The streets were wide. Wide enough for pack mules loaded with food and supplies and people to walk past without issue. Many people wore open and loose clothes, comprised of sleeveless short robes and shorts. Many of the homes and shops were made of thin wood with straw roofs. Air that let the humidity circle instead of settling.
Most of the people here seemed friendly to one another, or at least to recognize one another as the usual parts of their days. There was a fine mist on the sky above hiding the sun, giving the village some much need cool air. There was a thick forest that traveled up and around the mountain to surround the village.
“So this is Xye. Nice place. I don’t have memories of anything like this from Reditus.”
The villagers gave the strangers a wide berth as they walked down the street. The three of them definitely didn’t fit in with the locals. Most of the local’s beige skin looked white in comparison to their dark skin. Though some had striking tans from constant farm work. It didn’t help that one of them looked like an animal human hybrid.
Roxanne walked at the head, desperately wishing to get rid of the sleeves. At the very least they’d found a way to tailor make them so that her tail could come out of the pants. It swished behind her and she turned to glare at the one who spoke. “We’re not here to sightsee. We’re doing reconnaissance.”
“Of course. Whatever Daze and Badou order.”
Roxanne turned and glared, “That’s king or his majesty to you.”
“He’s not my king.”
The new guardian looked down at her smirking, bordering on a sneer. Roxanne met the girl only a few days prior. She seemed quiet and meek. Respectful even. But that was before Daze got his hands on her. Before Daze stole whatever he took from her and replaced it with a demon. It had taken over a week for her to wake up and when she did Roxanne doubted, she properly had.
Roxanne stared at the girl and met those empty black eyes that stared back. She noted the pocket watch they wore at their breast pocket. She finally looked away hissing under her breath. “Come on Silva.”
“My names Titanya kitty cat.”
Roxanne turned around quickly and swung at them claws first. Before they could connect a black disc of light appeared and her claws scratched against it with a sharp screech. Those close enough flinched at the sudden noise.
Cancer shouldered past them both and mumbled. “Stop screwing around. Let’s get this done.
“Oh lighten up crabby,” Titanya shrugged. “I’m just enjoying my new lease on life. Wish my landlord was around but not paying rent is nice too.”
Cancer turned a sharp glare back to the two of them. Wearing the same kind of black suit and red tie now, he fit the part. Around his neck he wore two pedants, his own and his father’s. At one hip were his katars but at his other were the pair of chakrams.
“Yeah well some of us still remember our old lives,” he said and then put his back to them both. “And the sooner we find this damn temple the sooner we can leave.”
Titanya and Roxanne both looked at the boy as he continued down the street. Rolling her eyes Roxanne followed him and Titanya took up the rear. “He acts like this isn’t some wild goose chase to keep us busy while Daze does Daze things,” Titanya growled. “Daze doesn’t even know if the temple is real!”
The three of them marched down the street but they were definitely now the talk of this small village. It wasn’t obvious but they had comments thrown toward them. Thankfully the two of them didn’t know the language. Not really. But Cancer stopped suddenly and turned toward a pair. They were young, maybe a year younger than him. They’d been sitting on a few crates cracking jokes and pointing toward the three of them. They said a few quick comments and broke into a round of laughter. At least until Cancer started talking to them.
His grasp of the language was formal and all from a book but it was coherent. The kids were shocked but the exchanges were quick. Cancer’s eyes narrowed and he seemed to be aggressively reaching toward his katars but an older man came toward them.
He was leaning on a cane and wobbled as he walked. He reprimanded the children and they shouted back at him but they finally left. He then started shaking his cane at Cancer speaking angrily. Cancer’s glare toward him slowly faded as he listened.
They turned into a proper conversation soon after. Cancer motioned to the other two and then started moving his hands, struggling for words and instead using his hands. And then the old man said something and he jumped on that. He spoke quickly, stumbling over his words and the old man pointed out of the village into the mountains.
Cancer clasped his hands together and bowed quickly. He stepped away and let the old man go on his way before returning to the other two. Titanya came forward first putting their hands on their hips, “Have a good talk crabby?”
