The Final Exam-Complete!

[Hopefire]

Amazing just simply amazing.

[Feuerfresser]

Now I read the whole story up to now and can't wait for the next chapter . Amazing story

[StickyPiston]

I just blitzed through this story in one sitting and I need more.
Please? Pleasee!

[Raneth]

I seriously apologize for the long wait between chapters!

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Chapter 13

The tunnel opened into a cavern, illuminated by dancing mage lights and torches set around the entrance to dozens of tunnels that ringed the area. Warmth buoyed Aran, melting the cold and stiffness from his muscles, and part of him wanted to lie down and sleep immediately. The other part of him stared in wonder.

“How many people live here?” Johann asked, his eyes wide.

“We are few,” Kalien said. “Now come.”

Aran walked further into the warmth, his gaze riveted to his surroundings. No ice ringed the stone, which was gray and black in places, very unlike the sun bleached stone of the Keep. Their small group turned into one of the tunnels, torches lighting their path. Then next to him Johann jolted, and Aran turned.

A woman caught Aran’s eye, but not for her beauty. Her hair was speckled and coarse, like the pelt of some sort of animal—no, Aran realized. Like the pelt of the jackalope that stood by her legs. She twitched her nose as he walked past, and he had the impression she was catching his scent.

“Greetings, Thalia,” Kalien said. She nodded to him, smiling as Shale moved past. The jackalope by her feet twitched its ears, the only sign of acknowledgment it gave as the enormous white wolf moved past. It did not react at all as Leath sniffed at its fur.

Aran craned his neck to keep his eye on it. Jackalopes were known for being cheerful and for being somehow immune to the efforts of predators, but something about its apparent confidence didn’t sit well. It didn’t seem at all like the few jackalopes he had observed around the keep.

It turned its head, looking back at him with one beady eye. He turned away, following Kalien more closely.

“How long have you lived here?” Johann asked. “I never…” His voice trailed off as they emerged from a tunnel into a small room. A fire glowed in the center, the heat loosening Aran’s muscles further. Leath gave a small huff and moved toward the flames, lying down in a ball.

“This will be your room while you are here,” Kalien said. “If that is alright.”

“I thought we were going to see the elder,” Aran said through a growing fatigue that made his muscles shake. “Briana?”

“Briand,” Kalien said. “You will. But I thought perhaps you would want rest first.”

Aran wanted to refuse. Aurora walked close to him, snuffling him with her long snout, then moved toward the fire. Her magic band shimmered, and for a moment Aran felt the fatigue of his own creatures as well as his own. He swayed on his feet.

Shame burned through him as hotly as the heat from the fire. Putting aside his own exhaustion was one thing. But ignoring his creatures was a crime.

“Aran, I know this is important to you, but I’d rather learn about this place while I’m at my best,” Johann said. “And honestly, getting sleep while you can is a good rule of survival.” He grinned, though it didn’t meet his eyes. “I assume that’s alright with you, Kalien?”

“That is fine.” Aran wished Kalien wouldn’t smile. It made his fangs protrude. “I had assumed as much. We can talk after you have rested. I can catch you a meal, if you wish, for the morning.”

Aran blinked.

“Uh, I like my meat cooked,” Johann said.

Kalien actually laughed, and Shale huffed in exactly the same rhythm. It made the hair on Aran’s neck stand on end. “Do not worry,” he said. “I understand. Now, if you are content here?”

“We are,” Aran said. “Uh, thank you.” He still wished he knew what he was doing here. But if nothing else, this would be quite the discovery to bring back to the Keep.

Kalien tilted his head, as if confused. “You are welcome. I will see you come morning.” Shale huffed in what must be goodbye, and the man and his wolf left the room.

“So,” Johann said, breaking the silence. “This is the home of the demons, huh? I expected more…I don’t know. Blood.”

“Blood mages,” Aran said. “But not dark mages.” He wanted to focus his magic, and scan the tunnels. But for now, Kalien was right. He needed to rest. Leath was already asleep by the fire.

“Should one of us keep watch?” Johann asked.

