A LEGACY OF LIGHT

RUNE

RUNE

They flew in the night, a black and green dragon, two shadows under the clouds.

As Rune glided, the cold wind felt heavenly in his nostrils. Whenever he went only a few days without flying, the magic tingled inside him, and he lashed out, grumbled, and felt as if ants were crawling through his bones. He would fly with Tilla many nights above the water.

And now I fly with Kaelyn.

He looked at her. She flew to his right, the hint of fire in her nostrils like two embers. She gave him a sad smile and tapped him with her tail.

"What did you want to show me out here?" he asked.

"Be patient!" she said. "I'm taking you there. And be quiet; imperial dragons still patrol these skies."

They glided silently. Forests and plains streamed below and clouds hid the stars. Dragon eyes were sharp--sharper than his human eyes--but Rune could barely see more than smudges in this darkness. Some distant lights shone--fortified outposts of the Regime--but otherwise the land lay in shadow and mist. A drizzle began to fall, and Rune allowed just a little more fire to fill his belly, crackle in his mouth, and warm him.

He tried to imagine that these forests below, rolling shadows in the night, were the waves back at home, that those distant lights were Cadport waiting on the shore. He missed those waves. He missed the cobbled boardwalk with its shops, rusted cannon, and Tilla walking beside him. He missed the Old Wheel, he missed Scraggles, and he missed his father.

I miss home, he thought. But what was his home now? And who was his father? Rune did not know, and so many questions still burned inside him like the fire. As he glided through shadow and rain, ice filled his belly along with the flames. He looked at Kaelyn, and she met his gaze, and he saw the same sadness in her eyes.

"There," she said and gestured below. "There's an old ruined temple on the hill. Do you see it?"

Rune squinted. He could discern only vague shapes in this darkness. He thought he saw pale columns, some only broken stems, rising upon a hilltop.

"A temple," he said. "An old temple to Requiem's stars."

Kaelyn nodded and began diving toward it. "It was a temple. Priests used to worship the Draco constellation here. My father..." Kaleyn sighed. "He didn't like that."

Rune descended beside her. Wind and rain stung his face. A temple of marble columns had once stood in Cadport; Rune had heard the city elders whisper of it in awe. They said priests and healers would play harps there, sing to the Draco stars, and bless the city. Today that temple was a courthouse, its walls draped with banners of the red spiral, its marble columns stained with blood.

But there was no use for a courthouse here in the wilderness, and as Rune descended toward the ruins, he marveled at the columns. Their marble shone like moonlight. Some columns lay shattered upon the hillside, but others still stood, forming a rectangle. The roof they had once supported had fallen; its bricks lay strewn across the grass, pale lumps in the night.

The two dragons landed upon wet grass. Above them loomed the temple columns, two hundred feet tall at least. Rune tried to imagine this temple standing in its glory days--back when the Aeternum Dynasty had ruled. He could almost see priests' white robes fluttering between the columns, almost hear their harps.

When he looked above, Rune gasped to see the clouds part. The Draco constellation shone between them, the holy stars of Requiem.

"Our people used to worship these stars," he said softly. "My father would pray to them at night. He thought I couldn't hear. Many of Cadport's elders would still pray secretly, knowing that if any soldiers heard, they would be broken upon the wheel. Do you think those stars have any real power, Kaelyn?"