“I know where we’re going next,” he said mostly ignoring them. “This area is called the Dragon’s Valley. And that,” he pointed to the path outside of the village leading into the forest. “Is called the dragon’s pass.”
“Where’d you learn to speak the language?” Roxanne asked.
“My teachers made sure I knew for cultural reasons. And I was a good student. Helped my brother. There’s a local shrine on the edge of the forest. That’s the closest we’ll get to a temple out here at least.”
“You sure it’s what we’re looking for? Could be local superstition.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
Titanya started to say something but finally raised their hand. “You mentioned dragons a lot. There’s still some dragon in me. Maybe I can help.”
“Won’t know until we get there.” Roxanne nodded toward Cancer, “Good work. Let’s go.”
Leaving the village behind they followed the path into the forest. The trees were very different out here. They grew rigid, the leaves balancing like shelves instead of giant bushes above their heads. They were deep green in tightened clumps.
TItanya touched one of the trunks and watched the insects climbing it. A line of ants, each holding a leaf, marching their way around the bark. Titanya rested a finger against it and one ant climbed onto their finger while the others started a new path around it.
They stared at it closely as it stopped, looking around and searching their hand confused. “So this is life on this side. Small. Fragile.”
Roxanne and Cancer followed the path, trees crowded above their heads and darkening their steps. Her ears flicked back and forth at the sounds of branches snapping and animals calling to one another. Her face was grumpy at the humidity sticking to her skin and the clothes.
“The things we do for Badou,” she mumbled then glanced back at Cancer.
He was silently following her lead his hands at his side. Loosely Roxanne was keeping track of where his hands were. His fingers twitched as they walked but they weren’t going for the weapons. Badou told her to keep an eye on him. She knew he meant to make sure he was okay. But she was still wary of this boy.
As Cancer walked, he felt the presence taking steps in time with him. He looked nothing like him yet they had a similar gait, a similar tilt of the head. “Xye. I never had the chance to visit it properly.”
“Do you ever stop talking?” he mumbled.
“You called me, Cancer. Isolated and alone. You needed someone familiar and here I am.”
“I never would have willingly called you even if I was dying.” The past him laughed but eventually just faded away at the corners of his vision. But he could still feel him nearby.
The path in front of them started to split into two. They stood on either side of it looking back and forth both equally unsure of which one to take. “So we split up?” Cancer suggested. “I take this path, you take the other.”
“That’s an idea but I have another,” she sniffed a few times. She scrunched her nose up as she caught the scents. The trees. The animals. But she was searching for something else. For the longest, she couldn’t get any read on it but something came on the wind. A smell she couldn’t describe. She started walking toward one of the paths and kept going.
Cancer raised his eyebrow, “What is it?”
“We can smell something. Someone. It smells like Silva did. But also smells like you.” Roxanne worked in circles sniffing the air going from one path to another indecisively.
“Smells like me? What do you mean?”
“You. The Zodiac. You have a scent that’s beyond human. Beyond magic. We can smell that here. In the forest,” she finally stopped in front of one of the paths. She sniffed again and pointed. “This one. This is the one.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Come on.”
She started moving quickly, running straight down the worn dirt path. It went down instead of up the mountain. Surprised Cancer sped after her. As they ran the path started to get sharper down as they went. It got to the point where more than once they both stumbled, almost falling in the looseness of the gravel.
Running down the mountain the both of them could hear the trickle of the water. They were near a river or something. Rounding a corner Roxanne slowed down and slid across the ground. Stumbling she swore more than once and hissed.
But in the midst of her frustration, she could see it. Far below them the trees spread apart revealing a small clearing. The clearing was of stone ground, a river that surrounded it and snaked away back into the forest. There were stone steps in the water, a pathway that they could trace through the river, and up the mountain that they were descending now.
There were small stone statues and altars. And from where they were, they could see the real pattern. The patterns in the way the stone was hewn. Chunks of stone segmented together like interlocking scales. And in the center was raised platform that connected to the entirety of the temple.
“What’s the pattern?” Cancer asked. “There’s no way they did that for artistic reasons.”
