Chapter 48: Fiery hot disobedience

Elina stared smugly through the bars. “I stole the antidote,” she yelped a little too loud with an endearing amount of joy in her emotions. Biscuit placed his pfod on her mouth to silence her.

Sylph only blinked in response and started to gesticulate as slow as she talked. “Let me get this straight; You stole from Nahana. And then you admit it to her daughter?”

Elina shot a worried glance down the corridor before she stepped up to the bars. “I am so sorry for what happened in the bath.” Fury and regret collided in her voice as she reached to grab a bar with a trembling pfod. “I would never touch someone without their consent.” Her ears sagged downwards and a wet glitter spread over her keen, dark eyes. “I don’t want to hurt dragons, Nahana knows this, but still-” She gasped for the next word and Sylph saw how Biscuit’s tail slowly coiled around hers.

Sylph could feel her pain and shame as if it was her own. While her knowledge of Aer voices remained limited, Elina’s differed from Nahana’s like a harp from a clogged exhaust. Hers did not force itself into Sylph’s head like Nahana’s. It invited her to share. Either Elina was an insanely good liar, or she really regretted what happened.

Sylph sat down in the middle of the cell, tail coiled around her. “I am well aware that Nahana forced you to do the things she wanted. I can hardly blame anybody for following orders after seeing what happens when you don’t.”

Elina brightened up instantly, as if a switch flicked on that sunny smile and cheerful voice. “I hoped you’d say that.”

Biscuit stepped up. “We are servants, not torturers. The recent developments in town are scary. Nahana meets more and more shady people, more humans than usual. And always that Tanno at the front. Forcing us to hurt you, her own daughter, was the drop that overfilled the bowl. We don’t feel safe.”

“So we want in on your escape plan,” Elina barked.

Sylph went silent. “What?” A fraction of her mind hoped they had an idea, because hers was non-existent. And she did not trust them just yet. “Me? I am her daughter, I could tell her. You are taking an insane risk.”

Elina’s smile was nearly as mischievous as the glint in her eyes, and she pressed her head against the bars. “Some people say what they think. Others reveal it in their voice.” She pushed one arm into the cell and waved her neatly filed down claws. “But almost everyone reveals it in their body and I have, let’s call it a hunch, for reading those.”

Did she just reveal she was a pathwalker? Sylph took the precaution of staying away, choosing to pace around the back instead.

Elina’s arm fell to the floor. “Let me tell you what I felt about you in that bath. You utterly despise Nahana. Every single motion towards her was aggressive. You felt similar to Biscuit and me. I thought you would smack him, but I am glad you kept his pretty face intact.” She sucked in a scant breath. “You’d beat Nahana to a pulp if you could. From the outside you may looked like a beaten wyvern, but your insides-” Elina’s voice shifted into a lower tone that carried too much prickly excitement for Sylph’s taste. “Inside, you are all fire, brimming hot with disobedience and almost stubborn conviction.” Her voice was now but a whisper. “In different circumstances, I would’ve loved to coax even a hint of that passion out of you in another way.”

Sylph did not know what to answer and felt her face grow hot. It sounded like a compliment, more than that really, but she did not want to consider that thought any further.

“What my soon to be wife is trying to say is that she is convinced you’ll do everything in your power to leave this city and Nahana behind you. She’s also taken quite the liking to you. So tell her to stop if you want her to. A simple no is enough,” Biscuit said, and looked all too calm about that last sentence.

Sylph smacked back into reality. “You two are engaged?” It was no surprise, but how were the last few sentences appropriate for a couple to say?

Elina peeled her gaze away from Sylph and swiveled her ears to listen down the corridor. “It was not only what happened in the bath. Rumors spread quickly, speaking of which, you have livened up our lives. Is it true that you threatened to shove a cactus up her behind?”

Sylph shook her head. “No, I never said that. Not to her anyway.” She eyed both of them again. It was difficult to find the will to trust them after all that happened. But their actions would get them killed if Sylph was loyal to Nahana. Knowing that, they still told her. Elina trusted her ability to identify Sylph’s intentions, and she was not wrong about them at all.

