When Dragons Rage

by Michael A. Stackpole

  No, Corde. Neskartu’s command barely brushed Isaura’s mind, but she felt a tingle. One kryalniri who had the misfortune of standing between the sullanciri and Corde caught the full brunt of it and fell twitching to the ground. It hit Corde hard, shaking her badly, but she bowed and withdrew to her own lines.

  Naelros peeled his hood back and looked at the sullanciri. “You will accept this challenge?”

  I have no reason not to. He possesses that wand and clearly wishes to avenge Orla’s death. He cannot stand against me, and if he uses that wand, it will be his certain death. Without another comment, the sullanciri took a step forward with his left foot. In an eyeblink he was there, ten yards from the Adept, his colors rippling down his body in tigerish stripes.

  Naelros shook his head. “So foolish.”

  “That is not certain.”

  The dracomorph’s forked tongue flicked out through the air for a moment. “Ah, you refer to the boy. I do not.”

  Isaura watched Kerrigan intently. He was obese and awkward, yet there was something about him. Not anything attractive in any sexual sense. Some of the Murosans had intrigued her in that way, but in Kerrigan she had not the least flicker of interest. She realized, after a moment’s reflection, it was less because of his appearance than another sense she had of him.

  One of kinship.

  They were linked in some manner, but that feeling was completely outside her ability to understand. She felt as if she were trying to hear a color or taste a song. She had no means by which to identify what she was feeling.

  Neskartu let his thoughts seep out in a circle. You are the youth. You may strike first.

  Kerrigan shifted his shoulders, then clasped his hands on the wand at the small of his back. “I issued the challenge. Yours is the first strike.”

  More laughter pulsed from the Aurolani lines.

  Naelros’ nostrils flared. “I do smell fear from the boy, but not enough. Not nearly enough.”

  Isaura shook her head. She could feel the power gathering around Neskartu. The sullanciri pulled from pure, strong flows, but only skimming bits and pieces of currents. What he was gathering would be strong, but merely a fraction of what he could have drawn were he open to the reality of magick. Neskartu’s right hand rose slowly, and his fingers flowed through a series of forms before he pointed his hand at Kerrigan and cast his first spell.

  The argent brilliance of the attack did not surprise Isaura, for she knew the sullanciri would try to overwhelm his enemy at a shot. A jagged bolt of lightning as thick as her thigh sizzled through the air, crossing between the combatants in a heartbeat. Pure power burned the air, and snow melted into steam.

  The bolt never hit the youth. It skittered wide, then curled back around, spawning smaller bolts the way a vine might sprout thorns. They stabbed at him with little silvery blades. Some curled and hooked, trying to rake over him, but none touched him. The lightning swirled around him faster and faster, tightening as if to crush him, but the silver slowly evaporated in an ectoplasmic fog that revealed Kerrigan unrumpled, unmoved, and unharmed.

  Isaura reached out and could feel the dissipating energy of Neskartu’s spell, but she caught nothing of what Kerrigan had used to resist it. As a rule, like would have had to meet like. While a skilled magician might be able to block or deflect a spell using a lesser spell, that was a function of the defender’s superior knowledge of magick.

  Which means he is so far above Neskartu that . . . No, that could not be possible.

  Kerrigan nodded slowly. “Please, you were a Magister on Vilwan. Out of respect for that position, I offer you a second strike.”

  The colors running through Neskartu danced as if they were drifting on the surface of a storm-wracked sea. Both his hands flowed wide at shoulder height, then descended and rose again. As they did, so did the power gathering around him. The mist from the snow began to gather and creep toward Kerrigan. It flowed up his robes, frosting them. Quickly enough he would be entombed in ice. Deprived of air, he would collapse, and Neskartu would let him smother.

  That was the intent of the spell. In reality, the vapor rose and some did frost the hem of Kerrigan’s robe, but it never got past his knees. The vapor did continue to flow upward, but it kept going, higher and higher, until it began to curl back around in a mushroom shape. The cloud above him continued to boil until the sullanciri’s arms fell and it all vanished.

