The Dragon Mist

"It is through one’s indomitable will, that true strength lies."

-   Vashys Bree

   Dragon mist crept through Rorn, riding the back of the wind like a spectral omen. The ghostly veil slithered along the exterior of Stratos Bree’s home, where Stratos sheltered himself away with his ailing wife and feverish son.

   Calloused hands rummaged through the shelves, sending empty vials and bottles clattering to the counter below. “No,” he muttered. “There must be more.” His wife’s wheezing breath punctuated the silence, each ragged inhale a reminder of the sickness stealing her life away.

   He rounded the table, boots scuffing against wooden floorboards, and dropped to his knees to search through a lower cabinet on the other side of the den. The hinges creaked as he yanked the door open.

   Empty.

   He murmured a curse. Without medicine, his wife likely wouldn’t survive the night. His son would follow soon after.

   With a despondent grunt, he pushed himself to his feet, legs leaden with exhaustion and dread. He trudged toward the bubbling stew, snatching a bowl from the table. The fire crackled, its warmth a cruel mockery of comfort.

   Stratos shoveled the meager meal into the dish. “Third time this cycle that wretched barrier has broken,” he said to his wife, sprinkling dill and parsley over the thin broth. The herbs’ fragrance briefly masked the acrid scent of sickness permeating the room. “When this damn mist passes, Pysos and I will have words about fortifying the pass.”

   He carried the bowl to Vashys’s bedside, his heart clenching at the sight of his son’s pallid skin. “Here, boy. Eat. You need your strength.”

   Vashys nodded weakly, accepting the meal. Stratos brushed his son’s sweat-dampened hair aside, wincing at the heat radiating from his forehead. With a gentle touch, he lifted Vashys’s chin, examining the boy’s face.

   Black lines traced along Vashys’s eyelids, like veins of obsidian beneath paper-thin skin. In the hollows beneath his eyes, the network of darkened vessels spread like ink spilled over parchment, a stark contrast to the boy’s sapphire gaze.

   “Is my light strong, father?” Vashys’s voice was barely a whisper.

   Stratos’s throat tightened, but he forced a smile. “Brighter than Idromir himself.” He planted a kiss on Vashys’s burning forehead, willing his own strength into his son.

   As he stood, the weight of their situation bore down on him. Hate seeped into his heart. Hate for the light-bearing Vandakari that installed themselves as gods and called themselves Mystics. Hate for the oppressive tactics that crippled Rorn’s medicine stores and left his family in such a state. But worst of all, he felt helpless. Each step back to the fire was laden with sorrow.

   Stratos filled another bowl and seasoned it for his wife. His gaze drifted to the mist-shrouded street beyond their home. The relentless haze curled against the windows, a grim thief of their precious time. Out there, somewhere in Rorn’s gloomy labyrinth, lay their only hope.

   He set his jaw, resolve hardening in his chest. There was no choice left. He knew what he had to do.

   “I have to go now.” Stratos placed the steaming stew on his wife’s bedside table.

   “No.” Vila’s assertion was a fading echo of her once vibrant voice.

   Stratos knelt, taking her frail hand in his. “I cannot risk waiting any longer. I won’t lose you,” he insisted. “Either of you.”

   Vila’s gaze met his, her eyes half-lidded and clouded with pain. The shadow sickness had ravaged her, corrupting the veins in the whites of her eyes in branched tributaries. She was fading, slipping away like sand through an hourglass.

   “You can’t ask me to sit here and watch you and Vashys die,” Stratos pleaded.

   A flicker of the old Vila sparked in her eyes. “And you can’t expect me to approve of your stupidity,” she retorted. Her brows furrowed, then softened as she glanced over at her son. A pregnant pause captured the room, heavy with unspoken fears and desperate hope.

   Vila drew a labored breath, the sound of it carrying the weight of her decision. Like most mothers, her child was her weakness. And her strength. She nodded.

  Stratos squeezed her hand and rose, moving for the cloak rack. “I’ll head for the caves,” he said, layering on garments to shield every inch of skin from the mist. “There’s a cart half-loaded with luxion that hasn’t been sealed in the vault yet. I should only need a handful.” As he fastened his cloak, a glint of hope saddled his voice. “Silas…rumors claim he found a way to refine it, just as the Mystics do.”

