Chapter 5 (abridged)
Helene's boots slipped on the scree as she climbed, sending a cascade of pebbles skittering down the mountain face. The wind howled through the jagged rocks, tearing at her cloak with icy fingers. She paused, pressing a hand to her ribs where the altitude stole her breath, and stared up at the black fissure in the cliffside—Drogar's lair. The entrance yawned like a wound in the stone, edged with frost that never melted, not even in high summer.
Her daughter's pendant—Selena's pendant—burned against her sternum beneath the layers of wool and leather. Helene touched it through the fabric, feeling the familiar outline of the silver oak leaf. She'd taken it from Selena's cooling body in the mortuary, pried it from stiff fingers that had clutched it even in death. The metal had left angry red impressions in the girl's palm—as if she'd been trying to press it into her very flesh.
A gust nearly knocked her sideways. Helene dug her fingers into a crevice, feeling the rock bite into her skin. Blood welled, dark as wine in the moonlight, but she welcomed the pain. It grounded her. Made her remember why she was climbing this cursed mountain in the dead of night. The wind carried whispers—or perhaps it was just the blood rushing in her ears—but she could have sworn she heard Selena's laughter in it, light and carefree as it had been before that golden-haired prince had ruined everything.
The last stretch was sheer. Helene's muscles trembled with exhaustion as she hauled herself up inch by inch, her boots scraping for purchase on the icy stone. One misstep would send her plummeting to the rocks below, where bones—both animal and human—lay scattered like broken twigs. She wondered how many of those skeletons had belonged to desperate souls like her, willing to bargain with a dragon for vengeance.
When her fingers finally closed around the ledge, Helene dragged herself into the cave mouth with a grunt. The air inside was unnaturally still, thick with the scent of sulfur and something older—like lightning caught in a bottle. Her breath fogged before her as she straightened, brushing frost from her sleeves. The cavern tunnel stretched deeper into the mountain, darkness pooling like spilled ink.
Helene's footsteps echoed unnaturally in the cavern, each click of her boot heels bouncing back at her twice—once from the walls, once from something much larger lurking in the dark.
"You've come earlier than I expected," rumbled a voice like grinding millstones.
A gout of emerald flame erupted twenty paces ahead, illuminating the cavern in sickly green. The fire clung to nothing, hovering midair to reveal the dragon coiled around a dais of blackened bones. Drogar's scales drank in the light, their iridescence shifting between bruise-purple and arterial red as he flexed clawed wings. His muzzle split in what might have been a smile, revealing teeth longer than Helene's forearm.
Helene didn't flinch. She'd seen courtiers' smiles just as sharp when she was the court’s pet witch.
Drogar's nostrils flared as he inhaled her scent. "Ah. The little witch reeks of grief and bad decisions." His tail flicked, sending a human skull clattering across stone. "I do love those."
Drogar's slit-pupiled eyes had tracked Helene's ascent long before her boot scraped against his threshold. From his perch high in the cavern's vaulted ceiling, he had watched the ant-sized figure struggle up the scree slope—a black-clad dot against moonlit granite, moving with the single-minded fury of a woman who'd already burned every bridge behind her. His tongue flicked out, tasting the air. Ah, the sweet stench of maternal rage. How deliciously predictable.
By the time Helene had hauled herself into the cave mouth, Drogar had arranged himself in what he considered a suitably dramatic pose—wings half-furled, neck arched just so, one talon tapping rhythmically against a femur from his last visitor. He let her take three labored breaths before speaking again. "Most supplicants bring tribute," he rumbled, smoke curling from his nostrils. "You arrive empty-handed save for that delightful reek of unfulfilled vengeance."
Helene wiped blood from her split knuckles onto her cloak. "I brought what matters." Her fingers closed around the pendant at her throat—the silver gone dull with months of ceaseless friction against skin. "Knowledge of what was taken from me."
Drogar's chuckle sent embers skittering across the stone floor. "Oh, this will be rich." He lowered his massive head until his breath stirred the loose hairs escaping Helene's braid. "Tell me, little witch, does the prince still draw breath while you climb my mountain? How very... civilized of you."
