The Rise of Deragon (The Deragon Duology #2)

30

Pandora

T he Temple of the Shrine—the sacred pilgrimage site that nearly every Mosacian citizen visits at least once in their life—sits atop the crest of a mighty cliff, overlooking a glittering lake full of what looks more like starlight than water. The crescent moon hanging in the dark sky smiles down on me as I soar up the footpath, and I barge through the gilded doors with minimal resistance.

I don’t outright ignore the temple’s cavernous atrium, but I do make a mental note to come back here in the daylight to better observe its glory. Seeing what I can of the carved statues and the sprawling inscriptions, I can only fathom how magnificent this space is with the sun streaming through the glass windows high above me. Perhaps I ought to bring Kit here when we both have our heads on straight.

Still, with most of its splendor diluted by the ever-present darkness, I’m able to veer straight for where I need to go with absolutely no detection from those still perusing. Very few visitors frequent the space, and the only person that bothers to speak to me is someone I realize is required to. A short, veiled acolyte approaches on soft feet. “Might you need guidance toward one of the deities, miss?”

“The temple of Venus,” I reply, casting my eyes downwards in hopes that she doesn’t make the connection.

“Just this way,” she whispers, and while she doesn’t touch me, I feel the phantom presence of her arm pushing me forward. Mosacia’s depiction of Venus the goddess stands high above the yawning mouth of her temple’s entrance, her beauty radiating through cold stone somehow. The sculpture is a clear match to the image Marzipan showed me in the book earlier today, and for once, it’s heartwarming to think of Venus without the association to my aunt overruling other opinions I can form. If I had to guess, I’d imagine the goddess to be fair skinned with rose-gold hair, an air of innocence about her that my aunt certainly lacks. Then, between the archway and where her crafted feet stand on a pedestal, the goddess’s listed domains etch their way across the cold stone in countless languages. The Urovian translation rests at the very bottom.

Love, Beauty, Desire, Sex, Fertility, Prosperity, and Victory.

“Miss?”

I suddenly realize the temple acolyte has likely been trying to get my attention. “Yes?”

She silently extends what I perceive to be a slip of thin, translucent paper. I look for crease lines of some sort to help open it wider and recoil sharply at the sandpaper texture. Purple powder stains my fingertips. “What is—”

“Set it upon the surface of your tongue.”

My eyes go wide as we stand before the door. “What?”

“Don’t immediately consume,” she warns. “The dosage is meant to unfurl gradually. Let it sit and dissolve on its own.”

Dear Saints, am I about to do drugs?

“Thank you,” I force out without looking at the acolyte directly, attention still fixated on the slip.

“Of course. May the goddess meet your needs,” she says as she departs with a curt bow of her head. She’s off to assist another visitor within seconds.

My awareness of this moment is unwavering. As tense as the prospect of her instructions are, I don’t allow myself to be afraid. There are seven attributes about the goddess before me, and I’m prepared to encounter one of them. If that means ingesting this substance and subjecting myself to a mysterious fate, I’ll do so. If it means shutting myself inside whatever dreamscape or hellhole this place really is for the small chance of reuniting with Madman, the choice is simple.

So simple, that I don’t let the idea of seeing anyone but him infiltrate my brain.

Not before I set the coated tab along my tongue and march inside.

+

The vast darkness engulfing me is almost enough to make my hair stand on end, were it not for the single teardrop of orange flame flickering in midair. A candle.

“Madman?”

I almost swear the darkness smiles back at me in answer, and I bound towards the light—towards him—my arms pumping ferociously. “ Madman —”

An invisible force extinguishes the flame, and my heart falls into my stomach not because of the darkness, but because a dim, overhead light suddenly casts the atmosphere in an amber glow.

Revealing Venus Deragon standing before me.

“What are you doing here?” I sneer, months of pent-up anger and resentment bubbling out of me.

“You’ve got some nerve to ask me that when my name is carved into the stone, Pandora.”

“This land doesn’t revere you , nor do I have interest in speaking with you. So I suggest you get out of my way.”

Venus lets out a low whistle, impressed yet vividly irritated. “I will . . . once you tell me who Madman is.”

“He’s none of your business.”

“Defensive, are we?” she croons, striding closer. “And rather . . . possessive .”

Her smile is serpentine, and I almost want to reach for her throat in retaliation.

But Venus stops me short. “There are two doors behind me. One red, one blue.”

My eyes dart beyond her to confirm she’s telling the truth. The red one has a fiery glow around its frame, while the blue looks to be coated in an otherworldly frost.

“Since you seem awfully frantic to reunite with this Madman ,” she drawls, “I’ll just go ahead and tell you that he’s here. Behind that door,” she says blandly, gesturing to the icy, cerulean door. I ought to keep my eagerness in check but knowing that Madman is who I came here for, I start moving, my speed increasing with each step—

“A word of caution, however,” Venus hums, her tone with oozing amusement.

The frenzied sensation in my chest only aches further.

“Should you open his door, there are no guarantees that Madman will even want to see you, let alone speak with you.”

I grit my teeth, recalling the last words I’d flung at him.

“I hope that kiss curdles your blood and rots your very bones. I hope my voice haunts you for the rest of your days, and that you never find another pretty dame who can sing their way into your soul like I did.”

“But I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that should you open the red door,” Venus resumes with such blatant slyness, “the person there will be dying to see you. She might even let it slip where she’s been hiding out.”

The image of my mother burns across my eyes. “You’re lying.”

“Open a door and find out,” Venus taunts back.

I cross my arms like a petulant child, and Venus finds the movement amusing. “Too bad you’re not blessed. Our kind can visit any door, any time. The temple doors will always open for those with a divine touch.”

