Dragon's Rise

by Lou Hoffmann

  Yet he knew Han would not kill one more person than was necessary to win the battle, and he knew Han fought for the people, the country, and the world he loved. And he knew that if Han didn’t fight—didn’t kill now—the horrors that might follow would most likely be far worse, and inflicted on victims rather than perpetrators of war.

  He knew he could live with it, this knowledge that tolerance could only go so far until it was turned against the tolerant like a sharpened blade. But he wished he didn’t have to. He wished he never had to discover that truth. Of course those weren’t the kind of wishes the Key of Behliseth could help with, and although he could wish not to be Suth Chiell, never to have to make a decision to send people to war, that wish was one that love, loyalty, and the honor of a faithful heart would not let him make.

  If I ever become a hero, don’t let it be about glory in war. If, when I’m long dead and gone from the world, someone tells stories about me, let it be because I loved my people, and took care of them.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven: Sun Child

  HAN ALIGHTED on the desolate battlefield and Lucky slid off his back.

  “I have to go,” Han thought, a note in his voice of urgency.

  Lucky thanked him for everything and watched him fly away. Sahsha, too, bid him farewell, and again promised not to forget him. Lucky looked for Rio, and asked an officer standing near if he knew where he was.

  “He’s fine, lad… sir. He’s got some cuts and bruises and the medics are taking care of him. Perhaps you too…?”

  “Not yet,” Lucky said, but he sank to the ground and let his head hang down, weary blackness dancing at the edge of his vision.

  After a moment, with effort, he raised his head to take in his surroundings. His gaze combed the battlefield, strangely lit in a sunrise that couldn’t quite drive away the bleakness of what he saw. Blood congealed in pools like pockmarks on the valley floor, surface shining like some secret magic. Strange lights flickered and hissed, smoked and vanished. Corpses—of men and women, horses, and some bodies Lucky couldn’t identify—lay like litter in solitary twists or misshapen piles. The air crackled with static and stank of ozone and rot. Pockets of men and women in tattered soldier’s garb stood in clusters. Some stared blank-eyed, as if they had become the same thing as the undead they’d just defeated. Some seemed horrified or sickened. Some spoke among themselves in low tones as if words could actually make sense of the scene.

  With no particular purpose, he shifted his gaze to Thurlock, who stood nearby at the center of a semicircular row with other wizards and some of Han’s officers. Thurlock spoke in a voice that sounded both hollow and filled to the brim with horror.

  “Behlishan…,” the old wizard said and then repeated, “Behlishan.”

  So many times, Lucky had heard Thurlock say that name, either with delight, or in supplication, or at times in irritation. But never this. Never as though he needed an explanation but couldn’t bring himself even to ask for it. Never as though he had no faith the god would hear.

  Someone, a soldier standing among the dumbstruck ranks behind the wizards and officers said, almost brightly, “Well, at least we won.”

  Disbelief clouded the rage that wanted to rise up in Lucky at those words. Thurlock lifted his hands, palms turned up, and let his head fall into them, hiding his face. It seemed to Lucky the old man shook, slightly. Han returned just then, human again, but his dragon eyes flashed—literally—following the soldier’s callous pronouncement; his expression mimicked that fear-inspiring glare Lucky had seen come over him in battle. His lips clamped shut and his hands fisted, but he didn’t look at the man who’d spoken, didn’t move, didn’t speak. Clearly, neither wizard nor warrior liked what the soldier said any more than Lucky did, but they said nothing.

  Lucky refused to be silent. He struggled to his feet to face—not just the man who’d spoken—but everyone nearby. His words began in an incredulous whisper. “Won? Won!” His voice rising, he went on. “Look around you! What is it about this blood-soaked field, this stink, the crying, the pleas, the ugliness all around, everything broken, so much taken—” He stopped, realizing he’d started to yell. He took a deep breath and concluded, “What happened here today has nothing to do with winning. The only winners I see are pain and death. And I swear by all your gods and any others, if there’s a way I can stop it from happening again, I will. You can take that to the bank.” His words and his vehemence surprised him as much as anyone else, and after he said them, he felt like he’d staked himself like one of the Cheyenne Dog Soldiers back in Earth.

