Dread wrapped around her thoughts like an old friend, an unshakeable sensation as her Ma-xur's words rang in her mind like a death knell.
"Drahka's do not choose our mates, we are as ensnared by the Season as all our kind, but we are not helpless,"
The air in the tent was warm, red spinning mandalas danced in front of her briefly, fading into nothing. She felt the heat buss beneath her chitin, an energetic warmth reminiscent of the height of the breeding season, and the air was thick with something the dragonfly couldn't quite place. It was smoky, enticing, and made her thoughts sluggish as she followed the pheromones down the hall. She dimly aware that something was off about the situation, but it didn't matter, and it was difficult to think past the inviting concoction of chemical signals that filled the air.
Come to me… they said.
As she walked the sound of a heartbeat gradually got louder, her apprehension and dread almost overridden by the haze overcoming her senses. As Dragoon reached the entryway, curtains drawn shut over the doors, her soul sense blazed to life.
Her soul sense was not something that could be measured in a value understood by most bugs, it was more akin to a feeling, of simply knowing who or what was within her proximity, for every bug, every creature had Soul, that vital component to a spirit, a will.
There was someone or something on the other aide of the door and the amount of power, the strength of will they commanded was staggering.
It made Grimm look like a harmless lumafly in comparison. The shock to her senses was enough to clear her mind and she realized with fury, that she'd very nearly been lured to someone's nest judging by the pheromones that filled the air.
She hoped it was Grimm, then maybe she could politely ask him to tone it down. She could feel her own power straining against the seals that bound them, her own body screaming at her that the male in the next room was strong, healthy, was everything a drahka would want in a mate.
Her mother had taught her better.
"If we cannot trust ourselves in the heat of the moment, then flee, hide, and if a drahkoh is exceptionally persistent, fight," Her mother had once said. "We are stronger than our instincts, we are not ruled by them, we do not ignore them, we acknowledge and work around them."
It took her a moment to realize she was shaking, she was afraid. The fear was an old one. Was Grimm being sincere? Was all of what had transpired these past few cycles just a ploy to get her into his nest?
Was she even doing the right thing by attempting to help him? She took a deep breath and gagged at the smoky taste that invaded her maw and sent her head spinning. She took to the air, coughing and trying to remain focused as another wave of heady warmth rushed through her system.
It was ridiculous really, here she was getting worried over what could be nothing. Her soul sense still shining bright with a warning, she darted through the curtains into the next room, and froze mid-air at the sight.
It was the circus tent stage, or at least a recreation of it. The stands were filled with glowing, golden flowers, the curled petals resembling the open maw of a dragonfly. The torches and lanterns weren't lit as the flowers alone offered more than enough light, with several scattered around the floor.
Something hung above the stage, a red patchwork thing that Dragoon could only describe as a heart with the way it pulsed and the glowing vines that lay in tangled heaps in the corners of the stage. For if it was a heart, then the vines were veins. But even the power of the beating heart above her head paled in comparison to the crimson being that took centre stage.
The tall bug, wrapped in a crimson cloak, bore a striking resemblance to The Troupe Master, save for the fact that this bug's horns were taller, and his chitin was red as opposed to Grimm's glossy black.
The Nightmare King looked at her with glowing red eyes, an intense gaze she couldn't quite make sense of. Was it lust? Love? It was beyond the scope of her experience with other bugs, and she was reminded of the spike of intense, burning protectiveness she felt from Grimm after he learned of her battle with the centipede. She approached cautiously, more than ready to flee.
She wasn't sure where she'd flee to, but she was prepared, nonetheless. When she was at a respectable distance from the crimson bug, he bowed. A familiar glint of kindness and amusement in his gaze.
"Welcome to my humble abode, Little Drahka," Grimm said with a smile.
This was too much, from the flowers, Emperor's Bloom, a common flower used by dragonflies for long lasting courtships and bonding ceremonies, to the fact that her soul sense was blinded to anything else in the room because of the power radiating off Grimm. Her small form was torn between running in the opposite direction and confronting her fear head on.
"This is a bit much..." she said shakily, having to land as she couldn't keep herself airborne, simply too overwhelmed and her body reacting accordingly.
