by Isaac Hooke
Malem smiled as Felipe promptly vanished back inside his robes, but his attention stayed on Hastor, who had slowed and fallen slightly behind them.
Are you all right? he sent, worried the dragon’s injuries were catching up to it.
In answer, Hastor decided to test Malem’s hold on him, and thrashed about in his mental grasp. The creature almost broke free.
Malem didn’t take kindly to that.
You’re healing well, I see, he transmitted, his previous concern gone. It’s time for you to give back some of the endurance we’ve lent you.
And so he sapped vitality from the dragon, feeding it instead to himself and the two women. He felt stronger immediately and sat straighter in the saddle.
Hastor’s thrashing increased, but the transfer of endurance had shifted the balance far in Malem’s favor, and he held the vise firmly in place. The dragon stopped writhing.
That was good, because if the dragon decided to fight his will continuously, that would only drain both their stamina’s until either Malem set the great beast free or killed it. He was tempted to just give in and release the creature, if only for a respite from the strain, but he would be damned if he was giving up his most powerful monster yet.
“Are you really going to keep that thing?” Gwen asked, glancing up at the flying beast.
“While my will can endure it, yes,” he replied.
“And what about our wills?” Gwen pressed.
“Your endurance, you mean?” he said. “Going forward, if Hastor fights me, I’ll be taking vitality from him as punishment. So you don’t have to worry on that end. I will borrow your vitality as needed during combat, however, to keep the dragon fighting for us.”
“Great,” she said sarcastically.
“It should get easier to control Hastor as time goes on,” he told her, “as the creature grows more accustomed to my touch on its mind, and I adapt to having so many mental slots taken.”
Through Hastor’s sight, he could see the mountains in the distance. “We’re almost at the mountain range. I can’t see any Metal Dragons, though.”
“They’re out there,” Abigail said. “Look for Mount Ademan.”
“I’m not sure what it looks like.” He turned his attention to the southeast suddenly, where Hastor had spotted incoming targets.
“What is it?” Gwen asked, sensing his sudden distress through their link.
“More black dragons,” he replied. “To the southeast. Five of them. Closing fast.”
“Told you we should have killed all those oraks,” Gwen said.
“Full speed!” he spurred Bounder ever faster.
Can you carry us? Malem asked the dragon. Humans on your back, steeds in your talons?
One or two of you, yes, Hastor said. But I’m already flying slower because of my injuries. Under load, I won’t be able to travel much faster than your horses.
That’s too bad.
For you, not for me, Hastor commented.
Oh, my dragon friend, your fate is intertwined with ours now. If we fall, you do, too. Keep that in mind when it comes time to fight.
The foothills became broader and overlapped at the bases with shallow hollows between them. One such foothill formed a long ridge, forcing the group to race uphill to surmount it. When they reached the apex, he could see the distant mountain range with his own eyes.
The mountains are too far, the dragon sent. You’re not going to make it.
Malem ignored the comment and continued at a gallop nonetheless. He adjusted his speed so that he didn’t pull too far ahead of Abigail and Gwen. He glanced at Xaxia.
“I’m sorry for leading you into this,” he told the unconscious woman softly.
Gwen pulled alongside him.
“Now would be a good time to summon that Darkness of yours,” she shouted.
“Doesn't work that way!” he told her. “I wish it did.”
Behind them, the dragons closed rapidly.
The party was going to have to fight again.
Let me go, Hastor sent. You’re not going to win this one. Why waste my life, too?
If I let you go now, you’ll only join them.
I won’t, the dragon replied. I swear it.
The day I trust a black dragon with my life is the day I can turn bread into gold.
Well that’s today, my boy! the dragon sent.
Malem would have laughed were the situation not so dire. I don’t think so.
The party topped another hill.
Abigail abruptly pulled up short. Malem halted Bounder a few paces ahead of her, while Gwen was almost at the bottom of the hill before she noticed the pair had stopped; she turned around and raced back up.
“What is it?” he asked. “We can’t stop!”
The fire mage ignored him, instead staring at the sky, and the incoming dragons. Hastor circled overhead.
“Abigail!” he said.
“We’re past the barrier,” Abigail said in wonder.
“What barrier?” he asked.
“We fight here,” the fire mage said. She leaped out of her saddle and dropped to the earth. When she landed, she slapped Ember before Malem could stop her, causing the horse to bolt.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked.
Again Abigail didn’t answer.
He considered releasing Felipe to Break Ember so he could command the horse to return, but he’d probably lose the monkey in the process. And while Ember might be more important at the moment, there was no guarantee he’d be able to exert his will over Abigail and force her to mount the horse, not in his current state. Unless he wanted to suck all of the stamina from the dragon, killing it in the process.
Via Hastor, he searched the sky for signs of any incoming Metal Dragons. There were none that he could see, though the heavy cloud coverage could have been obscuring them.
He had to conclude she’d lost it. He reached into her mind, but her energy bundle seemed normal. Well, that and determined.
Mount Bounder with me, he commanded.
She resisted. No.
“Damn it.” Staying in the saddle, he drew Biter. The blade gave him no vitality.
