Bright Flame, Deep Shadow (lesbian story)

Ardyan

Professor Martel's face is as white as the moon itself. He glances at the crags in the cliff above us, as if calculating how long it would take him to get away from Davorin and the beast at his back. When he finally wrenches his gaze from his only escape route, there is a resigned slump to his shoulders. Despite that, he holds his head high.

"Davorin, you must understand that I did what I could for you. It wasn't a lot, no, but I tried." There's a slight tremor in his voice.

I back away from them both, pressing my back against a column of rock at the cave's entrance. Martel doesn't move, though the dragon is three times the size of the biggest plough horse I've ever seen. It stretches its flat head out towards my history teacher, smoke spewing from its nostrils and the chain around its neck clinking. Davorin places a hand on the dragon's spiny back, as if to calm it. The dragon growls, a moan from the bowels of a mountain.

"Why should I believe anything you say?" he hisses, as if he were a dragon himself. No fire gushes fro his mouth, but the sparks are all in his words. "You told me dragons are extinct, yet the Flames of Astia ride them as often as we ride horses."

"Astia is a whole ocean away," Martel snaps. His hands are shaking now. "And a dragon is no donkey. They were not created to be tamed and ridden by just any man."

"You knew, though. You knew dragons aren't extinct, and you said nothing. Why am I not surprised, Professor? I wonder what other secrets you're hiding?" Davorin strokes down the dragon's back, and it snarls again. His hand makes an awful screech against the metallic scales.

"There are many things I know, Davorin, more than you can imagine. And I know what would happen if boys like you knew about creatures like that." He takes a step back then, the first I've seen him take. "Shall I tell you something?"

Davorin opens his mouth, but Martel isn't looking for an answer.

"I am the only reason you are still alive. I convinced Tanvik to have them heal your arms. He was perfectly content to have them throw you into the Deep Shadow and let you bleed out. The gods only know how you did it, but I am the reason you were able to escape."

"And I would have lived my life without any fucking arms, if I hadn't found that Metallurger. Did you have anything to do with that, Martel?" Davorin is almost screaming now, and for the first time since I've met him, he is not the courageous rebel from across the sea, come to deliver justice, or at least have a part in it. He is a young man just a few years older than me, with threadbare clothes and bare feet and a lifetime's worth of rage at the world.

Then, his eyes meet the ember gaze of the dragon, and I sense a silent command pass between them.

"Wait!" I scream, but the dragon lunges.

I bury my face in my sleeve. I cannot watch this.

I hear it, though. I hear flesh ripping, bone crunching, dragon growling, teeth gnashing, and above it all, my screams mingling with Martel's in a duet of agony and terror. I only cower as the dragon savages him like a dog. Not a flame is spat.

The screams die down, eventually, dissolving into sobs and splutters and choked prayers. After a minute even they stop, and Professor Martel is silent forever.

I struggle to my feet. The dragon slinks past me, back into the cave, and I don't look at the blood dripping from its teeth. Davorin stands over the body. Fighting the urge to be sick, I go to him.

There isn't much left. The dragon started with his legs. I don't focus on anything but the shattered glasses over eyes that were once as grey and sharp as a newly-forged sword, but are now the colour of fog.

"Why did you kill him?" My voice is steadier than it has any right to be.

"He deserved it. Didn't you hear what he said? How would I have lived without arms?"

"Plenty of people do. You got those," I nod at the Metallurger's handiwork, so like real arms while being anything but.

"By pure chance. He—" For a moment I think Davorin is about to aim a kick at the body, but he doesn't—"would have had me die too, but more slowly and with less dignity than even Tanvik thought I deserved. Come on." He clasps a hand on my shoulder, and it takes all my strength not to flinch away from him. "You need to go back to the castle and clean up, before someone misses you. Do me a favour and don't tell anyone about this. I noticed you found the book."

I'd dropped it at some point. I hadn't realised. I pick the list of the Academy's alumni up off the ground and hand it to Davorin, wondering how many death warrants I just signed.

"Will you be going back to Astia now?" I try to keep the hope out of my voice, but Davorin shakes his head.

"I'll have a look at this in the morning, see if there's anything else I need to get or take care of. Meet me in the woods at nightfall just in case I need you. See you then." He turns on his heel and disappears into the depth of his cave, leaving me with what is left of Professor Martel.

Most magical disciplines have their own final rituals. Hydrologists put their dead in a boat full of flowers and kindling, send it out to sea, then set it alight with a flaming arrow. Pyrologists cremate. Petrologists bury. Other disciplines do everything and anything in between, but I've always liked the Hydrologist way.

Ethereals, though—the whole tier of disciplines—we send our bodies to the Shadows. Whether you're a Timekeeper, a Seer, a Necromancer, or an actual Shadow, your body gets sent to what others call "The Black Realm". Nobody knows what happens after that. I guess the vultures do the rest. I don't think anyone really cares, so long as their body is far from a Necromancer's reach.

It's left to me to find a strand and lift what remains of the Professor into the Shadows. I throw up after I close his eyes, but I carry on, until all that's left of tonight are the splatters of blood on the rocks.

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A/N: Uploading two chapters today because of how short Arabella's previous one was. If you're enjoying the story so far, please don't forget to vote!