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009: Speaker of the Dead
Last Updated:
2025-02-09 19:30:48
VictoryAnne ViceSorry for the extremely long delay! Enjoy!
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Redemption of The Dragon Prince 010: Colored Thoughts
[Carnelia] The book is heavy with more than just the sinews and hide that binds it, but with the weight of what it means. My father, what is left of him, now rests in my hands. Should I open it? Sighing, my talons grip the book more firmly between my fingers as I take a deep breath and look around to see if there is a chair where I might rest. Passing a mirror, I pause, gasping. I don’t look like myself anymore, but rather a version of myself I do not remember ever being. I am tall and lithe, my chestnut skin glowing golden from within, my eyes shining like two burning suns.And on my brow, the lattice work of golden symbols glow dully in the shadowed room. Their swirls and dots formed along my horns into the shape of a gleaming crown.Squinting, I try to make out the words…A sudden stab of red hot agony pierces the inner walls of my skull as new symbols spring to life around me, activated by my desire to understand. From every direction I am assaulted by barbs of words, arrows of
Last Updated : 2025-02-25Redemption of The Dragon Prince 011: Missing Millicent
[Primus] It has been three days since I felt my mate die. As I move through my day every moment I felt bleeding through our bond replays in my mind, unforgettable in horror. She died scared and alone, burned alive on a throne of gold, unable to fight for herself or our little ones nestled deep inside her as they burned to a crisp all for the sake of her power-thirsty sisters and their unrelenting desire to rule the world. They will die first. As soon as I find them, I plan to make everyone who was in that room watching my love burst into flames die a slow, miserable, and equally painful death. Everyone, everything in that hellish place will burn, a fitting pyre for the drakaina who call themselves her sisters. But before I grant them oblivion, I want them to see everything they built shatter at their feet. Maybe then they’ll learn that some things in this world are irreplaceable. Carnelia, my Carnelia. Another unsuccessful day of talking to shiphands while I work on the do
Last Updated : 2025-03-12Redemption of The Dragon Prince 012: Secret Prince
[Primus] Melis looks smug, her hands on her hips, so sure that she is correct in her assumptions. "So what is it going to be," she demands, tapping her foot. "Are you going to do what I say, or do I tell the constable who you are and collect the reward," Meris raises an eyebrow, and I almost believe that she'd be willing to turn me in, just to prove a point. The thing is, I doubt she has any proof, regardless of what she says. Maybe she suspects something after the other morning when she was outside my room, but I've been careful not to leave a trace, not a single scale or a claw mark on the furniture -nothing to raise her suspicions when she enters my room to clean it. Something else is going on here. She must need to believe this impossible thing is true for some reason. It's funny that in her childish fantasies that I am a missing prince who can save her from her troubles, she guessed the truth. As Leon, I am nothing like I am as Primus. I spent decades refining this form, makin
Last Updated : 2025-03-18Redemption of The Dragon Prince 013: The Stricken
[Primus] I couldn't let that poor girl suffer. Not once I heard her screaming. "I shouldn't care," I murmur to myself as I remember Carnelia in Crimson, surrounded by the angry townspeople, trapped by my nightmare of a brother who was determined to claim my mate for himself as a human slave, just to irk me. And even though that was practically another lifetime, I feel a tug on my heart as Carnelia's terrified face flashes before my vision and I forget to think. All I can do is feel. It doesn't matter that she isn't the one I love. I miss my mate so desperately that I would do anything to be in her arms once more. Maybe if I save this girl, it will save a bit of what is shattered inside of me with Carnelia dead and gone on the other side of the world. Flying without wings, I let enough of my true self to unwind as I make my way down the hall, past the kitchen, and into the main wind through the hall with the speed of a true Earth dragon, the very soil beneath my feet granting me s
Last Updated : 2025-03-21Redemption of The Dragon Prince 014: Lost To The Waves
[Primus]Standing underneath the bright blue streetlight on the sloped street behind me is Melis in her tattered clothing, a torch clutched tightly in her hand. “I said leave him alone,” her voice rings out, loud enough to wake the dead. Or to scare them. The bodies surrounding me scatter back, reaching for the edges of the shadows and safety. The afflicted aren’t really dead, or at least, they never officially died. But they also aren’t what I’d call alive anymore, not really. The transformation that overtakes them steals their inhibitions and their pain, but amplifies their needs and wants to a point of madness. First, their bodies sicken with a fever that burns so hot their body becomes covered with blisters. When the sickness ends, they rise from their illness, their bodies slowly rotting. But because they do not feel pain in the same way as before, they rise stronger, and far less careful. There is only one exception to their lack of caution--fire. For the afflicted, it is a ba
Last Updated : 2025-03-29Redemption of The Dragon Prince 001: Slave Queen
[Carnelia]I had always wanted to see the world. I never thought it would be chained to the deck of a ship, as a human slave.My sisters, in their infinite mercy, thought it best for me to travel this way--collared and cuffed, iron around my ankles and wrists forcing my head and back to be bowed in submission as is the way with royal slaves. Covering me in rags and a cape of course cloth, nobody notices the technology around my neck, forcing me to maintain this unnatural state.Stuck in my human form, nobody recognizes me as the celestial Queen Carnelia Majere. I am simply "Stella."It has been three weeks of back-breaking misery since we left Elfholm. Since then I haven't had a single moment of peace. My sisters meant to break me, to force me into grateful service, and when pain didn't work, they tried humiliation. Like a common human captured to become a pet of a royal dragon, I am transported in shackles, my neck forced into an unnatural angle as too-short chains bind my neck and a
