Category: The Gloaming

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Chapter 29

I stood like a statue, dart in hand, as I contemplated the completeness of that thought.

I should burn my file.

Some of it. The bad parts.

I don’t know what would happen if I burned my whole file. I might cease to exist or lose my soul or something similar. It sounded like a bad idea. And the files didn’t chronicle everything. Day to day life was often summarized, and the interns used to joke about people who’s whole files were summaries. ‘Lived eighty years, worked as a shoe maker, died.’ A long and empty life had a thin, empty file.

But I could certainly delete any notes I didn’t like. ‘Committed a little treason. Offenses indexed in Addendum A.’ That part could get burned.

It wouldn’t stop anyone properly motivated, but it wouldn’t help.

The dirty secret of Fate is that people’s files got lost all the time. I worked there, and I know I made mistakes. A missing file wouldn’t be a shocking red flag. Files passed through dozens of hands, and I was just some mortal. No one cared about mortals.

I put the darts down and walked out the back door without telling Aubrey where I was going.

The tower shopette had tobacco and a lighter, The latter was a red-burning star fragment in a silver holder, one that blazed to life when exposed to air and ether. The air up here was mostly ether. The tobacco smelled terrible, and I don’t know why anyone liked this stuff. I also got some cheap papers and a pouch. For money I had to go outside and scrounge the hills for loose rubies and emeralds, but this place wasn’t as opulent as Hyperion. Cover established, I left the Emerald Hinton.

I’d worked in the basement of Tower Azure Nadella. There weren’t any interns now, during winter, so the corridors were largely empty. The potentate who ran the tower loved changing things for the sake of changing them, and constantly rebuilt stairways, moved walls, and shifted doors. He never updated the wall maps, so the place felt deliberately confusing. The ‘You Are Here’ signs lied.

Still, I knew generally where to go: down. I took stairways towards the smellier, moldier parts of the tower, and soon found the empty intern offices. The ‘File Request’ room door opened on the end of the hallway.

Inside, several long, knotted, silk cords ran from floor to ceiling. Within the walls, they traveled in jade and silver tubes, but in here they were exposed. Boxes of file requisition forms lay piled against the wall, unminded and left alone since the last batch of interns left. I didn’t even worry about disturbing the boxes. We’d piled them up here on the last day of the internship, and we’d done a terrible job!

I snagged a form and pen, it was dry, found a pen that worked three pens later, and requested my file.

“Kog, born in the House of Aeschites, Ascendant in Autumn.”

I clipped the form to rope and sent it on its way.

Somewhere out in the deeper bowels of Fate, automota made by the Clockwork Gods themselves would take it, read it, and process the request without thinking, questioning, or considering. The Clockwork Gods had not been fans of their servants thinking, questioning, or considering. They weren’t fans of free will at all, and weren’t happy anyone, humans or gods, had it.

The gods weren’t supposed to have it. That’s what Creation’s Oaths were for. They bound the Gods of Flesh to eternal servitude to the Gods from Gears and had since the Forbidden Revolution.

Us mortals were too weak for oaths. We might swear, but would it bind us through temptation and duress? Not always. We were only mortals, after all.

I thought of Creation’s Oaths, what Jermaine had promised to burn when I’d first gotten involved in this little regicide thing. They were here, somewhere. I couldn’t requisition them. I’d asked. Curiosity had urged me, way before I’d ever considered treason, regicide, or criminal behavior beyond underage drinking and speeding. Still, it seemed a shame to be so close to what we’d wanted so badly and not be able to touch them.

And I had fire right with me.

Hmmm.

They were probably– definitely guarded.

Something creaked and flapped in the cord tube, and a file appeared, paper-clipped to the cord. I took it down.

“Kog, born in the House of Aeschites, Ascendant in Autumn”

There was a small note attached.

“The treason addendum has been requisitioned by Judicial Director Priam.”

Sickness and death.

That was what I wanted! That was the important part! That was the whole goal, the objective, the reason I’d come…what exactly did they have on me?

I stared at my file for a little bit. It was pleasantly thick. I had some documents in here, not just summaries. Without opening the file, I looked around it and saw official copy ribbons folded among the papers like bookmarks. The Office of Duplication used those when they made copies as official as originals.

It was, coincidentally, super illegal to requisition your own file. I hadn’t done it when I’d worked here, but criminality had become somewhat less concerning to me recently.

