Starlighter (30 page)

Jason snapped his head around. Zena’s voice! He shuffled backwards, but not quickly enough to avoid Magnar’s swinging tail. It batted his ribs and sent him flying across the room. He rolled like a log, nearly swallowing the key, and stopped next to Koren’s feet.

“Be brave,” Koren whispered. Her voice trembled ever so slightly. “We are never forsaken.”

He looked up at her. In spite of the brutal chains and the bleeding wound on her cheek, she seemed so peaceful, so filled with compassion.

“What trickery were you concocting?” Magnar roared.

Jason shot up to a sitting position and used his tongue to tuck the key between his cheek and gum. “I was trying to escape,” he said, showing Magnar the still-intact rope and his empty hands.

He glanced up at the globe. It was clear.

“The prince!” Zena threw down a leather flask, stalked

to the bag, and swept it into her arms. Heaving a sigh, she hugged it against her chest. “He is unharmed!”

Magnar glared at Arxad. “Were you trying to distract me?”

When Magnar looked away, Jason spat the key into his hand and enclosed it in his fist.

“I was trying to get your attention, great Magnar, but not for the purpose of allowing the boy to harm the egg. That would be pure treason. I hoped to explain my relationship with Max—”

“Enough!” Magnar looked at the globe. It stayed clear. “Is the crystal still working?”

“Let’s find out.” Jason fixed his stare on Magnar. “You are a just and noble dragon.”

The globe instantly turned black.

Magnar spewed a ball of flames that splashed on the ground near Jason’s leg, sending sparks across his clothes. He followed with a bellow. “I will not be taunted with contemptuous blather from a petulant human! I keep you alive for one reason.”

Maintaining a scowl on his face, Jason remained seated. “What reason is that?”

“To ensure that the Starlighter tells me the story I request. I will incinerate you if she does not.”

Jason looked up at Koren. Her eyes now told him to be quiet. All would be well.

“Set the prince in position,” Magnar said, “and let us proceed without further delay.”

Zena took the egg out of the bag and laid it in the middle of the cloths about five paces in front of the crystal. She then retrieved the flask and held it to Koren’s lips. With
her head tilting back, Koren took a long drink, the muscles in her delicate but dirty throat pulsing with each swallow. When Zena pulled the flask away, Koren coughed and took several deep breaths. When she settled, she stared at the egg, her arms limp and her body resting against the binding chains.

Staying in a sitting position, Jason scooted back toward the egg. He kept his hands in his lap. Could he secretly break free from the rope? At this spot, the egg would be out of reach of his bound hands, which would make its corpse-like keeper happy, but once loosed, he would be able to grab the egg easily.

Koren pulled the hood up over her head. She closed her eyes for a moment and took another deep breath. When she opened them again, they seemed to shine like beacons in the hood’s shadow, and the globe at the top of the stake began to glow, brilliant and white.

“I am a Starlighter,” she said in a clear, loud tone. “I will take you back to a time when Magnar was one of only two dragons who knew of Darksphere’s existence.”

L
ight from above streamed into the globe, as if the sun poured radiance into its crystalline surface. The glow spread out like an aura, and Koren’s cloak took on a brilliant dazzle. Even the embroidered green eyes shone.

The aura spread across the nearby egg and reflected back toward her with dark light, as if the shell were casting a shadow. When the darkness passed over her, a voice entered her mind, smooth and low.
If you tell this tale to Magnar
,
he will no longer need the boy. The only reason he stays alive is so that you will use your gifts to reveal the past. Once you have done Magnar’s bidding
,
he will surely kill the alien human.

Koren looked through the shadow and locked her gaze on the reflective shell. She streamed a thought toward it.
If I don’t do this
,
he will kill Jason anyway. Maybe I can learn something that will stop him. It’s my only hope.

