Crowned in Black: Chapter 50

None of the dragons stopped us as we flew for the Eyrie.

Karalti was near the end of her endurance, but flew with a grim determination I had only seen a few times before. The two hundred-or-so dragons stationed at the Eyrie had emerged in a great cloud of wings and scales, roaring, keening, shrieking and wheeling in the sky. They were attacking the top of the Eyrie - their prison - in exultant rage.

My dragon seemed to know where she was going: she winged into a tunnel, then tucked her wings and body and plunged down a narrow shaft into the heart of the great tower. It went all the way down, through all the resting niches and the human-occupied levels, the ground floors with their chapels and prisons and halls, and underground. We burst out into the Nesting Chamber, and for the first time in half a year, I laid eyes on the Matriarch.

Usta the Pearl Queen had only been moved slightly from the last place I'd seen her. She lay on top of the nest where she had laid Hyperion, Tempest and Whisper’s eggs, all while she guarded her one and only Queen egg-inside of her crop. The stricken queen had been bloated, weighed down by tarnished jewelry and her own body. She was no longer fat. Over the course of half a year, she had become emaciated, her once-beautiful pearl scales clinging to her bones. They looked blurry. She was pierced through her wings and the flaps of skin at the corners of her jaws, and manacled at the wrists. All of these bonds were attached to chains secured to thick iron rings on the floor of the hatching chamber. If not for the slight rise and fall of her massive chest, I would have thought she was dead. In front of her was a large stone altar, and on top of that, held suspended by magic… was Withering Rose’s empty Heartstone.

"Mother!" Karalti cried out in dismay as she backwinged and landed beside her. Moaning with grief, she sank to her keel beside her mother and began to frantically nuzzle and lick at her head and neck, reaching a wing over to shield Usta's body. "What have they DONE to you?"

"Torture of the foulest kind." Usta's mental voice was rough with exhaustion. "They never forgave me for saving you, my daughter. Come... stand before me. Let me behold you."

Karalti's pain and sorrow beat through the Bond as she obediently staggered back up to her feet and paced around restlessly, crooning in her throat. Usta cracked a pale blue eye, looking up at her... and the corners of her maw lifted into something like a smile.

"Dark as night, brilliant as the sunset reflecting off the shores of a lake... ahh, Karalti. My beautiful daughter."Usta sighed and stirred weakly in her chains. It was an effort for her to roll onto her chest, but she managed it. I rubbed at my eyes, and silently urged Karalti to go and help her. "To see you like this... grown. Free. With a rider you love, who cares for you. It is a miracle.”

"A miracle you created," I said. My voice was tight. "I never got to thank you, Usta."

"That you have taken such good care of my daughter is thanks enough." Weak as she was, Usta's will was truly ferocious. The Matriarch clung to life with single-minded purpose. “I swore that I would not pass until I saw her.”

"We have to get you out of here! Out of... out of this!" Karalti seized one of the chains in her mouth, and hauled back on the ring. "Wait! We have healing magic now! Just hold on!"

"Karalti..." but before Usta could protest, Karalti's body hummed. She laid her claws onto her mother's neck, and the luminous blue-green energy of Breath of Life flowed up around her... only to dissipate on contact with the ruined queen's body.

"No! Why isn't it working?!" Karalti screeched aloud, nearly bucking me off as she reared sharply to her hind feet.

"Because I am held together by will alone." Usta shuddered in mingled pain and disgust, and as she shifted, I realized that her scales weren't just dull because of her ill health. They were peppered with millions of tiny holes. Void energy. "The Deceiver's puppet had me sing a Drachan, Malice, from the crystal prison that contained it, and transfer it into a sword. It meant the Drachan was channeled through my body, Karalti. There is no healing the damage it has done to me, not even with the Black God's blessing. But listen to me now: before she left for the Caul, our ancestress, Lahati, sent me a dream. She told me that she had given you her Queensgift to aid you in your war against the Drachan... but if you are to control the dragons of this eyrie, you must still take blood from me. But… I fear for you. This Drachan, Malice… it was nothing but howling nothingness and hatred."

Grief-stricken as she was, Karalti nodded. She drew herself up to her full height, neck rearing. "If it is Hector and I's destiny to die defending the world from the Deceivers... then it is a burden I accept. Life is worth protecting."

“As brave as I hoped.” Usta rumbled her approval. The great pearlescent head lifted from the ground, struggling under the weight of the chains hanging from her cheeks. Her jaws worked, and the sharp, sweet smell of mana filled the air as Usta's jaws parted, and she extended her bloody tongue. The vivid turquoise blood pooled in the center of it.