It was even more super illegal to read your own file. That was a different crime. And I was here.

I hesitated. My chest hurt.

Blisters and blindness.

I took the file, ran back to my office, and smelled the old scents of mildew and moist carpet, spilled food that never quite got cleaned up, and stale air. The blue walls had turned a sickening green, tiles of the ceiling had splotches of water damage, and the door didn’t quite shut because the frame had warped. I’d turned in a work order my first stint, another my second, and my door still didn’t work.

Death on all that.

I sat in the half-broken chair that slumped to the right and had given me back problems, slapped the file on my lap, and opened it. This was probably more treason. They could add it to the list before I burned the list.

The first page was a sheet of parchment. It read, “Executive Summary: Kog believes the cover story that his father killed his mother and tried to kill him before taking his own life. This causes him to overcompensate via a desire for fame. Revealing the truth to the mortal is not necessary. He is unlikely to affect Destiny in any meaningful sense and is not scheduled to be famous.”

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Chapter 28

The door opened and a new guard walked in. He looked like the other two had: different boulder, same rock. I snoozed without sleeping, and wasn’t so much awoken when he appeared as alerted. He pushed a cart to the edge of my bed and left it.

“Historiography just came in clean. You fought the dragon. You’re free of custody.

“Most places around here are controlled, so don’t go wandering off. You’ll be debriefed when someone gets around to it and escorted back to Meru when someone makes the trip with an open seat. You’re not allowed to stay in Medical, though. Clarification on where you can wait is coming.

“Eat up, some clean clothes are in the cart, and take a shower.”

That seemed straight forward. I had no questions, he had nothing else to say, and that breakfast wasn’t going to eat itself.

In an hour or so, I was ready for the day, and orders had come down.

“You’re going to be stuck in Emerald Hinton Tower until someone’s ready for you. Emerald Hinton has the gym, the library, a cafeteria, and a few nice parks. You can kill some time there.”

Boulder Number 4 had come in when I was dressed. The clothing they’d provided was gray and loose: pants, undershirt, a sweater, textile belt, and sandals. Everything was made of silk or wool. I’ve never had silk underwear before, but I could get used to it.

He dropped some green cards on the bed. “These are your meal cards. You won’t get more until tomorrow, so don’t lose them, but you should be back in Meru by then, so it won’t be an issue. We’re going to Snow Winston to see if they’re ready for you, but if they’re not, you are officially confined to Emerald Hinton and the grounds. You also can’t walk out of here, so saddle up. The staff wants you gone so they can clean the room.” And he rattled the folding wheelchair conspicuously.

I moved over. “Sally forth, Greevs!”

“Don’t call me Greevs.”

Greevs was a famous butler and chauffeur, and I needed something to call these guys instead of Boulder Number Whatevers.

Fate’s medical center took up the first few stories of the Chestnut Augustus Tower. Augustus had been a Fate operator years and years ago, famous for doing his paperwork well, and had died in battle. The periphery held people who needed long-term care (they got windows), and the inside held us short timers. Supposedly the interior is closer to everything, so if a critical patient (me) needed to be rushed to a specialist, I could get there faster than if I had a window-room across the building. I’ll allow it, but it seems awfully convenient as a way to deny me my window.

Greevs wheeled my chair out of Chestnut Augustus Tower and along a paved walking path outside the towers. Fate’s complex stood high in the mountains of the Firmament, the great sphere that held the Outer Ocean out. Beacons shined on the summits of each mountain, the great stars of Pallas’s sky.

I looked up. Pallas was dead overhead in the center of the sky, a huge ball of blue and gray. Her Sea of Clausius faced me with brown and green bits around the edge, while in the center clouds and fumes hid the Clockwork Gods working. Down there seawater fell over the edges of the unfinished surface of Meru to the underworld beneath. If I could look through clouds and mist, I would be able to see the scaffolding and winches, the huge gears that drive the continents, and the construction of islands and seabed slowly reaching across gap. Somewhere in there the geigun worked for the world’s Clockwork masters. They were something other than mortal or Celestial, but I knew of them only abstractly. They swung the hammers and moved the iron as the Clockwork Gods directed. I’d never met one. The Sea of Clausius was the last part of the world unfinished, and the clouds seemed to cover about half the ball.

I looked back down at the Firmament. On the shell of the sky, the Sun never set, but it did move around. Right now it was peaking around the mountains, and the shadows were dwindling. This was morning. I tried to think something deep about life, but only got, ‘Great things are a lot less great when you’re in them.’

