35.

A floating light shimmered into existence, blue-white and stark against the blood red lighting, the mote of light slowly expanded outward. Erak watched as the ball of light grew, bones at first until a young dragon’s skeleton was staring at them. Then tendons and muscles, blood and veins, then flesh and scales. A pair of stubby horns emerged from its head, lightning dancing around them as aqualine blue eyes formed.

An Eastern dragon, with a long sinuous body with a pair of long arms with flexible finders capped with sharp talons. It didn’t have wings as their heavier but more compact Western siblings had, but rather danced on the air currents, moving with the fast wiggling of a snake. Gray frills ran down its back and its scales were light blues, whites, and grays.

“You have doomed yourselves!” it wailed, shaking and trembling as it whirled in tight circles.

“Doomed!” It repeated, voice high pitched and keening.

“Is it broken?” one of the soldiers asked.

Spirit of Intellect

Rare

The only information on the small dragon that Erak could discern with a glance. He looked back over to Rutledge who thumped up to them and peered at it. The spirit stopped its keening cry and stopped in mid air to look at the old woman.

“Hmmm…strange. I can’t see anything about him,” Rutledge murmured. Erak looked at the old woman and for the first time saw the strands of Essence around her eyes. Unlike when others used the power, this use was subtle, just thin tendrils emanating from her eyes.

“I don’t want you peering into me!” the small dragon squeaked.

“Why are we doomed?” Sammus cut in, leaning around the old professor to look at the spirit.

“There is a creature on this ship. When I awoke, the ship was staffed with many people, but as I became cognizant, they were snuffed out.”

“By?” Sammus said. Rutledge was still peering intently at the spirit, frown increasing in both size and depth.

“It’s in the loading bay, but I don’t know what it is. There is something there preventing me from entering. That’s where all the crew headed to when it started.”

“Erak, are you going to kill it?” Sammus asked. Erak stared at the prince. What else was he supposed to do?

Erak turned to Nevia and invited her to join him with a few shorthand signs. Julius leaned over and whispered what he asked and Nevia nodded.

“My Prince, will you be staying here?” Nevia asked.

“No. I will go and find my subjects and if we can free them, then I will endeavor to do so.”

“Professors, I wish for you to stay here then. Constance and Bendu, stay here with the professors. Keaton, you’re with me. Stick with your battle partner. Lord Bloodsworn, Prince Sammus, we are ready,” Nevia said as she finished rearranging her small team.

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“Erak, I believe you’ll wish to lead the way,” Sammus said, waving back the way they had come.

Erak stood there and then looked at Julius and asked him where the hangar was. The professor nodded and asked the dragon.

“Lord Bloodsworn wishes to know the exact location of the hangar.”

“Out the hallway and to the elevator. Final level, button is labeled H,” the spirit supplied instantly. Erak nodded and started to trek out. The elevator was small like everything else and Erak entered it without looking at the others. Nevia squeezed herself into a nook that Erak didn’t take up and clicked the button to take them down to the hangar. The doors shut and Nevia looked up to him.

“My lord, it is my job to protect you. I know you are stronger than us, but my job, me mission, is to escort you and keep you alive to serve the Throne. I can’t do that if you go rushing off every time something catches your interest. I ask that you wait for a moment or three so we can accompany you.”

Erak nodded instantly. He had his own thoughts of that as well, she had lost most of her command following him and this was the least he could do for her. He wouldn’t stop his hunting as long as it didn’t pull him away from his overall mission.

“Better this way anyways. If you die, then it’s almost assured that we will all be dead. Better to die by your side than report the death of an Iron Ring bearer.” The elevator stopped and dinged open, Nevia not hesitating as she flowed out of the elevator with her sword drawn.

Erak left the elevator and he could swear that the entire thing lifted up as his feet left the elevator. Nevia looked at him and he sighed as he waited for the elevator to return with the rest of the team. He looked about while they waited.

The elevator had deposited them outside of a massive blast door of polished steel. The wide expanse of metal was decorated in strange glyphs, similar to what the sacrificial cannons had outside of the Armory. Paint had been used instead of blood, black as tar and still wet, they seemed to pulse and wiggle as Erak looked at them.

The doors to the elevator opened up and the rest of the team came out. They had all managed to squeeze themselves into the space and looked relieved to come out of it.

“Well, that’s disturbing,” Sammus muttered as he stared at the doors. Erak nodded in agreement before walking over to the door. The closer he got, the worse the feeling of being an invader grew. It was a feeling he should leave, an instinct as old as time that told him this was dangerous. He stopped inches from the door, the glyphs growing in size until they dominated his vision. Behind him, the mutters and curses of the rest of the party was fading away as if they were walking away.

Each brutal line of the glyphs, the way the paint clung to the steel, the way it absorbed the light. His breath caught in his chest as he stared at it. The world faded away as he fell inward into the darkness.

A hiss of air and then the darkness was sliding away and Erak could see in front of him, but it was obscured like a haze in both mind and eye. A creature stood there, gaunt and with a bulbous head and delicate fingers. Red dripped from its fingers as a wide smile spread across its face, showing off its thin needle like teeth. Erak wanted to raise his spear and slay it, but his arms weighed more than the world itself.

Every breath was a challenge.

Every heartbeat a strain.

Every thought moving through molasses.

“Ahhh….more ingredients. Excellent. Enter,” its voice was a rasp of steel on stone and Erak’s feet moved without him thinking it. The hangar was decorated with cocoons, wet and glistening they hung suspended from the ceiling and draped all the way to the floor. Gray-green and thin, he could see shapes moving inside of them, twisting and churning, shadows straining for freedom.

“So many lost, but more shall rise. Our Lord is a resourceful Lord, he wastes not,” the creature kept talking as the rest of the party walked into the hangar. The doors clanged shut as Erak stood entranced by the cocoons even as the haze around his mind was breaking away.

“You shall become something more. Yes…more. A great creation. A great…tool.” Its whispery words were dreadful, sliding down Erak’s spine like a stiletto. His hands clenched tight, straining under the pressure on his body. The heft and solid feel of the spear in his hand offered him assurance and grounding.

A terrible tearing sound reverberated across the hangar, the sound of cloth tearing, but wet and visceral. Talons speared through the cocoon and forced it open, then a shape came sliding out in a spray of blood to slide across the hangar.