Requiem's Song (Book 1) Read online

  REQUIEM'S SONG

  DAWN OF DRAGONS, BOOK ONE

  by

  Daniel Arenson

  Copyright © 2014 by Daniel Arenson

  All rights reserved.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by an electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the author.

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE: LAIRA

  CHAPTER TWO: RAEM

  CHAPTER THREE: LAIRA

  CHAPTER FOUR: JEID

  CHAPTER FIVE: RAEM

  CHAPTER SIX: TANIN

  CHAPTER SEVEN: ISSARI

  CHAPTER EIGHT: LAIRA

  CHAPTER NINE: MAEV

  CHAPTER TEN: ANGEL

  CHAPTER ELEVEN: JEID

  CHAPTER TWELVE: LAIRA

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: SENA

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: ISSARI

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: JEID

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: LAIRA

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: ANGEL

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: TANIN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: ISSARI

  CHAPTER TWENTY: LAIRA

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: ISSARI

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: TANIN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: LAIRA

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: RAEM

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: TANIN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: LAIRA

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN: TANIN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT: ISSARI

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE: LAIRA

  CHAPTER THIRTY: JEID

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE: LAIRA

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO: JEID

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE: MAEV

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR: LAIRA

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE: SENA

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX: JEID

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN: ISSARI

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT: RAEM

  AFTERWORD

  NOVELS BY DANIEL ARENSON

  KEEP IN TOUCH

  LAIRA

  On Laira's tenth birthday, the crone dragged her outside to see her mother burned at the stake.

  Laira blinked in the weak morning sun. She had not seen daylight in so long. For five days they had kept her in her tent, alone in shadows, alone in fear, the sounds of the trial—shouting, pleading, weeping—rising outside. Now silence filled the camp. Now, finally in daylight, Laira only wanted to return to the darkness.

  Other tents rose across the yellow grass, similar to hers, their animal-skin covers stretched across cedar poles. In the distance rolled a red forest, a place of berries and the whispers of secret men, and beyond the trees rose the faded blue mountains where the elk roamed. A murder of crows circled above, cawing, and Laira felt her head spin and she nearly fell. She clutched her doll, a wooden little thing she had named Mustardseed. The crone's talon-like hand tightened around Laira's arm, dragging her forward; Laira felt like a doll herself, helpless and small.

  "Keep walking and don't close your eyes," said the crone, a shaman named Shedah. Her arms were knobby like old carob branches, and her fingers ended with sharp, yellow nails that nicked Laira's flesh. Other fingers—torn off the hands of dead men—hung around Shedah's neck in a lurid necklace of bone and dried flesh, charms to ward off evil spirits. The crone was ancient beyond measure—some claimed her two hundred winters old—and so wizened her eyes all but disappeared into nests of wrinkles. Her gums were toothless, her nose beaked, her body withered, and yet she was still so strong, strong enough that Laira thought the crone could snap her arm in two. All Laira could do was keep walking, guided by the old woman.

  "I won't close my eyes," Laira whispered.

  Shedah cackled. "If you do, I'll rip off your eyelids and make you watch. So be a good little maggot."

  They kept moving through the camp. The tribe's totem pole rose ahead—the great bole of an ancient cedar, carved with images of bison, eagles, and leaping fish. Near its crest flared a gilded mammoth tusk, long as a boat, attached to the pole with rawhide thongs. The cross of wood and ivory towered above the tents—the god Ka'altei, a deity of meat and fire. Wherever they set down this pole marked their territory, a beacon for all other tribes to fear.

  Around the pillar brooded its guardians—the rocs, fetid birds the size of mammoths. Oil dripped down their black feathers, and their long, naked necks turned as Laira approached. Their cruel beaks—large enough to swallow men—clacked open and shut, and their talons, which were longer than human arms, dug into the soil. Their eyes watched Laira, gleaming orbs like circles of bronze. Were they not tethered to the totem, Laira thought they'd leap toward her, tear out her entrails, and feast.

