Chapter 298: Reldros, The Amaranth Fury

 

  The stars shone faintly in the night sky. Wisps of silvery clouds stretched across the darkened heavens. The crescent moon hung above it all, its blue light filtering down over the Rupture Mountains.

  The dragon lord, Kaleidrog sat at the edge of a cliff that sprouted from one of his mountains. His enormous draconic body was sprawled across the cliff, his serpentine tail lazily swishing back and forth at the edge. His ancient scales had grown thick and coarse through the millennia, though their luster had not dissipated, they shined with the same sapphire brilliance as they had when he was a hatchling.

  A light breeze swept past the cliffside with the quiet song of nature. He had almost forgotten what it was like to be awake in the real world, away from the Dreamscape.

  Kaleidrog sighed in contentment, “It really is a beautiful night.”

  The cliff he lay on hung thousands of paces above the border of Vulture Woods and Glimmer Grove. The scarlet trees of Vulture Woods stood like a dark wall cutting off the faint glowing trees of Glimmer Grove. But the Rupture Mountains did not care for the sister forests’ borders. The mountains extended throughout the western edge of the Ebon Realm without dispute.

  Kaleidrog knew Lunae wasn’t very far away. His synchrony magic could sense her prowling through her scarlet trees near the border, guarding her territory. Judging from the crescent moon in the sky, she no doubt knew where he was.

  The cliff was about a league from Lunae. It was at the edge, but he was still in attacking distance, she could call down a beam of moonlight if she wanted to. Yet Kaleidrog made no move to evade or defend himself. Lunae would never be so foolish as to attack him. As for him, he had no interest in invading her lands, he simply enjoyed the beautiful view from the cliffside.

  A beat of wings in the distance caught Kaleidrog’s attention. He was expecting several of his brood’s dragons to report back to him sometime in the next few days, but this particular visitor was unexpected, he did not come from the West or North; he came from the South, Vulture Woods. The obstinate dragon was flying right over Lunae’s forest without a care.

  The large red dragon did not stop and flew all the way to the cliff where Kaleidrog rested. He hovered a few dozen paces from Kaleidrog and landed with a single strong wing beat. His fiery amber eyes stared at the dragon lord with curiosity. Kaleidrog looked him over as well, though there was no glint of curiosity in his sapphire eyes, only annoyance.

  The visitor’s scales were a dark red with hues of purple mixed within its ruby luster. He towered over most dragons, from claw to brow his body reached 50 feet high. His wings stretched thrice as far on both sides of his bulky serpentine body. And yet despite all his size, he still seemed small in comparison to Kaleidrog.

  The red dragon folded his wings and bowed his head to his dragon lord, “Lord Kaleidrog, The Azure Sky, I –The Amaranth Fury– humbly greet you.”

  “Reldros, you haven’t had a single humble bone in your body since the day you hatched from your egg,” Kaleidrog said dryly. “What are you doing here? I ordered you to search the western hills of Dusk Valley. You shouldn’t be back for another four days.”

  Reldros narrowed his eyes, but he bowed his head lower, “Forgive me, father. But I had an urgent matter to discuss with you.”

  “So urgent that you had to fly over Lunae’s territory, openly defying our peace treaty?”

  “I sense Lunae down there too, baring her fangs at us,” Reldros snarled. “Let her come and try to challenge us. It is time I put that young pup in her place.”

  Kaleidrog shook his head slightly and channeled yellow mana into the tip of his foreclaw. A faint yellow sphere of light shimmered into existence around the two dragons, shielding them from Lunae’s sight.

  “You are too eager for blood,” Kaleidrog said calmly. “Simply because you have the power to match or even overwhelm Lunae does not mean you should seek a fight with her.”

  “Simply because? Eager for blood?” Reldros scoffed. “I saw the frozen broken remains of young Tandride’s body. Lunae butchered him! That is not a speculation, it is a fact! She drew first blood. She broke the treaty! Who is to say she won’t strike again?”

   “Zavinti saw Tandride’s corpse as well and studied what was left of him. She told me how he died. It was a very powerful long-range attack, which would have cost Lunae a great deal of energy. It was a half-moon that night, Lunae’s power would have been weakened drastically. Meaning she would have been tired after such an attack, left exposed.”

  “What’s your point?” Reldros frowned.

  “Lunae would never have left herself vulnerable if it wasn’t necessary. And she certainly wouldn’t have risked her own safety just to murder one of our brood’s younger, albeit bloodthirsty, dragons. I will not let Tandride’s death go unanswered, but I will hear out Lunae’s side of the story. I believe that if she killed Tandride then there must have been a very important reason.”

  “Which is what exactly?”

  “I’m still working on that. I was hoping to speak to her about it this very night. But after your clear disrespectful arrival, I highly doubt she’ll want to speak to us anytime soon.”

  Reldros looked abashed for a moment, but his anger quickly returned to his amber eyes. “Why should we even bother talking to her? We know she killed one of our own! That wolf is dangerous. I won’t have another one of ours be slain by her hands.”

  “You will not kill her.”

  “Then let me at least capture her, I’ll force her to talk. It’s a crescent moon tonight, she’s weak. It’ll be easy. Just give me the word.”

  “No, you will not attack,” Kaleidrog said adamantly.

  “Why!? Why do you insist!”

  “Because she is not our enemy!” Kaleidrog snapped his jaws. “But make no mistake, we have enemies! We are under a threat the likes of which you have never seen! We need allies! I don’t need you making more enemies!”

