To Cut Flames from the Air

Chapter II Part III: The Cursed Structure

It was about an hour's walk from where they had eaten before Mab and Arvil had reached where the structure laid, nested in the forest. It had what Mab could only consider a calmly dominating presence, like a vast and slumbering animal resting sprawled in the grass, or a mountain eroded by a hostile sea. It was undoubtedly a temple at some time, and an enormous one at that, though evidently many years of abandonment had left it a corpse of its former self, its stone walls feeling akin to a wilted flower as they slouched and stooped at points and crumbled entirely at others. Time had weighed down on the structure from above, and nature pulled at it from below, ivy and knots of thick grasses climbing up its walls as though chaining it to the ground and pulling it in. It was a scene of movement without motion, as though a cold tension was all that held the ancient walls upright. 

Untouched by the clawing ivy were the temple's doors, six times Mab's height and inlaid with intricate brasswork whose presence pierced the moss-tinted wood. The tarnished metal castings flowed across the gate with infinite delicacy, engraved in shapes of trees and elks and harps and clouds and radiance, figures and forms bolted to the rotting wood. 

"Do... we knock?" Mab asked.

Arvil smiled. "Who would answer?" 

"Oh, right..." Mab looked towards the door again. "Then how do we get in?"

"That is simple," Arvil said, spreading her golden wings. "Stand close to me."

Mab nodded and stood beside Arvil, who wove her arms with Mab's and held her close. Her grip around Mab tightened as the wind rose around them, a strong draft catching in her wings and pulling the two of them into the air. Mab gasped in surprise, clinging to Arvil so tight that she could feel the threading of Arvil's gambeson through her cloak. 

The two rode the breeze that carried them over the wall and into the open court of the temple beyond, and Mab got her first good look at what resided within. One would have a hard time descerning where the interior of the temple was and was not initially supposed to be shielded from the sky above, as all that remained of a roof was a quarter of a shattered dome, held in place by buttresses who were in a sorry shape themselves. Intricately tiled floors were punctured by all that could grow in the cracks between, mosaics with their images lost to wear, grime, and persistent wildflowers. Statues of the Eighteen and One stood in a mockery of those depicted, some lopsided, few fully intact, many under the rubble of rooves and walls and arches that could not stand the test of time, sorry shadows of sunlit shrines. 

In the center of the court was a terrible sore, a near perfect circle of scorched and putrid earth about ten paces in diameter around which the stonework of the structure seemed to wilt, as though melted and cooled. A figure of Blyksteguden Thyndrin, carved in marble, stood on the perimeter of the temple's black blister, so close that he was seemingly bisected down the middle, half his body missing and the other half curved and bowed in an unnatural manner, as if sculpted from tar rather than stone.

"What's that... uh, circle thing?" Mab asked when they had reached the ground on the other side of the wall. 

"I am not certain," Arvil replied. "It has not expanded in size for as long as I have been staying here, and its mere presence does not seem to be immediately harmful, but I would avoid approaching it if I were you. Follow me, I will show you to one of the rooms that remains standing."

Mab nodded, following closely behind Arvil as she climbed over the roots and rubble that covered the courts. 

"Umm," Mab said. "I... Hmm..."

"Yes?" Arvil asked. 

"Well, uh, earlier you said you were looking for a dragon," Mab said. "And, well, I was thinking, since you come from the mountains- or, sorry, that is if you do come from the mountains..."

"I do indeed hail from Dragascelge," Arvil said. "The Shrine of Dragons on Blodafeorde, which is, in fact, a mountain."

"Right, well, I was wondering if there were still dragons that... weren't dead there," Mab said.

"Sadly, there are not," Arvil answered. "I suppose there is something similar to a dragon that remains at Dragascelge, but if anything he is merely a convincing fake. All true dragons have been dead for centuries."

"So you're looking for... a dead one?" Mab asked.

"I am," Arvil replied.

"Can I ask why?" Mab asked.

"Of course you can," Arvil said. "To put it simply, I was born in the Shrine of Dragons under extraordinary and spectacular circumstances, due to which the Gods have considered me to be destined to participate in great deeds. The first of those tasks delivered unto me by Aurilin, the Goddess of Honor, and Vindil, the Goddess of Air, was to locate the head of the fallen dragon Aummal Claven."

"Oh." Mab slowed in her pace following. "Do you have to be destined for something if you're born under... uh, extraordinary circumstances?"

"Why do you ask?" Arvil asked.

Mab paused for a moment before she replied. "No reason."

∘∘∘

The room Arvil had lead Mab to was miraculous in the extent of its intactness, both adjacent rooms in a state of crumbling disrepair, one with its ceiling smashed through by a fallen arch. Mab suspected Arvil had done an extensive amount of cleaning prior, as even the amount of dust expected to accumulate in such a space was absent from most surfaces and a bedroll had been laid on the floor. There was one hole in the ceiling, but a small dented stove, which appeared to have been dragged there from a different room, was placed below it so that a ramshackle chimney could lead through the breach. The stench of mildew still hung in the air, but it was leagues above spending another night in the woods.

"Make yourself comfortable," Arvil said, opening the stove and placing kindling within.

Mab sat on the bedroll and tried to relax for the first time in days. She closed her eyes and focused on the forest around the temple. She counted under her breath.

"Counting birds?" Arvil asked, striking a fire.

Mab opened her eyes. "How did you know that?"

"It was just a guess," Arvil said. "An old priest I had known in Dragascelge used to count the birds on the mountainside as a form of prayer. He had been listening to them for so many years that he could tell how many there were by their sound alone."

"Oh, no, I can't do anything that impressive," Mab said. "I can just... see souls when I have my eyes closed. But, um, please don't tell anyone I told you that."

Arvil blinked. "Is that not also something impressive?"

"Well, I don't feel like something's impressive if..." Mab thought for a moment. "Well, if you don't make a choice to do it. That old priest must have practiced a lot, I've just been able to do this."

Arvil nodded. "I feel that line of reason is sufficient enough. I suppose, since I have lived my life guided solely by what I believe is my destiny, a lack of choice in the matter has left my life very unimpressive."

"No, no, no!" Mab said, her face growing flushed. "I didn't mean it like that at all! You sound very impressive!"

"There is no need to apologize," Arvil said with a smile, closing the oven door. "I am certain you'll prove very impressive in time."