The ground was littered with bodies and weapons. Bub shy;bling pools of some atrocious, noxious liquid seeped into the darkened soil, surrounded like the spokes of a ghastly wagon wheel by the scorched limbs and other portions of bodies that the acid had not devoured.
At the center of the devastation was the towering shape, growing ever more distinct as Tate approached over the dead bodies. It was clearly a dragon, spattered with gore and devouring a path through the remains of Tate's slain men. His stomach nearly turned again when he heard the sicken shy;ing crunch of metal and bone being ground together.
Twenty paces from the beast, Tate's horse would go no far shy;ther. Reluctantly, Tate dismounted. No sooner had he touched the ground than a huge black claw crashed down next to him, ripping open the horse. The noble animal screamed for less than a heartbeat, then was silent. Tate could hardly believe how quickly the dragon had lunged. He found himself staring into its glowing orange eyes.
Brandishing his sword, Sir Tate Sekforde welcomed his fate as he imagined Huma might have.
* * * * *
Khisanth felt the warmth of the horse squeezing between her talons. It was another death, only one of so many that day. Each one brought the sense of power and satisfaction that only came with killing. The veneer of civility and reason that surrounded her at most times was easily stripped away by violence, replaced by bestial instinct and fury. Sensation devoid of thought. Khisanth saw only life and wanted to make it death. She wanted to feel life flowing out from her victims, to squeeze it or burn it or tear it out until only some shy;thing repulsive remained.
Now this man stood before her, holding a long sword and a shield thrust bravely toward her. She had seen others with this courage today, and killed many. For some, the courage failed. They were especially delicious; Khisanth could actu shy;ally taste the fear and panic let loose in their bodies by her presence.
Khisanth peered more closely at this knight. There was something curious about him, his stance perhaps. She couldn't see his face behind the visor of his helmet, but the dust-caked emblem on his tunic tugged at her memory. The dragon ground her claws into the corpse of the horse to feel the satis shy;fying crunch of its bones. The sensation sparked a recollection. There were horses nearby the last time Khisanth had seen this man. She had eaten a horse not long before. He was a knight, a man of Solamnia. Her eyes widened in understanding.
The ambush. The event from years ago leaped into her mind. Once again she saw the knights crashing to the ground from their horses and the murderous ogres swarming over them. She saw the young knight who, on fire, had fled, rising from the ground and tearing on foot into the woods. She felt the pain of her broken human nose, the humiliation of having let him slip away. The anger at Led's betrayal. Her claw unconsciously squeezed the horse into unrecognizable pulp.
As the light of recognition flashed in her eyes, the knight recoiled visibly, almost as if he shared Khisanth's memory. Could he recognize her as a dragon, having only seen her as a human? She doubted it. Led had not. All of these thoughts raced through Khisanth's mind in the span of moments. She wanted badly to kill this man, to have revenge. Suddenly the rest of the battle didn't matter, the other humans and knights and horses barely registered on her senses. This Knight of Solamnia grew large in her vision, and his taunts from years before rang in her ears.
* * * * *
The dragon's claw slashed the air and raked Tate's shield. The Knight of the Crown reeled backward and stumbled in the litter. His hand splashed into a pool of acid. The knight rolled away from the cursed spittle and uttered a strangled cry as he clawed at the glove with his right hand. It came off in tatters, revealing patches of smoking skin underneath.
The dragon aimed another blow at Tate. The knight ducked aside and snatched up his dropped sword. Having missed with the first swipe, Khisanth swept her claw back again.
The knight was learning quickly and expected the attack. Instead of slamming into his body, the dragon's claw col shy;lided with a slashing sword. Steel bit into dragon scales and cut the flesh underneath-not deeply, but enough to cause the dragon to bellow with rage. Tate stepped backward, crouching, as if making himself smaller would lessen the thundering in his ears.
The dragon didn't react to pain like a human. She neither withdrew to examine her wound nor debated whether she was fit to continue the fight. The enormous black creature lunged forward with the unbelievable speed of her kind, striking again with the injured claw.
