{
  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "canonicalUrl": "https://serpentsquiggles.neocities.org//posts/fiction/endless-stars/i2c",
  "path": "/posts/fiction/endless-stars/i2c",
  "publishedAt": "2019-04-27T00:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:ivoe7cntxuy6at7uzmxzs2ft/site.standard.publication/3mfk6cpprzt2t",
  "textContent": "::: subchapter\nDeath was breathing quietly in the dark.\n\nThe feeling hadn't left Adwyn since that cursed iron gate came close\nbehind him. From everywhere and in everything⁠ ⁠---⁠ sight, sound,\nsmell⁠ ⁠---⁠ there was a certain malignity, and it settled into his\nscales. He would molt next cycle, he knew; and it wasn't soon enough.\n\nAdwyn drew a calming breath and spat out spicy venom. After an inhale\nthe dew came back, and he let it; his soul needed it.\n\nThe gate had seen him into a wide entry chamber that turned to a ramp\nwhich slinked down to something that already felt somber even when half\ninvisible.\n\nHe lifted the glowing lamp, and when the light brushed the deteriorating\nwalls, he saw script. Without the high guard's eye, there was no\ntelling for true, but he bet it was Pteryxian.\n\nThe murderer had said this was a mass grave. Were these cenotaphs?\n\nDid they spell final praise, or condemnation?\n\nWould anyone even return to find out?\n\nAbove many of the big bold letterforms (names or titles, perhaps) there\nlingered engraved portraits, dragons with the short, thin snouts of\ndesert-dwellers, who gazed listlessly out from fading visages.\n\nThese forgotten dragons fading away seemed so close to some ultimate\ndeath that one could imagine⁠ ⁠---\n\nAdwyn did not believe in ghosts.\n\nDeath was a blank, but all dragons were seen eternally in the gaze of\nDyfns. These dragons were gone from the world, but they were not\ngone.\n\nA whispering on the edge of thought. Mutely, Adwyn nodded and he tugged\nhis high stand into striding steps toward one wall. Here the weathering\nof rain or whatever else was near complete, and any cenotaph or portrait\nwas utter dust.\n\nA rock from the ground went to his foot and the orange drake began\nworking.\n\nIn his best, straightest serifs, the pits gained new memory: \"Wedd\" and\n\"Ysais.\"\n\nPlease forgive me.\n\nA thought, and he took a finer rock and wrought a portrait. Every\nDyfnderi monk knew the science of drawing, and painting.\n\nThere were no proper pigments, but crushed leaves and mushrooms did\ntheir part. The blood of wormrats gave colors of life to their cheeks.\n\nAnd last, dipping a toe into the lamp's glowing, glairy liquid, Adwyn\ntried to limn some effect like a living soul staring out from those\neyes. But it was known impossible.\n\nThe science of rendering had come as easily to him as all else, and at\nhis painting any critic would be impressed.\n\nBut Adwyn...\n\nHe stared at those likenesses, at the sum of his memory of Ysais and\nWedd. Wedd, caught laughing with some curious gleam, and Ysais,\nsilently sneering, yet some hope hiding in her brow. Details he'd\nnoticed, and never considered or identified. Subtleties of dragons he'd\nsurely never miss.\n\nThere were definitions of the yawning chasm of loss, which no lights\nillume.\n\nAdwyn stood there, silent, for a long time. Waiting for something to\nchange, waiting for anything to get better. Nothing did. Nothing ever\ndid.\n\nThe lamp went out, and now Adwyn was waiting in the dark.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nWhen he felt himself skip a thought, that was when Adwyn ceased\nwaiting. It had gotten late, hadn't it? The adviser would finish this\nnow, before exhaustion became intolerable.\n\nHis bones cracked when he moved, he'd been still so long. Adwyn knew\npersonal noises weren't as loud as they felt, but he trusted instinct.\nAnd instinct told him that sudden skitter in the shadows was something\nnew.\n\nDragons leapt quick, and body kept pace with thought as the orange drake\ndodged into a chamber mouth he'd spied on the walls and almost quietly\nhe rushed forth. His wings stretched in front and from this he knew\nwith time to slow when he came to the wall.\n\nHe snuck along the wall for another mouth and all this happened two more\ntimes before tiredness overruled instinct.\n\nPanting, fanning his frills and wings, falling onto his haunches, Adwyn\nhoped it was enough distance and he thought about his next action. The\nbaton made way to his wing, and already the drake was standing up.\n\nHe'd fought in webs before. He'd fought alone in webs before, when the\nbattle had gone to worsts.\n\nAnd this wasn't a web.\n\nHe smiled like another would grin. The next steps were slow, as the\ndrake collected detritus. Dead or now dead mushrooms, odd sticks or\nleaves, bits of sorry cloth or linen time had yet to devour, and equally\nsuitable things that nonethelesss he could not identify in the dark.\n\nHe put them in the lamp.\n\nHe had enough now, and picked up two rocks and for a moment clawed for\nany other survival minutia he could manage remembering.\n\nNo wind here, no worry about that. It was humid, worse than a web, but\nnothing could be done. Between that and the poor quality of his fuel,\nhe glimpsed difficulties lighting a fire.\n\nWhat else was there?