When I was a kid, my brother and I used to play by the banks of the river Ivanik that flows through the Wilds.  It was the only source in water in the whole Wilds.  50,000 square miles and only one source of water.   The local wilds believed a water dragon swam underneath the water, but Ivan would get upset at the thought.

"There is no such thing as a water dragon," he'd tell them, "All dragons are fire dragons.  I know real dragons.  My mother has a REAL dragon.  If it doesn't burn, then it isn't a dragon.  Until the river burns and boils...don't tell me there is a dragon under there."

He was all burns and boils.

And pride.

I remember he always wore the symbol on his chest.  A pin. A sword with flames surrounding it.~

"The Glabber sigil," Maxim states, "I saw it in the notebooks. A sword with flames surrounding it.  It's a sign of your family, Nikolai.  All the paintings of her in the texts have her wearing the same sigil."

I'd just told my story to the room.  I told the story of my brother.  The only other child that my mother had.

"I thought my brother was dead."

"What was his name?" Maxim asks.

"Ivan.  He was named after the river," I state.

"Could it be him?" Maxim asks, "Did you ever see his body in the ruins?"

I think deep back.  I remember the day.  The day something took over the Dread and burned down all the Wilds.  The Wilds were not like other cities.  We were all tree huts.  The people lived naturally.  They didn't live in stone towers.  Everything was dry because we only had the Ivanik river.  So it all burned.  All of it.

"I didn't see much.  Not much but ash."

"But your brother was brash and willful, right?" Maxim suggests, "That's what you said."

"He must not have met anyone else from the Glabber bloodline if he thinks that's unique," the soul of the Dread marks, "Tell Maxim to shut up.  He's not helping."

I look over at the Dread.  Luckily, I am the only one that can hear him so no one can be offended by the things he says all the time.

I look at Lady Arwen.  She has been quiet this entire time while her son has been speculating.  The elves definitely don't seem like they are much for words.  She seems to be so distant just completely in her thoughts.  I wondered how much of the rumors about Arwen were true.  Looking at her next to Maxim I can see how they are related even if he hasn't inherited the elf ways.

I sigh, "It's possible that Ivan did it.  But why?  What motivation would he have?"

"Mother, you had a vision that a child born of a Nikoletta will awaken the Great Immortal Dragon to end the world, right?" Maxim asks.

The Lady Arwen nods, "Yes."

"Did you see what that person looked like?"

"The visions don't work that way.  They aren't clear all the time."

"What if you're wrong?" I ask.

"Excuse me?" Arwen asks.

I look at how Maxim looks at me.  I think he's concerned that I might offend his mother.  I'm concerned as well.  I want to challenge her.  I want to say it's all bullshit.  Her stupid prophecy had caused all this chaos.  The only reason that I've not completely lost it with her is because of who she was to Maxim.

"I'm just concerned about accuracy.  That's all," I state.

"If you're asking am I sure, then yes.  I am sure.  Nikoletta's child, a survivor of the Wilds will be responsible for the End of Days.  My visions come true.  There are those who want this to happen."

"Tuti's group..." Maxim tells me, "The Shadow Regime."

I nod.  They were everywhere.

They were taking Arwen's prophecy as law.  I was as well.  So was Maxim.  Why were we so sure?  It keeps changing it seems.  Seems like she's just trying to grasp at her reality herself.  Maybe she's right though.  I don't know.  I just look at Maxim hoping that he'd help but he seems to be out of ideas.  He seems to be out of questions.  Either it was me or it was Ivan.  We were the only two children that Nikoletta had.

But why would Ivan do such a thing?

And where we he now?

We are disturbed by something walking in the room.  It's one of the nightingales.  I watch as the nightingale goes to the elf's ear.

Maxim leans over, "Elf magic can control animals.   All kinds."

He's a lean elf.  He raises an eyebrow that is almost as thin as a blade.  As he talks to Arwen her ears jerk up as though a dog would when it's been surprised by something.

"What is it?" I ask.

"Empire scouts.  They are at the edge of the forests on dragon back."

"They are looking for me," I realize.