She felt like her seals were going to break.
She felt like she was going to break.
Whether he could sense her impending breakdown or not, Grimm snapped his fingers, the stage gone and the two of them teleported to Dragoon's room. Grimm stood by the entrance as she stumbled over to her pile of blankets and cushions and practically collapsed into them.
Lying on her stomach, legs splayed to the side and arms limply dangling off the large cushion that supported her head, Dragoon sagged as the overwhelming force assaulting her senses and the pheromones that filled the air were notably reduced.
She pointed a finger at him. "You certainly know how to make an entrance."
"Too much?" Grimm asked cheekily, his body glowed with a dim red light as he strolled further in.
"Grimm, my seals were going to break, that is not a good thing," she said, becoming more animated as she voiced her concerns. "Fear, I can handle, walking into the perfect atmosphere to trigger a breeding season is risky but not unexpected… Both of those alongside a heaping amount of virility and strength of will to become a danger to my own safety? I could have hurt myself, or you."
"I have no idea what would happen if my seals were broken while I'm still here in your realm," She concluded. She sighed. "No matter, I had no clue what I was walking into, and made a fool of myself in the process."
"We have both made an error, I was unaware you would be so strongly affected, most bugs are intimidated, but never in any danger when invited into my realm." Grimm said gently.
He was keeping his distance, even now. Dragoon nodded and patted the free space beside her. He quirked a brow at her and she smiled.
"I did say I would decide my own fate, yes?" she remined him. "Sit down you overgrown lumafly, and we can talk this out while I adjust."
Grimm chuckled and moved with fluid grace to lie on his back beside her, his cloak pooling around him like a cape.
He turned his head to look at her. "Well my friend, what do you think?"
"Is there more to this place than your tent?"
"There is indeed, once you are ready, I will show you the rest of what my realm has to offer," Grimm replied. "You're taking this all rather well."
She huffed. "I did not take that well at all… I never handle the breeding season well. I was expecting some great being of terror, a hunter of hunters, a mighty force of nature not… this."
"This?" Grimm asked curiously.
"The most alluring and terrifying prospective mate I've ever met," Dragoon deadpanned. "The only prospective mate I've ever met."
"Ah, I did not mean to frighten you." He admitted.
"You were emulating the courting practices of my kind, I know. Were I any other drahka, you would have my acceptance from as soon as I saw you but alas, some of my flaws aren't purely physical." She said, motioning to her face. Her left eye was simply non-existent, chitin long grown over the empty socket where it would have been, and the way it dipped inwards just another sign of her limitations and shortcomings.
Not that it was much of a limitation, as it happened while she was still in the egg there was nothing for her to adapt to, she could function as well as any bug only with one eye, and whatever adjustments she made were never paid attention to. For it was her normal.
Dragoon sighed. "I enjoy the idea of finding a mate to share the Season with, I want to find a mate, someday, but it isn't my sole passion or goal in life. But to do so, to find a willing partner is almost expected of me. A notion drilled into my head from a young age, restore an area to habitable levels, wait for bugs to move in, find a mate, and become the mother of a new generation of bugs," she gestured at the higher being. "Discussions and theory are one thing... but I've never had anyone interested in me like that before, I've never given much thought to it before, and I suppose I cracked under the reality of.. all of this. Your display was so outside of my expectations, my instincts clashed my emotions and well…"
"You were overwhelmed," Grimm said sympathetically, reaching out to grasp her hand. "Little drahka, I care deeply, my feelings for you grow with every passing cycle, but I stand by my own words. You will always have a choice in this."
"And you?" Dragoon asked in turn.
"I take joy where I can find it, I would not seek you out if I were not interested in forming a bond with you." He replied.
"The tell me about yourself," she said and at his confused looked, lazily motioned at the pair of them with her free hand. "We need to start from somewhere and we barely know each other after all. Surely you have things you like or enjoy doing?"
"I am fond of music, of the myriad of ways bugs express themselves and enjoy expressing myself with mortal made creations, I can play several instruments, and I've dabbled in various artforms in the past," Grimm said. "I also like to cook. I know every soup, stew and hot meal known to inscectkind."
