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“You’re still here, then.”
“When I’m recovered, I’ll leave you all to your peaceful, empty kingdom.”
He smiled cruelly. “I wasn’t expecting anything else.” He moved to the pantry and pulled out a golden apple of which Tartarus was famous for. “After all, why would you stay and try to save your dying fathers?”
Since Charos left the kitchen without adding any more information to his statement, I sought out more information from Riseir, who was writing something at his desk.
“You’re dying?” I shouted.
He sighed in his chair and clarified, "As the slaves feel more abandoned and hopeless, we receive less prayer. We need their prayer to continue as gods. It feeds us. We are so weak now that we can’t protect those that remain here. We can’t fix the life pool. There are no new titans being born. We are all dying."
It was all I needed to know, so I nodded and quickly left and headed back to my room.
The situation is more dire than I realized. I’ll need to act quickly. Mobilize the army. Teach the troops more about titan culture. Get them praying and believing again. This business with my fathers can wait. I need to speak with Clawdia.
I made myself comfortable on the lounge chair and closed my eyes, searching for the scent of Clawdia's dreaming consciousness. Finding her asleep and curled up with her titan, I pulled her into the dreamscape of the Tartarus Palace gardens.
She appeared in front of me with a look of confusion on her face but clean and relatively uninjured. I sighed in relief.
“Sunlight," I greeted, "I’m glad to see you are freed."
"Baelen!" She rushed toward me and wrapped her small arms around my waist. Shock froze me for a moment before I leaned into her embrace, molded her against me, and breathed in the intoxicating smell of her blood. She leaned her head back to peek at me. "Thank you. I really appreciated your help.”
“You escaped to safety, then?”
“… Yes.”
I furrowed my brow. “You don’t sound certain. Are you still in danger?”
“No, we are safe now.”
I studied her face, trying to figure out what made her hesitant, and took a guess. “But you didn’t escape when I aided you? You were recaptured?”
She winced, pulling out of my arms, and I knew I was right. “We were recaptured. We nearly died again.”
My heart stuttered at the thought, but I managed to calmly remark. "I'm sorry I was not there with you. How did you escape?"
She took a breath, then babbled the summary. “I think our titan gift is healing, and I was able to heal both the protector and the dragon he killed, which distracted the witches enough for us to escape.”
I blinked. “You used your titan magic?”
“I started noticing threads everywhere. When they were draining Charlie and Zaide, I panicked. I just poured power into the threads, hoping it would do something. And apparently, it raised a dragon.” She bit her lip.
“We need to start your training as soon as possible, then.” I nodded to myself, reeling from the information. “You are safe from the dragon?”
“I think so. I think it was more interested in eating the witch's magic than mine. Or so Charlie told me.” She shuddered.
I froze. “It eats magic?”
“If it’s the same dragon from the myth, then yes.”
I grasped her shoulders and lowered my face to hers, staring into her violet eyes to impress the seriousness of the situation. “A creature that gains its power through the consumption of magic is extremely dangerous, Clawdia. You must stay away from it.”
She frowned. “We are away from it.”
“You need to keep away from it. You shouldn’t seek it out or try to destroy it.”
“I wouldn’t—”
