Crooked Finger and the Warl of the Dead

by Rex Hazelton

  Lifting his head in the direction he knew the thunderhead was found, though he couldn’t see it because of the orange glow that surrounded him, Kaylan reached out with his Powers of Intuition and touched the storm. The familiar sensation of watery vapor enveloped him until it began to coalesce into drops of liquid that rose up on him like those covering a pitcher of ice water on a warm day. As the first rain drops fell from the place where his mind touched the storm, others quickly developed and followed the watery vanguard as it plunged toward the ground.

  When Kaylan let his Powers of Intuition expand like a cloud does when it feeds on the warm sun, the drops multiplied exponentially within the influence of his burgeoning thoughts until they became a deluge that fell to the battlefield below. Lightning danced about like laughter inside the thunderhead that took joy in cleasning the warl it stood watch over.

  The sound of incessant rumbling filled the sky as sheets of rain fell on the warriors’ heads, a rain that made the Fane J’Shrym, Nyeg Warlers, and rebels lift their faces to greet the welcome shower while the Hag and whiteskins ducked their heads in revulsion to the magic they felt washing over them. The smoke covering the battlefield was forcefully tamped down by the deluge. Billions of water drops pummeled the filth, bending it to the storm’s will until all that was left of the wraith warrior horde was ankle deep mud that was as black as the massive dragon could be seen flying overhead.

  Aware that its cover had been removed- bothered that the rain had extinguished all the fires it had set, fires made with magic that could only be quenched by supernatural means the deluge apparently possessed- the dragon gave a screeching roar that called the last of the winged-cretchym to come to him. Their job was to keep the griffin busy as the Evil One got ready to use magic it didn’ think it would have to to subdue its enemies, terrible magic it had never needed to use in the Warl of the Living before, nor did it know how well it would work outside the Warl of the Dead where the Evil One had discovered its existence.

  Called Fires of Darkness, it got its name because it looked like sparks flying through the air when it was dispensed and nothing it touched survived. Utterly obliterated, neither ash, smoke, nor burn marks were left behind once the lethal sparks were done consuming their target. It was like, as many believed, the object of the Fire of Darkness’ attention had been expunged from existence.

  Having hit the Fane J’Shrym with its incendiaries time and again, the dragon didn’t see any proof it had slain anyone, though there was ample evidence that it had wounded its prey. The only kills the Evil One could verify were the charred bodies of the horses its flame struck and the Hag and whiteskins it inadvertently bathed in fire. And now… there was the rain that felt like thousands of sharpened teeth were assailing the dragon’s hide like it was raw bone the rain wanted to pick clean.

  As far as the Evil One was concerned, it was time to empty its armory and unleash magic it wasn’t certain it could control. And if things went as expected, there would soon be a lot less Fane J’Shrym to face when the Evil One finally led its angry hordes across the bridge it was erecting over Gul Fix on its way to conquer the Mountain of Song. The thought made the dragon smile as it stopped in mid-flight to rub its wings together and conjure up the Fires of Darkness. With the lethal sparks dancing around its broad wings like a massive swarm of bees hovering over a hedge filled with flowering bushes its numbers nearly hid from sight, the dragon dove straight for the closest Fane J’Shrym not worrying whether the Hammer Bearer was with them or not.

  Settling over its target, the dragon sent a shower of its own down upon the Fane J’Shrym. Mixed in with the rain that began to disappear as the radiant sparks consumed the water droplets it touched, the Fires of Darkness flew unerringly towards its prey, though the individual sparks seemed to move about in a haphazard way.

  Affixing themselves to the Fane J’Shrym like burs stuck on a pant’s leg, the fires began to burn those they landed on. Unlike dragonfire, they did far worse than redden their prey’s magically enhanced skin: flesh bubbled up before it blackened and cracked, hair was consumed, clothes and armor were burned away, weapons were consumed more quickly.

  To the Evil One’s chagrin, its enemy was not immediately consumed like others it had thrown the Fires of Darkness on. Still, the dragon found comfort in seeing so many being badly burned. When he saw a score of the Fane J’Shrym reduced to ashes that seemed to disappear in the falling rain, comfort turned to exhilaration.

