Chapter 1 - Acantha
It was especially quiet tonight, Acantha noticed as she neared the end of her evening patrol. It was always quiet in the tunnels, especially the ones that reached out well beyond the cavern in which she and her kin had made their home for as long as anyone could remember. A still, almost-claustrophobic silence was pressing down on her. It was almost enough to make her uneasy, and Acantha had always been in the habit of trusting her gut when it came to that kind of thing.
Then again, the past year had added a lot of standard background uneasiness to her life, so there was the additional challenge of figuring out whether this hunch was anything out of the ordinary… or the new ordinary, at any rate. Dragons typically didn’t adjust well to change at the best of times, and as an Earth sign, Acantha was especially set in her ways. Ever since the new Queen had arrived out of the blue, everything had been thrown into what felt like absolute chaos. Worthy chaos, Acantha kept telling herself. Valuable chaos. The kind of chaos that led to the kinds of changes they needed around here. But chaos, nonetheless… and as Captain of the Palace Guard as well as a Capricorn, chaos made Acantha especially tense.
She’d been trying her best to get used to their new way of life. A lot of it was undeniably positive. Having more contact with the wolves who lived in the forest above them, was a positive step. For centuries, the wolf pack had been an uneasy presence on their otherwise uninhabited territory, a constant potential threat, with the simmering tension breaking regularly into small conflicts that always hinted at the potential for all-out war. With the new alliance between them, brought about by the love of the wolf Alpha for their dragon Queen, that tension… well, it would be naive to suggest that the tension had evaporated. Centuries of ancestral war didn’t just disappear because of a wedding. But the tension was certainly evolving. Growing more complicated… growing harder to keep track of, in some respects.
Was that why she felt uneasy tonight? The patrols she’d just completed, those were new, too… a direct outcome of their increased contact with the wolves. It seemed there were certain paths around the territory they shared that were mirrored directly by tunnels carved into the rock below, untold centuries ago. These paths extended around the boundaries of their territory, where the forest was claimed by a thick, magical Fog that harbored all kinds of unseen dangers. The wolves had a long-standing tradition of patrolling the paths above, and the reason for that had become clear a year ago, when a spate of disappearances among both wolves and dragons were revealed to be a result of the Fog’s steady encroachment on their territory.
Acantha didn’t understand it herself. From what her sister had told her, the theory seemed to be that the Fog had a tendency to expand, to encroach constantly on the boundaries of their territory if not held in check. And the patrols that the wolves had been running for centuries were what held it in check… though nobody seemed to understand just why that was as yet. The Fog had been creeping closer and closer to both the wolves’ and the dragons’ homes, ever since the dragons’ tunnels had been abandoned due to a few cave-ins—or at least, that was the theory. Where wolves had a shared ancestral memory they kept in their minds, dragons relied mostly on physical records… and to call them unreliable was an understatement. Even now, more than a year after all these discoveries had been made, the scholars were yet to discover a concrete answer to exactly when the tunnels had been abandoned, and why.
But they were certainly not abandoned anymore. It had taken weeks of around-the-clock work, but the debris blocking the tunnels had finally been cleared. Acantha had strongly resisted this move at first—the tunnels had been full of Fog as well as debris, and she’d had serious concerns about safety—but she’d been overruled, something that still chafed at her a little. What was the point of her rank at the Palace, of all her responsibilities, if her authority could be so easily overruled? At any rate, the tunnels had been safely cleared, and from what she heard, the effect had been that the Fog above was receding. There were fewer sightings of the monstrosities that had regularly emerged from the Fog to attack unwary shifters on the edges of the territory, and the Fog itself was thinner on the outskirts, easier to see through.
That didn’t mean she was particularly keen on spending more time out there than was necessary, of course. Like any dragon, Acantha made regular trips outside of their mountainous home to stretch her wings and hunt, but she tended to stay close to the mountain that housed them, hunting in the foothills or close to the northern shore of the lake that lay to the south of the mountain. She still bore a heavy suspicion that bordered on dread for the thick, rolling Fog that surrounded their home. It was a constant danger, a lingering threat on the edges of her mind. Every young dragon learned to avoid the Fog, learned of the dangers it harbored. And those fears had only been made more concrete last year, when her sister Morgan had gone missing.
