by Craig Zerf
‘Almost,’ said Plob. ‘I forgot to introduce the captain.’ He pointed at captain Bhature who had been hovering behind Boy and had just pulled out. ‘Captain, this is Spice. Spice, captain Bhature.’
‘Oh, a pixie.’
‘No,’ said Plob. ‘He’s actually an interstellar cosmonaut from the Papad galaxy in the North-East spiral and he was brought here via a deformation in space-time called a black hole.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes.’
‘I don’t know what you’re actually saying.’
‘Neither do I.’
‘Do you have any spare peat for my dragon, she’s hungry.’
‘Yes. Lots.’
‘Well,’ said Spice. ‘Let’s sort the dragons out and then we need to talk about dragon flame and control thereof.’
They led the dragons to the stable to feed.
Chapter 14
‘First you take da arrow,’ growled Biggest. ‘Den yous dip da pointy end in da pitch. Den yous put it onna table next to all de others. See? Den, when da dragons they come overhead you grabs a handful of arrows.’ The Trogre picked up a pawful of around sixty arrows. ‘You sticks da pointy ends inna flame until dey is all burning. Den you chucks dem at da dragons. You hit da dragons, dey dies and you have done your job. See?’
Biggest looked around at the group of Trogres standing about him. They were all of his younger brothers as he had sent word for them to come poste haste to the capital in order to help defend the city.
And they had all come; Huge, Large, Great, Massive, Broad and Jock who was so named because his mother ran out of synonyms for Big.
Now Biggest, as the only person (Trogre) to have actually brought down an enemy dragon, was training them to be part of T.A.D.S or the Trogre Air Defence System. Initially Biggest had called it the Controlled Response Air Protection System until Jock, who was considered the intellectual of the family, had pointed out the acronym. Biggest had then changed it to the Command Reaction Attack Preservation Scheme. Jock had vetoed that one as well. After much thought Biggest put forward the name, Seriously Hard Intimidating Trogres.
Jock had called them T.A.D.S and put a final end to the lavatorially influenced acronyms after the other brothers pitched in with the Peoples Offensive Outfit.
Huge raised a paw. ‘Why does yous light dem?’
‘So’s you can see dem in de air,’ answered Biggest.
Broad put his paw up- next. ‘Who died and made yous da king of da place dat we all are? Why does we have to listen to you?’
Biggest leant forward and clubbed Broad on the side of his head with a massive bunched up paw. ‘Dat’s why.’
Broad rubbed his head. ‘Oh, I unnerstand now. Thanks.’
‘No problemo, little bro. Dat’s what I’se here for. Okay, Massive, you have a practise throw.’
Massive lumbered over, grabbed a bunch of pitch tipped arrows, thrust them into the torch and then threw them into the air with a grunt of effort. The group of brothers watched the flaming arrows arch through the sky.
‘Dat is one impressive throw, brudda of mine,’ said Biggest. ‘But, as dey say in da classics, what go up and such what. So…I sincerely recommend dat we run.’
The Trogres split like long dogs as the ground around them was peppered with flaming yard-long messengers of death.
After the last burning arrow hit the ground Biggest threaded his way around them back to the table. ‘Righty-ho my bro’s, Huge, you have a go.’
The whole process was repeated as the next brother took his turn. This time, however, Broad wasn’t quite fast enough and one of the flaming arrows punched through his foot. The ensuing laughter from the other brothers lasted for well over a minute.
Witty comment came thick and fast but, as Trogres are known more for their ability to crush heads than to invoke intellectual witticisms, they were all along the lines of, ‘hey, yous got a burning foot,’ or ‘Yous is lucky dat you is such a flame retardant mutha or you’d catch alight.’
After all of the brothers had been given a chance to practice, Biggest assigned them their posts.
‘Right, dere is seven of us. I will be a roamin’ Trogre dat will help out where de action is heaviest. Da rest of you will be situated at da four corners of da city.’
‘But dere six of us,’ said Broad. ‘And even I know dat dere’s more in six than in four.’
