A Burning Heart

Chapter One

There weren't always dragons in the Valley.

Why would there be dragons here? It was 21st century, it was a time of cars, of machines and computers. The electric era, the digital age, the slick turn of the century and the race of technology. It was reality, not a fucking Tolkien story. Fairy tales weren’t real and dragons didn’t exist.

Until two years ago they did. Dragons came, and…and you’ve seen it. Heard about it, the stories of what happened when dragons appeared and sent us all back to the Dark Ages. Burned our cities, razed the continents and slaughtered millions all within the span of a year. Sent us back…no, that sounds too kind for what happened. They fucking hurled us back, stomped us down and put us back at the bottom of the food chain. Mankind was no longer Homo Sapiens Superior. Now we were back to scrabbling around in the dirt, like the animals we are.

Dirt. That was my life now. Dirt. I hacked at the soil with my hoe. The wood was lumpy and warped beneath my fingers, making it difficult to hold and raising painful blisters on my palm. Grimacing, I adjusted my grip and tried to loosen the earth so we could plant. It was tough, winter had held on for far too long this year and the soil was like rock.

I hummed to myself, a pop song from an artist who had probably died during the Rage. Hollywood had been hit pretty hard. Made me miss the movies I had seen. I had been so excited for the Marvel films that I had planned my Sweet Sixteen to be Marvel themed. Except the theme that year had ended up being less about superheroes and more about hiding in a bomb shelter while sirens screamed and my little brother sobbed.

Now here we were, about two years later, and I was going to turn eighteen in a few days. Eighteen. It used to mean something two years ago. It was a time of change, of possibility, potential. I would be done with high school on off to bigger, better things. But now, now I was stuck in this Valley. Elysium is what some people called it, a pretty name for a very dull, very boring place. Just small dip in the mountains with lots of trees and lots of nothing.

But at least, we rarely saw dragons here.

My hoe bounced up against a stone and I swore. My mother clicked her tongue at me. “Irina, watch your tongue.”

“Andrei isn’t out here. He’s with dad,” I retorted. Lucky for my brother, he got to go fishing with my dad today. While I had to stay with mom and tend to the small, raggedy farm we had managed to cultivate amidst the thorns and stones.

“I’m here and I don’t like hearing you swear.”

I brushed sweat-soaked strands of dark hair from my face, “I’m sorry, daj.”

“Thank you, my little chaj.” I could hear the smile in my mother’s voice. She liked it when I used the few Romani words I knew. “Wait, you aren’t a little chaj any more. You are now a grown woman. Eighteen years old.”

“Not yet, it’s Friday.”

Mom walked over and planted a kiss on my forehead. “Well, I need to get used to this idea of use as a grown woman. It seems that it was only yesterday when I was—”

A thud rippled through the air. And then another, and another. A heavy, pounding rhythm that rang in my ears and vibrated along my bones. The deep noise continued, over and over again as my mom and I froze in place, the hoe dropping from my suddenly numb fingers. I knew that sound, we all did.

Dragon wings.

“Rina, run,” my mom shouted.

Heat flooded my body as my heart started to race and I began to run. The thudding noise followed as the trees began the twist and sway and then there it was. Rising above the tree line, sunlight glinting across twilight wings and shining along azure and amethyst scales. The twisting, lean body was beautiful, a study in light and color, an art-piece of motion and dance within the wind.

And it was utterly and completely terrifying.

The dragon opened it’s mouth and roared. I screamed and kept running. Dimly I could hear my mother shout, screaming at me to not look back and to keep going. Keep running, Rina. Just keep running. My feet slapped hard against the ground and my lungs began to ache, heaving in my chest and pressing painfully against my bony ribcage. Keep running. My heart was a drum, a rapid thud, an agonizing convulsion that was threatening to burst. Keep running.

Keep running.

I heard it first. A deep inhale, a rush of air, and then a gasp as the dragon vomited out fire across our tiny farm. Heat washed across my back and I fell to my knees, crawling into the dense knot of woods that surrounded the farm, rolling across the ground and over roots as I tried find a place to hide.

I peered out between the thick trunks. I could see the dragon, circling in the air, moving lazily as it spewed more fire down. What little crops we had managed to coax from the ground already were gone. I covered my mouth, stifling a sob as the dragon continued to destroy what little we had. And in that moment. I stared up at the creature, the myth revealed, the living legend. And I hated it.

Clenching my fists, I glared at the dragon, feeling the rage build in my chest until it felt as if there was no more room for air. I could barely breathe, barely think past the anger and hatred filling my mind. They called it the Rage, that first year of destruction and devastation. Of pain and death. Of hate and sorrow.

Of rage.

And I understood it now. Something slipped in my mind, a distant shift, and then a click. I frowned, rubbing my forehead. The anger, the hurt, the hate was still there. But there was something…I could feel a shape of something strange within my thoughts. A touch, a sensation.

A voice.

My eyes flew open at the sound. It was like hot and razor-edged, slicing the sides of my brain like molten knives. Every syllable held a hiss, a growl. A roar. It was like hearing fire speak within my mind. And it was both painful and glorious because within those words was a song, a melody that gilded the fire in gold and velvet.

It is fun watching the little monkeys run like that, I wish I could stay and chase them some more but Avarasal said that I was needed at…

I stared up at the dragon in shock. That…it couldn’t be…dragons didn’t speak. They were just mindless beasts wanting to kill and slaughter for no reason beyond a love, a need for death and suffering. You couldn’t speak with a dragon anymore than you could reason with a virus. Both killed because it was their nature and there was nothing that could override that.

The dragon circled once more than flew away. The flames faded from my mind. I clung to the tree, the bark rough beneath my fingers. I could smell the fire, the harsh, acrid stench of something burning. It was a scent I was intimately familiar with and it made my stomach turn.

“Rina? Rina!” Mom fell beside me, her dark eyes wide and filled with concern as she ran her hands across my arms and legs. “Are you hurt? Speak to me.”

“The dragon,” I murmured, feeling her press her palm against my forehead. “Daj, I’m fine.”

“I know, I saw the dragon too.” She peered closely at me. “You weren’t burned, were you?”

I touched my forehead. I didn’t feel warm beneath my fingers, yet inside my head there was an inferno. Heat blazed, twisted and scorched within my thoughts. I could feel the imprint of those words on my mind, agonizing burn marks that made me wince. And I could still hear the song, the music. A song of fire, of that brilliant light and warmth that was both life-giving and destructive.

A song of flight, a soaring melody of the wind whistling across wings and scales, filling the ears with a rapturous aria of sky and cloud.

The song of a dragon.

I had heard it, somehow.

“I’m fine, mom,” I repeated.

I’m fucked, I thought.