This time the blow caught Tate's shield on the edge. One talon pierced the thick wooden target just above his forearm. The knight was jerked off his feet as the shield was wrenched from his arm. He felt as if his arm would be pulled from his shoulder, but the shield's leather straps snapped like bull-whips cracking.
Tate tumbled to the ground yards from where he had been standing. Miraculously, he still held his sword, but he knew his shield arm was dislocated at the shoulder and broken at the wrist. Already his hand was turning black and blue around the burns. More splattered acid seeped through the armor on his legs, devouring leather straps and cotton padding and eating into the flesh of his calf.
The dragon loomed over him, leering with orange eyes that bespoke evil beyond the human's understanding. Yet
they were hauntingly familiar. An unusually barbaric neck shy;lace, made of swords and animal skulls, hung around her thickly muscled neck. The rancid mouth opened to reveal teeth like spear points fouled with human flesh. Tate waved his sword feebly at the dragon.
Instead of the painful oblivion he expected, the knight heard the dragon's inhuman bellow and felt the ground shudder as the beast thrashed away. Tate opened his eyes and saw the monster scraping its injured claw down its flank, snapping off more than a dozen arrow shafts that protruded there.
Tate felt hands slipping under his shoulders and lifting him up. He gazed into a human face again, the face of a sol shy;dier whose name he didn't know. Then he heard the strong voice of Wolter shouting commands to archers, followed by the solid twang of bowstrings and thunk of arrows hitting their target.
Tate stood with the help of the archer. "Bring my sword," he breathed.
Before anyone could comply, Wolter loomed above Tate, his fatherly eyes shining out from a grimy face. Blood and dirt darkened his tattered tunic and caked his charger. Tate reached up to the knight. "We've got to kill the dragon. Give me your sword, Wolter."
Wolter gripped the extended hand instead. "I know that, lad. You've fought valiantly, but you haven't the strength. Lead the surviving men back through the breach and to a safe distance, where we can regroup. I'll join you there." Wolter turned and muttered to Albrecht, "Get him safely away."
Tate didn't like the tone of voice, or the look in the tired old knight's eyes. "Wolter," he called, "don't risk it," but his voice was so weak Wolter seemed not to hear him.
The elder Knight of the Rose swung down from his skittish horse and addressed the archers. "Loose one last volley on my command and then retire-now!"
Dozens of bowstrings thunked as one. The dragon screeched at every impact, more in anger than pain. The missiles were
little more than pinpricks against the thick hide and scales on her flanks, but she had been robbed of her prize knight.
Sword raised above his helm, Wolter plunged forward toward the waiting monster.
Once again she forced the acid up her throat and blew it in a steaming haze toward the rushing knight with the gleam shy;ing long sword, and toward the line of men with bows. Many fell screaming as it burned or seeped through the openings in their light armor. Those who were able fled in pain and panic.
Stumbling and swearing, Wolter ripped away the acid-drenched tunic and pulled off his pitted, hissing great helm. Melted holes showed in the chain mail beneath. His face was burned and blackened. He shook the rapidly dissolving shield from his left arm. Clutching the long sword in both hands now, and with the name of Kiri-Jolith on his lips, he charged ahead.
The sweeping claw of t
he dragon met the knight's stab shy;bing blade. The sword pierced the bony scales and impaled itself completely through the flesh. Bloodied talons ripped through layers of metal. Wolter's body tumbled across the ground to land in a sprawl. Feebly he reached for the dagger at his belt, but the dragon pounced with her jaws open. Dust surged up around them, obscuring the scene but not the sound.
"Wolter!" cried Tate, helplessly watching his friend's fatal fall. Bending down in his stirrups, Albrecht grabbed his hor shy;rified superior by the belt and dragged Tate's struggling weight across his saddle. Albrecht spurred his horse into a gallop and waved the survivors from Lamesh to follow him through the breech. Leaving the horrid scene of monsters and destruction, the two Knights of the Crown, one unconscious, the other in shock, sped off toward the foothills.
