Savage Awakening 530. Man vs. Dragon (I)

The Patriarch stared down at him in silence.

Just when it seemed Haxorax might attack, he stumbled. Clutched at his head, teeth gritted. Lightning played around his skull in the astral plane.

“Master Lyxandor. Perhaps it is best if the Prince takes some rest,” suggested Sverrex. “Another Draught may yet serve him well...”

“No.” The Patriarch held up a fist. “Not just yet.”

He grinned and stepped onto the ledge.

“Master!” cried Sverrex.

But the Patriarch had already descended. Landed in a crouch right in front of his son. Princess Dya scrambled away, sobbing.

Then they stood face-to-face.

“You.” Haxorax’s face spasmed uncontrollably.

“It is not I that’s done this to you,” said the Patriarch. “Would you like to know who did this, boy? But you already know. You spoke his very name! Did you not?”

Haxorax twitched.

“…Zane?” he rasped. “I can’t remember—”

The name the Patriarch had so painstakingly drilled into that boy’s mind. The one name that he clung to, like a drowning man to a rock, as he writhed in the Sacred Rites.

“Then let me give you a reminder,” breathed the Patriarch. “That feeling searing your soul, boy? That is the most primal feeling of our race! That is dragon’s rage. And why shouldn’t you rage? You were meant to be the First Prince! The greatest hope of the proud race of True Dragons. You’ve gorged yourself on the very finest of our heirloom treasures, you heedless glutton—the Ten Million-Year Bones, the Wings of Sacred Wrath, the Primal Blood!—all for that one purpose. So the hopes of your race rest safely on your wings. That is the role you toiled for… all that. And you let some backwater human seize your #1 Rising Dragon ranking.”

Haxorax howled.

“The first time since the dawn of the era that a dragon did not sit atop the Rising Dragon Rankings… you were the dragon who’d lost it. That is your legacy, boy.” The Patriarch’s expression curved into a snarl. “For that you were shamed. Made to suffer. True enough. All those decades… I can feel them like white-hot spikes driving into your soul—even now they tear at you!”

The Elders stared blankly. No one had shamed the boy, in truth, save for Lyxandor. But that was enough. Deep down, pathetically, that boy still needed his approval.

“Stop,” Haxorax growled through gnashed teeth. “Stop—speaking—!”

“You know I speak the truth,” said the Patriarch, relentless. “That is why it so pains you. Did you think leaving the blood pool would stop the agony? Cease the rage? But it is already within you, boy! It’s too late for that! There’s only one way forward now.”

He seized Haxorax by his trembling shoulders. The torchlight gleamed off his teeth, off his eyes, making him a specter of red.

“Finish Zane Walker. Finish him, and your anguish will finally end. And you will be whole, boy. Whole, and reign again—as is your birthright!” His deep voice rose to a triumphant peak. It echoed down the chamber.

Haxorax stumbled, cringing, teeth clenched so tight blood dripped from his gums. He was spasmed with psychic lightning.

“You know what you must do,” snarled the Patriarch. “Or has Zane Walker broken you? Then you were never worthy of the title. Let down yourself, if you must. To think you’d let down your race in such pathetic fashion—let me down too, while you’re at it!”

He laughed. “All because you couldn’t do your one duty right, because you let a damned human ruin you!”

Each word ripped open a psychic wound in Haxorax’s mind.

At last, the boy’s mind broke. Torn open, and all he felt was hatred. It was too easy. The boy could hardly form a straight thought.

“ZANE!”

Haxorax’s face drew into an animal snarl. His eyes went bloodshot, clear, sharp, and feral—“I’ll KILL—”

He choked off, stumbled. “I’ll—”

One last shock went through his soul.

The Prince went to his knees and collapsed.

Lyxandor watched his son coldly. Haxorax was fine-featured now, sculpted to perfection. A beautiful creation. But he’d been a small, soft boy. One glance and you could tell he was no natural-born killer. It used to enrage Lyxandor, just looking at him.

It had been strenuous getting him here.

There was a drawn-out silence.

Then the Archpriest flew down and cradled the boy’s head in his hands.

“That… Master…” He shook his head.

“Speak your mind, Sverrex,” said the Patriarch. He kept on grinning. “Tell me what you’re thinking! Go on.”

At the silence—“Come now. I won’t punish you for it! I’ll swear it on my honor as a dragon.”

The Archpriest looked like he didn’t know whether to believe him or not. Then he just shook his head. “That should not have been done,” he said hoarsely. “You’ve inflamed him. With the state of his soul…”

In that moment, Lyxandor felt an incredible urge to backhand the man into oblivion. But he’d made a promise. And so he kept his word and merely laughed.

“All dragonkind,” Lyxandor breathed, eyes gleaming. “Can be cleaved down a single line. On one side are those who need time in feathered beds with warm milk, who need to be told all will be alright. That is how they deal with times of greatest stress—by folding… I do not fault them for it, just as I would not fault you, Archpriest, for being the little wyrm you are. That is simply your nature! Such dragons as you achieve nothing of significance and go on to lives of no consequence. But my son is not such a dragon.”

He clenched his fist. “My son,” he growled. “Needs a reason to fight. Needs a reason to go on the attack, a reason for his very heart to keep beating! I knew what he needed in that moment, and I gave it to him.”

“With all due respect, Master Lyxandor,” said the Archpriest, pale-faced. “You are no master of the soul.”

Lyxandor stepped up to him, getting so close that the Archpriest had to step back. He drowned the dragon in his shadow.

“I know my son, Archpriest… or are you implying otherwise?”

Sverrex shut his eyes tightly.