Grimm was, literally, glowing with pride.
"Impressive," she commented and at his expectant gaze, she offered her own titbits of information. "I admit, hobbies and activities for fun were few and far between growing up but, reading was my favourite pastime when I wasn't looking after nymphs or working on my farm. I raised fish, pale crabs, and medicinal plants. It was part of my training to be a Soul Bearer, but I had fun in the process."
Grimm nodded. "You've given much of yourself to take on your expected duty…"
"No, I'd say I found beauty in the simple things," she replied. "The sound of rain hitting the roof tiles, the efforts of cycles of hard work, the view of a field of medicinal flowers in full bloom, and the peace and quiet found in isolation."
Here she paused. "How much do you know about Soul Bearers?" she asked him.
"Beyond the fact that you devote your lives to restoring the land to its natural state, very little," Grimm replied, amused. "I believe I know as much on that subject as you do about my duties as The Nightmare King."
Dragoon was thrilled at the prospect of being able to share her knowledge with another being. "I could show you. we could make a whole cycle of it! The two of us teaching each other!"
"Sounds like a date." Grimm said with a smirk.
Dragoon let go of his hand to poke the side of his face, giggling. "No, absolutely not."
"Would you prefer to call it as time spent in my company?" he teased.
"Well yes, we can at least be tasteful about all of this," she replied easily. She sat up. "I do want to see the rest of this place. I should be fine for now."
Grimm teleported to the door, bowing. "It would be an honour."
She smiled as she flew after him. "Show off."
She flew behind him, exiting the tent, and stopped just outside the mouth of the tent to hover beside him. They were on a cliff overlooking the strangest forest Dragoon had ever seen. Trees with their branches twisted into the shape of an open claw dotted the land below, a scattered few had crimson flames burning in the middle of the hand-like tree akin to grant torches.
Several areas of the forest were marred by charred craters and shafts of bright light shone down through holes in the cavern ceiling that appeared to have burned straight through solid stone to reach them, and each and every charred tree within the lights grasp had sickly orange flames burning in their branches.
It was as if she had walked out into a warzone, the orange trees far outnumbered those that held the red flames.
"The Forest of Flames," Grimm explained, gesturing at the expanse of land before them. "Each tree is representative of a living bug, when lit with Nightmare Essence they have slept deeply enough for their mind to enter my realm."
She noted that out of the millions of trees, only a few hundred were lit with flickering red essence. She glanced up at the holes in the ceiling, squinting at the painfully bright light that shone down.
"The Radiance is attempting to break into my realm in an effort to free herself and spread her influence," Grimm said bitterly. "The orange flames are the bugs under her thrall, an eternal suffering that even death cannot stop. She is confined to Hallownest for the moment, but every bug that wanders into that kingdom is yet another soul lost to her endless rage…"
A roar sounded from above, loud and filled with fury as another beam of light burst through the cavern roof and blazed down on another tree, its red flame turning orange, the wood turning black and the ground becoming a ring of ashes.
Grimm winced in pain. Dragoon looked over at him in worry and alarm, but The Nightmare King shook his head and waved her off.
"My realm is as much a part of me as the Dream Realm is a part of her," he rasped. "This is but another reason why I had to adjust the ritual to be what it is now…"
She gently grabbed his arm and made to lead him back inside. Grimm smiled and allowed the dragonfly to guide him back into the safety of the tent.
"We need to start planning, this…this is not acceptable." Dragoon stated. Her every instinct, every bit of training she'd had over the seasons of her youth, was telling her that this realm and its master were in need of help. As they entered the room that held the Nightmare Heart, the Soul Bearer looked around, taking in the heart itself and the veins in the corners of the room with a sharp gaze and clear mind. An idea was on the cusp of forming, she could feel it, she just needed more information.
She gestured at the heart, firing off questions. "Symbolic or literal? Does it pump anything?"
Grimm blinked. "It transforms the gathered flames from the ritual into pure nightmare essence. The finished product is pumped around the realm in attempt to heal as much of the damage as possible."