She means to make me feel worse about being ordinary, but she’s mistaken. Because being unlike her is a far more rewarding option than being like her. Still, the temptation and boasting in her words rears its ugly head at me, and I force myself to straighten out.

“This is just some drug-induced state.” I make the desperate attempt to convince myself that my words are true. “This place . . . it’s not real —”

“The drugs only bring out what your soul is keeping locked away, but they’ll wear off if you don’t act soon. Open a door, Pandora.” It’s a command from my queen rather than sage advice from my aunt. “And decide what it is you desire more.”

Then, without another word, Venus disappears into thin air.

Desire— that’s the domain I’ve been brought face to face with.

Only it’s not the way I imagined it would be. It’s a million times worse—mainly because I am not offered enough time to dissect her words and whether she’s telling the truth.

But she’s right about one thing: I can feel the powder dissolving swiftly.

So I send a silent apology up to the Saints for whatever they’re about to see and run like hell towards the winter-blue doorway.

+

Madman’s alcove is torn to shreds and trashed so thoroughly that I feel the urge to weep.

Every candle is snuffed out and spilling old wax onto the rock flooring. Sheet music with furious scribbles and denotations litter the place in parchment, and even the gleaming piano is a pile of carnage and keys. The alcove is now lit by flame so hot it burns blue, licking across shelves of records and writings and literature. I feel the heat on my skin, but like the door I stumbled in from, everything looks . . . cold. Devoid of life. Even the harp didn’t survive the slaughter.

“Madman!” I scream, the ache insuppressible. “ Madman ! It’s me! Where are you?”

And then, I hear his voice moaning my name in a way that hints at disbelief, hidden somewhere amidst the destruction.

“Pan . . .” He can barely form the other syllables. “Pandora?”

“Yes! It’s me! Where—”

Madman’s hands sharply yank me into him, and I stumble backwards for only a second or so before our bodies collide. He must’ve been lingering behind me, slinking through the shadows somewhere, but I don’t mind the surprise. Because even as being held into him feels like cradling steel, I find an unshakable comfort here. I catch myself taking a deep inhale of his scent, grounding me to this moment before it has the chance to wash away, and Madman chokes on tears I never expected him to shed.

“I thought you were dead.”

“Andie found me in time,” I tell him, turning in his grasp so that I face him.

He still wears his mask, hiding himself from me despite knowing I see far beyond it. He’s still heaving and fighting to catch his breath, but he doesn’t go to adjust himself. If he cries hard enough, though, his mask will slip.

Then, Madman shakes his head. “No. After. When I went to your room to apologize.”

My heart stalls beneath my ribs. “You came back?”

“And you were gone,” he croaks.

My knees go weak, and we crumple to the ground together. He secures me by both wrists and we kneel before one another with a sadness that is painfully reverent. My head falls against his collarbone, and he rests his chin on the top of my head. It feels more soothing than the promise of a crown ever has.

“I thought I’d never see you again.”

It’s a cry, and I’m not sure who says it. It doesn’t matter, not when both of our souls are so clearly sobbing the sentence back to each other.

“What happened here?” I ask, unable to look at the mess of this place.

“It all reminded me of you, and I couldn’t stand the sight of it,” he rasps, his voice seething. “I couldn’t live with seeing these objects outlive you, not when your expert hand and angelic voice were what brought them to life to begin with. What brought me to life.”

“Madman—”

“My soul fell asleep in your absence.” His voice is mournful, tortured. “My worst nightmares became my reality. But seeing you alive right now . . . it erases all the sorrow that nearly drowned me these past weeks apart. Holding you like this, every fractured piece of me feels mended. Whole again.”

I bury my face in Madman’s neck, if only because my snot and tears are mingling together too disastrously to capture his mouth in a spell-binding kiss. But there’s a secret solace in hiding my face from his full gaze—much like it must feel for him when he bears his mask. And so, feeling equally concealed as I am vulnerable, I find the will to say the words, “I chose you over her, Madman. I chose to see you again . . . over the chance to reunite with my mother.”

The amount of honor in that choice is not lost on him. I sense it in the way the pace of his heartbeat skyrockets, then stalls altogether.

“How long did you wrestle with your choice?”

“Not long enough.”

Madman laughs, and the sound of it solidifies itself as my new favorite melody.

“When I see you again, angel,” he whispers, his mouth brushing my ear, “I won’t hold back from you any longer. I won’t restrict myself from you in any way. No secrets. No evasions. No mask.” I gasp, and the sound unleashes something in him. His words turn guttural, hands grappling me in a manner that I’m certain will leave bruises. “I swear it, Pandora. The minute I lay eyes on you, I’m getting you the hell out of wherever it is you are and taking you home —”

“Home?” I almost hiccup.

Madman finally notches my chin upwards so that I face him fully, a hair’s breadth away from a cataclysmic kiss that I’m starting to drift towards. My eyes are still glassy, but his come back clear. Steady.

“Tell me where you are, Pandora.”

“The Temple of the Shrine in the Sacred City,” I whisper, as if the admission is a betrayal somehow. “I’m in Venus’s sanctuary.”

The corner of his mouth ticks in a knowing smile. “Which pillar brought me to you?”

I sometimes forget that Madman, like Kit, is also Mosacian—meaning he’s likely made the pilgrimage before. “Desire,” I confess.

I prepare to give way to the gravitational pull between our mouths, but Madman presses a finger to the seam of my lips. Then, his voice drips with the kind of heat that racks through my whole body. “Patience. When I find you again, I’ll make sure that the real thing is worth it.”

And then, I succumb to my substance-induced stupor.