Chapter 10
The Truth
The clean, honey-colored bricks of Haven's Rest (officially, stuffily, Falls Rest) glowed warm in the late afternoon sun as Kai stepped out of the Magistrate's Hall. The heavy oak door thudded shut behind him, muffling the stunned silence he'd left inside. For a moment, he just stood on the worn stone steps, breathing air that smelled of baking bread, horse dung, and sun-warmed dust. Ordinary air. Glorious air.
Then, a slow, utterly mischievous grin spread across his face. It started small, a twitch at the corner of his mouth, then widened, revealing surprisingly white teeth against his weathered skin. It was the grin of a child who'd just pulled off the most audacious prank in the kingdom's history. He tucked his hands into the pockets of his impeccably clean, gray coat – the coat that, mere hours ago, had been a biohazard and let out a low, disbelieving chuckle.
Ignis Ferox. The Fire Fury. Scourge of Emberhold. Reduced a city of ten thousand to ash? He snorted, the sound startling a pigeon pecking near his boot. Ten thousand? Try ten families of miners and their many dogs, huddled around a muddy pit they optimistically called 'Ember's Hope', not 'Emberhold'.
The reality played out in his mind, a stark, hilarious contrast to the bombastic tragedy he'd just spun:
Flashback: Three Days Ago - The Blackroot Foothills (Not Peaks)
Kai hadn't been hunting gods. He'd been walking. Just… walking. Trying to put distance between himself and… well, everything. The woods were peaceful, damp, smelling of pine and loam. He'd been contemplating the merits of finding a quiet stream to drown the persistent headache left by his last necessary use of the golden eyes when the shouting started.
Three miners, faces smeared with grime and terror, stumbled out of a ragged hole in the hillside. They looked like they'd wrestled a badger dipped in coal dust.
"Conjurer! Thank the stars! Please! "You have got to help!" The lead miner, a burly man missing two front teeth, gasped, clutching a pickaxe like a security blanket.
Kai raised an eyebrow. "Help with what? Did your lunch get stolen by squirrels?"
"Dragon!" another miner, younger and paler than parchment, squeaked. "Woke it! We was diggin' a new seam, hit somethin' hard… then roar! Heat like a forge blast! Timmons… Timmons got crispy!"
"Dragon?" Kai repeated, skepticism warring with the sinking feeling in his gut. Dragons were legends. Annoying, fire-breathing legends that usually required armies, not lone, headache-plagued wanderers.
"Aye!" The burly miner nodded frantically. "Not big, mind! Young, I reckon! But angry! Burnt the entrance, collapsed part o' the tunnel! It's trapped in there, roarin' fit to bring the mountain down! Won't let us near our gear, nor poor Timmons'… remains." He shuddered.
Young. That was the operative word. Kai sighed. A young dragon. Probably scared, definitely dangerous, holed up in a mine it didn't want to be in, because some overzealous miners poked it with a pointy stick. Fantastic. Just the relaxing afternoon he'd planned.
What followed was less an epic dragon-slaying and more a prolonged, dangerous game of subterranean whack-a-mole mixed with extreme hazard pay negotiation (conducted entirely in roars, fireballs, and Kai's increasingly creative swearing).
The dragon was young. Maybe the size of a large cart horse, but all teeth, claws, and misplaced adolescent fury. Its scales were still soft in patches, a mottled brown and black instead of imposing volcanic rock. Its wings were comically oversized for its body, constantly getting snagged on rock outcrops. It couldn't fly properly yet its attempts resulted in frantic, fire-sneezing tumbles that were equal parts terrifying and absurd.
Kai spent hours:
Dodging: Tiny, poorly aimed fireballs that scorched tunnel walls and filled the air with choking smoke and the distinct smell of overcooked bat guano.
Luring: Trying to coax the angry lizard-reptile out into the open using half-rations of dried meat and increasingly desperate insults ("Come on, you overgrown salamander! Scared of a little sunshine?").
Trapping: Using minor earth conjuring (which made his head throb) to cause small rockfalls, trying to pin the beast without bringing the whole mountain down on both of them. The dragon just bulldozed through most of them, shrieking indignantly.
Getting Singed: His coat earned its first, non-celestial-dragon-related burn holes. His eyebrows felt permanently frazzled.
The climax wasn't majestic. It was pure, desperate improvisation. Cornered in a wider cavern, the young dragon, panting and spitting sparks, launched itself at him in a clumsy, fiery charge. Kai, out of clever tricks and patience, his head pounding like a war drum from the constant low-level conjuring and smoke inhalation, did the one thing he really didn't want to do. He triggered the golden eyes.