They wheeled me around the hanger to the Snow Winston Tower. Winston was…similar story to Augustus actually. Good at paperwork, died in battle. Huh. Anyway, the Snow Winston was finished inside with marble and limestone, the floor was a form of hard white agate, and the ceiling had reinforcement spars of aluminum. The walls had more decorations than Chestnut Augustus. Framed pictures of people getting medals, giving speeches, or sitting at desks, working studiously, lined the halls. A lady with dark braids smiled above a plaque naming her, ‘Admiral Tiana, first operator to achieve 100% budget request submissions on time.’ She faced a portly man who was, ‘Grandmaster Marcus, on completing one century of perfect attendance.’ They looked pleased, honored, and motivated.

I had no awards. My attendance had been shtuttick.

In Snow Winston an attache with a clipboard took my name, ticked a box, and told Greevs to take me to Rec. I asked if I could walk. The attache, Ezekiel, said I could.

I got out of the wheelchair, and the other guard, call him Betty, took it back toward medical. Greevs escorted me to Emerald Hinton and handed me over to a young lady behind a desk. She actually had a name tag, so I didn’t get to make anything up for her. Her name was Aubrey, and she looked concerned.

“Is he supposed to be in jail?” she asked. “There are no cells here.”

“No, no,” said Greevs. “He’s free to go, but he can’t go anywhere controlled. Historiography and maybe Obscene Beasts is going to interview him later. He just needs a place to stay so they can find him.”

“Oh. Okay. Well, he can use the recreational facilities, and the cafeteria is in the basement.”

“Thanks.” He tried to smile at her, but I think his face would have cracked. He left. She looked at me as if perplexed.

She was actually fairly cute with light brown hair, a round face, and slim-fitting green uniform.

“I fought a dragon, you know,” I said.

“That sounds outstanding,” she replied and opened a book.

Frankly, she wasn’t really that attractive. I wandered off.

The recreation facility had a few dart boards, billiards tables, and various board games. There was a room for parties and an area for quiet reading. Up a flight of stairs, the library seemed unchanged from the one-time I’d looked in here before, during my internship. It had immense volumes on tax law and hierarchical etiquette, but nothing with a murder or a little smooching. Up another floor was the gym, and I did have some familiarity with that. Still, I had recently come to the edge of death. I spent half an hour stretching before getting bored. Nothing was going on in the martial arts area.

The cafeteria blew my mind. They had spreads of ambrosia and wine of nectar and honeydew. All things considered, I avoided the latter, but ate what might very well have been the best meal of my life. The counter lady looked at my meal ticket but didn’t take it. I felt better than I had since all this foolishness began, and that was with bruises, cuts, and a fatal cold bane hanging over my head.

Without much idea what to do next, I approached Aubrey and asked if anyone had come looking for me.

“Nope,” she said without looking up from her book.

That hadn’t seemed like an unreasonable question to me.

I didn’t quite know what to do or where to go next. The ambrosia was working, and I wanted to give it time. I didn’t think I could sleep right now, even in a quiet area, and I felt like I’d be wasting an opportunity if I just slept through my time up here in Fate. I had wasted a lot of time working, and I wasn’t working now. Should I be?

I was throwing darts for no reason when inspiration kissed me.

I should go to the files room, see what they had on me, and burn it.

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Chapter 27

“Sleep first or food?” asked the Celestial orderly, getting immediately to the most important of matters.

“Food.” I decided.

We moved through corridors of some brown material that looked like polished stone. It didn’t seem to be in blocks. Praus, the orderly asking the good questions, was a small swarthy man. He smiled a lot, but I was a job for him. His friend had left without giving his name, and Praus had said he was taking me to a guest room.

I doubted leaving the guest room would be encouraged.

After several turns, he stopped in a hallway with a counter. I smelled frying meat and butter, heard sizzles and drips, and splashes and sloshing. Praus tapped the counter. Before anyone said anything, a burlap wrapped package appeared. He hung it from a hook by my head and pushed the bed off down the hallway.

That bag smelled of rice. I sniffed. Vegetables. I sniffed again. Butter. More vegetables. I needed that package inside me.

Within a few minutes, Praus wheeled me into a small room. It had no windows but did have a water house. The walls had stripes of pastel paints over the brown stone. Praus poured three cups of water and laid them on a table that pivoted over the bed. He moved the package there too before cranking a wheel below my head. The bed lifted me into a sitting position.

