I have a few songs for this chapter. First is 'Remember the Name' by Fort Minor. This song is for Malefor and Imperia, because the sheer badassery of the two of them deserves a song as epic as this one. And it's worth noting that this is at least 40% skill.
'Angel with a Shotgun' by The Cab comes back for Imperia, but you've hopefully already listened to it.
'You're Not Me' from the Yu-Gi-Oh Movie soundtrack is for Malefor.
The last, and perhaps most important, is 'Ready for War' by a bunch of rappers, specifically 50 Cent, Eminem, Dr. Dre and 2pac.
(searching '50 Cent Ready For War' will find the song pretty easily.)
This song takes the concept of badassery up to eleven, even if (like me) you find rapping and/or swearing distasteful it's still worth listening to just for the sheer level of awesomeness it conveys.
Malefor wouldn't be impressed, and you might not be either, if you don't listen to the lyrics it sounds like it's just swearing and ranting, but it's actually a song about being a rap legend. These guys are much cooler then you might expect, despite the association of rappers with being rough thugs.
Story now:
"Terrador, it's a pleasure to meet you." Malefor said lazily; the purple dragon leaned to the side as he walked and looked down the stairs past Imperia to where Flare was standing. "And you must be Flare, I've heard a great deal about you too."
The fire dragoness didn't respond; she just stayed silent, watching.
"Malefor." Terrador said softly.
The purple dragon didn't slow down as he neared Terrador, he only smiled. "Step aside please."
Terrador reluctantly stepped aside and Malefor walked past him, looking totally confident. He stopped as he saw Imperia.
"Hi there." Imperia curtsied, blushing. She was, for once, lost for words. Malefor's smile grew warm and genuine as he looked at the silver dragoness. He looked at her as if mesmerised, seeing her for the first time. Imperia was in a similar state, gazing at the purple dragon with a look that was almost a look of wonder.
"Imperia, I'm delighted to meet you at last." Malefor walked down to her and hesitated. "I'm not entirely sure how to greet you. A suitable mark of respect for all that I owe you, but naturally not something too serious. Could you raise your paw?"
Imperia did as she'd been asked; Malefor courteously took her offered paw and kissed it lightly.
"Thank you, Imperia for everything you've done for me." He bowed to her. "How's that for a greeting?"
Imperia shook her head. "That was nice, but not really my style. It was too awkward and formal." She reared up on her hind legs and then threw herself on Malefor, wrapping him in a tight hug. "We're doing this!"
Malefor made a startled sound, but after a moment he relaxed into Imperia's comfortable hold, rearing up and putting his wings and forelegs around her too. He lightly stroked the curve of her back and wings.
The two dragons separated after several seconds, Imperia gave Malefor a quick lick on the cheek before stepping back. Malefor smiled fondly at her, looking flattered but somewhat unsure.
"You're even more beautiful than I had expected."
"You're not so bad yourself." Imperia replied playfully. He was indeed rather handsome, he didn't have Volteer's eccentrically cute appearance or Spyro's lean strength and grace, but he had a refined scholarly style that charmed Imperia instantly.
"I thought you two hadn't ever met." Flare said.
"This is our first time meeting face to face." Imperia said, looking back to the fire dragoness.
"But we are friends." Malefor added.
Flare snorted. "You'll be discussing baby names by the end of the week."
Imperia looked at the wall with a blush; the obvious implications of that comment left her too embarrassed to reply.
"I've never had any intent to gain Imperia's affections." Malefor said briefly.
"Well maybe not, but you didn't need to shoot the idea down quite that quickly…" Imperia muttered, still blushing.
Malefor laughed. "I said only that I had no intent to gain your affection, I did not say that I don't desire it."
"Oh."
Imperia was momentarily caught by surprise, and then she smiled.
"And you also spoke only in the past tense. I'd missed that at first." Imperia said coyly. She giggled in embarrassment. "That's good to know. Oh, and am I to take that comment as an attempt to attract my affection? Thus rendering your previous statement invalid from now on?"
"Perhaps we should save this discussion for later?" Malefor said, glancing back at Terrador, looking slightly awkward.
"I'll look forwards to later." Imperia responded. Malefor blushed at her words and spent a moment just looking at her.
Imperia saw genuine warmth in Malefor's eyes, she smiled softly.
Terrador stepped across so that he was blocking the stairs. Malefor heard the movement and sighed, in moments the emotion he had shown was hidden again. Imperia was disappointed, she didn't like seeing Malefor behave so coldly.
