A Night of Dragon Wings

SOLINA



She lay in his bed under the quilts. She paced his room and caressed the marble statues he had sculpted. She lifted the wooden turtle he had carved for her, kissed its head, and placed it back upon the shelf. She stepped outside and gazed upon the trees. She dreamed. She missed him. Loneliness clawed at her and stung her eyes.

I am so sad without you, she thought, pacing his chamber again and again like a prisoner in a cell. I am so alone. I want you with me.

But it was time to leave this place. It was time to rule. To conquer. To slaughter his people and bring him here—to warmth, to memory, to light.

To me.

She stepped toward the door of his chamber, placed her hand on the knob, and closed her eyes.

I wish I could stay here forever. She was young here, only twenty-three and still bright with youth, and her face was unscarred, and no pain or hatred or death filled her heart. A perfect day.

She tightened her lips, twisted the knob, and opened the door.

She stepped out of memory and into the chamber.

She walked up the stairs, emerging to the rim of the well. All around her spread the Hall of Memories, its columns rising from darkness to the shadowy domed ceiling. The pit surrounded the well, spreading all around her like a moat around a tower. Once only shadows and wind had filled this pit. Today her glory festered here.

"My children," she whispered.

The spawn of nephilim filled the pit, biting and mewling and clawing at one another, their bat wings beating and their eyes leaking pus. Each was the size of a man already, and they were growing larger every day, the strong feeding upon the weak. They writhed in the pit like a pile of maggots. A million or more rotted here. The strongest rose to the top, teeth bloodied and bellies bloated with the flesh of their brothers. For a mile deep they festered, stinking of decomposing flesh and blood and nightsoil.

"You will rule the world someday," Solina said softly. She stood upon the bridge, looking down at them. They reached out to her, claws shaking and glimmering with blood. They hissed her name.

"Sssolina… Sssolina…"

Mature female nephilim clung to the columns around the pit. Fifteen of them screamed here, bellies bulging and contracting and birthing more spawn into the pit. Blood poured down their legs, and nothing but wounds now spread between their thighs, and still their spawn burst out screaming and hungry to fall onto the million others.

Lord Legion himself clung to the sixteenth column, father of his brood. He licked his lips, gazed upon his wives and children, and gave a toothy smile. His drool rained.

"My queen," he said to her, bowing his horned head.

"Your brood is strong, Legion," Solina said to him from the bridge. "They will consume the world."

The great nephil hissed. Twenty feet tall, his body like a blackened cadaver, he spread out his bat wings, lovingly embracing the stench of his spawn. He inhaled and licked his chops.

"He will lead them when I'm gone," Legion said. "He will be the greatest among them, a devourer of the weak, a conqueror of dragons."

Solina smiled and placed her hands upon her belly. She could almost feel her son wriggle inside. She could almost hear him screech.

The weredragons killed my child with Elethor, she thought and closed her eyes. But Lord Legion has given me a new heir, and he will be greater. He will rule this world.

She still ached from the night she had allowed Legion to know her. Her belly gave a twist, and Solina gasped. That was his son. That was the demon child within her. His claws tugged at her womb, still too weak to break through.

But soon, my child, she thought. Soon you will emerge into this world and be my heir, a great king the world will cower from.

She opened her eyes and looked back at Legion.

"Keep mounting the females," she told him. "Again and again. We need more. I want them pressed against the ceiling until they crack it. Very soon, Legion, we will have enough to cover the sky of the world."

He nodded, fangs bright with drool.

"For you, my queen, I will create a mountain of spawn."

She nodded and crossed the bridge. As she left the Hall of Memory and marched toward her throne room, she caressed her belly and smiled.