   Vila’s eyes widened. “Silas? But he’s—”

   “I know.” Stratos adjusted his gloves. “But right now, he’s our only chance.”

Vila chewed her lower lip. “Come home,” his wife said, fear buried in her tone. “I won’t have you die for me.”

   He offered a soft chuckle. “Dying for one’s family is the only time it means something.” Stratos laced the final bracer tight to his wrist. “If Silas can brew the solari elixir…”

   He turned to Vila one final time, memorizing every detail of her face. Fear of the mist plagued him, but resigning to inaction while his family died was a fate he would not allow himself to suffer. He settled his luxion infused goggles in place and pulled up his dragon-hide mask. The silver swell outside pressed against the window, but as he looked at his wife and son, Stratos knew it was the only choice he had left.

Stratos burst from the house, the dragon mist instantly assaulting him. It tore at his clothes with invisible claws, burning holes and devouring layers of fabric with voracious hunger. A low, menacing growl rippled through the noxious air, as if the mist itself was warning him to turn back.

   Silver tendrils swirled around him, reducing the world to a hazy blur. In the distance, shadowy silhouettes loomed, their shapes indistinct and threatening. Stratos ran, his heart pounding, knowing that to linger meant certain death. Those who stayed too long in the mist fell prey to its insidious whispers, their minds unraveling as surely as their bodies were consumed by the acidic vapor.

   He clung to his one hope: follow the ridge of the gorge to the cave’s mouth. There, he would find shelter from the fiendish mist. He narrowly missed a divot in the cobbled landscape.

   If I can make it that far…

   As he ran, whispers crept from the miasma, growing louder with each labored breath. Something always seemed to move just beyond his sight, sending icy spires of fear down his spine. The hazy silhouettes swayed as words coalesced from the cacophony of whispers.

   You won’t save them, a voice taunted, dripping with malice. You are weak—insignificant.

   You’re a fool, another hissed, the words slithering through his mind, dredging up memories he had tried to bury. A coward.

   Then, a voice stopped him cold—Vila’s voice. A figure materialized in the haze, one familiar to him. In her arms, she carried their child. You’re leaving us?

   He clenched his eyes shut as his own voice responded. I have to, Vila. Our supplies are dwindling. If the Mystics restrict our rations any further, we won’t survive. We have to make our situation clear to them.

  Others have already volunteered. The pleading in her voice struck him harder with the weight of knowledge and regret behind it. I need you here…your son needs you here.

    I’m doing this for both of you, he lied.

   “No,” he gasped. Hearing the flimsy justification of his younger self sank into his chest like an icy dagger. What a fool he had been. Regret tormented him over the time he lost chasing egotistical purpose and self-gratification. He refused to make that mistake again.

   Steeling his will, he forced his legs back into action. Glancing at the ridge to his right, he watched it disappear beyond the undulating curtain of fog. The mine had to be close. It had to be.

   His lungs burned with each toxic breath, tendrils of mist finding gaps in his mask’s defense. Every inhale pushed him closer to the brink of madness. Vila’s voice returned as a cruel whisper in his ear. What kind of man abandons his family—his newborn child? Coward. Traitor.

   Tears streamed down his face, cutting through the grime and mist. It’s your fault. Your son will die because of you, she said.

   “No!” Stratos screamed, his voice raw and desperate. And then, like an answer to his plea, the opening of the cave appeared through the haze like a gaping maw.

   With a final, prodigious effort, he hurled himself forward, swallowed by the safety of the cave. He collapsed, gasping and trembling, free from the clutches of the infernal mist.

   Pulling his mask down, he drew in deep, determined breaths as if trying to purge the poisonous fumes from his very soul. With each inhale, fragments of his sanity knitted themselves back together. As the last remnants of mist retreated from his mind, he peeled off his heavy cloaks, one by one.

   Shakily, he rose to his feet, still pulsing with adrenaline. At the cave’s mouth, where the dragon mist lapped hungrily, Stratos surveyed the pile of ruined garments at his feet. The outermost layer was little more than tattered rags. He sobered, reminded that if not for the protection, his flesh would have been ravaged instead. With fate’s blessing, what remained would be enough for the return journey.