Last Updated : 2024-09-08Redemption of The Dragon Prince 002: Savior
“Dela’h Nove!, Dela’h Solvei! Talame Talame!”Blonde afros bow before me, their dark faces and golden-scaled hides gleaming in the harsh sun of mid-day, the lush canopy overhead providing as much heat and moisture as it provides shade. I am unfamiliar with this climate. I may been conceived here, my nest made of briars my mother gathered, but I was not hatched here, I was not raised to handle the humidity of my home continent. “It is a good thing they don’t know how you suffer, Talame,” My sister Lyra hisses in the Luxandrian tongue, a habit she has when she wants to insult me and doesn’t want the locals to understand, using their word for “messiah” only to appease their ideas of formality and respect. “Would they still call you their sweet savior if they knew you had more in common with the devils in the sky?”She grabs my chin and forces me to look up at the branches above us, to remind me of her true meaning. They call the Luxandrians the “devils of the earth, the devils of the
Last Updated : 2025-01-04Redemption of The Dragon Prince 003: Not Quite Home
My body freezes and I look at the three of them, my sisters, their eyes glowing as the colors swirl within like captured star fire. The joy in their expressions is palatable, filling the room as they look to me as a new hope as if everything rests on my shoulders.“It will be glorious,” Cosima exalts, holding her arms up in prayer, “Once the celestial fire burns through you, everything will become clear. You will see the words now written, and hear the song once known.”Seeing my confused face, Nova places a gentle hand on top of mine, “Don’t worry, Sister, you can survive the change. You are just the right type.”I look at Lyra, who smirks slyly as she holds the secret of what is to come close to her chest like a new babe. Of the three, she was the most likely to tell me the truth--if only to make me miserable with anticipation and fear.That she hasn’t said a word speaks volumes about her intentions. Whatever it is they have in store isn’t just a simple coronation.The rest of the r
Last Updated : 2025-01-09
Latest chapter
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 014: Lost To The Waves
[Primus]Standing underneath the bright blue streetlight on the sloped street behind me is Melis in her tattered clothing, a torch clutched tightly in her hand. “I said leave him alone,” her voice rings out, loud enough to wake the dead. Or to scare them. The bodies surrounding me scatter back, reaching for the edges of the shadows and safety. The afflicted aren’t really dead, or at least, they never officially died. But they also aren’t what I’d call alive anymore, not really. The transformation that overtakes them steals their inhibitions and their pain, but amplifies their needs and wants to a point of madness. First, their bodies sicken with a fever that burns so hot their body becomes covered with blisters. When the sickness ends, they rise from their illness, their bodies slowly rotting. But because they do not feel pain in the same way as before, they rise stronger, and far less careful. There is only one exception to their lack of caution--fire. For the afflicted, it is a ba
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 013: The Stricken
[Primus] I couldn't let that poor girl suffer. Not once I heard her screaming. "I shouldn't care," I murmur to myself as I remember Carnelia in Crimson, surrounded by the angry townspeople, trapped by my nightmare of a brother who was determined to claim my mate for himself as a human slave, just to irk me. And even though that was practically another lifetime, I feel a tug on my heart as Carnelia's terrified face flashes before my vision and I forget to think. All I can do is feel. It doesn't matter that she isn't the one I love. I miss my mate so desperately that I would do anything to be in her arms once more. Maybe if I save this girl, it will save a bit of what is shattered inside of me with Carnelia dead and gone on the other side of the world. Flying without wings, I let enough of my true self to unwind as I make my way down the hall, past the kitchen, and into the main wind through the hall with the speed of a true Earth dragon, the very soil beneath my feet granting me s
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 012: Secret Prince
[Primus] Melis looks smug, her hands on her hips, so sure that she is correct in her assumptions. "So what is it going to be," she demands, tapping her foot. "Are you going to do what I say, or do I tell the constable who you are and collect the reward," Meris raises an eyebrow, and I almost believe that she'd be willing to turn me in, just to prove a point. The thing is, I doubt she has any proof, regardless of what she says. Maybe she suspects something after the other morning when she was outside my room, but I've been careful not to leave a trace, not a single scale or a claw mark on the furniture -nothing to raise her suspicions when she enters my room to clean it. Something else is going on here. She must need to believe this impossible thing is true for some reason. It's funny that in her childish fantasies that I am a missing prince who can save her from her troubles, she guessed the truth. As Leon, I am nothing like I am as Primus. I spent decades refining this form, makin
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 011: Missing Millicent