“I can set a ward.” Aran called upon his magic, fighting past the resistance and promise of a headache as he plumbed what little reserves he had left. He lay threads of control over the air, and sighed when it was done. “If you hear a thunderclap, someone is entering,” Aran said.

“Works for me. I’m going to sleep. I may not be a mage, like you, but I intend to learn as much as I can here.” Johann’s eyes shone in the light of the fire.

Aran nodded. He didn’t bother to correct Johann again that he was not a mage just yet.

If this worked out, he would be soon.

***
Leath’s whining woke him. His body responded slowly as he sat up, stretching his arms over his head and twisting his back to regain mobility. He had been too exhausted to notice, but the stone floor was far from comfortable.

The air was cool but not cold, the firepit blackened and the fire out. Aurora swished her tail, her hooves clacking on the stone when she walked toward him, and Leath wandered in a circle around the entrance to the room where Aran had set the ward, whining once more.

Aran blinked, and then his blood ran cold. Johann was gone.

He summoned his magic immediately, testing the ward. No one had entered. But that didn’t mean Johann couldn’t have left.

“Leath, find Johann!” His voice was rusty from the combination of sleep and the flat air of the caves. Leath barked once, then put his nose to the ground.

In seconds Leath’s tail wagged, and he headed out the door and down the hall, Aran jogging behind him and Aurora clacking sedately behind. The direcore clearly had the scent.

Leath turned a corner and barked twice, and Aran launched into a sprint. His heart pounded. If Johann was hurt—

“Aran!” Aran skidded to a stop. Johann stood across from a man with long white and grey hair, who carried a small kitsune wrapped around his neck like a fur collar. The white-furred fox lifted its head, baring its teeth at Leath and then growling further when Aran and Aurora came into view.

“Aran, I didn’t think you’d wake up any time soon.” Johann ran his hands through his hair, smiling sheepishly. “I just wanted to explore, and was asking this guy here about food. Were you, uh, worried?” He flicked his gaze down to Leath, who wagged his tail and barked twice again.

“Good, Leath,” Aran said. Leath gave a pleased whine. Easiest tracking job ever.

“I am Orayan. You are the keep-mage?” the man asked. He had fangs like Kalien, if a bit smaller, and his hair was the same shade as the kitsune’s fur. Another blood mage. Aran swallowed, trying to push away his instinctive unease at the man’s appearance. How did that happen? Did they try to look like that?

“Uh, yes,” he said. “I am Aran, a mage from the keep.”

Orayan’s eyes narrowed, and Aran noticed his eyes were the same blue as his kitsune’s. He began walking around Aran and Aurora the way a cat circles a mouse. “You’re wandering around here lost? And Kalien expects you to bond with the black dragon?”

Aran’s heart beat hard and his pulse beat in his head. Shock and weakness from lack of food made him sway. “I—I’m not sure.”

“Will you drink its blood?”

The memory of his illness and the sight of the wolf’s blood in the basin came back to him, and Aran’s stomach flipped sickeningly, the nausea made worse by hunger. “No,” he said, his voice weak. He hoped dearly that was not what Kalien wanted him to do.

Johann met his eyes and moved closer, giving his shoulder a light pull. “C’mon, Aran. Let’s go find some food. I know Kalien said he’d bring us something, but I’m guessing he didn’t expect us to wake up so early.” He reached out and patted Aurora on the nose, and her band of magic sent a sense of calm through Aran.

“What time is it?” Aran asked. The blood mage and his kitsune watched them walk away, Aran shrugging his shoulders to clear the eerie feeling of being watched by a predator.

“I’m not really sure. I feel rested, though.” Johann jumped over a large rock that blocked the path, and Aran stepped more carefully. “There’s no light down here. Well, no natural light anyway. Does the keep have lights like those?” he pointed at a lone magelight that lit a portion of the hall that contained no torches.

“Yes.” Aran sighed, thinking of home. “Hundreds.” He wondered how blood mages could summon magelight at all. Their magic...he blinked. He hadn’t sensed any strong magic since coming down here. There were traces, of course, but the strong cocoon of magic that defined the Keep was absent.