  Naelros’ dark eyes blinked. “Now I smell much fear.”

  “From the boy?”

  “No.”

  The Vilwanese youth bowed his head to Neskartu a third time. “You knew my mentor. You caused her death. I will allow you a third strike, but no more.”

  Neskartu’s anger radiated out wordlessly. Even Isaura flinched, but the youth did not. The sullanciri’s body shifted as his fury built, and he gathered in power. Neskartu grew and expanded, rippling with shadow muscle, sprouting huge dragon wings. Colors raced, bouncing within him as if trapped in a closed vessel, melding and shifting. Incredible amounts of power poured into him, more than Isaura would have ever thought he could contain.

  The sullanciri twisted, lifting a wing past the dolmen behind him, and grabbed the stone. He yanked it side to side, as if it were a tooth to be loosened in the jaw, then tore it free. Muddy clods of dirt dripped and fell from the thick end. He raised it over his head, then smashed it down on the Adept.

  Isaura caught no sense of Kerrigan employing magick in his defense. Ungainly and jiggling, he danced aside. The stone slammed into the ground hard and heavy. Isaura could feel the earth shake even where she sat. The impact bounced Kerrigan back and dumped him on his fat backside.

  He slumped against the black stone and grabbed at the edge with his right hand.

  Mine! Neskartu’s triumphant mindburst made her breath catch in her throat. The hulking sullanciri bent over, grasping the stone again. Muscles rippled over his back and arms. Colors intensified to outline them. Once more the stone would rise, once more it would fall, and Kerrigan would be pulverized.

  The stone did not move.

  Calmly, despite the violent effort shaking the sullanciri, Kerrigan rolled to his knees, then levered himself up with his hands on the stone. Though the stone had landed in turf softened by spells and melting snow, Neskartu might as well have been trying to uproot the whole of Navval. All of his efforts were for naught.

  Kerrigan’s voice gained a bit of an edge. “Enough. You have had your third strike. You had one for being challenged. You had one for what you had learned. You had one for what you have done.”

  Neskartu’s clawed hands released the scored stone. The sullanciri straightened, but kept his wings unfurled to make himself larger. The colors no longer raced through him, but flowed in bright, twisting sheets.

  And now you would have your strike?

  Kerrigan nodded slowly and brought the wand to hand. “My strike, yes.”

  The sullanciri’s colors quickened. He had said that Kerrigan’s use of the wand would bring certain death. Isaura did know that Neskartu graced the most promising and treacherous of his students with gifts like that wand. While these gifts enhanced the ability to cast magick, they were not without danger. Through them the sullanciri could destroy a rebel.

  Isaura found herself wanting to shout a warning, but she could not. Her mother had told her that she would be betrayed, and the words came back to haunt Isaura. I will not be the one to betray her.

  A heartbeat later, she knew neither the warning nor the betrayal was necessary.

  The youth looked up at the creature towering over him. “I know two things. If I cast through this wand, you will kill me. If I use this wand, I will kill you.”

  Power flowed so quickly into Kerrigan that Isaura could feel currents warping to fill him. Neskartu began preparing defenses against any number of combat spells, but they mattered not. The sullanciri had missed the most important clue about his attacker, and had he spotted it, he might have been able to prepare correctly.

&
nbsp; Isaura doubted that would have saved his life.

  Kerrigan was not a combat mage. He did not cast a spell through the wand, but on the wand—a wand Neskartu had enchanted himself. The spell hyperaccelerated the wand. In the blink of an eye it went from motionless to a blur.

  Like an arrow, it punched through Neskartu’s chest. It tugged at the flesh of his back, tenting it between the wings. The wand lifted the sullanciri so quickly into the air that his arms and legs streaked out behind him like streamers. The wings collapsed around him, and his body followed, until he had become nothing but a dark line ringed with angry colors. Then Isaura heard a thundercrack, felt it ripple through her chest. The end of that line snapped forward to the front, then it disappeared into a puff of white vapor high in the sky.

