Page 80

80

She Who is Named for the Night & The Dawn

NYX

T he fire led me onto the terrace, where it then defied logic and gravity, climbing the ledge and lighting the way along the snowy bluffs, rounding a bend into the unknown.

I sucked in a sharp breath, preparing to scale the mountain. I’d scaled buildings—it couldn’t be much different, right?

I could feel Michael watching me but I didn’t dare look back. If I looked back, I was done for.

I didn’t look down, either. I didn’t need to know how far I’d fall if I made one wrong move.

Planting my palms on the ledge, I heaved myself up. The bottoms of my leather boots were ridged and grippy, thank the Goddess. I rose to a full stance, gauging the path the flames lit for me. The terrace sat beside a tall cliff that had one lip jutting out that was level with my feet. Less than a foot wide, and I’d have to jump to it. The jump was short but if I made one mistake, I’d be raven food a thousand feet below.

I can do this , I vowed.

A dormant, hidden part of me knew what was happening. My soul, perhaps. Half of me felt as though I’d been waiting my entire life for this moment.

The other half, though? The conscious half? Had no fucking idea what was going on.

There was no point in drawing it out. I just needed to jump over to the lip of rock on the side of the giant cliff that may or may not be able to hold my weight. Easy.

Here goes nothing.

My teeth clenched, my belly instantly diving as the ground vanished from under my feet. The mountain air nipped at my cheeks and messed up my hair, and for a fleeting second, I thought for sure I was dead.

But I landed on the rock, and it didn’t buckle under me.

I wobbled a bit, pressing my body tightly against the flat slate of icy stone. With my heart going bonkers, I had to let out a laugh. A manic, deranged sound.

With my back pressed against the wall, I started shifting along the ledge, following the blue flames. Each step I took gobbled them up, leaving only smoke in my wake. I didn’t allow myself a glance back at the terrace before I rounded the bluff and it was out of sight.

Looking back was simply not an option. Like Orpheus’s ascent out of the underworld, I had to keep going. Only I didn’t know if I was heading to hell or salvation.

What I did know is I’d follow the mysterious blue fire anywhere.

I scaled the narrow lip as long as I could until it dropped off and the fire trickled down the frozen slope of the mountain. I bit the inside of my cheek as I peered down at the whole lot of nothing I’d have to hold onto. I’d have to slide down on my ass and pray for the best.

This was mad. Entirely fucking mad. I was about to abandon the tiny ounce of security I had and plummet down the deadly slope into oblivion. A thick bed of fog clung to the cliffs below, swallowing up the blue flames so I had no inclination of where they led.

The strange fire could have been a trick or a trap or a figment of my imagination. I could have hallucinated that entire scenario with Michael.

“No,” I growled aloud. “This is real. It’s real. Keep going.”

I stepped one foot off the lip of the rock, letting my boot hover over the mysterious darkness. The full moon beamed her silver-blue light upon me, and when I glanced up at her, a wave of serenity washed over me. The stars around her twinkled encouragingly. Was the night sky on my side?

One, two, three.

I yelped as I jumped, my ass quickly colliding with the icy tilted rock that snatched me and yanked me down into the depths of the unknown.

My fingers aimlessly grasped for purchase and the fog laughed in my face as it devoured me. I slid and thrashed as the gnarled surface of the unforgiving mountain tore my skin apart. The speed was jarring but it was worse that I couldn’t see a thing. I must have descended over a hundred feet before the ground began to flatten out. I was almost relieved until the earth vanished from under me and I found myself captured by a ravenous free fall.

My scream filled the night before my stomach lurched into my throat and snuffed it out.

Desperately, instinctively, I clawed at the mountain. A strangled cry of relief left me as my fingers clasped around a jutting stone. My body jolted to a harsh stop. My jaw snapped shut on the impact and I instantly tasted blood. I dangled there, my mind spinning out of control. I’d passed through the fog, so when I looked down, I saw the endless nothing that hungered for me.

“Fuck,” I whimpered, tightening my fingers around the stone that was the single thing standing between me and death. My arms were already burning from holding my body weight. My chest ached with the ferocity of my pulse. A cloud had passed over the moon and now the world was dark and hopeless and I was hanging alone on the side of a mountain and I’d die here and maybe they’d never find my body.

No. You will not die tonight. Keep going.

Delusional until the bitter end, I was.

I searched for the blue fire. Had I lost it?

Angling my neck around to see was beyond difficult but finally, I spotted a cluster of blue light. Nearly a hundred feet down and to the left, the fire writhed on a flat plateau of rock.

There was no way for me to get there. Besides swinging my body and flinging myself and miraculously making it that far and surviving the drop.

This was quite the special fucking night.

I hung there, panting, reality crushing me from every angle. My fingers were searing with pain. I was going to slip soon.

Then I remembered how Solaris had tossed me off that building. Three stories down onto the pavement. I had stuck the landing.