   Turning his back on the mist, Stratos faced the vaulted cavern of the luxion mine. His breath caught at the sight. Luminescent veins of ore climbed the walls and arched across the ceiling, disappearing into the depths like a river of starlight. Cart tracks spanned the floor, branching and intersecting throughout. He’d marveled at the view hundreds of times, but with his family’s mortality in the balance, the life-giving ore pulsed with more gravitas.

   Stratos trekked deeper into the mine, his footsteps echoing in the silent chamber. The guttural breath of the mist rumbled through the cavernous space, issuing an ominous reminder of its waiting torture before silence took root once more. He located the stores of luxion, barred behind thick iron beams of the vault. Within, a chaos cloak lay strewn across the center table. He eyed it greedily. Crafted from dragon hide, it would protect him from the mist. But it was far beyond his reach, and time was agonizingly limited.

   Standing sentry before the vault was the cart of luxion ore, its ethereal glow spilling over the edges like liquid moonlight. As desperate as he was for the safety of the dragon-hide cloak, the ore was all he needed.

   With reverent care, he scooped a handful of the precious gems, inspecting each for the telltale darkness of opscurion corruption—a touch of shadow that would render the light useless for his purposes. Satisfied, he pocketed them in a leather satchel tucked beneath his remaining layers.

   “Bring them strength,” he whispered to the gems, more for his own sake. Luxion light was a potent shield against dragon mist, more so once refined. Rorn adopted the practice of imbuing their building material with luxion powder centuries ago as a defense against the dragon mist. Though, the Mystics returned less and less of the precious ore as of late.

   For a moment, Stratos savored the mine’s tranquil silence, an estuary of peace amid the chaos outside. He closed his eyes, breathing in the unpolluted air, hoping to bottle such peace as a barrier against the violent miasma that awaited him. The faces of Vila and Vashys flashed before his mind, reminding him that peace was a luxury he couldn’t afford.

   Returning to the mouth of the mine, Stratos collected the cloaks once more, each layer a fragile guard between life and death. He held onto the comfort that Silas’s home was near to the cave—but further still from his home and his ailing family. A necessary obstacle for the elixir he needed.

   Stratos took one last, fortifying breath of clean air before pulling his mask back over his mouth. The mist writhed beyond the invisible barrier, hungry and waiting. Eyes blazing with determination, he plunged back into the haze.

   Stratos raced toward the heart of the village, the mist transforming familiar streets into a labyrinth of hazy shadows. Without the ridge wall as a guide, he was adrift in a sea of silver fog. The whispers started again, creeping messages of doubt into his mind.

   His foot caught something solid. He stumbled, hands outstretched, and found himself sprawled across the mead hall steps. Relief washed over him, offering momentary reprieve from the panic tightening in his chest. Momentary…as he found the ghostly figure of his wife looming over him, her voice rife with pain. I can’t believe you. How could you do this to me?

   Another figure approached. This was never the life I wanted, his younger self exclaimed. But I still rode to the citadel. I pleaded our case to the Mystics and their answer was clear. What more would you have me do?

   “Coward!” Stratos rose angrily beside his doppelganger—a manifestation of his every mistake and regret.

   Vila wept. So, you would abandon us? For her?

   “No, no, no,” Stratos pleaded, climbing to his knees. “I—I didn’t. I—”

   There is nothing for me in Rorn! Shadow Stratos said. Nothing but failed dreams and rock dust!

  “Shut up!” Stratos threw a fist at his hazy silhouette, striking not but air. He threw another, the momentum disrupting his balance. Stumbling, his shame tempered his anger. Amid Vila’s cries, he positioned himself next to her shadow figure, tears stinging his eyes. “Don’t listen to him. Please. He’s just scared. I was scared. I hadn’t realized what I had. I love you.”

   I am in Rorn, she said. Vashys, your son, is in Rorn. Is that not enough for you?

  Her words fell on him like a great weight, entangling and anchoring his heart. The mist probed his psyche and projected his greatest insecurities before him. Shaking his head, he attempted to dispel the vision. He willed himself to use the hallucination to fuel his motivations rather than deplete them. Orienting himself, Stratos sprinted down the road behind the hall, his heart pounding in rhythm with his footfalls.