All of this rumination was only making her gathering sense of unease worse, and Acantha lingered at the mouth of the tunnel she’d just finished walking. Maybe she shouldn’t be taking these patrols alone. The rest of her staff always made the nightly patrols in groups of two at least—it had become an unofficial exercise in strengthening the bonds between them, and Acantha had quickly begun to make use of the new rosters as a means of putting dragons who had disagreements to sort out in the same place for a good chunk of time. They were already beginning to catch on to what she was doing, of course… and a few of them had even been bold enough to ask why she patrolled alone, if the rest of them were sent in pairs.
The answer she hadn’t given them, of course, was that the patrols made her uneasy. Having her staff there would only add the strain of keeping up a brave face. It was a ridiculous thing to be frightened of. Possibly the least dangerous work in the entire cavern, the equivalent of a pleasant evening stroll (though the view of endless stone walls was nothing to write home about). Still, on some level Acantha would have preferred to patrol the Fog itself, ready to fend off the beasts and monsters that dwelled in its misty outreaches.
Was she really just stuck in her ways, she wondered? That was what Morgan thought—her little sister always rolled her eyes when Acantha grumbled about all the changes. It was maddening, really. If anyone should have been uneasy about the Fog, it was Morgan, who’d been physically snatched by some kind of magical force in the Fog and taken to some bizarre place that was somehow not quite part of their reality… the details were still hazy, even to the people who’d been lost, as well as to the Queen, who’d been instrumental in their rescue. But Morgan, far from hiding away in fear from the Fog, had instead become obsessed with understanding it. She spent most of her time studying it now, either whiling away long hours in the labyrinthine Palace Archives or worse, actually making field trips to the outer edges of the forest. Acantha didn’t like any of it. But that didn’t stop her from accompanying Morgan and her little study group into the forest every time they went. In fact, she insisted on it. Someone had to be there to fend off the threats they had become so blasé about.
Morgan was probably in the Archives still, Acantha thought, rolling her eyes with what she had to admit was mostly fondness. She had a tendency to lose track of time when she was following a passion like this one, the other important things in life—like food, rest, and a healthy daily routine—melting away like snow. Their parents had always blamed it on the stars, but Acantha wasn’t so sure. Her sister’s empathy and uncanny knack for understanding other people’s feelings, that was a water sign thing. Her failure to take care of herself… that was all Morgan.
Good thing she had a boring, routine-obsessed older sister to drag her off to bed. Acantha smiled as she headed into the Palace. The Archives were on her way back to her quarters anyway—she’d stop by and check how deeply Morgan and her new scholar friends had gotten lost in their research. Maybe that would help with the uneasy prickling on the back of her neck that she still couldn’t shake. Morgan could always sense when Acantha needed a bit of help on the emotional side of things. They’d grown a lot closer over the last year or so, and Acantha knew she wouldn’t be handling all these changes nearly as well as she was without Morgan being there to talk her through it.
Acantha moved through the passage, already looking forward to seeing her sister. Each cavernous room was lit by the same ever-present magical glow that seemed to emanate from the stone of the mountain itself, put in place before anyone could remember by means that nobody living understood. But each room she passed through, though stuffed to the brim with bookshelves groaning with dusty old records, was nonetheless devoid of actual life. Could all three of them be on a deeper level of the Archives, hunting for some ancient record that might contain a clue to whatever abstract mystery they were chasing today? It looked like nobody was here, though. They usually left a study station set up on one of the large stone tables that populated these upper levels, but every table she passed was empty.
But her gut was telling her someone was here. Acantha had spent her whole long life in this Palace, ever since she’d earned a hallowed place on the Palace Guard and begun to work her tireless way up to being its Captain. Though the Palace Guard were strictly in charge of defending the whole realm, not simply its royal family’s home, the great building at the very bottom of the mountainous cavern was nevertheless the most central part of their work. She felt a connection to this place that bordered on spiritual, as though her own body had been carved of the same stone that comprised its walls. It wasn’t something she could articulate or express well, even if she was in the habit of sharing those kinds of things with anyone but her sister… but it was true nevertheless. And the more she walked through the Archives, the more she felt that she wasn’t alone here.
Her sister and her scholarly friends might have gone home already… but the Archives wasn’t empty.
Acantha paused at the top of a staircase. The Palace was deceptively vast… even its elaborate three-story facade belied the true extent of it, built so deeply into the stone that parts of it even broke out into the forest above. But while the palace chambers reached back, the Archives extendeddown. Floors upon floors upon floors, reaching down into the living rock, until the very air felt different, more dense. Morgan always said that it felt like all the records and history were pressing in on her down there, but Acantha knew better. Acantha knew that it was the earth itself enveloping her down there, equal parts comforting and terrifying. Maybe that was a Capricorn thing, too. Or maybe she’d just grown eccentric and superstitious over the years. She’d certainly spent enough of them in this place to justify a few quirks.