The purple dragon coiled around and began to walk back up the stairs towards Terrador.
"You'd really give your life to keep me from leaving this cell? It's not even my cell."
Terrador didn't reply. Malefor laughed.
"There are dragons like Thoran, the former guardian of electricity, out there in the world, dragons who are cruel, remorseless murderers, and yet you are more concerned with Imperia and myself?"
"You could destroy our world, they couldn't."
"And yet I take care in my actions to cause minimal destruction, while they can and do destroy the families, homes and lives of innocents with hardly a second thought."
"I've explained your plan to them." Imperia said helpfully. "About remaking the world as a more peaceful place, united under the leadership of you, Spyro and Cynder."
Flare in particular noticed that Imperia neglected to mention she had previously claimed to disagree with the plan. The fire dragoness didn't comment, wondering if Malefor knew about this.
"Ah, and how was it received?" Malefor asked.
Imperia walked after the purple dragon, sticking close to him. "Volteer saw nothing inherently wrong with it, Cyril disagrees completely, and these two -" Imperia flicked her tail at Flare and then again at Terrador. "-haven't given any definite answer."
"I thought Volteer would agree." Malefor mused. "From what you've told me about him he seems to be a similar dragon to myself."
"There are similarities, yes." Imperia nodded, smiling to herself.
Malefor reached the step below Terrador and stopped, the two dragons were so close they were almost touching.
Malefor considered Terrador with interest, the green dragon was larger and physically stronger than he was, and the sense of calm that he possessed was quite impressive. Malefor had no fear of Terrador whatsoever, but he had to admire the other dragon.
"Let's not concern ourselves with the fate of the world. Nobody alone has a right to decide what to do about that. You, Terrador, are only one dragon. It's now your chance to decide the fate of a single other dragon: me. Do I leave here as a criminal, or can I leave as a potential ally?"
Malefor spoke without any indication of threat, but Terrador did not miss the fact that both of Malefor's options resulted in the purple dragon doing exactly what he wanted to do.
Terrador hesitated, he couldn't stop Malefor, and stepping aside was the most logical option, but doing so just felt wrong. Malefor saw the conflict in the earth dragon's eyes, he sympathised with it completely, but the cold logic in his mind was working rapidly to calculate Terrador's emotions and design ways to manipulate him.
He started working on his best line of attack; Terrador's obvious strength, his military disposition, came with an inherent opening for manipulation.
"You may not have trusted the cheetahs at first, they are independent, dangerous, adaptable, not the most reliable of allies. Yet when you needed their help, they came; and you were not expecting that because, blinded by your distrust of their ways, you missed seeing the truth about the race of cheetahs. They fight for honour, and they have a strong sense of pride and justice."
"I know what you're doing." Terrador said softly. "You're putting doubt in my mind, trying to make me trust you."
"Do you trust only yourself?" Malefor seized the weakness Terrador had given him and instantly spun it into a counterargument. "I'd be surprised. You understand that you can't know everything, and sometimes you need to take advice."
Terrador faltered, his mind working rapidly. Malefor was trying to control him, but… He hadn't lied… Terrador hadn't trusted the cheetahs at first, yet when they had needed that alliance the most it had proven to be a true one. Could Malefor be the same?
Malefor had also been wickedly accurate with his comment on trust; Terrador had once only trusted himself, until he had met Ignitus. The fire dragon, his closest friend, had taught Terrador the lesson that even now he valued the most. Ignitus had taught Terrador that there were many good dragons, good individuals of every species, in this world, and they were worth protecting. Malefor surely couldn't have known that when he made the comment, but it had a profound effect.
Malefor saw that his comment had made an impact, he had based it only on the knowledge that Terrador was an army commander and would therefore need to trust some information without verifying it for himself, but clearly there was something else about Terrador. He may not have planned it that way, but it wasn't difficult to adapt to it, he had been going to press the guardian further, but now there was no need.
"The choice is yours." Malefor spoke softly.
After several seconds Terrador stepped aside.
Malefor stepped past him, Imperia stayed close to the purple dragon's side as the two of them walked away.
Terrador sighed, resting his weight against the wall. He felt stressed and more than a little bit confused. Flare walked up to him and touched his tail with hers. Flare's soft feathery tail felt unusual brushing against his scales.
"You did well, Terrador."
"Maybe… but did I do what was right?"