“Try to drink all three. If you need help making it to the water house, someone will be right outside. If you can handle things on your own, go ahead. Eat, sleep, eat again, and we’ll see how you are later. Anything else you need, Vincent?”

“Nope.”

“I’ll put a change by your bed. Sleep well.”

He left. I ate, drank all three glasses, dragged myself across walls, and hung on hand-rails to make it to the toilet. When I was done, I felt weaker than I ever had. But I could move.

Dr Thay had said whatever had left that injury on my side would kill me. Hoarfast had, and he was up here, somewhere, with me. Thus, after eating, contrary to doctor’s orders and my own desires, I did not go to sleep. Winching the bed into a more vertical sitting position took all my effort, but I was able to do a little thinking.

All right, self, what are we trying to do here? I thought.

No thoughts, no voices that sounded like thoughts, urged death and murder in my head.

That was terrifying, I admitted to myself. To suddenly find out the thoughts in your head weren’t yours, and they meant harm to others, meant to use you to do harm to others, it was mind-horror. That sword–

I was pretty sure the Drowning Breath of Ogden was dead. I’d stabbed it into the dragon’s head, and last I’d seen, fire had erupted around it. Could I kill a sword? I don’t know, but I was glad it was done.

And at least the sword died doing what it loved: killing.

What was I going to do about this side? What was I going to do here? Hoarfast had seen me. Would he talk?

I doubted it. I couldn’t imagine he’d say anything to Fate about our shared treason.

Someone knocked on the door and a moment later opened it.

The door opener was a big, meavily muscled man with extremely short hair, thick beard, and no neck. He went from shoulders to head with only a few rolls in between. He wore a white underlayer and gray armor: shoulder pads, elbow pads, knee pads, boots, a neck protector, tombstone chest piece, gloves that looked more like gauntlets, and an iron hanging from a carabiner by his shoulder. I didn’t recognize the gun type. He had a knife on his chest too, set up for a vertical draw. He even had shooting glasses: an amber, one piece lense that wrapped from temple to temple. He looked deeply, extremely bored, and his other hand held his place in a book with one finger.

“Vistor,” he said.

A woman walked in carrying a glass vase of lilies. She was a small person, fair-skinned, with her hair in a bun. She wore normal clothes: pants, laced shoes, and a formal sweater. The lilies were pink, yellow, and orange.

Smiling, she asked, “Good morning. Are you Vincent?”

“I am,” I replied.

“I’m Samsara. I’m with hospitality. These are for you.”

“Thank you.”

She put them on the table, fluffed the flowers, and breathed deeply a few times. “They’re nice.”

“Thank you,” I said again, slightly confused. “Who sent them?”

“Hospitality. We try to give everyone flowers, but we made you a special bouquet.” She wiggled her eyebrows and leaned close to whisper. “It’s because you don’t have a window.”

“Oh.” I was on full alert. She might be an enemy. I was prepared to falcon-dive in an instant, and with all the strength in me I’d… flail uselessly. She could beat me to death with her clipboard right now.

“Enjoy,” she said. “And try to get some sleep.”

‘Samsara,’ if that was her real name, left. She knocked on the door before going out.

Self, you’re being a little paranoid, I thought.

Was I going to kill Hoarfast?

The thought frightened me. Hoarfast frightened me. Thinking about killing someone frightened me. What if this was another impostor thought, the echoes of the sword in my head? It wasn’t. The thought felt like me.

But the decision exceeded me. What was I going to do now? Fight him? When I’d just admitted to myself the nice lady who delivered flowers could beat me up?
The flowers smelled wonderful, and the room felt warm.

What was I going to do if Hoarfast tried to kill me?

I staggered out of bed, shuffled into the change of clothes, and hauled myself to the door. I knocked twice and pulled it open.

The human boulder watched me from above his book.

On the other side of the door, another equally prodigious human boulder was filling out paperwork on a clip board. I glanced at the form. How Much House Can You Afford? it said.

“Are, ah, you guys going to be here for a while?” I asked.

“Yup,” said Boulder Number 1.

“Need something?” asked Boulder Numer 2.

“Just wanted to see if anyone was out here,” I said.

“We are,” said Numer 1.

“And if your concern is medical in nature, we can assist with that. We’re both medics.” said the other.

