"This used to be my mother's favorite garden," she answered softly, her slender fingers gently caressing a flower, the name of which now escaped her. Her detached tone belied a hidden intensity, flammable as the oil she had buried beneath the warehouse. Purposefully she avoided his gaze, already knowing what he would say — those smug, tired metaphors, those irrelevant words of comfort, well-meaning yet utterly hollow. He would urge her not to grieve too much over what had already happened, trying to convince her to join him in dreaming of a future that would never come. Then, as had happened on countless nights before, he'd reach out and gently touch her cheek, just as she now caressed the flower. Yet she felt agitated, oppressed by the autumn evening's lingering heat and the insects' incessant chirping, so before he could speak, she snapped the flower's stem and turned to look at him. Seeing him surprised, she smiled, then carefully tucked the fiery flower into his gilded collar. "Come now, let us be off. I'm sure someone will take care of all this."
The dragon hesitated, its eyelids narrowing like sheets of iron as it surveyed the stifling darkness. It had not fallen for her trap, not even for a moment. Yes, she had lured it here, into this narrow cave. But what of it? It looked down upon her with a scorn that was as terrible to behold as its own proud plumage. She was nothing like her mother, not like the archer by whose arrow had pierced its throat decades past, the woman who had driven it into the depths of the dark forest like an alpaca, who had deprived it of the simple pleasure of ravaging human villages — the woman who had earned its hate. No, this trembling whelp before it was nothing but her frail echo who could not hope to stand against its claws, much less her ghastly, fearful fate. Her very existence was a mockery of her bloodline, an insult to the ancient lineage of dragons. What absurd notion led her to lure it here? Such a childish stunt could lead only to her death. It was in this moment that the dragon caught the faintest whiff of a strange smell lingering upon the air. For a brief moment, its thoughts were troubled by a flicker of unease, yet this faded quickly beneath the weight of its arrogance.
Pushing open the old wooden door, he caught the faintest whiff of a strange smell, like oil, or perhaps dry wood. He paid it no heed, simply taking her hand and leading her into the dim recesses of the warehouse. No matter what happened, he would guide her forward. Silently, he thought to himself that someday he would lead the entire Flower-Feather Clan the same way. Without thinking, he glanced up at the massive dragon skull suspended above them. He did not remember such a relic having been there before he'd left the Clan, but that was irrelevant. Lianca and her chosen successor were both now dead, and her soft-hearted second daughter lacked the strength to rule the tribe. Only he, who had accompanied that daughter since their youth and was deeply trusted by the Holy Sovereign, was worthy of leading these ignorant people toward the future that the Holy Sovereign had described. Elder Nyamgondho had no objections to this — he too was a child of the Flower-Feather Clan. After the wedding night was over, all opposition would be silenced.
In that silence, a strange notion stole upon her, like a new and unfamiliar dream. She wondered, what if the young man she had once yearned for, the one who was once her companion, what if he had never left the Flower-Feather Clan, and what if he had not gone to serve the Holy Sovereign, but instead had stayed to witnessed her change, the growth of her defiance — would he have been pleasantly surprised or dejected? The beast's smoldering eyes locked onto her in the darkness, its pulse entwining with her breathing so that the two could no longer be distinguished. An almost imperceptible movement; and with that, a spark shot down the fuse, racing towards the oil barrels not far from where they were. |
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