"We'll find out." Flare said. "In your situation I'd have done exactly the same thing. Don't blame yourself for anything."
"How did you know I was thinking of blaming myself?" Terrador asked, chuckling slightly.
"Because I know you, my friend." Flare curled her tail over his and rested a paw on his shoulder.
Terrador closed his eyes, feeling somewhat comforted. "Thank you Flare."
The fire dragoness nodded. "It's no problem."
"Flare? Would you have let me take Imperia back to her cell? Or would you have been on her side?"
Terrador looked at Flare. The dragoness shrugged. "I'm not happy with Imperia right now, but that doesn't change the fact that I love her. I don't know the answer to that, Terrador. I'm sorry. Now, I might ask you the same question: would you have taken Imperia back to her cell?"
Terrador chuckled again. "I very much doubt it."
Imperia walked beside Malefor up the steps and back to freedom.
"Thanks for the rescue."
Malefor smiled, looking back at the dragoness. "I'm surprised you needed it. Originally I thought I'd just be visiting."
"Ah, yes, well, I knew how to escape my cell without any problems, but just as I got out Flare came to visit me." Imperia looked down the stairs to where Flare and Terrador were talking. "I could have gotten away without too much trouble, but I felt that I ought to try and fix our relationship. Then Terrador came down and trapped me."
Malefor laughed. "How very like you; to prioritise those you care about over the most logical course of action."
"Speaking of which… you're not mad that I told Cynder the truth, are you?"
Malefor glanced across at her with amusement. "Of course not. I may not have expected or wanted it, but your ability to surprise me is one of the things I most like about you. I trust you with my plans, and I've trusted you with my life; I know you won't always do what I would do in your situation, but I trust who you are."
Imperia blushed slightly. "That's… a really nice thing to say. I didn't think you'd punish me for disobedience or anything like that, but I did expect you to be a bit mad at me."
"I'm often frustrated by you and your attempts to play around with my plans, but I think you have only good intentions, so I allow your meddling."
"Plus I can turn out to be useful on occasion." Imperia commented.
Malefor laughed in agreement. "Invaluably useful, and excellent company."
"Aww, thanks. I'm honoured you think so highly of me." Imperia purred. "So have you thought any more about our morality debate?"
"I have thought about it a great deal. It's objectively better to remove undesirable behaviour from our society then it is to merely penalise it. I still don't think you ought to call it a 'morality' debate."
Imperia frowned. She usually had at least one extended discussion going on with Malefor, and this latest one was about justice in society. Some individuals in a society would take advantage of others, or harm them, and that did damage to the society as a whole. The question that the two dragons were currently debating was weather it was better to use laws to keep potential wrongdoers under control, or if it would be better to remove the desire to do wrong, before it could ever lead to an action.
Imperia had a response prepared for Malefor's view.
"It's objectively more effective to stop dragons from thinking the wrong thoughts, but you can't say it's objectively better. Saying its better would be to discount the value of a dragon's right to choose. You yourself respected my right to choose only a moment ago, in that you allow me to do what I want to do, even if it goes against what you would prefer that I do."
"True, but I know that you have good intentions. Surely removing bad intentions from dragons would result in more dragons like you, who I can trust to do the right thing without needing to be controlled."
Imperia smiled playfully. "I have a few bad intentions, I choose to ignore them. Would you remove that from my personality?"
"That's an appeal to my emotion, not a strictly rational argument." Malefor looked disapproving.
"Oh really? Well that's a fallacy fallacy. The fact that I can't outmatch you with detached logic and instead choose to respond with different tactics does not make me wrong. Oh, and I was using myself as a valid counterexample that still needs to be refuted, I'd be less than I am without the negative sides of my personality, and I'm not the only one. I simply used myself to make sure that you thought my point through thoroughly."
Malefor hummed thoughtfully. "Well played. I'll come back with a rejoinder to that later on, once I think of one."
Imperia grinned at Malefor and brushed her wing against his. "Maybe I'm right about morality."
"Maybe…" The purple dragons shrugged. "It wouldn't be the first time you've been right." His wing flicked, but he didn't pull away.
The pair of dragons emerged into the sunlight of Warfang. There were high buildings on all sides and a pair of guard dragons standing on either side of the door. The dragons were there to guard Imperia, but the purple dragon was right beside her. For a split second nobody moved, and then the guards both spoke.
"Spyro?" One asked doubtfully.
