Alamosa Arena (American Dragons Book 9) Read online

  Her webs were tangled, and difficult to traverse, in the void between worlds, where she lived. Her home was the abyss, since the beginning of thought, and she was very comfortable there. She couldn’t leave it. So she was taking it with her, inching along, slowly preparing herself to reenter time and space. That yellow sun, a special sun, sent the blue-green gem dancing and spinning, giving it light and warmth, then cold and darkness. Two times the blue-green gem would spin, and then, she would appear on its surface. It would be a simple matter after that for her pieces on the Game World to swell. She would blanket the entire planet with her children, those precious pieces of her.

  She’d never before committed so much of herself to any one task. Yet this task was vital.

  She passed the time playing with her doubts, so novel after spending so much of her life in the perfect serenity of omniscience.

  Yes, the questions and doubts were lovely. Why hadn’t Tara Heridan called out to her? The Drokharis child had her, obviously. If only Heridan would give in to her natural inclinations to call out to her mother. That had not happened.

  Another question. How had Quinnestri hidden her planet so well? Aqualyra, in another of the universes, was a true prize, full of life.

  How did Steven Drokharis undo the Terror Trio, not once, but twice? The child had even killed a favorite of hers, another version of himself, Ven Dro. To pervert a hero was a true delight. And yet, that ploy had failed.

  It seemed the son had usurped the power and cunning of the father. Game World’s Stefan Drokharis had fallen despite his Americos Chambers. That was a poor name for them. They should’ve given Quinnestri more credit.

  The doubts seemed like a luxury, yet Zothora didn’t want to end the game. Ven Dro had failed to retrieve Icharaam’s Orb. Icharaam, such a fine meal he would’ve made. However, she enjoyed the irony of his murder. Brother killing brother made fine theater.

  Could Drokharis and his wives use the Orb to undo her? They had another weapon, the Hellstring, a bit of Mynn Lyrr’s genius. That weapon wasn’t a simple bow, but straddled all of creation, Morta and Animus alike. In it, she sensed the void.

  That unsettled her a bit, which was thrilling and new. Such games were wonderful! Not as good as eating, but nothing was as good as that, certainly not the sexual antics of lesser creatures. Ha! How the lesser creatures loved their gasping and shuddering. Such a waste of time, that. When she made love, she undid souls. Now that was exciting.

  Thinking of the sex act, she thought of the wives of her enemy. She knew of them. She’d seen them through the eyes of her children. The Drokharis child loved them, and that was certainly a weakness. Was it a frailty she could exploit? She hoped so.

  Zothora thought of the Ohkreela, lonely and heartbroken, but now with a new family. Quinnestri would hate her for her Morta. Had the Lyra queen joined the Drokharis child? It didn’t matter. Zothora thought of the small woman with her ancient sword, the green fire on its blade. Another bit of Mynn Lyrr’s magic, which was an echo of Mathaal’s sorcery. She was named after a rodent. That was fitting.

  The Ohkreela had her lover, the assassin, who had been a failure from the beginning. Both of them loved the troublesome seer, the blind bitch who toyed with the future. Such sight she had, and better yet, she was pregnant. What a meal both she and her baby would make.

  The bear thing was inconsequential and weak. As were the genetic aberrations, the twins. Their schemes were as laughable as their hubris.

  That left the two other wives of the child—Mynn Lyrr’s heir and the last of the Dragonknights, Thirteen. Both gave Zothora a bit of discomfort. They were powerful in their own right, and they loved the child. They had been his first. To kill one of them would break the child. It might be worth seeing him weep over them before he joined them in Zothora’s belly.

  Those two wives might be the key to undoing the child, if it came to that. It wouldn’t. Zothora would appear on the Game World with a vast army, and she would wipe the board clean. The child would call in armies of his own, betraying his home world and how many others?

  Countless. Each world was connected, and she would bring the Great Devouring to them all.

  And after? Her last doubt was her favorite because it was the most precious and concerning. What would happen when she sucked the last bit of Animus from all possible universes?

  The answer was simple. She would starve to death. For the Animus grubs could only create so much of the life energy she craved.

  The idea frightened her. That made it unique and oh-so delicious.

