could have only been the past, as she turned to look at Damek standing behind her. She looked then to dark castle of the Atrum and saw that the city around it did not yet exist. This was where most of the eminor on Aster lived three hundred years ago. She remembered as this being the place where she had apologized to him for overreacting with fear to the phelan he had created. After he had brought Kas back to her by sacrificing one of the giant, wolf-like spirits. “I wanted to see you,” she said simply.