Time didn't stop completely, but it slowed enough for him to see the trajectory of the clumsy charge, the soft spot where the neck scales weren't fully hardened. He materialized his dagger not from fire, but sheer annoyance, and planted it deep into that spot as time snapped back. The dragon didn't die instantly. It thrashed, shrieked (a sound more like an enraged teakettle than a god's death cry), and finally collapsed, twitching, after what felt like an eternity of exhausting, messy, undignified flailing.
Kai slumped against the cavern wall, breathing hard, the golden eyes winking out and leaving him with a skull-splitting headache that made him see stars that weren't celestial either. He looked at the dead dragon. It looked… small. Pathetic, almost. Certainly not like a city-destroyer. Just a scared, angry kid who'd been woken up rudely and paid the ultimate price.
The miners, cautiously peeking in, were ecstatic. They offered him a pouch of rough-cut gemstones and their eternal gratitude. Kai took the gems (useful), ignored the gratitude (ephemeral), and eyed the dragon. Waste not, want not. He hacked off a sizeable chunk of horn – it was impressively black and sharp – and the haunch (which turned out to be disgusting).
The core he took because… well, it pulsed, and he wasn't one to leave potential power lying around. He left the miners to deal with the carcass and poor Timmons, his head throbbing with every step as he walked away from the scene of the most underwhelming dragon fight in recorded history.
Back to Present: Haven's Rest - Grinning Like a Loon
Standing on the Magistrate's steps, the memory of that clumsy, smoky, headache-inducing fiasco clashed gloriously with the image he'd just painted: the booming, archaic pronouncements, the invented name (Ignis Ferox! He was particularly proud of that one – sounded properly ominous and vaguely like heartburn), the fictional city of ten thousand souls (poof!), the sheer, unadulterated gravitas he'd faked with nothing but an old accent and a clean coat.
They bought it! The thought bubbled up, pure, unadulterated glee. The clerk looked like he'd seen a ghost! A ghost holding a tax form! He pictured the man's spectacles flying off, the stammering, the frantic scramble for the ledger. He'd just convinced an entire bureaucracy that he'd soloed a god-dragon based on a horn he'd hacked off a glorified, fire-breathing iguana with identity issues!
The best part? The pain. The dull, persistent ache behind his eyes, a souvenir from overusing his weird golden eyes just to survive the young dragon's tantrum, was now the phantom pain of a celestial dragon slayer. He chuckled again, the sound rich and warm. Oh, the irony was thicker than dragon hide.
He adjusted the Stormguard badge on his coat. It felt less like a relic and more like a trophy for Best Performance in a Bureaucratic Farce. Fifty thousand silver crowns. For that. He could buy… well, he could buy a lot of very nice headache remedies. And maybe a castle. A small one. Somewhere quiet. Very, very quiet.
He sauntered down the steps, the picture of the weary but noble hero, nodding gravely at a wide-eyed old woman selling apples. Inside, he was practically dancing. Just gotta collect the money. Play it cool. Seasoned conjurer. Seen it all. Killed gods before breakfast. Yawn.
The treasury was in a fortified annex next to the Magistrate's Hall. Kai presented his writ to a clerk whose desk was practically groaning under ledgers and coin scales. This clerk was older, jowly, and looked like he'd been weaned on vinegar. He peered at the writ, then at Kai, then at the Stormguard badge, his expression skeptical.
"Ignis Ferox, eh?" he rumbled, his voice like stones grinding together. "Big bounty. Big claim." He squinted at the writ again. "Says you presented the horn. Where is it?"
"Remains in the Magistrate's custody as definitive proof," Kai said smoothly, his voice back to its normal timbre but layered with an effortless, bored authority. The 'seasoned conjurer' vibe. "They deemed it too… potent… for casual transport. You may verify with Clerk…" He frowned slightly, as if trying to recall the insignificant name of the trembling man he'd just traumatized. "…the spectacled fellow. Hemlock's subordinate."
The treasury clerk grunted, clearly unhappy about having to move. He heaved himself up and lumbered next door. Kai leaned against the counter, examining his fingernails with feigned nonchalance, ignoring the pounding behind his temples. Come on, come on. Just hand over the shiny silver.
Minutes ticked by. Kai could hear muffled, urgent conversation through the wall. Finally, the treasury clerk returned, looking significantly less skeptical and significantly more… pale. He avoided Kai's eyes.
"Right," he muttered, clearing his throat. "Verification… uh… appears satisfactory." He unlocked a heavy iron-bound chest behind him. The clunk of the lock echoed. He lifted a series of heavy cloth bags, each bulging ominously, and placed them on the counter with solid thumps. Five bags. Ten thousand crowns each. They smelled of cold metal and dust. "Fifty thousand. In mixed silver crowns, as per the charter."
