by Vic Broquard
Zoran Chronicles Volume 2
Dragons, Power, Courts, and War
Vic Broquard
Copyright © 2008, 2009, 2012, 2014 by Vic Broquard
Third Printing
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For Morgan and L. Ron Hubbard
Contents
Chapter 1 The Solution to Yesterday’s Problem Becomes Today’s Problem
Chapter 2 Surprise Visitors
Chapter 3 Adjustments
Chapter 4 Meetings
Chapter 5 The Raiders
Chapter 6 Escalation
Chapter 7 Problems
Chapter 8 Body Parts
Chapter 9 The Fall High Council
Chapter 10 Treachery
Chapter 11 The United Council
Chapter 12 The Petr Falls Affair
Chapter 13 A Long Winter
Chapter 14 Elsewhere, Winter Turns Bad
Chapter 15 The Fall of Jing
Chapter 16 The New Rulers of Jing
Chapter 17 Honani Makes Waves
Chapter 18 The Spring High Council
Chapter 19 The Spring United Council
Chapter 20 Summer’s Respite
Chapter 21 Countermoves
Chapter 22 Strike Force One
Chapter 23 Detection and Action
Chapter 24 The Strange Case of Adrianna Whitehall
Chapter 25 Repercussions
Chapter 26 Jarka Makes Waves
Chapter 27 The Problem with Neutrals
Chapter 28 Love Lost, Love Found
Chapter 29 The Abbreviated Fall High Council
Chapter 30 Foiled Again
Chapter 31 Discoveries
Chapter 32 The Exploration of Voss
Chapter 33 Up and Down
Chapter 34 In the Beginning
Chapter 35 The Ordeal of Milena Dezda
Chapter 36 Repercussions
Chapter 37 Ancient History
Chapter 38 Weather Plays a Role
Chapter 39 The Battle for Anwyn
Chapter 40 Death and Destruction
Chapter 41 Ancient Technology
Chapter 42 Adjustments
Chapter 1 The Solution to Yesterday’s Problem Becomes Today’s Problem
The slum town of Ningho lay on the outskirts of Nanchan, one of the three capital cities of the swamp planet of Jing. Baron Chen Meerong had retired, ceding his throne and Circle of Ascension to his eldest son, Baron Gang, who was now twenty-five. For his younger sons, Baron Jie, twenty-three, and Baron Li, twenty-one, he had had two more Circles of Ascension built at the other two larger cities of Chaohu and Zhouhan, but these cities lay some five hundred miles distant from Ningho and in opposite directions, more or less. Why? Solid ground was hard to find on this swamp planet, especially ground which would support larger cities and the needed stone fortresses to both support and defend these great Circles of Ascension that gave the barons and baronesses their powers.
Although Ningho was only some twenty miles from the castle of Baron Gang in Nanchan, ten of these were merely foggy swampland. The poorest of folks eked out marginal lives in and around Ningho. Yet here too was the home base of the Swamp Raiders, five like-minded folks who had banded together to tackle the ever-growing problem of the greens, that is the Green Dragons.
Chan Meerong, twenty-four, was their leader, while her younger sister, Wen, twenty-two, was her second in command. Three men in their late twenties had joined up with them, Kang Zu, Tao Wu, and Peng Long. The three men were skilled fighters, who once had been in Baron Chen’s army. Baronesses Chan and Wen now lived in exile from the royal courts. Both had defied their father’s arranged marriages to off-world men, each of whom had sought to solidify their political alliances against the “Zoran Crowd” — a derogatory term for Baron Zoran and his allied planets. Worse, both young ex-baronesses thought that their father’s secret deals to bring hundreds of Green Dragons to Jing, giving them sanctuary here in return for their protection and allegiance, had been an awful, terrible blunder. Baron Chen had made that decision some nineteen years ago and now Jing was infested with these infernal beasts, as the two women called them, only when they were being polite about the dragons.
The five sat around a beat up table in Wu’s Bar. The hour was late. Urine, stale swamp fog, and tobacco smoke fought for dominance in the dimly lit room. Kang knocked down another shot of low grade swamp whiskey, “God-damn greens! May they rot in the bayous!” They’d just heard another report of locals being attacked by the Green Dragons. A family of three were found dead, their flesh eaten away, leaving behind bleached bones. Green Dragon slime was exceedingly toxic to human flesh. This was the sole topic of many who had frequented Wu’s this evening.
“Aye. Wish they were not so damnably hard to kill,” Tao interjected angrily.
“Top of the food chain — isn’t that what old Zoran used to say a score of years back?” Wen asked, searching her childhood memory. She was barely four when dragons suddenly came into existence, arriving on Jing.
“Damn dad to hell,” Chan answered hostilely, banging her mug on the marred tabletop. “He should have known better than to bring those foul, wicked demons to Jing. It’s all his god-damn fault. Now he’s retired, sitting comfy in his fortress home, and what do our idiot brothers do? Nothing! Not a god-damn thing! Damn right, Wen, dragons are at the top of the food chain and our people are their food!”
