Crown of Dragonfire (26 page)

She stepped toward a
pile of crates. Their wood was so rotted Vale was surprised they didn't fall
apart. He raised his axe, prepared to slice through any other apparition that
approached. In his other hand, he held his lantern.

Gingerly, Tash tugged
open the lid on one crate, then yelped and fell back a step. Vale's heart
leaped into a gallop.

"What is it?" He
prepared to swing his axe.

Tash pointed. Vale
brought his lantern down to reveal a collection of crabs fleeing out of the
chest.

"Maybe this is it,"
Tash said. "Maybe it duplicated one crab into many." She placed her seashell
into the emptied crate, closed the lid, then opened it again. Another crab
escaped.

Vale blew out his
breath. "Wonderful. You found the amazing seashell-to-crab chest. Useful when
you're hungry for crab legs. Not very useful for freeing a slave nation, unless
you plan to defeat the seraphim with a plague of crabs."

She sighed, retrieved
her seashell, and approached another wooden box. This one was large as a coffin,
carved of wood that had once been ornate. A rusty lock held it shut but fell
apart at a tug from Tash.

"I'll try this one,"
she said and tugged open the lid.

Clawed white hands
reached out from the box, grabbed her, and yanked her inside.

Tash vanished into the
shadows.

For an instant, Vale
could only stare in shock.

He gave a strangled
yelp, leaped forward, and reached into the chest. His hands sank into nothing.
Heart hammering, he shone his light into the crate. It was empty.

"Tash!" he cried. His
pulse pounded in his ears. "Tash!"

Laughter answered him,
coming from all around, spinning in circles. Countless voices were
laughing—some deep and guttural, others shrill. They surrounded him, dancing
an invisible dance. Vale spun around, raising his lantern, trying to see them,
but he saw only shadows.

"Where is she?" Vale
shouted. "Bring her back or I'll burn this ship down!"

The laughter rose
louder, and he could see them, just glimpses—shadows, streaks of light, faces
appearing and vanishing. A host of the undead, mocking him. Vale swung his
lantern around him.

"Return her to me!" he
demanded. "Or this ship will burn."

"Then she will burn
too!" rose a shriek.

Another voice cackled. "She
will join us! She will spend eternity in our drowned hull. Burn her, living
one. Burn her!"

The voices chanted
together. "Burn her, burn her!"

"Show yourselves!" Vale
demanded. "Or are you cowards who hide in shadows? Face me."

In a ring around him,
they appeared.

Vale inhaled sharply between
his teeth.

The creatures creaked
forward, raining dust. Skeletons, draped in scraps of ragged leather and rusted
iron, their jaws unhinged in lurid grins. Crabs bustled in their ribcages, and
barnacles clung to their bones. Wisps of pale light wrapped around them,
holding the bones aloft, forming the vague shape of flesh—diseased skin,
leering eyes, bloated faces. Their bodies had rotted centuries ago. Banished
from the afterlife, the souls had returned to find nothing but old bones to
nest in.

"Where did you take
her?" Vale said.

Their jaws opened and
closed, and the rephaim cackled. They raised old blades and muskets, and upon
their rusted shields and breastplates, Vale saw faded paint forming red
spirals.

He inhaled sharply.

They're Vir Requis!
he realized.
Minions of the Cadigus regime!

He knew the tales of
Cadigus. All Vir Requis did, even enslaved in Tofet. Not many liked telling
those tales, but still the whispers had passed from parent to child. Stories of
evil Vir Requis, murderous, foul, Vir Requis who had stained their kingdom, who
had dethroned the Aeternum family and created a reign of terror before losing
their power in Requiem's great civil war. And here they stood before him! The
rotted bodies of those traitors, risen again.

"She dances now in our
halls!" the rephaim said, speaking together in dozens of voices. "You see but a
shell of our kingdom, living one. But our realm is vast. And she dances for us.
She dances!"

Their light flared,
blinding, green and white and blue, and Vale saw it. Just a glimpse. A vision
that shook the ship, that made him fall to his knees. In the light, he saw the
ship restored, once more sailing upon dark seas. Hundreds of men filled it,
clad in black armor, the red spirals upon their chests. Hundreds of other ships
sailed around them, and dark castles rose on tors. Beneath stormy clouds flew
thousands of dragons, roaring out their fire. The empire of Cadigus, traitors
to Requiem, lingering forever in this mirror world.

