The Dragon Prince - Book 1: Cold War

We Stand Alone Together

His cage was too cold. Callum rocked back and forth, squeezing his legs against his chest to find a modicum of warmth. But the moment he gathered just enough heat to be comfortable, the cage became too hot and so he stretched out his arms and legs to cool himself. And so this improbable cage was either too hot or too cold but never simply warm.

The cage - like such things of magical origin - was built within his own mind. A personal purgatory in both the literal and metaphysical sense. Ernda, the inventor of this torturous cage actually believed such a construct to be more humane than the ones made humans made out of primitive bricks and mortar. There Callum sat, out in Sunfire elf courtyard for the entire village to see.

The cage was a statement: Behold the human! Watch as he rocks back and forth to provide simple comfort to his apelike form! Humiliation was its other, cruel purpose.

Certainly, Callum would have been embarrassed to see himself prostrate in this matter if he were capable of standing outside the cell of his mind. Inside the cage was a whole other matter. Thoughts of doubt and fear washed away any notion of escape. Has all the loss in his life lead to this? His failure to truly understand Sunfire magic was linked to his failed to convince Xadians that humans were capable of compassion and worthy partners in peace. Maybe Zelmai was right, maybe his romantic feelings for Rayla were clouding his judgement?

'Oh, Rayla!' His mind called out. Despite the heat, Callum pulled his legs closer to his chest as he wondered if he had put too much of his own heart into that relationship. It was clear that she wasn't ready to be romantic with him.

'Am I worthy?' 

How could he be? He was a human and she was an elf. Their very world was antithetical to their relationship. If he couldn't even convince these Sunfire elves that he was capable of good, how could anyone believe a human could ever truly love an elf.

'Oh, Rayla...'

Rayla

In her momentary lapse of consciousness, the magic imbuing her restrictive vines died and crumbled into dust. Rayla's eyes fluttered open and the tips of her fingers instinctively reached for the rough, comforting texture of her short swords. 

'I can always count on the cocky Sunfire elves to leave  a person armed if they think they're weak.'

A gratingly beautiful instrument played somewhere around her though she couldn't quite get a fix on the source. She rose to her feet and let her turquoise eyes adjust to the dim light, she realized she was still inside the Bard training hall.

"Ah, the moon princess awakens," Ernda's candied voice cooed. "Won't you please share a drink with me?" A single cone of light appeared above the stage, highlighting Ernda's stunningly beautiful features. 

The sagely bard continued to play a Cello-like instrument with a long bow stringed with wispy strands of unicorn hair. Rayla grabbed a chair, with a gruff flick of her wrist she flipped the thing around and sat on it in reverse.

"Dear, dear Rayla. Look at you. So full of fight and fervor, aren't you?"

"I'm always ready for a fight. Are you challenging me to one then?"

The sagely elf chuckled as she played a wistful song on her cello. The old elf began to thump her foot into the wooden floor and with each beat, Rayla felt her heart pound inside her chest.

The bard's skin burned red. The air around her cello fizzed with effervescent bubbles of light that terrorized Rayla's mind.

"I could burst your childish heart with but a single chord change." The bard's baleful voice became three discordant voices all at once. As quickly as the terror came it was over, the saccharine sweet voice of Ernda returned. And the cloying nature of bardic magic made Rayla question whether Ernda had said these words at all.