Chapter Eight – Shadows on Ice
"I don't like this," Yami muttered. Unlike the day before, Yami and the Purple Knight flanked Yugi on either side, adapting their pace to Yugi's shorter stride. Never had anyone given Yugi this sort of consideration before, and he wasn't sure how to feel about it.
"It does seem uncommonly quiet," the Purple Knight agreed. "How long have we been traveling in the Dragon Lands?"
"Nearly an hour. I would have thought that Seto would have met us at the border with a full wing of his fire-breathers, but..." Yami shrugged. "I don't know what to expect, now."
"Isn't he the Lord of Ice and Dragons?" Yugi asked.
"Yes. Oh, you mean about his fire-breathers? He is lord of all dragons, so he has access to all the elemental attacks through them."
"Wow." Yugi pondered the possibilities. "All the elements at his command... He's very powerful, then."
"Do not forget one important thing," the Purple Knight suggested. "Every dragon, even the Lord of Dragons himself, casts a shadow. My Lord Yami is the more powerful. He knows the inner darkness of any being that casts a shadow. If needed, he can evoke Shadows to mirror that darkness, in the form of a creature's innermost fears, as a potent attack."
"Yeouch!" Yugi glanced sidelong at Lord Yami and considered the implications of that power.
"Perhaps Lord Seto doesn't care to face such..."
Ironically timed to Yugi's words, dragons of all sizes, shapes and colors popped into being in the sky overhead, while others slithered snake-like and wingless upon the ground.
"Ah!" Yami smiled fiercely, while an unholy red light filled his eyes. "This is what I expect from the Lord of Dragons! He seeks to overwhelm my power with his dragons. Little does he know that this is nothing compared to the Cold Shadows I have honed my power against for so many, many years."
"Lord Yami!" A commanding figure stood upon the back of a great, winged, silver dragon. Long reins were clasped in the figure's left hand, while the right hand seethed with some sort of power. "I might let you retreat, like the cowardly dog you are, if you turn and leave now."
"Retreat?" Yami shouted up at the rider, who could only be Lord Seto. "Why should I retreat when I have the advantage?"
At his gesture, the shadow of the silver beast the Lord of Dragons rode reared up from the ground and bit on its own caster's tail. Lord Seto cursed as his energy shot went wild, striking and freezing a great tract of ground so he could maintain his balance by grasping his riding reins with both hands. A well-placed ice shot pinned his dragon's shadow to the ground. Unable to budge its own shadow, his silver dragon was likewise immobilized.
The Dragon Lord sprouted white leathery dragon wings of his own, and took to the air under his own power. Flanking him on both sides, as well as directly above and below him were dragon-winged humanoids. Thus protected, his shadow obscured and overlapped by others on the ground, Lord Seto called down to his rival again.
"What brings your cursed shadows here to darken my land?" Lord Seto demanded. "No matter. I won't permit you to invade here!"
He formed a giant, seething mass of energy between both hands and launched it at Lord Yami. Without a sound, the Purple Knight threw himself in the path of that energy, which instantly encased him in ice and froze him to the ground. Roaring, Lord Yami gestured, and the shadows of the Dragon Lord and his protective phalanx of drakes twisted together. In the air above, Lord Seto and his drakes collided with each other. Cursing wildly, Lord Seto unleashed a barrage of ice-bolt attacks, seeking to strike the Shadow Lord.
Laughing, darting in and out of every shadow cast upon the ground, and some of those cast upon the clouds in the air, Lord Yami taunted Lord Seto. Yugi wondered at his insane behavior before he realized that more often than not, Seto's wild ice shots immobilized one of his own dragons, instead of striking the teasing Shadow Lord.
Yugi could only stare in horror as one of the land-bound dragons dodged one those misguided shots – and the ice-bolt headed straight toward him. There was no time for him to try to dart out of the way, for the shot was a seething ball of blue-white energy thirty feet wide. He closed his eyes and wondered what it would feel like to be instantly frozen as the Purple Knight had already been. He didn't know for sure, but Yami didn't seem too upset that his Guardian Knight had been frozen. Yugi suspected that the Purple Knight would be okay once he thawed out again, but Yugi was only flesh and blood, not a creature of Shadow as the Purple Knight was.
"YUGI!" The note of panic in Yami's voice deepened Yugi's fear that being hit by a bolt of ice launched by the Dragon Lord was a very bad thing. A moment later, he was abruptly pulled into someone's arms. The pull of gravity suddenly disoriented him, as did a curious fwapping sound.
