“I’m sorry, what?” Sayori’s tone was clearly annoyed with the two of them. “You’re telling me that in the past month, not only has this idiot farm boy been blessed by a wild matriarch, she made him a dragon rider, and he’s having visions that include the damn Lord Commander of the White Order? This is ridiculous!”
The deep voice of the Lord Commander could be heard through the rushing air around them. “Is this true? A wild matriarch blessed you?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Is that how you met your dragon?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“And she granted you more than one vision? Several of them? One of them, including me?”
“Yes, to all of that, Sir.”
The wind blowing and the massive flapping of the iridescent dragon’s wings were the only noise that was heard. He tried to sit up more on their large host, but had difficulties with how they had strapped him in.
“Did you find a nest, boy?”
The question hit him like a lead stone. No one else even thought to ask this. His story so far was that he had just helped a trapped Zuma, and the matriarch had just shown up. He didn’t know what to say or how to answer. If he told him of the nest, it would reveal he had been lying about the whole interaction, but he had seen the man. He had seen him in full battle armor next to him in what looked like a battle against the darkness itself.
“Yes.”
He looked over to see Sayori’s mouth wide agape at his answer. She shook her head and gave him a bewildered look, motioning out her confusion behind the Lord Commander’s back.
“Tell no one else,” the older man commanded.
Sayori was still shaking her head when she said, “how, why, what? No, no. There are no wild nests. No nation has wild nests. There haven’t been wild nests in centuries. Nope. A matriarch, I can maybe see one hiding out but breeding? Nope.”
“Silence,” ordered the man.
She was just squinting at Kaden, giving him dirty looks. It wasn’t his fault that no one else had seen a nest in decades. Zuma had taken him there. He didn’t have a say on if he discovered it or not. They allowed him to visit. If no one else had seen one in decades, that was because the dragons weren’t allowing them to. That was not his fault.
The man turned his back toward Kaden and in a firm voice said, “if anyone knows, they will hunt them. You will keep this to yourselves.”
They both said in unison, “yes, sir.”
“Sir,” Kaden leaned forward, “how did you know?”
“I too was blessed in a nest. You don’t get multiple visions from a normal matriarch.”
They both shared a look of surprise that the man was telling them this.
“I am taking you to the citadel out of protocol, but it is a dangerous place these days. These are dangerous people you are going to be interacting with. Don’t trust them. Don’t trust my men. Trust only each other. There are serpents in the house of dragons.”
His ominous words had them both acting scared and confused. Sayori was looking back and forth to him and the Commander, trying to puzzle together his words. Before she could say any more, the dragon started its descent toward the city. As the large beast dove, Kaden finally was able to see the sprawling city below. It was massive. At its heart was a white complex of buildings and towers.
The Citadel.
Descending into the city on such an enormous beast was unlike anything he could have ever fathomed. The flight was smoother than riding Zuma, but the ground was coming just as fast. They slowed as the towers neared before touching down right outside the outer walls. The Lord Commander unstrapped himself and came to help them as well.
Kaden caught a glimpse of his eyes. They were as shimmering white as the dragon they rode. If he had been blessed by a nest too, he wondered how powerful the Commander truly was. Kaden wondered if he too would gain such a look.
The man grabbed their arms and picked them up with ease before jumping off the tall height of the dragon. They hit the ground without issue and he quickly set them down. An army of men were running up to greet them. The other two dragons touched down nearby, with Taldor and Zuma following closely behind. Zuma let out a defiant roar, and the group of men slid to a stop before them.
He saw a smirk barely dance across the Commander’s face before he went back to his cold demeanor. The men were shouting at the white mage to subdue Zuma, but they had broken out of their trance. Taldor stood off to the side, motionless but watching.
“Do something to calm them,” ordered the Commander.
Taking a deep breath, he pushed his will out toward them, hoping that Zuma could hear him over all the noise of the Citadel. The surrounding energies were oppressing and ever present. The massive dragon behind him was blinding them with their power. He was extremely thankful that in his vision, they seemed to be on his side and not the other.
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Zuma’s eyes cut over toward him and they puffed out a huff of mist that hit the three of them like a slap. They were not happy at the situation, but he couldn’t blame them. He wasn’t happy either. Pushing out his thoughts again, they responded. With a dramatic flair, Zuma sat their hind legs down and put their front feet together. Steam and smoke curl up and out of their mouth. They let out an annoyed reverberation.
“They have an attitude, don’t they?” said Sayori.
“Yeah, they have a lot of opinions.”
A group of armed men joined their group and escorted them away from the dragons. The Lord Commander was right behind them. No one questioned him, no one asked for a report. He led them in silence through the large iron gates. Looking back over his shoulder, he saw an annoyed Zuma glaring at him as he got out of their view.
“You’re not going to hurt them, are you?”
The commander said nothing.
“You won’t hurt them, will you?”
The commander shook his head and said, “they will be escorted to the stables and kept under guard. They won’t be hurt unless they themselves cause an issue. If they do, we will do everything in our power to restrain them.”