Hastor, get ready to fight.
Oh, how lovely, the dragon responded. I get to die today for a human.
Not if I can help it.
Gaze intent on the incoming flying beasts, Abigail flung both arms downward, and they ignited with flames.
A shockwave traveled outward from her body, throwing Malem and Bounder backward. They nearly hit Gwen, who had just crested the apex of the hill, and her steed was similarly sent reeling back by the invisible force.
The iguanid scrambled to its feet, bringing Malem with it; in front of the saddle, Xaxia’s body flopped about lifelessly.
When he was upright again, he found Abigail standing before him, growing. Her dress ripped away as her body stretched in all directions, leaving her naked. Only the collar at her neck remained, expanding with her body, pressing ever into her flesh. Soon she was half as tall as the hill giant had been.
“What the hell is she?” Gwen said from beside him. Her horse was reeling.
Malem absently issued a calming command to Neeme, and did the same for Bounder. He wished he could do the same for his own fright. From Abigail’s energy bundle, he still sensed that same outflow of determination, and that was somehow reassuring.
He heard what sounded like breaking bones, and Abigail began to scream. She bent over and covered her face in pain, and he sensed terrible agony over their link. She continued to grow, but her body was changing shape now, too. It began to stretch hideously out of proportion as different portions transformed before the others.
The bicep on one arm enlarged to match her thigh, while the forearm stretched, becoming pole-like. The fore and index fingers of that hand merged, as did her third and fourth digits, become two single large units that rivaled the thumb. Scythe-like talons grew from all the digits. Her other arm began a similar transformation a moment lat
er.
Demonic wings sprouted from her back. Horns from her head. A long pointy tail from her rear. Thick vertical plates protruded from her spine. Her jaw protruded sickeningly.
“She’s a Balor!” Gwen shouted. “Run!”
He raised a halting hand. “I sense no ill intent from her. At least, not directed at us.”
As Abigail continued to transform, and her proportions began to even out, the final shape began to become apparent. Those weren’t horns on her head, for example, but ears. And that tail, it wasn’t pointy, but long and broad, ending in a smooth taper.
“Not a Balor,” Malem said.
Her skin ripped open all over her body as another layer pressed through from inside, this one surfaced by scales of bright silver. The ribbons of skin dropped away, leaving behind a huge reptilian body coated in those scales, iridescent beneath the sun. The scales lining her underbelly were slightly different, these ones tinged with red and gold.
The pain abruptly ceased to emanate from the bundle, and was replaced by determined rage. The being that was once Abigail reared, and stood to her full height, towering over them in all her majesty, raising her neck and extending her wings. She issued a stentorian roar, no doubt meant as a warning to the incoming dragons. She was beautiful, yet terrible to behold.
She lowered her forelegs to the earth once more and the ground shook.
He had a hard time equating the majestic creature before him with the woman he had made love to against the wall of a cellar only a short time before. It was a little unsettling, in fact.
“Fuck me,” Malem breathed in awe.
She brought her head around to look at him with a horizontal opening eye. He stared into a black iris in the center of a golden sclera. The whole eye was about the same size as his entire head.
“No thanks,” Abigail said. Her voice sounded its usual timbre, but with the powerful lungs of a dragon behind it.
He could still feel the same bundle of energy coming from her. No, not the same. It was more powerful. Everything was amplified: the stamina, the intelligence, the magic.
“You’re a dragon?” Gwen asked.
“You always were good at putting two and two together,” Abigail replied. She returned her attention to the fore, and gazed at the incoming enemies with narrowed eyes.
I can’t believe I slept with a dragon. A dragon in human form, true, but a dragon nonetheless.
“Is it always that... painful?” Gwen pressed. “It looked like every bone in your body was breaking.”
“Which it was,” Abigail told her. “The process is only drawn out like that if it’s been a while since I last transformed. Next time, the transformation will take place much quicker. It’ll still hurt like hell, though.”
“Can you carry us the rest of the way?” Malem said.
She shook her head. “They’re too close now. It’ll take too long to get up to speed. Besides, I want to teach these a-holes why it’s a very bad idea to enter Metal Dragon territory. I expect your friend will help me out?”
He glanced at Hastor, who circled overhead. “He’s chomping at the bit.”
“No I’m not!” the dragon boomed from above.
Malem smiled. But you will help.
If only to impress her, the dragon replied.
Don’t get any ideas, she’s mine.
The dragon’s bundle of energy seemed amused. We’ll see.
“Stay behind me,” Abigail said. “Their breath won’t harm me. You, on the other hand...”
Malem steered Bounder behind her, as did Gwen.
“Still can’t believe she’s a dragon,” Gwen said.
“Yeah,” he said. “I guess that explains why I was able to Break her.”
“Maybe you should sleep with some more of these dragons before this is done,” she joked.
“I don’t think they’re the transforming type,” he said.
“I meant the Metals,” Gwen said.
As the five dragons closed, Abigail abruptly took to the air. She dove toward the center of their formation. When she got within breath range, he realized she was bigger than the blacks.
He overlaid her perspective atop Hastor’s and his own so he could get a complete picture of the coming battle.