They wouldn't stop.  Not now that they knew about the dragons and they thought that I was the one gathering these dragons together for the Great Immortal Dragon.  They wouldn't stop hunting me.  They couldn't.

"We can't let them get him," Maxim states, "He's too important."

Important to who exactly?

Arwen's facial expression doesn't change.  It's not cold and empty like Natasha or bitter and crude like Raisa.  It was pleasant in a way but still stuck in this eternal loop of beauty and happiness.

"I know this is important to you," Arwen states, "But it's important we stay safe as well.   Our elven magic has kept us safe, but for how long?   We thought that this Dragon news might keep us safe from the Empire for just a little while longer but we didn't dream these dragons up.  You saw.  Those dragons are getting bigger by number.  They will burn down the world of man.  They are coming and we must focus on protecting our people from this threat---same as they did in the Capital of the Dragonov Empire."

"She told," a voice states.

I look over Arwen's shoulder.  I notice she isn't reacting to the voice.  It's because she can't hear it.  The Dread is here.  He's looking right at her.

"Told what?" I ask.

"Your mother about the Elven articles," he said, "Your mother fled to the Wilds.  Why'd she tell?"

"Good question."

"Who's he talking to?" Arwen asks.

She's looking at me.  She's not the only one.  The other elves look at me as well.  Their beady eyes piercing through the dark forest lights lit only by fluorescent magical spheres amongst the trees.  I look over.

"Why'd you warn my mother?  If you believe your prophecy to be true why warn her knowing a mother would do anything to keep her child safe."

Arwen looks at me as though she doesn't understand the question.  Strange.  She seemed to be so well spoken with English before this.  I'm staring at her and even though I've never seen an elf, it seems universal when someone doesn't expect you to ask a question and remains somewhat dumbfounded.

She turns to Maxim instead, "We don't have time for this.  He needs to leave.  We've avoided the wrath of the Empire for some time.  They are focused on the dragons.  Let's keep it that way.  We need to give them their prisoner back."

"You give him back, I'm leaving with him," Maxim states.

"Maxim---" I try to stop him.

Maxim isn't having it though, "I'll tell them I helped him escape.  I'll be hung for treason.  Is that what you want?"

Arwen looks over at me.  She's clearly irritated.

"Maxim you're being stubborn."

I was causing conflict.  Unnecessary conflict.  I didn't know the relationship between Arwen and his mother. He never spoke of her even though he talked about his father often.  Right now it feels like tension.  It makes me uncomfortable.

"It's fine," I interrupt, "I'll leave..."

The last thing I wanted to do was be a hindrance to the elves.  The last thing I wanted to do was be a hindrance to Maxim.

Maxim immediately grabs my hand.  The way he does it turns me on.  It's a sense of ownership.  A young knight fighting for what he believes is right.  At that moment, I'm right and he wasn't going to let this go.  Not for the mystical elves and not even for his mother.

"The empire isn't the only one who wants him.  There is another.  A Shadow regime.  They tried to make me kill him...they killed..."

Maxim is breaking out into tears.  All the magic and mystique fades away and all that is left is a mother concerned about her son.

"I know," his mother states,  "Come...we'll talk in private."

"Nik---"

"Jhaartael will escort him into a room," his mother tells him, "We'll watch them."

~

I'm taken to a private chamber in the woods.  The chambers crouched in the shadows like a sleeping bear. This lumpy den of thin wooden walls with a small opening at the front barely wide enough for a scrawny child to squeeze through was topped with last season's torn of winter branches and browned coarse ferns.

"Tight squeeze," I mention before laughing and adding in, "That's what HE said last night."

The elf doesn't laugh.  Not even a little bit.

"Who's he?" the Dread asks clearly sticking close by me.

"It's a joke," I state.

I'm saying it more to the elf than the Dread but I watch as the Dread forces the fakest laugh I'd ever heard before.  I think this was his way of trying to be more human in order to please me.  It wasn't necessarily successful.

My elf guard gives me a long stare.  He doesn't like me.  It's not hard to tell.  The elves all had unique features but shares similarities.

