act41side

You're the writer, not me. I simply wished to offer my own story, to spark your imagination.

Your own story?

Wait, are you another survivor? Did you also narrowly escape death in that city last autumn?

Only those who've experienced the truth for themselves would recognize what your stories are based on.

Well, go ahead then. I'm all ears.

Very well. Deep in the ruins of the former royal capital of Tara, long since destroyed by Catastrophe...

Deep in the ruins of the former royal capital of Tara, long since destroyed by Catastrophe, on one uneventful yet peaceful day, the flame burning in a metal stove was snuffed out.

This was no urgent matter, but the red dragon came all the same.

Does it resist being lit?

Or is it that not even an ominous outsider—newly come after centuries of silence—can relight old longings and resentments, near worn away by time?

Or... perhaps I simply need to be less reserved.

A purple flame dances around the stove.

Under its light, the red dragon's face looks even paler than before.

Are you awake?

Or must I remind you who you are?

The pathetic red dragon who cast aside his crown and wandered the wilderness for twenty years, only to be murdered by his closest kin on his return. Labhréathach the Exiled King, correct?

It truly is a pity, seeing someone still in shock at his own bloody death, six hundred years after the fact.

Six hundred years?

Give or take. The true date of your death has long been forgotten.

I'm shocked, yes, but not at my death. More at the fact that, after six hundred years, the Dracos have once again produced an aberration spewing the flames of death.

They even let you grow to adulthood without strangling you in the crib.

Did the Victorians bid you rouse me from death's slumber? Or did you hide that ridiculous crown from them beneath your bed?

Victoria no longer yokes the Red Dragon. The Tara of today heeds no foreign master.

Hah, not bad.

Tell me then, is it popular to wake the dead to deliver good news these days? But sorry, I've nothing to reward you with. Now if that's all, you'd best be on your way.

With my flames burning within you, you won't be ending this after a few trifling pleasantries, Labhréathach.

Ending? My ending came long, long ago. You're the one with unfinished business, yeah?

Look, I get it. They're the flames of death, after all. They'll get you into all kinds of trouble. Life and death getting jumbled up, herds of undying beasts, newborn cubs having their lives snuffed out before you know it, the works.

So, how big a mess are we talking here? A field? A city? A countryside?

I set all of Tara alight to free her from Victoria's heel.

You WHAT?!

Let her be razed to the ground. Let Tara become a nation of the dead. Either way, the flames of death will seek out new kindling. Or so I thought, at first.

But allowing so many lives to fade away simply because I am out of ideas, well, that would be awfully imprudent of me.

And so I came to you. Tell me, what should I do to cleanse these deathly flames from the fields of Tara?

...If only that were empty bluster.

Go ahead, use your imagination.

I've heard enough. What I'm about to say isn't for you, but for all the people still willing to call themselves Tarans.

Those tainted by your flame and marching towards death have been renounced by life itself. It will never return to them.

This goes without saying for the corpses marching behind you, obviously, but the same holds for those who still live yet walk like the dead. There's no medicine that can save them.

Gather them together, so that their fires do not taint others.

Appeasement. Is that all you can suggest?

Hah... Of course not.

Next, find another red dragon. Assuming you haven't already slaughtered your kin, of course.

Find a real red dragon, one whose flames warm others' lives. Let things return to as they once were. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, life to life, death to death.

Is that all you know?

It is, ignorant young dragon.

Then it seems you don't know much more than I do.

The red dragon does not even bother to sneer at him. She simply turns and leaves.

She passes by a ruined home, faint yellow candlelight seeping through the cracks.

This is the wilderness where the dead roam. No one should be living here. And so, she knocks on the door.

Who're you?

Who I am is unimportant. What's important is, why are you living out here?

I came because there aren't any Victorians here to knock at my door and rob the food I dug up myself, along with my savings...

Five years ago, on a night like this, a wicked caster came by, killing the Victorians as they closed in, step by step.

I offered him beastmeat, grains, and freshly-brewed wine, but he told me he didn't need any of it. What he needed was fire, a fire fueled by those who would happily burn themselves away.

And so my only son, Keith, left home and followed him.

What a noble soul.

Then, three years ago, someone knocked on my door in the middle of the night again. It was Keith.

My Keith. He no longer spoke, or wept, or even breathed. He just stood there, his body covered in purple flames.

How tragic.

It gets worse. I buried him, but he refused to rot away in the earth. Instead, he dug himself out, and now his corpse is wandering endlessly the wilds.

Which is why I'm still living here.

Are you one of that caster's friends? Are you here to lay Keith to rest?

I am.

Ah, here he comes.

A walking corpse, wreathed in purple flame for all to see, shambles towards the two.

The red dragon presses the point of her spear against the corpse's chest. The fire rages so hot that it sears away its flesh in an instant, leaving nothing more than ash.

But an idle thought crosses the old man's mind: the fire did not seem to burn out, but instead went up along the spear to return to the red dragon's body.

And what of you? You're also tainted by the purple flames of death, are you not?

The old man looks himself over, but sees no flames licking his body like they did with his only son. But to the dragon, the flame consuming him was even brighter than that of the dead.

...If you mean sorrow, anger and hatred, then you're right, witch.

The Victorians taxed me in coin, while you and your ilk taxed me in blood. Together, you've taken all I have.

I've been empty inside for a while now. The only thing keeping me standing are those so-called flames of yours.

Then what if I were to take them back? What would you say to that?

I'd say 'you're late.'

The old man closes his eyes, facing the point of the red dragon's spear.

He can feel the fires of anger and sorrow propping him up burble as they flow into her hand. As they leave his body, his muddled consciousness leaves with them.

He can sense that death is near, but considering how stagnant his life has become, he no longer fears it.

But the fires suddenly stop flowing.

Why? Why won't you kill me?

Because you no longer need to be killed.

A spirit once told me that life will never again grace those tainted by the flames of death. Now I see that he was right.

'Now I see that he was right,' the red dragon answered coldly.

How is that for an ending? I took what I heard from the old man and added a bit of spice. It shouldn't be too jarring an addition to your story, I would think.

Throwing in the ghost of the legendary Exiled King, are we?

It'll do, but do you really <i>need</i> the ending to my story at this point?

What you've seen clearly differs from what I saw. I must see it through your eyes, hear it through your ears.

You're not one of those bored toffs who's into 'piecing together the truth', are you?

I have never once considered the truth boring.

Hah. Well, seeing as we both managed to make it out of that hellhole alive, I can pass you all the drafts I abandoned in the process of observing, thinking and writing.

But as for how those stories actually end, I couldn't say.

Since you were talking about the Red Dragon... how about I start there, too?

The writer pours another half-mug of beer directly into his belly, glances at the woman with a hint of provocation, then begins to tell his tale.

If you have ever made the journey to the Red Dragon's Lair we call Na Saoirsí, no matter how briefly, you will never forget the Dark Woods along the way.

They are dismal and damp, filled with a gloomy mist and fae who love playing tricks on men. A labyrinth of darkest black.

It is said that, of all the people who have entered, not a one has ever left without the forest's permission.

Even if it <i>does</i> open its boughs to allow you passage, the mischievous fae will still lead you astray, jeering at your clumsy movements all the while. But once they finally leave you be...

It will become as beautiful as a painting, a painting that should not exist in this realm.

The red dragon, along with the people who have followed her all this way, step into the lair without the slightest hesitation, leaving that beautiful sight behind them.

Na Saoirsí, the heart of Tara, 'the Red Dragon's Lair'...