"YUGI!" Yami's voice sounded tiny and far away. Yugi opened his eyes in surprise, and started violently. Arms closed around him restrainingly tight, and alien blue eyes, set in an entirely alien-seeming face, widened. That face shook from side to side as the creature cautioned Yugi against sudden movements. Yugi turned his head slowly, orienting on the ground that was receding further and further away with each wing-beat. He noticed how Yami stood next to a misshapen pile of ice, and shouted up at Lord Seto who hovered above him.
"He's only human! How dare you attack him like that?!"
"How is it my fault that you brought a frail human along and failed to protect him adequately?" Lord Seto retorted.
"If you hadn't attacked us, and frozen my Guardian, he would have been protected!"
"If you..." the rest of Lord Seto's statement was carried away by the wind as the creature carrying Yugi into the sky flew higher.
"They, uhm, like to argue, don't they?" Yugi ventured. For an answer, the creature pantomimed a big smile. Since it revealed a mouthful of needle-sharp teeth, it wasn't quite as reassuring as the creature probably intended. Hoping that it wasn't carrying him away to eat him, and Yugi suddenly wondered what the thing did eat, and why so many things (well, only two, but it seemed like a lot) seemed to want to eat him all of a sudden, Yugi thought it best to see about getting into the creature's good graces, somehow.
"Uhm, thank you from saving me. From that, uhm, ice blast. I think it might have killed me if it connected."
The creature locked its uncanny gaze on Yugi's eyes and nodded very deliberately. "You didn't want me killed?" Yugi asked softly. The creature shook its head solemnly. "Thanks." Yugi repeated. He looked down again, to find that the creature had flown them even higher. He noticed that the battle seemed to have wound down. There were still the bright bodies of dragons glinting in the sunlight, and the darkness of their shadows alongside them, but all activity seemed to have stopped. Perhaps Lord Yami and Lord Seto were still yelling at each other. Yugi noticed something, and in trying to see better, turned against the right arm of the creature flying with him. Obligingly, the creature banked to the right.
"Thanks," Yugi muttered absently. A few more of the mute requests to see the entire field showed Yugi something he thought was significant. "Lord Seto waited until we were past the villages before showing up." His glance darted into the creature's face. "Was that intentional?" A nod answered his question. "So, he cares for and protects the humans of his land, and isn't just the Lord of Dragons, right?" Another nod. "That's why you saved me. Lord Seto wasn't trying to hurt me with that attack, was he?" A shake of the head answered this question. "So, what now?" Yugi shivered. They were flying so high up the air had become quite cold.
The creature gestured with his sharp chin in the direction they were flying in. Yugi turned his head to look, and once again, the creature turned in his flight enough for Yugi to see. A giant castle, set into the very summit of a mountain caught his eye. "Lord Seto's castle, no doubt." Yugi sighed. "I hope it's not as creepy inside as Lord Yami's castle was!"
The castle didn't appear creepy. The creature flew them to what had to be a landing strip for the dragons, and set Yugi carefully on his feet before releasing him. Now that Yugi could see the creature properly, he was sure it was one of the drakes who had flanked Lord Seto after Yami unseated the Lord of Dragons from his mount. A little more than six feet tall, the drake, if drake it was, was covered in fine white scales that became larger and more plate-like across the torso. He appeared to have hands as dexterous as a human's, tipped with a dragon's claws. His leathery wings were like a dragon's, and white. The blue eyes were without pupils, but still seemed to house intelligence. The reptilian features of the face were sharp, and very hard to read.
"You are a – drake, right?"
"Yessss," the drake responded.
"You talk!" Yugi smiled. "Why didn't you speak before?"
"It'sss hard to talk while flying," the drake responded. The drake had an uncommonly soft voice, and pronounced sibilance.
"Thank you, again, for saving me," Yugi bowed slightly toward the drake. "I am Yugi. What is your name?"
"I am... I am the White Knight. I guard my Lord Ssseto," the White Knight responded. "And you do not introduccce yourssself fully. You are the Hero."
"I... How...? How did you know?!"
"Our Lordsss might be sssomewhat dim, but we Guardiansss are not, Hero. We recognizzze you."
"Why did you not bring him back to the ground once the fighting stopped?" Lord Seto demanded as he landed. The white dragon wings he'd flown in on disappeared once he stood on the stones of the landing-way.
"I wonder about that myself." Lord Yami landed after the Dragon Lord. Seto glared at him with a sour, disfavoring glance, then gestured. The wings of Shadow Yami wore disappeared.
"Perhaps my brother Guardian senses the same thing about Yugi that I do," a restored, and be-winged, Purple Knight suggested. His purple, armored wings disappeared at Seto's impatient gesture. The Purple Knight stumbled slightly, for he had not completed his landing before his wings were taken away from him.
"Seto...!" Yami's eyes gleamed red at the insult to his Guardian.
"Peace, my lord. I tarried too long before landing," the Purple Knight said.