"And you are effectively starving yourself to try and keep the realm stable," Dragoon stated and at Grimm taking offense to her statement, she crossed her arms. "You fed on nightmares, now the best you can do is store flames in a mortal shell and, by my best guess, subsist on scraps in order to transfer as much of the collected essence to the heart to keep this place running."
She continued. "You can't feed on bugs because they don't dream, the ones that do dream are tainted by The Radiance, unfit for consumption as it were, and without a means to balance out the feeding process, you would be no better than her yes?"
He nodded. "Expanding my presence to pull every bug into my realm would drive them mad, their rest would be filled with pain that carried into the waking cycle… A fate I do not wish upon those who have done me no wrong or ill will."
"And what of the bugs that willingly follow you?" she asked as she let go of his arm to fly up to the Nightmare Heart and inspect it.
"Individuals that came to me, desperate, with no one else to turn to and nowhere else to go," Grimm began. "What protection I could offer came at the cost of their true selves, suppressed by masks imbued with nightmare essence."
"Do you give them choice to leave?" she asked as she focused on the rhythmic beating of the patchwork organ.
"The banishment clause," he explained. "Should they tire of the ritual, they may choose to end it prematurely, it does not harm me, nor my child, and the bugs involved are freed from my service with no memory of ever having met me. Some servants of course, simply choose to settle in a kingdom recently cleansed and they return to the fold after a time."
"And you simply move on to another land." She guessed and glanced over at him to see him nod curtly.
She hummed in thought. If he could feed on nightmares of living bugs again…
"If you could feed on living bugs once more, would that remove the need for the ritual as it currently is?" she asked.
"Nightmare Essence derived from the living is far easier to process than that of the long dead. It would be more efficient," he replied. "Though I dare not risk adding to the damage The Radiance started…"
"Spirit is manifestation of The Will, The Spirit present in bug and beast," Dragoon recited, an idea taking shape. "It can be channelled to heal, to harm, to bring imagination to life…"
What is a Nightmare, but merely an unpleasant Dream?
She knew what a nightmare was, a mess of images, memories, scenarios brought on by the sleeping mind to instil fear, sorrow, a sense of danger. She was no stranger to any of these things and with that knowledge, she worked backwards. She called upon her will, her soul and channelled thoughts of warmth and joy.
Of peace and serenity, the calm, quiet moments of her travels. The happiness of a pleasant conversation, the hard-won satisfaction of good hunt, and the encouraging, buoyant joy of sharing her accomplishment with another. She poured all that and more into the spell taking shape in her hands. The veins in her wings glowed white with soul and gradually, the ball of white energy in her hands shifted into a pale, rosy gold, mandala rising off it and fading into nothingness.
Her head was split open by the piercing scream that filled it, her vision went white, and her spell dispersed as she blinded by something. Pain, burning sharp and hot lanced through her body, her wings seized up and she crashed to the floor, glaring up at the golden sky and the figure hovering before her.
The giant, glowing moth, glared at her with fury to last for ages to come. She struggled to her feet and roared back at it, pushing past the pain to glare defiantly.
It screeched at her, a voice barrelling into her mind, loud and commanding.
"YOU WILL NOT TAKE WHAT IS MINE!"
Dragoon snarled at the crowned moth, The Radiance. An instinctual need to defend her mate from the god trying to invade his territory rose in response to the threat the God of Dreams posed. She did not linger on the thought, the guttural declaration of partnership, the war cry known to her people, spilled out of her mandibles automatically.
"Drahkoh-hem Grimm!" For my mate Grimm.
"Drahk-xur!" For family.
Her power rushed to her defence, white gauntlets encased her hands, pointed boots wrapped around her feet, and a teardrop shaped helmet covered her head. It was only the bare minimum of her Soul Bearer uniform, but it would be enough as she readied herself to fight.
The Radiance screamed again, a fresh wave of pain leaving her immobile. She struggled to stand firm against the onslaught of burning, her armour crumbling to dust and her legs gave out beneath her. She could barely muster up the focus to hiss at her foe.
The Radiance was not pleased. "TRAITOR! FOOLISH GIRL! YOU WILL BOW TO ME!"
