—Nyctoph Realm—
Dragneel narrowed her eyes. What luck! From the frying pan into the fire. Ryuoketusai would skin her alive once she stepped into the Ivory Realm. Of all places, it had to be the Nyctoph Realm, right under King Rael’s nose!
“I think you understand the gravity of the situation. So, I hope you won’t be funny. If you can promise me that, I will send you to the Ivory Realm. Not a soul would know.”
Dragneel locked eyes with Night. He wasn’t joking at all. He hated her presence, but his heart wanted to help, even with reluctance. Well, she didn’t blame him. She wouldn’t have helped Dragneel Bloom, who was sprawled on the pathways of the garden, if she were in his shoes. She would never take a generic risk with no meaning. He was an angel in comparison.
“I will not.” Her response was dry, but a glint swirled in her blue irises.
That night passed with both of them holed up in the room. Night remained busy with his paperwork while Bloom got the permission to explore his bookshelves. He had quite the collection, ranging from stories and fables to philosophy and warfare. As Dragneel read through the titles of the books and documentaries, she unearthed an answer she was hoping to find.
Night was indeed under house arrest.
If Dragneel wanted, she could have confronted him then and there. But she had to cook the pot slow or else the stew wouldn’t soak in the flavour.
The morning rays diffused in the cloudy sky and cast an overall grey. The sun was on the horizon, marking the beginning of a verbal conflict.
Night furrowed his eyes in distress, and Dragneel sat on the bed, smirking.
“You say you want to know about the Nyctoph Realm. Why?”
Dragneel raised her eyebrow. She felt awesome with the young lord losing his composure. She shook her head in a pretensive disappointment. “I don’t think I asked something difficult. I just want to know what changed in Nyctoph after the Emperor’s death. Specifically, in the past thousand years.”
Night shut his jaw tight. His fingers curled around the armrest. “I told you yesterday, don’t act funny. If I want, I can hand you over to King Rael’s military officers this very instant.”
Dragneel smiled at him and broke into a fit of giggles. “Hah! Who do you think who’ll get in trouble? Me?” She pointed a finger at herself, then at Night. “Or you?”
Night’s face contorted in disgust. “What do you mean?”
“Oh, it’s as simple as cooking rice.” Dragneel waved her hand in a playful conviction. “I mean, the military officers would be more interested in what I know about you than my business in the Ivory Realm. After all, in a mansion filled with servants, only one serves the lord from behind the doors. No one enters the room, no one goes out.” Dragneel pointed at him as she sank in comfort. “You…you’re under house arrest. Rig—”
A silver flashed in his eyes and pinned Dragneel against the bed. Black tentacles coiled around her limbs and neck and tightened. Dragneel winced as she barely evaded a choke by wedging her wrist between her neck and the tentacle. She grabbed the outline of the treacherous tentacle and tried to push it away. Her body convulsed with the paltry amount of air she had in her system. A bead of sweat outlined her face and fell from her chin.
“Wrong move, lady.” Night strutted up to her and towered over her figure. “Now, I have to silence you.”
Dragneel wheezed with her whites on display. She closed her eyes as her body trembled with her mocking laugh. She slid her palm along the tentacle and twisted it away from her neck. With a swift duck, she freed her neck. Dragneel finally got to see the tentacles through her light-reticent eyes. There was no trace of ‘anything’ coiling around her, but ‘something’ was restraining her.
Night hauled her up in the air, attempting to recapture her neck. Dragneel saved her neck each time by deflecting the black tentacles with flickers of pure energy—Kannu.
A golden particle flew past her eye. And suddenly there were many. A flash crossed her mind. These particles were floating around every time Night used his powers! Maybe it could solve her situation!
As Night flipped her again, there was no resistance. His face hardened, confused by her sudden change of behaviour. “Did you reach enlightenment?” He rubbed his temples. “Don’t be haughty from now on.”
Dragneel was in her own world to even hear Night. She stared at the particles pulsing. Each pulse generated a network of fine threads for Kannu to disperse. And each Kannu carried Night’s instructions to that ‘something’ restraining her.
She raised her head and smirked at Night. Her body glowed white, dispersing her aura into her surroundings. Her Kannu clashed against Night’s Kannu, disrupting the delicate chain of command and feedback.
Night glowered, appalled as Dragneel slipped past his bindings and on to the bed.
Dragneel bounced off the bed and landed on her feet. Sparks flew off her fingertips, and she shot a few rounds at tentacles. Each bullet of Kannu diffused into the innate networks of Night’s Kannu and, one by one, they dropped to the ground like a water drop meeting the pond. They scrambled away, under the bookshelves, behind the curtains, and under Night’s robe. One even came and hid under her feet.
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The black entity copied her movements as she raised her arm to dust away the dirt. Then she understood what they were. “Shadows?” She looked at his face in suggestion.
Night raised his hand and closed his fingers into a fist. The black entities rushed to his palm and swirled to form a ball. Night released his fist as his eyes gleamed, a smile on his lips. The room turned dark, as if someone had switched off the lights. “Yes.”
Dragneel’s extraordinary senses didn’t detect Kannu in the new formation, making it a superior technique in comparison.