Just another difference between his magic and the magic of the blood mages. He swallowed hard. He wanted answers, and he wanted them now. To bond with the black dragon...he shivered.

“Look.” Johann pointed at a flickering light down the hall. As they grew closer, the stone around them lightened, and they emerged into the main cavern they had seen the day before. Men and women, along with their creatures, gathered around a fire pit, and the scent of roasting meat filled Aran’s nostrils. His stomach growled.

“At least they cook their food,” Johann said. Aran nodded.

His hunger faded in the face of the menagerie that began to surround them as they approached. Nulorns, both with regular fur and the rarer, coarse furred variety, wandered the space, and direwolves wrestled in small packs under the watchful eyes of men and women who showed fangs when they smiled. There was no sign of Kalien or the white-furred Shale. An osath soared overhead, dizzying Aran with an aerial display, then disappeared into a hole in the ceiling. In the corner, beautiful lights flashed on dark fur. Aran peered down the tunnel, but saw only a woman with dark hair with shimmering highlights, who presumably followed whatever creature he had seen.

He began to count the people he saw. No more than a score, fewer even than the number of novices at the castle. So few…

Leath growled a warning, and then something sharp prodded Aran in the chest.

He looked down from the ceiling into the eyes of a reindeer, the sharp tip of its icy antlers locking Aran in place. Johann stopped too, grabbing Aran’s shoulder.

“Who are you?” a man’s voice growled. He stood next to the reindeer, his eyes ice blue. Other than that, thankfully, he looked normal.

“Guess we should have waited for Kalien, huh?” Johann said, his grip on Aran’s shoulder the only thing belying his anxiety.

The man curled his upper lip, and his reindeer stepped back, looking down at Aran with just as much disdain. Leath barked once, and the reindeer stomped a hoof, sending Leath skittering backward toward Aran. A vicious growl ripped from the direcore’s throat, and chatter by the fire stopped.

“Hey, look…” Johann said, stepping forward. The reindeer swiveled its head, and Johann put both hands up, palms out.

“What are you doing here?” the man asked, his voice a whipcrack. “Keep mages, like you. Soft, with soft creatures.” Leath growled, and Aurora even flicked her ears back. "Mere copies of ours."

“And you are…the guard here?” Aran resisted the impulse to summon his magic as more people began to crowd around them. A direwolf sniffed at Leath’s flank, and Leath bristled and snarled, flaring his wings. A nulorn loomed over Aran, and he had the distinct impression he was being hemmed in by antlers.

The creatures here weren’t normal either. Too…smart. Cunning.

“Leath, down,” Aran commanded, and the direcore lay on the stone floor, teeth still bared. Aran put a hand by Aurora. Thankfully his pegasus was calm, though her ears were still flat.

“Can’t you control your creatures, mage?” the man asked. Johann met Aran’s eyes, a pleading look. Do something.

Damnit, he wasn’t a mage. He was just a student. He just needed a dragon. What was he supposed to do? He didn’t even know how these people’s magic worked.

“Kameth!” Aran turned at the harsh voice, the gridlock of antlers parting to let Kalien through. The white direwolf huffed as it trotted into the circle of people.

“I brought him here, so there is no problem.” Kalien glared at Kameth and his deer. “Do you want our magic to die? We must wait until he talks with the elder. If the elder decides he is not suitable, then we will turn him out. But not before.”

The fur on Leath’s ruff flattened as people began moving away. Kameth and his deer snorted in unison. “Why did you not keep him confined?”

“Would you confine someone you wanted to help you?” Kalien retorted. Kameth shook his head, turning his back.

Aran took a deep breath. “Thank you,” he said, turning to the blue eyed man. Shale wagged his tail once. “I…I suppose I should have stayed in my room.”

“It’s my fault,” Johann said quickly. “I thought…I figured we could wander.”

“We will not wait for breakfast,” Kalien finally said. “Hunting is poor anyway. I will take you the elder now.”

Aran blinked. “Now?”

