A faint smile crossed Mio’s lips as she stared up at him. “We’re called Phantoms. Not living. Not dead. We exist to serve. Once you land in the Chasm, you can never leave. There is no escape from here.”
Adrian made a show of studying their surroundings, his fists planted firmly on his hips so Mio couldn’t see them shaking. “Why escape? I think this place is amazing. Why would you ever want to leave?”
Mio tipped her head back and laughed. It was the lightest sound he’d heard from her in a while, and it helped to ease some of his anger on her behalf. “So true.” She leaned toward him, holding on to her smile. “But there are some who want what they can’t have. And no one likes being looked down on by another.”
Yes, he understood that idea easily enough.
“Another difficult question,” Adrian carefully started. He reached up and touched his own throat while staring at Mio’s. She didn’t miss the nonverbal signal, because she also lifted a hand, her fingers landing on the metal collar that was wrapped around her neck. It could have passed for a bit of simple jewelry except for the fact that everyone Adrian saw in the Chasm wore something very similar. Some were more ostentatious while others were incredibly plain, but they were always there.
“A mark of being a Phantom,” she murmured, her hand falling into her lap. “Though if you are a full-blooded dragon and can shift, it also suppresses that ability. Only the clan leader you serve has the ability to release the collar’s power and allow you to shift.”
Adrian’s mouth fell open, but not a sound came out as the words were trapped behind a ball of rage in this throat. Dragons were prohibited from shifting because of some stupid debt or feud with another clan. Slaves. Servants. This was…barbaric.
Of course, he came from his own society of class warfare, but there was always the belief that you weren’t trapped because of your birth. There was the idea that if you worked hard, trained hard, you could rise up to be more. A lot of that was bullshit, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t try. That he didn’t have hope.
His upbringing had been simple and poor. He’d made some magnificently bad decisions in his teen years, but now he was a bodyguard for the king. He was paid enough to afford a nice apartment in the city if he wanted one. He earned well more than his parents ever had, and he was no one’s slave. No one was stopping him from going after whatever dream or notion entered his head.
“You’re angry,” Mio stated, sounding somewhat surprised.
“Fuck yes, I’m angry!” Adrian snapped before he could catch the words. “This is bullshit!”
Mio laughed. It was an amazing sound as it danced past him in the small, hidden square. She carefully returned the box of cookies in her lap to the proper bag. “I take it you don’t have anything like this in your home.”
“No, not quite like this.” Adrian shoved a hand through his hair and scratched his head. “I mean, sure, there are elitist assholes who believe they’re better than everyone else. You can never get away from that. But Erya doesn’t have slaves. People aren’t prisoners of their birth. While I might not have a shot at being king, I could one day be a minister or the Chancellor if I really wanted to be.”
“There are whispers among some of the clans that they’d like to do away with the old separation. They’d like to welcome in some of the dragons that had been sent away. But as long as Clan Takahashi remains in power, that’s never going to happen. They still cling to the old prejudices. If you’ve dishonored your clan or dared to love a human, you’re less than a dragon and aren’t worthy of being in a clan.”
Adrian held up one hand, stopping her. “First, where are the humans coming from? I thought only dragons lived here.”
The young woman smiled and shook her head. “Shipwrecks. Humans wash up on the beach every once in a while. Just like you.” Her smile faded. “But I don’t think there are any full-blooded humans alive on the island now.” She wrinkled her nose and brow at him as she said in a low voice. “You humans don’t live for very long.”
Considering that the old legends stated dragons lived for centuries—no, humans didn’t live long in comparison.
But Adrian thought it was better to move them along from that line of thinking. “Would the other clans welcome in those who aren’t full-blooded dragons?”
Mio’s expression scrunched up. “Those are a harder case. Dragons are prideful and have always looked down on humans. The Takahashi aren’t the only ones who hate the half-breeds.” She paused and tapped her lips with one finger. “Though I wonder if that would change with the presence of your king. Particularly for Clan Omari. It does throw an interesting twist into the mix.”