Yami glared at Seto's smirk, but held his tongue. Ignoring the power-play between the lords, Seto's Guardian responded to the Purple Knight's observation. "Indeed, I do. Lord Ssseto, Yugi isss the Hero of legend. I can sssenssse it."
Lord Seto's gaze raked across Yugi with a nearly-physical presence. "So, you will abandon me?" Yugi sensed hurt under the accusation. Immediately the White Knight dropped to his knees and bowed his head respectfully before his lord.
"Of courssse not, my lord! It is my duty to guard you. But, Yugi isss the Hero. He can wield the power to break the hold of the Lord of Chaosss upon the land. That would make you Lord over all dragon-kind, and ressstore the onesss the Chaosss Lord has ssstolen from you."
Lord Seto shook his head. "Dreams and fairy-tales!" he snapped.
"It will mean nothing to you, but the power of the Well of Shadows, the only aspect of my power out of my reach aside from the Shadows the Lord Dragon of Blackness and Chaos has stolen from me, has been broken. By the Hero's hand," Yami stated. "I now have complete dominion over the Cold Shadows."
"You mentioned them to me once..." Seto seemed thoughtful. "Shadows that you fought against, and couldn't control completely. But how could this one have helped you with that?" Seto sneered.
For an answer, Yami summoned the Gloomblade. "He entered the darkest part of my citadel and found this."
"Is that – the Gloomblade?! You've been trying to find it for centuries!"
"It is indeed. Yugi found it for me."
Lord Seto stared at Yugi again, and shook his head. "The Hero? I can't..." A cunning smile crossed his face. "There is no way for the earthbound to leave my Aerie. Even your ability to walk through shadows is useless here, in the highest keep of my power. You will remain here tonight, while I think on all of this." Lord Seto turned and stalked toward the arch leading into the castle part of his Aerie. "Guide them to the guest rooms, Guardian. Let them rest, under guard, until evening."
– – – – –
They might have been under guard, but Lord Seto's hospitality was more than adequate. Lord Yami, Yugi, and the Purple Knight were guided to a suite of rooms that contained, among other amenities, lofty, airy ceilings, an enormous bathing pool, wardrobes filled with clothes to fit anyone, including drakes since many of the garments had slits for wings, and a surprising sense of peace and calm.
After his bath, Yugi wrapped up in a soft and fluffy robe, and padded barefoot out into the giant common room in their suite. He leaned his head against the frame of a window huge enough for a dragon to fly through and gazed out upon the land below. Dragons flew in and out of the Aerie without ceasing. Yugi was able to watch as some of them stooped to the massive flocks of herd beasts below, and selected their dinners.
"Thossse herdsss are kept sssolely to feed dragonsss," the White Knight told him. He approached the window himself to point down. "Dragonsss who feed upon flesssh are not permitted to take from any flocksss tended by human villagesss. Only the flocksss at the bassse of the Aerie."
"There are legends of dragons who feed upon human flesh," Yugi mused aloud.
The White Knight nodded. "Unfortunately, thossse legendsss are true." The White Knight turned a glance toward the Purple Knight.
"Speaking a human language tires him, and I am acquainted, more or less, with the facts. Permit me to elaborate," the Purple Knight asked as he stepped forward. Yugi nodded.
"Dragons are far more than animals, but still have some of the instincts of the predator. When injured, they seek solitude and easier prey. It is a sad fact that to such dragons, humans often appear as the easiest prey there is. Dragons that have tasted human flesh have the hardest time being satisfied with any other food. Lord Seto does not permit such behavior to continue."
"What happens to them?"
"They are brought here, and imprisoned for their own good. It takes years, sometimes centuries, but such dragons are rehabilitated and retrained to take only the food permitted them by the Dragon Lord. Only after he is satisfied that no lust for human flesh remains in them are they set free once more."
"It isssn't punissshment," the White Knight added.
"No, such incarceration isn't punishment, it's rehabilitation. Lord Seto has a deep understanding of his dragon subjects, and is concerned that they co-exist peacefully with the humans living in his land, as well."
"Doesn't he have human subjects?"
"No, no more than my Lord Yami does. Responsibility to humans, yes, but ruler-ship over them, no. Seto prevents dragons from running amok and harming humans. He also controls the destructive power of Ice, mitigating winters that would otherwise be too harsh for people living here, so far to the north, to survive. Some humans are drawn to the Dragon Lands. Some tend the flocks of the Aerie, or otherwise perform the duties of servants here in the castle, and others just like the way dragons appear in the sky. Some dragons are even friendly, and it's not unusual for dragons to befriend humans, or vice versa."
"So the humans who live here aren't subjugated against their will," Yugi mused.