  The tribesmen stood everywhere, dour, staring, clad in fur and leather and holding spears. Some stared at Laira balefully. One hunter, a burly man with a scraggly red beard, spat at her. Others gazed in pity. Clad in a robe of patches, a druid woman whispered ancient prayers, reaching toward Laira but daring not approach. In Laira's old home across the sea, men now wove wool and cotton, built houses of stone, and shaved their beards, yet here in the north—in the Goldtusk tribe—lived an older, prouder, rougher people, warriors of fur and stone and hair. War paint covered their leathery skin, and tattoos of totem animals coiled around their arms.

  The crone kept tugging her forward, and Laira wanted to use her curse—the secret disease of her family, the power that would let her escape this tribe, let her free her mother, let her kill them all. Yet she dared not. Mother had used the dark magic; now the woman would burn.

  Past campfires, the totem pole, and a mammoth carcass buzzing with flies it rose—the pyre.

  Upon the pile of wood and kindling she stood tied to the stake—Laira's mother.

  For five days in her tent, Laira had shed many tears, yet none would now flow. The crone who dragged her forward paused, and Laira stood in the dead grass, staring, feeling dead herself, feeling empty.

  Mother wept.

  Her face was so beaten Laira barely recognized her. It looked less like a face and more like a slab of bloodied meat. Tears poured from bruised, bloodshot eyes to flow down lacerated cheeks. When Mother spoke, her voice was slurred, thick with blood and shattered teeth.

  "Don't make her watch. Turn her aside. Please . . . Laira, my sweetness, please, close your eyes."

  Laira bit her lip so hard she tasted blood. She wanted to run away, but how could she? She wanted to close her eyes, but Shedah had promised to rip off her eyelids. The crone gripped both her arms now, fingers digging, hard as bronze, and Laira wondered if those fingers could shatter her bones, rip off her limbs, kill her right here with the pain. Mother wept upon the pyre and Laira wanted to do something—to use her curse, to scream, even to weep, some act of defiance or emotion . . . but she only watched.

  "Behold the reptile!"

  The voice, high-pitched and raspy, tore through the camp like a blade through flesh. Goose bumps rose on Laira's skin. Wincing, she turned to see him—the man who ruled the Goldtusk tribe, the man who would sentence Mother to death, the man who filled Laira's nightmares.

  "Zerra," she whispered.

  The chieftain limped toward them, tall and swaying like a wicker effigy in the wind. He wore patches of fur, leather boots, and necklaces of bone beads. His prized possession, a bronze apa sword, hung upon his belt. The blade was leaf-shaped, double-edged, and as long as a man's forearm, sprouting from a semicircular crossguard. In some of the villages across the river, men now forged metal, plowed fields, and raised huts, but Zerra had always scorned them. His were the old ways, th
e ways of hunting and gathering, of tents and campfires, of blades taken from corpses rather than forged in smithies.

  More than his towering height, his sword, or his mane of grizzled hair, it was Zerra's face that frightened Laira. Half that face was gone, burned into something wet, raw, and dripping. Mother had given him that wound—or at least, the creature Mother had become, a monster of scales, fangs, and fire.

  The disease, Laira thought and shivered. The curse that had us banished from Eteer, our old home across the sea. The curse that lets my family turn into reptiles. Into monsters. Into . . . dragons.

  "Zerra, listen to me!" Mother cried from the pyre. "Banish us. Banish us to the escarpment. We will not hurt you. We—"

  "You will burn and scream for me," Zerra said, his left eye blazing from his melted flesh. "You are lower than one who lies with pigs. You will squeal."

  You screamed, Laira thought. You squealed.

  She had seen it five days ago. She had dreamed it every night since. She knew those nightmares would fill her forever. The memory pounded through her, shaking her bones.

  While the men had hunted upon their rocs, Mother had taken Laira into the woods to gather berries, nuts, and mushrooms. Mother's amulet gleamed around her neck, a silver talisman bearing the sigil of Taal, a god of their old home across the sea, a god unknown to any others in this northern hinterland. Past a grove of birches they had found a pond, a place of water lilies, golden leaves, and mist. It was a secret place, a perfect place. A place for dark magic.