"Then take this, and know all that I know," Usta said. "The bloodgift I should have been permitted to give you when you were born. Gods… I feel Solnetsi’s rage. I understand her anger at these humans."

“Most of us aren’t like that,” I said. “The humans of Vlachia hold the Solonkratsu with reverence.”

“Good.” Usta closed her eyes.

Karalti craned her muzzle forward, and wrapped her tongue around her mother's like a handshake. A pulse of blue-white light passed between them, and the color seams between Karalti's scales flared, then began to glow and slowly pulse as Usta's body did the same.

[Karalti has learned the Song of Binding!]

[Karalti has regained mana: 1200/1200 MP]

[The Diamond Pact has been broken. Your Queen has gained her first Flight of Dragons!]

[You have completed Darkness Shines in Light Places! You gain 6500 EXP!]

[Karalti gains 8433 EXP. Karalti is Level 21!]

Song of Binding

An ancient spell used to translocate, bind, or release souls and non-corporeal entities into suitable non-living vessels. Brought by the Solonkratsu to Archemi, the Song of Binding is only available to queen dragons descended from the magitechnologically-enhanced lines of the Nine, the most powerful of the Solonkratsu to descend from Erruku. Karalti, as a direct descendant of Matir, is able to cast this spell.

Casting the Song of Binding consumes almost three quarters of a dragon's available mana pool. However, the Hymn is powerful enough that it can be used to bind the non-souls of dragons, gods and greater spirits, and even the Drachan into weapons and other suitable whitecrystal mana vessels. The Song of Binding was a vital component in the creation of the Dragon Gates, the Caul of Souls, and other grand magical artifacts created by the dragons.

As Navigail finished reading the description to me, the transfer between Karalti and Usta began to fade, leaving Karalti bigger, stronger, and glowing with heat... and Usta depleted. With a soft groan, the elder queen slumped to the ground, head flopping loosely to the sands.

"Mother!" Karalti hadn't even quite finished growing before she went to her, shielding her with her wings and frantically licking at her face and neck. "No! Please! You can't!"

"I have done what I dreamed of one day doing, in all the days spent rotting in this dark place. Do not grieve for me, my daughter. We broke the cycle... and we are now both free." Usta's voice was dreamy now, her throat clicking on every shallow, labored breath. "My only regret is that I have never... that I have never seen the sky."

"Wait." I spoke before I realized what I was doing, taking a step forward. "Usta... this spell, the Song of Binding. It’s not just for moving Drachan around. It's the spell that was used to bind the Nine to the Gates, to make the Gates themselves. What if you COULD see the sky? What if... what if instead of risking Karalti's life to bind a Drachan into the Heartstone... what if it was you?"

Karalti's head turned to me in shock. Usta cracked open one rheumy eye.

"I know you're dying. I know you're exhausted... that you've given everything for us, for Archemi." My hands balled into fists as I came closer. "But this death, it’s wrong. It's not fair that you've never been allowed out of this fucking place. It's not fair that you die like this." I felt my voice growing louder. "It's not fair that Karalti and I might need to kill ourselves to bind one of these motherfucking Drachan to a machine that will always want to corrupt and kill the woman I love. So come with us. Let Karalti use the power you just gave her to sing YOUR soul into that stone. Let us install you into Withering Rose, and FIGHT. Fight the piece of shit people who did this to you, who caused this mess by feeding Squalor and fucking around with what Archemi was supposed to be. Because sure, this world was supposed to have its challenges and its hardships, wars and conflicts and who knows what else... but it wasn't meant to be like THIS, where we have to sacrifice our lives, maybe even our souls, and deal with this fucking hellspawned Lovecraftian shit. So come with us, Usta. Please. You might not be able to hold onto this body, but as the heart of a Warsinger, you can stand by me and Karalti's side and face the future with us. As a fucking apex predator. As a warrior and a Queen. As a dragon, and all that means. Free and powerful and... angry. Righteously fucking angry, and alive."

My voice was cracking a little by the end of the rant, gauntlets creaking from how hard I was squeezing my fingers into my palms. But with every word, I watched the light rekindle in Usta's brilliant blue-white eye. Even on the verge of death, her will was so powerful that it beat out into the air like a forcefield.

"I chose my daughter's Rider wisely."Usta's telepathic voice was still breathy, but the dreamy, distant quality had vanished, replaced by a core of iron. "Karalti. Do it."

