"Read it out loud, will you, chief?" Eret asked hesitantly. "I'm finding it a bit difficult to believe, myself."
Hiccup snatched up an ancient looking document with a glare, and began to read out loud.
"On a day like any other the gods descended as mortal men, and in the rock of the island, using their myriad gifts, they carved a place of secrets, where the path to power begins."
He looked at them. "There's more about which gods came down and what they did but I'll just skip that part."
He made to continue, but Snotlout interrupted. "No, wait. What kind of stuff does it say?"
"Just like, Thor used his lightning, Vidar used his strength, Odin used his magic and watched and instructed them, yadda yadda yadda," Hiccup said tiredly. "Do I need to hit you or can I move on from this?"
"What did I do?" Snotlout protested.
"After the whole bit about what they did," Hiccup continued, ignoring him, "it says 'So the chamber was built, and the gods left with a warning never to pursue the secrets within.'"
He looked at Eret. "I don't know why you couldn't just believe me when I told you."
"It is about the gods, chief," Eret replied. "I'm a believer, but it'd take a good bit to convince anyone that the gods were right here."
"You're right, I guess," Hiccup sighed. "Still, I wish we knew something. Like how Myre knew about this when even the Berkians had forgotten."
"Maybe-" Tuffnut began grandiosely but was instantly silenced by Ruffnut's hand slamming down over his face, vying to get her own word in.
"No, maybe- hey!"
Tuffnut had stuck his tongue out with her hand clapped over his mouth.
"Yakface!" she said as she headbutted him hard enough to make him drop to the floor. He sprang up again in an instant and threw himself at her, and they disappeared, rolling over the floor, into another room. Hiccup winced as something crashed.
"I hope that didn't break, whatever it was," he said.
"The only thing that's broken is their brains," Snotlout commented, grinning.
"For once, Snotlout," Hiccup said, his good humour returning to his face as the twins loudly scuffled behind a wall, "you might even be right."
=0=
"It hurts," Myron was saying, over and over, seemingly without pausing for breath. He was lying prostrate on the back of the Razorwhip he'd borrowed. His arm had been tightly bandaged, but evidently the pain was lingering.
"We know, Myron," Alphas said, hopping across the ground towards Wreckage, rustling as he went. They'd retrieved Lysander's body from the inn, left a small pouch of gold coins in their room for the innkeeper to use for repairs, and left. They'd stopped to pick up the wolf carcass that Olympiodoros had battered into the ground, and were now far outside the city, in a part of the rolling plains where the grass grew wild on a long downward slope of the land.
Alphas tripped over a tangled patch of grass and faceplanted into the ground.
Swearing quietly, he got up, and instead of continuing, he plopped down, rustling as he did so, and called Wreckage over to him. The dragon wandered over and sat down beside him, and Alphas began looking through the saddlebags.
Over at the foot of the slope, Stratos and Omegas were laying Lysander to rest. Olympiodoros was sitting some distance from them, hugging his knees to his chest and utterly quiet, staring off at nothing. Alphas had wanted to ask about the bloody cape he'd had around his shoulders the entire time, but Olympiodoros seemed to need some space for now.
He found the bottle of poppy extract, and nudged Wreckage. When the Black Angel turned to look at him, he gently pried the dragon's mouth open and fitted the bottle between the teeth.
"Give it to Myron," he said, gesturing at the person in question.
Wreckage got up and lumbered over to Myron, who was sweating very hard and holding his arm very tightly against his chest. He had, at some point while Alphas was searching for the poppy extract, turned over while lying on the Razorwhip, so he was looking up at the sky, like blue topaz overhead in the light of early morning.
Wreckage nudged him with the bottle, and Myron opened his tightly shut eyes, looked first at Wreckage, then at the bottle between his teeth, then at Alphas, then back at Wreckage. After a moment, he took it from the dragon's mouth, the stopper caught between the dragon's teeth, and drank the entirety of the bottle's contents in a single gulp. He dropped the container after it was emptied, and it bounced in the grass. Wreckage began sniffing through the thick greenery, trying to find the bottle.
Olympiodoros stirred from his reverie removed from the waking world, and looked behind them, beyond the hill Alphas sat on, at the foot of which they were burying Lysander.
Snarling, he leapt up, hands burning orange once again, and was answered by a far wilder sound rapidly approaching.
The fires of his fingers winked out as the wolves crested the hill, Umbra sitting astride the neck of the leader, the wolf with a cloudy eye that had picked her up in the cave.
She held up her hand, a stone, similar to the one that had erased their magic in the cave, held between her fingers, and smiled at Olympiodoros, although there was no humour in the expression.
