A billowing cloud of ancient mortar dust rolled over us, and I covered my mouth with my sleeve. Our torches guttered briefly before stabilizing again, and I groped forward toward the opening, feeling my way through the airborne dust.

The entrance to the sanctuary had been collapsed. A heavy fall of brick blocked the way out.

Kitana and I were trapped.

“Master Jack? What happened?” Kitana cried out.

“Tamara trapped us,” I growled.

“Oh no,” she moaned. Fear made her voice crumble.

I left the collapsed entrance and felt my way back through the dust. Kitana’s face and hair were coated in a dusting of ancient mortar. She threw herself into my arms when she saw me.

“I suppose we kind of deserve it. We didn’t exactly treat Tamara nicely.”

“Fuck her! What do we do? How do we get out?”

I gently took the torch from her hands and ground it out on the floor. “First thing is we conserve our light. Let’s give the dust a chance to settle, and see if there is another way out.”

I waved my torch over the carved walls, scanning over the chiseled text. It was a history, of sorts, the language couched in an archaic turn of phrase. Kitana lifted her tear-streaked face from my chest and stared up at the carvings.

“Can you read this?” she asked.

“Sure. It’s not exactly hard. Can’t you?”

“Oh, no. It’s in human language. What does it say?”

I scanned over the first section. It described how the world was tied together with a web of consciousness. It sounded like a bunch of shit, to me, but I relayed the bullet points to Kitana.

“Well, yes,” Kitana nodded. “Everyone knows that. If all the elves were to die, then this world would cease to be. Even the orcs know that. They could wipe us out if they wanted to, but if they did, they would destroy themselves.”

I nodded noncommittally. I didn’t want to get into an argument with Kitana right then, no matter how loony her superstitions were. I moved onto the next section of wall and lifted my torch high to read the carved text.

“This is interesting. It says the dragon doesn’t belong to this world. Oh, here we go. It mentions the flow. It’s uh… a sympathetic vibration between the dragon, outside the world, and the elves, creators of the world.”

Kitana gave me a confused look. “I don’t know what that means.”

“It’s like…” I held up my hands and hesitated while I tried to translate to a medieval level of education. “Well. Kind of hard to explain. The dragon gives the elves the power of the flow.”

“Like, a gift?”

“I don’t know yet. There’s more to read.”

The dust was beginning to clear from the air as I made a slow circuit around the carved walls, piecing together the mystery of the flow. As far as I could tell, elves were selected by the dragon to channel the flow. The stronger the elf’s connection to the web of the world, the more powerful the flow.

The next panel described the elvish path, and how gaining access to the flow was itself a path choice. It seemed like the web itself was formed by the elvish paths. When there was a need in the community, the need drew a young elf toward a path that would fill that need.

“It’s a good thing you haven’t chosen a path yet,” I grinned. “If you want to be a siren, you’ll have to make it your path.”

“Kind of hard to do without a mentor,” Kitana grumbled.

“Well, without a mentor, you’d need to be selected by the dragon. Let’s see…” On to the next panel. This one had more to say about the flow. In order to reach the flow, one had to accept their role in the world. That sounded a lot like a path selection. There was a contradiction there. How was someone supposed to take the path of a siren if they had to have a path first?

“What is it?” Kitana asked.

“It just doesn’t make much sense. Whoever wrote this was being obtuse. In order to reach the flow, someone has to accept their role?”

“It’s not just elves who find the flow,” Kitana pointed out. “Humans do as well.”

I shook my head. “So, what, to learn magic, all I have to do is accept my fate?”

“I don’t know,” Kitana shrugged. “Have you accepted your role in this world?”

“How could I? I don’t know why I’m here, or what I’m supposed to do. The only guidance I have is to find the truth, whatever that means. Somehow, I doubt my role in this world is to fuck the mayor’s daughter.”

“Mm. But you do it so well!”

Kitana put her arms around my waist from behind, and one of her hands cupped my crotch. She felt along my length, and made a disappointed sound in her throat when she found me soft.

“Really, Kitana? Now?”