"But mother-"

"DO IT." Usta growled. "He is right. My life... my whole life was taken from me. I spent it here, chained in the bowels of the earth. I can surrender to the Black God's embrace and go sweetly and meekly to my death, or I can exact retribution for what was done. And not only to me. To my mother, and her mother before her, and to Lirenian and her beloved Grigori, betrayed for power over us and our kind. This body will die, Karalti, but he is correct. I can live on. I can fight. As a dragon queen, descendant of Matir himself... as a Warsinger. Rejoin the lines of the circle around me, and use it. Quickly, before this prison of flesh expires. I cannot hold on much longer."

Karalti shuddered, head bowing, but climbed to her feet and flicked her wings neatly along her flanks. I went to her, and felt through the Bond that she wanted me to mount... so I did, leaping to her back and crouching on one shoulder. My dragon paced around the circle inscribed around the struggling body of her mother, found the gap, and nicked one of her fingers with her teeth. She used the blood to close the ring, and it flared softly, as did the pylons around the empty Heartstone.

"Thank you," Usta sighed.

Karalti rattled in her throat as she paced over and positioned herself behind the stone, sitting back on her haunches and the base of her tail. She spread her hands and wings, lifted her head, and concentrated. I watched her mana pool begin to sink. I held onto the saddle straps like a sailor holding onto the rigging of a mast. Karalti's entire body began to glow with a luminous nimbus of energy, and her jaws parted as she began to sing with a high, pure tone. Like all Solonkratsu songs, there were no lyrics... only the compressed, coded words of power, each one drawn into pure polyphonic melody. My dragon's throat swelled as each new note built and overlaid the other.

I watched as the elder queen gave one last sigh and fell limp, the pearly scales dulling to a bone-white color as SOMETHING drew from her and flowed forward, into the stone. The Heartstone began to glow, and glow... light flooded the hatching chamber, lighting up every dusty, dark alcove in the cavern. Karalti was crying, eyes tightly sealed, radiant blue mana leaking from the corners of her eyes and down her scaled cheeks as she called Usta's soul from her body. The sound piped through every doorway, and as I closed my eyes, I heard the singing of hundreds of dragons roll through the tower above, all of them in tune with their new Queen.

Suddenly, there was an incandescent burst - then a shockwave of energy that rattled the foundations of the tower and sent the sands of the hatching chambers flying into the air. And when the light and dust cleared, the Heartstone remained, floating between the pylons like a brilliantly burning, blue-white star. Lightning licked across its surface, flashes that danced off the corpse of the dragon sprawled before it. But even though Usta's body seemed small, dull and shrunken, the force of her mind - her soul - radiated from the Heartstone and swelled over us.

The chorus outside of the Eyrie turned to a rumble as the earth and sky both began to shake. Thunder and lightning rained down from the sky, and I felt my link to Matir start to fray.

“Solnetsi is free. We have to go, now,” I said urgently, dropping back to the saddle. “Grab the Heartstone!”

Karalti threw her head back and roared to the rumbling ceiling - one last salute to her mother before she shook herself and stalked forward. She clasped the great glowing stone in her arms, folding it into her Inventory.

“One final gift to you, Herald.” The voice of the Black God whispered through my mind. “The very last. Karalti… call your brothers and sisters to you. I will return you all to Myszno.”

“TO ME!” Karalti’s mental voice flared through the Eyrie. Hundreds of voices cried out in response, and as she stalked for the doors to the Nesting Chamber, they blew open. No fewer than six dragons and their riders were on the other side. As one, they bowed to us.

Karalti breezed by them, letting out short, sharp barking noises. Cutthroat made similar noises when she was looking for Suri - location calls. We charged through the Eyrie, gathering dragons from every corner of the colossal structure. The pack of us smashed out through another door into the wasteland surrounding the tower, where still more found us. Karalti sang as she flung herself into the air, followed by every dragon still in the Eyrie.

Solnetsi was stalking toward the Eyrie, dragging her white wing along the ground. Matir had hurt her, but he hadn’t killed her. The expression on the Godzilla-sized dragon’s muzzle was one of pure, focused murder. Lightning struck the Eyrie and sent a massive chunk of it flying to one side. Dragons shrilled as the debris threatened to knock us all from the sky.

“Godspeed, my Herald. My daughter.” Matir whispered. “And… thank you.”

Darkness seized us, and then the cold. And as we warped away, I saw the tower fall.