This time, I hit the corner edge of the shipping crate and crunched instead of bounced.
[Warning! You are Stunned!]
[Current HP: 25/440]
[Warning! This enemy’s challenge rating is dangerously high!]
“Urrgh…” The blood beat in my temples. I had to keep this fucker away from Karalti.
“You there! Search the stable!” The mage called back over his shoulder as he stalked through the gate and out to the street. The Stun counter was still ticking down, and I struggled to move as he closed in on me, hand raised. Lightning danced around his fingers. “And you, heretic! Where is she? Where is the queen?”
“Have you checked your ass? I heard it's pretty roomy in there.” I spat blood, moving to hands and knees. I still had the Spear of Nine Spheres wrapped in one tight-knuckled fist, for all the good it was doing me.
“You are in no position to sling insults.” The masked Mata Argis Agent had a cold voice, dark with anger. “Where is she!? What have you done to her?!”
“The same thing I do to your mom every night.”
The mage wrenched me to my feet with a spell, his gauntlet burning with blue fire. “Have it your way! We will extract the information at base without any need for your input. By the power vested in me by the Warden of Ilia-”
His speech was cut off by a furious black blur of claws and teeth. Karalti dove at the back of his head and hit him at full speed, sending him staggering toward me. He flung his hand out just before his concentration broke, but the spell was successful. I was whiplashed around in mid-air before being slammed down onto the rough ground. I hit the knee-high cliffside barricade hard, and felt something crack in my chest on the rebound. My arm went numb, and my spear skittered off across the dirt.
“Karalti! No! Stay back!” I yelled, rolling over to scramble up.
The little dragon’s neck swelled. She hissed and spat, kicking with her powerful hind feet. She caught her sickle claw on the edge of the mage’s mask and kicked it free, baring a surprisingly young face. He looked like a Mormon: pale, pointed face, wavy nut-blond hair. Karalti got one good slash across his eyes before he caught her by the neck like a turkey.
Karalti squealed, and my guts froze cold.
“Let her go, you jackbooted piece of shit!” I roared, blood pouring from my nose, and charged at him, desperate to provide any distraction at all. If they took her...
“Hold fast!” The last swordsman was running towards the pair of them with a net outstretched.
“No!” I screamed now, real terror overwhelming common sense, self-preservation, even the need to breathe. Every day, I was haunted by what had happened to her mother, and what would happen to her if they took her. “Let her go!”
“Hector!” Karalti screeched, little limbs flailing as the pair of men closed in.
The soldier reached them before I did. He threw the net over Karalti’s struggling body, snaring her wings, and grabbed her in a bear hug.
“Stand by! Hold her! Don’t worry - she’s too young for fire!” The mage was struggling to see and catch his breath. He went to go pick up his mask. I bellowed, charging him, but he wasn’t distracted enough to ignore me - with a dismissive sweep of his hand, his magic sent me sprawling.
“HECTOR!” Karalti twisted in the soldier’s arms like a fish, slashing and biting. he tried to pull away from her, but a lucky claw caught him in the neck and he went down, blood spraying from his carotid. He dropped and she fell with him, still struggling in the net.
[Karalti lands a devastating blow! X5 damage!]
[Mercenary Soldier is hemorrhaging!]
[Congratulations! Karalti is Level 2!]
“Time to end this,” the mage panted, standing over me. He levelled his smoking hand at my chest. “The Knight-Commander sends his regards.”
Chapter 3
Six feet behind him, Karalti’s body was consumed by a kaleidoscopic haze. The opal seams in her scales spread over her entire body. The guard nearly dropped her as she seemed to liquify, then doubled in size. It distracted everyone, even the mage.
Before she’d even stopped glowing, the dragon reared her head back and opened her jaws wide. “CHAAAA!”
A thin plume of burning liquid, like ghostly white napalm, burst from her mouth. The net caught fire, and when it hit the Mata Argis Agent, he caught on fire, too. It spattered the ground, and wherever it landed, white flames erupted.
The Agent’s cloak caught like he’d dipped it in gasoline. The heat was so intense I could feel it from the ground. I recoiled as he jumped back and to the side, shouting a new spell. “Bla’pahaz!”