Again the voice spoke in her mind.
Better to let Jason die without revealing the secret
,
for Magnar will surely use
this knowledge to gain more human slaves and eventually conquer their world. Refuse him
,
and I will keep you safe. All you need do is submit to my chains.

Keeping her head turned toward the egg, Koren glanced at Jason. He seemed to be working on an escape plan, though Magnar hadn’t noticed. If this brave young man had risked his life to rescue her and also managed to survive a flood, maybe he could work another miracle now. Finally, she focused on the egg again.
I will take that chance.

“What is the delay?” Magnar shouted.

As the aura faded and shrank, Koren swallowed. “The prince interrupted my concentration.”

Magnar swung his head toward Zena. “What is the prince doing?”

“I will ask.” Zena pulled something from the bag and pressed it against the egg’s shell.

Koren squinted. The object looked like a girl’s finger!

Jason grasped his shirt, tugging it open. A patch of skin on his chest pulsed with purple light. He bit his lip and grimaced.

After craning her neck for a moment, as if listening to something, Zena nodded and put the finger back in the bag. “The prince is encouraging the Starlighter to submit to him. He wishes to continue speaking to her while she is telling her tale.”

Magnar angled his neck back toward Koren. “Was he speaking to you?”

“He was.” Koren sagged within her cocoon of chains. “But when he speaks, I am unable to concentrate. I wish to tell this tale, but I cannot do so unless I can stay focused.”

“Is this merely the prince’s request?” Magnar asked Zena.

She nodded. “A most earnest one, but he will acquiesce to your wishes. This trial is for your benefit, not his.”

“Cover him!” Magnar ordered. “I must learn the truth!”

Zena draped one of the nest cloths over the egg, shutting off the blackness.

Koren took in a deep breath and straightened her body. “I can continue now.”

“Proceed,” Magnar said. “The egg will stay covered.”

As Koren continued breathing deeply, the aura strengthened and began spreading again like a widening cylinder of light. A powerful force weighed down her mind, evil, dragon-like. She allowed her face to twist and her voice to deepen into a growl. “Since you will never escape, it will serve you well to obey. Death is the only other option.”

Ghostly images appeared within the aura—a dragon resembling Magnar and ten or more humans, all but one groveling on their knees. One man stood tall, and as he strode up to the dragon, Koren spoke his words in the tone of a masculine human. “If given that option, you foul beast, I gladly choose death over slavery.”

Koren switched voices as quickly as the characters surrounding her switched speakers.

“Uriel,” Magnar’s image said, “you amuse me too much. Killing you would be like slaying a clownbird. Even as good as they are to eat, their antics are too amusing to use them as food.”

Uriel lifted an arm, revealing a chain dangling from a manacle. “You will see. Someday we will all be set free.”

Suddenly, the scene changed. Uriel lay alone on the ground. He sat up and let a key slide from his mouth and into his cupped fingers. After unlocking his chain, he crept on hands and knees.

In the aura, he didn’t appear to be moving at all, but the ground passed by his body. After a few seconds, he stood and ran. The aura flashed, and, in an instant, he arrived at a mesa. Kneeling at its base, he dug into loose soil until he found a thin rope. He reeled the line in until a crystalline peg popped out of the mesa’s grip and into his lap.

He stared at it and spoke in a whisper. “After this voyage to my homeland, I will return you to your hiding place. Perhaps my plans will fail and my son will be the next human that gazes at your beauty, but I hope no dragon ever looks upon you again.”

A whispered voice from behind passed into Koren’s ear along with the clinking of metal on metal. “This is Jason. Zena and the dragons are hypnotized. I’m still tied, but I’m loose enough to unlock your chains and the ring around your neck. Try to stay focused on your tale until I can break free.”

For a moment, the aura began to fade. Koren took another breath and searched her mind.
Bring back Uriel. Where did he go? Where is he now?

As she regained her concentration, Uriel materialized, kneeling again and retying the rope to the peg. He picked up a long metal rod and pushed the crystal into the hole as far as the rod would allow. He then shoved the dirt back into place, packing it tightly with the rod.