Kai didn't blink. He didn't gasp. He simply nodded, as if receiving payment for a slightly tedious pest control job. "Adequate." He produced a sturdy, nondescript sack he'd 'acquired' earlier that day. "Load it."
he clerk's mouth opened slightly, then closed. He'd probably expected protestations about weight, requests for guards… not a casual 'load it'. Mutely, he began shoveling the heavy bags into Kai's sack. Each bag made the sack sag lower.
When the last bag thudded in, the sack looked like it contained several anvils. Kai hoisted the strap over his shoulder with a grunt he couldn't quite suppress. Gods, that's heavy.
But the weight was beautiful. He gave the clerk a curt nod. "The Compact's gratitude is noted." He turned and walked out, the sack of silver clinking softly with every step, a sound more melodious than any bard's lute.
Nightfall
Kai didn't linger at The Grinning Griffin. He paid his bill with a single, newly acquired silver crown, leaving a generous tip that instantly erased the barkeep's lingering wariness and replaced it with beaming gratitude. He didn't order supper. He needed to be gone.
He felt the town's atmosphere shift as dusk deepened. Whispers became conversations. Conversations became excited proclamations. The story spread like wildfire, fanned by the terrified clerk in the Magistrate's Hall and the awed treasury clerk:
"Did you hear? Stranger at the Hall!"
"Killed Ignis Ferox! The Fire Fury!"
"Slew it single-handed! Presented its horn! Black as night, glowing with captured fire!"
"Destroyer of Emberhold! Ten thousand souls!"
"Stormguard! Had the badge! Looked like death warmed over… but noble!"
"Fifty thousand crowns! Just walked out with it!"
"A living legend! Right here in Haven's Rest!"
By the time true night fell, the tale was already evolving. The dragon was now the size of the Magistrate's Hall. Its breath had melted mountains. Kai had fought it for three days and nights, using spells lost to antiquity. He was probably a prince in disguise. Or a demigod.
Kai, meanwhile, was engaged in far less glamorous pursuits. He used a fraction of his newfound wealth to make a single, lightning-fast purchase from a bewildered, elderly estate agent who was just closing up: a small, sturdy stone house on the very edge of town, bordering the wilderness. It was overpriced, slightly dilapidated, and perfect. He paid in heavy silver, no questions asked, signed the deed with a flourish (using a fake name that sounded vaguely Stormguard-ish: "Kaelen Stormwarden"), and pocketed the key. He didn't even look inside.
Let them look for the great dragon-slayer in his new mansion, he thought, grinning in the darkness as he saddled the sturdy, unassuming bay mare he'd also bought hastily from the livery stable (also overpaid, also no questions). They'll be knocking on that door for weeks.
He led the horse, laden with the sack of silver, the pack containing the dragon core, and his meager belongings, through the quiet back alleys of Haven's Rest. He avoided the main square, where a crowd was already gathering, hoping for a glimpse of the legendary hero. He could hear snippets of songs already being composed.
Just beyond the town's low wall, near the gate he'd first entered, he mounted up. He took one last look back at the warm glow of the town lights, the silhouette of his newly acquired (and instantly abandoned) house, and the distant buzz of excitement centered around the Magistrate's Hall. The pounding in his head was a constant companion, a reminder of the real fight, the real dragon.
He patted the sack of silver slung behind the saddle. It clinked reassuringly. "Fifty thousand," he murmured to the night air, the grin returning full force. "For a lizard with bad breath and worse manners." He shook his head, the sheer absurdity of it washing over him again. "Ignis Ferox. Honestly."
With a soft click of his tongue, he nudged the horse into a walk, then a steady trot, leaving the legend of the Fire Fury's demise – and the baffled town of Haven's Rest-firmly behind him. He rode hard through the cool night, the rhythmic clop of hooves and the jingle of silver coins his only companions. The stars, indifferent celestial spectators to his grand deception, wheeled overhead. His head still throbbed, but now it throbbed in time with the beautiful, heavy music of fifty thousand utterly undeserved silver crowns.
He rode until the moon was high, then found a secluded copse far from any road, built a small, discreet fire, and finally let himself laugh, a long, loud, helpless laugh that echoed in the quiet woods, the sound of a man who had just pulled off the heist of a lifetime with nothing but audacity, a clean coat, and a perfect fake accent. He fell asleep beside the fire, the sack of silver serving as his pillow, dreaming not of gods or dragons, but of peace, quiet, and maybe hiring someone else to carry his money.