Water condensed out of the air around him in a sphere and dumped over his head, like someone had poured a bucket over him. The water sloshed down, saturating his clothes... but the flames were not extinguished. Clouds of steam spewed into the air.
“AAAAIIIIIEEE!” Now he was boiling alive instead of frying. He spun away from me, clawing at his robes to get them off. I rolled to the side and clapped a hand down on the haft of the Spear of Nine Spheres. Maybe we could pick away at him like this? Maybe we could...?
The mage snarled another Word of Power, whipping the dust and dirt on the street around himself like a tornado. The earth covered him, and when it fell away, the flames were extinguished. His HP was still in the green - the fire had distracted him, but Karalti was still only Level 2. It hadn’t injured him that much.
“Bad man!” Karalti’s raspy, parrot-like speaking voice cut through the air as she charged the Agent at a run, leaping into the air with great beats of her wings. “CHAAAA!”
“Karalti! NO!” I shouted, but it was already too late.
The mage blocked the napalm stream with an energetic shield, and then swatted the little dragon from the air. She cried out as she tumbled away, rolling to stillness in the churned dust of the street.
We weren’t strong enough. We just weren’t strong enough, and I wasn’t strong enough to protect her. Teeth gritted, I burned through my healing items and prepared to charge anyway... except that someone else got there first.
“FOR TALTOS! FOR HONOR!” The man who emerged out of the cloud of dirt was massive. Six and a half feet tall, shoulders wider than a door, a saber in his hands. The Mata Argis mage got a shield up between him and the newcomer just in time, but the blow of that sword against the magical barrier send him skidding across the ground.
The mage looked nearly as confused as I did. He was preparing his return attack when a bright bolt of energy slammed into him from my other side. I glimpsed a small, wiry man in bright blue robes, with a steel-gray ponytail and mage-gloves that crackled with energy. The Mata Argis Agent staggered, reeling close to the barrier overlooking the cliff, and I saw my chance.
Wheezing from broken ribs, my HP throbbing in the red, I charged the mage and tackled him off the edge.
Whatever magic school the Mata Argis mage had been to, they apparently hadn’t taught him how to fly. He howled all the way down, plummeting like a comet into the crushing hundred-foot waves that thundered against the base of the cliffs. Archemi’s physics was a bitch.
[You have defeated Mata Argis Agent!]
[You gain 200 EXP!]
[Congratulations! You are Level 9!]
[You have unspent ability points!]
[You have unspent skill points!]
“Karalti!” There was no time to gloat. Struggling for breath, I ran to my hatchling. She was up on her feet, but she was down below half HP. A man in bright blue robes moved away from her as she flapped toward me.
The dragon hit me in the chest and knocked me on my ass. She clung to me with four sets of pointy claws, wings beating wildly. “Hector! Hector is hurt!”
“Hector’s gonna be fine.” But Cutthroat wasn’t. With Karalti pressed in close to my hip, I limped across the smoking ground and back into the stable yard, to the huge body sprawled on the ground. I dropped to my knees beside Cutthroat, a lump rising in my throat. The hookwing was, to all appearance
s, completely dead. Out of habit, I jammed my fingers under the edge of her jaw, feeling for a pulse, even as my HUD display showed me her level and remaining HP. It was at 5 out of 460, and dropping slowly.
[Your Mount is in a critical condition! You must restore HP equal to one quarter of her total HP to stabilize her.]
“Shitballs,” I said to no one in particular. I raided my inventory - there were ten Bonebreak Poultices that each healed 50 HP, six Moss Tinctures that healed 70 HP, and a bunch of mana-infused potions that I could use, but would be toxic to Cutthroat.
I slapped a poultice onto her wounds and pulled the dinosaur’s head onto my lap. Her skull was as long as my torso, but I pried her jaws open and poured two Moss Tinctures down her throat and returned the empty bottles back into my inventory. Cutthroat twitched, then kicked spasmodically along the ground as she regained consciousness, tearing long furrows in the dirt. Then she whimpered.