“Fucking doesn’t require light,” she pointed out.

I turned around and she stretched up for a kiss. I obliged, but my gaze went over her head. Tamara’s attempt to collapse the passageway had been successful, but those bricks had to come from somewhere. The space above the doorway had once been bricked closed, but there was a gap there now, large enough for me to squeeze through.

“Look!” I took her by the shoulders and turned her around.

She pouted for a second, then gasped in relief. “A way out!”

“Let’s go. I’ll boost you up.”

“Wait! What about the flow? We came all this way.”

I kind of thought it was pointless. Learning to reach the flow required the Dragon. All I needed was to go find the Dragon and plead my case. If this world was anything like the stories, he’d send me on some quest. Still, there wasn’t any harm in reading through the last couple panels.

The flickering torchlight made reading the archaic script harder than it had to be, but I persisted despite my impatience. The last two panels described the age of the new Dragon. The world had broken before, and it seemed like the Dragon had healed it. I frowned thoughtfully. Whatever power the Dragon had used to heal the world, he obviously hadn’t been able to do it again.

I reached the end of the last panel and Kitana looked at me hopefully. “Well? Did you find the secret?”

“No… only that the world had broken before. The Dragon healed it last time, but hadn’t managed to this time.”

Kitana looked disappointed, almost to the point of tears. “That can’t be it. There has to be more!”

“If there is, it isn’t in this chamber. I haven’t given up yet, Kitana, but we need to get back to the surface. We can return, properly prepared, and search this cave from top to bottom.”

She hesitated, then nodded. “As long as you take me with you.”

“Deal.”

I lit Kitana’s torch with my own, then boosted her up into the gap. She crawled forward out of sight, then her voice came back, muffled with distance. “It’s clear. You should be able to fit.”

I tossed my torch up, then jumped up after it. By the time I got my torso into the gap, I was panting and the torch was almost guttering out. I picked it up and blew on it gently until it was burning brightly again, then wormed my way forward.

The broken bricks were painful to crawl over, but I didn’t care. If all I got out of this adventure was a couple scrapes and bruises, I’d call myself lucky. The collapse hadn’t gone very far, and after crawling forward a couple feet, the piled bricks sloped downward into the passage beyond.

Kitana was waiting for me, and she pressed her finger to her lips, warning me to be silent. As soon as I had room to get to a crouch, I stopped and waited. For a few seconds, all I could hear was my heart pounding in my ears, then I heard Tamara’s voice, raised in argument.

I lifted an eyebrow at Kitana and gestured for her to put out her torch. My torch was nearly burned out, and the light it gave was dim. Once my eyes were adjusted enough to make out the passage around us, I led the way, following the sound of Tamara’s voice deeper into the maze of passages.

Whoever Tamara was arguing with, they had deep, growling voices. I saw glittering torchlight up ahead, and passed my torch back to Kitana before creeping ahead. Around the next corner, I caught sight of Tamara and her new companions.

There were seven of them. Eight feet tall even hunched over, hugely muscular, and dressed in loincloths and hide boots. Brass rings glittered on their skin, wherever it could be pierced. Their hair was black, and they styled it in long braids. Body hair matted their chests and arms, and I could smell their stale body odor even at a distance. I didn’t need Kitana’s whispered gasp in my ear to know what they were. Orcs.

The largest of the orcs was a solid six inches taller than his companions. The bridge of his nose had a row of fat rings running down it. He had his arms folded, and was glaring down at Tamara.

“That wasn’t the arrangement, little elf,” he growled. “You bring the curious elves here, and we take them away.”

Tamara reached up with shaking fingers and started undoing the buttons down her shirt. “I know what the deal was,” she said throatily.

“We should take this one instead,” one of the smaller orcs suggested.

The leader grinned broadly, showing off yellow tusks. “The witch knows. We spared her all those years ago, and she has betrayed her kind ever since. No sacrifice offered, so she is the offering.”

“They’re going to take Tamara!” Kitana whispered.

Tamara pulled her shirt open and her fat tits swung free.

The lead orc let out a booming laugh and grabbed one of her tits. “See! She has prepared herself for us!”