He set his hands on his knees and blew out a breath. “Must hurry,” he muttered. “The portal will not stay open long.” Then, he vanished again, and the aura began to fade.

“The lock’s open,” Jason whispered. “I’ll think of something to get those chains unwrapped.”

Underneath the aura’s diminishing light, Jason crawled on hands and knees back toward the egg.

When the crystal’s light disappeared, Koren looked at Magnar and heaved a loud sigh. “I think that’s the end of the tale.”

Magnar, Arxad, and Zena blinked and shook their heads. Then, with a rising growl, Magnar whipped his tail from side to side. “So it
is
buried in the mesa! The holes Uriel drilled in the center pointed to a deeper burial. The little rodent outsmarted us.”

Zena marched toward her bag. “Uriel’s method of hiding the key makes me wonder…”

Koren swung her head toward Jason. He jerked at his bonds, but they still held him fast. It seemed that only a few threads kept him from breaking free.

“Aha!” Zena lifted the key ring. “There is one missing!”

Koren shook off the neck ring and thrashed at her chains. They loosened and slid down her body, but they tangled at her knees. She couldn’t break free.

Magnar’s head shot toward Jason. “Where is the key?”

Jason broke the final thread and tossed the key high in the air. As Magnar and Arxad followed its flight, Jason leaped toward Koren.

“The Starlighter!” Zena screamed.

As Jason pulled on the chains at Koren’s feet, Zena ran and crashed into him, knocking him over.

Magnar roared. “You will now cook, Starlighter!” A streak of fire shot from his mouth and struck the globe next to Koren’s ear. The crystal erupted in blazing light. Heat surged across Koren’s back. She stiffened. Her body seemed to adhere to the stake as if her skin were fusing
to the crystalline surface. She swiveled her head toward Jason and cried out, “Help me!”

With a loud grunt, Jason threw Zena to the side and lunged toward Koren. Setting one hand on the stake and one on Koren’s back, he pried her loose and shoved her away. She tripped over the chains and rolled on the ground, her legs now free.

Arxad jumped toward Koren and set a clawed foot on her chest. “I have her, Magnar!”

Koren struggled beneath the pressure, but she couldn’t budge. She looked at the crystalline stake. Jason still stood there, his hand apparently stuck in place as the fiery glow wrapped him in its clutches. He moaned, his gaze riveted on Koren’s, his eyes wide and anguished. Zena climbed to her feet, smiling as she crossed her arms and stood guard.

“No!” Koren screamed. “If he dies, I will never tell another tale for you!”

“I have no more need for your tales,” Magnar said, shuffling to Arxad’s side. “The Starlighter will follow him at the stake. Let us be rid of them quickly without a public spectacle.” He sent another stream of fire at the globe. Its energy redoubled, sending streaks of jagged light into Jason’s body. He arched his back, making more of his body cling to the stake as he let out an elongated cry, “Koren! Use your gift! Save yourself!”

“Silence her wicked tongue!” Magnar ordered.

Arxad shifted his foot from Koren’s chest to her mouth and set his head near hers, shouting, “You will be quiet!” He then added a whisper, “Magnar has one vulnerability. If you are wise you will discern my meaning.”

His foot lifted slightly, allowing her to turn her head toward the egg, still draped in its nesting cloths. The key Jason had thrown lay on the stone floor in between.

With a mighty thrash, she jerked away and scrambled on hands and knees, scooping up the key as she scuffled toward the egg.

“Stop her!” Zena cried out.

Koren lurched to the egg and jerked off the cover. Wrapping her arms around it, she set the end of the key against the shell and shouted, “If you don’t let Jason go, I’ll break it and kill him! I swear I will!”

Magnar let out a trumpeting screech. “If you do, I will slaughter you in an instant!”

“You’ll still have a broken egg and a dead prince.”

