Pillars of Dragonfire

PILLARS OF DRAGONFIRE

FLAME OF REQUIEM, BOOK THREE

by

Daniel Arenson

• CHAPTER ONE: TIL
  
• CHAPTER TWO: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER THREE: VALE
  
• CHAPTER FOUR: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER FIVE: LUCEM
  
• CHAPTER SIX: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER SEVEN: VALE
  
• CHAPTER EIGHT: ISHTAFEL
  
• CHAPTER NINE: TIL
  
• CHAPTER TEN: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER ELEVEN: VALE
  
• CHAPTER TWELVE: LUCEM
  
• CHAPTER THIRTEEN: ISHTAFEL
  
• CHAPTER FOURTEEN: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER FIFTEEN: VALE
  
• CHAPTER SIXTEEN: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: ELORY
  
• CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: BIM
  
• CHAPTER NINETEEN: LUCEM
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY: TIL
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: ISHTAFEL
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: LUCEM
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: ISHTAFEL
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: JAREN
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: VALE
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN: TIL
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE: TIL
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY: VALE
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE: TIL
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE: ISHTAFEL
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE: VALE
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX: ELORY
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN: VALE
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT: LUCEM
  
• CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE: JAREN
  
• CHAPTER FORTY: ISHTAFEL
  
• CHAPTER FORTY-ONE: MELIORA
  
• CHAPTER FORTY-TWO: VALE
  
• CHAPTER FORTY-THREE: ELORY
  
• CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR: VALE
  
• CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE: ELORY
  
• AFTERWORD
  
• NOVELS BY DANIEL ARENSON
  
• KEEP IN TOUCH
  

 
 
TIL

They crept through the
ruins—a man, a woman, a child—seeking life in fields of death.

Please, stars of
Requiem,
Til prayed silently, moving through the snow.
Let there be
others. Please.

The snow kept falling
and she couldn't stop shivering. Her woolen cloak was too ragged, and the wind
invaded its holes to claw her skin. Her patches of rusted armor, cobbled
together over the years, felt like ice pressed against her. Holes filled her boots,
snow sloshed around her toes, and Til began to wonder if the cold would kill
her before the fire of the seraphim could.

The ruins of Requiem
spread around her. Clouds veiled the sun, allowing only dim light to fall upon
the devastation. Columns lay shattered around her like the bones of giants.
Icicles clung to statues of dragons and ancient kings. An archway still stood on
a hill, the entrance to some old temple, the walls around it long fallen. Only
crows now stood upon what remained of the battlements, the priests and warriors
long fallen. Homes, schools, libraries, hospitals—all now lay as strewn
bricks, covered in snow. Forgotten. Dead like the denizens of this place.

Nova Vita, fabled
capital of Requiem,
Til thought, shivering as she walked among the snowy
ruins. She lowered her head.
Like every other place, you too are gone.

"There's nothing
but death here," she whispered.

At her left side, her
father grunted. "Let's take a closer look. We'll scan the city."

Til turned to look at
him. Father was tall and haggard, his eyes dark. Like her, he wore a tattered
cloak, the gray wool dusted with snow. Like her, he sported flaming red hair, most
of it hidden beneath his hood. Like her, he held a bow, and a sword and quiver
hung across his back. Yet he seemed more hopeful to Til, stronger, braver.

He still believes,
she thought.
Still believes we can win this rebellion. Still believes other
Vir Requis survived.

Five hundred years ago, the seraphim had come here to Requiem. Five hundred years ago, they had carted off nearly all the Vir Requis in chains.

But a few Vir Requis had remained in their homeland. A few had avoided the chains, had hidden, had survived, had passed the torch of Requiem to a new generation.
For five centuries, free Vir Requis had been fighting the seraphim here in Requiem, haggard but wearing no collars, hiding in forests and caves, keeping the old flame alive.
As most of their people languished in slavery far in the south, these few had remained, had fought on. Til. Her father. Her brother. Perhaps they were the last.

"I want to leave,"
whispered Til's brother. "Please, Father. Please. I'm scared. They'll find
us. I want to go back to the caves.
Please
."

Til turned to her
right. Her brother, Bim, walked there. He was only eleven years old—a full
decade younger than Til—but his eyes were older. Dark eyes, too large in his
gaunt face. Haunted eyes. The eyes of an old soldier who had seen too many
killed, had killed too many. Bim too carried sword and bow, the weapons too
large for him, and beneath his hood, a man's helmet wobbled on his head.

Forced to grow up
too soon,
Til thought. She placed a hand on his shoulder.
Like I was.
Like we all were. But will he live to be my age?

"Soon," Til
said, trying to make her voice soothing, though fear coiled through her.
"Soon, Bim. We just have to see if any others live in this city."

His eyes flooded with
tears, and his breath shuddered. "We've been looking for others for so
long. For years. For years, Til! It'll be the same here as everywhere else.
Just bones."

He pointed.

Til looked and her
spirits sank deeper. Three skeletons hung from the frosted branches of oaks,
swinging in the wind. The crows had stripped them bare. These were not the
skeletons of Requiem's ancient warriors, those who had fallen in the Great Calamity
five hundred years ago when Prince Ishtafel had shattered this land. The ropes
around their necks were too fresh. No. Here were others like Til and her
family. Others who had survived the war, who had been living in hiding,
fighting from the shadows all these centuries. Still falling. One by one. Last
lights going out after a great flame, last stars vanishing long after the sun
had set.

Father approached,
placed his arm around Bim, and turned the boy away from the grisly sight.
"We keep going, son." Father's voice was but a whisper. "Just a
little longer. We might yet find life here."

