Locked Legacies

Chapter XXV: It holds a mark

Mystichut was no longer a small house in an island with significant emotional attachment from the prince's part; it had become a center of dragon research, with a new discovery which boosted the investigation. As it had become a common occurence, Augustus was pacing across the room, and Faylinn sat on the floor, scribbling with ink whenever they connected any kind of dot. The music sheet was in his hands as he frantically read it: "Where Fire, Water, Air and Earth meet, hides the only passage to the realm of the wings..." He repeated for the third time, while Faylinn's eyes frantically scanned the map.

"There's no volcanoes near the coast... Nor lakes," the girl informed before crossing out the option that was written on the notebook; four other ones had been discarded before, leaving no alternative to search for. "I don't think there is any place in this kingdom where the elements meet; no place in the archipelago, for that matter."

"Well, that leaves us with nothing, then. How are we supposed to know where this door is?"

Faylinn shrugged, "Don't ask me, ask whoever decided to write something so essential in the format of a cryptic song." Her tone of voice showed how desperate she was; there was a mixture of exhaustion and anger as she spoke. After a sigh, she continued, "Let's read whatever comes next."

"To unlock thou must find the key that rests in the wild, among the trees thou shall see that five virgin ones hold a mark... You don't think we have to find keys scattered across the forest, right?"

"How would a key be a virgin? I don't think it is a compatible word for 'key'," she suggested.

"What is 'virgin' even compatible with? Mary?" Faylinn chortled at his catholic joke, rolling her eyes, and Augustus couldn't help but smile softly before continuing, "I would like to assume that someone hasn't left people around the woods with marks on them."

The worker's eyes widened, "For God's nails, Gus, that was a dark thought," she giggled nervously, "It can also work for places or animals, I guess. A virgin area, for example, is a place that hasn't been altered by humans, or where no hunting is carried out."

Augustus listened attentively, the wheels in his mind turning with drive. "Something that hasn't been altered by humans..." he repeated her phrase, a pensive frown on his features as he did so. "You don't think it can apply to dragons too, right?"

"What are you thinking?" She questioned right before he crouched down on the floor, grabbing one of the closed notebooks and flipping through the pages, looking for a drawing to show her. After a couple of seconds, he pointed with his finger at a small sketch, "Remember this?"

Faylinn's eyes traveled to find the symbol they copied from the eggshell, "From Prince Rainer's dragon, yes."

"That's a symbol, right? There's a symbol for every element—"

Faylinn raised her eyebrows at the realization; "—A mark."

"Precisely," he smirked, proud for having thought of that, especially because Faylinn usually outsmarted him, "It's referring to dragons that haven't been altered by men, that haven't been hurt or captured by any kingdom."

"In the forests, there are five dragons that haven't been hurt by men, which have a symbol; they are the key to their world," she said aloud as she wrote it down on paper. "What is next?"

"What is an element to men, to nature is a link; yellow be the eyes of the beast, always on the brink," he read while Faylinn fidgeted with the necklace he had gifted her, deep in her thought. "There's a dragon with yellow eyes that is important, that's clear. What about being on the brink? Or being a lin—"

Before he could finish his sentence, the prince was interrupted by a distant howl. It wasn't usual for the creatures to howl when they were near humans; they had learned not to cry, or they would be punished. That is why he lifted his head to look up through the window, his index finger on his lips as he signaled Faylinn to stay quiet so he could pay attention. For a second, his heart stopped; perhaps Phobrakha had broken the law and had started the war before the king arrived at Exspidraco. Even though that would have definitely explained the sound, he was wrong; as soon as he stepped outside to investigate, followed by the girl, he saw Rainer's former dragon get into a kind of trance.