  The curse always itched within Laira and her mother. The disease forever cried for release. They stepped into the pool, submerged themselves in the water . . . and shifted.

  Hidden underwater, Laira opened her eyes, and between algae and the roots of lilies, she saw Mother change. White scales flowed across her body, the color of moonlight, and wings unfurled from her back. Her body grew, becoming almost as large as a roc, slick and graceful and thin. Laira changed too, letting the curse raise golden scales across her. Her wings stirred the water, and she blasted sparks from her mouth.

  Their claws rested on the pool's floor. Their tails braided together. Their heads—long, scaled, and horned—rose to the surface. Nostrils and eyes emerged into the air. Men called it a curse, but to Laira it felt so good. This felt more like her natural form than the scrawny, raven-haired girl she was at their camp. Scaled and winged, a golden dragon, Laira felt whole. She felt true. Looking around the forest, she tried to imagine flapping her wings and flying, seeing mountains, forests, and rivers from high above, so high nobody could hurt her.

  "Why must we hide?" she asked, sticking her snout over the water. Lilies tangled around her teeth. "They say that other cursed ones live at the escarpment in the north. They say it's safe. They say Zerra's own twin brother hides there, cursed with the same disease."

  Mother blasted smoke from her nostrils. Her eyes narrowed. As a dragon, her voice sounded deeper, stronger, almost musical. "There are no others, Laira. That's only a myth. The world is cold and large and empty. The lone wolf perishes. The pack survives. The tribe of Goldtusk is our home, and Zerra is a kind master."

  "A master who would slay us if he knew our secret!" Laira said. "I hate hiding. I hate this curse. Why did you have to give me this disease? You infected me." Tears burned in her eyes. "If I must be a dragon, let me fly. Let me be free. I won't cower in the water."

  Anger flowed through Laira, rattling her scales, and flames filled her maw. With a cry, she beat her wings. She rose from the pool, water and algae dripping off her scales, claws scratching at the air. Mother gasped and stared from below. Laira knew the rule—only become a dragon underwater, in darkness of night, or in deep caves, never in the open. They had been caught shifting in their last home, a place Laira could hardly remember, and they had barely escaped. But Laira didn't care. Laira was done caring. She hated hiding and she would fly.

  She beat her wings, rising higher, soaring between the trees until she crashed through the forest canopy with a shower of orange leaves. The cold wind streamed around her and Laira laughed. This was freedom. This was who she was. They called it a disease but she felt healthier than ever, not a monster but a noble spirit of fire.

  "Laira!"

  She looked down to see Mother rising from the forest—a slim white dragon with blue eyes.

  "I can fly!" Laira shouted and laughed. "I can fly to the escarpment. I can find the others. I know they're real. I—"

  "Laira, come back here!" Mother shouted, flying toward her.

  The white dragon reached out her claws, grabbed Laira's leg, and tugged. Laira screamed and tried to free herself, and her wings beat, and—

  Shrieks pierced the air.

  Laira fell silent.

  Mother spun around in the sky, stared east, and cried out in fear.

  "Rocs," Laira whispered.

  The great birds, larger even than dragons, covered the sky, fetid things like oversized vultures. Their heads were bald, their necks gangly, their black feathers damp with the oil they secreted. Their talons reached out, and upon their backs rode the hunters of the Goldtusk tribe.

  At their lead, riding upon a massive roc that dwarfed the others, rode Zerra.

  "The curse of the reptile rises!" cried the chieftain, his hair billowing. He raised a flint-tipped spear in his hand; feathers and scrimshawed raven skulls adorned its shaft. "Behold the weredragon."

  Mother hovered and snarled, hiding Laira behind her. She faced the advancing horde. Dozens of rocs flew toward them.

  "Fly down into the forest," Mother said softly, still facing the foul birds; it took Laira a few heartbeats to realize Mother was talking to her. "They haven't seen you yet. Land among the trees, become human again, and return to the camp."

  "We have to flee!" Laira said.

  "They're too fast," Mother replied. "They will catch us if we flee. Into the forest, go! I'll hold them off."