Her eyes glowed with sudden flames, and two fire elementals appeared, each one on the neck of a different black. They wrapped their arms around the necks and climbed toward the heads; meanwhile, the dragons flailed their necks, trying to shake them off. They dropped from formation.
The other three swerved toward Abigail, as Hastor hung back. They didn’t bother to unleash their toxic breath or their streams of dark magic, probably because it would have no effect on her, a fellow dragon. Instead, they flew straight at her, no doubt to rip her apart.
She homed in on one of the dragons, and when she was only a few body lengths away, she unleashed a powerful stream of liquid fire from her mouth, striking the creature in the head. She dodged underneath the dragon at the last possible moment and avoided impact. The other two swatted at her as they passed, trying to latch onto her wings, but they missed when she tucked them in, which had the added effect of accelerating her.
She stretched her wings to their maximum extents when she was past and then began turning around to make her second flyby.
Like the liquid fire she had unleashed on the oraks, the flames on the dragon she struck continued to blaze. The fire didn’t seem to be actually burning the beast, not with those thick scales it had, but he realized that wasn’t the intent: instead the blaze, which burned from just above the nostrils of the muzzle to the forehead, was blinding the creature. It tried to put out the flames with its forelegs, but succeeded only in spreading the liquid fire to its taloned paws.
The two fire elementals meanwhile had climbed into the faces of their respective dragons, and were similarly blinding them. One of them was hit from above by Hastor, who had circled in from the side to dive bomb the monster. Hastor smashed into its neck and tore a big chunk away. Blood spurted from the wound in pulses, and the injured dragon soon stopped flapping its wings and plummeted the rest of the way to the ground. Malem felt the impact even from where he was standing, and knew the creature had died. The fire elemental vanished upon impact.
That left two of the dragons blinded and flying drunkenly in random directions, and another two that remained unscathed. The latter pair finished turning around and closed to make another pass at her. Meanwhile, Hastor pursued the blinded creatures.
The blacks released acid at Abigail as they came in, perhaps hoping to counter her liquid flames, but she didn’t bother to unleash her deadly breath this time. Instead, she dove, passing just underneath one of them. She spun her body upside down, and raked her claws across its belly. The stricken dragon screamed.
Abigail tucked in her wings and dove backward, turning her long neck to unleash a stream of flame into the fresh wounds, and the dragon screamed anew.
The other one was coming down on her, but Abigail rotated as she fell and brought her maw to bear, and released another spurt of flame. It lasted for half a second.
The black covered its face with its arm, protecting itself from the blinding fire, and then let its blazing forearm drop. Then it swooped down on her and opened its mouth.
But Abigail met the dragon head on. The first spurt of flame had apparently been a feint, because she unleashed the real attack now, flames that lasted a full two seconds. She aimed squarely inside the open mouth of her enemy, and the flames seared its palate.
The dragon shut its mouth and tried to turn away. That was a mistake. Abigail latched onto its head with her forepaws, and drove her talons into its eyes.
Listening to the horrible screams of that dragon as it went blind was no easy thing. And Malem had thought the shrieking of the hill giant when the spider spat venom into its eyes was bad...
The dragon tried to swat her away with its forepaws, but Abigail dodged the blows so that the black ended up only further scratching its ow
n scales.
Abigail continued to shift positions, ripping free several chunks of flesh, and then finally she pulled away from the dragon. The creature flew on blindly, heading away from the battle. Hastor, having ripped out the throats of the other two blinded by fire, went after it, set on dispatching that one, next.
That left only one more dragon.
Too late Malem realized that one had figured out Abigail’s weakness: it was diving toward the three defenseless humans on the hillside below.
He and Gwen scattered, steering their mounts in random directions. A blast of acid hit the hilltop behind them. The stream followed Malem, and he was forced to zigzag in front of it.
Finally the stream let up, and the dragon landed in front of him.
Malem drew Biter. The sword glowed blindingly, eagerly, hungry for the dragon’s blood. So bright was the weapon’s glow that even the dragon hesitated.
Malem used that moment to strike. He spurred Bounder forward, commanding the beast not to look the creature in the eye. He himself kept his gaze averted, instead relying on Gwen’s eyes to guide him.
Black mists appeared in the air as the dragon launched its dark magic at him. It opened its mouth to breathe acid again, too. The gills on its neck glowed a subtle green...
Malem swerved to the side at the last possible moment, and the black swirls struck the grass behind him, withering it. The acid carved a runnel deep into the soil.
He passed on the left side of the dragon, and swiped at its foreleg with his sword. He cut a gash through the thick skin, but it wasn’t deep enough to cause much more harm. The dragon responded to the wound by reflexively striking out with that limb, and Malem and his mount went flying through the air.
They landed a good ways away, on their side. Xaxia moaned; she seemed otherwise uninjured.
He righted Bounder and tried to gallop away, but the iguanid had a terrible limp, now.
The black dragon smirked as it opened its mouth once more.
A silvery form smashed down on its head. Talons and teeth rent that exposed neck, and a moment later the head separated entirely from the body.
Abigail spat out the severed body part. “No one attacks my friends.”
