ILLYRIS | i. "DAUGHTER OF DRAGONS." GLORY AND GORE
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PRESENT DAY QUEENS, NEW YORK
DESTINY'S A GAME. You win, or you lose.
Some called it a doomed pit, the unseen puppeteer in a web of metaphysics, or a ladder you could climb to reach the unknown treasures, driven by greed or to fulfill a feeling of purpose.
Destiny took away Theadora Valaryen's childhood. So she was going to close her eyes, and see what it would take away next.
Thea's belief in fate was like a rising and falling tide. Could she have gotten a better life? Sure. Does she deserve it? Well, that wasn't up to her. But as the last living daughter of a dynasty of dragon-riding sorcerers, death was supposed to be the end to her story. It was the opening, it might as well close the same way. But the game wouldn't stop. She was a paycheck for the assassins that Asgard and the Mad Titan sent after her... and the breathing reminder of a legacy forged in flame and bloodshed.
Which meant she was kind of screwed.
"It's a sign."
Thea stared at the large cedar chest, decorated with gold embellishments. Whatever was inside thrummed with energy, causing her wrists to prickle like fireworks were erupting beneath her skin. She only ever got that feeling when she was sensing something mystical or... enhanced.
"Or just a gift," Thea suggested, stepping forward cautiously. "Not everything has symbolism."
She cautiously approached Sera, who stood by the front door, clutching a small piece of parchment between her pale fingers. Thea's footsteps, like everything in her life, was calculated and careful as if she was trekking through a minefield.
Sera seemed to be in a high mood, sending a wave of relief over Thea's nerves. She was a tall woman with eyes the color of ice though her hair was like a mane of fire. Fiercely beautiful, she often reminded Thea of a sword. Sleek, strong, but in the end, deadly.
"Go on, open it," the woman encouraged.
Hesitantly, Thea popped open the small clasp of the chest and lifted the lid. She found piles of velvets and damasks in fancy shades of vermillion and fuchsia... and nestled in the soft cloth, two huge eggs. They were the most beautiful things she had ever seen. The first was colored black like a midnight sky with flecks of red that came and went as she examined it all around. The second was like gold itself, a rich bronze in color washed with emerald swirls that gleamed in the light. They were so large—almost the size of her head—it took both of her hands to hold the black egg. She expected that it would be made of some enamel or porcelain, or even blown glass, but it was much heavier than that as if it were all of solid stone. Cradling the egg in the crook of her arm, Thea ran her fingers down the rounded bottom. Its tiny raised scales gleamed like polished ebony metal under the light from the ceiling fan.