‘Six sides is a polygon.’ Said Giant, apropos of nothing.
‘Polly gone where?’ Asked Broad.
‘Nowhere, polygon is a six sided thing.’
Jock shook his head. ‘No, is a hexagon you thinking of. Polygon is just many sides.’
‘Shuddup,’ said Biggest. ‘You all know what I means. You be spread around da ourtskirts of da city. Dats all.’
‘And da parrot?’ Asked Broad.
‘What parrot.’
‘Da one dat gone. Polly.’
Biggest punched Broad in the face.
‘Oh,’ said Broad. ‘I unnerstand.’
Spice had shown Plob the dragon-firing bit that her grandfather had designed for her. It fitted over a dragon’s head and mouth like a bit and bridal on a horse. The difference being that, instead of working on the lips and roof of the mouth to steer, it was solely used to depress the dragons tongue down to create a mild gag reflex which would, in turn, cause a ball of fire to be ejected from the beasts mouth. In other words, you gave a tug on the reins and - Bam! As opposed to chucking pepper at the beast and randomly spraying the area with fire.
The girl explained that, on a full feed of Natrium crystals, a dragon would be capable of around ten to fifteen shots before it needed to eat and recharge.
Plob had taken the bit to Blean the blacksmith who had made up one to fit Nim’s larger head and then the two teenagers had flown away from the city so that Plob could get in a bit of firing practice.
It was proving to be hellishly difficult but, after six shots, Plob had managed to hit a hay bale that they had hung from the top branches of an Oak tree.
They flew back for lunch and refuelled the dragons with more Natrium crystals.
They ate in relative silence since Spice was not used to company and worked on the theory that it was better to stay still and let people think that you may be an ignorant mountain hick than to talk and cause people to know that you were.
As a result she didn’t tell Plob how well he had actually done. She had spent her life with mountain dragon folk and never before had she seen a person pick up the difficult art of dragon firing so quickly. This, combined with his almost uncanny ability to make his dragon perform aerial manoeuvres that were nigh on impossible, made Plob most probably one of the best flyers that she had ever seen. The fact that he was, to all intents and purposes, a rank amateur irked her more than a little. Apart from that, she liked him. He was presentable, well built and polite and he looked at her as if she were the most beautiful thing that he had ever seen.
Her silence caused Plob to assume that, firstly, he was an embarrassingly rubbish shot, so he vowed to himself to try even harder that afternoon. And, secondly, that she had noticed his apparent inability to stop staring at her leather encased bosom, so he vowed to himself that he would…stare in a more subtle fashion for the rest of the day. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to look Spice in the eyes it was just that, when he did, he found it to be more disturbing than staring at her magnificent front. Chests were chests but Spices dark green eyes frightened him. If he looked for too long he found that his heart started beating like a broken clock and he felt an almost undeniable need to throw himself to his knees and declare undying devotion. He was sure that it was all an infatuation brought on by a surfeit of testosterone combined with long lithe feminine legs and skintight leather, so, until he got over it he would stick to staring at Spice’s shirt-puppies instead.
After a short rest they took off for more practise. On their way to the outskirts they came across an unkindness of eight or so ravens flying over the fields. As it w
as the beginning of the lambing season and Plob knew that the local framers were trying to thin out the raven population, due to attacks on newborn lambs, he decided to use them as target practice.
His first round took out the leading raven and the rest of the unkindness scattered. He jinked left to follow one, fired, hit. Went right, hit. Left again, miss, hit. Climbed, fired. Two at once. The last two spilt up, one going high and the other low. Plob kept straight and level and then pulled Nim into a mini-dive and pull up, firing twice as he did so. Both ravens disappeared in a flash of flame.
Plob punched the air and glanced over at Spice. But his whoop of excitement jammed in his throat when he saw the look on her face. She pointed back towards the city, took Tempest into a sharp turn and headed back. Plob followed at a distance feeling a little shamefaced.