“I need to get fucked!” Tamara moaned.

“Don’t worry, little elf,” the orc chuckled. “You’re gonna get fucked. More than you thought possible. You belong to the orcs now.” He pulled aside his loincloth and bared his dick to Tamara. It was thick and coarse with lumps and warts.

Tamara reached for it hesitantly, then bent forward to take the head into her mouth. It didn’t take long for her to suck the orc to hardness. The orc had an impressive cock, longer than mine by two inches or so, and thicker around. Tamara worked her pants down off her hips as she gagged on his meat.

One of the smaller orcs stepped behind her and sunk his cock into her cunt. Tamara gave a loud moan of pleasure, and her cry seemed to set off the other orcs. They crowded around her, talking excitedly amongst themselves.

“Oh, Dragon,” Kitana whispered. “She’s going to get gangbanged by those orcs!”

“Yeah,” I grunted. Any sympathy I had for her was fading away. No elves returned from the caves? More like, she betrayed every elf who came seeking the truth of the flow. How many of her own people had she led into the clutches of the orcs?

If it would be any comfort for her, she had never gotten a taste of my cum. She was going to stay desperately aroused, and anything the orcs did to her was only going to make her want more. Tamara gave a choked scream, then begged for it harder.

The orcs shifted around, and the leader supported her by the ass with her legs wrapped around his hips. His long, thick cock was buried to the hilt in her cunt. A second orc stepped up behind her and drove his cock up her ass. Tamara shrilled and bucked wildly as the two orcs started pounding into her. She screamed as an orgasm wracked through her, and the orcs never slowed their thrusting.

“Look at her take those cocks,” Kitana whispered in awe. “Fuck, I’m getting wet!”

I didn’t want to stay there and watch Tamara get gangbanged. As titillating as it was to watch her shake through an almost continuous orgasm, eventually the orcs would get tired of her, and I didn’t want to be anywhere nearby when that happened.

My sense of direction was a little fuzzy, but I was pretty sure the orcs were between us and the spiral staircase back to the surface. I tapped Kitana on the shoulder and eased back out of sight.

“What is it?” Kitana whispered.

“As much as I’d like to watch the show, we should probably go.”

Kitana looked back at Tamara and bit her lip. “Oh fine. You’re turning me into a total slut, Master Jack. All I can think about is you doing that to me!”

“Maybe later, Kitty. Now let’s go!”

I grabbed her hand and pulled her away from the corner. Once the wet slaps of Tamara taking orc dick faded behind us, I got out a fresh torch and lit it from what was left of the one Kitana was holding. With enough light to see clearly by, I spotted a stairwell going up.

Up had to be the right direction, even if it wasn’t the giant staircase from earlier. I led Kitana that way, and we climbed to a higher level. The brickwork from the lower level was replaced with finely-faced granite blocks. The floor was polished marble instead of flagstones, and the torch sconces on the walls were oil lanterns instead.

“Woah,” Kitana said softly. “This is nice.”

I paused in front of a full-wall mosaic of the Dragon and held my torch up. The eyes glittered with faceted gemstones. “Priest quarters. Must be.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Kitana objected. “The priests of the Dragon are servants of the people. They live simply, not like this. These are royal appointments!”

Marble statues flanked a double door up ahead. The metalwork on the doorways had been covered in gold foil long ago, but now they were patchy with rust. I pushed open the doors and slowed to a halt.

The doors opened to a great stone cavern, with a smooth, even floor of deep sand. To the left, the cavern rose upward in a long, sloping tunnel. The late afternoon sun gleamed at the top where the passage opened to the surface.

I didn’t give a shit about the tunnel, though. The cavern wasn’t empty. In the back of the cavern, there was a huge angular shape. My torchlight caught on scales and arching wings.

It was the Dragon.

“Oh, Dragon!” Kitana gasped behind me.

“Yeah.” I put a hand on Kitana’s arm as she tried to go past me. “Hold on. There’s something wrong.”

