CHAPTER 40

We redrew the map before we abandoned the pool room for good. It allowed me to explain a couple of things: we need to make use of two entrances simultaneously, and one of those should be the one directly in line with the drake and the Golden Door. Being hidden, it will be tougher for the beast to spot someone coming from that direction. The second entrance will be a distraction. We desperately need to draw away the first burst of fire.

I also told them what the dice were for. With them and the bottle of magic glue, I said, I could trap the drake and give everyone else a chance to strike it down. Reva protested that point immediately: I was injured and useless with a weapon. If anything, she should be the one to use the dice. We argued back and forth until Essa put an end to the discussion saying that we needed someone to be a distraction and someone else to deliver the killing blow.

“You’ve used the dice before?” she asked me point blank.

Ignoring Hilde’s accusatory gaze, I answered that yes, I had used them before, or how did they think I’d made it through the entire dungeon with an injured hand? It was settled.

Leaving the pool room is a nerve-wracking endeavor. Again the feeling of being watched, again the jumping at shadows and noises. Though I’m sure Essa is eager for an ambush, we reach the first entrance, directly behind the Golden Door, without a single hint of one. Essa stays behind with Hilde while Rev escorts me to the next entrance over.

“You’re sure you know how to use those, right?” she asks.

“I’m sure,” I say.

“You’re looking very red, you know?”

“Warm in here.”

She looks at me with uncertainty, biting her bottom lip with a sharp canine.

“Promise me I won’t have to watch you get mauled by a drake.”

“You won’t. If anything, you’ll regret ever naming the thing.”

Rev’s mouth twists into a frown.

“Oh. Yeah, I guess I will.”

After walking a quarter of the way around the inner ring without a hiccup, we arrive at the entrance we were searching for. The narrow passage faces the hoard directly and I have no trouble spotting the golden drake. This time, he’s not buried in riches, but lying on them and snoring softly. As I watch, one of his eyes flutters open and then closes again, though the snoring doesn’t stop.

Cunning.

“Right,” I say. “All right. You can go back to them.”

Instead of answering, Rev wraps me in a tight hug.

“You better live, all right?” she says, her voice tiny.

“I promise,” I say. “You too?”

“I’ll do my best.”

We separate and stand there, looking at each other with tears in our eyes. After a moment, Rev nods and jogs back down the corridor to join Essa and Hilde. Everything depends on their attacking together.

“Do you really know how to use the dice?” asks Rue.

“Yes. You throw them and call out what you want improved.”

“All right,” he buzzes. “Good.”

We wait in silence. I’m trying to listen for both the sign or any indication that Metalface is about to make his move but Rue’s buzz drowns a lot of things out.

“Did you see the blank faces?”

“Hmm?” I ask, distracted by my headache, the bright lights of the braziers.

“On the dice.”

“Right.”

“So if only blanks come up, what do you think—?”

“Not going to happen. And if it does, we’ll just roll again.”

“But there are quite a few blank faces now.”

“Rue.”

“Sorry.”

Throw the dice, I think, dragging my feet on the sand to make a level surface. On it, I set a piece of wood that Essa was kind enough to rip from a bench. Call out what you want improved. Bait the drake…

A quick, sharp sound of wood on stone. I wait. The sound repeats twice. That’s the signal; all is ready. Suddenly I feel a pang of fear and regret for making it sound like I was the only one who could make use of the dice. What was I thinking? Essa or Rev would have been much better at this than me. Hell, Hilde has two working hands and is pretty quick on her feet, why did I—

You know why.

I breathe in and exhale slowly. I do know why I did it. Three stones, four people. If we’re going to have to leave someone behind, I’d rather take the choice out of the table rather than make it. If someone is going to stay behind, at least I can do it while distracting a drake so others can live. The only difference between me and Essa on this matter is that she said so out loud.

Bunch of martyrs, I think with a humorless smile, and pass beyond fear into a place where even my pounding headache and flushed cheeks can’t follow.

“Ready?”

Rue buzzes all the harder and I toss the dice down, listening to them clatter and bounce to the rhythm of my heart.

A three and a blank.

“Speed!” I yell, pick up the dice, and turn into the room as a surge of… assuredness floods my mind. I only have an instant, but as I step into the room I find the time to take it all in: Rev, Hilde, and Essa peeking from their position and waiting for my entrance. The Golde Door between them and the drake, whose enormous eyelid creaks open in the time it takes me to walk inside me and collect my bearings.

My body feels pleasantly alien. There’s a certain clumsiness present in everyday movement: the dim awareness that the body mostly works by itself and if I were to focus too hard on individual processes – like walking or breathing – I’d spoil the natural momentum and end up tripping over myself or breathing manually until I managed to forget about it. Well, none of that exists now. My body is an extension of my will. My feet go where I want them to, my balance feels perfectly attuned to the shifting sand. When the drake breaks out of the pile of gold, I no longer see an impossibly agile beast for its size. It’s fast, yes, but, I realize with a smile, I’m faster.

