Page 3

He tilted his head back slightly, dropping the hood of his cape, then raised his arms to the sky before beginning to utter a curious litany of strange accents.

He was using an unfamiliar language, though I’d studied no less than a dozen of them: Osacanian and Arslaisian, which, along with Muvarian, were the most widely spoken languages of the Lower World, as well as local dialects and even those of distant islands.

Suddenly, something strange happened: the grass began to quiver and the branches of the trees cracked.

I could even hear the black roses shiver under an imaginary wind.

I looked around, anxious and alert. My gaze met Dovah’s.

He wore a worrying half-smile, even somewhat mocking.

He was amused by my fear, which made me all the more furious.

As for Paivrin, he continued to chant prayers, or magic incantations, given the change in atmosphere.

“You’re going to belong to me, Ashana of Muvaria,” said Dovah abruptly in a deep, sensual voice.

It was the first time he’d said my name. As my gaze was drawn to his, I felt as if he were hypnotizing me.

“You will bind your soul to mine. Your life to mine. Your body to mine. For all eternity,” he continued. “Neither time, nor space, nor other gods, old or new, will be able to break what will unite us, for only our Father’s will prevails.”

The roses began to grow and, before my astonished eyes, spread out over the ground in a carpet of brambles. Then came the grass. It covered Paivrin from head to toe, wrapping itself around Dovah’s and my clasped hands.

“What’s going on?” I panicked. “Is this magic?”

My fiancé smiled ominously.

“A magic as old as the world, when the creators still reigned as absolute masters over this desolate land now trodden by ungrateful humans. I take you as my bride, Ashana of Muvaria. You are now the wife of a powerful lord, the lord of ashes. Let my blood flow through your veins and let yours set me free.”

I didn’t quite understand the meaning of the words he spoke, and there was a bizarre echo that layered over them, giving them a frightening dimension.

Then he bowed to me to unite our lips and seal our marriage according to his religion—or so I thought.

No one had kissed me before Dovah. No one had even considered stealing a kiss from me, for that matter.

I had no means of comparison, but the instant his mouth pressed against mine, my whole body began to vibrate, as an unfamiliar warmth spread everywhere, right down to my belly.

I felt wobbly and, probably to prevent me from collapsing to the floor, Dovah encircled my waist with his muscular arm.

The only coherent thought that managed to cross my foggy mind was: No!

Don’t let your father’s murderer kiss you!

I tried to push him away, but to no avail. I felt like I was trying to push over a mountain.

“Dovah!”

I opened my eyes first. I hadn’t even realized I’d closed them. Dovah ignored Paivrin and let out a curious growl as he tried to force the barrier of my lips. He even tightened his grip, and I felt completely trapped.

“Dovah! Come on, that’s not how it’s done!” His friend lectured him angrily.

Suddenly, my now-husband opened his eyes in amazement. He tried to pull away from me in such a hurry that I almost fell over backwards as he released me. This would have happened, had we not been held by a kind of egg-cocoon of grass and branches in which our legs were trapped.

“What is this?” I exclaimed.

“Dovah was a little too enthusiastic, so nature acted as a kind of mirror to his impulse,” Paivrin explained flatly.

“Enough!” roared Dovah, cutting Paivrin off in his explanation. “Do what you need to do to get us out of here!”

To which Paivrin smiled hypocritically.

“It’s all your fault. I thought you were going to...”

But Dovah, his eyes black with fury, interrupted him with an index finger pointed in the air.

“Don’t go any further. I mean it.”

His interlocutor did not take his threat lightly and, with a grave expression, struck the ground three times with his staff. It took a while, but the grass, branches, and brambles retreated, as if slowly curling in on themselves.

Once free, Dovah walk away first. I thought he was going to let his friend and me return home alone, but no. He was just waiting much further away.

“Don’t hold it against him too much. He was only obeying orders.”

I didn’t answer, for the simple reason that I understood perfectly well what he was getting at.

The fact remained that, wedding ceremony or not, you don’t shamelessly kiss the daughter of the man you’d just slaughtered a few hours earlier.

But should we expect a different kind of attitude from the man everyone called the Black Demon?

“Your union was inevitable,” insisted the young man. “You’re going to live together from now on, so try not to let your hatred overwhelm you. It will destroy you...both of you.”

“What kind of ceremony was that?” I asked, trying to change the subject. I wasn’t familiar with this religious rite. I also wasn’t ready to discuss my future as a wife, especially today.

“I imagine your religion is that of the One God,” continued Paivrin.

I nodded in confirmation.

“Well, I’d only say that ours evokes the sons of a single god who’s just a little older than yours, and that it’s a religion that’s rather inherent to our ‘particular’ nature.”

We both walked slowly, taking the time to smell the fragrance of the rose gardens. Nature? Particular? What did he mean by that?

“Really? What is its name?” I asked.

“The Cult of the Patriarchs.”

I stopped dead in my tracks. I’d heard about it as a child.

The famous Cult of the Four Patriarchs. A devotion to four dragons, the ones who supposedly created our world.

Four dragons were said to have emerged from the womb of the Source after its union with the Father of the Universe, all endowed with great powers.

There was the ash dragon, the terrible black dragon.

He was the originator of earth, volcanoes, and lava.

His stone was ruby, and his power was fire.

His flames were capable of reducing the whole world to dust. Then there was the jade dragon, who had created nature, flora, and fauna.

Then came the sapphire dragon, creator of rivers, seas, and lakes.

And finally, the opal dragon, the sky dragon, master of the wind and lord of the clouds.

It was an old religion, really. Perhaps even the very first of human beings.

However, dragons didn’t exist. No one had seen one for thousands of years.

This cult fell into obsolescence, becoming nothing more than a forgotten legend, a myth at best.

I turned to Paivrin.

“I never thought I’d meet anyone practicing this lost religion.”

Paivrin opened his mouth to reply when suddenly, a shrill cry rang out. A feminine scream that gave me goose bumps. The desperate cry was followed by loud laughter. Without a moment’s thought, I rushed to the call for help.