  He looked around to find every eye in range fixed on him, some over jaws slack with surprise. His heart hammered with dread almost as severe and at least as painful as the fear he’d swallowed down facing Mahros. But after a moment, a rustle wound its way through the ranks of soldiers standing nearby as they, one at a time at first, then by threes and sixes and dozens, went to one knee. It wasn’t the same as bowing—they held their heads high and looked directly at him—but it was respect.

  In a flash of knowledge springing from someplace far deeper than conscious thought, Lucky understood that—even if years passed before he wore a crown like Lustrex—in this moment on the bloody battlefield, he became Suth Chiell—Sun Child—of the Sunlands.

  “Yes” came Han’s answering thought. “I’ll wager you’re right. On the one hand, I stand with these people, in awe of you, Luccan. You are a leader. On the other hand, it’s kind of strange because I don’t think they know what ‘you can take that to the bank’ means.”

  Han didn’t smile, and neither did Lucky, but Han’s familiar, understated presence in his mind was a comfort not too different from a smile, and it eased some pressure from the coiled spring inside Lucky, dialed the tension back a little. Lucky took a deep breath. He looked out to the people who had honored him and said, simply, “Thank you.”

  Then he sat back down on the ground. Not really on purpose. Wherever the energy came from to compel him to make his declaration, it had drained away and left him feeling as empty as if he’d bled out. It was all well and good to be angry, to proclaim resolve, but the red-tinged clouds roiling overhead made it impossible to truly believe the sun would shine again.

  Thurlock stepped near and put a hand on his shoulder. It felt like comfort, but not like hope.

  Han spoke into his thoughts. “It will be all right, lad.” Lucky supposed it would, in some manner, but that fell short of a promise too.

  Maizie came and sat beside him in the mud, leaning against him. Her cold, snuffling nose helped some, her unquestioning love warming Lucky’s world—not enough, but some.

  Then Rio was there, somehow, and he knelt down beside Lucky in the death-soaked mud and whispered in his ear. “Maybe we didn’t win, Lucky, but the people did, and the children did. And I did too, because you’re still here with me. And you had a whole lot to do with making things turn out that way. Without you, it wouldn’t have been only pain and death who won—it would have been the enemy. And if they’d won… not something I want to think about.”

  Rio was right about the children—the ones they’d saved from the Terrathian pens, the ones at home, and the ones yet to be born. That was a win. And he and Rio together with maybe a future—that was precious and worth staying alive for. And true: they hadn’t won, but they had stopped the enemy from winning—at least for now.

  So, it was just possible they’d managed to win the right to keep hope alive. Recognizing that turned like a key to open the locked box of Lucky’s stricken heart. A tide of gratitude rushed through him, feeling warm enough to melt him on the spot. He thought its source might be the Key of Behliseth, which tingled against the raw skin of his chest. He held Maizie in the circle of one arm, leaned his head against Rio’s chest, and shut his eyes as he let go of a long, cleansing breath. He was almost asleep in the next instant.

  Han stepped close. “Come on, Rio,” he said, calmly practical. “Help me get Luccan up on K’ormahk. You two can ride.
I’ve got to stay here for a while and see to some things. Thurlock’s grabbing a Portal home, though, and Maizie can go with him. They’ll be there at the Sisterhold by the time you get back. As soon as Thurlock has a little energy, he can help the healers take care of Luccan.”

  Lucky woke up enough to mumble thanks to Han and sort of walk, with help, and soon he and Rio were safely mounted on K’ormahk’s broad back. “Don’t let me fall, K,” he thought to the horse.

  K’ormahk only snorted in response, but to Lucky’s surprise Ciarrah answered in a tired voice. “He won’t. You’re safe, Blade-keeper.”

