Path of Dragons

Elijah sat next to a fire, sipping water from his new canteen. It hadn’t even occurred to him to have his loot identified back in Seattle. He had far too much on his mind. Even after his previous resolution to keep his priorities in order, it had taken every bit of self-control he possessed to keep himself from taking on the Shape of the Sky and flying toward Easton. He could have reached the city in a couple of days, and then, he could get on with the business of exacting revenge for his sister’s murder.

Yet, the moment he’d laid eyes on Miguel and Carmen, he’d remembered why he had made the choices he had made. First, he needed to get them to safety. Then, he would help them to get their lives back on track. Maybe that meant settling them into Ironshore. Carmen was a Blacksmith, after all. She could surely find a place in the mining town.

And there were other children in Ironshore. Miguel could make friends his own age.

It was a good plan, though Elijah wasn’t certain that Miguel would ever fully recover from the things he’d experienced. They had changed him, and irrevocably. The only question was whether or not he would embrace that change and use it to his advantage or if he would let it cripple him.

It wasn’t that simple, Elijah knew. The human psyche was a fragile thing, and healing it wasn’t as simple as mending broken bones. At best, Miguel would be scarred for years to come. At worst, he would have post-traumatic stress disorder. As callous as it was, Elijah hoped for the former, if only because those scars could become potent armor for life in a world that was as far from safe as humanity had ever experienced.

In any case, Elijah felt obligated to keep the only family he had left as safe as he could manage. So, he hadn’t taken off for Easton. Not immediately. Though his rage remained just as potent as ever, he’d shunted it into its own facet of his Quartz Mind, where it could roil as much as it needed. Every now and then, he focused on it. It was almost a form of torture, and it kept the pain fresh, but he felt that he needed that reminder. It was a means to keep him from forgetting that he had another duty.

Because eventually, vengeance would come.

Elijah didn’t look over as Carmen settled in beside him. She, Miguel, and the tall, slender swordsman whose freedom Elijah had negotiated, had insisted on coming with him as he scouted out a new location for a dolmen. It slowed him down considerably, but he didn’t have the heart to refuse them. The other refugees had remained with Lucy to recover before embarking on their new lives.

“You know what’s weird?” he said, still staring at the fire. “I don’t remember her face. Not really. I remember events. I remember that stupid sweater she wore the last time I came home for Christmas. But I can’t remember her face.”

“I do,” Carmen said, sitting with her forearms on her knees. “I remember all those best memories in perfect detail. I even remember the last time I saw her. She was wearing the armor I made for her. Carrying the spear I’d forged. And she seemed so hopeful, like she intended to use the time in the tower to mend the breaking relationship she had with the man who’d once been her friend. Her mentor, really. I sometimes wonder if she had that attitude right up until they murdered her.”

“I wish I had memories like that,” Elijah admitted. “I was talking to her on a video call when the world changed. I had no idea that would be the last time I’d ever see her.” Then, he glanced at Carmen, asking, “You don’t have any pictures or anything, do you?”

Carmen shook her head, her face illuminated by the firelight. Elijah could see tears glistening from her cheeks. She did that a lot, lately. It was as if finally finding Elijah had reignited her grief. For his part, he’d shed plenty of his own tears, though most of them had come in seclusion. He wasn’t ashamed of it or anything. Crying was a normal reaction to loss. However, he wasn’t the sort of person who took solace in company. For better or worse, he was a loner, and his time since the World Tree’s touch had descended upon Earth had only accentuated that.

So, he usually wept alone, just like he did everything else with only himself for company.

“No,” Carmen answered. “Before everything happened, most everything was digital. We had some family photos in the house, but when we left, we prioritized supplies. By the time we came back, everything had been destroyed. After that, I just never thought to get anything new made. There were a couple of artists in Easton but…I guess I just thought we had more time.”

She sighed. “I thought I saw it coming,” she admitted. “I even warned her. But I didn’t really think he’d go that far. We were all friends. We had neighborhood barbecues. They worked together for years. In retrospect, I should have seen the signs. His wife was terrified of him. I don’t think he was ever abusive – not physically, at least – but…well, knowing what I know now, it should have been obvious that he’d go down this road.”

“Maybe,” Elijah said. “I’ve killed people, you know. Not many, but there was one just a few days ago. I don’t know why he attacked me, either. He was at the top of the power rankings. Higher level than me. But when it came time, I didn’t hesitate to do what needed to be done.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I want you to understand that that was me when I didn’t really have anything against the guy, other than that he attacked me,” Elijah said. “I crushed his skull. But this? This is going to be different.”

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“I know,” she said softly.

It was telling that she didn’t try to dissuade him. Carmen wanted Roman dead as much as anyone, but it seemed that she had accepted her own limitations.

For the next hour, they both remained in place, staring at the fire. As they did, the sun slowly rose above the horizon, casting the sky in blue and orange. It was a beautiful sight, but neither were in the right frame of mind to appreciate it.

Still, the rising sun brought with it a pair of wakeful companions. Colt pushed himself to his feet, then stretched a few times before silently joining them by the fire. Miguel mimicked the swordsman.

“What are we doing out here?” asked Carmen.

Elijah answered, “I need to find an appropriate spot for a dolmen.”

“What’s that?” asked Miguel.

