A Veil of Amethyst
Haunted by loss, a grieving father and his loyal companion turn to a retired knight for help in facing the ultimate test of their resolve: a dragon preying on the citizens of Ashenfell once more.
“You’re missing him?” Clivedale asked.
“Aye,” Dalton said. He always did, but especially so this night.
Clivedale looked to his companion with a sad smile, then back over the gate’s edge. “I miss him too. Bremmer was the best of us—I feel your sorrow.”
“It’s not just sorrow,” Dalton murmured, releasing a sustained breath of fire. “A lot of rage, too.”
Atop the western gate of Ashenfell, the two stood watch. To their backs, the city slept—or pretended to. Like the beating chest of a sleeping babe, its deep umber pulsated a low light as its citizens scurried into their homes or the Blackened Mare. But opened doors were quick to close in the name of safety. The faintest flicker of light is cautioned to provoke the fury of the sky gods above. No one knew how many were left, only that they were angry—and deservedly so. Their numbers had dwindled after a series of successful Hunts led by Ashenfell’s Sir Johan Ragnar.
“Let’s not conflate these beasts with gods,” he’d say with a certain gravitas. “Though hotter, their blood still runs red like mine and yours.”
That was ten years and seven dragons ago. Ragnar’s first conquest was the Jade; his last was the Amethyst. After felling the Amethyst, Ragnar vowed never to slay another dragon for the remainder of his days, as Ashenfell finally had peace.
“Rage like yours doesn’t come to me,” Clivedale resigned. “What’s the point? We can never best a dragon.”
“My quarrel isn’t with them,” Dalton said, narrowing his eyes, “but with Johan the Coward.”
“A coward?” Clivedale recoiled. “We owe so many years of peace to him.”
“And we’ll owe many more of fear.”
“It’s not cowardice—he swore an oath.”
“Fuck his oath,” Dalton spat. “His oath cost my son his life and many others theirs’.” The image of Bremmer’s molten breastplate infused with his scorched rib cage burned in Dalton’s mind as he looked over the same expanse where he discovered his son’s ravaged remains just a year before. Dalton winced as he thought of the pure agony that would have been Bremmer’s final moments. His voice lowered. “Johan grew soft and forgot about the people he originally fought to protect.”
Clivedale considered Dalton’s words as he thought about the last eighteen moons. Things were safe after Ragnar’s last conquest—until they weren’t. Hunting parties would leave the city gates and disappear into the countryside, never to return. Couriers would discover blistered and mangled bodies splattered across nearby roadways. Citizens leaving their homes hugged their families like it might be for the last time. Fear again grabbed hold of Ashenfell in a way it hadn’t since before Sir Johan felled the Jade.
“Have you spoken to Sir Johan since Bremmer?”
“No, Clive,” Dalton scoffed. “I’ve nothing to say—”
Ripping through their conversation, a sudden and thunderous roar tore over the western expanse. The sound shook the marrow in Dalton and Clivedale’s bones, weakening their knees. Fear clawed up Dalton’s spine and tightened around his gut like a vice, and his hands instinctively reached for his bow despite not having a clear target to train it on against the black of night. He knew the truth: only one creature could bellow like that, and it’d take a lot more than an arrow to stop it.
“Sound the bell!” Dalton barked, but Clivedale was already racing toward the nearest tower. His dash was cut short by a falling mass striking the stone pathway with a wet smack, followed by the brittle crunch of bones. It was a body—or what remained of one. Its twisted remnants painted the ground in deep scarlet, barely visible under the hint of moonlight.
Clivedale froze, his eyes locked on the silhouette of a winged beast cutting through the crescent moon in the distance. Its tail, a dark blur, whipped as it streaked toward the Forest of Black several leagues out. Before it disappeared, Clivedale made out a subtle shimmer that would have been lost against the sea of surrounding stars had there not been such a contrast in color: a shimmer of violet fire danced across scales, sharp and dazzling even against the dark sky—and utterly terrifying.
“The Amethyst,” Clivedale whispered, his voice trembling. “I thought Sir Johan had slain it.”
As Clivedale stood stupified, Dalton inspected the charred remains flattened before them and pulled from it a pendant, heavily misshapen from the Amethyst’s hellfire. “It seems as though Johan hasn’t been entirely forthcoming.”