There was nothing but the burning light, it filled her vision, burned through her soul sense, and she couldn't think. Another screech, different from The Radiance, filled her ears and something dropped on top of her limp form. Everything turned red as fangs sunk into the back of her head.
She awoke to find Grimm, no longer the bright red of his nightmare form, cradling her in his arms, cloak billowed out behind him like a cape, and rasping apologies. The room was dark, and the Troupe Master's body heat a welcome respite from the searing heat of The Radiance, a soothing warmth that brought relief from the pain that still lingered even after waking.
"Hey." She croaked out quietly. He blinked and sighed in relief.
"Are you hurt?" he asked.
"Nothing life threatening." She concluded.
"…Can you still hear her?" he asked hesitantly.
She thought back to the searing pain, the booming voice, the blinding light. There was nothing. No trace, no spark of anything that had to do with The Radiance. Her seals were still intact and the only thing that was out of the ordinary, beside the mild ache in her head, was the fact she could sense Grimm's thoughts alongside her own.
I am so sorry, I had to, please be alright.
"Her, no. Though I can definitely hear you." She replied.
She felt Grimm's surprise as well as saw it etched upon his mask like face, red eyes going wide. She felt him quickly withdraw his presence from her mind.
"I ended the dream by delving into your mind and devouring the pain she was causing you… She was going to kill you and I, acted on impulse…" he said. "I heard your declaration and I… reacted."
"Oh, beetle dung…" she cursed. "I have no idea what came over me, I was just so furious, she should know better! And you've been nothing but considerate and respectful this entire time and-" she winced, her tirade cutting off as a spike of pain lanced through her body.
Grimm rubbed her arms soothingly. "I know, we'll deal with her in time."
"We still need to make a plan…" she argued weakly. "We should be doing something…"
"We did do something," Grimm reassured her. "You generated Dream Essence, and I could feed on your pain as easily as if it were made of nightmares. This means her connection to a bug can be severed completely. We can use this knowledge to craft a weapon capable of cutting her off from those she controls."
"And thereby save those she's captured." Dragoon surmised.
"Precisely, it will weaken her enough that I can destroy her without causing harm to the innocents under her influence," Grimm said. "Focus on resting, my Drahka-hem, I need to be sure you are well before we continue."
"And then?"
"We shall see if you can also channel nightmare essence, if so, I can teach you how to use it to protect yourself," Grimm said, expression melting into one of concern. "Ritual or no, we are bound together from this moment on. I will not have you go through that again."
She nodded, calm acceptance and a dash of possessiveness dancing through her mind as she relaxed into his embrace. It was less a realisation and more akin to reaching a new understanding. At some point she had already decided this higher being was to be her partner, her mate, for as long as she would live.
"Mine." She hummed.
"Always." He replied.
Notes
Ma-xur: biological mother.
Drahka: Female dragonfly. The equivalent of women or lady.
Drahkoh: Male dragonfly. The equivalent of man.
The bugs of Odonata don't have separate words for male/female in reference to bugs outside their species, so drahka and drahkoh are used when talking about a bug of a specific gender, or about guys or girls as a whole.
The suffix hem is derived from hemolymph, and meant to convey a romantic bond, with the intent to have young. Couples that are mates, but choose not to have young, are spouses as opposed to mates.
It's uncommon for a female dragonfly to openly claim a mate, but usually happens in self-defence when something threatens the potential partner or herself (usually another male attempting to claim her or a high ranking female pushing their weight around.)
In this case, The Radiance was a threat to Grimm, and Dragoon's gut response was to chase off the threat.
Drahkoh-hem: Mate, male.
Drahka-hem: Mate, female.
Drahk-xur: family
The suffix xur, derived from azure, the colour of lifeblood and hemolymph, is used for blood relatives. dragonflies raise their young as a community, familial bonds form between nymphs and their caretakers, with the notion of family encompassing both blood relatives and those that helped raise the children.
Xur is used as an indicator of biological family, usually for medical and legal reasons within a community, as well as to keep track of family trees and who is related to who for matchmaking and breeding.