  The rocs shrieked, drawing nearer. Their stench filled the air, thick as fog, and their cries split the sky, slamming against Laira's eardrums.

  Laira shook, hesitating, wanting to fight too, wanting to drag Mother to safety, wanting to fly north and find the other dragons fabled to exist . . . but she simply obeyed.

  She flew down past the leafy canopy. Before she hit the ground, she heard screams above. Fire blazed overhead and blood rained. Laira landed by the pool, shifted back into human form, and gazed up at the sky.

  She trembled. She wanted to cry out but dared not. Past the branches, she caught only glimpses of the violence. She saw Mother blowing fire, a blaze greater than any pyre, tinged blue and white with horrible heat. She saw Zerra ignite, scream, and burn upon his roc. And then only smoke, talons cutting into scales, and pattering blood on fallen leaves.

  A human again—ten years old, scrawny as a twig, and clad only in her buffalo pelt—Laira ran.

  She ran through the forest, across the meadow, and into their camp. She ran until Shedah—wizened, cackling, covered in moles—grabbed her. She screamed in the crone's grasp as the hunters returned with their catch. Mother was now in human form, beaten and bloodied, tied with ropes. She was trying to shift into a dragon again; scales appeared and disappeared upon her body, but whenever she began to grow, the ropes dug into her flesh, shoving her back into human form. Men tossed Mother onto the ground, kicking, striking with sticks, and Laira wanted to run to her, she wanted to shift into a dragon and save her, but she only raced into her tent, and she only trembled.

  For five days she cowered as Shedah guarded the tent, sealing Laira in the shadows.

  And now she stood here, staring, all her tears spent, watching her mother upon the pyre, watching Zerra lift a torch and bring it toward the pile of wood and kindling.

  "Please," Laira whispered, and finally her eyes dampened. "Please, Zerra, please don't kill her. Please."

  The chieftain slowly turned toward her. He stared, the ruined half of his face dripping pus and blood. Slowly a smile spread across his fac
e, displaying crooked teeth.

  "One day, little worm . . ." he said, voice like wooden chips rubbing together. "One day I will find the curse in you too, and you will scream like this."

  With that, Zerra spun back toward the pyre and tossed his torch into the kindling.

  Oil soaked the straw, twigs, and dried leaves. They burst into flame with the speed and ferocity of dragonfire.

  Mother screamed.

  The fire spread across her, blazing skyward, licking skin off muscle, flesh off bones. And still Mother screamed, writhing in her bonds, begging, wailing.

  And Laira screamed too.

  She tried to close her eyes, but Shedah grabbed her eyelids with rough fingers and held them open. She tried to break free, to run to her mother, to flee into the forest, but the crone held her fast.

  "Mother!" she cried. "Mother, please!"

  Please, she prayed silently. Please die. Please stop screaming.

  Yet she would not. The screaming and writhing continued within the inferno, the fire eating Mother's flesh as if slowly savoring a meal. The smell of cooking meat filled the camp, as savory as spiced game. The flames tore through the ropes, and Mother fell from the stake to land in the blazing kindling. She managed to roll off the pyre, to run several steps through the camp, a living torch. She soon collapsed, rolling and whimpering. Zerra stood above the charred mockery of life and laughed.

  "Yes, reptile." The chieftain smiled thinly and the firelight blazed against his own wound. "You burned me. Now you will forever burn in the depths of the Abyss."

  When finally Mother was silent and still, Shedah spat a green glob, huffed, and released Laira.

  She stood for a moment, staring at the corpse of her mother. It still burned, crumbling away into charred ashes. Laira wanted to embrace the corpse. She wanted to save her, to beg the shaman to heal her. But she knew: Mother was dead.

  Men tossed rugs over the corpse, stamped out the flame, and bound the remains with ropes. They hung the charred, blackened thing from the tribe totem, a sacrifice to Ka'altei. Mother swung in the wind, banging against the carved pole, shedding ash. She barely looked human, just burnt meat upon bones. The rocs beneath the totem rose, reached up their talons, and snapped their beaks, but they dared not yet eat. The great vultures looked back at Zerra, their master, begging.