Her palm struck the cavern wall with a crack that echoed like a snapped bone. "I want him to suffer as I suffer." Frost spread from her fingertips, jagged patterns spiderwebbing across the rock. "Every time he looks at his bride, I want him to see my daughter's face. I want his entire gods damned bloodline cursed. I never got to hold my grandchild in my arms, so he will never hold his. I want to strike all his children sterile and I want all of them to die young, as my daughter did."
Drogar's tail twitched like a cat spotting prey. The emerald firelight deepened the hollows beneath Helene's eyes, turning her grief into something jagged and dangerous. "Ah," he breathed, sulfur-scented smoke curling between his teeth. "Not just any suffering, then. You want his joy poisoned at the root." His claws scraped against stone as he circled her. "Tell me, witch—when you curse a man's bloodline, do you start with the past... or the future?"
Helene's fingers tightened around the pendant. The silver edges bit into her palm, matching the old wounds on Selena's lifeless hand. "Both."
The dragon's laughter shook loose a shower of pebbles from the cavern ceiling. He stretched one massive wing, the membrane casting a blood-red shadow across Helene's face. "Delicious." His forked tongue tasted the air again. "But curses this thorough require... equivalent payment."
A ripple passed through the cavern—not wind, but something older. The floating emerald flames dimmed as Drogar's bulk shifted, his scales whispering like a thousand rustling scrolls. When he spoke next, his voice held the weight of deep earth and older magic: "Your life for his curse. Your death for his suffering. Do you agree?"
Helene didn't hesitate. She yanked the pendant from her neck, the chain snapping with a sound like a breaking neck. "Agreed."
Drogar's emerald flames pulsed brighter, casting jagged shadows across the cavern walls that twisted like hanged men dancing. His chuckle sent tremors through the stone beneath Helene's boots. "Oh, this will nourish me for centuries," he purred, the sound like grinding millstones. His massive head tilted, obsidian claws flexing against the rock. "But such exquisite suffering requires... fermentation."
Smoke curled from his nostrils as he leaned closer, until Helene could see her own reflection—distorted and flame-lit—in each of his slitted pupils. "The curse must steep in your corrupted body. Released with your last heartbeat." His tongue flicked out, tasting her resolve. "Are you willing to linger in this agony a little longer, witch? Or does your hunger for vengeance pale beside your grief?"
Helene's fingers convulsed around the broken pendant chain. She imagined Selena's cooling fingers in the mortuary, the way the attendants had pried them open like unclenching a dead flower. "How long?"
Drogar's wings unfurled with a sound like a thousand swords being drawn as he considered. "Three years to weave the threads properly." His tail lashed, sending bones skittering. "I want every stitch of this curse to unravel across generations—each death compounding the misery like interest in a moneylender's ledger."
Emerald firelight caught the hollows beneath Helene's eyes as she nodded. Time meant nothing now. The world outside this cavern—the castle bustling with renewed wedding preparations, the grave still fresh beneath the orchard trees—was already dead to her.
Helene's fingers traced the fractured edge of Selena's pendant. "Three years?" Her voice scraped against her throat like a blade across whetstone. "I'll wait three decades if that's what it takes."
Drogar's emerald flames cast her shadow monstrous against the cavern wall—all jagged edges and grasping hands. The dragon's amusement rumbled through the stone beneath her boots. "Patience was never your virtue, little witch." His forked tongue tasted the air between them. "But grief... ah, grief makes excellent fertilizer for vengeance."
She pressed her palm flat against the pendant, feeling its edges bite into her flesh. Selena had worn this every day since her fourteenth nameday—had clutched it as she fell from the tower, as her body shattered against the cobblestones.
"I am willing to wait as long as it takes," Helene repeated, her voice softer now, deadly.
High above, wind screamed through the cavern's upper chambers like a chorus of widows. Drogar's tail coiled around a pile of skulls, his claws absently tapping out a funeral dirge against a femur. "Three years to weave the curse properly," he mused. "Three years of you kneeling in this cavern while your hatred ferments. Three years of watching through my flames as Prince Aldrick fathers children he'll never keep."