  Lucky hadn’t given the blade a thought. Her weight in the ankle sheath was so familiar now it didn’t even register. Not quite believing he’d managed to forget her after what they’d just been through together, he asked, “What about you? Are you okay, C?” He wasn’t quite sure what he meant. She couldn’t be killed… could she?

  “I will recover, but for now I am spent. Please find my brother soon. I fear he will be necessary.”

  Lucky was just awake enough to be surprised and confused by her request. “Uh…. What, Ciarrah?”

  But Ciarrah had not been exaggerating when she said she was spent. All the response Lucky got from her was a thin voice fading to nothing. “Blade-keeper, you did well today.”

  K’ormahk ran, and then his wings made their first powerful, pushing strokes to sweep the ground away from his thundering hooves, and they were airborne. Immediately, Ghriffon swooped into position alongside them, and the other eagles fell into a narrow V-formation behind him. Henry flew among them tipping his wings in salute, but then went back, and Lucky was sure he’d stay with Han.

  They flew together for a short while, K’ormahk and the flame eagles, until they cleared the ridge where Lucky had camped with Thurlock to prepare for battle. Then the eagles dipped a wing toward K’ormahk and his passengers in farewell or salute, and one at a time they turned away west to catch, Lucky supposed, a better wind to take them home. K’ormahk whinnied once in farewell, and then the world faded and stars came into view all around them, as if newborn.

  That first moment among the celestial lights inspired a moment’s awe, but for Lucky, the trip home to the Sisterhold held none of the glory and wonder of star flight like when K’ormahk bore him and Han home—not so very long ago. On this journey, their time-and-distance-folding flight was filled with too many flashing lights burrowing past Lucky’s closed eyelids to reach his aching head, and cold wind cutting through even the warmth of Rio’s sheltering body close behind him. Lucky felt seasick and lost and heartbroken, but still, underneath all of that, he’d become more determined than he ever could have put into words.

  I’ll fix this, he thought. Somehow, I’ll set this broken world right.

  Exclusive Excerpt

  Kaynenh’s Triad

  Sequel to Dragon’s Rise

  The Sun Child Chronicles: Book 5

  By Lou Hoffmann

  Battle weary and haunted by the terrors of war, Lucky will try anything to get relief from nightmares and flashbacks. He gets some help from magical friends, and his dog, Maizie, keeps him from feeling too lonely. Wizard Thurlock’s lessons about Sunlands history and politics—topics Lucky must understand if he’s going to take up his destined role as Sun Child—provide a welcome distraction, but not a respite from worry. Wounded soldiers need care; orphaned children need homes. The enemy, though defeated, might not be gone for good. And something is not right with the world’s life-force magic.

  A journey across the continent to investigate Ethra’s altered, disappearing water is stalled when the Wraith Queen shows Lucky nothing is as it seems. He and his allies call on all the strength and magic they can muster, trying to heal the world. But Kaynenh’s Triad—an ancient musical formula that has long kept the balance between Ethra and Earth, between water and stone—has been broken. Can Lucky find the talisman that will sound the missing tone in time to restore the magic and keep the worlds alive?

  Coming Soon to

  www.harmonyinkpress.com

  Prologue

  Luccan

  SAFELY BACK at the wizard’s tower, the battlefield Lucky had left behind haunted his attempts to sleep. The pale walls of his room in Thurlock’s house—the safest, most comfortable place he knew—became rocky cliffs crawling with zombies. The moon’s steady silver light turned into dizzying blasts of icy breath from blue drakes. The dance of the maple’s shadows transformed before his eyes into the thrust and slash of wraith-wielded blades. Maizie’s presence and the comforting, familiar soft cotton of the wizard Thurlock’s pajamas kept Lucky from getting lost in the illusions, but repeated bursts of momentary panic left him with eyes glued wide open.