“What should we do?” Clivedale asked.
“We’re going to find it,” Dalton breathed, “and we’re going to kill it.”
The blood drained from Clivedale’s face as he regarded Dalton. “We can’t best the Amethyst! Are you mad?”
“Doing nothing isn’t exactly serving us, is it Clive?” The corner of Dalton’s mouth curved into a slight smirk. “Besides—we won’t be alone. Johan Ragnar will be joining us.”
Clivedale’s heart fell to his stomach, and his head hung low. Given his vow, Ragnar had no reason to help, but the thought of changing Dalton’s mind once set was equally daunting.
“Sir Johan’s oath,” Clivedale said, exasperated. “He hasn’t answered a call to a dragon Hunt in years.”
“He’ll answer this one,” Dalton said, holding out the pendant in response to the unasked question he anticipated from Clivedale: Why?
The pendant’s etching, though disfigured, was incontestable: a howling wolf in flames—the Ragnar Crest.
* * *
Johan Ragnar was not hard to find.
Following his retirement from the Hunt, his life struck a peculiar balance. His days were filled with the quiet repetition of habit, yet his routine carried an air of mystery. He dwelled on the same hilltop, foraged the same forest, and visited Ashenfell’s markets daily to purchase what he could not secure. But once a fortnight, whispers of Johan venturing out of Ashenfell’s western gate rippled through the city. When dragons began preying on the citizenry again, everyone feared for his safety. But Johan always returned unscathed.
He spoke of these brief excursions to no one, and no one dared ask. His reputation for terse courtesy was well-known. He paid his debts promptly and acknowledged everyone he passed with a curt nod, but his words seldom stretched beyond what decorum required. The commanding presence of his earlier days—the fiery speeches and bold declarations—had long since faded.
Most nights, Johan drank alone in a dimly lit corner of the Blackened Mare. The flickering lamplight danced across his weathered features, casting shadows that seemed to deepen his retreat into himself.
The Blackened Mare rarely rose above a hushed murmur, the air thick with impending doom. Grim undertones clung to the room like a damp fog, and even moments of levity—like the rare burst of laughter sparked by an animated storyteller—quickly dissolved, smothered by the weight of Ashenfell’s latest tragedy.
Here is where Dalton and Clivedale resolved to make their play.
“Oi, Johan,” Dalton said, sliding into the empty seat beside the retired dragon slayer whose eyes remained trained on his half-empty tankard. “We’ve come to get your help.” Clivedale remained standing and watched.
“No,” the answer was flat and final.
“No?” Dalton blinked.
“I’m not Johan,” he said, finally looking up from his drink. His eyes darted from Dalton to Clivedale, still standing, and the faint interior lighting of the pub revealed a violet hue in the man’s eyes that flickered with the same intensity as the flames of the nearby hearth. Few have been close enough to notice their color, but the tales surrounding their origin were plenty.
Dalton leaned forward, already impatient with the ruse. “You may not be Johan, but you know him well enough.” He pointed to the flaming wolf on the man’s cloak.
“Sir Johan,” Clivedale interjected, easing himself into the remaining chair. His voice wavered slightly, but he pressed on. “There’s been another victim. One of many, we know. But you’re the only one who can stop this. Please, listen—”
“That sounds like a request better made to this ‘Sir Johan’ you’re looking for,” he said. “And even so, I doubt you’d have much luck persuading him. I hear he doesn’t hunt dragons anymore.”
“I think he might this time,” Dalton cut in, his voice edged with frustration. “Johan’s words don’t seem to mean much. Last we heard, he’d slain the Amethyst. Yet, Clive and I saw it—alive and well—only hours ago. Care to explain?”
Johan dropped the antagonizing facade and sat straight in his chair. “Where?”
“Why do you care, Not-Johan?” Dalton said, crossing his arms.
“Where?” Johan repeated, the fires of his eyes flaring.
“Over the west gate of Ashenfell,” Dalton slammed the Ragnar pendant onto the table, its surface glinting faintly in the surrounding lamplight. “It dropped Cassia right out of the sky before heading toward the Forest of Black.”