Helene's fingers tightened around the pendant until its edges bit into her flesh, drawing blood that welled dark as wine in the flickering emerald light. "Three years," she repeated, her voice a blade forged in grief. "Three years to watch him suffer."
Drogar's tail lashed, sending a skull clattering against the cavern wall. His laughter rolled through the chamber like distant thunder, shaking loose pebbles that rained down around Helene's boots. "Oh, you amuse me, little witch." His massive head lowered until his sulfurous breath stirred the loose strands of her hair. "Most come seeking quick vengeance—a dagger in the dark, a poisoned cup. But you?" His forked tongue flicked out, tasting her resolve. "You want his bloodline to wither like blighted wheat across generations."
Helene didn't flinch. The blood from her palm dripped onto the cavern floor, each drop hissing as it struck the stone. "I want him to watch his child die as I watched mine." Her voice cracked like ice underfoot. "I want his house to become as mine has—with a mother's screams echoing through empty halls."
Drogar's tail coiled like a viper ready to strike as he studied Helene's bloodied palm. "All curses require balance, witch. Even this one." His voice rumbled through the cavern like distant thunder. "A path to redemption must exist—however narrow, however unlikely. That is the way of magic."
Helene's fingers curled into fists, nails biting half-moon crescents into her palms. "Redemption?" The word tasted of ash and betrayal. "After what he took from me?"
The dragon exhaled a plume of sulfurous smoke that formed a twisting double helix in the air between them. "Not for him. For the magic." His emerald eyes glinted with ancient knowledge. "The stronger the curse, the sharper its escape clause. This is the law."
Helene's breath came ragged as she stared at the glowing helix—its strands intertwining, separating, then merging again. Like bloodlines. Like fates. A muscle twitched in her jaw. "Name your terms."
Chapter 29 (abridged)
"Tell me!" Aldrick's roar cracked against the cavern walls. His voice was no longer human—it was the sound of a man drowning in his own marrow, desperate enough to gnaw through his veins for one more breath. The dragon's mocking silence coiled around him tighter than chains. "TELL ME!"
Drogar's tail twitched, sending a ribcage skittering into darkness. "You already know," he purred, the words slithering between Aldrick's ribs like a dagger finding its sheath. He spoke slowly drawing out each word. "You have to fulfill the vow you broke."
Aldrick's breath hitched—a wet, ragged sound that echoed through the cavern like a dying man's last gasp. "I have done that," he rasped, fingers clawing at his own throat as if he could rip the words back. "Helene's blood will sit on my throne." His voice cracked like thin ice over dark water. "Her great-grandson. Lily's child. My heir."
Drogar's laughter erupted—a thunderous, booming sound that sent stalactites trembling overhead. The dragon's scaled sides heaved with mirth, his tail lashing against the cavern walls hard enough to send a cascade of bones clattering down. "Oh, little king," Drogar wheezed, wiping an imaginary tear from his luminescent eye. "That is not the vow you broke." His laughter subsided into a series of clicking chuckles. "Silly boy."
Drogar's massive head tilted, his slit pupils contracting to dagger-thin lines. The dragon exhaled—a slow, deliberate stream of smoke that curled around Aldrick's legs like a lover's embrace. "Have you forgotten already?" The words dripped with mock sorrow. "How very tragic."
Aldrick's knees struck the bone-littered floor with a crack that echoed through the cavern. His fingers, still crusted with Daemon's blackened blood, trembled against the bone-littered floor, his breath coming in ragged gasps that stirred the dust of centuries. "Enough!" The word ripped from his throat raw as a fresh wound. "No more riddles—no more games!" His voice shattered on the last syllable, the sound of a man broken against the wheel of his own making. "Tell me!" His voice was a ruin of itself—half-growl, half-plea—the sound of a man who had already lost everything worth losing. "Please."
Aldrick's fingers Drogar's scaled bulk shifted in the shadows, the rasp of his claws against stone echoing like laughter. "Oh what was it now?" The dragon's voice dripped with mock contemplation, his forked tongue flicking the air as if tasting Aldrick's desperation. "Did you vow to Selena that she would have your throne? No..." A dramatic pause, punctuated by the clatter of vertebrae knocked aside by his twitching tail. "That's not quite right."