[Cutthroat has been stabilized! HP: 145/460]
“The creature is badly wounded.” The blue-robed man had joined us, brow wrinkled with concern. He looked to be in his early fifties, and he had a scholarly, handsome face, with wise dark eyes. The huge knight who had intervened in the fight hovered by his left shoulder. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man with an impressive moustache and strings of black runes tattooed over his cheeks and under his eyes. He was dressed in a fine chainmail tunic underneath black and red lamellar armor, which made him look like some kind of Slavic samurai.
“Yeah, she is. Stand back.” I uncorked the second Moss Tincture and poured it in, shoving my arm into her mouth to make sure it went down.
Putting my hand in Cutthroat’s mouth wasn’t the stupidest thing I’ve ever done, but it was definitely in the Top Ten Dumb Ideas of Hector Park. When her eyes flickered open, dark and hazy, I had about a second to pull my arm out and scramble away. I barely managed to stay out of reach as Cutthroat snapped at me, jaws clapping together barely inches from my face.
Karalti hissed at her and drew a deep breath. Before I could stop her, she exhaled wheezily in the hookwing’s direction, but only a few tiny drops of burning liquid and saliva sprayed from her mouth. None of them landed on the dinosaur, and Cutthroat almost looked offended.
“Oh.” Karalti hunched down, looking up at us from the ground.
I turned to regard the pair of men who were still shadowing us. “Thanks for the assist.”
To my surprise, both men went to their knees. The big knight bowed to the hilt of his sword. Blue Robes flattened himself down on the ground.
“Please forgive our imposition, rytier,” the smaller man – mage? priest? – said as he rose back up. “We saw you and your draak in distress-”
“-We could not let these rogues continue their assault on this holy creature, or you, her sacred guardian!” The knight finished. He had a deep, booming voice to go with the moustache, but gentle eyes. He gazed at Karalti as if she were an angel fallen from heaven.
Karalti leaned in to sniff them curiously, wings buzzing. I rolled my shoulders and grimaced. People were beginning to stare at us, which was literally the opposite of what I wanted right now. “Well, thanks. I really appreciate it, but we have to find a ship and leave. The next wave will be here any minute.”
“Please lend us your ear for a minute more, rytier,” the knight said. He had a strange, thick accent. Not Russian, but definitely somewhere east of Germany. “I am Ur Kirov, Knight of Taltos and a representative of His Majesty Andrik Corvinus the Wise, and this is Father Petko Matthias, priest and scholar. We come from Vlachia, where your draak is a most holy being. We were, in all honesty, on our way to a royal vessel when we spied your entanglement with this knave and his-”
I groaned. “Well, thanks again, but we don’t have much time. Where are you going with this?”
“Ahh, well… we have been recalled to mighty Vlachia at the Volod’s request following a great tragedy in the kingdom.” Kirov sheathed his sword, nodding thoughtfully and with a disturbing lack of urgency. “I was sent here to protect Father Matthias, but by the power invested in my office as a Knight of the Red Star, I would offer you and your draak sanctuary aboard our vessel.”
My eyes narrowed. I’d had enough of Archemi’s knightly orders to last me a lifetime, but this guy was too ridiculous to not be sincere.
“The Volod ordered that we should bring any skilled adventurers with us to address the problems of the kingdom,” Father Matthias added softly. “But to find a true draak in the company of a skillful warrior… it can only be a sign from the Nine.”
The Nine? That caught my attention. I caught Cutthroat’s reins in one hand as she tried to limp past me and pulled her to a stop. “Wait. You’re a priest of the old gods? The dragon gods?”
Matthias glanced at the nearest bystanders. “Please be a little more discreet, rytier. Their worship is outlawed here.”
Kirov clasped his hands together, beseeching me. “We cannot in good conscience abandon a draak and her guardian in these barbaric lands. I would beg you to consider our offer.”
I frowned. The gamer in me said that these two were about to offer me a quest - a juicy one, given that they directly served their king. But I’d been avoiding people ever since leaving Fort Palewing, and the string of betrayals and the gross abuse of the dragons that the knights of the Order of Saint Grigori committed had left a bitter taste in my mouth. Still, the name ‘Vlachia’ rang a bell somewhere... and after a couple of moments thought, I remembered. Vlachia was the country where I was meant to meet up with Matir.