"No. Humansss are permitted to leave the Dragon Landsss any time they want." the White Knight clarified. "Only dragonsss are watched by Lord Ssseto. Many are trusssted to leave, but they know their actionsss are watched closely by the Dragon Lord. Lord Ssseto can appear wherever a dragon isss in the blink of an eye."
"That's a power like Yami's ability to walk through shadows."
The Purple Knight nodded. "And his power is supreme, if he wishes to enforce it, here in the Dragon Lands, just as my Lord Yami's power would overwhelm even Lord Seto's if they were in the Shadow Lands." Yugi glanced from one knight to the other apprehensively. "What?"
The White Knight's face split into his disconcertingly fang-filled grin. "He worriesss that we will fall into dissscord over our lordsss and their powersss."
"Oh! Nothing of the sort!" The Purple Knight turned and buffeted the White Knight playfully on the shoulder. "Each serves his own lord, but we have a connection to each other even deeper than that."
"Oh?" Yugi looked from one to the other – imposing nine-foot tall purple armored knight with glowing purple eyes just barely visible through the slit in his visor, and the still-impressive six foot white-scaled drake who stared back at him with alien blue eyes. "I don't see..."
"A resssemblanccce?" The White Knight doubled over laughing. Even the Purple Knight chuckled.
"Let me say we are brothers by spirit, rather than blood. I suppose if Lord Yami commanded it directly, I would be compelled to attack the White Knight..."
"...and if Lord Ssseto commanded I would attack the Purple Knight..."
"...but barring that, we are far more alike than unalike. Despite our appearances."
Yugi nodded. Brothers by spirit? That made sense. It felt right. "Well, then. Even if I weren't before, I am most certainly now, very pleased to make your acquaintance, White Knight."
"The honor to ssserve the Hero is mine," the White Knight replied.
"Hmph. Still making friends, I see," Lord Yami stated. Yugi froze, and stared up into his faintly glowing red eyes with a stricken, nearly guilty air. Yami laughed. "It's okay! You are allowed to make friends other than me!" He laughed again and deliberately banged into Yugi shoulder to shoulder as he stepped past him to admire the view from the window.
Eyes wide with surprise, Yugi looked up at the Purple Knight. The knight nodded gravely, but Yugi definitely got the sense that he made Yami's stern Guardian Knight smile by making the Lord of Shadows laugh.
"You ssshould get dresssed," the White Knight suggested. "Lord Ssseto will be sssummoning you to dinner sssoon."
Yugi found his hand reaching toward a gray and black tunic in the closet. His own clothes were gone, sent down into the depths of the Aerie to be cleaned, the White Knight had told him. Before his hand closed upon the dark, tempting garment, Yugi realized he was in a slightly tricky social situation.
If he wore 'shadow' colors, it might be construed that he favored the Lord of Shadows, and the Lord of Dragons could take insult. There was something about Lord Seto that made him think that he better mind every "p" and every "q" in order to not offer anything that could be construed as an insult. But, if he wore blue, or white, colors which could be seen to 'favor' Lord Seto, Yami might be upset.
He never bothered to care about what he was wearing so much before, as long as it was comfortable, but now the choice seemed almost like a minefield. He finally settled on a dark green tunic, hoping that the color would be viewed as 'neutral' in the eyes of the two volatile lords.
Lord Yami smiled and raised an eyebrow at him when he appeared in the main room of their suite again. Yugi relaxed a tiny bit. One down, and one to go. The White Knight led them from their rooms through the castle the Aerie was constructed of, into a large dining hall. Lord Seto watched them cross the long room with hooded eyes.
"Your guests, my lord." The White Knight bowed, and stepped to a place just to the side and slightly behind his lord. The Purple Knight mirrored his position behind Lord Yami, leaving Lord Seto, Lord Yami and Yugi as the primary three in a small conversation group.
"Had I realized how ineptly Yami was protecting you, I would have been more careful that my attacks not threaten you," Lord Seto said by way of greeting.
"To translate, Seto is coming as close as he ever does to apologizing for his mistake," Yami said.
Dinner started as a tense affair, with both the lords vying for the upper hand in their evidently long-seated squabble. Once Yugi caught a glance that looked remarkably like an eye-roll from the White Knight, and the Purple Knight's answering shoulder shrug, he stopped worrying and began enjoying himself. By the end of the evening, he was almost certain that the animosity between the Lord of Shadows and the Lord of Dragons was mostly on the surface, almost as if for show. He suspected that underneath all their bluster and put-downs, Yami and Seto each actually admired the other – but each was too stubborn to recognize it, much less admit it aloud.
– – – – –
Author's notes –
Next chapter teaser – The Lord of Ice and Dragons (Seto insisted he have another chapter. Grrr!)