“Well. You’ve put me in a bit of a conundrum now, haven’t you?” 

Eli looked down at the egg, comfortably nestled within a bed of straw and furs so thick only the top third of it was visible. Around it, the shadows swarmed like storm clouds blotting out the horizon, not quite swallowing the egg but edging around it and creating what Eli had only ever been able to describe as a tear through the light of the world. To either side of it, the candles flickered and bathed the walls in a pale golden glow. But where the shadows hovered, a void that invited the fear of the unknown, so empty and deep did the promise of its presence create. 

The egg didn’t seem to care.

With a sigh, Eli dropped onto his backside and folded his legs before the nest. He set his chin upon his awaiting palm, his elbow digging into his inner thigh, and stared at the egg. The shell was a curious thing, mottled with teal and black so thickly that he could barely see the cream color beneath it all. Rumors existed about eggs such as this one, about the sort of dragons that supposedly hatched from them. Violent and untamable, natural kings and queens of their own kind who bowed before no one and nothing. Incredibly rare and to be avoided at all costs if encountered. 

How the emperor had managed to get his hands on one, not even Eli could explain. 

Although that was assuming everything spoken in rumor was spoken in truth. Eli knew as well as the next thief that while truth often sat somewhere within rumor, it very rarely held the heart of it. More often than not, the truth had been ground up and sprinkled throughout the rumor, and if you were lucky, that grinding had left it more like the thick chunks of dried fruit in Orospezian spiced cake and less like the spices themselves. But a good thief could pick out those pieces, regardless of how small, and get a better idea of the trouble they were likely to run into by following such rumors, for the more lucrative the rumor, the less likely you were to find the unquestionable honesty in the truth it contained and the more likely it existed as an approximation of that truth. 

And there was a very big difference between honest truth and something playing at honesty. 

Eli reached out and ran the tip of his index finger down along the curved side of the egg. Textured like pebbled leather without any give to it. And warm. So strangely warm. He pulled his hand away, a frown eating away at his mouth.

“No wonder they were in such a rush to get you back to the capital,” Eli murmured. “Think you can give me a little more time? I’d like very much to get you someplace better, but if you insist on doing this in the next day or two, you’re going to make my job a lot harder.”

He had no idea if the dragon inside the egg could hear him, but it soothed him to hear of his efforts regardless. Things birthed when they were ready, and that was a truth Eli understood as readily as he did that the sun shed its light on the world without asking for recompense and that the seasons took hold of places differently, but they still came nonetheless. What plans he had mattered little in the face of nature and her designs. 

Still… 

“It would be a great help. Even my skills can’t bring the Flamecrest any nearer.”

The egg wasn’t terribly big, though it weighed more than its size led one to believe. Reaching up to his mid-thigh, Eli thought it average as far as dragon eggs went. Granted, he hadn’t seen one in quite a few years. Supposedly, bigger eggs existed, but those had often been attributed to wild-born and bred dragons, not those captive to the various nations who had once employed the creatures. Though, employed was perhaps a generous term.

To some nations, dragons had been no more than exceptionally large cavalry horses with a mind far more keen. Dragon riders were practically nonexistent, and instead, the dragons were commanded through magical links that tethered them to their handlers. As far as Eli knew, the problem sat not in humanity’s ability to safely outfit a dragon for a rider but rather the general dislike dragons held for being saddled in the first place. No matter the construction, all attempts to put the creatures under harness or bridle or any sort of contraption to render them ridable had been met with stiff and, at times, violent resistance. 

They appeared far more inclined to follow instructions than they were to be forced into any particular action.

Eli found dragons fascinating. But maybe that was simply because he, too, could understand the lure of gold and security and the flight of freedom. Why any dragon should have contented itself with serving some nation baffled him, but the time of dragons decked out in military regalia (apparently a far different thing in the mind of a dragon than a saddle or anything like it) and soaring the skies in some attempt to secure a battlefield were long past. The Aurinon Empire lost its last remaining dragon a decade ago, and no other nation had managed to secure one since for itself. 

In fact, some argued that dragons had gone extinct, done in by man’s greed and the inability to manage so large a creature, who bred so rarely as it was even in the wild. There was also the thought that they existed in such low numbers they would be impossible to find. That rather than see themselves dragged into the service of one nation or another again, they had flown to the edges of the earth, places too inhospitable for any human to survive long enough to find them.