Looking back toward the landing, he pushed his will as best he could toward a now distant Zuma, hoping they could feel him. He tried to push the thought of comfort and positivity, but he knew Zuma was irritated, he could at least feel that. He hoped they would behave. One bite of the Lord Commander’s dragon and Zuma would be in pieces. He hoped they respected that and knew their place.
People in various colored robes, suits, and dress gawked at them as they were escorted into the buildings. He wasn’t going to fight the situation. That would only make everything worse. Sayori grabbed and held onto his hand for comfort. He watched the woman easily kill rebels and yet she was grabbing onto him for comfort in the uneasy situation. They hadn’t known each other for very long, but now the two of them had experienced more in their short time than most ever did in a lifetime. If grabbing his hand comforted her, he wasn’t going to stop her.
And the fact that a pretty girl was willingly grabbing his hand was a plus in his book.
The armored men peeled off and only a few followed them behind as the Lord Commander led them down a hallway. A man in an ornate white and golden robe that reminded him of the grandmasters stood with a door opened.
“Lord Commander Arnould Daralty,” nodded the dark-haired man. “We have these cells ready.”
The Daralty Armistice Treaty. It was named after the Lord Commander.
He nodded to the man and beckoned Kaden inside. Sayori’s grip tightened before she dropped it and let him be escorted alone into a white room. It was empty, with only a faint glowstone illuminating the room from behind glass in the ceiling. He turned around to try to catch one last glance at Sayori, but the door was closed before he could do so.
They left him alone in an empty room with only his thoughts. No noise was escaping. All he could hear was the pulsing of his blood coursing through his ears. He would go mad if they left him in there for too long. Nothing was going as planned, but nothing ever did. He sat down and tried to organize his thoughts.
If he was going to represent his nation, he need to be more prepared to handle these dignitaries he was sure to meet now that he got everyone’s attention. If he didn’t figure out what was going on, he would look like a fool. Sayori was right. He needed to be better, to do better. He couldn’t keep stumbling through things.
The house of the serpent was known amongst the mages to be a rebel group. The Lord Commander mentioned that there were serpents in the house and the other mage in his party had accused them of being serpent agents. They were obviously very concerned about this rebel group and, from what he had seen that day, how the rebels were able to shut down their magic without possessing any themselves, he understood why they were a worry.
They weren’t wrong. He didn’t know anything about politics or the inner workings of the nations, but he knew what trouble was and how to avoid it. What happened today was trouble. He needed to be vigilant and avoid coming into a situation like they had that day. The robed figures had caught his attention several times, but he had his guard down. He didn’t know he even needed to be concerned about such a threat.
He knew now, though
Lord Commander Arnould Daralty knew he had been blessed at a nest. The man even admitted he too had been blessed by a nest. In all the people he had met so far, not a single one even posed or suggested the question of a nest. The Lord Commander knew right away. He wondered how many nests there may be if the Lord Commander had been blessed at one.
He recalled Sayori’s commentary that there hadn’t been any nests in centuries, not that anyone knew of at least. He recalled how a magic shielded the large underground lake once they flew away from it. If no one knew of the nests, then maybe the magic that shielded them was something more than even mages could manipulate.
The man he met was the same man in his vision. The dragon he rode on was the same one he saw. Part of his vision becoming reality was hitting him hard. They kept saying they were tales of the future, but he didn’t believe them, not truly. The only vision that had anyone he recognized was his family. All the other figures, the faces, they were blurred or utterly foreign and new.
There on his dragon’s back in a fierce storm was Arnould Daralty, the Lord Commander of the White Mages. The only thing he knew about white mages was that they could use every type of magic, and that they were in charge of the citadel. He never bothered to learn how or why this was. He just knew they were the best of the best. It never occurred to him that he may have a chance to become one of them.
“Lord Daralty…” he had been pacing around the room as he ruminated on his thoughts. “Who is he…”
The man said himself that he had been blessed in a nest. He was a leader of the white mages. From what Kaden knew, this could mean he was the leader of the entire citadel. The Daralty Armistice Treaty had to have been named after him or his family. The man was highly respected and connected.
“It seems like he’s also going to be helping me lead the war against the darkness,” he murmured to himself.
The vision had changed. It had moved directions. Instead of showing him who was behind him, who was joining him, it had showed him that the gathering of dragons in the storm was there to challenge a swirling darkness. A darkness he knew well already. He didn’t have to try to piece together what it was. He knew it well.
He tried to push his mind out, his energy out to see if he could feel Zuma, but he felt nothing in response. He wondered where they had taken them. Had they been cooperative? Was he going to be let out only to find they had to put a combative Zuma down like a sick animal?
He let out a long sigh.
Several minutes passed. Then several more. He was left pacing up and down the room. He had inspected everything he could in the low light. The glowstone above was dim and fading. It flickered in and out, its magic nearly gone. Laying on the floor, he began counting the seconds between the light as it went on and off. If they weren’t going to kill him with magic, they were going to do it with boredom.
The door slammed open, and light flooded into the room, blinding him and making him squint. He instinctively raised his hand to block the light from doing more damage. A tall but slim figure stood out through the light.
“You look like a peasant.” A new clean robe was thrown at him, smacking him in the face. “Put that on so you’re at least presentable when we meet with the council.”