"Malefor?" The other said.
The two guards looked at each other, the one who had said Spyro obviously hadn't even thought of Malefor, and he stared back at the purple dragon with a terrified expression.
"Malefor!" The second guard growled again, stepping forwards.
"I'm meant to be here." Malefor said smoothly. "Go and check with Terrador and he'll tell you so." The pure confidence with which he spoke left the guards unsure.
"W-where did you come from?" The first guard asked.
"Ask Terrador, he'll explain."
"Watch them." The second guard growled, and then he ran down the stairs to find Terrador.
The first guard tried to get between Malefor, Imperia and the exit. Malefor smiled at him. "Don't tell anyone I'm here, we don't want to cause a panic, do we? I'm busy, so I'm leaving and you are not allowed to follow me. If they ask why you let me go then say that Imperia and myself disappeared in a flash of light, they will believe you."
The guard shook his head.
"I actually will disappear in a flash of light if necessary." Malefor used wind to nudge the guard aside and then walked away, Imperia walked with him.
The guard scrambled after them, but was blocked by a wall of wind; by the time he'd flown over it Malefor and Imperia had gone.
Imperia and Malefor walked around the dragon temple, heading towards one of the rarely used side entrances, they passed nobody as they walked. There was a nice view of the Warfang skyline to their right.
Malefor sighed, looking thoughtful. His eyes scanned across the buildings of Warfang.
"This city was my home."
Imperia looked at him, seeing hints of nostalgia in Malefor's behaviour. She gave him a smile.
"This city is my home too. It's a beautiful place. You could live here, if you chose to."
"You live in the northern tower, right? You've mentioned that you had the rooms renovated, I'd like to see that."
Imperia laughed. "Oh please, my best work by far has been Cynder's fortress, compared to that my own little projects are just dabbling."
"That's not true, you used tonnes of my resources to lavishly decorate that fortress, but you don't live in it, so I don't think you had the time to make the entire palace utterly perfect. I'd like to see what you've done to your home."
"Thanks, I can hardly refuse after you complimented me like that, can I?" Imperia added a hint of flirtatiousness to her voice. "I'll show you where I live sometime soon then. But first, you've already met Flare, so… I think I ought to show you my other partner!"
Imperia skipped ahead before taking a quick left and darting into a door in the dragon temple; leaving Malefor behind her looking more than a little bit bemused.
The purple dragon looked around the temple as he walked after Imperia. He walked briskly, not wanting to lose her, but he could quite easily track her lavender scent so he didn't need to break into an undignified run in order to keep her in sight.
The dragon temple was much grander then he remembered it. When he had been in Warfang he had spent almost all of his time in the massive caverns below the city. Then the temple had simply been a building with one large circular room for meetings, with nothing interesting in it. Malefor could tell that the temple was now a school, he could see evidence of young dragons inhabiting this place, he also spotted areas with lots of shallow claw marks, suggesting that dragons could run and play in those places without needing to be careful of damaging the stone.
Malefor hadn't been to a place like this since he'd been a child. Being back here now felt unusual to the purple dragon.
It felt strangely… nice.
Malefor followed Imperia's scent around a corner, but then the scent stopped. Malefor frowned. Imperia had gone into a nearby classroom. He went to the door, but the classroom was occupied by several young dragons. It was an obvious trap. Malefor kept going down the corridor.
After a few paces he smelt lavender again, she hadn't gone into the classroom, she had only wafted some of her scent in there to fool him.
Malefor wasn't sure if he should be annoyed or amused. The wind dragoness had known how he would follow her, so she was deliberately playing games with him by manipulating where her scent led him.
Malefor was not the sort of dragon who ought to be 'messed around' with. Then again Imperia was the type of dragon who would mess around with him anyway.
The purple dragon activated dragon time. He wasn't going to play along too much. He walked after the sliver female, reluctantly deciding that he was amused rather than annoyed.
Malefor caught up to Imperia where she was running down towards one of the meeting rooms. She was still frozen in time, her body was totally still with only one of her four paws touching the ground, she was poised gracefully, looking back to where she knew Malefor would be following, and she was laughing. It was a beautiful moment.
Malefor cocked his head as he looked at her; he admired her shapely figure and the playful lively look on her face. He walked right up to her before deactivating dragon time.
To Imperia it seemed like Malefor had appeared beside her in a flash of purple light, she yelped in surprise and skidded to a halt.