  In the thundercrack’s wake, silence reigned. Shock showed on all faces, save that of the Adept. He looked mildly curious, then rubbed his hands over the thighs of his robe. He frowned as he looked at the stone, then gestured almost blithely and it floated back into its original position.

  Off to Isaura’s right, a fire captain snarled an order. A spark was set to the firehole of a dragonel. Smoke spurted upward with a hiss, then a moment later the weapon roared. It belched fire, and an iron ball arced out. It bounced once, splashing water and grasses, then bore down on Kerrigan.

  The youth froze. The ball struck him solidly in the chest, tumbling him back two dozen feet. A great cry rose from the Aurolani lines and the dragonel crew heartily congratulated itself.

  Then the Adept struggled to his feet. He wove unsteadily, but appeared to draw strength from the cheers of the spectators high on the walls. He staggered over to where the ball lay steaming on the ground, then lifted it awkwardly. He waddled off with the thing suspended between his knees.

  Naelros shot to his feet and snarled at the dragonel crew. The gibberers mewed and hid themselves behind their weapon. The dracomorph turned his head and looked at her. “He will use the metal from the ball to shape wards to deflect anything with a similar content, will he not?”

  Isaura nodded. “If all the balls are from the same crucible, or the ore was mined in the same place, they would be effective.”

  “But not wholly.”

  “After what I saw here, I could not judge.”

  The dracomorph nodded slowly. “This changes things.” He settled back onto his heels. “This changes many things.”

  The calm that bled into his voice surprised her. “He has slain a sullanciri and is very powerful. You cannot be thinking to continue the siege.”

  Naelros fixed her with a dark stare. “He is powerful, but not the most powerful. He has changed things, so shall we. With proper aid, your mother shall be pleased, and Navval will be mine.”

  CHAPTER 62

  S varskya lay before Adrogans, broken and old. Houses sagged. Towers had collapsed, crushing buildings and raising stone scars across the landscape. The outer city had once been beautiful, and the walls surrounding it almost ornamental. Those walls remained largely ornamental, having been long since overgrown and covered with snow. So many gaps had been worn in the outer ring that one could not easily follow its line with the eye. It would have been simple to mistake it for hillocks.

  Nothing moved in the outer city. That, Adrogans reminded himself, did not mean nothing waited there. The sprawl stood a half mile thick at its narrowest point, and quadruple that at its widest. In the quarter century since its conquest, the streets had shifted as new buildings were raised and old were razed, but the various routes to the old city were still obvious.

  The old inner city, which had grown around the docks, still boasted towers and tall walls. Prince Kirill’s evacuation of the city had let the Aurolani take it without requiring its destruction. Consequently, Adrogans could easily imagine its splendor in the previous era, but he doubted he would ever see it look so grand again.

  General Caro rode up. “We are ready to go when you are, General.”

  Adrogans snorted. “We might well wait forever then, for I do not know if I will ever be ready.” He glanced up at Nefrai-kesh’s tower, where flickers of flame flashed from windows with a certain regularity. “What are you thinking?”

  Phfas laughed harshly. “A question you should put to him when your sword is at his throat.”

  “If we can get that far, Uncle.” Adrogans’ constant companion, Pain, offered him nothing. She did not cling to him or claw him, but merely rested against his back as if she were a tired child given to his care, not the embodiment of physical torment. With combat looming, she should have been at her most fierce, anxious for the orgy of agonies.

  The potential slaughter had Adrogans’ mind racing. Any of the snowcovered hovels could have been packed with firedirt. If he sent tight formations into the city, an explosion would kill hundreds. If he spread them out to forestall that from happening, concentrated Aurolani forces would overwhelm his thin lines and slaughter his warriors. And if he has enough firedirt to make all those hovels explode, my entire army will die.

  On the one hand, the Aurolani hardly needed to defend the outer city since the walls of the inner city still held. Adrogans’ swift advance had outstripped the chance of any siege machinery being brought up. And while the outer city would yield enough lumber and rock to build such things, that would take time. Since the Aurolani could be resupplied by sea, time worked in their favor.