In the Black Wing's camp, Khisanth licked at the lacerated claw. Around her, ogres and mercenaries gleefully set about the business of killing the injured and looting the dead. Min shy;utes later, Jahet swooped overhead and then landed nearby, Maldeev on her back, holding a bloody mace.
"We've survived, if not emerged victorious," Jahet said, trying to raise spirits. "Your brilliance in battle will be leg shy;end," she added to the other dragon, casting a glance at the destruction surrounding them.
Khisanth eyed both Maldeev and Jahet sardonically. She made no reply to Jahef s comments. Instead, she asked, "You have dealt with Dnestr and Neetra?"
The other dragon nodded. "It is done." She could see the anger in Khisanth's eyes. "What's wrong? We were losing, but look around us now. Hundreds lie dead. Solamnic knights litter the field."
"We made the best of a bad situation brought on by treach shy;ery. Three of our own kind turned against us. What hope is there for the Dark Queen's cause if her agents so readily turn on each other?"
Khisanth rose to her feet. "I've spoken many times of my amazement that humans rule the world while dragons live in the shadows. I couldn't understand how such a thing was possible. After today, I begin to comprehend."
Anger squeezed Khisanth in its enormous grip. She tipped her head back, raised a bloodied claw to the skies, and howled, "Takhisis, I've called you my queen! Can treachery be your plan?" The black dragon blasted her fury and frus shy;tration into the sky, exhaling a cloud of acid that rocketed upward. Spraying out, it rained back down in sizzling droplets and gobs. Ogres, men, even Jahet and'Maldeev, scrambled out of the burning mist.
Only Khisanth did not emerge, for she was no longer on the Prime Material plane.
Chapter 19
Khisanth stood among the burned and broken bodies.. Her raised and clenched claw was extended toward the smoke-filled sky. Suddenly the dragon felt her bones contract and expand simultaneously, as if she were being squashed and stretched. The pain was excruciating. Khisanth wondered briefly if she hadn't suffered more grievously in the fighting than she'd thought. Craning her neck, the dragon looked down the length of her spine, but saw nothing that should cause such torment.
Is this how it feels to die? Must your soul be torn to incom shy;prehensible bits or compressed into nothing, to leave no trace behind?
Khisanth didn't take a step, or even twitch a muscle, but the world around her shifted, wavered, like summer's heat on pond water. As she peered through the haze, the landscape around her altered dramatically. Battlements, even the mountains, were gone, and the land stretched on forever, empty and flat against an eerily glowing red sky. The sky itself seemed to merge with the sandy ground, leaving no horizon, showing no stars nor moons nor sun. And yet, for all the radiant red, the area seemed as black as shadow.
At least, unlike in the plane of lightning, there was ground here. Khisanth dropped to all fours and stepped warily, half suspecting the ground to drop away beneath her like quick shy;sand. Movement was slow, but there was nothing to walk to, no landmark for which to head. Khisanth scanned the entire area, but still saw nothing.
Until she looked forward again. Misty vapors were slip shy;ping upward from the sand before her and coalescing into vaguely human forms. Blobby, molten flesh ran more than rested on their amorphous frames. They looked like anguished, twisted, mobile, melted candle wax. Only the occasional sug shy;gestion of a face separated one from another.
"What-who are you? Where am I?" she demanded.
Silence.
Suddenly, like an unstoppable, soundless tidal wave, a row of the hideous creatures surged forward. They raised molten claws from the depths of their blobby forms and raked the air before the black dragon.
Khisanth darted backward-into an equally dense row of the silent and bizarre creatures behind her. She saw more than felt claws sinking into her scales from before and behind. Each did little enough damage, but together the growing legions of nameless creatures were beginning to draw blood, and pain.
Like a sickle through tall grass, she swished her tail from side to side, sending the creatures tumbling across the sandy landscape. Some snapped in half like cold and brittle wax, then lay still, but more quickly rose from the sand behind her to replace them. The ones in front of her tore relentlessly at her chest, forelegs, anything they could sink a claw into. Khi shy;santh kicked and lashed out and bucked around wildly like a horse, trying to throw them off. Then she noticed that the
ones that had snapped in half had, like worms, formed into two new, tenacious creatures.
