Frostbite
5
Epilogue
{Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon Soundtrack: Big Valley}
There was a nice current coming from the south. It had managed to pick up warm winds as it passed over the Valley and was filtered through the golden leaves of Twilight.
Even this far out on the side of a mountain, it still smelled like lilac, from the bushes that grew at the foot of Twilight's edges during the Spring, bordering the Northern Range.
Cynder kept her gaze locked on the faraway horizon. Before her were immense, endless and golden grasslands, the stretch of the forest, and the distant, white band of a river snaking through the countryside.
Avalar.
She had been so close to it all this time, and she had no idea until now.
Ironic.
Taking a minute to sit on her haunches, she idly toyed with magic around her paw, working the healing spell into her chest with slow swirls of her wrist on unconscious motions.
The flight from the edge of the mountainside had been fairly easy. Though weakened immensely, Cynder had had enough energy to at least get herself out of the deeper fjord-alleys of the range. She had hunted and killed a ram, feasting on its cooked meat in the later afternoon, and dipping herself in a river to rid her hide of the rotten detritus covering it. Cynder remembered that submerging herself in that river had felt better than any bath she had prepared in her castle. Evening was closing in now, leaving Avalar's skies to become a strange blend of deep golds, oranges and blues with stringent clouds.
Cynder was seated on a plateau ringing the hip of a low peak marking the border between the two regions. Birds chirped and the wind whispered softly. The Terror of the Skies enjoyed the warmth from the sun's glare overhead and closed her eyes, finding her center.
Control.
Breathe.
She supposed it was just another annal to add to the pile. Sometimes it got tiresome to think about. But exhaustion was nothing after the last few days, it was… irrelevant.
There was perspective to this kind of thing after a traumatic event. Cynder was content to mull and breathe on the grassy plateau, watch the sunset, watch the grasses turn in the wind and the trees gossip through their fluttering leaves.
I wonder how they'll all react, she thought, suddenly smiling grimly. When they find out I'm not dead.
Cynder's musing rumble silenced, and her eyes slowly opened to match her frown.
"You have never lived."
She at first wondered why that memory out of so many had been the one to return to her in her sleep. But wondering was foolish. It was because of Reslo, and Darkshade. They were the crux.
Cynder could name a hundred allies she had held that had died under her supervision, working alongside her, or in tandem with her. So few of them had any remembrance in the tired dragoness' mind. But something told her Reslo was one of those few. Even Darkshade, even though she had only known him a day.
That brief flicker into the lives of her own subordinates had impacted her. And- she hated to admit it –but those hours before the end had made her feel less alone than she had in years.
Terror of the Skies.
A swallow flew out of one of the trees on the plateau behind her. It fluttered out on hopping paths down into the valley below. Cynder trailed it with her eyes, imagining herself as the creature, only she was not carefree and singing…
She was diving. Screaming.
Screaming.
Like the time of frostbite that had almost killed her.
Her jaw quivering, Cynder rose to her feet and stretched her forelimbs in the evening sun, letting the rays warm her scales as she sunbathed like a happy lizard in the grass.
Times like these were all the same. She started them alone, and when the times ended and she needed to talk about it the most…
…This was all.
She had the air, herself, and the grass.
Though maybe, Cynder could try and will herself to become used to that isolation, but her heart put doubt in her soul about it. The caverns beneath the mountain, they… they made her shiver even now.
This new deployment Malefora was planning in the South… She was basing Cynder in the ancient ruins of the Forlorn Watch, a draconic tower built ages ago and abandoned to nature. Chieftain Visigoth and his Apes had been busy repurposing it in anticipation of her arrival.
All of this beauty, and the secrets it hid under its earthen flesh…
None of that would matter. War was coming again, it was in the air as much as the scent of lilac was. Avalar was beautiful. But like Reslo, like Darkshade, in order to ensure her own survival… these things were unified by the fact that they all were sacrificial lambs.
If only the sky would fall, maybe then the world would end and I would be at peace.
Haunted, Cynder extended her wingspan and took off into the evening sky without a word.
{🎩}
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Fin