Elina flicked Biscuit with her wing, prompting him to continue. “There is another rumor. It concerns Dust, the old, cast away champion. Apparently, he orchestrated Tanno’s murder, which is why he had to die.”

Biscuit’s eyes slimmed, and he rushed towards the grates, which prompted Sylph to fall into a fighting stance. “But it was you, wasn’t it? You murdered Tanno.”

How did a dragon named after his chocolate sprinkled scales come to that conclusion?

Elina perked up. “So it is true.” She let go of the bars. “Good riddance, but poor Dust. He did not deserve that.” The pain of loss seeped into the cell. “Murdering captain plaything is certainly one reason why the last days were so turbulent.”

Sylph mouthed a reply. “I haven’t said anything. Captain plaything?”

Biscuit laughed a single ha. “Your face is prove enough. Tanno died by the pfod of an Aer. Dust comes home after years of exile with a seemingly random Aer. Dragons and even humans are not that stupid.” He raised his pfod, tapping some imaginary list right in front of them. “Did you know that Nahana and Tanno had an alliance?”

“She’d never ally with a human.” Sylph prodded them. Nahana had obvious feelings about them. But she could also not put it past her to make more than what she called deals with Prina.

“This is the kind of info that would push you right past punishment alley and straight into the pit.” Elina slid towards the cell door and played with the heavy iron lock. “How do you think this town survives? Nahana bears the entire burden, which is why I used to admire her and came here in the first place.”

Sylph nodded, and Biscuit was quick to continue. “But that is where the wyvern loses its scales. Nahana is not a great person. We both realized that. We want to get away in silence. Start a new life beyond the desert and I am sure you know how to get there, to Sawaila.”

It was by chance that she caught Biscuit glancing towards Elina’s underbelly. Sylph tilted her head just a little to the side to peek through the bars and Elina shied away, but Sylph already saw her slightly distended scales. It was not obvious enough to guess if you did not know, but judging by her reaction and his words, the answer seemed clear. “You are with egg.” Sylph realized and Elina nodded slowly. “That’s why you want to leave.”

She continued to fumble with the lock. “Servants aren’t supposed to be together like this. It is unprofessional. Really shows you which side of the love argument Nahana takes. I don’t want to raise a hatchling in these conditions.” Elina shivered, but a hint of her emotions broiled with suppressed anger. “Not if I have the chance to give them a better life.” She fell silent and leaned fully into Biscuit, who started to gently rub the side of his face against hers. “It was an accident,” she smiled, but her smile turned to a bitter frown. “Such a slight chance. Hybrids happen so rarely, but it did, and now I’m so glad and excited and trapped in this palace and don’t know what to do anymore.” Elina looked both; happy and deeply distressed and her voice carried just those feelings.

Sylph could not help but smile back. This was no ploy of Nahana. They grabbed what they saw as perhaps their last chance to leave the desert. Surely Veria would not mind two more passengers. “Alright, the four of us are escaping.”

Their faces lit up and tails uncurled. “Wait, four?”

“Us three, and Brandon.”

“Oh, that human,” Elina said and looked down the hallway towards his cell. Sylph wondered if he could hear them whispering. Probably not.

“He’s not that human. He is Brandon,” Sylph sneered.

“Alright, sorry, not something that is very common around here,” Biscuit said, and also turned to look down the rows of cells. “She must really like you if he is still alive.”

“Or she plans to kill him in front of my eyes like today.”

Biscuit stepped away from the bars and folded up his wings, poking Elina with his tail. “Sorry, we are already away from our responsibilities for too long. We’ll be back this evening.”

Elina stopped at Brandon’s cell. “Nice to meet you too, Sylph’s human friend.”

“Who were they?” Brandon raised his voice after he was sure they had gone.

“Two servants. They want to flee with us.”

Brandon seemed to consider it for a second. “We have an escape plan? How do you know they aren’t working for her?” He echoed her worries.

“Revealing your plan to run away to Nahana’s daughter is a terrible idea if you weren’t convinced she was on your side. As for a plan, we don’t have a plan, yet.”