Johan’s gaze fell to the pendant, and he bore into it intently before finally slumping back in his seat, shaking his head.
“Stupid.”
Dalton’s jaw tightened, and his knuckles whitened as he clenched his fists. “Have you no heart?” he growled. The image of Cassia’s smoked carcass burned in his mind. “She was your niece!”
Johan took a sustained drink, sitting back yet again. He wiped his mouth slowly and looked at Dalton. “I have more heart than she had a head.”
Dalton nearly shot to his feet, but Clivedale laid a hand on his shoulder, a gentle reminder for Dalton to steady himself.
“She went looking for trouble,” Johan continued, unfazed. “And she found it. Did either of you ever wonder what she was doing so far outside the city walls? In the Forest of Black, no less?”
“We don’t know if that’s where she was,” Clivedale faltered.
“Of course it was,” Johan said, almost bored. “Returning her body to Ashenfell was as clear of a message as any: ‘Stay away from my nest.’ And that’s where he’s gone—the Forest of Black.”
For a moment, the three sat in tense silence. Johan’s words sank in before he leaned forward again, his tone shifting. “I’ll help you with your dragon, but I have three conditions.”
Dalton’s eyes narrowed. “We’ll hear them after you tell us why the Amethyst lives.”
“First off,” Johan said, raising a finger. “I don’t owe you an explanation. You came to me—Let’s get that straight.” He paused, allowing his words to settle. “But aye, the Amethyst lives. I spared his life on my final Hunt.”
“Why?”
Johan’s gaze turned distant, and his voice softened just barely. “I saw a bit of myself in him,” Johan said. “Scared and alone, with most of his kin slaughtered. I looked into his eyes and saw fear—the same fear that drove me to hunt dragons in the first place. And then I realized…” His voice hardened again. “I was their beast—the thing terrorizing them. So I let him go. I gave him a chance to start anew, but it seems his vengeance outgrew his fear, and others have paid for my mistake. So I’ll help you. I owe Ashenfell this much.”
Clivedale and Dalton exchanged glances, their doubt and determination warring between them. Finally, Dalton spoke. “What are your three conditions?”
“First,” Johan began, his voice measured and deliberate. “Leave your large weapons. Small arms only. Nothing larger than a dagger.”
Dalton scoffed. “How can we hope to fell a dragon with mere daggers?”
Johan’s expression didn’t waver. “If you’d seen what I have, you’d know a dagger is all you need.”
“Second,” he continued, “one of you must land the killing blow.”
Clivedale’s heart raced. “But you’re the only one who’s ever survived!. I—I can’t—”
“Then get your friend to do it,” Johan shrugged, motioning to Dalton. “Five years ago, I swore never to slay another dragon, and I don’t intend to break that oath. I’ll guide you and tell you what you need to know, but I won’t be the one to strike it down. Understand?”
Dalton nodded, his jaw still clenched. “And the third?”
Johan’s smirk returned, faint but unmistakable. “We leave tonight.”
* * *
The trio’s ride would not be a long one. The Forest of Black, as an entity, was known to all, but its interior remained an enigma. It wasn’t far—a mere five leagues from Ashenfell. But few could say they’d ever entered, and even fewer could navigate its depths. ‘The Forest of Black’ was more than a clever name. Its canopy was too dense for most sunlight to permeate. High noon could feel like dusk when traversing Black’s bowels, and the band would need all the sunlight they could get to find the Amethyst, so Johan pushed them to leave that night. If the three were to have any luck, they’d need to begin their search at first light.
“No torches,” Johan instructed. Already noting Dalton’s defiant expression, he continued, “Unless you want the Amethyst to stop us en route, heed my words.”
Clivedale motioned to the moonlit expanse, “How will we get there?”
“Our horses know these roads well,” Johan said, his eyes glistening with the stars, “as do I. Follow me.”
And the three were off into the black night, their paths marked only by the hooves of their mounts rising and falling against the road.
“Dragons eyes are better than their ears,” Johan affirmed with a shout to Clivedale and Dalton. “Once at the edge of the Forest of Black, we’ll rest until sunrise and continue on foot.”
“Black is massive,” Clivedale called out. “How will we find its den?”