   Silas’s door came into view, wreathed with the same protective ring of luxion inlay as his own. Stratos hammered against it, his fist a frantic drumbeat. The mist voices rose into his consciousness, picking at his sanity.

   The door flew open, revealing a startled, portly man. “Stratos?” Silas barked in wide-eyed disbelief.

Stratos stumbled across the threshold, gasping as Silas slammed the door shut, silencing the mist’s siren call. He slumped to the floor, allowing the last whispers to bleed from his mind before forcing himself to his feet.

   “Have you lost your mind?” Silas hissed. “What are you doing here?”

  “I need your help,” Stratos panted, gripping Silas’s shoulder for support. His eyes, wild with desperation, locked onto the apothecary’s. “My wife… my—my son…”

   Staggering toward the table, Stratos fumbled with his satchel, spilling luxion gems like fallen stars across the teak surface. The frantic energy startled Jadis, the apothecary’s wife, who was seated across from him wearing concerned eyes.

   “I need the solari elixir,” Stratos said. “Please, Silas.”

Hesitation flashed in Silas’s eyes. “Stratos, I—”

   “Don’t!” Stratos snatched up a gem, thrusting it towards the man. “I know you found a way to refine the gems.”

   “How do you—”

  “It doesn’t matter!” Stratos roared, his desperation giving way to near madness. He was treading in dangerous water, but he didn’t care. He shoved the gem closer, its light casting eerie shadows across Silas’s face. “My family is dying. I risked everything in that accursed mist. Can you or can you not?”

   Silence stretched between them. Silas’s eyes flicked to his wife, then back to Stratos. “The Mystics—”

   “Will never know.” Stratos’s voice was a hoarse whisper. “Not by my mouth. I swear it. Please.”

   For a moment longer, Silas stood frozen. Skepticism battled with compassion in his eyes. Finally, he gave a slow, curt nod.

   “Thank you,” Stratos breathed, sagging with relief.

   Silas jerked his head toward the fire, and Stratos gathered the stones. The apothecary moved to his workbench and retrieved a cloth-covered object. He unveiled a crucible unlike any Stratos had ever seen. The stone cylinder gleamed in the firelight with an otherworldly allure. A strange pulse radiated from it, as if the object itself were alive. Questions burned within Stratos, but the urge to satiate the surfacing curiosities was severed by his desire to save his family.

   With steady care, Silas removed the lid. Stratos placed the luxion inside, their glow glinting prismatic colors off the inner wall of the crucible. Donning thick gloves and wielding long tongs, Silas placed the cylinder on the bed of coals in the fire. Flames licked at the crucible as Silas enclosed it in fiery-red stones.

   “This is tricky work, Stratos,” Silas muttered, his brows furrowed in concentration at the makeshift furnace. “It demands absolute precision. I can’t guarantee it will save them. And if we’re discovered—”

   “I know,” Stratos said. “But what choice did I have? The Mystics tighten their grip, rationing our supplies while people suffer. Desperation breeds risk…”

   A hush fell between them, broken only by the crackling coals. Jadis shifted uneasily in her chair, her eyes darting to the mist-shrouded windows.

   “People are losing faith,” Silas whispered, the words hanging dangerously in the air.

   “Silas,” his wife cautioned.

   A culpable expression took root on Silas’s face.

   Stratos nodded grimly. “It’s why we’ve turned to…alternative means. It’s why you’ve dared to refine the luxion in secret, is it not?” He searched Silas’s face for confirmation, but the man remained impassive. “We’re not alone in this. We’ve all had to learn to survive without our godly rulers.” His last words dripped with venom.

   “Quiet!” Silas hissed, eyes wide. “Even the mist doesn’t ward off the Mystics’s spies. They have low tolerance for blasphemy and scant mercy.”

   Before Stratos could retort, the crucible began to glow. It shifted through hues from a fiery red, to ethereal blue, then to deep, cosmic gray. Yet, a nimbus of white light still enveloped it, as though it contained a captive star.

   With practiced motion, Silas brushed aside the coals and deftly maneuvered the crucible with his tongs. Clicking his tongue, he commanded Stratos to move away, then set the vessel on his workbench. The wood hissed and charred, prompting Silas to transfer it to a stone tablet. A blackened ring lingered on the wooden surface.