\n\nAh. He knew dragons had a certain temperment of venom oily enough to\nhelp. Was it spicy? Bitter? Tart?\n\nHe hoped it was of the latter two; the adviser wasn't as good\nat⁠ ⁠---⁠ inspiring temperments in himself, as some he knew were. He\ndidn't consider it a virtue.\n\nAt length Adwyn managed a droplet of both. He judged the right flavor\nbitter by the slimy feel of it. But this little bit wasn't enough.\n\nEvery dragon was a touch different, with their own little language of\nscent. Adwyn found that bitter venon came best when he was angry,\njealous, stubborn. He thought of what mattered to him, what he really\nwanted to protect, out here in Mlaen's country. His sister, who refused\nto ever again speak with him, whom he hadn't seen in gyras? It only\nmade him sad. The people of Dyfns, who needed an effective king,\nsomeone like him? He found it vaguely annoying.\n\nThey were his usual answers, and truly they did nothing for him.\n\nWhat about the handsome high guard, who'd wet the adviser's fangs more\nand more the longer he'd lived here? ...Secrets hurt, Adwyn had\nlearnt. It⁠ ⁠---⁠ changed things, to know that Rhyfel the younger was\nRhyfel the elder, that Gwymr/Frina's beacon of justice and comaraderie\nwas the murderous, thieving bandit who'd roamed the cliffs, who'd stolen\nthe Berwem outpost from the Dyfnderi protectorate, who'd conspired to\ndethrone Dwylla. Adwyn would have listened to his reasons⁠ ⁠---⁠ but if\nthe scarlet drake did not even find him worth telling?\n\nThis was something angry, but not the right kind of anger.\n\nWhat about the frustrating bluescaled exile? The wiver who could do\nthings, important things⁠ ⁠---⁠ if she cared to. No, in the depths he\ndidn't care for her.\n\nAdwyn sighed. Really, it was a farce that he'd had to think this hard.\nThe answer was the very first thing he thought of.\n\nThe insomniac red wiver, who no doubt still sat awake on that dillerskin\nrest, still from time to time worrying about Adwyn in that scheming way\nof hers.\n\nIt would be a very sad thing, if Adwyn were lost forever down in the\npits, and never again knew a morning with Mlaen and a chat over coffee;\nhim having just woken up, and her having not.\n\nCynfe too, the cryptic halfbreed. She took after the faer like a\ndaughter. The bundle of net came out his bags. Perhaps her gift would\nprove useful again. He dropped it into the lamp.\n\nFor morning coffee with Mlaen, for her wouldbe painter of an adoption,\nand maybe for Gwymr/Frina itself, Adwyn supposed he could go forth.\n\nThe bitter venom was a trickle now, and the drake spat into the\nmurderer's lamp. The rocks grinded against one another and sparked and\nsparked. Nothing. Nothing. A little ember which didn't catch.\nNothing. Another ember, a lucky one.\n\nAdwyn had light.\n\nThe pits were very dark, but Adwyn had light.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nThe pits were unlike a web.\n\nOne could have a flame here, yes. The air wasn't chittering and humming\nwith secret conspiracy, yes. And yes, there were no strings of\nunsightly strength slowing every step.\n\nReally, the pits were unlike every no drake's place in which Adwyn ever\nhad to operate a mission. In a number of ways, but the one that shone\nout was here his efficiency⁠ ⁠---⁠ even his survival⁠ ⁠---⁠ depend on\nhis care for other dragons, rather than his lack; the lamp's new flame\nwas fueled as much by his bitter venom as it was by what poor flammable\nbits he could find.\n\nThe magical net had done something⁠ ⁠---⁠ given the flames some electric\nnature that left it crackling and smelling of ozone and sending little\nshocking fingers dashing out on the cursed iron of the lamp.\n\nThese bolts were very bright, so Adwyn added more torn bits of net every\nso often.\n\nMore often, he had to think of Mlaen and what he would fight for.\nEnough to dew bitter, and spit that into the flames.\n\nHe would need water soon, he knew; his canteen was dimming fast. He\nprayed the pits had a pool or stream, or that he would find the rumored\ndoor very soon. There came a rumbling, and the drake added food to that\nprayer. He could cook it now.\n\nBut hope for that was scarce. He watched the bugs and fungi grow\nthinner deeper in the pits, and really, what could live this deep\nunderground? Would he want to eat it?\n\nAll that said the rooms if anything grew thicker⁠ ⁠---⁠ or at least more\nnumerous. Many more cenotaphs rotted away in their fashion. Some had\nfallen apart so that skeletons could be seen, and a thing had gnawed at\nthe bones.\n\nAll the while the walls still felt the engaved letters of that unsure\nscript.\n\nTill suddenly even that changed, from possibly Pteryxian, to antiquated\ny Draig: Who taketh to the highest skies, or In memoriam, or Walk\nfain in the gaze of Dyfns. The numbers he found were as early as gyra\n547, and as late as 651.\n\nWere the old outpost workers buried here? Before or after the fanciful\nlegends of terror had limned its reputation?\n\nIt was an inappropriate thing for such a grave site, but Adwyn felt\nrelief. Both for the change of epoch which surely foretold the end of\nall this scenery of death (and perhaps, that persistent feeling of dread\nquickening like breath), and because it in total meant him clos",
  "title": "Slumber"
}