Night stopped using his magical prowess. The sunrays leapt to hug both of their figures. They stood dumbfounded now that everything was over, awkward in their own ways. Dragneel glanced over at the mess they had made of the room. The devolution of the bed, displaced books, laundry out of the cabinets, and Night’s paperwork strewn on the floor like feathers after a cockfight.
“At least your bed didn’t break.”
Night side-eyed her murmuring curses. “You started it, Witch.”
Dragneel raised her arms in surrender. “Look, I know what I asked for is sensitive info. Probably involves the situation about the state and political issues, but I have a proper compensation for it.”
Night deadpanned.
“No. I mean, really.” Dragneel nodded her head before Night even commented. “Should we clean it up first?”
Night added to the conversation. “And have some food, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh, yes.”
Night flicked his wrist. Using the black mist, he lifted the scattered documents. The black mist circulated his body and started stacking different reports to different rows and columns in mid-air. Bloom looked up and observed. Threads formed by the black mist intersected and filled the ceiling of the high arch room, exchanging papers like messages around the web.
It took him minutes to assemble the papers. And then he raised his nose in triumph. Dragneel said nothing but understood that he wanted to show his superiority. Well, she wouldn’t reveal more. After all, they couldn’t even pass on their real names.
----------------------------------------
They cleaned the room in silence. With Bloom handing him the things and Night putting them back to place. By the time the maid snuck in her breakfast, they sat in the far corners of the room; the bed abandoned. The maid squinted her eyes, trying her best to figure out what, but nobody cared to explain. Bloom was evasive, whistling softly. And Night was stuttering with his instructions.
They watched the maid slam the doors and then blinked at one another. A strange kinship was brewing between them. They knew that if one revolted, the other followed suit to the guillotine.
“You aren't ordinary. Are you?” said Night, chewing on a leaf.
Bloom glared at the male and then flipped the pages of the report. “I didn’t know you had paperwork to do all while under house arrest.”
Night hiccuped.
“Sorry.” He hiccuped again. “What did you say?”
“Your house arre—”
“How did you even know that?” Night dropped his bowl on the tray. He rolled his eyes in frustration. “Gosh!”
“It’s just because I haven’t seen someone sneak around his own house in a while.” Bloom sipped on the broth of her stew. “And your maid was on her tippy toes, like having me here was a crime. There were people stopping outside to eavesdrop the entire night…around twenty. How do you explain that if you aren’t under observation?” She pointed at his mini library. “That thing has never been updated in a millenia.”
Night looked at her and then at the library. “Then why do you assume I know anything about history in a thousand years? I haven’t left these premises since about the same time.”
“At first, it was an assumption.” Bloom slid her hand under the bed and took out a paper. “Until I saw this.”
Night stood up, pale as a sheet, and frantically counted his sheets. “How did you get that?” He lashed at her.
“You got careless.” Bloom confronted his statement in a serious tone. “Do you now understand why I said that if I’m arrested, you aren’t safe? Also, someone can’t plan a rebellion without knowing what he’s facing. So, shall we seal the deal?”
Night lifted his hands up in surrender. “You win.”
Night scooted closer and Dragneel followed.
“So, to understand the state dynamics of Nyctoph, you need to know what happened before.”
Dragneel raised her finger. “You mean, about King Rael and how he got to power?”
He nodded. “Yes. Prior to Rael, the Ryders had ruled the dragons in Nyctoph and likewise, the Ryder King was the representative of Nyctoph in the Council. This is how the ages have gone by. But then, a dragon challenged the King and won. The dragon was none other than Rael.”
“He didn’t get up on one fine day and challenged the King. Did he? How did the dragons even accept it?”
Night took a sheet and a brush. “That’s what is interesting. Rael took formal education alongside everyone his age, including politics and magic arts at the common academy. He garnered support in the guise of the Ryder family’s illegitimate relative.”
“Illegitimate relative?”
“The Ryder family has a specific rule that has protected the family from potential rebellion. Only the immediate descendant is eligible for the kingship. All the others are illegitimate relatives. They don’t inherit the kingship, but receive positions in fields that suit them the most.”
He made three circles on the paper and connected them with lines, showing parent and progeny, a family tree. “Let’s say a King has two sons. Both are eligible to inherit the kingship. One of them becomes the King and has children. Then, after the King, the eligible candidates are the brother and the King’s children. But the brother’s children aren’t eligible candidates.”
“So, was King Rael even an illegitimate relative?”
“While many speculated it was false, it ended up true. But why will an illegitimate even get support? There’s an incident behind it too.”
Night pursued his hands and took a deep breath. He closed his eyes and lowered his voice. “It’s called the Royal Arson. Two thousand years ago, the Ryder family died in an arson act. All of them, except the King and his immediate family because they weren’t in Nyctoph. Investigation failed to reveal the reason for the fire. It was called an arson because even the generals died in the fire. Imagine the supposedly best warriors dying because of fire. They recovered all the bodies and discovered that everyone was dead, basically.”
“But then King Rael appeared.” Dragneel looked up from the paper. “And the nobles got a weapon they could use against the royals. Classic move.”
“Yes,” Night said. “Rael Ozmer survived an arson that no one could. We even dug up the coffins to confirm. The dead were in their caskets while he roamed the land. As if he appeared from thin air.”