He was tall and thin almost like Tuti...weird.

But Tuti didn't have pointy ears, of course.  Then again neither did Maxim.

I shake off the thought.  Impossible.  Even though the length and shape of these ears vary it seems but they all came to somewhat of a point.  I would have noticed pointy ears on Tuti.  This guy did resemble how lean Tuti was though.  I couldn't tell his age and it crosses my mind what if they were immortal or lived as long as dragons.  Either way, they seemed graceful.  They seemed more beautiful and wiser, with sharper senses and perceptions, and abilities or crafts that seem alien or magical.

"Stay.  No, Go!"

I don't think he speaks the best English.

"Didn't think I was allowed to in the first place," is my response.

He has barely anything on.  Often elves do not possess facial or body hair.  I noticed none of them seem fat or old.  They all seemed soft faced.  Almost innocent in a way---like Maxim.  Except for this one...this full elf seemed almost a bit androgynous.

As soon as he leaves the Dread swirls around.

"Don't like him," the Dread states, "Don't trust them."

I was having the same feeling.  I look outside the window of my tree dwellings.  Below I can see Maxim and his mother.  They are speaking.

"Can you hear them?" I ask, "Can you go spy on them?"

"No," he responds, "I only exist where you are outside of my own body.  I can only see what you see.  I can only go where you go."

"That sucks."

"We need out of here," he states, "Did you see how she ignored your question?  I know you don't want to hear this but there's something I remember?"

"What?"

"When your mother left me and went to the Wilds I often flew back and forth.  I noticed...search parties.   From the Empire.  They were looking for your mother and trying to bring her back.   This was right before I burned down the wilds."

I shrug, "So what?"

The Dread grabs me by the arm and leads me to the table, "Think.  Nik.  You're smarter than this."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are.  I believe in you."

The Dread wasn't just going to tell me what I needed to know.  It was as though he wanted me to put it together myself.

"These people give my mother a clue. She leaves the empire to protect that clue.  The empire comes looking for her...probably head to the Wilds.  Someone makes sure you get there first.  Someone makes sure you burn down the wilds."

To protect the secret.  The secret that my mother was hiding.

"Maxim did say it himself.  Elf magic can control animals.  All kinds.  Including dragons."

Fuck.

"I have to tell Maxim."

"Tell Maxim what?" a voice states.

It's Maxim walking back into the room.  I grab him at that moment.

"Maxim, we have to leave."

Maxim raises a confused eyebrow, "Why would we leave?  I just convinced my mother to let us hide out here for a while."

"Leave him," The Dread says, "He's a fucking idiot.  Sneak out and I'll meet you at the edge of the forest.  If they pursue you I'll burn this thing these forests to the ground worse than I ever did the Wilds."

He means it too.  I watch as the Dread walks up behind me.  His dark long arms surrounding me making sure that I was protected in any way possible.

I give the Dread a look.  I needed to be alone with Maxim and he knew it.  He seems to know the look right now before he disappears in an irritated flash.  I couldn't convince Maxim of what was happening with the Dread here.

I grab Maxim.  I sit him on the chair in the room.  The skinny elf chairs are thin but the closeness of them makes this moment intimate.

"Maxim, I know this sounds crazy but I think they are behind it.  Something is off about this place.  Something is off about these people."

"These people?" he asks, "I'm one of these people."

"I'm not trying to make it about that, but the Dread helped me figure it out.  He said----"

"I don't give a fuck what the Dread said," Maxim grunts getting angry and getting up, "The Dread is trying to tear us apart.  He's jealous.  Don't you see that?  He's playing mind games because he knows that you want to be with me."

Maxim might be right to a point.  The Dread was definitely trying to win me over.  I was torn before a human and a dragon with no clear option on who to choose.  Both of them had their upsides and both had their downsides.

"I know he's flawed."

"He's the most jealous dragon I'd ever heard of," Maxim states, "We can fix him..."

I'm confused, "Fix him?"

"Like I did Skyscreamer," Maxim responds.

I'm confused at that moment.

