Chapter 66: The Mammoth's Graveyard

The spectacle of this morning was still fresh in Thomas's mind. Leon had taken him in his arms in front of the entire court and demanded that the siren return to him safely.

 Thomas was glad that Lucius had not been present because he wouldn't have been able to live through the embarrassment if the vampire had been.

"What are you thinking about?" Lucius asked him, pulling up his horse next to Karl.

"Nothing much. The king is a good actor," Thomas mused. If he didn't know why Leon was putting on the show, he would have been fooled himself.

"His theatrics will get old, eventually," Lucius assured him. "Your blood tasted different this morning."

Thomas blushed at that. He urged Karl forward.

"Oh, don't tell me! You actually got laid!" Lucius barked a laugh behind him, and Thomas blushed harder. Darn mocking vampire and his superior sense of taste.

"Who was the unlucky sod?" Lucius urged his horse and caught up to Karl again.

"Leon," Thomas murmured.

"Getting an early start on the whole consort thing, are you?" Lucius spoke with a smirk. "Did you enjoy yourself?"

Thomas sighed. He had enjoyed himself. He had been perfectly willing. Yet, he felt repulsed at himself. Leon had ordered a genocide, and Thomas had still laid with him.

"You won't enjoy yourself when I get my hands on you," Lucius murmured, eyes narrowed.

"Stop that," Thomas commanded. Not expecting the command to take hold. "You will not have me."

"It is not like I want you, don't flatter yourself," Lucius told him with a smirk. "It is just that you need to be unmade to feel the guilt that you should be feeling."

"And rape is the only way to do it?" Thomas asked. He wondered if he should chain up Lucius during the night. Just in case.

"I could have killed Rina and Teri, instead. Now, I can kill Leon, I suppose," Lucius mused, more to himself than to Thomas.

"I won't beg for Leon's life, of all people," the siren spoke. "He has it coming."

"Be that as it may, he is your lover now. I need for him to either die, or be disgusted with you," Lucius continued, not caring that his words cut like a blade.

"He is already disgusted," the summoner told him. The way Leon had made him talk all throughout the night. How he had kept his eyes closed. Those were all telling signs.

"You'd be surprised but, he is not yet," Lucius sighed dramatically, and looked Thomas in the eyes. "He is a king. Expected to marry even if the spouse is someone butt ugly. You are not butt ugly, Tommy. Just fat."

Thomas blinked at that. He was not ugly? Really now?

"And, since you are actively trying to lose the weight, you won't be fat for much longer. Why should that murderer have you and be happy?" Lucius peered at Thomas's chest, right where the heart should be.

"When you speak like this, I almost feel like stopping with the diet," Thomas told him. It was the truth. Once he hit seventy kilograms, he would be fit. Once that happened, Lucius was sure to hurt him.

"Go ahead and give up. End up a land whale. See if I care," Lucius told him with a laugh. "It still won't protect you."

"Well, I..." Thomas was cut off by a murder of crows flying over his head. The mockingbird screeched, and hopped off his shoulder. It became visible, and grew back to its normal size.

"Go and eat," the siren told the mob. The bird flew off towards a cliff, and the sounds of battle were to be heard soon after.

"Do you think that there is a dragon there?" Lucius asked. A stream of fire answered him.

"The bird will be fine," Thomas told him. He looked around. There were many bones scattered around. Some bigger than the rest. He got off Karl, and went to the nearest dragon head. He could fit in it just fine. So, he went in, and took a tooth in his hands.

"Chem, get this tooth off," Thomas commanded, and the dungeon core sent a jolt of mana up the siren's fingers. The tooth came off, and Thomas pressed it to his harp.

<Harp unlocked: Dragon harp;

The user will be able to use fire-based magic. >

Thomas nodded, and got out of the head. The mockingbird was waiting for him outside of the head.

"Go and clear this area of dragons," the summoner commanded. "Eat them all."

"I thought that you will leave the dragons be?" Lucius's voice broke him from his trance.

"There needs to be a safe stretch of land so Yaranhold can be connected to Orestria," Thomas told him. Dragons would just complicate matters. "Chem, set up a tunnel with a barrier above it. From now on, this tunnel will be your first level."

"As you wish, master," a bright orange barrier appeared in the air, and it cut through the Mammoth's Graveyard. Thomas felt it connect to Yaranhold, and summoned a screen.

"Don't cross just yet," he told those in the city that were listening. "Wait so that the graveyard can be secured."

Thomas cut off the connection, and turned to Lucius.

"Do you think that good deeds will wash away the bad?" Thomas needed to know. Hoped to hear something from the vampire that reminded him of the times when things made sense.

"Could be. Yima and I always picked up worthless and suicidal quests alike after we razed a city," Lucius admitted. Thomas smiled brightly, and the vampire busied himself with looking around at all the bones.

Perhaps Lucius would never forgive him. Might be Thomas was having baseless hopes. But he had to hope that there would be someone with him in the darkness. Someone who he could trust.

Thomas opened his bottomless bag, and began to collect the bones. Making sure to take only the dragon ones. The mammoth ones were useless, so them, he left to his slimes. The first caravans would pass through the graveyard when he gave them the green light, and Yaranhold would no longer be a target.