"That… is so cool!" She said. After a brief moment of shock she started walking again.
Malefor fell into step beside her. "I'm glad you think so. However I doubt that many will share your view about such theatrics."
"You might be surprised. This city has gotten used to me, and you're nowhere near as silly."
Malefor snorted with laughter at that. "You do have a point there."
Imperia nodded, she turned into a separate room, Malefor followed her automatically before he realised that there was a blue dragon already in the room. His eyes met those of the blue dragon, and it was just a moment too late to use dragon time.
Imperia looked between Cyril and Malefor for a split second, and then she spoke. "Cyril, where's Volteer? I'd like to introduce two of the most important males in my life to each other. It'll be hilarious, wouldn't you say?"
Cyril's expression went through several rapid phases. Firstly had been irritation at seeing Imperia and a strange dragon walk into the room, secondly was what could best be called determination as he took a step forwards as if to stop her. Determination became mixed with shock and a slight bit of fear once Cyril realised exactly who Imperia had walked into the room with. He failed to speak for long enough to hear Imperia's words, and then the primary expression on his face became one of bewilderment.
Imperia had to laugh at his expression, and Malefor chuckled slightly as well. Cyril gaped at them for half a second, before regaining his composure.
"Impe- Mal- what? Whe-? How?"
Or not.
Imperia waited politely for Cyril to put together a coherent sentence. Malefor wasn't entirely sure how to respond to this sort of situation, it was simply too strange.
"What is going on?" Cyril demanded of Imperia.
"Malefor came; he talked to Terrador, now I'm free again. Where's Volteer?"
Cyril spluttered, struggling to express his shock and make sense of what was going on. Imperia's explanation was hopelessly inadequate.
Malefor knew better then to underestimate the ice dragon, Cyril was paralysed by indecision, but any hint aggression would probably result in the ice dragon making an instant recovery from that, having seen a clear course of action, and an ice spike fired at his head a millisecond later. He stayed quiet. He had to admire Imperia's quick thinking; her methods were questionable, to say the least, but she'd controlled the situation expertly, perhaps even more effectively then Malefor could have.
Cyril spoke warily now.
"Why is he here?"
Imperia responded with a smile, and then she shrugged and looked back at the purple dragon. "I don't know exactly. Malefor?"
Malefor considered the two of them thoughtfully.
"During the battle at Shattershelf I took a prisoner. I've simply come to return her as a gesture of goodwill."
Imperia frowned. "A Warfang dragon? I thought Terrador accounted for everyone."
"We did account for everyone." Cyril said briefly, with a suspicious frown.
"Not a Warfang dragon; one of the fire dragons. She was brought down by the war machines during the siege. Gracious had given orders that all fighting dragons were to be killed, but I felt otherwise."
"Why bring this fire dragoness here? And where, supposedly, is she?" Cyril didn't bother to hide his disbelief.
"Outside the city gates. I put her to sleep and left her by the road. Even I can't do everything, and infiltrating your city was enough of a challenge without bringing her. As for why here specifically, well-" He smiled slightly. "I knew that it would be Warfang dragons that would try to come looking for me, and that it would be Warfang where Imperia was held."
"You're completing multiple goals with a single move." Imperia nodded. "That makes sense."
Malefor looked at her, and some sort of understanding seemed to pass between them. Malefor hesitated, no longer looking so relaxed. "You'll be glad to know that Ember is alright, she and Cynder are both perfectly fine, as is Spyro. I left Cynder and Ember in a room together."
Imperia snorted. "Better be careful, or you'll find a smoking ruin when you get back."
This comment earned her a glare from the purple dragon. "That isn't likely, but I have no intention of delaying here overlong."
Imperia nodded, Malefor went to continue but Imperia interrupted him. "Cyril, we should probably see to that fire dragon before she wakes."
Cyril considered the two of them. "I don't trust Malefor with only you keeping watch on him." He turned to Malefor. "Maybe I couldn't stop you from leaving, but that doesn't mean I'm willing to leave you alone without a trusted dragon present."
Imperia began to grin. "No need to worry, Cyril. Volteer's coming."
Cyril frowned. "How-?"
Imperia flicked her wings. "Wind dragon, remember? And I know exactly how Volteer's body shape feels."
The silver dragoness was correct; Volteer hurried through the door an instant later.
"What's going on? I overheard fragments of information from Flare, cause for speculation, rumours, hints at…" The electric dragon trailed off, his mouth falling open as his eyes processed Malefor.