"You did what?' I ask Maxim.

"I fixed Skyscreamer," he states, "Well my mother did."

"Elf magic.  You're using elf magic to make her passive," I realize, "That's why she isn't jealous.  That's why she doesn't rage like other dragons, isn't it?  She's under a spell..."

Maxim grabs me by the hand, "Listen.  I can convince my mother to do this to the Dread as well.  We can make the Dread as passive as a mouse.  It takes a while to work but I promise we can make it happen.  Imagine what that would be like."

"You're serious..."

Maxim lied to me...

Again.

He told me Skyscreamer CHOSE to not care what he did.  He said they had an agreement.  There was no agreement.  The more I sit there looking at Maxim, the more I realize just how much of a liar he is.  This man had gone out of his way to continue to lie to me.

I'm in shock right now.  Maxim basically had his dragon in a trance.

"We can be together," Maxim states, "You can really TAME your dragon, instead of having your dragon tame you.  We can be together.  Don't you want that?"

He reaches over at me.  I know deep inside Maxim thinks what he's saying is something that I want to here.  He thinks this is romantic.  Honestly, I'm disgusted in this moment.

"I'd never take away his rage," I respond.

He was a dragon.  They were meant to be fierce.  They were meant to be feared.  The Dread's rage was a part of him.  How could Maxim use this magic to do something like that?

"Nik listen---"

"I think you should leave."

"But I love you."

Hearing him say the words and admit it out loud sends shivers down my spine.  He told me he loved me.  My mind is blown at that moment.  It's such a human thing.  It's such a human emotion.  It's something I never would think I'd get from the Dread.  Not in a million years.  All those nights in Nair I wished some handsome knight would come to rescue me and tell me how he loved me.  Now there was one and it just wasn't enough.

"I think you should leave," I state.

Maxim nods, "Yes."

"Oh and Maxim?"

He turns.  He probably thinks I'm changing my mind.  I'm not.

"Yes?"

"You need to think real long and hard.  Someone controlled the Dread using magic.  Someone made the Dread burn down the Wilds.  If your people can do that to the Dread, then who knows what else they can do."

He closes the door on me.

"Maybe you're right," Maxim states, "Maybe I should leave.  Anyone who would think the worst of people just because they are different isn't someone who I want to be around.  I thought you were different.  But you're just like the Prince.  You fit in well with the Empire..."

~

I'm in the room that night.  I can feel almost on edge.  I'm upset over Maxim.  I'm upset because he didn't believe me.  When I hear someone coming into the room and walking over to me I assume that it's just him.

"I said I didn't want to talk."

"Didn't want you to be alone..." is the reply, "It's a full moon out. You should see it.  Special things can happen on a full moon."

It's not Maxim.  When I turn I see the Dread.  I'm surprised it's him.  I'm surprised I'm so upset that I turn and throw myself into his arms.

"I'm not in the mood."

"Because of a boy?  This is some human thing that I don't understand, isn't it?"

"He doesn't believe me," I state.

"He's a fucking idiot," the Dread says, "I know you weren't in here crying.  You are Nikolai, a knight of House Glabber."

"I'm no knight."

"Not yet," he states, "You will be.  Close your eyes."

"Dread."

"Close em.  And imagine you were with me."

"I am with you."

"No not with my soul.  With my body."

I do what he says.

There is darkness and then all of a sudden there is light.

And that's when I see it.  The dragon.  I'm not in the room anymore.  I'm a field.  It's at the edge of the forest.  Overhead is Skyscreamer.  She's flying out in the distance stretching her wings but here in the grassy plain was the Black Dread.  Terrifying and beautiful as always.  It looks at me. The same beautiful grey eyes as I ever imagined.

Over its head is the moon.

I had been transported to the dragon in the same way that the dragon's spirit had come to me over and over.

"I told you---" the soul returns next to me, "Special things can happen on a full moon."

We sit out there for what seems like forever.  The dragon keeps a watch over me and his own spirit.  But it's the Spirit that I lay on in the grass.  I rest my head on his thigh.  He plays with my hair.  He keeps looking down on me as though he is some artist taking me all in so that he paint me.  I didn't feel like I was worth being painted and his stares make me feel naked but for some reason, I don't stop him.  I sit there and watch as he studies me.