“Yes.” He stared at Aran the way his teachers had when he had made mistakes in his first year of classes. “She is the only reason you are here. If she decides we do not need a mage’s help after all, we will turn you out, as I said before.”

“We can’t stay?” Johann said. “What if we want to learn?”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “Keep mages have nothing to learn from us. Now come.”

Johann sighed, and Aran patted Leath. He would have liked to get food, but at least now he would get some answers.

But Kalien’s words to Kameth came back to him, and they chilled as he followed Kalien down the hall.

Do you want our magic to die?


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TBC. Comments and critique always appreciated!

[LightningDragon]

Please, can we please have more? o3o

[Feuerfresser]

It's like feeding some one with very small pieces of a really good meal . And everytime you start to immerse yourself in the story, it stops

[Raneth]

I've heard your pleas--here's the next chapter, and it's longer than usual!

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The tunnel they walked down was pitch dark, with no torches or magic to guide their way. Aran relied on Leath, Aurora and his own magical sense of the stone around him to guide his way. Johann held on to his shoulder, and more than once the other man tripped and stumbled.

Kalien and his direwolf walked so quietly Aran wondered if they had vanished, leaving him and Johann alone to wander the dark tunnel.

“Here,” Kalien said, and his voice made Aran jump. “It will be bright.”

Fire hissed to life, sending light down the hall.

“Blood and ash!” Johann yelled behind him. Aran bit his own tongue to keep from shouting.

A white dragon, encased in ice, met their gaze. The dragon’s mouth was open, fangs as long as Aran’s arm looking as they would burst out of the ice at any moment.

“Celeste?” Aran whispered. It couldn’t be.

“No, but I am glad you know that tale,” a reedy voice spoke. Aran whirled.

The light grew brighter, Aran’s eyes burning at the sudden change. He and Johann stood at the entrance to a cavern that extended far into the distance, and if Aran didn’t know better, he would assume they had come aboveground. The ceiling of the cave was invisible, only darkness extending overhead.

“You are the mage,” the voice said again, and Johann gasped.

A woman so ancient she looked skeletal appeared in front of Aran, an ice phoenix clinging to her unprotected arm and a bright magelight hovering above her head. Despite the lack of any leather or glove, the phoenix’s talons didn’t penetrate the leathery looking skin.

The woman peered at Aran. Kalien and Shale stood at her side. “You are from the keep, and you specialize in earth and air magic?” she asked.

“Yes.” Aran took a deep breath. “How did you know?”

“Not all blood mages began that way. I am a mage, like you. I can sense your magic.” She swiveled her gaze to Johann. “And you are not a mage of any sort.”

Johann gave a shaky smile. “So…you’re the elder?”

She nodded. “I’ve been so for nearly 100 years.”

Aran’s heart flipped. Were he not staring at a woman who’s frayed white hair drifted from a skeletal scalp, who may have drank the blood of a phoenix for all he knew, he would assume she was lying or confused.

“So,” Johann continued, watching the phoenix with wary eyes. “Why Aran? Why bring him here?”

Fires, Johann was more with it than he was. Aran shook his head. He had questions too. Of course, they started with the answers to Johann’s.

“Come.” The woman beckoned, and the phoenix on her arm leapt into the air. Aran focused, and discerned the slight band of magic that linked her to the creature, one that Kalien and Shale did not share. So her link to the phoenix was normal.

That still didn’t explain her age. Or anything, really.

The cavern stretched ahead of them as they began to follow the woman. Kalien stayed behind, and they walked in silence until he became nothing but a speck in the distance. Aran was about to ask if he could fly to speed things up when Johann grabbed his arm. “Aran, stop.”

Aran looked down, squinting at something that shimmered on the stone floor. Then his eyes widened.

The stone had ended. Only ice extended out further.

Leath walked out past Aran, then immediately spread his wings, his paws splayed out as wide as they could. He gave an uncertain whimper. Aurora stopped next to Aran, then whickered at Leath, who finally gave up and skittered back over to the stone. He tucked his tail between his legs.

The elder looked back over her shoulder. “Are you coming, mage?”

