Dragon Aster Trilogy

13: TEMPEST



Loki silently watched Yri’s psi as she woke to the smell of smoke, and looked across the white marble floor. The slow-drifting blackness was swirled about by the aeri wind, and it took a moment for the daoran to realize that her surroundings were no longer under attack. The main gate was still down and the breeze that entered soothed over some the violence that had hit them. She looked for her Ancient, but it was hiding somewhere else.

Yri got to her feet and fixed her gold and green dress the best she could, but it was irreparably ruined. As she looked around the main hall of Toria, much of it was ruined as well, with the walls blasted black by gunfire and explosives. Several drapes and tapestries were still on fire.

“My Queen, are you alright?” a dragoon asked, and came running from the stairs at the far side of the main hall.

“Where are the griffins?” she asked, no longer concerned with herself as much as she was for the state of her kind.

“They’re all dead. That swarm of plumas hit them so hard, they didn’t so much as have the chance to call a retreat. We killed the few trying to escape.”

Yri didn’t look to remember what had hit her. She lifted up her dress from the floor and went up the main stairs, as the few dragoons who were still alive from the surprise attack started to get back on their feet. She reached the throne room and pushed open the doors. Yri looked around it, only to find a dragoon cloaked in black standing near the window. “Loki?” she asked in disbelief.

The dragoon turned around, but he didn’t take off the silver mask that he wore. “All of you deserve to die for your transgressions against Aragmoth and the Caelestis.”

“It was you controlling all those plumas? How?” she demanded.

“It doesn’t matter. All that matters is what happens now.” He walked over to Yri and caught the Threads to her lungs, suffocating her. Loki then ungently pulled the High Priestess to her knees before him. “Renounce yourself as Queen and allow me to take my place as King of Toria, or I will call every one of my plumas back to strip the skin from your bones.”

Yri’s eyes came back into focus as some air returned to her. “You will never be King.”

“Then allow me to sharpen your reasoning,” Loki said, then pulled Yri behind him as he left the throne room and headed downstairs. He dragged the struggling High Priestess behind him and only stopped on reaching the main gate. Then he grabbed her by the throat and held her over the side. “Renounce your title, or I will see to it that you fall without your wings.”

“You’ve gone mad!” Yri hissed at him. “No one will listen to you. You are nothing but the wretched, weak son of my pathetic sister!”

Loki’s grip tightened as he wanted nothing more than to strangle her with Thread to prove just how weak he wasn’t anymore. “I am tired of being the weaker one.” He took his mask off his face with his free hand. “The only question now is will I let you near my Princess?” Loki looked to one of the Regals who had landed on the gate. He threw Yri to a sliding stop at the winged cat’s feet.

The other dragoons who had followed the commotion froze, as there was no saying what the Regal would do next. Yri slowly got to her feet and backed away while facing it. But the Regal didn’t attack her, it simply stepped back and dropped back into the air.

Loki looked for what had frightened it off, and saw the High Guard flying towards Toria. If they were back so soon, then there was no war on the Suzerain Continent. He would have to get rid of Yri in a quieter manner and at a different time.

Yri looked into the distance still trembling, where the massive black shadow of a Cael cut through the cold air for Toria.