They landed in the field and Plob slid down from Nim and walked quickly over to the girl. ‘Look, Spice, ravens are considered vermin by the locals, it may have seemed a little over the top but I can assure you…’
‘Oh, be quiet,’ she snapped as she climbed down from her dragon. ‘Who cares about a bunch of flying rats. But you,’ she walked right up to Plob. ‘What you just did up there is impossible. That was beyond skill, it was…’ she clenched her hands in front of her face as she groped for words. ‘That was…’ she gave up, put her arms around Plob’s neck and pulled him into a fervent kiss.
Plob was now more puzzled than ever, but the tiny piece of his brain that wasn’t going; “Wayhey!!!” knew when to keep quiet.
So he did.
And it was good.
The Vagoths came again that night to sow fiery destruction throughout the city. King Bravad had forbidden either Plob or Spice to go up against them, as he did not want to risk his only two usable dragon fighters. He had a plan for the two teenagers.
Biggest and the T.A.D.S brought down two dragons and wounded another, but all in all it was another night of one-sided war and loss.
Chapter 15
‘Captain, we managed to isolate the enemy dragons primal signatures during last night’s attack,’ said mister Roti, the science officer. ‘We have now set the Random Acquisition Data Relays to automatically quantify the expected mass and bearing of the adversarial airborne beings visa-vie their relative placement in both time and space.’
Captain Bhature sifted through the maze of techno-speak and translated. ‘You’ve set the RADAR to track incoming dragons?’
‘Yes, captain,’ agreed the science officer with a small sniff of disapproval. ‘However, it’s not that simple. I have also added a temporal length factor with an amplitudinal tramontanian response analysis.’
This one was a little more difficult but eventually… ‘You can tell how far away they are and how long it’ll take to get here?’
‘Yes, sir. Also, crewman Daal has been involved in the process of steeping L-theanine in a balneal of aqua pura in order to facilitate the offering of a calescent potable libation.’
Bhature stared for a while as his brain chewed through the orgy of unnecessary loquaciousness but this one had him cold. ‘Science officer Roti.’
‘Yes, captain.’
‘Could it be that you are removing the urine?’
‘Sir?’
‘Taking the piss, Roti.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Well then, pray tell, what the hell did you say that crewman Daal is doing, and no fancy words.’
‘Making tea, sir. Would you like a cup?’
‘Certainly would, science officer. And get someone to ready my grav-cycle, I need to tell Plob about the RADAR.’
King Bravad had sent messengers to all parts of the kingdom and had called up all and any trained dragons and flyers.
But dragon flying is a rich man’s sport and there are few rich men. There are even fewer that would spend their wealth riding around on a two ton, fire breathing death trap.
How many, one might wonder? Well, I’ll tell you. Exactly thirty-six excluding Plob and Spice.
The Vagoths had over five hundred.
And why do they have so many may you ask? Once again - I’ll give you the real, actual, cosmic reason; Because the forces of Evil shall be legion - and the forces of good shall be…well…thirty-seven.
Sucks doesn’t it?
On the plus side, they had many more dragons than flyers. Breeders had, after a little royal persuasion, bulked up the available dragon count to eighty-two, including eleven, rare, huge, double headed, Longcaster dragons that needed at least two flyers each to control them.
King Bravad, who had been a professional soldier before he had become king, glanced around the room of flyers. Rich men and rich men’s sons. Public school boys almost to a man. The odd mountain dweller or circus flyer but, on the whole, a club of the lands elite. Heavy on teeth, light on chins, voices that could barely manage a vowel and mouths that hardly opened when talking. Nicknames like ‘Sausage’, ‘Pumpkin,’ ‘Bunny,’ and ‘Bumpy,’ echoed around the room. ‘Toast’ became ‘taste’ and ‘book’ became ‘buk’ and ‘house’ rhymed with ‘mice.’
But Bravad had seen these buggers fight before and he knew that they were the hardest, most vicious combatants in the land. More so because they saw war as an honourable sport with rules and etiquette. They believed that war had winners and losers and they played the game to the very limit of their innate superiority and beyond, after all, it would be less than honourable to do otherwise.