  It could have been that Nefrai-kesh desired nothing more sinister than buying time. The problem Adrogans had with that was that Nefrai-kesh could have bought a lot more time by the proper use of troops in previous battles. If he had strongly garrisoned the Svar Bridge, taking it would have won time and chewed up a lot of Adrogans’ troops. And if boombags had been used there, there would be no counting the cost. Come spring, he could have crushed what was left of my forces.

  There were many contingencies for which Adrogans could not account. While arcanslata reports did keep him informed in general terms about the eastern front, he had no true sense of how many of Chytrine’s troops were being diverted there. It was quite possible that Nefrai-kesh would not be reinforced. In fact, it could have been that his troops were being drawn away to be used in Muroso. The conquest of Sebcia could have hurt Chytrine much more than anyone knew.

  He looked over at Caro. “Does his giving us the outer city make any sense to you?”

  The Alcidese commander shook his head, then tipped his helmet back. “All the discussions we have had have failed to explain his reasoning. My greatest fear is that he wants us in the city because it cuts down our ability to maneuver and he can infiltrate troops among us. Worse, if we are drawn into certain lines of attack and he is able to bring a dragon to his side, we are undone.”

  Adrogans nodded. “But after the last dragon was slain at Fortress Draconis, Chytrine has not used one. Her control may not be good, or there may be few she can control with as little of the Crown as she has. If one were to be employed against us, though, it would have been used at the bridge or the Three Brothers. Still, you have a point. If we see one, we must push our forces into the Aurolani forces and make it hesitate.”

  Phfas cackled. “He did not hesitate with boombags.”

  Caro winced. “A good point. Nefrai-kesh seems fairly intent on killing us by whatever means.”

  “I would accept that but . . .” Adrogans gestured boldly at the outer city. “There is not so much as a flag flying outside the inner city walls.”

  “I like the paradox no more than you do. It suggests he has a surprise in store.”

  “The only surprises I like in combat are the ones I create.” Adrogans sighed. He glanced right at the new bugler. “Signalman, general advance.”

  The horn sounded and the army of liberation started forward. Adrogans had arrayed it in a wide line. He had his infantry set up in ranks five deep, which meant they had a greater frontage than normal. The Svoin Irregulars actually ranged out in front of the professional soldiers. They moved in a ragged line, clearly eager to enter th
e capital.

  Behind the infantry came the cavalry, and it maintained its tighter formations. When Nefrai-kesh sprang his trap, Adrogans wanted to be able to hit hard with a mobile force. The cavalry oriented on the larger roads, and Adrogans assumed that if there were going to be boom traps, those would be the most likely spots for them. That’s where he would put them were he defending the city, so Adrogans had to hope the infantry screen could locate and destroy any traps before the cavalry would ride into the city.

  Everyone moved forward smoothly. Adrogans noted no alarm or extra activity on the inner city walls. Banners fluttered and sentries marched. If they saw anything, or heard the bugle call, they gave no sign. A few spectators did appear on the walls to watch the advance, but they appeared calm.

  The Irregulars entered the city. As they had been ordered, they slipped into buildings and moved through them, hunting for anything out of the ordinary. The Svoin survivors had spent so much time lurking in the warrens and byways of a dead city that Adrogans knew they would feel right at home. They crept through it like mildew growing up a wall and signaled back as they cleared each block.

  His infantry moved in next and secured roads. Squads searched for signs of traps, but Adrogans didn’t see anyone deploying the red flags that would indicate danger.

  Then, as the cavalry reached the outer walls he saw it. A figure in black, a small man, came walking up the street from the inner city. His cloak flowed out after him as if made from forty yards of diaphanous black silk. Little pieces of it seemed to snap in a breeze that did not exist.

  The figure stopped, then bowed, and the cloak shifted from black to white.

  “Tricks to amuse children.”

  Adrogans smiled at Phfas. “A sign of a truce. Nefrai-kesh offered the same at Svoin.”

  “That is not Nefrai-kesh.”

  “No, but it is his herald.” Adrogans glanced at Caro. “Care to ride with me once again, General?”