And Tash—Tash among
them.

"Tash!" he cried, reaching
out to her.

He saw her upon a deck,
again wearing many jewels, dancing like a wick in a flame, spinning, leaping,
swaying, clad in black silk, tears on her cheeks, the haze of booze and spice
in her eyes.

"Tash!" he cried,
leaped toward her, tried to grab her . . . but she faded away, and the light
dimmed, and Vale was back in the belly of the ship.

Once more the rephaim
surrounded him. Their luminous, ethereal faces twisted atop their skulls, some
snarling, others grinning. They stepped closer, raising their chipped blades.

"She dances for us. But
we have no use for you, living one. Your soul we banish, and your bones we'll
watch fade to dust."

A rusted sword swung
his way.

Vale parried with his
axe.

The blades slammed
together, raining rust.

"Hear me, sons of
Requiem!" Vale shouted. "Stop this. I know who you are. I—"

With a hiss, another
undead warrior lashed a sword his way. Vale leaped back, swinging his axe.
Another sword swung and slammed into Vale's armor, chipping the steel rings, knocking
the breath out of him. A bearded warrior, an octopus nesting in its rib cage,
swung down a hammer, and the heavy iron hit Vale's shoulder. He roared in pain.

"She will dance and he
will rot!" they cried. "We will watch the crabs feast."

"Vir Requis, stop this!"
Vale said. "I know your name. You are warriors of Requiem, soldiers of Cadigus.
I am one of your number!"

They laughed, moving
closer, lashing their weapons. "We care not. We fought Vir Requis, we slew Vir
Requis! We fight only for ourselves. You are no brother of ours. The living are
our enemy."

One of the rephaim
swung a chain. The iron links slammed into Vale, most hitting his armor, but
one link rose to hit his cheek. He cried out and fell. When a sword lashed
down, he raised his axe, barely parrying. His lantern fell and extinguished;
only the light of the rephaim now lit the ship.

"But you still fought
for Requiem!" Vale shouted. "I know your story. I've heard of your pride, your
vengeance. You fought to make Requiem an empire, even if you needed to slay the
old king, to betray the old dynasty, to kill all those who opposed you."

Rage flared in their
eyes, blasting out with white light. Their faces twisted and their shrieks
rose, creaking the ship, cracking slats of wood on the walls.

"The old Aeternum kings
were cowards!" they cried. "Weak, sniveling, pathetic—worms who let Requiem
fall to ruin. Betray them? They betrayed all of Requiem with their wretchedness.
The Aeternum dynasty had us kneeling in the dirt before griffins, phoenixes,
demons, wyverns. We soldiers of Cadigus made Requiem strong!"

Vale shoved himself to
his feet, axe swinging, knocking them back. "Yet Requiem has fallen! You could
not save her. The children of Requiem now kneel in the dirt, enslaved to the
seraphim. We wear the iron collars of slavery." Vale tugged at his iron collar.
"Millions of Vir Requis are dead. Half a million of our kind, chained and
beaten, now serve the enemy while Requiem lies in ruin."

Their cries rose to a deafening
pitch. Crates shattered. The walls cracked. Slats of rotten wood rained from
the ceiling.

"The living one lies!
We built an empire to last an eternity. We hail Cadigus! Requiem will never
fall."

"Requiem fell!" Vale
shouted. "I came here to save her, to find a treasure to give her hope, to
raise Requiem against the cruel seraphim who enslave her children. While you
sing and dance in your ship, your descendants languish in chains. Help us,
warriors of Requiem. Grant me the Chest of Plenty, so that we may create many
weapons to fight the enemy." He raised his fist. "For Requiem!"

"You lie, you lie!" they
cried. "Requiem will never fall."

Vale shook his head sadly. For over a thousand years, these poor rebels
had hidden here, rotting away, unaware of all that had passed, forever guarding
their vainglory.

Perhaps they are
slaves just as much as we are.

"I speak truth," Vale
said. "If you still have a doorway to the afterlife from which you were
banished, if only a keyhole, gaze through it and hear the whispers of the
fallen. A hundred thousand slaves were slain only days ago. Seek them. Speak to
them. Hear the cry of dragons."

The rephaim stared at
him, then vanished.

Darkness, complete and
enveloping, filled the belly of the shipwreck.

Silence fell. Vale
could hear nothing but his breath and the barely audible whisper of waves
outside.