“Shut him down,” Lyxandor told the other Elders. “Cancel this… ‘press conference’ that Earthling Ventor so whines about. No interviews. Not a damned scrying glass in sight! I want him an enigma until he’s in the cage. Understand?”

He saw that they did. 

“Leave me.”

“Pardon… the Princess, Master,” said Elder Jaxanor. “What shall be done about her? If she kicks up a fuss with the True Phoenixes…”

“She won’t,” said Lyxandor. “I’ll speak to her personally. I’ll tell her the truth of what happened here.”

“…Which is…?”

“That all this shall be resolved once he excises his heart-demon, of course. That this is all a temporary measure! That her Haxxy shall be returned to her soon enough. And I’ll make sure she knows who’s to blame.”

Dya’s was a little mind, even littler than those of the Elders. With a little pressure and the right words, Lyxandor found he had no issue bending such minds to believe anything he wanted them to.

Jaxanor bowed out too. Archpriest Sverrex had almost gone when the Patriarch stopped him with a look.

“That Living Death draught,” said the Patriarch. “You know what to do now, don’t you? Keep the boy down until he’s called to fight. I want him to wake with slaughter on his mind and not a damned thing else. Pump him full of it. Do what you need to, so long as he’s strong in that ring. The moment he sees Zane Walker… he’ll know what to do.” 

The Patriarch snorted. “Though I expect that man will submit long before it gets to that point. Then he’ll yet serve a useful purpose in the war. Or Noughtfire will throw the towel for him! That’d be a sight, wouldn’t it?” 

He said that with pleasure. 

“And if the man doesn’t bend the knee?” 

“Then so be it.”

Sverrex was silent.

“Ask your damned question,” said Lyxandor. “I know you’ve got one.”

“If we do all this and the Prince’s soul shatters… what then?” Sverrex looked a tad watery-eyed.

“Then I’ve killed my son,” said the Patriarch. “Does that answer your question?”

His grin widened. Veins stood out like cables on his neck.

“Now. Will you do what I’ve told you, and fuck off?”

For a second, the Patriarch thought Sverrex might pull a Kajax. Might show some sudden spine. But the Archpriest trembled and found he was a dragon of no consequence after all.

He just gathered up the fallen boy and fled.

Then the Patriarch stood alone in the chamber.

***

“Welcome, Earth-folks, those watching at home and tuning in across Dragonspire! I’m Tyler,” said Tyler. 

“And I’m Becca,” said Becca. 

“We’re coming to you live from WRN Channel 6, just weeks away from what’s being billed as the ‘Duel of Destiny!’” 

WRN Channel 6 was one of WRN’s lesser-known channels. It only had a few tens of millions in viewership. Tiny in the grand scheme of WRN’s viewership, but the folks that called Earth home seemed to like it.

“It’s important to remember this is just a showcase,” said Becca brightly. “I like to think of it as a bout to show off the very best of us. It’s coming just a few decades after the first war with the Monsters. We all know about the losses of two Great Faction Heads, Frost Saint Selina and the Stone-Fist King, who fell holding off Prime Endbringers… it really hit the galaxy hard at the time. The question ever since has been—just who’s going to step up next war? The two names put forward over and over are ‘Zane Walker’ and ‘Haxorax.’” 

“We all know Earth’s own Zane. And after his latest escapades in the Ruins of the Lost Ones, it’s widely rumored he’s made some big leaps, especially physique-wise.”

“Reportedly, Haxorax has too."

“I’ll tell you what, Becks. Zane’s sure got some big, brass—” 

Becca elbowed Tyler, who winced.

“Zane’s brave as hell,” Tyler amended. “We knew that coming in! But going up against a top-flight talent like Haxorax, who just hit Empyrean with some once-in-generations dragonblood ritual… You’ve got to feel for Reina, that’s all I’m saying.”

Reina was clutching a pillow to her chest as she watched, though she didn’t appreciate it being pointed out.

“It is a jump we’ve never seen before,” Becca acknowledged. “Not just trying to fight over that so-called ‘Empyrean Wall,’ but doing it a full realm down. It’s true the oddsmakers aren’t so optimistic. That being said—if there’s one man known for defying the odds, it’s Zane.”

“We’re rooting for you, big fella!”

Reina turned off the broadcast. She decided she’d go for a run, just to work off the stress a little.

It was true that expert opinion across the Galaxy was heavily on Haxorax’s side.

She would still take Zane heads-up, physically, but from all she’d seen, the First Prince of Dragons would make it competitive—especially after the Sacred Rites.

The Shards of Destruction were widely known to be Zane’s one real advantage. But he’d only have five Destruction to Haxorax’s three Creation. Meaning that two-Shard advantage would have to make up a whole realm’s difference.

Knowing what Reina knew, she still believed in her man. She still never liked seeing him go out there without backup, though.

She changed into running gear, tied her hair, slapped on Gravity bands, and started a lap. The 1000x gravity they exerted on her made it feel like she was on her old morning workout, before Integration had even gone down.

It was around dawn. She was back on Earth today, here to take a few final meetings with VGI. She firmly set her mind to that.

She made her way across the Luminous Factions’ running trails, which wound alongside a picturesque river that hugged the Faction grounds. By the time she’d made it back, she’d worked up a light sweat. She was feeling pretty good as she made her way back to the main skyscraper. She always liked getting up early and seeing the morning sunlight slowly raise its curtain on her Faction.

Folks were waking up around here too. She got plenty of cheers as she went by. “You keep your chin up, Miss Reina!” shouted an old baker named Sammy. He waved a lump of dough. “Don’t you listen to them naysayers! Any real Earthling knows our Zane’ll dig deep and show something no one’s ever seen before, just watch!”

She couldn't help but smile.