Thrall - Christie Golden [87]
He waited, sweat gathering beneath his armpits, for his master’s response. It was a long time coming.
“I was beginning to think I needed to come and get the job done myself,” said Deathwing, his voice a warning.
The Twilight Father had to make a great effort not to visibly sag in relief. “No, Great One. You see that I can serve you well.”
“It is… reassuring. I am at a delicate juncture in my current plans. It would have made me angry indeed to be called away from them. What you say has merit. But what of Thrall? Is he dead?”
“He fell to the earth from the back of Kalecgos during the battle,” the Twilight Father said. “Even if he survived the fall, which is unlikely, Blackmoore went after him.”
“You think him dead, then?”
“Certainly.”
“I do not,” said Deathwing. “I want the body. Search for as long as you must to bring it before me. I will see it before I discount him.”
“As my lord wills, it shall be done.”
“Chromatus still needs a watchful eye until he has fully recovered. No harm must befall him.”
“It shall not. In fact, Chromatus has an eye to the future. He has demanded that Kirygosa be brought to him. With the promise her eggs showed before, I believe we may have solved the problem of short-lived chromatic dragons.”
“Chromatus is wise. Good, good. She should be honored to be the mother of the future.” His grotesque metallic jaw dropped slightly in an approximation of a grin. “This pleases me. You have done well despite the setbacks you have had to face, Father. Continue to do well, and you shall be rewarded.”
The smoke that had formed Deathwing’s image once again became swirling black mist, drifting to the floor to coalesce into a black, solid orb that cleared to assume its original appearance. The Twilight Father sagged and wiped at his damp brow.
They had managed to bring a fairly complete laboratory with them. And Kirygosa had come to know it intimately. She knew every bubbling beaker, every small burner, every vial and needle and “specimen” in neatly labeled jars. She knew the scents and the sound of the place, and she knew the tools with which the apothecaries did their jobs.
Here she had known agony, and humiliation, and racking grief. But she had always known that, even as she sometimes silently wished for death, she did not truly desire it. And she had known that they would not kill her… until they no longer had need of her.
And once they had done to her what they had brought her here to do, they would, indeed, no longer have need of her.
Her heart was racing. They were watching her closely. In the past she had fought them tooth and nail, extracting what little satisfaction she could by harming them before they began tormenting her. They were no doubt expecting an even fiercer struggle. Instead she put on a bleak face. Exhausted as she was, it was not difficult to even coax tears into her eyes.
“The blue dragoness no longer protests?” said one, half goading her and half surprised.
“What point is there?” Kirygosa said dully. “It has availed me nothing before. And before, I had the hope of rescue.” She lifted her tear-filled eyes to his. “But this time I will not be dragged off and forgotten until you need me again, will I?”
The other one, a female troll named Zuuzuu, shook her head and cackled wildly. “I guess nobody told you where you going dis time.”
Horror coiled coldly in Kirygosa’s belly. “I… thought you were taking me to the laboratory again.”
The two cultists exchanged cruel smiles. “No, you cute little dragon girl,” said Zuuzuu. “You be catchin’ da eye of Chromatus.”
“Wh-what?” Kiry stammered. Surely they couldn’t mean what she thought they meant… not with that five-headed, decaying monster. …
“He figures that you two might produce stable chromatic offspring,” said Josah, a large, stockily built human with reddish blond hair. “A word of warning: Don’t expect a nice candlelit dinner beforehand.”
The two of them laughed, Zuuzuu with her awful cackling and Josah with his smug, hearty bellow.
Kirygosa wanted to kill them. She wanted to shred them to pieces, to flee, to fly, to be