Sir Danny hillith of kattegatt's Arc

Chapter 12 of 13

Danny felt her hand in his, warm and certain, as she pulled him close. The bedroom walls flickered with candlelight on carved dragons, and for the first time in three years he wasn't counting steps or weighing words. Then the floor shook. A crack split the stone beneath them, sharp and final. The sound came from deep below, echoing up through the mountain itself. The dragon mistress froze, her fingers tightening around his. Her face went pale. "The seal," she whispered. Danny knew without asking which seal she meant. The frozen chamber. The thing she'd been guarding all this time. It was breaking open. Danny pulled free and ran for the window. Outside, the mountain was burning. Flames twisted up through the rock face where none had been before, painting the dark stone orange and red. Dragons circled above the peak, their wings catching firelight as they screeched warnings into the night sky. The crack beneath the tower floor widened, spreading toward the walls like lightning frozen in stone. Heat poured through the gap, carrying the smell of something ancient waking up. The dragon mistress was already moving, grabbing a cloak from the wall and throwing it over her shoulders. "We have to reach the chamber before it breaks through completely," she said. Her voice was steady but her hands shook as she fastened the clasp. Danny caught her wrist. "Tell me what's down there," he said. She met his eyes, and for a moment he saw fear there, real and undisguised. "Something that shouldn't wake," she said. "Something I was supposed to keep frozen forever." Danny let her go and reached for his sword. The pommel warmed under his palm, the crystal beginning to glow. He'd spent three years planning how to win her heart, rehearsing words and building strategies for moments that never came. Now the moment that mattered had arrived, and it required no planning at all. The sealed chamber was breaking. The thing inside was waking. And she needed him to stand beside her, not behind a wall of careful preparations. He nodded once. "Then we go together," he said. She took his hand again, and this time when she pulled him forward, it wasn't toward the hidden bedroom but toward the door, toward the mountain, toward whatever was rising from the ice below.