“Really?” I sounded way more skeptical than I meant to.

“Yep,” said Number 1.

“Fate has a surprisingly good education plan,” said Number 2. “Free ride to medical school if you meet time-in-service requirements.”

“What’s worrying you?” asked Number 1. He lowered the book to his lap, holding his place with a finger. I glanced at the title. He was reading Sweeps From Guard
With enough truth to hide my evasions, I said, “Everything, in general. I’m worried something is coming after me.”

“Is this a precognition, and if so, do you often have visions of the future?” asked Number 1. He did not sound like he was joking.

“I can find the worst possible girl to be interested in with precognitive accuracy,” I replied somewhat bitterly.

Number 1 went back to his book. “Yeah, join the club, buddy.”

“Get some sleep. We’ll be here,” said Number 2.

He was still watching me, but our conversation had ended. I shut the door and shuffled back to bed.

Weird as it was, I felt a lot better.

I gave myself permission to sleep and began to drift. I felt like a toy soldier in a leaf boat, floating over a deep pond. Through a patch of lilies, a stream emptied into the dim water. Ripples pushed my little leaf boat around, but I stayed above water, thinking of worries, enemies, and things that could go wrong. But a few drops made it over the railing at a time, the little boat settled deeper, and the ripples of the small stream kept building until the boat was gone. I sank from awake and worried to dead-to-the-world unconscious in half a blink.

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Chapter 23

A shadow the size of a building watched me from outside the forge light. Hasso’s body and those of his slaughtered servants were long since gone. Sometime during my labors day had fallen into night, but the heavy overcast had let the transition sneak past me. The furnace blazed merrily, building up immense heat, and the two ruined attempted-murder weapons were beginning to run like warm butter. I held the third sword, the Drowning Breath of Ogden, that I’d taken from the agent of Fate. The shadow had eyes of green, teeth like a fireplace grate, and its breath danced with foul, green flames.

I put down the smithing hammer, took a two-handed grip on the sword, and found my hands cramped. I shifted to a single-handed grip, but I didn’t know what to do with my other hand. I’m a bare-handed fighter by training and temperament, so I wanted to put my other hand up in a guard, but that seemed stupid. The sword should be the guard. For striking, should I punch or swing the blade? Both, I guessed.

The shadow moved sideways, away from the ruins of Hasso’s storeroom. The less threatening shadow of the storeroom bulged with it. Then the strange shadow stepped into the wide courtyard, and I saw it distinctly. It was a dragon.

But it was wrong.

Dragons are long, serpentine things. They swim through the air like fish. They’re elegant, fine, and graceful. This thing lumbered. It had big, heavy shoulders on stout legs with broad claws like shovels. Its body resembled an elephant’s but didn’t rest on its legs; it hung from its shoulders. The triangular head swiveled on a thick neck, more like a rodent’s than a snake’s. Its tail flopped and lashed behind it, lying still mostly, thrashing sometimes. The whole critter looked incorrect.
“Hello, mortal man,” it said, and its voice was even worse. It was full of malice, cruelty, and greed, and the hairs rose on my neck and arms.
This thing must die, Kog. You need a sword that can kill it.

“Don’t listen to the sword. Listen to me, delightful person.”

Kill it now, Kog.

“Hush, toothpick.”

I jerked my head from beast to blade, because suddenly I could hear the sword talking and a whole bunch of things I hadn’t known I hadn’t known made way too much sense. But the hesitation was an opening, the dragon took it, and the beast charged across the courtyard and struck through the forge door.

It struck like a ferret, I dodged sideways, its squat shoulders slammed against the door frame, and the thick head swung sideways to bite at me. I ran towards it, climbing up one of the small woodpiles inside the furnace, and got to about its ear level where I was behind its jaws. This made the beast retreat to get an attacking angle, but that pulled its head outside the room. It smashed sideways, trying to bite with the side of its mouth. The door frame shuddered. Bits of brick and mortar fell. I climbed up the woodpile and wedged myself into the corner of wall and ceiling. The heavy, green eye followed me, and the critter retreated.

For a moment the room was quiet except for the blaze of the furnace. Fire is a lot louder than I ever expect.

“You didn’t attack!” yelled the sword, and it wasn’t me thinking! The sword was talking to me! “Kog, kill the dragon! Stab!”

It was silent and it was inside my head, but the sword was yelling. The dragon burst through the wall.