"Wait, wait." Drogar's massive head tilted, his luminescent eyes narrowing to slits. "Did you promise her a child?" The dragon's chuckle sent shivers crawling up Aldrick's spine. "No... that's not it either."
Drogar's sudden movement sent bones skittering. "Ah!" The dragon's exclamation cracked through the cavern like a whip. "Now I remember." His massive bulk leaned forward, sulfurous breath heating Aldrick's face. "You... vowed..." Each word landed like a hammer blow. "To marry..." Closer now, scales clicking like a deathwatch beetle. "Only... her."
"Enough." Aldrick’s voice was raw as exposed nerve endings. He wiped his bleeding palm against his thigh, leaving a smeared handprint on the silk. "If the curse demands my vow fulfilled..." His throat worked around the words like they were shards of glass. "Then I’ll marry her."
The cavern fell silent but for the drip of water echoing like a heartbeat. Drogar’s massive head tilted, his luminescent eyes narrowing to slits. "Her corpse?" The dragon’s chuckle sent Aldrick’s stomach lurching. "How very romantic." Then the dragon exhaled—a slow, sulfurous stream that made Aldrick’s eyes water. "You can’t marry a ghost, little king." His scaled claws flexed, sending bone fragments skittering. "Not even you are that mad. At least, not yet." The dragon mouth widened in a slow predatory smile. “Give it time.”
"Not Selena." Aldrick’s voice was hoarse, as if he’d been screaming for hours. His gaze lifted to meet Drogar’s lambent eyes. "Her brother’s child. Lily."
"Oh dear." Drogar's scaled eyelids lowered halfway in reptilian amusement, his tail-tip flicking a skull across the floor like a child's discarded toy. "Such a tragic oversight," he murmured, the words thick with mock sympathy. "Weren't you listening? You vowed to marry only her and I’m afraid you have already been married. So that means you’re out."
The dragon's massive claws clicked against stone as he shifted, revealing the jagged inscription of Lily's name half-hidden beneath soot. “Besides, isn’t the girl already dead?” His sulfurous chuckle curled around Aldrick like funeral smoke. "Dead girls make poor brides, little king.”
"Did you truly think," the dragon mused, his smoke-laden breath curling around Aldrick's slumped form, "that Helene would let you cheat her with bastards?" A scaled claw flicked dismissively toward the carved names on the cavern wall—Alexander, Daemon, a dozen others. "Her vengeance requires ceremony. Not drunken fumbling in dark corridors."
Drogar's tail twitched—slow, deliberate—sending a femur skittering across the bone-strewn floor to tap against Aldrick's boot. "Helene's bloodline continues," the dragon murmured, his voice thick with amusement, "with the little orphaned princeling Lily bore."
Aldrick's laugh was a hollow thing, rattling up from his chest like dry seeds in a gourd. "Frederick?" His fingers dug into the bone-strewn floor, splinters lodging beneath his nails. "He's just a babe. He can't—"
Drogar's tail lashed, sending a ribcage skittering into the dark. "And he also happens to be a boy, if I’m not mistake," the dragon purred, smoke curling between his needle-teeth. "So he's disqualified, I'm afraid." His claws flexed, scraping stone. "Unless you've suddenly discovered a way to change that particular condition."
The torchlight flickered wildly as Aldrick swayed on his knees. The realization slithered through him like cold oil—Frederick could sire daughters when he is old enough, but all of Aldrick’s children have inherited the curse. Every child of his blood would wither in agony until Frederick produced a girl old enough to wed one of Aldrick's doomed sons.
Drogar's chuckle was a rasp of scales on stone. "Ah. There it is." His massive head tilted, lambent eyes reflecting Aldrick's shattered expression. "The math settles in at last." A claw tapped the cavern wall where new names waited to be carved. "How many children do you suppose it will take? How many of them will choke on blackened blood before a daughter of Helene's line is old enough to kneel at your altar?"
The enormity of it crushed Alaric like a millstone: every child he'd ever sired, every child yet unborn, condemned to wait for Frederick's hypothetical daughter while their veins turned to tar.
The dragon chuckled darkly. “Delicious.”