“Is this…” Aran let out a slow breath, but didn’t see the telltale fog that signified deep cold. Magic permeated the air, heat magic so subtle he hadn’t even taken conscious notice of it. Not for the first time, he wondered why Thane hadn’t sent a fire mage on this assignment for their exam. He should be in the caves of Nareau or perhaps in the Alasre mountains, not here.

“It is safe, I promise you. But come. I want to show you something. You want to know what we are, yes?”

Aran met Johann’s eyes. His friend nodded. “I’ve walked on ice before. I’ll be fine.” The dark haired man grinned, a sight that lessened some of the crawling anxiety. “You’re the one who might fall.”

“I’m more concerned for Aurora and Leath.” He leaned down and patted his direcore, mind buzzing.

Well, he may not be able to melt the ice, but something told him that would be a bad idea anyway. Instead, he put his hand on the stone, concentrating.

Magic flowed into his hand, shaping the stone. He needed stone, but also dirt, grit. He combined the magic with the bands from Aurora and Leath.

“Come here,” he said, infusing the command into the bonds with both his creatures. Both his companions approached.

He touched Leath’s paw first, then Aurora’s hoof. A layer of mud and dirt formed on his companion’s feet, one gritty enough to give traction. He duplicated the magic, doing the same to his shoes.

When the thrumming energy stopped, Leath immediately tried to stick his paw in his mouth.

“No, Leath,” Johann said with a laugh. Aran patted his direcore’s head before standing back up.

“You want the same?” he asked Johann.

“No reason to turn it down,” Johann said with a shrug.

“Alright,” Aran called to the woman once Johann’s shoes were as gritty as his. “Now we’re ready.”

The woman nodded, then turned and began to walk. Aran, Johann, and the direcore and pegasus followed her out onto the ice.

***

The warmth began to fade the further they walked, and with it the light. Aran summoned a magelight of his own, but it did little to illuminate the vast dark cavern.

Out of curiosity, he leaned down, heating his finger with the barest of fire magic and swiping it over the ice, the cold water a pinprick. Then he took his finger in his mouth.

Salt.

Pressure and silence hammered at his mind. They were walking not only underground, but over a frozen sea. He thought back to the maps of Arkene he had studied before coming here, but nothing had prepared him for this.

How far north had they come? It made no sense. They certainly hadn’t come farther than Kensig.

Or maybe they had. Kalien had led them straight north, not west, and at a pace few normal travelers could match. Aran shivered.

“Cold?” Johann asked. His voice was eerily flat in the cavern. The air here was stale, unmoving.

“Not yet.” Aran peered ahead, at the woman who always remained about a dozen feet ahead of them. “Getting there, though.”

“So, mage. Tell me about yourself,” the woman said suddenly, her voice loud for being so far ahead. “Tell me about your magic, and about the Keep. Why did you decide to go there?”

Aran blinked. He had thought she would be telling him about this strange place, and the blood mages. He took a deep breath, putting on arm on Aurora’s shoulders. What to say?

“My mother brought me to the Keep when it became obvious I had magic.” Johann lifted an eyebrow. “I used to shape stone into little figures. I made a pegasus the last day before we left.” Aran patted Aurora. “My mother kept it, I think.”

“You think?” Johann asked.

“She died.” Johann frowned, nodding in sympathy. “A few years ago.”

“What will you do as a mage?” the woman asked. “Where will you go?”

Aran looked up, but the woman hadn’t turned. She just kept walking. “I want to be an archmage,” he said. He regretted saying it immediately. Archmage. As though he, a student walking through a cavern with little idea of what he was getting himself into, could ever be an archmage.

As this exam went on and on, he realized he just felt more and more like a child. He had thought he was ready.

“There is far more to magic, and the world, than being a mage or an archmage,” the woman said. “Let me tell you of our world. But first, your friend. Tell me about yourself, Johann.”

Johann’s eyes widened, and he met Aran’s eyes for a moment, pausing on the ice. Aurora walked past him, brushing him with a wing the same way she had when Aran had been young and anxious.

“I…I’m just a guy from Nyack,” he said. “I wanted to be a mage, but I had no magic. I got sent home.” He shrugged.