  “...I have lived since the Sundering Age,” Reldros said coldly. “I have seen dark gods live and die. I have seen cataclysmic natural disasters swallow entire cities whole. I have seen Ages rise and fall! And despite your lofty beliefs, I can handle whatever danger is coming after us. Our brood can handle this threat.”

  Kaleidrog looked at his son coolly and with a tired voice said, “No, they cannot. This is something else. The Unildyr are deadly to us more than anyone else. They exist solely to counter our chromatic magic. They feed on our power. Believe me when I say we are at a terrible disadvantage.” 

  “Disadvantage, huh…?” Reldros muttered thoughtfully. “Father, I came here tonight because while I was searching the western hills of Dusk Valley – as you asked me to – I spotted Holo. I spoke with her at length. It turns out she had new and vital information on the enemy. I flew back as quickly as I could to personally relay to you the information.”

  “You talked with her?” Kaleidrog asked, mildly surprised. “You? I would have guessed you would have attacked her the moment you had the chance.”

  Reldros shrugged his gigantic shoulders, “As you said, we need allies. I know you don’t believe it, but I am capable of setting aside my anger for the greater good of this brood.”

  “Hm, so I see,” Kaleidrog smiled. “So, tell me, what did Holo have to say?”

  “She found details regarding our enemy from some ruins in Shadow Lake. It seems the enemies you spoke of are called Dragonbane. They are monsters that once walked the earth in the Age of Titans… They slaughtered our kind.”

  Kaleidrog’s draconic face had become bereft of emotion, his cold eyes the only sign of life left. “...Did Holo say anything else?”

  “Yes, she spoke of the ancient Vesir queendom; the queendom of eternity and mortality and the most powerful country in the Age of Titans. The last Vesir sovereign, Queen Ananta, rallied the people from all over the lands, and with the help of her dragon, Vismarya, she led the fight against the Dragonbane and their master, Unildyr… Father, you were there. Weren’t you? You fought alongside the Vesir armies.”

  “...It was a long time ago. None of it matters anymore,” Kaleidrog whispered.

  “I disagree. Holo says Queen Ananta used the ‘The Sword of the Vesir’ to defeat Unildyr and his Dragonbane. The problem is the sword was lost and Holo doesn’t know where it is. But you were there. Do you know where the sword might be?”

  “The Sword of the Vesir…?” Kaleidrog muttered bitterly. “There’s no point.”

  “No point?” Reldros shook his head. “Of course, there is a point! You said it yourself. We are facing a threat like never before! Why would there be no point in finding a weapon that might help us win this war!”

  “You don’t understand,” Kaleidrog said and closed his eyes.

  “Then let me tell you what I do understand. When Holo came to us in the Dreamscape she told us about the creatures known as ‘Unildyr.’ The moment she said that name you seemed incredibly disturbed, because you knew what they were. But those creatures are called Dragonbane or Kalden Obitus in the old tongue, not Unildyr. Yet you made no effort to correct Holo or anyone since. You’ve been holding back information since the beginning! Information that could legitimately help us! Why?!”

  Kaleidrog kept his eyes closed and said nothing.

  Reldros growled, “You are the lord of our brood. You are the only one of us who was alive back in the Age of Titans. It is your responsibility to protect our family, our brood, all dragon-kind! So why won’t you tell me what happened during the war against Unildyr? All I really know is that we won the war, but the details are still unclear–”

  “Won?” Kaleidrog opened his eyes. 

  The ground shook as he stood and rose to his full height, twice the size of his son. He stared down at Reldros, a rare glint of anger in his sapphire eyes. And at that moment, Reldros remembered why his father was feared among gods and monsters.

  Yet Reldros met his father’s gaze and held his ground, “...You’re still alive, aren’t you? I’d say we won the war.”

  “You call the sundering of the world a win? A victory for our people? Anyone’s people?” Kaleidrog scoffed. “You have no idea how much we lost, what the world lost!”

  Reldros couldn’t stand his father’s glare any longer. He bowed his head and looked away in shame.

  “You speak of things you do not know of,” Kaleidrog sneered. “You stand here and speak with such confidence judging ME? You’re so certain that what you say is right, when the reality is that you are fumbling in the dark, teetering at the edge of a chasm! You don’t care about what happened all those thousands of years ago. All you care about is what you can do now, how you can ‘fix’ everything. But this cannot be fixed, not with all the power in the world. NOTHING CAN BE FIXED!” Kaleidrog roared.

  Reldros swallowed hard and forced himself to look up and face his father’s anger, “...The past cannot be changed, I understand that. But what of the sword? Can it not help us in this war? Should we not try to find it before the enemy does?”

  Kaleidrog laughed incredulously, “You still don’t get it, do you? If the Dragonbane have returned it means that the Sword of the Vesir is broken. There is nothing that can be done about it. There is nothing to fix…”

  “Then why even bother fighting!? Why send our people to scour the lands in search of the Dragonbane?” Reldros yelled indignantly.

  Kaleidrog sighed tiredly and turned his back to his son, “...Because we must fight… even if it is a losing battle.”

  “Is that what you’re doing? Fighting? That’s not what it looks like to me. Where is the great dragon lord who led our people through the last five Ages? That’s who we need right now.”

  “...Leave.”

  Reldros stepped back, pain etched across his face. He shook his head and opened his wings wide, “Mother would have been ashamed to see what you’ve become… If you won’t fight for our people, then I will.”

  Without another word, Reldros leaped into the sky and flew off into the dark horizon. Kaleidrog sighed and released the yellow sphere of protection around himself. He laid back down on the cliff and stared out over the scenery of the mountains and the border of the sister forests.

  “It really is a beautiful night…”