As the reptile roars down the golden incline and darts in my direction, I hold my ground. I wait until I can see the blue of its eyes, until I’m sure the force behind its run is too great to be easily repurposed, until it opens its mouth and I see the inferno building in its guts. And then I run, kicking up sand.

The burst of fire engulfs the space where I was standing, sending out a blast of heat that nearly sears my skin, but I’m long gone. I run around the drake’s side, digging into my pocket to grab the hard leather bottle. The beast runs in place, trying to turn, choking on its own flame. Nearly laughing, I make a beeline for the hoard, hoping that’s where the drake doesn’t want me to be.

And I’m right. As the sand under my shoes is replaced with gold coins that test my balance as much as my greed, I look back to see the drake crash against the walls before righting itself and rushing to the hoard, bellowing. I jump off the top of the fortune of gold, skidding down the other side.

I rush to the arena’s wall. There’s only a moment of respite before the drake catches up and there’s a lot yet to be done. Luckily, I’m fast enough to make the most of it. Popping the cork with my teeth, I slather the wall in glue. I want to cover as large a surface as possible, make it nearly impossible for—

The hill of gold explodes into teeth and claws. I jump to the side before they can reach me, rolling on the sand and getting white flashes of pain with every bump against my hand. I stand and curse: I dodged too soon. I wanted the drake to hit the wall with its side, but in my panic gave it lots of time to stop by itself.

Its hungry eyes, color changing with every flicker of the torches on the walls, fixate on me. It thinks I’m cornered. I’m not; I could dance around it if I needed to, but the issue isn’t that. The time limit. Seconds left. I didn’t bother to keep count; I thought everything would have been finished by now.

The drake crouches, about to charge.

Before it does, I dash forward. There’s only a narrow space between it and the glue-covered wall, but the drake hesitates when I move. It’s probably not used to having things run at it. Its bite misses by a wide margin, but instead of running to safety I stop in front of the patch of glue. When it turns to me, I’ll get in position, bait it, jump at the last second, and then it will be—

Movement in the corner of my eye. I barely have time to take a step back and put my back against the wall before a tail as thick as a tree trunk passes a handspan in front of my face. A lucky strike. The monster shakes its giant head from side to side, trying to see where I got to.

I still got this. Steady.

I try to step forward, but my shirt sticks to the wall. With a sinking feeling, I realize my mistake: I backed into the glue. I struggle, trying to break free, ripping a few seams but not enough. Not enough. Rue’s frantic buzzing drowns out all sound, and finally the beast spots me, a fly in a net. It turns to me, ponderous, slavering.

“Hey!” the shout pierces through the buzz.

Essa is standing on top of the golden hoard. She kicks a pile of coins, which pelt harmlessly off the drake’s hide. The beast’s eyes narrow.

With a deafening roar, the creature runs after her. I watch as its fat body slithers up the incline and disappears behind it. A moment later, there’s a flash of white light, and I know Hilde, armed with the blinding shield, has joined the fight.

But blind or not, the monster won’t let itself be beaten so easily. We either trap it or die. I flail from side to side but only manage to get myself more stuck. I yell in frustration, drowned out by the roars. My struggle comes to a halt as I’m hit with a wave of sluggishness. It’s like having weights tied to my arms and legs, and with them the return of my headache, the dread, the impossible odds crashing down onto me. My speed has run its course.

“What in hell are you doing?”

I look up. Essa is standing there, her brown skin flaked with sand and dust.

“Go help them!” I yell. “I’ve got this.”

“Evidently,” she says. She surfs down a wave of coins and comes to a stop next to me. With a gauntleted hand, she rips my shirt and I stumble away, free, lucky that I’m not leaving any skin behind.

Kneeling on the sand, I search for the hard leather bottle and finally find it. It’s nearly depleted now, most of the glue having run into the ground and made a sculpture out of sand and gold coins.

I scramble up the hoard all the way to the top. Essa is gone, joined the fight as soon as I was out of danger. I crest the top of the mound of gold and look down. My breath catches.

I see the drake, roaring to the emptiness of the ceiling, clawing and biting into thin air. I see Rev, her spear in hand, searching for weak spots in the drake’s scales striking at it not in hopes of piercing the thick hide but to call its attention to her, and then jumping back to dodge its flailing limbs. I see Hilde, short sword and shield in hand, circling the drake at a safe distance and putting the shield up, ready to blind the beast again. And I see Essa running down the slope in the middle of a nonsense warcry, jumping up and bringing her sword behind her hand in two hands. The gauntlet flashes red when she slices the sword down in an arc. The blade sinks into the beast.

Its roar nearly pushes me off balance. I look up. The ceiling gives no hints, the walls no promises, but in that moment, I hope, surprising even myself, that all the Godtouched in the world are watching. That they know that in their dungeons of despair, gods of war were born.

I’m still thinking these thoughts, elated and drunk on our glory, in our daring, when the drake’s tail whips through the air again and smacks straight into Essa, sending her slamming against the Golden Door. She doesn’t get back up.