The Dragon Chase: A Tale of the Everburning City

Chapter 29: Tabitha

"Corkscrew spin, wasn't that?" Mathias asked her, as he watched Gerald's ship fire another cannon shot at the Dragon. The normally impassive shadow grinned a little as the Midnight Songbird lashed out one more time before catching the wind and vanishing behind the glare of the Spire's light.

"Yes," Tabitha replied, still smiling. His ship moved through the winds of the Spire with whimsical ease that obfuscated the challenge of the feat.

Nearly half a year, of both their lives, had been devoured in speculative study of the Spire's winds. They had both risked arrest to send balloons and smoke to test those theories. She had insisted, fiercely, that he learn how to pilot the ship in those winds despite the constant peril to any ship making the attempt.

But Tabitha had never told him why. She regretted that, now.

"He has to survive, Mathias," Tabitha said, more to herself than to her shadow.

"That's in his hands," Mathias reflected. He glanced back to her and added, "But you prepared him well for this. I'm not entirely happy about that."

"I know. I swear I didn't make the decision lightly," Tabitha insisted, grimacing as she recalled a battle she fought years ago.

"No. But you still made that decision alone. What would you have done if he learned, but didn't have the willpower to endure it effectively?" Mathias asked.

"I would have killed him," Tabitha answered. She nearly did anyway. The lessons that taught techniques like the heat haze and rapid explosions required the student to risk their life. More than a few students had died learning how to wage war with the Craft.

"That is some comfort," Mathias replied. He glanced back up, and grimaced. "We're close."

The Dragon flew ahead of them, flying lazily in a small circle, matching the altitude of her apprentice's ship as it waited for the spiralling winds of the Bore to bring the Airship back to it.

They were still, despite having poured herself into the reservoirs and pushing the sails to their limits, too far away to help. Her anxious trepidation was shared by every soldier on the deck below her, as they waited by loaded Valkyries or stood watch on the bow with Salamanders in their hands.

The ship began to rumble, gently, as the winds of the Spire began to pull the ship towards it. She gently forced the sails in slightly, and shifted the angle of the ship to compensate.

And felt the fury of the Spire for the first time in her life.

She had lost long hours of her life, in the last few years, watching this immense spike of brilliant red hellfire. Her mind was slipping into the madness of scourging, her will intertwined with the flame's need to consume and burn. It drew her to the distribution pipes, that moved a small part of the Bore's fires to the fringes of the City and warded off the Gloam. It made every exercise of her will a struggle, to remember who she was even as she gave it up to the fire.

But feeling the Spire up close tore at her mind and threatened to break her into pieces. The allure of the flame was a current that she had to swim against just to think, let alone conjure up enough of herself to resist the temptation of taking hold of that immense power.

Of becoming that immense power.

"Take this," Mathias said, offering her a knife towards her, hilt first. His voice was harsh and ragged, and as she reached out her hand, she could sense his other hand wrapped around the long knife with the obsidian pommel-stone.

Which was odd, since there was a piece of obsidian on the pommel of the knife he was offering her.

"Is that-" she began, unable to finish. She knew that knife, from a dark and terrifying night six years ago.