“It’s a dragon,” Titanya said finally catching up to them. Their black eyes widened and parts of their skin rippled as scales started to form on their face. “Guess this wasn’t superstition after all.”
“How are we getting down there?” Cancer looked at the path and it became horrendously narrow. Part of it even disappeared under a recent landslide.
“We don’t trust that.”
“Neither do I.”
“Then let’s just fly down.”
Both looked at Titanya raising their eyebrows. Roxanne took a slow breath, “Okay. We’ll bite. How?”
Titanya smirked and two pairs of wings sprouted from their back. One was a silver scaled wing and the other was a black feathery one. They wrapped one arm around the two of them quickly and then jumped. Neither of them were happy about being suddenly a hundred feet in the air. Neither of them had flying high on their lists, least of all under Titanya’s aid.
As they flew Cancer could see the dragon properly. A shape that wrapped around itself like a snake with horns. He could just barely remember it from the books.
Wriggling in Titanya’s grasp, Roxanne pointed to the center of the temple, “There’s someone down there!”
Both turned and sure enough, sitting on the dragon’s head was a person. They didn’t seem to notice the three of them soaring above their head. Catching the winds properly the trio coasted and then came down on the edge of the temple.
The moment they landed, Roxanne broke away from Titanya as fast as she could. Her tail thrashing she pointed a sharp claw at Titanya, “You do that again and we’ll claw your face off.”
“Lighten up kitty cat,” that got another hiss. “Let’s focus on what’s in front of us.”
The three of them exchanged glances and looked at the stranger. He sat with his fist pressed together and head down. He had soft beige skin and long black hair. It was tied in a tight ponytail that traveled down his back. He wore a sleeveless blue vest but, in the light, it seemed iridescent purple. His pants were a pale tan and he wore simple black shoes.
Roxanne sniffed and recoiled. There was something beyond magic in the air. Her fur was standing on edge and she walked on her toes. Even Heine was on edge.
Cancer on the other hand felt at home. It reminded him of being in the temple. A familiarity that made him wish he could turn to his brother. But he put that behind him and focused on the man in front of him.
“So who’s this guy?” Titanya asked loudly.
“No idea,” Cancer replied. “But I can feel his power.”
“You know he can probably hear you two?”
“Probably. But we came looking for him right?”
“We don’t know that yet,” Roxanne glanced back at Cancer. “For all we know this is just some local mage.”
“I know magic isn’t my thing but even you have to feel the power coming from him.”
“We can but,” Roxanne grasped for the words. “The magic here is different. Strange. We don’t know what he could be.”
“Well let’s stop beating around the bush and just ask.” Titanya walked past the two of them and walked right up to him. They heard the warnings and shouts from their companions but they kept going until they stood directly in front of him.
They crouched down, hands between their legs, and stared. He was slightly elevated on the dragon’s head, the mouth of it facing them. From this close, they could see his face. He had a square jaw and thin cheeks. His eyes were closed but she could tell they were large. Everything about his face seemed off, not quite human, kinda the same way as Roxanne’s.
Titanya tilted their head back and forth and reached out a finger to touch his head. Before they could touch him, his eyes opened and they were a deep blue like sapphires. The pupils were long black slits and when he blinked his lids moved sideways.
“Whoa. You’re awake.” He said something but Titanya didn’t understand it. They turned around to look back at Cancer and Roxanne. “You pick up on that crabby?”
“He said don’t touch him,” Cancer approached slowly and those draconic eyes turned to him immediately. Cancer raised his hands taking a step back. “I’m not dangerous.”
The man stood slowly and he was taller than all three of them. Just looking at him he seemed older too. By a generation or two. There an ancient quality to him that even Titanya respected to a degree. So they backed up and gave him space. Cancer walked forward and locked eyes with the man for a long moment.
He tilted his head to the side and blinked again. He said something and Cancer responded. He struggled over a word but got it out and the stranger shook his head. “Stop,” he said in a heavily accented voice. “Your Xye is terrible.”
Cancer made a face and smirked, “Well your Nerodalan is ancient.”