She moved down staircase after staircase, feeling like she was in an odd trance. The stone was speaking to her without words, every brush of her fingertips against the ornately carved banisters of the staircase urging her on, sending her towards what she was beginning to realize must be the source of her worry. Had this been what had been prickling at her all night, even as she made her nightly patrols undisturbed? Someone in the Archives… nobody was permitted this deep without the express permission of senior archivists, and yet she was still moving. Morgan wouldn’t have come down this far on a whim. This kind of excursion would involve prior planning, probably multiple meetings with the archivists who ran the place. Acantha would have been informed.
Because down here, amidst the ever-present groaning bookshelves of ancient records, the dragons stored their most precious artifacts. Most were of historical significance only, and of those, the most beautiful or important were kept higher up, displayed on the upper levels proudly for the residents of the cavern to visit and enjoy whenever they pleased. But down here… even Acantha wasn’t completely apprised of the nature of what was kept down here. All she knew was that the objects down here weren’t simply of historical value. Some of them contained real power, real magic. And while it was never made explicit, Acantha knew that a major part of her role as Palace Guard was to keep those objects safe from casual visitors.
Or was it to keep visitors safe from the objects?
No casual visitor would be this deep in the Archives, she knew that. And when she reached the next landing, she felt that bone-deep instinct warning her to stop. Here, on one of the lowest floors of the Archives, where the pressure of the stone around her was a physical force… her hand moved to the hilt of her sword, and she felt a readiness for battle moving effortlessly through her body, familiar like an old friend.
Someone was here who shouldn’t be. Dragon or wolf, it didn’t matter. They were an intruder… and they were about to face the consequences.
Chapter 2 - Cato
He opened his eyes. That was a good sign. So was the breath that he’d just taken. If he’d been entombed alive in solid rock, as had been a distinctly possible outcome, his ribs probably wouldn’t have been able to expand… nor would there have been a lungful of cool, dusty air to take in. Good signs, all good signs. Cato took another breath, savoring the giddy rush of continuing to be alive. If you couldn’t take pleasure in the little things, what was the point of any of it, right?
A shame he was too far from home to report his success. The coven wouldn’t know if he was alive or dead until he got back to them. And he’d have to wait hours before he could gloat about what a legendary daredevil he was. Hundreds of miles through solid rock… the precision, the danger. This was bragging rights for months, maybe years, depending on how competitive his fellows got about topping this achievement.
But he was getting ahead of himself. He hadn’t achieved anything yet. These would be hollow bragging rights indeed if he returned empty-handed, and there’d be a punishment to make the loss sting even more. No point in infiltrating a vault, after all, unless you also liberated its contents. Otherwise, you were just a sightseer. And these sights, Cato thought as he revolved slowly in place, taking in the room… these sights weren’t exactly worth the risk. A dusty, cluttered room with absurdly high ceilings… what, did the dragons feel a need to make even their libraries big enough for their winged forms? Surely nobody was allowed to shapeshift in a library. But maybe they’d need to. It certainly seemed like you’d need wings to reach the upper shelves of the enormous, teetering stacks that reached up towards those ceilings.
But Cato wasn’t here for dusty old books. He was here fortreasure.
There were a lot of old folktales that warned of the foolishness of attempting to steal from a dragon’s hoard. That was the point of folktales, wasn’t it? To tell stories, to impart wisdom to as many people as possible. And it was true that stealing from dragons wasn’t a good idea for the average person. But neither Cato—nor any of his coven—were average people. And for them, a warning meant an opportunity. Dragons didn’t hoard just anything, did they? You didn’t hear about dragons who hoarded pebbles, or dry leaves, or pinecones. No—they hoarded things of value, things of power.
And Cato and his coven were very interested in power.
He moved swiftly through the room once he’d gotten his bearings, murmuring a few words under his breath that dimmed the light that glowed at the end of his staff. He’d expected darkness, but it seemed that the dragons had enchanted the very stone of the mountain to illuminate even their archives in the middle of the night. There was something about that that rankled in him, somehow. Cato had spent his whole life fighting tooth and nail to assemble a few scraps of power… and here these dragons were, wasting more magic than he’d ever use to keep an empty room well-lit.