  He gave up on sleep and got out of bed, taking the quilt with him. After a stretch that ended with a sad sigh, he padded as softly as he could down the stairs, with the worn patchwork wrapped around him like full body armor. With a faint chime like tiny bells, the chandelier over the wizard’s table shivered slightly as he passed, splashing faint rainbow lights on the stones of the great hearth. Behind the grate, wizard fire flickered low and heatless in the summer night. The great winged armchairs beckoned him, but Lucky resisted the pull and continued past to the front door.

  When he stepped out onto the worn boards of the wide porch, a breeze teased at the bristly fuzz on his cheek, so he gave it a scratch while he looked around. Somehow, from atop the hill where Thurlock’s tower stood, the openness of the spacious manor grounds seemed friendlier, less fogged-in and secretive than his roomful of ghostly imaginings. The night wasn’t still, however. Soldiers and others involved in the battle at the Giant’s Hand were coming home in shifts as each unit wrapped up its task in cleaning up the messy remnants of warfare. Out in the fields surrounding the military headquarters, fires burned among the tents, and lanterns moved through the camps lighting the steps of returning troops and those who’d be keeping a welfare watch through the night. The chances returning soldiers wouldn’t be hungry were slim to zero, too, and that likely explained the lights blazing in all the manor’s kitchen windows.

  Probably the entire staff had either stayed working late or started early. Or both. Maybe they’d need to keep the kitchen going all hours for a few days. The army usually cooked for itself, but at a time like this, their meager kitchens were not enough. And, Lucky thought, tastier food coming from the manor might boost morale. And it wasn’t only soldiers in the tents who needed feeding. All the windows on the infirmary floor blazed with light, reminding Lucky that wizards and healers would be constantly laboring to care for the injured. They and their patients both needed plenty of food and hot tea. And then there were those keeping the night house—something Lucky preferred not to think too hard about right then.

  With all those people to feed, the kitchen was busy—too busy for Lucky to go there to find a snack, ordinary comfort, or a game of Skippers with Cook. In a while he might go there to see if he could help with the work, but he was in poor shape himself and likely wouldn’t be much good at helping others until he was able to rest. For that, he needed to calm his mind and his battle-frayed nerves. Sleep would help, but he’d tried that, and it wasn’t working. In the meanwhile, he knew it would be best if he could be with other people—or at least not alone. He was pretty sure those two possibilities weren’t identical.

  Lucky knew he could find Thurlock at the infirmary, but for once he was there to be cared for, not to help someone else, and Lucky figured the last thing he needed was a freaked out sixteen-year-old clinging to him while he recovered from his own wounds and ills. Lucky did consider going to the infirmary for help with his troubles, but most likely it was already chaos there, what with injured soldiers and rescued children. Lucky hoped the stream of injured fighters would dwindle to nothing soon, but the children… well, if more remained alive, he hoped they would come to the Sisterhold. Twin waves of emotion struck Lucky as he thought about the kids who’d been kidnapped: horror at all they’d suff
ered, and gratitude that at least some had been saved. But still, he wanted to save them all.

  Lucky couldn’t honestly see how they could ever go back to being normal kids after the abuse they’d suffered. How could they forget being hooked to the Terrathians’ life-draining machines, or being worked and whipped until there was no life left in them to steal? How could they erase the memories of being penned in dark caves, of having their cellmates carried away to their death while they waited their turn. Lucky didn’t know if they could ever be whole again, but he did hope, just like he hoped for his own future, for the people he loved, and for Ethra—and he thought hope was reasonable, not blind. Because if anyone could restore the spirits of children and a world’s balance, it would be the healers and wizards of the Ethran Sunlands.

  If he could be at their side, if he could help at all, he’d be there.

  Niamh

  SURE, I’M Ciarrah’s brother, but my magic isn’t like hers. It doesn’t run deep, sing in the dark, or cut like a diamond shard. I’m too timid, and I always have been. What boldness I had, Ciarrah lent me. During our Drakha childhood, ages past, I found myself always caught in her wake, playing her games, following her lead, getting into her trouble. I loved every minute of it, though.