“Hold on a second.” Keeping one eye on the two men and one on my hookwing and dragon, I opened up the description of the first major quest I’d ever received:
Ongoing Quest: The Temple of the Hidden Seed
When the Dark Star rises to the sky, journey to the Thunderstones at Myszno, a village in the east of Vlachia.
Reward: ???
Difficulty: Level 12-15
“Do you happen to know where the Village of Myszno is?” I asked Kirov.
“Myszno? Why, of course!” His moustache bristled, and his eyes turned distant and dark with emotion. “Myszno is both a village and a province, down near the southern border of Vlachia. It is a sight that would melt the heart of any painter. The endless forests, the rolling hills, the mountains soaring into the sky like…”
“Myszno village is a place of pilgrimage for the local natives,” Matthias added, rapping Kirov’s armored sleeve to shut him up. “There is a holy place up in the mountains near the town, but rumors of monsters and worse have grown in recent times. However, it is not anything I can speak of comfortably out of doors, especially on Ilian soil.”
Interesting. I was betting that ‘holy place’ was the Thunderstones, whatever they were. I nodded sharply. “Alright. I’ll talk with you. You said something about a ship?”
“Yes. Our mighty steed awaits.” Kirov nodded. “Now, please, come with us so that we might see you aboard, and journey with you to safety.”
Chapter 4
The Vlachian royal ship was called the Hóleány - pronounced ‘Hoo-lan’. It was easily the nicest ship in the port: a sleek cruiser with four huge magitech engines and layers of waxed silk sails.
The pair of men led me and my saurian friends down the harborfront with some urgency, half-sheltering Karalti and me with their cloaks. Guards were pouring from the city now, stopping and frisking people, pulling back robes, harassing dark-colored hookwings and their owners. We reached the gangplank just ahead of the tide of angry soldiers.
“Shelter, at last,” Kirov said hoarsely. He looked to Father Matthias. “Please, Father, you and our guests must go first, lest these rogues try to breach the deck. I will stand guard until you are hidden.”
Kirov seemed to be a real, honest-to-gods chivalrous knight. I didn’t argue with him. I just scooped Karalti in my arms and carried her up to the ship like a big puppy. Cutthroat limped up without complaint, too injured to be her normal rage-driven self, while Fa
ther Matthias followed up behind her. Well behind, so that she didn’t knock him off into the sea with her lashing tail.
“We have facilities for your hookwing,” he said, once we were on board. “We will stable her, and then retreat to the guest quarters to discuss our dilemma.”
“Thanks.” I looked back over the railing, watching as a unit of black-cloaked soldiers swept down the road. They were about five hundred feet from us, but I could see them clearly, zooming in my vision like a sniper scope. “We need to hurry. The Mata Argis are going to be on us any minute.”
Matthias was looking at my eyes and face as if he were seeing it for the first time. “You have the dragonsight? That means you trained with the Skyrdon of Ilia. And she-?”
“Karalti escaped a fate worse than death, and so did I.” I blinked, refocusing to close range. “Let’s go to the below deck.”
The priest escorted us there. Cutthroat was anxious on the ship, hissing at every shadow until we locked her into her stall. I unequipped her muzzle just as the ship’s engines began to roar. Her feathers flattened against her skull, and she crouched down, eyes darting from side to side.
“That’s a good girl. Sit down and don’t murder anyone, okay?” I patted the door, and left with Matthias for the main deck. “Thanks, by the way. You didn’t have to do this.”
“It is our honor,” he replied, leading the way back up the stairs. “Our vows include that of hospitality. Your Karalti is a rare and precious creature. How did you come to accompany her?”
I liked his choice of words: ‘accompany’, not ‘own’. “The short version is that the Skyrdon of Saint Grigori enslave their dragons, including Karalti’s mother. Her mother gave me Karalti to protect. She asked me to give her a good life.”
“The gods judge us by the way we treat those in need,” Matthias said, slowing to turn and duck his head. “Do your people worship the Nine, then? You’re not Ilian.”
Archemi Online Chronicles Boxset Page 38