That made the stranger smirk. Titanya spread their arms, “So we all speak the same language now. Great.”
“Yes. And I could hear you three since you entered my forest. I don’t know who you are. But you feel like yaomo. Especially you,” he said looking directly at Titanya. “What do you want?”
“We came here seeking the temple of the dragon. We take it that’s you?” Roxanne asked raising a suspicious eyebrow.
“I had many names across many generations. The name that this version of me prefers is Long.”
“Long?” Cancer repeated. Looking around at the temple he turned back to Long. “Does that mean this is your temple?”
“It is a temple dedicated to me and those like me.”
“Like you? So there’s a bunch of dragons?”
“No. When I die another will be born to continue my line. Just like the others,” he said simply.
“The others? Wait. Are you a Zodiac?” Cancer asked his eyes widening.
“That’s your term for it but yes,” Long nodded.
“Alpha and Omega. Never talked about you.”
“That’s because we aren’t born of them.”
“What? Are you saying there’s another Zodiac? Fully independent of the goddesses?”
“The world is bigger than this country.”
“We don’t have time for a history lesson,” Roxanne growled looking at Cancer first and then at Long. “We came to find the temple of the dragon. We found it. And it has a guardian. So that begs the question. Are you an enemy or not?”
Titanya looked Long and spread their arms. But Cancer looked at Long and then back to them and stood in front of him. “No.”
Roxanne’s eyes narrowed and her lips curled back into a snarl, “What?”
“Is this a conflict you really want, Cancer?”
Ignoring the voice, he glared at them both but focused on Roxanne, “We don’t have to give Daze another Zodiac. Ruin more lives.”
“You know what’s on the line for us.”
“I do.”
“You’d ask us to risk the life of our king for what? Some solidarity you have with a man you’ve never met? Some long lost cousin?”
“They don’t need to be put through what my family has been through already!”
“And what about ours?!” Roxanne shouted. “What about what ours has been through? Should we put ours behind just so your conscious can be clear?”
“Badou would.”
Hissing softly Roxanne spread her fingers extending her claws. Her mask started to manifest around her mouth slowly, “Watch what you say next boy. Watch it carefully.”
“If you want to avoid fighting your new allies, be smart.”
Cancer glared at her and shook his head. “Daze doesn’t know this Zodiac exist. If he did he’d have come here himself. If he had a choice Badou would leave them alone. Lie. Protect them.”
“And what makes you think you know a damn thing about Badou?”
“Because I know about Regina,” Her eyes shrunk to pin points at the name and he kept talking. “I know that Badou regrets that to this day. And because of that he doesn’t do sacrifices. It’s because of that that he feels responsible for me. It’s because of that that I believe him when he says he didn’t know. And it’s because of that that I know he’d try to find another way. He said you’d know that better than anyone.”
She hissed and growled and swiped at the air more animal than person. But her mask faded away and she fought the tears at the corners of her eyes. She turned slowly and pointed right at him, “If we do this and Daze finds out we won’t let Badou take the blame for this. It’s on you and you alone. Is that clear? Badou may not but we will sacrifice you in a heartbeat.”
Cancer nodded quickly and she hissed again walking away from them. Titanya watched her go and then back to Cancer and Long. “Uh. What just happened?”
“We’re going back,” Cancer said and let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. “And we’re not going to talk about this place or him to Daze.”
Titanya just shrugged, “Works for me.”
Cancer trailed behind and glanced back at the Long. Long watched the others go and then focused on Cancer. He felt young right now but still said, “An old me wanted to meet you. I hope I can meet you again.”
Long sat down slowly at the head of the dragon and he said something in Xye that made Cancer’s face scrunch in confusion. “What does that mean?”
But Long had closed his eyes and Cancer realized that he wasn’t going to talk anymore. Sighing he turned and started after Titanya and Roxanne. He looked down at the pendants around his neck and his heart ached. But he wiped his eyes, took a deep breath, and ran after his new allies.
Dully he could hear clapping in his ears. “Well done successor. I couldn’t have done it better myself.”
The Harlequin Library 