“It’s like a monument. Think of Stonehenge,” Carmen answered, clearly putting her educational background as a historian to good use. Then, she asked, “Why, though? Is it…like, a memorial site?”

Elijah shook his head, saying, “No. Not really. I assume there’s one of those back in Easton, right?”

“There is. No body, though,” Carmen said. Then, she quietly added, “Just a marker.”

Elijah’s fingers tightened into a fist, but he didn’t immediately respond to that piece of information. Instead, he took a deep breath, before saying, “This dolmen is special. It’s part of a spell. Once I’ve finished it, I’ll be able to teleport back…home. There are limitations, so it might take an extra week after that, but that’s something we’ll figure out later. For now, though, we’re searching for the perfect spot.”

“How will you know it?”

Elijah shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s more of a feeling than anything. Or if I find a natural treasure,” he said. “But this close to Seattle, I doubt there’s anything around.”

After that, he shared some of his grove berries among the group, but he got a bit of a shock when Miguel passed out after a single bite. It only lasted a few frantic seconds, and when he rose, he eagerly asked for more while wearing a mile-wide grin across his face. Carmen nixed that idea, and Elijah tended to agree. From what he’d felt, the boy hadn’t actually been hurt by the berry. He’d just been overloaded by ethera and vitality, which both seemed like good things.

Regardless, he wasn’t going to go against a mother’s wishes regarding her child, so he handed over some dried meat instead. Carmen and Colt had no issues with the berries, though. It was, in fact, the opposite, and even that small meal left the both of them looking a little healthier and far more energetic.

That left Elijah to look forward to what his coffee would do, once he got around to harvesting his trees and roasting the beans.

In any case, after they finished their breakfast, they smothered the fire and set off across the desert. To Elijah’s surprise, the others were decent enough with their woodcraft, but he found plenty of opportunities to point out one thing or another, especially to Miguel, who took to the lessons with verve.

He seemed especially interested when Elijah grabbed one of the big desert monitors and let the boy touch it. The reptile wasn’t particularly happy about being manhandled, but because of Elijah’s long experience in the wilderness and, most likely, his archetype, the creature tolerated it.

Still, when Elijah released the four-foot-long lizard, it scurried away and disappeared into the desert.

Like that, they continued for three more days until, at last, Elijah sensed something nearby. He couldn’t figure out what, precisely, it was, but he recognized the feeling as similar to what he felt outside of Argos. Before, that sensation had led him to the site of the Dragon Circle, so he didn’t hesitate to follow the ephemeral trail.

When it ended, he couldn’t help but gasp at what he found.

It was a small pond, maybe a hundred feet across and surrounded by greenery. More importantly, when Elijah approached – alone – he sensed that the pond played host to a guardian. He pulled a hunk of meat from his satchel as he stepped into the tiny oasis, and at first, he didn’t see the creature he sensed. However, it only took a moment before he saw the bulge of a giant shell cutting through the water.

Elijah tossed the still-bloody hunk of meat into the water. Or at least that was where its arc should have taken it. Instead, a giant turtle snapped out, catching the chunk in its beak.

“Easy there,” Elijah said, his voice steady as he held out his hand. “I’m not here to hurt you or take your treasure.”

Elijah wasn’t even certain there was a treasure to take. He didn’t feel one. But in his experience, one usually came with the other. It didn’t matter, though. He wasn’t some ravening devourer hellbent on harvesting everything that could be of use. He only wanted to build his dolmen, though he needed to make peace with the giant turtle before he committed to that.

Thankfully, animals were fairly predictable. Part of that was clearly his archetype’s influence. One with Nature could be taken literally, and wildlife – whether that meant animals or the more advanced guardians – tended to accept him far more easily than they did other people. So, the creature was already predisposed to accepting him, which meant that it only took a few hours of feeding to get it on his side.

Still, when Carmen, Miguel, and Colt finally approached to see him scratching the creature’s chin – its head was at least two feet across, and the rest of its body matched that size – it let out a low rumble. To which Elijah responded with a simple, “No.”

Its growl didn’t cease until Elijah fed it another hunk of meat.

After that, it went silent, even allowing Miguel to approach. He seemed to delight in the turtle’s presence, which the thing picked up on. Apparently, giant oasis turtles could read a person’s mood.

Either way, that lasted a few more hours before Elijah was willing to leave the others in the oasis while he searched the area for proper materials. At first Carmen insisted on accompanying him, but he only responded by saying, “You’ll just slow me down. I need to cover a lot of ground. You can help when I’m toting rocks across the desert, though.”

After that, he cast Shape of the Sky, eliciting three gasps of surprise. He said, “Relax. It’s still me. This is my secret. Just go with it.”

Then, he launched himself into the air, and though he wobbled a bit – he still wasn’t completely accustomed to the mechanics of flight – he quickly found himself soaring high into the skies. Once there, he circled a few times before activating Eyes of the Eagle. From so high up, and with his vision magnified, he could see for dozens of miles in every direction. Still, it took a few more hours before he found a sandstone pillar that was surrounded by dozens of appropriately sized boulders.

It was almost forty miles away from the oasis, which meant that he was in for a significant hardship, getting everything into place. However, if there was one thing he was accustomed to, it was hard work. So, he landed, shifted into the form of the lamellar ape, then hefted the largest stone.

A moment later, he was trudging across the desert, once again carrying a multi-ton boulder on his back.

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