Victory's Price

Phoenix - Mollen (Part Twenty-Nine)

Chapter 29

Phoenix folded her head over the neck of her mount. It was late in the day and fever had returned with a vengeance.

“Are you alright?”

Wolf rode behind her. He had their extra mount lashed to his mare with a stout piece of rope.

He did not need a reply and she wasn’t likely to give him one.

The cliff road was a lonely and unused byway, populated only by heather and grass. It was spring and the countryside was blooming but Phoenix had no beauty in her soul. Had the natural world contained any connection to her, she would have felt more of a kinship with stark rock. After four hundred springs and four hundred summers, she’d realised everything died. Except her.

‘And doesn’t it feel good?’

Originally, the words just swam around her head but then another manifestation of her sins rode with her, tiny claws gripping onto horsehair.

“Dragon.” The greeting held no surprise and she hid her remorse.

‘In a way.’ The creature flicked a forked tongue. ‘In fact, a lot more literally than in life I would guess.’

His miniature blue scales shone in the sunlight. He was a lot more real than her previous delusions.

“What do you want?”

‘You think the Stars don’t know you’re coming back? I came to pay my respect, give my greetings.’

“We were sworn enemies.”

‘Oh but we liked each other really.’

“It gave me no greater pleasure than to watch your life’s blood as it slowly pooled on the floor. You died at my hand and my only regret is that I did not make it a slower process.”

‘You have to say that: you’re still living. The nice thing about being dead is that I’m no longer plagued by pride.’

Phoenix narrowed her eyes.

‘I know, I know, I see the irony. Pride was his downfall and now it’s all gone. I’ve become very wry in my afterlife.’

“You were always mocking.”

‘Wasn’t stupid enough to mock you.’

“Stupid enough to fight me.”

For the first time the tiny dragon had began to show signs of the ferocity of the man he was supposed to imitate but it had gone almost as soon as she addressed it.

‘Well, we all have our mistakes. The point is, now it’s myself that I mock. See, completely different man.’

It seemed to think, studying a claw.

‘Actually.’ It said, a strangely venomous tone to its voice. ‘I think it depends. I think this is the first time I’ve actually been a dragon and not just called one. I think when I’m a man I still hate you.’

The little dragon uncoiled itself languidly from the horse’s mane and stepped delicately onto the saddle.

‘Do you think the monsters from the Stars can ever leave them?’ It asked.

“You’re here.”

‘Yes but you know how the deal works. We haven’t been human for nearly four hundred years. You’re as much Star now as I am a creature of them.’