The beast smashed brick and stone, but Hasso had reinforced his walls with steel frames. Part of the building folded down, throwing me with it. I hit the ground, bricks hit me, and the dragon’s jaws snapped above my head, grabbing rafters and pulling down the ceiling. The building groaned.

It snapped, snapped again, and twisted its head. It couldn’t really see down without turning its head. I dove for another woodpile.

The dragon pulled back and appeared in the doorway again. This time it didn’t stick its snout in. It pointed its head sideways to the door so it could peer in with one eye. Between us the furnace blazed. I had hid by the back wall, while the woodpile wasn’t perfect cover, there was a lot of brilliant furnace-light between us. The dragon cocked its head up and down. It looked up at the hole it had smashed in the wall and tried to figure out if I was up there. It shuffled around outside to get a look with both eyes, but then it had to pull back even further.

The sword whispered about murder, murder, murder. Against a dragon, it seemed like it had a point. While charging the dragon would take me straight into its jaws, there was that big, beautiful hole in the wall over its head.

I grabbed a handful of wood dust, tossed it, and screamed, “Obesis!”

Running up the stairway of dust motes while the echoes of the word still hung in the air, I passed right before the open doorway. The dragon darted in to strike, but I shot through the wall while the dragon’s round shoulders slammed into door frame. I had an instant of a beautiful opening on its head before the beast unfurled its wings. The left one hit me in the guts, knocked the sword away, and trapped me against the wall.

I spoke Raln, and all things were blades, even my hand. I cut its bat-like wing from bones to edge.

The dragon tore itself out of the building and took half the wall with it. Hasso’s steel reinforcements screamed and rent. Bricks fell on the forge. I dove for the sword, artlessly dodged a shovel-like claw, and the dragon’s head swung around again. It bathed the ground in fire but aimed too low, entangled by the skin of the breaking building. Dragon-fire blasted courtyard stone, old metal fragments, and bits of plumbing. The forge fires turned green and evil as dragon-fire infected them. I got the sword.

“Obesis!” and I ran across ripples of searing heat as dragon fire burned the courtyard. The dragon lost me when I went up, and I landed on its head with the Drowning Breath of Ogden. The sword bit dragon-skull to the hilt.

The creature screamed, jerked sideways, and threw me. I tried to lobotomize it on exit. On hitting the wall I muffed the landing, but the beast couldn’t capitalize. It stumbled backwards, spasming, and from its skull poured green fire and black blood. The creature shrieked. Its skull hung open and soft tissue jiggled. I thought of a cracked egg with the yolk not yet poured into the frying pan.

But the dragon was not yet dead.

It lumbered backwards. I got up.

I’d hit something in that fall. I had no idea what. My right leg wouldn’t hold my weight. After standing for a moment, it buckled underneath, and I’d slumped against a wall like a drunk. I flipped the sword to my off hand, between the beast and me, and pushed myself off the wall with my right. The blade dripped with dragon blood, sizzled with dragon fire, and started talking.

“Finally, you blister, you’re getting work done,” said the sword.

“The filth can you talk!?” I yelled.

“I’ve been talking to you for days. Why are you so surprised?”

“Because…” I had no idea what to say. “Death!”

And the dragon whispered, “Come now, mortal man. Lay down the sword, and let us speak as living beings.”

“And death upon you too!” I yelled at the dragon and most-definitely, absolutely, positively, DID NOT lay down the sword.

I had cut open the dragon’s head. Part of its skull was missing on the left side, and another part was flopping around. I must have missed the brain but had come close. The dragon sidled sideways to face me while protecting its wound. One huge, green eye stayed on me. Flame escaped its snake-lips every time it spoke. Between us Hasso’s courtyard burned, and the dragon stood back, leaning against the wall of the supply yard.

“No, no, no, mortal man. Do not listen to the sword. I mean you no harm.”

“The sickness you don’t!” I said.

“I only want us to be friends,” said the dragon.

“Kog, it’s lying.”

“Of course its lying– you, shut up!” I said to the sword.

“Kog. It called you that before,” said the dragon. It smiled. “Ah Kog. I know you now. Koru has spoken of you. I hate him too. Put down the sword, let us be friends, and we will work Koru’s destruction.”

Its voice bubbled and sparked. Soft consonants flowed, hard ones popped. Flame licked out of its wounds, and the beast winced. Then it smiled. “Friend.”

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