The fact that he now sat before what was undeniably a dragon’s egg proved that dragons were not extinct. But Eli had never believed them to be completely gone in the first place. 

As with so many precious things, you simply needed to know where to look to find them.

A howl rose up, the sound echoing eerily down the corridors of the labyrinthine cave Eli had taken the egg to after his heist. It reached him as crisply and as clearly as if he had stood by the creature making it, and its presence sent a frown tugging at his lips once more. 

“It would seem the hunt is on,” Eli said. He hefted himself up to his feet with a grunt, then gently set his palm to the top of the egg. For a brief moment, a smile countered the frown that had entrenched itself at the corners of his mouth. “You should wait. Once I’m done with my game of hide-and-seek, I’ll be back for you. After all, you and I have far better places to be, and I’d like to get there without the emperor’s hounds at my heels. I’m sure you can understand that.”

He patted the egg as he might have a kitten, letting his fingertips tickle the top curve of it before he pulled them away and turned to face the mouth of the tunnel. His tongue ran along his lower lip. Eli flexed his fingers.

There was still more work to be done.

With a glance behind him, his gaze fixed not on the egg but on the shadows waxing and waning around it, he murmured, “Turn the light to shadow. Let unknown eyes see only darkness and fill them with the fear of the emptied vessel so that they avert their gaze and seek only the comfort of the stars.”

Behind him, the shadows flickered, and the candles threatened to gutter out. Their flames burned black for a brief moment before settling once more into their previous golden glow. In those few seconds, however, the shadows of the cave had deepened, devouring any light that dared try to penetrate its domain. As Eli walked into the tunnel, the shadows closed in behind him.

Getting out of the cave required navigating a series of twists and turns, with various pathways branching off only to converge in different areas before weaving their way out into the earthen depths once again. Not once did Eli lose his way. He knew this place as the wolves knew the forest, the snow its chill. A two-day ride from the clearing in the Glasterkka where he had stolen the egg, though not too far from the small city of Syehnäki and still well within the confines of the Aurinon Empire’s borders. Eli had often used this small network of caves to hide not only himself but various other things in his possession to be collected when he saw fit.

It helped that most who knew of this place considered it a gate into Death’s realm and thus steered clear of it. What many of them didn’t know was that it was Eli himself who had contributed to that ominous reputation, having soaked his magic so deep into the shadows of the tunnels that few could navigate it without misfortune greeting them. Coupling the truth of those encounters with a few stories Eli spread throughout the city’s taverns on his stays there, he had crafted for himself a hideaway that few spoke of for fear of inviting Death into their homes. 

Not that it stopped everyone. But that was what well-laid plans, or at least some well-calculated traps, were for, were they not?

Eli stepped out into the open air and turned his gaze up to the sky, the stars so numerous he thought the moon must have spilled an ocean’s worth of pearls across her nightly gown. The air was still warm with the late summer heat. Yet, despite this, he pulled the hood of his cloak over his head. To his left, the shadows draped across the stony side of the cave rippled, drawing his attention away from the sky. 

“Thank you for that,” he said. A pointed muzzle emerged from the darkness, pink tongue lolling out the side just behind an elongated canine tooth. A little further in, Eli could see a pair of golden eyes, bright as light-struck diamonds. He reached out to scratch at the creature’s nose. “You were at the city’s north gate, weren’t you? Our friends from the capital have arrived then..." He smiled as the creature’s tongue washed over his palm, leaving a thin trail of shadowy liquid in its wake. “Let’s see if we can lead them on a merry little chase, shall we?”

The creature whined, the sound a series of low, rapid clicks from deep within its chest. Eli hadn’t known what to make of it the first time he had heard it, but having spent enough time with the creatures since his first introduction to them, he had learned it to be a sound of agreeable excitement. One of many things he had learned about them over the years, including their name. Though they were called many things, most commonly shade-hounds, Eli understood they had one they preferred above all others, one he suspected came from their own minds: drimgair. 

Hunter of dreams.

“Return to your post. Tell the others to keep their watch.” Eli gave the drimgair one final pat before it retreated, its muzzle sinking into the shadows without a ripple. “I’ll be there within the hour."