She let the stone go, and all eyes watched it tumble to the ground, to be lost among the green.
And then everything exploded.
The wolves charged down the hill at the same time as the dragons surged forward. Myron's borrowed dragon whipped itself out from under him, leaving him to fall to the ground. He screamed in soundless pain as he thudded to the grass, the impact jarring his arm. The moment he got his voice back, he heaved every curse he could think of upon the Razorwhip, too enraged and in pain to realize that the dragon, Dice Slice had left him the way it had to weave that lithe body around the throat of a wolf loping towards them, slicing right through the tendons as it curled into an ouroboros around the canine's neck.
The wolf fell, black blood seeping into the ground, and Dice Slice returned to Myron, shielding him from any other attackers.
Alphas tore a patch of grass from the ground, and began to draw in the soil, ignoring the wolves. He had full faith in his companions and their dragons to see what he was trying for, and to buy him time.
Stratos noticed.
The double blades of his axe began to move just a little bit faster.
Olympiodoros saw.
He began tearing into the wolf in front of him with something that could have been mistaken for rage, if Alphas didn't know better.
Omegas looked at him, studied the patterns he was making in the barest second that he had before a wolf snapped at him, and understood instantly.
He carved a pattern of his own into the wolf's teeth, which were unable to hold up to his artistry and shattered. The wolf started backwards, howling in pain, and Omegas closed in.
Alphas tore some more grass out of the hillside and continued to draw.
And then, finally, the last person to notice him noticed him.
Umbra looked over at him from where she was perched on the back of a wolf, and he knew that she too understood.
A series of whistles sounded out, varying degrees of pitch that all worked to drive one specific instruction into the minds of the pack.
She pointed at him, and every wolf's head turned, pale silvery eyes locking onto Alphas.
They darted forward.
Every dragon was shouted into action to slam into the wolves, drive them back, keep them at bay for even just one more second to let Alphas finish his work.
He continued to draw, unwilling to let the mayhem of sound surrounding him distract from the vital task at hand.
At last, he looked up, searching for whoever was closest to the top of the hill.
"Omegas!" he yelled, his voice drowned out by the sound of Olympiodoros' dragon, a Stoker Class species named a Fire Fang, screeching as a wolf's teeth sheared through its tail.
Olympiodoros roared in fury and swung his sword so hard at the wolf that he managed to cut the paw from its leg. It staggered back and fell over, and Olympiodoros went straight for the heart.
"Omegas!" Alphas called again.
This time, his brother heard and looked around questioningly, and Alphas swiped his hand down with urgency. Omegas understood and ducked, and the wolf that had pounced at him slipped down the hillside, tumbling to the bottom. Omegas watched the wolf for a few seconds, then looked back at Alphas.
"The stone!" he shouted. "Find it!"
Omegas nodded and strode up the hill.
Something slimy splashed on Alphas. He didn't waste any energy looking up. He knew what it was.
"I should have Nocte crush you right now," Umbra told him as he made sure that none of his sigils had been disfigured by the splatter of saliva. He didn't even look at her.
"You're not going to," Alphas replied. He retraced a damaged curve, pressed down on some of the blobs of saliva with his hands so it would soak into the dirt, then recreated one of the runes that had been erased by the liquid.
Only then did he look at Umbra, standing over him with her arms folded.
"The only one you've killed is Lysander," he said. "If Myre had told you to kill all of us, you would have by now. You had enough of an opportunity back in your cave, but you didn't."
He tilted his head. "Myre wants to keep us alive."
"Smart boy," Umbra nodded. "He did tell me not to kill all of you…"
In a flash, there was a black blade to his throat.
"I can still kill some of you, can't I?"
"Then do it," Alphas told her, unblinking. "Cut my throat. There's nothing to stop you."
"Well," she said. "If you want."
Up at the crest of the hill, Omegas brought his axe down on the stone and broke it apart.
Down at the base of the hill, Umbra stepped back and swung.
Alphas pressed a finger to the palm of his other hand, and purple exploded, flinging Umbra back. He looked at the drawings he'd made in the soil, and pressed his hand to one corner as Umbra got back up.
Instantly, the world grew dark, early daylight receding to give way to a moonless night, lit by stars.
"What did you do?" Umbra hissed, knife poised to throw.
Alphas looked at her. He threw his hand out towards the stars, all the while keeping his gaze fixed firmly on the assassin. His fingers curled into a fist, gripping the air.
He smiled at her with his teeth, his eyes wide open, an expression more wild and untamed than anything one of her wolves could have ever made, and yanked.
The stars flared, growing brighter and redder. Umbra stared, transfixed, until Alphas spoke.