“It does not do to give up so easily,” the woman said. Johann looked down at the ice as he walked.

“Now. Do you want to hear of us?”

Johann looked up, and Aran’s heart pounded. “Please,” he said, thinking of the foreign scene back at the caves, where animal-like humans and their creatures had gathered around the breakfast fires. It was so strange.

Then again, perhaps the Keep would be strange to these people also.

“A long time ago, before magic had been tamed like the creatures magi bond with, it was a wild force. People lived in hovels, dressed in furs, and they feared it. It was unknown.” Her voice wound around Aran, a flow of heat and sound that shimmered into shapes. Shadows of leaves dotted the ice, and when Aran blinked they vanished.

“Walk, mage. Walk and listen.”

The first of us is lost to history. Her name, affinity, companion…gone. But her memories remain, in the blood of all magical creatures.

Aran blinkded slowly. He could see it, at the corners of his vision.

When the world was young, the fires from the great eruption still scorched the air, and the great ice was not here. People lived at the mercy of nature, at the whims of sky and earth and fangs and claws.

There was a man, or perhaps a woman. It is not known. But this person was the elder of their tribe. Luck favored them all their life, and they had a special bond with nature, with the songs of the trees and leaves.

But they began to grow old, and their power faded.

Aran blinked, the voice, for one moment, losing its hold on him. They still walked, but in the vast emptiness around him the shapes of trees and dense forest began to grow. Then the voice came again, and he was swept away.

“You cannot go,” the woman said. She was old, but beautiful, with silky hair with gray like tinsel. “The wolf will kill you. It has killed two already.”

“The tribe cannot go on with a maneater on the loose. I have always been lucky.” His mouth stretched in a smile. “I will put it down.”

“You will die,” the woman said. “And for nothing!”

“It will not be for nothing,” he replied. And he headed away, into the depth of the forest.

Jagged bones jutted from the ground, the remains of the man eater’s last meal. The man waited, sharpening his knife. The moon rose high before it came.

The wolf was enormous, with fangs as long as the man’s fingers. He waited, listening to the song of the trees in the evening air.

“So, you will consume me. You will take the force of nature with you if you do,” he told the wolf. “Then what will you do?”

Pain flared, and the fangs closed.

Aran gasped, the images fading. “And that wolf, who ate the blood of a mage, was among the first,” the elder said. “Do you see, mage?”

Aran sank to the ice, his body shaking. Pain danced along his nerves, the memory searing.

“Do you see?”

Aran couldn’t speak. It was Johann was managed it, stammering from somewhere behind him.

“Magical creatures were born…from animals that ate mages?”

***

Aran felt ill, the memory of the pain of the wolf’s fangs--of death--fresh in his mind. It couldn’t be. Magic transferred through blood, from an ancient mage, had made the first direwolf?

“It was not all violence,” the elder said. “Some gave it willingly, those curious. Those who died in the rivers or streams and were eaten naturally by fish, or absorbed into the dirt and grass that others ate. But yes. Every species of magical creature you know of, the oldest—the first of their kind—took their power by consuming another being who contained power. It is the way of things.”

Aran sat on the ice, the cold seeping through his pants. Leath moved closer, wagging his tail and licking his face. Leath. The offspring of a manticore and direwolf, who were the offspring of creatures in the distant past who had eaten a mage. Or perhaps, of creatures who had willingly taken a mage’s blood.

“Why humans?” Johann asked. “Why was the first mage a human?”

“That is what we claim, for we are human,” the elder said with a laugh. “But perhaps the true tale is that the first direwolf ate a rabbit with the gift of magic. Who can say? But we know that is how magical species are born. Magic infused with blood. Humans become mages. Creatures become a species of their own.”

Aran patted Leath, who licked his hand. The origin of magical creatures…could that really be it? Could one of the longstanding mysteries of the keep really be so simple, and so…barbaric?

Of course no one would test it. No one would feed a mage to an animal. It would be…he shuddered, remembering the tinge of direwolf blood on his tongue.

Direwolf blood. Shale. Kalien.