They walked onward, and
with every step, Til's hope shrank. When she had been a youth, there had been
others. Not many but enough to give Til a sense of camaraderie, of hope to see
Requiem reborn. She had fought with them, the last free Vir Requis, the
ancestors of those who had survived the war, who had hidden in tunnels and
forests while the seraphim had carried their brethren to southern slavery. For
centuries they had hidden in their ravaged homeland, scurrying from hole to
hole, fighting in the forests and ruins.

Until five years ago.

Til lowered her head.

Until the disastrous
rebellion.

The man had led them,
the prophet, the one who had claimed to be king. He had gathered all free Vir
Requis, all those who had cowered and hidden in Requiem. A thousand dragons had
flown that day, flown against the Overlord, the cruel seraph who ruled over
these ruins.

And the dragons had
burned. They had fallen screaming.

Hundreds had perished
in the flames that day, and the survivors—mere dozens—had fled. For five
years now, the Overlord had been hunting them. Killing them one by one. Til's
comrades. Her mother. Her older brother. Until this was all that remained: a haggard
father; a frightened son; and her—a young woman with red hair, old patches of
armor, and fading hope in her heart.

As they kept walking,
fire crackled above.

At once Til, her
brother, and her father leaped aside. Father crouched behind a toppled statue,
and Til and Bim huddled under a fallen log. Red light fell upon the snow. Til's
heart pounded, and she clutched her sword's hilt. Peering from under her snowy
hood, she saw them above.

Chariots of fire.

She grimaced, cold
sweat on her brow. She still remembered those chariots tearing through the
rebels five years ago. She still remembered the seraphim, deities from the sky,
slaying her mother and older brother. A thousand times in her dreams, she had
seen these chariots fly into Requiem—the Old Requiem from five hundred years
ago—and topple this city.

Only three now flew
above, their firehorses shedding ash, and suddenly Til wanted to summon her
magic. To become a dragon. To fly, to blow her fire like she had during the
rebellion. To burn down the seraphim, even if she died in their fire.

And why shouldn't she?
She was not like the Vir Requis slaves who languished in the south, captives of
Saraph. Her ancestors had avoided the chains and collars, had remained in
Requiem, had learned to survive in these ruins. Til was a warrior descended of
warriors. She had been fighting in these ruins all her life. She reached down,
felt her magic tingling there—the ancient magic of Requiem. The magic that
would let her fly as a dragon. To fight instead of cower.

The chariots flew
onward, and Til released her magic and lowered her head.

No,
she thought.
The rebellion is over. There is no more hope to fight the seraphim, only
hope to maybe find more Vir Requis. To maybe live another day.

With the chariots gone,
they emerged from their hiding spots. Bim was crying. The damn boy was always
crying lately.

"You have to be
strong." Til grabbed his shoulders, leaned down, and stared into her
brother's eyes. "You hear? You're eleven years old, old enough to fight, to
be a man. To be strong."

"I want to go
home," he whispered.

Til's throat tightened.
"This
is
our home." She swept her arm across the ruins.
"See this place? This is Nova Vita, the ancient capital of Requiem. Where
our ancestors are from. See the old walls, the archway, the bridge?"

He shook his head,
shivering. "I see only burnt stones. Only bones. I want to go back to the
cave. The place in the north where we hid. To hide. To hide from the fire.
They're going to burn us." He covered his eyes, and his voice dropped to a
whisper. "The seraphim."

Father approached and
brushed snow off Bim's shoulders. "Come, son, just a little farther. There
might be others here. Other survivors."

Til looked over Bim's
head and met her father's gaze. He stared back, his green eyes so weary in his
haggard face. She had the same eyes. Eyes that clung to hope though the mind
knew there was none.

She nodded. "We
keep going."

They kept walking
through the ruins as the snow fell. As they stepped over frosted bricks, Til
imagined a home standing here, a hearth crackling, a family gathered together
in prayer and love. She walked alongside a staircase that rose only four steps,
leading to a pile of rubble and smashed statues, and she imagined a temple
standing here, soaring toward the sky, full of priests who sang the old songs.
When she gazed up at the clouds, she imagined millions of dragons flying above
in every color.

This was a great
nation once,
Til thought.
A nation now enslaved in the south. But I will
never be a slave. I will never wear a collar. Better to live like a rat,
scurrying from hole to hole, than live in a cage.

The sun was low in the
sky when she saw it ahead. Til froze and gasped. Her father and brother stood
with her, staring with wide eyes.

"There it
is," Till whispered. "It's real."

She had always known
her father to be stern, laconic, but now the haggard man knelt in the snow, and
his eyes dampened.

"King's
Column," he whispered.

The ancient pillar was
still distant, miles away, but easily visible. It soared above the treetops,
three hundred feet tall. Til had never seen it before, but like all Vir Requis,
she knew the tales. Thousands of years ago, the legendary Aeternum had raised
that column in the forest, a beacon to summon the wild, hunted Vir Requis from
across the world. It had become the backbone of Requiem, the kingdom of those
who could grow wings and scales, breathe fire, and rise as dragons.

For thousands of years,
Til knew, the enemies of Requiem had tried to topple this column. Yet so long
as a single Vir Requis breathed, the column would stand. And so even now, in
these ruins, with the seraphim burning the sky, King's Column still soared.

"Thousands of
years ago, this was a beacon to our hunted, outcast people," Til said.
"I pray that it acts as a beacon still. If any others survived the
rebellion, I pray that we find them here."