Imperia smiled, she circled away from Malefor and nearer to Volteer, but she also shot a glance at Cyril. "I suggest you find someone to look for this fire dragoness."
Cyril, surprisingly, left without a comment.
Imperia happily turned back to Volteer and Malefor, wondering what would happen.
"Oh… Ah… ahem… hello?" Volteer didn't seem fearful of the purple dragon, but he was clearly somewhat shaken. After a few moments he hurriedly closed his gaping mouth.
Malefor smiled and inclined his head in respect for the other dragon. "Imperia has told me a great deal about you, Volteer. I'm pleased to meet you." The purple dragon's aura of detached coldness was fading again as he engaged in the conversation.
Volteer blushed before replying. "I've only recently been privy to information on your association with Imperia; she spoke very highly of you." He glanced across at Imperia, who nodded cheerfully.
Malefor laughed. "We'll see, do tell me if I live up to her comments. What would you do if you were in my position?" He considered the two other dragons. "You both know more about Warfang then I do. How would the city react to my presence here?"
Volteer chuckled.
Malefor looked at him, expecting him to speak, but apparently the electric guardian was just going to laugh.
Imperia shrugged. "It's hard to guess. Poorly at first, for sure, the question is how long it'd take everyone to warm up to you. I imagine that the moles would accept you without too much trouble; they've always been able to see the benefits of having powerful allies."
"Indeed." Volteer said. "The moles, despite lacking in stature, have remarkable endurance and strength; however they are well aware that they're best served by associating with other more powerful races and using their essential, invaluable, unparalleled and irreplaceable building skills for the benefit of both them and their allies, who, where and whatever those allies might be."
Malefor looked at Volteer; the lightning dragon's comment had been entirely accurate, but it had been phrased in an unusually complicated way.
Malefor had never previously considered the moles to be of great value, when he needed things built he had used the apes or the orcs for labour. The apes were difficult to control as well as being severely limited in terms of their adaptability, while the orcs were only capable of very basic problem solving and couldn't comprehend more abstractly creative forms of thought at all. Anything that required actual intelligence he had usually preferred to design by himself, such as Cynder's former abode in Concurrent Skies. Moles, however, were excellent builders; they were highly intelligent, with practical minds that excelled at architecture and engineering, plus they typically had honest and trustworthy natures.
"So the moles might take my side…" Malefor decided to appreciate moles more in the future, the more he thought about them the more appealing they looked as potential allies. "How long would it take to gain some support?"
"Weeks, probably." Imperia said.
"And Cyril would almost certainly prove to be trouble." Volteer added. "For the moment he'll undoubtedly be thinking that you're beyond him and cannot be dealt with by his preferred means, but if you tried to engage in political activities then you'd be stepping straight into his sphere of influence."
Malefor looked amused. "Cyril's preferred means?"
"He can use laws like a cheetah would use a battle-axe." Imperia said.
"Or a club." Volteer added helpfully. "A great big steel club with dried blood and dully gleaming spikes all over it."
Imperia shook her head at that. "More like an axe, I think, it's got sharper edges and can be swung faster. The point is that if you're answerable to authority then Cyril will personally make sure that you never do anything the slightest bit dangerous ever again." She tapped her snout thoughtfully; internally wondering if that could actually be a good thing.
Malefor nodded. "I see. Well I don't have time for that now, once I can afford to spend months dealing with Cyril, dragons, moles and everyone else then perhaps I shall consider ways to get Warfang on my side. Imperia your comment on weapons reminds me, I would like to borrow your Dragnslayer."
Volteer frowned. "What would you plan to be doing with a weapon imbibed with such abilities, and surrounded by such sinister reputation, and coupled with an ominous name, and which I might add is of great value to Imperia? Why, the Dragonslayer is a dangerous tool with a definitive purpose, and that purpose is not one which many dragons would approve of, ah, and would you plan to threaten Spyro with it? Because if that is the case then I feel it would be unwise to let you have it. In fact, you haven't yet explained what you're doing with Spyro at all."
Malefor raised a paw in a calming gesture, stopping Volteer's tirade of comments.
"You know about Spyro's dark side, naturally. Well I'm solving that problem for you. Spyro isn't going to be harmed; indeed he'll be benefited by this, just like Cynder and I were."
"But the Dragonslayer? It slays dragons; it was named by someone who had a very literal mind!" Volteer still didn't look happy.