“You need only know where to look.”
Within four hours, the group arrived at the forest’s edge, its depths shrouded by the mystery of night. The three began to make camp and laid out their bedrolls but refrained from making a fire, again, by Johan’s instruction.
“I’ll take the first watch,” Johan said, leaning against a thick tree along Black’s perimeter. Clivedale obliged, jumping to the ground and looking at the stars above. Dalton looked to his companion and pursed his lips as he considered Clivedale’s naive earnestness.
“Tell me about Cassia,” Dalton said to Johan, breaking the silence like a hammer on glass.
“No.”
“You didn’t seem perturbed.”
“Is that a question?”
Dalton rolled his eyes, “Why did you not seem perturbed?”
“We grew distant after the attacks began again. She refused to speak to me until I resolved to hunt whatever dragon was preying on Ashenfell. I assured her my mind was made up, and I hadn’t seen her since.”
Dalton took a calming breath. “Before, you said you had almost no kin. How can you receive her death so coldly? It’s like you barely received it at all.”
Johan scoffed, dismissing Dalton’s words with a wave. “She made her choice, as I made mine—and now she’s dead. The dead have no use for guilt, so I have no need to feel it. There’s nothing more to say on the matter.”
“But how—”
“Sir Johan,” Clivedale cut in, his eyes still closed as he lay awake. “‘Small arms only’? You haven’t told us exactly how to slay the Amethyst with only a few daggers.”
“Do you know how dragons kill their prey?” Johan asked, glad to change the subject. He finally looked down at Dalton and Clivedale in the bedrolls.
“Reducing everything to ash,” Clivedale said.
“Like Cassia,” Dalton added, observing Johan’s face for an averse reaction, which he did not offer.
Johan’s eyes returned upward, his violet irises glinting in the starlight.
“Dragons hunt as much with their minds as they do their talons, maw, or breath. Once a dragon conquers your mind, the body follows. Under their grip, you’re no longer Dalton or Clivedale. You’re the Jade or the Ruby. They snuff you out of your own body like sand over a fire and do with you as they please.” Clivedale and Dalton’s gaze remained locked on Johan, unblinking.
Interpreting their silence as confusion, he continued, “The truth is, Cassia was dead long before she entered the Forest of Black. So—” he turned to Clivedale, “Why small arms? If our dragon takes hold of one of you, I’d rather you be brandishing a dagger than an axe or a sword.”
“So, how will we make the killing blow?” Clivedale asked, a trembling edge to his voice.
“Tomorrow,” Johan said. “I’ll tell you tomorrow.”
Dalton turned over in his bedroll.
“Of course you will.”
* * *
The sun peered over the hills to the east, shining its morning rays on the band of men as they readied themselves and tied their horses to the trees along the edge of the Forest of Black.
Johan ushered Clivedale and Dalton to follow his lead into the forest.
“I know Black well,” Johan said. “As fate would have it, my Hunts brought me here on more than one occasion.”
“How many times?” Clivedale asked, stepping over a root.
“Seven,” Johan chuckled. “Here is where I found the Jade. I spent a year hunting the Ruby after, traveling to the furthest reaches of the High Nine. But I found her a stone’s throw away from where I discovered her brother—and all her kin after.”
“So you know exactly where to go,” Clivedale breathed, his sweaty grip tightening along the hilt of his dagger.
“Aye. It’s here that I last encountered the Amethyst, and it’s where I suspect we’re to meet him again.”
“How will we know when we’re close?” Clivedale asked.
“Just keep your eyes peeled for dragon bones.”
The trees within Black were sparse—a curious mismatch to the dense canopy overhead. Each trunk bore a heavy crown spanning outward and upward, interlacing with its neighbors. Scattered beams of light pierced through the gloom, providing just enough light for Dalton and Clivedale to stumble onward, but Johan continued his march with unerring purpose as though the forest itself whispered directions to him.
Soot and dirt powdered the ground beneath their boots and muffled their footsteps. Yet, it was not the earth’s silence that unnerved Dalton but the forest itself. There was no rustling of squirrels in the branches, no distant cracks of twigs broken by unseen hooves, and even birds seemed absent, their usual songs replaced by an eerie void. Only the occasional insect chirp broke the oppressive stillness.