"Nice little animals you have there," he said, and she whirled back into a defensive stance as she remembered there were enemies around. Alphas tilted his head.
"Let's drive them extinct."
He flicked his hand, and one of the stars in the sky blazed, erupting into a huge fireball that descended upon them, screaming past overhead with a thick trail of smoke and ash streaming behind, and thundered cataclysmically into the hillside, the world shaking at the impact. The wolves jumped out of the way, howling, as the red-hot rock cooled, sizzling in its crater.
"What the hell are you doing?" Umbra shouted. "Stop it!"
Alphas flicked his hand another time, and another star fell out of the sky, crashing this time on top of a wolf, burying them both deep into the ground with the force of impact.
"Stop it!" Umbra cried, as he crushed another wolf with a gesture. "I'll go! I'll go! I won't do anything to you ever again! Not even if Myre tells me to!"
Alphas studied her for a moment, then snapped his fingers.
Several stars detached from the sky at once, careening into the wolves in their burning descent, taking out half the pack at once.
Umbra got down on her knees, and clasped her hands. A tear slipped out from the corner of her eye and streaked down her face.
"Please," she whimpered. "Please. Let them live. Kill me instead, but let them live."
Alphas sighed as he considered it.
"You and your pets can go for now. But if I see you again, I will not hesitate to end you right there."
He took his hand off the sigils in the dirt, and the night sky turned back to day. Umbra scrambled up and ran to the wolves, whistling as she went. The wolves, their ears already flat against their skulls in the face of a force they couldn't bite until it stopped kicking, wasted no time in obeying and bounded off, one of them picking her up in its teeth as it went.
Alphas called Wreckage over, and hauled himself up, gripping the saddle for support. Omegas walked over and helped him climb on.
"You let her go?" he asked, when Alphas was sitting comfortably on top. He nodded.
"Why?"
"She's not really guilty," he said, combing through his hair with the fingers of the hand that didn't have any wolf saliva on it, taming his dishevelled hair a little. "Myre sent her. Myre's responsible for Lysander's death."
He looked at Omegas. "So, Myre's the only person we go after. He's the only one we make pay."
Omegas nodded to himself, looking away in the direction Umbra had gone.
"It makes sense, I guess. Still kind of doesn't sit right with me, though."
Alphas watched him for a moment. "She's a mercenary. A mercenary is a tool. Are you going to be mad at the sword that cut you?"
Omegas held up his hands. "My mind gets you. That doesn't mean my heart does."
"Fair enough."
=0=
"I see," Myre said, never once taking his eyes off Umbra.
They stood in a room on the other side of his ship to his office. This was a wooden box, no furnishings, no windows, no decorations, no occupants other than Myre and Umbra. There was only one door, and it was locked from the outside. Myre had left Modo outside to lock them in. He was no doubt listening with his ear to the door.
She shifted uncomfortably.
"Is that good enough?" she asked. "Is it what you wanted?"
He closed his eyes contemplatively for a moment, hooking his thumb into the waistband of his trousers. "It is… adequate. You only killed one?"
"Yes," she replied. "His name was Lysander, I think."
"I see. Well, he isn't a key player in this game, so I think that much was alright."
"Is that it, then?" Umbra asked after a while. "Have I repaid my debt?"
"Certainly," Myre said.
He waited a little longer.
"So… why isn't the door opening?"
"I haven't told him to open it," Myre replied.
"Why not?" she said, her brow furrowed in confusion. "I thought we were done here?"
"The previous matter is resolved. However," Myre continued, "there is something else."
She raised an eyebrow.
"There is a riddle," he told her, "that they came to your city to retrieve."
He stepped a little closer, looking down at her, formulating the perfect expression to impress upon her the importance of his next question, a blank face with a subtle air of coldness, lacking any humour whatsoever.
"Do they have it?"
"Yes," she replied. "I saw it."
He switched the expression he wore to a lighter one, as if to perk up. "Ah. And did you read it?"
"No," she said. "It was too far away. And it didn't look like it was written in Latin. It was too…"
She made a gesture.
"Too all over the place. All over the page."
"I see. Well, I suppose it's enough to know that much. Your part in this is done."
She gave him a slight bow. "I'm glad to have been of help. If you ever need my assistance, I will gladly give it to you."
"That's nice to hear," he said, smiling calmly at her. He knocked on the door, a specific and complicated rhythm, and heard the clink of keys as Modo found the one that fitted in the lock.
"As for the loss of your wolves," he said, as Modo turned the key, "I have prepared some compensation for you. I understand it can't be easy to lose so much of your pack at once."