   Heart pounding, Stratos leaned in as Silas lifted the lid. His hopes plummeted as he peered inside. The luxion gems lay unchanged, mocking his desperate gambit.

   “No,” Stratos breathed. “No, it–it can’t be. There must be something—anything!”

   “In alchemy, things are rarely what they seem,” Silas said, retrieving a rough-stone mortar and pestle.

  Extracting the nuggets of luxion from the crucible, Silas placed them into the bowl. Despite the unchanged appearance, the luxion was brittle and crumbled beneath the pestle. As Silas worked, the air itself seemed to come alive and the coarse silt glowed brighter. Light spilled over the mortar’s brim in a smoky haze, growing more intense with each circular motion of Silas’s hand. It was as if Idromir himself was peering through the bowl, blessing their clandestine work.

   Stratos watched, as Silas worked the luxion into a fine, luminous powder. The apothecary paused, tilting the bowl, allowing the radiant sand to flow like a river of light. As the layers of sand folded over, the light concealed within strengthened. Try as he might, Stratos couldn’t fathom the arcane process unfolding before him.

   With a satisfied nod, Silas turned to the shelves above. His fingers danced over glass jars filled with clear liquids, indistinguishable to Stratos’s untrained eye. Selecting one, Silas added a few drops to the mortar. The mixture hissed softly as he stirred it with a small metal spoon, creating a gritty, glowing paste.

   As Silas transferred the concoction to a small cauldron and added water, an alluring fragrance filled the room. It was at once sweet and bitter, pungent yet pleasing. The scent hit Stratos like a physical force, drawing his mind back to the mist-shrouded streets. The world tilted and he stumbled into a chair, gripping the table’s edge for support.

   His wife’s accusing voice echoed in his skull, a phantom reminder of his failures. “I’m trying,” Stratos whispered, his control fraying at the edges. He needed to focus, to push through the shroud of doubt and fear if he wanted to save his family.

   “It’s not real.” Jadis’s gentle voice stole him from the chaos in his mind. “The mist feeds on our fears.”

   Stratos nodded, pressing a trembling palm to his forehead. “Right now,” he admitted in a whisper. “I am wrought with fear.” He offered a smile, unsure if it was meant to comfort her, or him.

   Silas’s voice broke through the moment. “It’s ready.”

   Stratos turned to see the cauldron emitting a soft, pulsing glow. The elixir within shimmered, holding the promise of salvation.

   Stratos watched as Silas carefully poured the meager amount of liquid into a vial.

   Will there be enough to save them both?

   Silas rose from the fire, cradling two vials of luminescent liquid. With a gentle shake, they erupted in a spectacular glow. “I can only hope this will cure them,” he murmured, his voice heavy with uncertainty. “I can’t promise anything.”

   As Stratos reached for the vials, Silas held back, his eyes searching Stratos’s face. “The world grows darker by the day. It’s easy to feel abandoned.” He unfurled his fingers, offering the elixirs like fragile hopes made tangible. “Do not abandon your hope, Stratos. In these shadowed times, it’s all we have.”

Stratos’s fingers closed around the vials, their warmth pulsing against his skin. “My family is my hope,” he said. “They are all that I have.”

   He drew a deep breath. An act intended to both compose him and ready him for the nightmarish journey ahead. Each venture into the mist left invisible scars on his psyche, inviting madness to take root. Time to heal such wounds was not a luxury he could afford. With a final nod of gratitude to Silas, he steeled himself, pulled the tattered cloaks tight, and faced the door.

   Silas’s hand on his shoulder stopped him. With little more than a glance, a silent conversation passed between them—an understanding of sacrifice, of the lengths one would go to protect their family. With grim resolve, Silas opened the door and Stratos raced into the waiting fog.

   The mist’s assault was immediate and merciless. Before he’d even reached the mead hall, a cacophony of malevolent voices bombarded him.

   You’re too late, the voice within called. You’ve failed. Your family is dead.

   They died alone, screaming your name, another voice taunted.

   But you abandoned them. A third cackled.

   They are with us now. Forever. Dozens of voices wailed through the mist.

   Stratos pressed on, each step a battle against the toxic miasma and his own fracturing mind. He tried to retreat to the sanctuary of his thoughts, but the mist was there; insidious and relentless.