It isn't until he stops stroking me that I finally ask, "What?  What are you looking for? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"I want to figure you out.  I am still trying to figure out how to make you want me as much as I want you," the Dread states.

"This helps."

"What?"

"Just being normal.  Just sitting out here.  Just being there for me.  That's what makes you human.  Not trying anything.  Just---existing..."

"I'll always be there for you."

I smile back at the Dread, "I know that.  I think I know that for sure."

"I'd like to try something else though."

"Like?"

"Like this..."

He leans down and kisses me.  His warm mouth pressing up against mine in a way softer than I imagine a dragon would kiss me.  His hands run through my hair slowly.  He extends his long body over mine until I'm flat on the grass and he's sliding between my legs.

His kisses get warmer.  Slower.

Then I watch as in a second, as though by magic he's completely naked.

I look at his body.  His lean torso.  I look at his beautiful face.  The way he looks at me seems as though he could spend eternity just staring at me in this way.

"I'm going to make love to you," he tells me.

His breath is warm against my neck.  I look down to see his dick growing between my legs.  His pale skin presses up against my dark skin.   His long black hair falls over me.  His grey eyes pierce me.  He licks his full pink lips a few times making sure that they are wet and glistening in the moonlight.

And I want it.  I want it so bad that all I can do is whimper a soft, "Yes..." in the wind.

"I'm not going to be gentle," he warns me, "I'm not going to tickle you like a human.  I am going to FUCK you like a dragon.  I'm going to make you feel my rage."

I wanted every bit of it.  I wanted every bit of his rage.

My whimper is lower at that point.  Shorter.  More submissive.

"Yes..."

He undresses me taking my pants off.  Right before he positions his long dick in my ass he stops and turns almost irritated by something.

"Dammit..."

"What?"

"The idiot's back," he states.

I don't know what he's talking about but all of a sudden it seems as though my whole nature is shaking in the darkness.  I feel my body shaking.

All of a sudden I'm not in the grassy plain. The moon and the stars don't hang over me in the most romantic way.  The huge Dragon isn't nearby and his dragon soul doesn't have my legs apart ready to explore my insides.  Not at this moment at least.

Instead, it's just Maxim.

He's shaking me and it feels as though I was waking out of a dream.  But it was no dream.  I knew better.  It was real.

"You're right," Maxim states.

"What made you say that?" I ask.

"She didn't know anything about my father's disappearance.  My father never left her side.  That meant that he was here in the forest.  She betrayed him.  She betrayed my father."

Tears are running down his face.  He seems so sure.

"You know this..."

"I overheard her talking?"

"Where?"

"In her praying circle.  It's where she goes to meditate.  She's still out there talking to someone."

"To who?"

Maxim shakes his head, "I couldn't tell. The person wasn't responding and the person was covered in a shawl.  There is one thing I did see though."

"What?"

"The Glabber Sigil."

Ivan.  He was here.

I don't hesitate, "Show me."

~

Sneaking to this praying circle isn't easy but we manage to get there.  The praying circle is a formulated circle marked in stones in the middle of the forest.  A pool is positioned behind it with waters that swirl around almost as though smoke is underneath.  Strange bright lights flicker out of the pool.  They reflect on who I can tell is Arwen sitting at the edge of the pool.

She's talking to someone though.

"I have failed you," Arwen states, "I wanted to keep the army of dragons quiet for as long as I can.  The Empire knows.  They are preparing.  I have failed you..."

The figure shakes it's head silently.

"We must kill Nikolai," Arwen whispers, "We must kill him so that the Empire can feel they are safe from the threat.  They will let their guard down and we can destroy them all.  Once and for all."

That's when the person lets down their shawl.

"You haven't failed me," the person says, "It's still time to kill Nikolai.  It is a sacrifice that must be made."

That's when I notice who it is.

My mother.  She was alive.

And she was pregnant.

 

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