Bravad, on the other hand, was a crass professional, so he knew that in war there were only losers and dead people. So he fought to stop the war as quickly as possible as opposed to fighting for honour.
The king drew his sword and rapped it on the table for attention.
‘Gentlemen.’
Conversation stopped, teacups were put down, moustaches were stroked, pipes were filled and positions of studied insouciance were adopted.
‘Gentlemen,’ he repeated. ‘I have called you all here today because, as you know, we are at war.’
This statement was greeted with a round of applause, like he had just announced an up coming tennis tournament or sailing regatta.
‘The Vagoths have come here from another dimension and are using their dragons to burn us at will. I suspect that this is simply the beginning…a softening up phase, if you would. It shall be up to the people in this room to stop this new enemy.’
Another round of applause. Then someone asked a question. There was nothing so crass as raising a hand or deferentially approaching the king, he simply raised his voice and asked. ‘I say, sire, I’m sure that I speak for all of us when I say that we’re all jolly keen to have a crack at these fellows but one does feel compelled to ask, how?’
‘We will fight them in the air. Dragon on dragon.’
‘Well, with all respect, my liege, we’ll give it a damn good go but it’s likely to be a very short fight, what with our beasts being unable to flame and theirs being more of the fulguratic variety.’
Bravad grinned, in the same way that a wolf does before it attacks. ‘Gentlemen, follow me.’
They filed after the king who led them to the royal jousting lists. At the end of the lists was a twenty-foot flagpole with a bale of hay on the top. Bravad guided the noblemen to the stands and bade them wait.
Within a minute or so two dragons appeared over the horizon and bore down on the crowd. They flew wingtip to wingtip and as they drew closer they accelerated into a spectacular series of aerobatic flying. Snap turns, suicidal dives, loops and barrel rolls that brought them above the waiting throng.
The one dragon climbed high above them and the second dragon came thundering over the lists, the massive wings raising clouds of dust as they propelled the two-ton body through the air.
And then, without warning of any sort, the dragon spat a ball of white-hot flame. The fire struck the hay bale causing it, and the top ten-foot of flagpole, to simply disappear.
The dragon rolled into a snap turn and came back down the lists firing
as it came, once, twice, three times. The balls of flaming plasma tore up the turf as they exploded on contact.
Then the dragon turned again, flared its wings, dropped gracefully onto the ruined sod and sat down so that Plob could dismount. The second dragon dropped down and landed next to it, also sitting to allow Spice to climb down.
The nobles went wild.
Chapter 16
Typhon had been struggling. He simply could not transport more than six dragons across the divide at a time. So he had called on his pet witch. And a blacker and more midnight hag one would struggle to find. Warts had she aplenty, a nose as long and hooked as a dog’s hind leg, hair like hanks of greased yarn and eyes as crossed as a frog in a flytrap.
But when it came to the dark arts there was none darker.
‘Blood magik,’ she said to the demon lord. ‘As I have told you before, true power can only be gained through the sacrifice of sentient beings. If you want to move a greater quantity over the divide then you need blood. Barrels of blood.’
Typhon had tentatively approached Gooballs and explained. He was surprised to find how easily the Vagoth minister accepted the theory.
‘That shouldn’t be a problem,’ he had assured the big T. ‘We can use goblins, after all, nobody likes them. How many, twenty, thirty?’
The demon shook his head. ‘Oh no, that won’t do at all. To create real power we’re talking about much, much more.’
‘Not a problem,’ continued Gooballs. ‘A hundred?’
‘Umm…you know what, this is my fault,’ said Typhon. ‘I’m obviously not expressing myself succinctly. I need gobs of them, loads, oodles, plenty, reams, scads slathers, tons, wads.’
‘Thousands?’
Typhon smiled. ‘Now we’re getting close.’
They used the army to round them up. The goblins were housed in the open, like cattle, penned in by barbed wire fences and armed guards with barely enough space to all lie down at the same time.
