The Eternal Dragon’s Call

Chapter 1: The Ghost in the Marrow

"You think this dust is just dirt but it is actually the powdered remains of our mistakes."

Xavier dragged his boot through the gray, choking silt. He kept his head low. His pulse was steady. Or at least he tried to keep it that way. The black scales creeping up his neck itched with a burning, rhythmic intensity. It felt less like a skin condition and more like a parasite eating him from the inside out. He adjusted the coarse wool scarf around his throat. He pinned it tight.

Just keep walking. Don't look at the sky. Don't look at the soldiers.

A jolt slammed into his chest. It felt like a hot iron spike driven through his ribs. He gasped, dropping to one knee as the world tilted. It was not a physical pain. It was the phantom echo of a dragon. It was a scream from a partner he had been forced to abandon to save his own miserable life.

Ignis.

The name felt like acid in his mind. He gripped his chest. His knuckles turned white under the grime. The pain rippled outward. His vision turned into a smear of black and gray. He could not breathe. His lungs felt like they were filling with wet ash.

"Hey, you. Scavenger."

Xavier tried to stand. His legs were lead. He looked up. A Shadow Dominion captain stood over him. His armor gleamed with a polished, predatory malice. He poked Xavier with the tip of his spear.

"Why are you hiding your face, filth? Show me the skin under that rag."

Xavier swallowed hard. Bile rose in his throat. He forced a tremor into his voice. He wanted to sound as pathetic and broken as he could.

"Just a rash, sir. A contagion from the waste. I do not want to infect your men."

The captain sneered. He stepped closer. The stench of ozone and cheap tobacco rolled off him.

"A contagion. Right. You look like you are about to drop dead. Maybe I should save you the trouble."

"No, wait, please."

Xavier scrambled backward. His heart hammered against his ribs like a trapped bird. The agony in his soul was sharpening. It was blooming into a white-hot terror that threatened to tear his consciousness in half. He could feel the connection he had tried to bury for years clawing at the surface. It was desperate to manifest.

The captain ignored him. He reached out to tear the scarf from Xavier's neck.

"I want to see what you are hiding. Everyone here is hiding something for the Empire. Are you a spy?"

"I am just a beggar, sir. I swear to you. Please, just leave me alone."

A small cry broke the tension.

Xavier looked past the captain’s shoulder. A girl, no older than ten, stood frozen near the edge of the pit. She had tripped. Her small hand scraped against the jagged metal of a ruined supply crate. The captain’s second in command turned. His face twisted into a cruel, bored expression. He leveled his kinetic-bolt caster at her.

"Look at this little rat," the second said. His voice dripped with amusement. "She was trying to steal a ration tin. Should I put her down, Captain?"

Xavier’s vision flared red. The pain in his chest vanished. It was replaced by a cold, hollow silence that was far more dangerous. He saw the soldier’s finger tighten on the trigger.

"No," he whispered.

The captain swung back to look at Xavier. He was too late.

Xavier did not think about his cover. He did not think about the patrols or the consequences. He threw his hand forward. His palm was open. The skin did not just break. It shredded. The black scales underneath caught the light of the dying sun. They erupted in a torrent of violet, searing flame.

The blast did not just hit the soldier. It vaporized the air around him. The soldier was thrown back twenty feet. His armor warped like hot wax. His scream was cut short as he hit the jagged rocks of the ravine.

The entire camp fell into a stunned, deafening silence.

The captain froze. His spear clattered to the ground. He looked at the smoking crater where his man had stood. Then he looked at Xavier. The scarf had fallen away. It revealed the thick, obsidian-like scales that had now spread across Xavier's jaw and up toward his cheekbone.

"Dragonbound," the captain breathed. His face drained of all color. "You are the last of the abominations."

Xavier did not wait. He scrambled to his feet. His hand still glowed with the dying embers of his forbidden fire. He did not look at the girl. He did not look at the carnage. He turned and bolted into the labyrinthine shadows of the ruined city.

He ran until his chest burned. He ran until his vision swam with spots. He ran until he reached the heavy lead-lined door of his bolt-hole. He tumbled inside. He slammed the heavy iron bolt into place. He collapsed against the freezing stone.

His hand was shaking so violently that he could barely unbuckle his pack. He grabbed a canister of heavy-grade numbing salts. He poured them over his arm. He hissed as they burned against his skin.

Stay calm. Stay hidden.

He looked at his reflection in a shard of broken glass. The scales had retreated. But they left behind a dull, bruised color that would never truly go away. He had done it. He had used his power. The Dominion would be hunting him by morning. Every bounty hunter from the border to the capital would be scanning the wastes for a man with dead eyes and cursed skin.

He felt the presence before he heard it.

It was a shift in the air. It was a tiny, deliberate adjustment of pressure in the corner of the small room.

Xavier did not pull his knife. He did not have the energy. He just slumped deeper into the darkness.

"You think you are so clever, hiding in the dirt like a rat," a voice purred from the shadows.

A woman stepped into the sliver of moonlight filtering through the cracks in the ceiling. She wore a coat of deep, midnight blue. They were the colors of a house that had been extinct for twenty years. She held a crossbow. It was aimed with terrifying, clinical precision directly at the soft spot beneath Xavier's jaw.

Xavier let out a ragged, humorless laugh.

"Are you here to finish what the captain started? Or are you just looking for a trophy?"

The woman tilted her head. Her eyes were sharp, intelligent, and completely devoid of mercy.

"I do not kill things that are already rotting from the inside," she said. "I am Lyra. And I have been tracking your heartbeat for three weeks."

Xavier looked up. His voice was barely a whisper.

"Then shoot me and be done with it. I am tired of running."

Lyra lowered the crossbow. But she did not look away.

"I do not want you dead, Xavier. You are the only person left in this fractured, dying world who knows how to talk to a dragon. And right now, my life is tied to the one in the capital. So you are going to get up, you are going to pack your things, and you are going to help me find the blade that kills gods."

Xavier felt the ghost of a smile touch his cracked lips.

"You are insane."

"Maybe," Lyra said. She took a step toward him. Her shadow stretched across the floor. "But we are both running out of time. Are you going to save yourself, or are you just going to sit there and wait for the rot to take your heart?"

The phantom heartbeat in his chest gave a sudden, violent thump. It echoed the call he had been trying to forget.

Find me, the voice of the dragon whispered in his mind.

Xavier stood up. His legs were shaking. His eyes met hers with a cold, desperate hunger of his own.

"Lead the way," he said.