For a moment, Magnar just stared, shifting his weight from side to side. Zena seemed frozen in place, her pupils wide and wandering. Arxad’s eyes darted, but his expression gave nothing away. Jason moaned. As fiery light encircled his petrified body, his wet, red face continued to twist in agony.

Koren eyed the globe. It remained blazing white. But was that because it had transformed to cooking mode, or was she really telling the truth, that she really would break the egg and kill the prince? At this point, she didn’t know, and she didn’t care. “I’m not going to wait much longer!” A breeze blew her hair across her face, and sweat and tears kept it plastered there. “Release him now!”

Magnar waved a wing at Zena. “Make it cease!”

Scowling, Zena ran to a support column near the courtyard’s doorway and pulled a lever. The ceiling began to close again. As the partition crossed the sunlight’s path, Jason’s flaming cocoon ebbed. When the dome finally clicked shut, the flames died away, leaving a few surrounding torches as the only lights in the chamber. The globe atop the stake continued to glow, its color now gray.

Jason slumped and dropped to his hands and knees, his head down as he gasped for breath.

“What do you propose to do?” Magnar growled. “You cannot hold this impasse indefinitely.”

“I will…” Koren looked around at all the eyes staring at her, four from dragons and two black orbs from Zena. “I will take the egg and Jason away from here.”

Magnar’s growl deepened. “We will follow you to the ends of Starlight. You would never have a moment’s peace. And when the prince hatches, what will you do? Will you murder him? Or will you, like most humans, consider his life more valuable once you can see him?”

Koren gulped. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. And Magnar had a good point. The dragon inside the egg was alive. Could she really kill him? “If…If you let us go, I promise to keep him alive.”

Magnar looked at the globe. As its grayness faded to white, he let out a rumble from his throat. “I see.”

Koren stared at him. She had to maintain confidence, but with the globe once again detecting lies, he could easily ask questions that might expose her uncertainty about killing the prince immediately.

The shell began to grow warmer, and its familiar voice penetrated her mind.
You cannot kill me. Yes
,
you might run away, but deep inside
,
you love me
,
and you will return to me. Someday you will gladly accept my chains.

She sucked in a breath but maintained her stare. She couldn’t let Zena or the dragons know that her courage was about to crumble.

Arxad stepped close to Koren and spread a wing toward her. “May I offer a solution?”

“Speak your mind,” Magnar said.

“I will take the boy and girl, with the egg still in the girl’s possession, to a secret place where they can escape
to freedom. She will release the egg to me, and I will bring it back here unharmed.”

“And if she breaks the shell or harms the prince?”

Arxad guided his head directly in front of Koren’s face and breathed a blast of hot air. “Then I will kill them both.”

Magnar and Koren turned toward the crystal in unison. The globe stayed clear. His face still red, Jason rose to his feet and staggered toward Koren. He dropped to his knees next to her and gasped, “Thank you.”

“No, Jason,” she whispered as she looked into his glazed eyes. “Thank
you
.”

Jason turned toward Arxad. “How do we know you’ll keep your end of the bargain?”

Arxad spoke directly to the globe. “If the Starlighter honors her word, I will take her and the boy to a place where they can escape to freedom without interference from the dragons.”

Again, the globe stayed clear.

“Only if no one follows,” Jason said. “Not Magnar, not Zena—no one.”

Magnar growled. “So be it. Take the two humans, and let us be done with them forever.”

“One more item,” Arxad said.

Magnar swung his spiny tail, apparently growing more agitated by the second. “What is it?”

“If I do this great deed for our citizens, then I ask that all charges against me regarding Maximus be dropped. By my willingness to kill these two, you now know that my loyalty ultimately lies with dragons and not with humans.”

The globe shone as clear as ever.

Magnar stilled his tail, staring at Arxad for a moment before answering. “The charges are dropped. Let the records show that Maximus drowned in a tragic accident.”