   Where were you? His wife’s voice cut through the chaos, stopping him cold. His breath came in ragged, shaking gasps as he pressed his fists into his temples. “No. No. Get out of my head!” he cried, his voice lost in the swirling fog.

   I suffered while you were gone. Our son suffered. Why did you leave us to die?

   A chill shuddered through him. He stumbled forward on leaden feet, only to feel the searing pain of the mist tearing through his final cloak. His scream of agony transformed into a battle cry. He charged ahead, the tattered remains of his protection streaming behind him like a war banner.

   The ridge wall materialized through the haze, a beacon of hope. Stratos veered toward home, his heart pounding with renewed determination. He was so close—so agonizingly close.

   When his foot found a divot in the cobbled path, his ankle twisted, and he crashed to the unforgiving ground.

   The vials flew from his grasp and shattered against the stones. His heart plummeted. His hope, his family’s salvation, disappeared before his eyes. It was over. He’d failed.

   Time slowed, each moment stretching into an eternity. Stratos’s heartbeat thundered in his ears, drowning out all else. The elixir, once luminous with promise, crawled through sediment and rock, forever beyond his reach.

   The mist surged forward. It breached his tattered sleeves, clawing ravenously at his exposed flesh. Tears stung his eyes, but his breath remained trapped in an eternal gasp. His mind screamed at him to move, to rush home and be with his family in their final moments. Yet his body refused to obey, paralyzed by the weight of his failure.

   As despair threatened to consume him, a figure emerged through the fog like a ghost. He feared another hallucination of his wife come to punish him. Instead, he found a fable personified. The Ghost of Light. Cloaked in white, it drifted through the mist untouched, crouching to examine the shattered vials before turning its hidden gaze upon Stratos.

   “Stand,” it commanded, its voice a low gravel.

   Stratos stared, transfixed by a mixture of awe and terror. He’d heard the rumors, believing them to be myths to pacify the weak. But placed beneath the creature’s gaze, he found a strange faith fluttering in his heart.

   “Stand,” the figure repeated, its tone brooking no argument.

   Against the weight of sorrow, Stratos obeyed. The cloaked figure gestured for him to lead, and he stumbled forward. Each step was agony as the mist tore at his flesh and poisoned his lungs, but something beyond his own will propelled him onward.

   They reached his home, and Stratos crashed through the door, the ghost slamming it shut behind them. He threw the remaining cloaks from his back and turned to find the spectral figure hovering over his wife’s still form. A moment of terrible silence passed before the creature turned away. No words were needed; Stratos knew. His wife was gone.

   His wife was gone…

   A guttural cry tore from his throat as he collapsed beside her. Her skin was cold beneath his touch, her once vibrant eyes glazed and lifeless. Tears still glistened in the inky black hollows of her terrified stare. What little strength remained bled from him as he wept on the floor. “No,” Stratos sobbed, his world crumbling around him.

   A flash of brilliant light erupted from across the room. Through tear-blurred vision, Stratos saw the cloaked figure standing over Vashys, his son’s body writhing within a cocoon of radiance.

   “What are you doing?” Stratos screamed, lunging forward only to be repelled by an invisible force. He watched in horror and fascination as inky tendrils of corruption were drawn from Vashys’s body, thrashing wildly before dissolving into nothingness.

   As quickly as it began, it ended. The light faded, leaving the hovel in silence. Stratos rushed to his son, finding no trace of the sickness that had ravaged him. Vashys’s skin was cool, his breathing steady. Life had returned.

   “Thank you,” Stratos whispered to the creature towering over him.

   “Darkness moves unabated through the realm,” the creature said. “Death will blanket the land, though that will not be the end of this curse.” Its hood turned toward Stratos and though he could see no face, he felt the weight of its gaze. “The shadow is raising an army. War is coming. If light does not rise to meet the coming darkness, the world will be consumed by it.” The creature turned toward the door and opened it on the hungry silver cloud. “And your wife’s death will know no peace.”

   Before Stratos could respond, the being vanished into the mist, leaving him with a maelstrom of questions and a newfound purpose in his heart. As Stratos cradled his sleeping son, gazing at his wife’s lifeless form, something shifted within him. The ghost was right. War was coming. Not between light and shadow, but servant and master. And in that moment, the fires of rebellion were lit.