He stepped forward right as the door opened, his exit perfectly timed as to look like the world moved for him. Umbra followed like less of a chosen one. Modo shut the door and began to tail them from a distance, just enough to look like it was out of earshot, but not actually be.
Myre didn't mind. This was nothing that Modo couldn't hear.
"You are too kind," Umbra said respectfully.
"I too am human," Myre said. "I can empathize."
"Some people will forget," Orgoze said, emerging soundlessly from the shadows and walking alongside them. Neither Myre nor Umbra was surprised. Myre was Myre, and Umbra did the same thing for a living. "You are just as inhuman as you are not."
Myre accepted the compliment with a nod of his head.
"I have some news for you," Orgoze said.
"I know," Myre replied.
They walked onwards in silence for a while, Modo trailing behind them from a distance.
Where the corridor split, Myre turned to Umbra. "Go down the right, and tell the guard at the second door you see that I have instructions for him to take you to the receiving area. The gifts I have prepared for you will be waiting there. After that, you may leave. He will show you the way."
She nodded and turned to leave, but he called her back.
"Do me a favour and call the guard by his name without first asking for it, while he's leading you to the receiving area. His name is Arshaka."
Umbra was slightly confused, but agreed to it and left. Modo caught up to Myre and Orgoze, and together they continued to the conference room.
When they reached, Orgoze opened the door, and Myre and Modo continued through. Orgoze closed the door behind him as Myre drew a chair and seated himself.
"Now," he said, interlacing his fingers and resting his elbows on his knees as he gazed up at Orgoze, "what is it that you have to tell me?"
Orgoze bowed. "Eurenym has completed his process. He believes he will be accustomed to the change in approximately two days."
"That's good," Myre said. "What else?"
Orgoze licked his lips, nervously. By that action alone Myre understood what he was about to tell him.
"You've located it?" he asked, sitting up.
"We have, sir," Orgoze confirmed. "However, I must advise you against pursuing this course of action-"
"I assure you that I know what I am doing," Myre interrupted quietly. "You do not need to worry about the situation turning volatile. I have it, as always, under control, and I always will."
Orgoze bowed his head. "Very well."
"Show me," Myre commanded, lifting a leg and resting it by the ankle on the knee of the other. "Mark the location on a map."
Orgoze drew a large map from under the table, and set four weights at the corners. He tapped at the edge of an island in the Barbaric Archipelago.
"There is a cave there. It is completely inaccessible. It opens out to sea and there is no way to access it by land. Ships are also an inadvisable option, as the entrance is guarded by sharp rocks. Furthermore, the entrance is only available during low tide."
Myre took in all the information and sat, thinking for a moment. "How big is the entrance?"
"At low tide, about the wingspan of a Nightmare, and half the height of an average ship."
"Could a Tidal Class dragon take you in?"
"It would be a tight fit for most, but a Shockjaw could take you in, perhaps. The cave seems expansive, however. The entire island might even be hollow. You could spend enough time in there that the tide rises again, trapping you inside. Even if you tried to get out by having your dragon swim, you would most likely run out of breath."
"A Sliquifier, then? They let you sit in their mouth if they trust you."
Orgoze shook his head. "It might not have adequate space to move, near the entrance."
Myre was silent for a few minutes.
"I'll figure it out after I've seen it with my own eyes," he finally said. "Prepare a ship to take me there. And make sure that there are Tidal Class dragon riders to accompany me. Two with Shockjaws, one with a Sliquifier, one with a Thunderdrum. And one with a Sand Wraith."
Orgoze bowed. "Understood."
Myre looked at Modo. "Would you like to come? I understand you haven't seen any excitement for a while."
Modo grinned. "Sure thing. I'll get my travel bag ready."
He stood, stretched, then lazily exited the room.
Myre waited a moment, then reached out and knocked on the door. "Leave."
There was an amused sound on the other side of the door, and Modo's footsteps retreated into the distance.
"Well then," Myre said. "You will handle things concerning outside correspondence, in my absence?"
Orgoze nodded. "I can take care of it. If there are any specific instructions, please tell me. I will keep them in mind."
Myre waved a hand at him. "Nothing that you can't figure out on your own. I trust in your ability to dress any political wounds that come your way."
Orgoze bowed again. "Thank you, Myre."
Myre stood up and pushed his chair back into position. Orgoze went to set the map and its weights back in place as Myre opened the door to leave. He paused for a second.
"Orgoze."
"Yes?"
"What is the name of the island where the cave is?"
"It is part of a cluster of islands collectively known as the Meathead Islands," Orgoze said as he collected the weights and deposited them under the table.
Myre nodded and left, closing the door behind him with a soft click.