“Actually, Chan, our people are not food for the greens. They don’t eat us — just kill us. Greens hate humans and kill us for sport,” Peng politely corrected his leader.
“Okay, okay, so they don’t eat us,” Chan amended herself, hiccupped, and countered. “No, they just dissolve our bodies and kill us. That’s bad enough. Well, that’s not entirely true, Peng. We now know that the greens only attack out here in the slums of Jing. They never attack the wealthier cities. I swear that they have a bargain of some kind with the barons. But, yes, it was a whole family this time. We’re just going to have to go after that green and kill it before it has a chance to do that to another family!”
“Agreed. Tomorrow we go dragon hunting again,” Kang added. “Say, how many have we killed so far? My mind is a little fuzzy tonight.” He hiccupped.
Tao laughed, “Too much cheap whiskey, Kang. Muddled your brains. Good thing a green isn’t here now; you’d be slimed in no time!” All laughed, but Kang knew that what Tao said was true. They’d returned three days ago from their last mission, successfully slaying another green that was on their “most wanted” list.
“Eighteen,” Chan answered. “We’ve been at this five years now, gang, and we have a paltry eighteen to show for our hard work.” She sounded disgusted.
“Yes, but that’s eighteen more than any other hunters on Jing,” Peng countered.
“But there aren’t any other hunters on Jing,” Wen protested. “We’re it! We are the only ones fighting the accursed dragons.”
“Hey, that we know of — we haven’t been all over Jing, just in this area. Yes, the barons are turning a blind eye to the dragons as long as they don’t attack them and their precious cities. Out here in the sticks, we folks are left on our own,” Chan added. “They’ve only got us to protect them. Eighteen, damn, that’s hardly a tree in the swamp around
here. Pathetic gang, pathetic.”
“Yes, but they are so damnably hard to kill, Chan. Keep that in mind, will ya?” Tao justified. “Seventy feet of pure fighting machine, scales so thick a sword can’t cut through them, claws like razors.”
“Don’t forget they can pick up a dozen of us and fly off with us,” Kang added, greatly exaggerating how much a dragon could carry and still fly.
“That’s ignoring their slime spittle breath, to say nothing of their magic spells,” Chan growled. Magic spells and slime breath — if the truth be told, those were what made these powerful creatures so hard to slay. Worse, from Green Dragon to Green Dragon, there was no predicting what spells any given beast would have. The last one they’d killed very nearly did them in when it shot a Ball of Flames at them as they charged it. All five had miraculously avoided the searing flames by diving into the swamp waters. The women’s Duska senses had again saved the five from certain death. Indeed, Chan and Wen were convinced that only a Duska had any chance at all of killing a dragon and that was only a slim chance at best. She didn’t ask her group how many dragons had successfully eluded them. It was far more than eighteen. The dragons could also Shadow Walk, though theirs was somehow different that the Duska’s Shadow Walk — at least that’s what many had said that old Zoran had said so many years ago. “Damn Zoran for bring the dragons into the federation!” she cursed her off-world, enemy baron.
When Chan and Wen turned fourteen and come of age, each had been given their birthright Ceremony of Ascension. Chan recalled her ceremony, during which her special gland at the base of her body’s brain activated. Through the guidance of the Priestess, she’d been initiated into the Shadow Walk, which allowed her to walk through space to any of the sixteen planets within the Federation. Her first trip was nauseating, but by the last walk, she had mastered her fears and was now a true Duska, a Shadow Walker, which was her given birthright. All those who ruled throughout the Federation were Duska, both barons and baronesses.
Duska were special, multi-talented, different human beings, gifted by birth with an oversized gland, which, upon puberty, set them apart with special powers and abilities. Perhaps the greatest of these was their ability to Shadow Walk, in which they could transport themselves and others, if they chose, from one planet to another within the Federation of Planets. Also, their reaction times were phenomenal, and males usually made use of this by becoming master swordsmen, though often women were so trained as well. Certainly, all male Duskas were given standard fighter training from about the age of six onwards.
Magic was also prevalent throughout the Federation, though it took many shapes and forms. Although no one ever made an accurate assessment, popular opinion held that one in ten of every inhabitant had some latent magical skill, though often this amounted to little more than having a spoon stir a cooking pot or starting a fire in the fireplace — little, useful sort of things. From among those with magical skills, a relatively few had gotten some magical training and were able to cast limited formal, useful spells, these were called the Adepts. Often, they made their living by trading their spells for room and board or gold coins. Clean, Mend, and Polish were some of their main spells.
Even fewer still had the funds or backers to make a full time study of magic. These were called Mages. Armed with an array of spells, often power spells such as Ball of Fire, Lightning Bolt, and Killing Vapors, these men and women frequently found lucrative employment within the ruling baron’s army of enforcers or even their armies proper. Those who did not, were often employed by the many warlords who controlled lands currently beyond the dominion of the barons and baronesses.
