Paled

I am the stars, and she is my moon.

***

Blood stops flowing but I'm still breathing.

Paled stared at the broken body before him, flicking his tongue in and out as if trying to decide where it would stay. The necromancer's neck was twisted oddly, and blood dripped from his mouth, which was bared in a snarl. He was still shivering and jerking, but his movements were slow and his breaths lagged. Paled shoved the body into the murky waters, and then turned his head to see if anyone had seen the necromancer's murder. Nobody was there, but Paled still felt uneasy, like unseen eyes were watching him, pricking his scales and sending a cold creep down his spine.

Paled craned his neck to look down at the lake. His new body was reflected in the water. I'm back! He wanted to scream and shout and dance. He flexed new talons and flapped new wings and flashed a new smile at his reflection. He turned in a circle and flipped his new tail as hard as he could against the hardened dirt. A huge crack now spanned the ground. He scored his talons against the broken land. He tipped his head and let out a roar that echoed against the sky. Passing his tongue over yellow, rotten teeth, he muttered to himself, "I'm back. Now nothing will get in my way."


***


The two mirrors circled, both the same colors, one female, one male. Paled pounced on the other mirror and ripped his claws into the other mirror's frills. The female turned and slashed his belly. Paled let out a roar and sank his teeth into a wing. He was flung off almost instantly and then huge talons pinned his shoulders down. A whip-thin tail coiled threateningly around his throat, and four violet eyes locked with his. "You win." Paled croaked. "Kill me and get it over with." One silver tear fell from an eye. His freedom was gone. No more second chances.

The female glanced at the tear, and then with a flourish she leaped off of him and vanished into the night. Four purple eyes watched him, and then there was a whisper. "My name is Leeched."


***


Paled searched everywhere for her. For Leeched, the mirror that had spared his life. But she was gone. Vanished. Invisible. Wherever Leeched was hiding, Paled wouldn't find her. He wondered if she was resurrected from the dead too. If she understood him, his thirst for blood, death, and glory. But then why had she spared him? These thoughts circled in his head, over and over, like a broken record repeating itself.

One day he found a single clawed footprint. It was hers. The next she found a tooth. And then two days later a purple/white scale. She's letting me find her. He realized.
And then after a week of finding scales, torn claws, teeth, and tracks, he stumbled upon a huge willow tree. Its long lime-colored branches drooped all the way to the ground. Paled pushed aside the curtain of green and stepped behind. Leeched was waiting, her eyes watching. "I've found you!" Paled said, sounding astonished. She smiled, and lifted a talon. It was bleeding. Then he noticed Leeched's gums were bleeding too. She had pulled out her teeth and talons to leave a trail for him.

"Why did you do this?!" Paled exclaimed.
"I don't know, you were just...different. From the usual victims."
"Is that a good thing?" Paled asked tentatively.
She shrugged her shoulders.

"I hope you're happy." Leeched said, out of the blue. "Happy with what?" Paled replied, looking confused. "Happy that we share the same story."

"Sometimes it's like you can read my mind." Paled said.

Leeched stared at him for a second, as if pantomiming the idea. Then she continued. "You were brought back too. You had to go through the same things as me. Like you were me."

Paled nodded. He could almost see the idea forming in Leeched's head before she said it aloud. "Because you were me."

"It makes sense." Paled said thoughtfully. "Some necromancer tried to resurrect a dragon and ended up resurrecting two parts of the dragon, one male, one female, which turned into two complete dragons. We're a science experiment gone terribly wrong."

"I think we should stick together." Leeched spoke. "Two science experiments gone wrong wandering together is better than two science experiments wreaking havoc alone."

"You're right." Paled said. Everything he thought seemed to echo in Leeched's words.
"I think it's time to take a little tour around Sornieth."

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