"I'm not going to use it for that." Malefor said. He glanced at Imperia. "What do you think? May I borrow it?"
Imperia hesitated. "I'd willingly let you… If I currently had it."
Malefor looked at her, the silver dragoness shrugged apologetically. "Please tell me that you had to give it to Terrador, so that you couldn't use it to escape your cell."
"Ah… no. I sort of… gave it to Cynder."
"Well that's just great. Imperia, if I may ask… what in the name of the Ancestors were you thinking when you gave Cynder that spear?" Malefor allowed his voice to rise slightly in volume.
Imperia looked at the floor and mumbled. "I just wanted to help her…"
"The moment Spyro is freed he will become Dark Spyro. That was the drawback of the method I used to keep him from changing too early. I set up defences, but they'll only slow the two of them down, and against that spear my sigils are next to useless."
Malefor spoke rapidly to himself, walking briskly around the room.
"She didn't use the spear before, not even when I was there." He looked at Imperia. "She had perfect opportunities to use the spear on me, but she didn't. Why not?" He answered his own question immediately. "She's waiting for something, or she forgot she could summon it. Either way she will escape eventually, and she'll go after Spyro. Imperia, come with me."
"Huh?" Imperia blinked at him, blushing slightly.
"You caused this problem, and I don't want you to cause further disasters, but I need you to reason with Cynder."
"Are you sure?" Imperia looked hesitant.
"Cynder's escape is a definitive, and it will happen after X amount of time. The longer we wait the faster the time remaining until amount of time X elapses, the decrease grows faster at an exponential rate. If it hasn't happened yet then it becomes progressively more urgent that we return. Yes, I am sure."
"Malefor?" Volteer nervously spoke even as Malefor stalked across the room and opened his wings. "Did you just transfer a substantial value of gems to me, or are my magical senses somehow giving me inaccurate information?"
"I did transfer gems to you. An advance payment." Malefor didn't slow down as he replied. "Imperia, we need to go."
"An advance payment? For wh-"
Volteer's question was answered when Malefor took off, the purple dragon blasted a hole in the roof as he accelerated into the sky.
"Oh. Right. Insurance costs. That's… reasonable." Volteer mumbled.
Imperia shrugged apologetically. "We'll talk about it all once I've gone and rescued Cynder from Malefor. Or possibly once I've rescued Malefor from Cynder. We'll see how it goes, and I'll tell you everything later. I love you, bye!"
Imperia kissed him before running across the room, Volteer hurriedly waved goodbye.
"Oh! And say goodbye to Flare for me too!"
The silver dragoness followed Malefor out through the hole in the ceiling and disappeared.
Volteer frowned after them. "But hang on… considering time X is inevitable then isn't it more logical to begin your calculation from the moment you left as opposed to from the present? In which case every moment has an equal chance of being time X, and therefore no moment is more urgent then the next, aside from it being one more moment in which time X might occur."
He looked up at the hole in the roof.
"Malefor! Your logic is overly pessimistic and results in an unnecessary sense of time pressure that has nothing to do with the actual causation of the events you're concerning yourself with!"
There was no reply, but Volteer hadn't really expected one. He frowned to himself.
"Hmm… neither view is technically wrong. His is just more urgent. Then again… Sometimes urgency is needed. Malefor called it an amount of time X, where as I considered X to be a certain time that could occur at any time beginning from a specified moment…"
He looked back up at the roof.
"Nevermind! You have a fair point!"
Cyril walked briskly back into the room just in time to hear Volteer talking to an empty smoking hole in the stone. "Volteer! Where is Mal… uh… what are you doing?"
I'd like to know what you thought of this chapter, particularly about Imperia and Malefor.
Another thing:
I'm thinking of writing a new story, you can see the current outlines for ideas on my profile, but I think that now is a good time for me to ask you all what you would want from a story of mine. What fandom, genre, plot, important moments or whatever would you like to see in a story? I'm interested to try new things.
Please don't worry, though. I am still thoroughly absorbed in A Duel with Destiny, and it's not about to end.
The next update may be delayed, that's because the whole story has been leading up to the next moment. It will be a multi part chapter, and I'll post all the parts over the course of a single week. The only thing is that I need to finish writing it first ;)
Remember way back in chapter 5 when I said that Spyro and Cynder each have another song to be revealed later? I said it ages ago, so you may have forgotten, but I did say it. That time will be next time.
I'll see you then.
-4Dragons