I released an aggravated cry at the ogling stars. The cloud over the moon passed, her silver light drenching me once more. How was this my life?

“Fine,” I grunted.

Building momentum with my legs and hips, I started to swing my body. I couldn’t think about it or I’d fuck up. I swung myself and at the last second, I kicked my boots hard against the side of the mountain and launched into the frigid air that whistled in my ears as it claimed me.

The fall was fast and furious and purely outrageous. If the trees below had any sentience at all, they’d laugh at me. Perhaps my last thoughts would be about how unhinged I was as a person. My entire life had been one big bravado of chaos and bad choices. It all played in my mind’s eye as a pathetic montage as I hurtled toward the bluffs below.

The last thing I saw before I was walloped into darkness was a bed of blue flames.

When I came to, everything hurt.

I groaned, my hand instantly nursing the back of my head. I felt as though I’d been crushed in one of those industrial car flattening machines. My spine, my legs, my neck—everything burned with ripe agony.

But I was alive.

It all came back to me and I had to choke a laugh. The Goddess wasn’t done with me yet.

Groaning some more, I forced myself to sit up and scour my surroundings. I’d made it to the platform of rock, but the blue fire had abandoned me.

I stared into the dark mouth before me—an entrance into a cave.

Somewhere deep inside it, blue light flickered.

“Great,” I rasped. “Can’t we be done already?”

It took me several minutes to let my bones heal and gather the strength to stand up. I swayed in the cold wind, my teeth chattering. Why wasn’t my fire keeping me warm? I tried to summon it, but I was met with an internal wall. Nothing to tap into. My heart tumbled in alarm.

I held my hands out and then it all made sense.

I’d shifted.

Growling in annoyance, I stalked into the cave. I had no energy left to be apprehensive. It was just time to get this shit over with.

The cave was deep and dark, with narrow walls but a surprisingly high roof. Jedidiah would have had to duck, but I was fine. It went straight in for about twenty feet before it curved and robbed me of knowing what fresh hell sat in waiting. I stopped before the bend, taking in a sharp breath and steeling myself.

Blue light pulsed, summoning me forward.

The breath was knocked from my lungs. It made no sense. Had I died after all?

I crept forward, beckoned by the roaring blue flames that crackled in the rounded space of the dead-end cave. This fire was stacked with logs, burning like a regular fire, save for that ethereal blue shade. Next to it was a small treasure trove that looked as if it had been around to witness the birth of the first mountain. Its aged wood was nearly colorless, the padlock ready to crumble to dust. At my feet lie scattered, charred animal bones.

On the other side of the fire, was the dragon. He didn’t look right.

My heart pounded to a fierce beat as I studied him in his strange, ghostly state. His scales were a pale, dull beige instead of gold, and he was curled up in a tight ball, as still as stone. He should have sensed me but he didn’t flinch.

“ Pst ,” I called.

Nothing.

I dared to move toward him, each step bringing me closer, yet confusing me more.

His scales, they were—

“Oh, my Goddess,” I whispered. The vision he’d shown me from the fire. His scales looked all wrong because those weren’t his scales—it was in some kind of chrysalis that had formed around him.

That meant…

A magnetic tug on my heart had me turning around. Facing the blue flames once more, and the trove beside them. I swore I heard the faint tinkle of bells coming from them.

Calling me.

Shakily, I kneeled beside the strange chest, taking a few deep breaths.

The lock opened for me before my fingers even touched it.

My lips parted in awe as I opened the lid. I hadn’t known what to expect, but it wasn’t this. Pale light from the fire illuminated a coiled-up leather whip. A pipe packed with dried herbs. And a piece of paper rolled up like a scroll, bound with a wax dragon sigil.

I stared into the trove while my heart attempted to shoot from my throat. Knowing the words awaiting me in the scroll were going to irrevocably change my life forever, I grabbed it, my fingers trembling.

She who is named for the night and the dawn,

If you are reading this it means you made it to the second half of your Initiation and for that, you should be proud, but the real trial has just begun.

The Goddess chose you to resurrect a legacy that has been maliciously wiped from the realm.

Sacrifices have been made to allow your dragon the power to transcend his juvenile form in the span of two moon cycles. He will rise a mountable beast, and you must be ready. To secure the bond you must face your deepest fear and unlock the secret power that has been lying dormant in your soul.

When you are ready, the dragon will challenge you.

May the Goddess be with you, Drakiana.

— S.S.

Time to process the words was not a luxury that I was given. As soon as I finished reading, the herbs in the pipe lit themselves and began to smoke.

I dropped the paper and grabbed the pipe, bringing it shakily to my lips. I didn’t recognize the scent. These were no common herbs that I’d ever encountered. The intangible aroma had strange visions dancing in my mind’s eye before I even breathed in the smoke. When I dared to inhale, pins and needles exploded in my head, and the world was vacuumed away into blackness.