  But first, the game. She would win the game and rejoice.

  For in the end, she knew, everything had to die. Including something as old and wonderful as her own dear, dear self.

  Chapter Six

  STEVEN LED HERIDAN back to her room in the main terminal. She lifted her hands. “I guess you’ll be locking me up again.”

  Steven did have handcuffs for her, enchanted to dampen her Morta powers. They weren’t quite perfected yet. Nefri had snapped hers rather easily when she first arrived. They’d tried various ways to improve the magical matrix of the item, and hopefully, they’d gotten a bit better.

  Steven held the cuffs. “Do I need to? In the end, we can’t chain your mind. Calling out to Zothora would be the worst thing you could do to us.”

  She scowled at him. “I could rip out your throat. I could kill the sluts in your little harem.”

  “Escort,” Steven corrected. He snapped the handcuffs on her wrists.

  She sighed. “Sorry, it’s my Morta core, the rage in me. And I’m a little turned on from our kiss. And no, that’s not an offer. I need to sleep.”

  “You do,” Steven agreed. He hadn’t told her that her former Prime was in the main terminal. Heridan had smashed through the front windows, and so, she hadn’t seen him. Was this a good thing? Steven wasn’t sure. He had the idea that Heridan would have a strong reaction to SD. That may or may not be a good thing.

  Steven left her and found his full Escort in the main terminal, the full complement, including Uchiko and Nefri. The two were sitting in chairs next to each other, passing a bag of rehydrated eggs back and forth. The ninja would take a spoonful, choke it down, and and pass the bag to the dark elf.

  Chazzie and Pru gave their own sticky yellow breakfast doleful looks. “Don’t get me wrong,” Chazzie said, “I have the utmost respect for the United States military. Their guns are cool as fuck. Their food? Makes me want to use those guns to shoot myself.”

  Pru nodded and grimaced at another spoonful of the ruined eggs. “You know, a bit of Crazy Earl’s Magic Sauce certainly would do wonders for this shit. But I’m beginning to think Crazy Earl’s hot sauce can only be found on Gaia Alpha.” She sighed.

  Tessa held up Icharaam’s Orb, the original. She’d crafted dozens more. “I had to work on copying the orbs, ladies, but believe me, I’m sure Steven and I can Enchantrix up your sauce.”

  “You’re sweet,” Chazzie said. “But it’s doubtful you’re that powerful.”

  Quinnestri sighed. She wasn’t eating. It was clear she didn’t want to be there.

  Steven glanced around and realized SD wasn’t in the group. “Is Mr. Drokharis still in his room?” he asked.

  Zoey pointed an accusing finger at Tessa. “It’s worse than that. He’s outside, smoking. Tessa gave him cigarettes, which the poor man shouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole. I know I say a lot of things give you cancer, but come on, cigarettes definitely give you cancer.”

  “Unless you’re a Dragonsoul,” Mouse said. “Pretty sure between Magica Cura and FleshForge, we could fix that shit up right quick and in a hurry. But I’ve cut down. Tessa has too. We listen to you, Zoey, despite your unwavering hatred of Spam.”

  That only made the bear girl pout more.

  Steven left them and made his way outside. He turned into a dragon and sniffed the air. The tobacco smoke led him to the western parking lot. SD wandered over the cracked asphalt. All the weeds had been s
ucked dry of Animus and had blown away. Clouds of red dust tore through the blue of the sky in crimson claw marks.

  Steven landed in the deserted parking lot, towering over the bearded man in a leather jacket, leather pants, and boots. He stood next to a BMW motorcycle, probably the same one he’d ridden in on.

  A cigarette dangled from SD’s lips. “You look like I did, back about two hundred years ago.” He touched his beard. “The salt came from too many hours casting magic I probably had no business casting. I’m actually young for a Dragonlord. Only about three hundred years old.”

  “Are you feeling better?” Steven asked.

  SD shrugged. “I don’t believe I’ll ever feel better again. You’ve felt it. I burned out my core. Just one of my many mistakes.”

  Steven shifted human. “We all make mistakes.”

  The bearded man nodded. “We do. But my mistakes destroyed a planet and got everyone killed. It’s a hard thing to carry.”

  “I can’t imagine,” Steven said. “But I was itching to fight the Zothoric. I can see why you jumped into the battle with both feet.”

  “Maybe.” SD flicked away ashes. “But you were smart enough to bring the war here. That was from my other self, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, my real father in Gaia Alpha. He didn’t survive Rahaab’s cabal. I had help from other people as well. I got lucky.”

  “And I didn’t.” SD coughed into his hand. “These things will kill me, but I suppose I don’t have long. I won’t survive without my core. Until that happens, I want to help you. First, though, there’s something I want to talk with you about.”

  “It’s just the two of us,” Steven said. “What is it about?”

  “My son.” SD frowned. “I won’t call him Steven. He chose to be called Ven Dro. You must think I’m a terrible father.”

  “It did cross my mind. I’ve not been a father before, so I don’t know how important my opinion is going to be.”

  “You soon will be.” SD took a drag on his smoke. He let it out slowly. “Sabina is quite a woman. All of them are.” He hooked a thumb back to the terminal.

  “Again, I got lucky.”

  “Or blessed.” The bearded man paused. “You know, I thought I gave my son everything. I didn’t jump right into the Dragonlord life. I was a Ronin for a long time, free to pursue my studies, and study I did. I was obsessed with the Dragonknights, Arthur, Merlin, the Lady of the Lake, all of that. That obsession led me to the Path of the Twin-Souled Dragon, so I guess it was a good thing.”

  Steven stood, not speaking. He’d let the elder Drokharis talk as much as he wanted.

  “I had daughters for a long time before Ven Dro came along. When I finally had a son, I was thrilled. I swore I would turn him into something. I wanted him to be more than a fine Dragonsoul. I wanted him to be the best. I pushed him, and pushed him, and pushed him. At the same time, I kept him out of combat. That was for selfish reasons. If I got him killed in some meaningless skirmish, I knew I would never forgive myself. You didn’t grow up like that, did you?”

  Steven laughed. “Not even remotely. The world pushed me, though. My foster father was a gambler, probably an alcoholic, and when he was around, he wasn’t ever really there. I had to take care of my stepmother and our house. I had adult problems at an early age. I thought it wasn’t fair. Now, I don’t know. Maybe it was a good thing.”

  “Seems like it.” SD winced against the smoke. “When I was on my winning streak, Ven Dro saw it. I think he figured we’d always keep winning. But he saw those as my victories, rather than it being a joint effort.”

  “When we fought, he kept talking about that... winning. He didn’t want to lose.” Steven thought it was ironic that in the end, Ven Dro had lost and lost big.

  “That was all my fault.” SD dropped his cigarette, smoked down to the filter.

  “I don’t know,” Steven said honestly. “You did the best you could. Zothora got to him, maybe early on, and we can’t discount her influence. I’m dealing with Tara Heridan, and while she should join us, she’s conflicted. Zothora is powerful, probably one of the most powerful beings that exists. To have her in your head wouldn’t be good for anyone. I never had that, and neither did you.”

  SD cracked a grin. “So my son got involved with the wrong crowd? He betrayed me and his fucking species out of peer pressure?”

  “I’ll make sure to tell my daughter not to hang around with ancient demon goddesses.” Steven didn’t want to make light of the situation, but there were no answers.

  “Being a father is hard, harder than all this war stuff. When I have an enemy in front of me, the path is clear. I fight. With kids, the battles are small, and you don’t know what is going to break them and what is going to help them. It’s a subtle dance of pushing them and then letting them be. I know that now.”

  Steven didn’t want to end the conversation on such a sour note. “Look, what happened to you and your son was fucked up. But if we can kill Zothora, his death, and all your mistakes, will have meaning. You and I can rid the universe of something that has plagued all life for eons, since the beginning of time it seems. That’s important. You can show us how to avoid the mistakes you already made.”

  “Now, that’s some silver lining talk if I ever heard it.” SD moved forward and grabbed Steven by the back of his neck. His grip was weak. “I can’t be proud of my son, not after what he did, but I can be proud of you. So, let’s go talk with your Escort. We have a war to win.”

  Back in the terminal, Tessa had broken out cans of peaches. They ate them as they talked.

  SD gave Chazzie and Pru an overview of the situation.

  Pru lost all the expression on her face. She grew pale. Chazzie wrinkled her nose, mouth half-open. She turned to her sister. “So, those Americos Chambers were all connected, and the Zothoric went through them like an F-16 through a bug light.”

  Pru got some color back in her face. “Remember Daddy had that bug light on our porch outside of Amarillo? It certainly was fun to watch them skeeters light up. Zap, zap, zap.”

  “The moths were the funnest, though,” Chazzie said. “They’d catch fire and fall to the ground. Remember the lizards would come and eat all them BBQ’d bugs?”

  Quinnestri butted in. “I do not think this—”

  Pru held up a finger to shush her. “So, we certainly aren’t going to be like that one dumbass coyote who never tried to get the roadrunner the same way twice. Just because the chambers didn’t work the first time, that don’t mean they won’t work again.”

  Tessa raised a hand. “Can I say something?”

  Chazzie stuck out her tongue. “If you have to.”

  The barista rolled her eyes. “Gee. Thanks. So, if we placed one of Icharaam’s Orbs in each chamber, and if we had a master chamber, we could possibly super power them. Ignite them all at once, not to repulse the Zothoric, but to kill them. We lure in the queen and then hit the lights. Bam. With any luck, she’ll be like your moth hitting an Amarillo bug light.”

  “Can I see one of your orbs?” Quinn asked.

  Tessa tossed her one. She murmured a word in Lyra, and a purple light glowed across her skin. Her eyes turned into two amethysts. “Yes, I see what Icharaam did. We talked about doing something like this, and I am very happy he succeeded.”

  “So what do you think of my plan?” Tessa asked.

  Quinn nodded. Each time she blinked her eyes, the flickering purple fire faded a bit.

  Like Tessa, Steven wondered what kind of abilities she had.

  “It would be desperate,” the Lyra queen said. “Once Zothora is here, with her Myriad, we are committed. We either win the fight, or we lose it forever.”

  “What do you two think?” Steven asked the twins.

  Pru went first. “It certainly seems to me, and I’m no expert, that if we hit those chambers with Tessa amounts of Animus, it’s going to bring back a lot of green to this continent. That could be problematic, since the bugs eat the stuff. We don’t want to ma
ke them more powerful.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” Chazzie said.

  Steven had to chuckle to himself. Chazzie thought Pru was smarter than her. Both were equally brilliant and beautiful.

  “It would be a side effect,” Quinn agreed. “Yet, in that initial blast, if we destroy the queen, her drones will die. That would include the Prosha, this Ulita Rozhenko. We would have to make sure both are here, on this continent.”

  An idea occurred to Steven. “We have someone with a direct line to Zothora. Not only could Heridan know when Zothora is set to arrive, but she could lure the big Z to an exact location. Hell, she could contact Ulita right now.”

  “Not here,” Sabina said in a quiet voice. “The airport is our sanctuary.”

  Mouse laughed sarcastically. “And yet, Daddy Drokharis found us here. How was that possible?”

  All eyes turned to SD. He raised his shoulders and dropped them. “I’ve been organizing the humans, and they’ve been running patrols. Someone saw activity here. I did some recon, and it was easy. The Zothoric might be good at sniffing out Animus, but they aren’t as good at tracking down humans. And they are working under one Prosha. That has crippled them.”

  “Thanks goodness,” Zoey burst in.

  Aria spoke for the first time. “Before, you mentioned you created your own master chamber, near a place called Alamosa. You mentioned your core and RealityFire. Tell us more about that.”

  SD went to speak but a voice from above cut him off. “Stefan Drokharis. Stefan. Mr. Drokharis.” Tara Heridan, in her Zothoric form, hovered over them. BlackBlood tentacles swirled around her as the handcuffs fell from her wrists.

  She vanished and appeared in the shadows on the west side of the terminal.

  The elder Drokharis stood. “Tara, I heard you’d found a home here. You look...” His voice died.

  Mouse burst out with inappropriate laughter. “Yeah, there’s no way to finish that sentence off without using the word ‘bug’ or ‘bitch.’”