Exceedingly rare were those in the third category, that of the Archmage. These individuals had gone far beyond the mundane use of magical powers and spells, extending their knowledge of arcana to unknown limits. Wherever possible, every baron had one Archmage in their employ, who, among other duties, taught magic to those gifted few. Baron Gang Meerong, the women’s older brother, still had the use and support of their father’s Archmage Liang Don, who was now sixty-five. True, all three barons had several mages in their employ, but only the one, aging Archmage, a distinct disadvantage. Many other planets had several Archmages backing the barons there, none more so than on Adapazan and Baron Archmage Zoran Vladislov.
For over twenty years now, this had become a very sore point among the other many barons. Baron Archmage Zoran’s wife, Baroness Archmage Zdenka, continued to turn out new Archmages at an unheard of and alarming rate. Hardly a year passed without her announcing that yet another of her mage students had achieved this exalted status. True, some fifteen years ago, many of the barons had challenged her products, claiming these supposed new Archmages were not in fact true Archmages. The High Council backed the challengers and conducted an extensive series of tests of these new Archmages and their spell casting abilities. To the dismay of the many challengers and barons, all of her new Archmages fully passed their rigorous tests. They were in fact Archmages, capable of casting the most powerful of all spells.
After that, many of these new Archmages sought employment on the Zoran-aligned planets. A few ended up working for the Neutral barons, but none for the Have-Not’s, such as Jing. Long ago, Chan realized why her father had made the awful decision to bring the detested Green Dragons to Jing. Self-preservation. With their enemy barons loaded with Archmages and Golden Dragons, the very independence and survival of Jing was in question! The presence of the greens was supposed to act as a deterrent to their enemies. Perhaps it had, Chan sighed. Jing had not yet been attacked or invaded by armies, dragons, or magic users.
Assassinations, well that was an entirely different story! These came with the position of baron or baroness. Indeed, their mother had fallen victim to an assassin’s poisoned blade, though their father, then Baron Chen, somehow escaped. It was not long after that that he had passed on his throne to his eldest son, Gang, and gone into retirement. In fact, Chan had not seen her father for many years, not since he had exiled Chan and Wen. She smiled, recalling the last bounty poster that Baron Gang had posted around Ningho. Each year, the bounty had risen. Today her head was worth fifty thousand gold and Wen’s, forty thousand.
Here in Ningho, they need not worry. Eighteen kills had endeared them to the locals, who looked to them for their protection, not the baron who never came here or sent any aid, just the loathsome tax collectors. Most all of their kills had been viewed as revenge by many in Ningho, since the dead dragons had killed one or more of those who lived in and around this area of the swamps. No, they were relatively safe here in Ningho. Still, sooner or later Chan knew that Baron Gang would tire of the game and send out assassins to cut them down or sick Archmage Liang on them. The aged Archmage had trained them and he knew their strengths and weaknesses as well as their personalities. He would be a most worthy opponent, one that they might barely have a chance of eliminating, but only because they were Duskas. On that, the two rested all of their hopes.
Early on, they discovered that the greens loved gold and gems. Each green that they had slain had a den somewhere in the vast swamps. However, they had been successful in locating only ten of the eighteen, recovering quite a stash of gold and gems. Most of the gold they donated to the seneschal of Ningho, who doled it out to the residents, covering their yearly taxes for the most part. Again, this helped ensure that none in Ningho would betray them to the barons.
Wen spoke up, “Well, if we are going to go after number nineteen tomorrow, we had all best get some sleep.” Chan agreed and had the others hold hands with hers, while she teleported them all to their secret base of operations in an isolated area of swampland.
They did not see a dark cloaked man rise, grin, and leave the inn after they left. He had been watching them all evening and once outside the inn, he too teleported away. He arrived within the walls of the Royal Palace in Nanchan.
Neither saw another dark cloaked man rise, grin, and leave the inn after both had left. Once outside and after a ca
reful glance around him, the man simply vanished. No spell was cast.
None of these three saw yet another dark cloaked man rise, grin, and leave the inn after the others had left. He climbed into his boat and began poling his way through the shallow swamp waters, heading towards the city of Nanchan.
Finally, as the inn closed for the night, the barmaid Yan cast one of her few spells. A Message was sent.
“Ah back at last, Mage Hui,” the twenty-five year old Baron Gang acknowledged the arrival of one of his mages. “Come share some wine with me.” He poured out the red liquid into crystal goblets imported from one of the desert planets. The men were in his private study deep within the fortress and Circle, far from prying eyes.
“Anti-scrying?” asked the thirty-five year old Mage Hui Shihuan.
Baron Gang quickly cast a few protection spells and handed the expensive goblet to his mage, who had quickly vanished his grubby clothes, replacing them with his fine suit — a few quick spells cast.
He took the offering and sat down in the overstuffed, leather chair opposite the young baron. “It is as you suspected. The Swamp Raiders — your sisters — showed up at Wu’s Bar, talking about their recent slaughters of the Green Dragons. Eighteen they claim that they have murdered, sir.”
“Incredible! So many? I had no idea that they were killing so many. I guess that I should have upped the bounty on their heads long ago. This is getting way out of hand, Mage Hui. I simply cannot overlook their rebel behavior any longer.”