[Primus] It has been three days since I felt my mate die. As I move through my day every moment I felt bleeding through our bond replays in my mind, unforgettable in horror. She died scared and alone, burned alive on a throne of gold, unable to fight for herself or our little ones nestled deep inside her as they burned to a crisp all for the sake of her power-thirsty sisters and their unrelenting desire to rule the world. They will die first. As soon as I find them, I plan to make everyone who was in that room watching my love burst into flames die a slow, miserable, and equally painful death. Everyone, everything in that hellish place will burn, a fitting pyre for the drakaina who call themselves her sisters. But before I grant them oblivion, I want them to see everything they built shatter at their feet. Maybe then they’ll learn that some things in this world are irreplaceable. Carnelia, my Carnelia. Another unsuccessful day of talking to shiphands while I work on the do
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 010: Colored Thoughts
[Carnelia] The book is heavy with more than just the sinews and hide that binds it, but with the weight of what it means. My father, what is left of him, now rests in my hands. Should I open it? Sighing, my talons grip the book more firmly between my fingers as I take a deep breath and look around to see if there is a chair where I might rest. Passing a mirror, I pause, gasping. I don’t look like myself anymore, but rather a version of myself I do not remember ever being. I am tall and lithe, my chestnut skin glowing golden from within, my eyes shining like two burning suns.And on my brow, the lattice work of golden symbols glow dully in the shadowed room. Their swirls and dots formed along my horns into the shape of a gleaming crown.Squinting, I try to make out the words…A sudden stab of red hot agony pierces the inner walls of my skull as new symbols spring to life around me, activated by my desire to understand. From every direction I am assaulted by barbs of words, arrows of
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 009: Speaker of the Dead
[Carnelia]The water clock on the wall drips quietly, marking the moments that pass in the otherwise quiet place that was once a grand palace. My cheek is cold and damp as I inhale the scent of mold, the sodden carpet under my hand barely retaining its shape as I brush my fingertips against it.When did I fall asleep? How am I here, in this place when just a moment ago I was....Where was I?"Look, she's awake," I hear Lyra's voice as she walks around my exposed body. "She didn't die after all."She doesn't sound pleased. If anything she sounds extremely disappointed that I somehow survived whatever torture it was she had just subjected me to. Knowing her, it was especially painful.Thank the gods I can't remember it. Whatever it was, my skin feels fresh, raw, and warm. Reaching over, to touch my other hand, I can feel that my skin is not blistered as I'd expect, but smooth and unbelievably soft, not unlike the touch of my own children when they first took their human form."We are ble
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 008: Becoming Light
[Carnelia]"Liar," I hiss into Nova's ear as she bends down to place the shining crown upon my head. "You don't care if I live or die.""I never said that I did," she sighs. "Only that I'd gladly take your place if I could. It is an honor to die for this cause. I'm willing to give my life if it means freedom for our people." She pauses biting her lip she closes her eyes. "I'm sorry, I know you don't feel the same way, but I hope you know that your sacrifice will mean the world to us." she exhales. "I just hope you can forgive us."I want to spit at her, to growl and tell her what a foul beast these three drakaina are, but as soon as my mouth opens, a large disk of clear stone with inlaid gold wire in intricate webbing is placed between my teeth while a pair of spectacles with the same stone is placed just over my eyes. It is translucent enough to see through but everything is now blurred in milky white fog. Like the crown, the sensation is cool and smooth, almost calming.Nova's uniqu
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 007: Moon Shadow
[Primus]I wake with a start, forced from the dream of my mate beneath me by a cold hand pulling me back, grasping my flesh, and yanking me into the darkness. As I blink awake, the shadows seem deeper somehow.When I squint, I can almost make out a silhouette.Someone is watching me. Someone who doesn’t think I can see them based on the brazen way they stand in the center of the room, shadows seeming to stem away from him in every direction as if crafted from these very same shadows.My eyes trace the edges of darker shapes within the swirling vortex of night in my room. I can feel Carnelia’s despair through the link in our rings, faint but still reaching me across continents. I want so badly to close my eyes and rejoin her, to ignore this intruder and go back to sleep. But to rejoin her would mean leaving myself vulnerable. Whomever this is, they can mold the shadows around themselves like a cloak.I have only ever seen one other person do something similar, and he was the king of the
Redemption of The Dragon Prince 006: Shining Crown
[Carnelia]The march to my death is long and slow. We exit the dining room to stand at the beginning of a long corridor lined with bodies, each one standing to attention, gazing at me with hopeful eyes, whispering the words “savior” and “messiah” in the ancient tongue of the sun dragon as an ancient, musty robe of gold fabric embroidered with shining suns is placed on my shoulders. The cloth has been carefully cleaned, but like everything else in this palace, it is slightly marred, gently tattered, and tarnished around the edges.I’m supposed to feel a kinship with these people who have faced so much but still stand tall and straight, with skin in colors ranging from tan to mahogany. And while I see a similarity between us, I know I am not one of them, not really. I haven’t lived through the same trials and adversity. While I feel for them and their plight, I am not one of them, something I am reminded of every day by the drakaina who calls me sister, but only to mock me, teaching me