Dalton’s gaze shifted uneasily. He could not ignore the gnawing sensation that the forest should not be this quiet—but what could possibly thrive in a place hunted clean by fire and fangs? He stopped clear in his tracks.
“Johan,” Dalton called out. “What’s our plan?” Panic wormed into Dalton’s chest, but he kept its edge from his voice.
“The Amethyst rests up ahead,” Johan said.
“And you thought to tell us this now?” Dalton’s eyes widened, and his voice lowered to a whisper, but Johan’s volume remained level.
“Relax. The Amethyst hunts this time of morning. As you probably noted, he won’t find the food he needs here in the Forest of Black. We have time.”
“How much?” Clivedale asked.
“Enough,” Johan answered curtly. “The plan is straightforward: we hide, await his return, and strike as he sleeps. Now come.”
After passing several dozen more trees, the Forest of Black revealed the first departure of its namesake: a bright clearing where, instead of trees, there were several white-spotted mounds, just as dark as the soot blend beneath them. The smallest was twice Dalton’s height—and the largest, many times higher.
As Dalton approached the nearest heap, he saw the white spots were not colorations but protrusions, each the width of his own body.
“That was the Onyx,” Johan said. He approached Clivedale, standing in front of the largest grave. “And that one was the Opal.”
The enormity of the pile left Clivedale’s limbs heavy. Even with his neck arched fully up, he could not see its apex. “I didn’t know dragons bury their dead,” he said.
Johan grunted in affirmation. “Now—I have a question for you two,” Johan said, continuing his steady stride toward Clivedale. “Why is it so important for you to kill this dragon? Who was Cassia to you?”
Dalton shook his head and looked away from the Onyx’s mound. “It’s not about Cassia. It’s about the constant fear we live in. We’ve lost many before Cassia—I lost my son,” Dalton felt his voice begin to quiver before squashing the emotion and continuing. “And we’ll lose many more if we continue doing nothing. Slaying that which haunts us sends the message to our brothers that we’re not helpless.”
Clivedale looked down and sifted the dirt with his feet. “You know—it felt we had found a sort of hope for a time. Because of you, Sir Johan. You felled the Jade, and things felt safe. And then the Ruby—and things felt safer still.”
“But over the last few years,” Dalton started, “Ashenfell’s hope has faded. And I want to reclaim it. For those we’ve lost.” He exhaled slowly. “For Bremmer.”
“So Johan,” Dalton said. “Tell us, where should we lie in ambush?”
Johan continued taking small, calculated steps, finally closing the distance separating himself and Clivedale. “I’ll repeat to you exactly what I said last night when you approached me in the Blackened Mare: ‘I am not Johan.’”
Faster than human eyes could register, Johan plunged his dagger deep into Clivedale’s throat until only its hilt remained exposed. The man’s dispassionate amethyst eyes only observed as Clivedale fell to the ground, sputtering and drowning in his blood.
Though he could not speak, Clivedale looked at Johan in disbelief, his face a bloodied mask of anguish.
“I am not Johan,” he repeated. “Though his body has served us well these last five years.”
Dalton stood paralyzed, hopelessly bearing witness to Clivedale’s life slowly leaving his writhing body. Dalton could do nothing to move his arms from his sides or his feet from the ground, but he willed himself to unclench his jaw just enough to utter a single word.
“Why?”
A deep and mighty growl emanated from the side, sending tremors through the earth and up Dalton’s legs, but he could not turn his head to look. His eyes remained locked on his fallen companion. In his periphery, he saw one of the burial mounds collapse within itself as a figure emerged. Though Dalton could not make out the shape, he saw a sliver of serrated amethyst slither out of view and escape behind him.
“After many years, we began losing hope. Johan felled the Jade, and we grew frightened. Then, he felled the Ruby and we grew frightened still. But five years ago, the Amethyst grabbed hold of him, and we felt hope once again.”
Dalton did the last thing his body would allow: he closed his eyes.
Whether the next blow came from the Amethyst behind or its vessel in front, what followed made no difference.
Like Cassia the day before, Dalton was dead long before he entered the Forest of Black.