There were footsteps in the sand in front of me. They weren’t recent, but among the perfectly smooth sand, they stood out clearly. I could guess what they were from; the priests on their yearly pilgrimage, coming to pay homage to the Dragon.

The footsteps never went very close. Five or six steps past the door, then there were depressions where they fell to their knees and genuflected. I stepped out onto the sand and lowered my torch so it cast a shadow across the surface of the sand. There were other footsteps, much older, that had approached the dragon.

I walked closer to the Dragon, past where the priests had stopped. The bulk of the Dragon towered over me. With the wings folded up, it was the size of a house, and not my dinky little one-room cabin. The scales that ran down its flanks were the size of my spread hand. The claws that sank into the sand were as long as my arm.

The great head lay on the sand, slightly turned away from me. My torchlight glittered along the sweeping horns and caught on the spikes running down its spine. It was magnificent, horrible, terrifying. Exhilarating.

“Dragon!” I called, and held my breath, waiting.

Nothing happened. I breathed out and took another step closer. The Dragon was perfectly still. It was so immobile, I couldn’t even see it breathe. A few more steps, and I got a clear look at the flesh of the Dragon’s neck.

He was emaciated, nothing more than skin and bones. The scales were dull, the flanks sunken and hollow. I walked around to the head and knelt down beside it, following the footsteps of the other humans before me.

The Dragon’s eyes were empty, the lids pulled deeply into the skull. His jaws were slightly open, and I could see the tongue between the scything curve of teeth, shriveled away to a leathery flap of flesh.

He was dead.

There were no sirens among the elves because the Dragon had not been alive to give his blessing for centuries. Had the siren war brought about the death of the Dragon, or had the Dragon’s death set it off?

Ultimately, it was academic. Kitana wasn’t going to become a siren. I wasn’t going to be learning about the flow. Did that mean I was stuck here until I died? Various elves had told me other humans had learned to use the flow and had returned to the real world, but how did they know? Maybe they had all been overcome by despair and committed suicide or something.

I gave the dead Dragon a last look and set off across the sand toward Kitana. She had stayed in the doorway, and watched me approach with wide eyes.

“Did you speak with him?” she asked in a breathless whisper.

She practically vibrated with excitement. I opened my mouth to tell her the truth, then closed it again. It would crush her to know that the Dragon was dead. “Kitana…”

“What? What is it?”

I looked away. “I know why there haven’t been any sirens in three hundred years. The Dragon… he’s dead. And has been for a long time.”

Kitana let out a choked cry and fell to her knees. “What?!”

“I’m sorry. Jesus, I’m so sorry, Kitana.”

I sat down next to her pulled her into a hug. Kitana slumped against me. Her shoulders shook as she cried. “I—I don’t un—understand,” she sobbed.

It all made perfect sense to me. Lira’s words came back. The orc raids are too quick for the Dragon to respond in time. Only the priests were allowed to see him. I would bet everything I owned that Tamara knew, and she was collaborating with the orcs to prevent the other elves from finding out.

I comforted Kitana while I stared at the hulking corpse of the Dragon. What was I going to do now? In the immediate future, I needed to get out of these caves. Climbing up the steep passage of the Dragon’s exit tunnel might be possible.

“Kitana,” I said softly.

“What?”

“It’s getting late. If we’re going to make it back home before sundown, we need to start moving.”

She nodded and sniffed back tears. “Can I see the Dragon? With my own eyes?”

I climbed to my feet and offered her a hand up. “I don’t see why not.”

We walked across the sand to the Dragon’s head. Kitana knelt in front of the dead creature and bowed her head down to the sand. There were some scales that had sloughed off the Dragon’s hide, and I scooped one up. It was hard as steel, and the edges were serrated and sharp.

“Here, Kitana. Take this as a memento.”

She took it and clutched it to her chest. “Thank you, Master Jack.”

I gave her a sad smile. “Maybe keep where you found it a secret, for now.”

Kitana swallowed. “Oh, Dragon.” She flinched and glanced at the corpse. “Yes. It would cause a panic.”

She got up and took my hand. We turned our backs on the Dragon and started the long climb to the surface.