Page 25 of Waking Her Dragon

“I know this Magic,” Kara whispered. “Syd... I know what this is.”

For the first time the Special One could ever remember, Kara’s voice sounded… fragile as she telepathically spoke to Syd while using the young woman’s mouth to speak to Carrick and Ginnie. A tremor moved through their shared soul, carrying something Sydney had never felt from the first Dragon Queen before: memory sharpened by fear.

“There are primeval forms of Dark Magic that cannot breach certain sacred barriers. Darkness cannot activate portals or artifacts forged purely from Light. It is physically impossible.”

Sydney kept her eyes on Carrick, but her attention was entirely focused on the Dragon Queen. “Go on.”

“To bypass this, Darkness corrupts,” Kara explained, the weight of centuries pressing into every fiber of Sydney’s body. “It traps a powerful being of Light, forcing their pure energy to serve as a baseline. An anchor. But to actually trigger the threshold, to open the lock, the magic requires a second, separate source of extraordinary Light.”

She paused, blew out a sharp breath, then added, “I watched Magic like this destroy kingdoms before your species had names for them.”

The pieces clicked together with sickening precision. Syd’s gaze snapped to the papers on the table. “Garrett is the anchor.”

Carrick’s jaw tightened. “We think he is. The signatures Gunnar found align with a captive Guardsman’s baseline.”

Sydney looked inward at Kara, then back at the legendary Guardsman. Her voice didn't shake. “And I’m the key.”

“No,” Carrick said instantly, his voice a low, protective growl. “We don’t know that, Sydney.”

“That wasn't a question, Carrick.”

“She’s right,” Ginnie cut in softly. She didn’t look happy about it, but her hand rested firmly on a translated text. “The evidence fits. Garrett is a Dragon Guardsman sharing his soul with an ancient Dragon King. Sydney is the Special One, sharing her soul with one of the first Dragon Queens.”

Silence stretched across the kitchen. King and Queen. The cosmic symmetry of the trap hung heavily in the air.

“A Dragon King to hold it shut,” Sydney whispered, the horror of it settling into her bones. “A Dragon Queen to open it.”

“Or close it,” Kara telepathically corrected sharply.

Sydney froze.

Across the table, Ginnie’s sharp Necromancer eyes caught the sudden stillness. “Syd? What did she say?”

“A key doesn’t only open a lock,” Sydney murmured, a dangerous spark finally igniting in her chest. “It can lock it, too.”

Suddenly, Sydney’s exhausted brain went into overdrive. The lethargy vanished, replaced by cold, hard calculus. Leviathan thought he was running a brilliant game. He thought he was dangling Garrett as bait, luring his perfect, unsuspecting key straight to the door.

“Fine,” she thought. “Let him.”

She would go to him. She would walk right up to his unholy door. But she wouldn't play the victim. She would turn that primordial key in the lock and trap the bastard on the wrong side of it.

She didn't know what nightmare Leviathan might be trying to unleash from behind that barrier. She didn't need to know. It was primeval, terrible, and it could never be allowed into their world.

“Great. Let’s assume you’re right,” Carrick said, firmly planting his palms on the table. “We still don’t know where the damned door is. The Chihuahuan Desert is a vast expanse, Sydney. We can’t just knock on every canyon wall.”

The words door, lock, key, threshold bounced around Sydney’s exhausted brain, suddenly striking a hidden spark. Her breath hitched. The memory didn't come as a nebulous prophecy, but as a razor-sharp image from her time in the Hall of Knowledge.

She closed her eyes, visualizing a side text she had frantically skimmed. On the yellowed parchment, there had been a detailed drawing: a black, serpent-like Dragon curled tightly around a massive stone doorway. It was the same symbol she and Kara had encountered earlier in their search.

Beneath the drawing sat a very old inscription she hadn’t understood then.

“What is bound by blood may be followed by blood,” Kara translated in her mind, her voice laced with heavy dread. “What is joined by Fate may cross where none may tread.”

Sydney’s eyes flew open. “I don't need to find The Abyss.”

Carrick frowned, leaning forward. “What?”

“I don’t need to find the physical door, Carrick. I just need to find Garrett.”