Desperate, she summoned the bile that waited in her stom shy;ach. It surged up her throat and shot out between her jaws in a hot green stream. Khisanth pivoted, aiming her acid down shy;ward, shaking gruesome creatures from her and into the cor shy;rosive acid. The creatures' faces twisted into even greater anguish as they dissolved. Hope flickered in Khisanth's breast. She shook and spewed with a fury, until every last creature was reduced to smoldering gray patches.
To Khisanth's utter shock, the pieces not eaten by acid had begun to reform into many, many more creatures. They seemed angered, even in their silence.
The grotesque beings suddenly darted back from her, though she had made no move, nor spoken a word. Then Khisanth saw the reason.
Rising up behind the last row of creatures, silhouetted against the glowing red sky, were much taller, winged beings. Perhaps half Khisanth's height, they were thin with wiry muscles. They stepped closer, kicking the trembling blobs from their path. These new creatures looked reptilian, with long, prehensile tails-though eight feet tall, they reminded Khisanth strongly of the much smaller stone gar shy;goyles that were poised on the corners and turrets of Shal-imsha Tower, meant by its builders to chase away evil spirits. These were not made of stone, but leathery flesh, like her own underbelly. Six of them were black as night, and two were vivid green.
"Who are you?" Khisanth demanded, repeating her last words to the newcomers. She pointed at the quivering crea shy;tures who had worked so hard to tear her flesh from her bones. "And what are they?"
Lemures-mindless spirits. They can't answer. Khisanth looked around, startled. The voice had spoken inside her head. She spotted a red reptilian creature staring closely at her and decided it was the one that had answered her telepathically.
"We're abishai, sentries on the Abyssal plane," it said, its tone very low-pitched and slow, like stone would sound if it could talk.
"The Abyss?" Khisanth squealed, a sound she'd never heard from her own throat.
Without answering, the creatures snapped into formation, boxing Khisanth in with two abishai on each side of the dragon, save for the front. She began to walk forward, feeling a strange tug at her thoughts. Dimly she realized she must be under a spell, to respond without complaint or contest. Only after the spell faded was she able to resist.
Khisanth dug in her heels. The black and green creatures stopped in their tracks. Even eight creatures, large by any other standards, could not hope to budge a dragon who did not wish to move.
The red abishai extended its tail toward her and revealed the small stinger at its tip. "Poison," it said. The creature looked around anxiously, as if something
would emerge and slay it for communicating with the dragon. Nothing did.
The warning was enough for Khisanth. For now. They started forward again.
The sentries stopped marching abruptly, though their des shy;tination looked not a whit different from their departure point-dark red, glowing sky, like a fire the size of the world burned in the distance. The shifting sand made it difficult to tell up from down. "Wait."
The small battalion of abishai disappeared into the dark red sky as mysteriously as they had arrived.
Khisanth detested mystery of any sort. Where did they go? Did their absence mean the lemures would return? The thought of those brainless creatures clawing at her relent shy;lessly made her feel more trapped than the escort of abishai had. Every nerve tingled at the tips of her scales.
But the lemures did not return. Nor did anyone-or any shy;thing-else. She waited. And waited. Khisanth thought it nearly possible that an entire cycle of seasons could have passed while she waited, for what, she didn't know.
Then, to Khisanth's utter amazement, a wall of fire shot up out of the sand like a geyser. Through it stepped a creature
she would have mistaken for another abishai, if it hadn't cor shy;rected her thoughts.
"Cornugons are the Abyss's greater baatezu," it said in a sepulchral tone. "The distinctions between them and lesser baatezu like abishai are obvious."
Looking more closely, Khisanth began to notice subtle dif shy;ferences-the flesh-covered horns, the slightly more human-looking face, deeply slanted eyes, and protruding tusks instead of rows of equally jagged teeth, like the abishai. And this one gripped a large barbed whip in its talons; the abishai were armed only with claws.
"I am instructed to take you to your meeting." The cornu-gon nodded its horned head once toward the wall of flame.
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