Were they gone? Had
they fled in consternation at his words?

Tash . . .

His eyes stung.

"Tash!" he cried. "Rephaim,
return her! Sons of Requiem, return now and—"

With blazing, white,
blinding light, the rephaim reappeared.

Their spirits now shone
so brightly they nearly drowned out the bones within. Their eyes blazed like
smelters, white and searing gold, casting out steam. The fallen rebels of
Requiem raised their heads and cried out in anguish, shrieks that snapped
planks of wood, cracked the rotting crates, shattered bottles and jars within.
The shipwreck rattled madly, and Vale fell onto his back, and it seemed that
the entire beach shook. Holes opened above, water gushed into the chamber, and
green light flared upward, crashing through the shipwreck like the horns of an
underground predator rising through prey's flesh. Above he could see the sky
alight.

"Requiem fell!" the
rephaim cried, voices torn in agony. "Requiem fell!"

Vale nodded, head
lowered. "I'm sorry, friends."

"Friends?" they
shrieked. "We are no friends of pathetic slaves, collared, weak. We served
General Cadigus! We are strong, proud, noble warriors who fought our enemies,
not submitted to collars and chains." Their light blasted out, shattering more
planks of wood, and their faces twisted into grotesque masks, the jaws opening
impossibly wide, the eyes burning.

Vale pushed himself to
his feet as the shipwreck shook. "I do not submit!" He tugged at his collar. "I
fight. Even collared, I fight. Tash fights with me. We slew seraphim. We came
here to find a weapon—to find the Chest of Plenty, to duplicate a key that
would open half a million collars, that would let Requiem fly again. But you
stole Tash! You hide the Chest of Plenty! If the last light of Requiem fades,
her death will be upon you, sons of Cadigus."

"He lies, he lies!"
they said. "We fought for Requiem. You let her fall. The blood of Requiem was
pure! Lesser heirs weakened her, let Requiem fall to rot, to disease, to
slavery."

"My blood is not weak!"
Vale shouted into the storm. Winds raged around him. Waves pummeled him. The
light seared him. "I slew seraphim. I died for Requiem, as you have died. I
rose to the starlit halls. But I returned to life! The priestess Issari, our
mother, gave me life again so that I may fight. I left the afterlife as you
did. But I do not cower in a shipwreck, dreaming of old glory. I fight! Will
you fight with us, sons of Requiem?"

They screamed. They
stormed around him, and again Vale was there—in a sea full of ships, dancers on
the decks, thousands of soldiers singing, chanting, banging drums, waving
swords, and Tash dancing around them, her silks fluttering, jewels shining upon
her, her eyes glazed with spice—the endless dance of afterlife on the dark
seas. The dragons coiled above.

"We will fight!" they
cried. "We fight always for Requiem. Requiem! May our wings forever find your
sky."

The sea rose and fell, roared
skyward, collapsed, and the ships sank, and cannons blasted, and everywhere
shone that light, fading to darkness . . . shadows . . . silence . . . and the
whisper of waves.

Vale lay on the sand.

He coughed, took a deep
breath, raised his head, and looked around him.

The shipwreck had
collapsed. Slats of wood, shattered balustrades, chipped masts, rotting sails,
rusting cannons, chains, an anchor—all lay strewn across the beach. The eerie
light had faded and the moon shone above.

A moan sounded at his
side. "Vale?"

He flipped over, heart
bursting into a gallop, and saw her there.

"Tash!"

She lay on her side on
the sand, coughing. The jewels she had worn in the fever dream were gone. Once
more, she wore her baggy harem pants, and only a single jewel shone in her
navel. Sand and seaweed caked her hair.

For a moment, Vale
couldn't even move. So much love for her filled him that it hurt.

I almost lost her.
She is as precious to me as the halls of Requiem and all her heroes of the
afterlife.

Vale pulled Tash into
his arms, and he nearly crushed her against his chest, kissing her hair, her
forehead, her lips.

"I . . . I was
dreaming," she whispered, blinking in confusion. "I was dancing in a great
fleet of Requiem ships. I saw dragons, Vale! Real dragons! Dragons of the past
. . ."

Holding her against
him, Vale looked over her shoulder. In the sand, hundreds of crates had
shattered. A single chest stood among the wreckage, still whole. A faint light
clung to it, then rose in wisps.