Epilogue
I awoke to the sound of dragon call and the cries of trumpets. Trumpets? Was this some new type of dragon that I had never heard of?
“Little Sister…” I was welcomed as soon as my eyes fluttered, to see Ymmen’s great head looking at me. He was lying down, on his side, and his bulk was surrounding me with its shielding warmth. But he was in terrible pain. I could see the great mess of torn and slagged scales that ran down his shoulder and throat almost all the way to his breastbone. He had stopped bleeding, but I could see the great gobbets of green ichor that had accumulated there.
“Oh, my heart—” I said, reaching to cradle his snout with my arms.
“I did it. I killed the thing. And you killed your adversary, too…” he said, and his voice was a low croak of pain and anguish, but shot through with such intense pride in me that I started to cry.
“Nari? Nari!” There were hands on my shoulders, attempting to turn me over, but I would not leave my brave dragon. Not now, not ever.
“Leave her!” Another voice. Abioye, I could feel him as he crouched beside me as my god-Uncle Tamin’s hands gently released me, and Abioye’s were there instead. The beast of my heart jumped once more, and now I could feel the pulse of that golden thread stretching between all three of us; Ymmen, me, and Abioye. The young lordling made no attempt to separate me and Ymmen. Abioye merely held both of us, me and the dragon, as well as he was able.
“Child of the Western Wind, it is done…” said a new, deeper, and infinitely tired voice. It was Fargal, and I released just one hand to wipe away my tears and shift, to see that Fargal stood over all of us. She looked older than she had done before, somehow, the folds of her scales draping around her neck and belly like an ill-fitted robe.
“Look, child, look at what you have achieved…” Fargal said, and there was no denying the Eldest Sister’s voice as I turned my head to look out in front of us, to see that the mountainside was littered with the remains of dead metal dragons.
“They collapsed when you – when Inyene fell,” Abioye whispered beside me, and I knew then what must have happened.
I had killed Inyene, and somehow in that same act had killed the ghost of High Queen Delia too–
What could Abioye be thinking of me! The shiver of shame and guilt ran through me like a sword, but when I looked up at Abioye’s strong face I saw nothing but acceptance. “I’m so sorry…” I still whispered to him all the same, and Abioye knew instantly what I was referring to.
“I’m sorry too.” I watched Abioye’s lips move as I listened to his words. There was no hesitation in either them or his voice. And no sound of anger or resentment, either. “I’m sorry for what Inyene did to you, and to everyone else…I am sorry for what my sister became.”
I bowed my head, allowing Abioye to grieve in whatever way he had to. The earth beneath myself, Ymmen, Abioye and Fargal was blackened, as if some great firestorm had fallen just there. I knew that it had to be Inyene—perhaps the dragons had made sure that she would never rise again like Delia did.
“But the Stone Crown?” I suddenly thought in horror. “The dragon souls?”
“With the shade of Delia gone, so, too, did the Stone Crown disappear,” Fargal told me. “It crumbled to dust, releasing all of its trapped souls – and my kin can remember now… We can remember everything…” Fargal sighed, content, and I could tell that she was full of a knowledge that no human could ever grasp. The entire history of her kind, from their mysterious beginnings to every story and memory that they had to share, from now on, into eternity…
But my dragon, too, will soon become a tale. The sudden knowledge spiked through me as I turned back to Ymmen at my side instead. I could tell through our bond that he was dying. The last great curse-magic of Inyene the Metal Queen had almost split his life from his body, and it was only his stubborn love for me that held him here.
“Don’t go,” I whispered to him, once again reaching out to grasp on to my dragon’s snout. I was crying, but my heart could pick out every scale perfectly.
“I have to go, Little Sister. But I go to join the others. The endless cycle of being…” Ymmen coughed—
“No.” This came from Fargal, lowering her head towards us. “I may not have much left in me, but this, I can help a little…” She started to breathe over Ymmen and me with her hot cinnamon-laced breath, and it was like the fresh, purifying winds of the Soussa, bringing me calm and strength…
Another great judder and a cough from Ymmen beside me. I could sense strength pooling into his limbs – but it wasn’t enough, was it? He was a little bit stronger, enough to live for a moon at most, perhaps…
“No. Don’t go. Don’t leave me, my heart…” I sobbed again.
“There is one place where he will be healed. Where ALL things can be healed,” Fargal said slowly, lifting her head and gazing westwards through a gap in the mountains where a clear light shone through the clouds.
“The Western Track,” Ymmen said, and hope moved through his mind. “I remember how to get there now. A place like this place. A land like this place, but – healing…” he whispered.
“Yes,” Fargal confirmed. “But it is not a path taken lightly. And only a dragon’s magic can take you there,” she intoned.
I could see that the release of the dragon souls had given them back this knowledge, too – but selfishly, I still didn’t want Ymmen to go, even if it meant being healed. A part of me knew with a certainty as deep as my bones what Fargal must be meaning: once that road had been taken, the traveler could never go back. Through my connection with Ymmen I could sense – something – of that distant and fair country that lay beyond the Western Track. It was a place, a land – but unlike anything on this side of the sun and the moon and the stars. The dragons knew it of old – and I wondered, was that where their kind had come from, so many millennia ago?
“I won’t leave you, I’ll go too!” I said and heard a moan of dismay from Abioye. Turning, I could see that his eyes were shining with tears. I knew what he wanted to say even before he said it, and I had to shake my head.
“No, Abioye. There is so much that this world needs of you, here. Your strong arms, your wisdom. You saw all of this happen. You can help rebuild what happens next…” I said, but despite all of those reasons, I knew that Abioye had understood my unspoken reason: That this was a journey that I had to do for Ymmen, alone. I couldn’t let Ymmen fly alone, and I couldn’t let Abioye leave this world and all that it still offered him, even if I knew that he would throw it all away to come with me without a second’s thought.
Because he would throw it all away without a second’s thought, I realized. That was not what this thing between us should be based on. I wanted him to decide from the best of himself; his best thoughts, his best feelings. I couldn’t bear it if he ever looked back onto the Three Kingdoms, the land of his birth, and regretted his decision to leave…
And so, I had to go, even though I knew that it would break my heart to do so—
“Please,” I begged him. “Find my mother. Care for her,” I said, thinking about all of those that I would leave behind. “Naroba, too – she will need friends…”