“So why do you take the blood of magical creatures then?” he asked. He got to his feet, slowly. Johann leaned against Aurora, his face pale. “Why would those who aren’t mages do that?”

“The power is meant to be shared,” the elder replied. She had walked closer, and her phoenix stood on her shoulder once more.

“Humans shared their magic with animals. Animals became magical creatures, with power of their own. They share it with us, through bonds with mages, or,” and she swiveled her gaze over Aran’s head, back down the long path they had come, “with regular humans, who give their blood back. The sharing makes the human stronger, tougher, and makes the creature smarter. Were I a creature, I would rather share blood with a human than share a bond with a mage.” She nodded to Aran, and then to Leath and Aurora. “Those of us here…we are few, but we remember. We keep the memories of all creatures, and their origins, as well as we can.”

Johann shifted his weight from foot to foot. “So…are you the only ones?”

“The only ones in the north. There are others. They avoid mages.”

Aran frowned, his legs still shaking from the memory, the spell the woman had shared. “So…if you don’t like mages, why am I here?”

“You are a young, strong mage,” she said, her gaze suddenly sharp. “And your blood is potent. I can tell. You may even be related to us.” Aran swayed, and Leath steadied his legs. “Your blood will remind the first of the ice dragons of what she is.”

Aran froze, his stomach exploding into shaking butterflies. Leath’s fur prickled next to him in response to his flash of fear.

“What?” Johann said. He was the first to move, pushing Aran behind him and standing in front of the elder. “If you think you can just take a mage and tell him to feed himself to a dragon—”

“Calm,” the elder said, holding up a hand. “Only the smallest amount is needed. We are not transforming the species into something new. We are reminding it of what it has become.”

Aran’s brain whirred. The first of its kind. The first ice dragon, in existence, and dragons were ancient. Ice dragons were one of the most ancient species there were. He suddenly felt very small, a tiny speck in a vast cavern of ice. “What was it before?”

“I do not know. I was not alive then. But it was a mutual sharing, with this dragon and this dragon’s ancestor, an ancient creature of sea and ice. My ancestor performed the sharing. He, too, was a mage. Every member of our family since has shared blood with this dragon, until my father.”

“And why doesn’t he…” Aran nodded. Right. He was dead.

“He died very recently, of a sudden illness. Which is why the dragon has abandoned us. That is why you must remind her of mages. Of humans. Share your blood. Bond with her, if you can. Take her home.”

“Why can’t you do it?” Johann asked. “You’re a mage, aren’t you?”

“I am old, and dying. And my blood has been shared with another, and I have no sons or daughters.” Aran nodded. The white dragon in the entrance.

“So…the first dragon. Ice dragon.” Johann ran a hand through his hair. “How? I don’t get it. How old is it?”

“She is thousands of years old,” the elder answered. “The line was born as the ice began to creep over the northern sea.” Aran’s stomach dropped. That was older than the Keep itself.

“My ancestor was powerful,” the elder said, her eyes distant and sad. “More powerful, by far, than most mages of the keep. Only the most powerful of mages can affect a transformation like the one that began the line of ice dragons. But it will only take a drop to remind her.”

Aran swallowed.

“Please,” the elder said. “Make your choice. You do not have to do this. But I feel strongly that the blood of my ancestor runs in your veins. I think you can take a dragon who is ancient, immortal, and angry, and bring her back to understanding.”

Her ancestor. Aran blinked hard. His mother had been from the Callisto islands, his father…he didn’t know.

And it didn’t matter. Blood traveled far in thousands of years. She could easily be right.

“Aran?” Johann asked.

He reached out, and Aurora was there, nuzzling his hand. Leath stood by his legs, their bands of magic and presence anchoring him in a sea of ice.

He didn’t know if he could do it. He didn’t even know if any of it was true.

But he also didn’t know if he could ever pass his exam, and here he was, trying anyway.

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll do it. Take me to the dragon.”


_________

TBC

[Feuerfresser]

Thanks, another great chapter .

[Namyre]

Mehhh... More please...

[LightningDragon]

I can't wait to read more! c: