A Dragon's Tale Ch. 30

"Please Kendra?" Taloni asked. "Then we could see each other again even after you return, and I can talk to you too. I mean, all of master's other wives will hear when I do talk to you, but wouldn't that be wonderful?"

"It'll give you options." Rachel pointed out. "You don't need to take advantage of those options, but you'll have them."

Kendra stared at them for several seconds before speaking. "And you won't be able to hear my thoughts?"

"We couldn't anyway." Ethan replied. "I can only hear the thoughts that my wives purposely send to me. I can feel their emotions, but not hear their thoughts unless they want to share them."

His wives nodded in agreement.

"Can I undo it if I want to?" Kendra asked.

"Um, I don't know; I never tried." He cocked his head to one side.

Moments later, he felt Rachel's 'mind tunnel' disconnect from him, only to reconnect a few seconds later.

"Yup, you can disconnect." The redhead confirmed. "I just tried it."

"Hmm." The dragon huntress mused.

"It can't hurt, can it?" Taloni said. "I would be really sad if we got separated. What if we had to leave Nalatia suddenly? How would you find us again?"

"And if they did need to leave Nalatia without warning, how would you bring back the dragon scale weapon thingy?" Selene added.

Everyone looked at her.

"What?"

"Dragon steel." Rachel said with an amused smile. "It's called dragon steel once the scales been forged together."

"Yeah, that." The Brazilian woman said, then turned to Kendra. "How would you bring it back to Ethan if he had to leave suddenly and you couldn't find him? Wouldn't that just leave you further in his debt because you'd be sailing around with his weapons?"

"That's a good point." The dragon huntress conceded.

"Please Kendra." Taloni said. "I'd hate to never see you again."

"Yeah, that would be awful." The raven haired woman nodded, then added sternly. "But you all need to stay away from my thoughts; I'm not letting anyone in."

"No one?" Ethan raised his eyebrow and glanced at his Fey wife.

"I don't think I can only let specific people in, so..."

"Okay, but I hope you do at some point." Taloni said brightly. "You really wouldn't believe how lovely all of master's wives are; I know you'd like them."

"Maybe; we'll never know." Kendra replied, then closed her eyes and looked like she was concentrating.

About a minute later, Ethan felt her connect to his mental fortress, and then moments after that to the antechamber 'below' it which allowed them to all talk to each other at once.

*Can you hear me?* He thought to her.

Nothing.

He wasn't too surprised because they hadn't been bonded very long, and he got the distinct impression that she'd walled off all possibility of contactbefore she'd connected.

"There, happy." She said.

It wasn't a question.

Ethan looked around at his four wives and smiled broadly. "Yeah; yeah I am."

Kendra gave him an odd look, then untied her canoe-sized airship from the Argo. "Bye."

And then her airship shot upward as its sails unfurled.

"That was... abrupt." Selene commented.

"That's Kendra." He shrugged.

"Please don't say that master. She's nice, just lonely. Besides..." The Fey teen got a mischievous smile on her face. "...I'm so glad you trust Kendra implicitly master."

"I do?" He raised his eyebrow.

"Well, you did just convince her to sail off with the incredibly valuable dragon scales and probably didn't even consider the possibility that she might steal them. You must really trust her for the idea to not even occur to you."

He cocked his head to one side.

Huh.

Damn, Taloni was right. He hadn't even thought of the possibility. It had literally never occurred to him that Kendra might abscond with the dragon scales and not return. Not even once.

Interesting.

* * *

Sarah felt herself slowly come back to consciousness, feeling the comforting support of her mattress underneath her. For a brief moment she felt the light on her eyelids and was worried that she'd overslept.

Then she remembered.

She remembered all of it. She remembered breaking the chains around her wrists and ankles. She remembered lunging at the soldier who was advancing on her father. And she remembered... She gulped and shut her eyes tighter, as if that would prevent her from remembering the two soldier's looks of terror as they left the land of the living.

She felt like her heart was breaking in half.

She wanted to forget that the whole thing had happened. She wanted it to never have happened in the first place. She had tried; she had tried so hard to resist, but in the end she'd needed it. She needed her problem to solve another problem. She hadn't trusted Illuminar, but instead she had...

Had...

She sniffled.

Moments later, she felt a comforting hand on her forehead and her father's voice coming across very softly. "Sarah, are you okay?"

"No Papa." She whispered, still not wanting to open her eyes. "No, I..."

She rolled away and pulled the covers over her head, trying in vain to block out the world. Sadly, cotton sheets and a worn quilt did little to block out anything. She wanted to block out everything; everything at all, everything in the whole world.

"You saved me." He said softly.

She nodded, not wanting to answer.

"Rindrin took the bodies to bury them." Her father said. "He insisted on helping."

"He did?" She asked, still holding the covers over her head and keeping her eyes tightly shut.

"He did."

She nodded again, glad that her betrothed cared enough to help, and glad that she'd saved her father... but not that way. Any way but that way; any way but her problem.

"I tried Papa." She finally said. "I prayed to Illuminar -- blessed be He -- every single day. I prayed that He would make me good. I'm sorry."

"I wish I knew how to help you Sari."

She half smiled at his use of her childhood nickname. She hadn't been able to say her own name when she was young, and 'Sari" was all she could get out. It had stuck as a nickname until... until her problem had entered the portrait and life had gotten grim.

"I tried dear girl; I really did." His voice sounded like it was cracking. "We went to all those temples, saw all those priests."

"I know Papa." She whispered back.

She finally opened her eyes and pulled the covers down enough that she could see the sky outside her window. Laying there, looking up into the sky where Illuminar's heavens were supposed to be, she felt... she felt almost betrayed. She had tried to seek Him her whole life and now this had happened to her.

"Please help me." She whispered to the heavens. "Please."

Then she closed her eyes and begged for sleep to take her.

* * *

Ethan watch Kendra's airship start to turn and marveled at how much he'd apparently grown to trust the woman that had tried to kill him so many time.

Irony.

"Oh, Ethan, this is... this is amazing." Alana breathed from behind him so he turned towards her. Her hand was on the dragon hide they had recovered, and he guessed that she was assessing its properties for enchanting. "I've never felt dragon leather before; there's so much room for enchantment here."

"Oh?"

"Yes." She nodded. "There are so many options too. Self-repair, a hardening and stiffening enchantment for armor, fire resistance." She looked up at him. "Even a strength-enhancing enchantment like Kendra has."

He grinned. "Strength-enhancing? I like the sound of that."

"Me too." Beth sighed wistfully as she looked at his biceps.

"It would make amazing armor." Rachel added.

"I could definitely use some." He agreed, thinking back to all the times he'd been wounded so far. As he thought about it, he realized he was wounded almost every time he fought someone, and sometimes badly. Getting his bicep sliced while fighting Kendra in the Arena and being impaled by Gonorran stood out, but he'd suffered numerous smaller wounds too.

"Hey, could I make it so I can summon the armor like I do with my hammer?" He asked, thinking of the times he'd been ambushed. Plus, the memory of Tony Stark calling his armor in Iron Man 3 was igniting his imagination. That would be awesome.

"Sure, but then you'd still have to put it on." Alana replied, raining on his parade.

"Really?"

"Yes." Beth interjected. "Armor needs to be properly fitted and attached or it will just slide around. Think about having a metal tube on your upper arm and trying to fight with it sliding all around. That's what it would be like."

"Yeah, that wouldn't work." He sighed.

"What if you summoned it and then just held it in place with the summoning spell?" Selene suggested.

All his wives laughed.

"What? It wouldn't work?" The ex-FBI agent asked.

"It would work, but it would also drain his mana very fast." Rachel replied. "It doesn't take too much mana to summon something, but constantly using mana to hold it there would deplete your mana very fast. Then multiply that by..." She frowned, clearly counting. "...at least twenty pieces of armor for good coverage -- maybe up to fifty or sixty if you articulate the hands -- he'll run out of mana very fast. He'll be defenseless when he does run out because then the armor will fall to the ground."

"Oh, okay that makes sense." The caramel-haired woman replied.

"But couldn't we enchant it to stick?" Ethan persisted. "So I could summon it and then it sticks to me when it hits somehow?"

Alana shook her head. "No, that would work because..." She trailed off. "Well actually... Hmm."

"What?" He said.

"It's never been done because you'd need to enchant a part of the person, which obviously isn't possible, but you're a dragon so... hmm."

"I like that 'hmm'; that makes it sound like a possibility." He started grinning.

"Well, there are activatable enchantments that'll make two things stick together pretty strongly." Alana said. "They could stick to a part of your body and they wouldn't slide around. They might get dislodged -- maybe -- but you could just summon them back into place."

"They probably wouldn't get dislodged." Rachel interjected. "Armor pieces usually wrap around the body in some way or another, so they should stay put."

"Good point." The wood elf replied nodding.

Ethan rubbed his hands together excitedly. "This is starting to sound like a possibility."

"Why doesn't Ethan just enchant himself instead of adding armor?" Selene asked. "I mean, you all said that dragons can do that right?"

"It would take too long." Alana replied. "A living dragons can stack a lot more enchantments into his scales than I can into these because of a living dragon's natural harmonics. However, while a living dragon can make his scales far stronger and harder than a mage can enchant them after he's dead, there's a downside. It takes alot more mana for a dragon to enchant himself effectively. Living dragon scales can become far stronger, but it takes far more mana."

"I can confirm that." Ethan nodded. "I'd love to get there eventually, but this armor would be a great stop-gap solution until I do."

"I'd feel much better knowing you are well protected master." The Fey teen leaned up against him.

He put his arm around her. "Me too."

"Me three." Alana said.

"Me four." Beth and Rachel said at the same time.

He chuckled and then turned to the redheaded teen. "Speaking of number four, don't we have an event tonight?"

Rachel -- so interested and outspoken mere moments before -- suddenly seemed a bit subdued as she nodded.

"Ladies, can I have a minute to talk with the bride?" He said to the assembled crew.

They all either nodded or assented, so he reached out and took Rachel's hand. The redhead accepted his hand and didn't resist his gentle pull as he led her to the front of the ship.

* * *

Sarah was floating dreamily down the center aisle of a beautiful chapel wearing the most magnificent white wedding dress. Everyone from her childhood was there smiling at her. Her father was guiding her down the aisle, looking trim and fit as he always had in her youth. Up at the altar, Selene was dressed in the most magnificent maid of honor dress, and Alana and Beth were bridesmaids waiting next to her; all of them were smiling at her and welcoming her forward.

Her groom was also up there, looking dashing in his... well she couldn't quite make his clothing out, but it was very nice. She couldn't quite make out his face either, but he had wings and scales. It was the dragon; the dragon who'd rescued her from her life and the problem that had plagued her for so long.

Suddenly, her father stopped and looked at her, disapproval written all over her face. "Wait, you still have your problem?"

"No, I... I don't think so." She stammered.

The whole room erupted in whispers and murmurs. The brown-haired girl caught snippets of conversation that went like "I thought she'd taken care of that.", and "How could she get married with a problem like that?" and even "She's got a lot of nerve!"

"Wait, no; I'm better now." She pleaded to everyone, her eyes filling with tears.

No one listened.

The congregants all turned and started walking away. Selene looked at her with pity, shook her head and then left. Alana and Beth looked horrified as they chased after Selene, barely taking the time to cast a reproving look backwards. Even Ethan -- the prophet of Illuminar Himself -- shook his head at her and turned away. Suddenly, the room was completely empty and she was left all alone, crying on the floor in her wedding dress, which was now somehow very dirty and tattered.

She couldn't believe it.

Her problem had cost her everything. Not even a prophet of Illuminar would look at her. She felt stained; sullied... unclean. She felt like Illuminar Himself had abandoned her. And while she would never stop trying to serve Him, she wished He would help her.

Sheneeded Him to help her.

"Sarah." A comforting feminine voice said.

She turned her head to see the loveliest woman that she'd ever seen standing there. She was clad entirely in robes of the purest white. Her clothes and skin seemed to shine like the sun, but with the warmth of a flickering candle. She looked to be about Sarah's own age, but that simply wasn't possible. She had the beautiful face of a young woman untouched by age, but the eyes and presence of someone ancient and full of wisdom. Her heart-shaped face was the picture of perfect femininity and was beautifully framed by her long hair that was probably blonde but looked white, probably because of the light. She had a soft smile on her face that instantly made Sarah feel comfortable and safe.

She thought she recognized the woman, but it took her a moment. "Gabriella?"

"Yes dear girl."

Suddenly, this didn't seem like a normal dream to Sarah. Suddenly, the whole thing felt more real than the nightmare she'd been enduring.

"This is real." Gabriella assured her.

"You were at the inn earlier but now you're..." She averted her eyes, realizing what the luminous woman might be. "Are you..."

"A messenger of Illuminar -- blessed be He." She nodded. "Commonly called an angel, yes."

"Why?" She whispered, desperate to know the answer to her most burning question. "Why do I have my problem? I always wanted to serve Illuminar. I always tried to..." Her breath caught. "Why did He do this to me?"

"Dear girl, He didn't do this to you." Gabriella said kindly.

"He didn't?"

"No." She shook her head. "The men who kidnapped you and summoned your 'problem' were wicked men, using Illuminar's gift of free will to do unspeakable evil. That's the downside of free will; many use it to commit unspeakable evil."

"But couldn't Illuminar have stopped them?" Sarah asked.

"Of course He could; He could've stopped every evil act ever committed with less effort than you use to blink..." She replied. "...but then what of free will? To stop every act of evil would require violating free will, which Illuminar -- blessed be He -- won't do. But He did help you Sarah, you just didn't know it."

"He did?"

Gabriella nodded. "The men who kidnapped you had planned to force themselves on you before the ceremony; He prevented that. They were trying to summon one of Saidow's greater minions, but He also prevent that; instead he only allowed a weaker demon to possess you. Had a stronger one possessed you, you would rarely be yourself."

"Oh." Sarah replied, having never thought of that before. Yes it had been bad, but it could've been so much worse if... She gulped.

"He prevents so many horrible tragedies before they happen." The luminous woman continued. "Every near miss attributed to luck, every burst of intuition that something is wrong or dangerous, and every time a tragedy is averted; that is the God of Light protecting His children."

"But so many bad things happen anyway."

"Yes." Gabriella nodded sadly. "Yes, men abuse their free will and ignore the commands of Illuminar -- blessed be He -- to do wicked things. Men abusing the gift of free will would've already destroyed mankind a thousand times over if the God of Light wasn't always working behind the scenes, preventing horrible atrocities every day. But instead of being praised for the countless protections He offers, the God of Light is often reviled and hated for not violating man's free will to prevent the few tragedies that do occur. Or at least, they are 'few' in comparison to the many He prevents."

"Oh." Sarah said, not sure what to make of that.

"He is also responsible for the good things." Gabriella added. "There are literally dozens of portals in the Ten Kingdoms through which Selene could've passed. Illuminar ensured that she came through the one that is near you, so that you could meet her."

The innkeeper's daughter managed a small smile. "I really appreciated that, especially since..." She trailed off, thinking about her problem.

"What happened to you was an evil tragedy perpetrated by wicked men." Gabriella acknowledged with a mournful expression. "Sadly, many men use their free will for evil purposes, and too often innocents get ensnared."

"Innocents?" Sarah swallowed.

Could the angel mean her?

"I do mean you Sarah." Gabriella nodded. "Do you remember the prayer you prayed after you escaped?"

She nodded. "I asked that Illuminar would use me to help someone do good things in the world -- despite my problem -- and I wanted to marry the best husband I could."

"Illuminar -- blessed be He -- heard your prayer."

Sarah blinked.

Then her eyes started filling with tears for quite another reason.

"Really?" She whispered in disbelief. "He heard me?"

"He did, and He was touched by your sincere desire to do good even after your tragedy."

"He was?"

It seemed too good to be true.

She had spent the years since getting her problem thinking that she was unclean; tainted and not worthy of the God of Light. She'd often wondered if He even heard her prayers because she was afflicted with her problem. She didn't know if Illuminar still loved someone who'd been tainted as she was. She had hoped so, but hadn't been sure.

"Sarah." Gabriella knelt down and looked deep into her eyes. "You are a precious daughter of the Most High God of Light, and He loves you very much."

Sarah felt her eyes fill with happy tears as the angel's words sank into her ears; into her heart and soul. Suddenly, she knew them to be true deep in her core. She knew that Illuminar -- the almighty, all-righteous, and perfectly pure God of Light -- she knew that He loved her and cared deeply about her.

"Thank you." She said, feeling a bit of peace in her soul.

"You're welcome." Gabriella smiled. "Precious daughter of Illuminar -- blessed be He -- I'm here because you need to know something. I have a message for you, and one you'll need to remember in the days ahead."