  Finally, the Evil One thought, Vlad’War’s bastards are mine. I’ll burn them all until there are no Fane J’Shrym left, not in the Warl of the Living or in the Warl of the Dead, nor will I leave any alive to serve me when the warl becomes all mine. The name Fane J’Shrym will cease to exist and all memory of it. Vald’War and this Hammer Bearer of his will have failed and in so doing, they’ll show the Mountain of Song its own fate.

  Since the Fires of Darkness’ sparks had limited lifespans, the deadly outpouring had to be replenished in an ongoing fashion. As such, the dragon looked like it was shaking radiant snow off its wings like a traveler dusting off their cloak after coming indoors after braving a blizzard. Where the sparks fell, the rain ceased to exist. It wasn’t turned to steam as one would think. It simply ceased to exist.

  Those the Fires of Darkness fell on fared better than the rain. Because the Hammer of Power’s magic had touched them, they were able to ward off oblivion. But the battle to keep from being thrown into an abyss of nothingness was excruciatingly painful. The struggle to keep one’s mind that was being torn from them was a torment beyond belief, so much so, that the physical burning the Fires of Darkness inflicted on its victims was a weak counterpart to what was happening inside. In time, the dour shower the dragon poured on the warl had trapped thousands beneath its shower of brilliant sparks, thousands that crumpled to the ground as they were burned alive by the Fires of Darkness Kaylan’s rain couldn’t quench.

  Riding on a griffin’s back, Andara came to use his healing magic to keep as many as he could from being pulled into oblivion along with the sparks that vanished as they returned to the place of nothingness they had come from. Rising to his feet as he stood on the winged-lion’s broad back the Healing Wizard threw out his hands. As he did, amber-colored light spread through the rainstorm and fell on the afflicted like pollen falling on flowers desiccated by the sun’s searing heat. Whereas, scorched flowers couldn’t respond to the pollen, the charred bodies convulsed as the Healing Magic fought to keep them anchored to an existence that was becoming increasingly difficult to bare, an existence that ensured their spirits would continue on to the Warl of the Dead after their bodies had perished. If Andara failed to do what he was trying to do, there would be nothing left of the person to make that fateful journey.

  Seeing what Andara was doing, the Evil One roared for the third time and flew over to remove the Healing Wizard’s magic from the fight. Annoyed by do-gooders in general, the ancient entity was livid that Andara was trying to interfere with his handiwork, so, it planned on hitting the Healing Wizard with a concentration of the Fires of Darkness that was so great it would be impossible for a single person, no matter how strong their magic was, to survive.

  Taking note of the massive dragon flying at him with bad intentions filling its eyes, Andara knew what to expect. Still, he’d continue to pour his magic into the withering Fane J’Shrym until he could no longer do so. In this case, that meant until his existence had been extinguished. In Andara’s mind, saving others while losing himself in the process was a fair trade.

  The dragon’s bright yellow eyes were reduced to sinister slits as the Evil One conjured up more Fires of Darkness by striking its wings together. When the monster threw the abominable fiery sparks forward in a concentration that was so dense it looked like a shaft of light cast out of a giant blacksmith’s furnace, the dragon’s eyes opened wide in anticipation of the damage its magic would do.

  A moment before the radiant shaft of searing hot magic hit Andara and the griff
in he stood on, a mass of colors rivaling those some hummingbirds have flashed into the Fires of Darkness’ path and intercepted the brilliant shaft, diverting it away form the wizard. The sinewy shape that wound its way through the falling rain away from the impact site told the Evil One that another dragon had joined the fight. When a second blast of magic was diverted by another dragon that was the color of star’s blood, the Evil One realized that more than one had arrived. But being so much bigger than the two dragons that had unexpectedly showed up, the Evil One felt he could deal with the inconvenience the beasts posed. Plus, it was apparent that the first dragon didn’t intercept the second shaft of magic because it had been injured by the first one. Still, to overcome the amount of devastating magic the two dragons had survived did not go unnoticed.

  Without a moment’s hesitation, the Evil One quickly chased down the griffin that Andara continued to stand on as he dispensed his Healing Magic, and sent a third shaft filled with the Fires of Darkness at the wizard. This time, the colorful dragon returned to take the hit. Unlike the first time the beautiful dragon saved Andara, the huge beast toppled through the sky with so much smoke coming off the long, serpentine body it looked like a campfire someone tried to extinguish with too little water and too few few kicks of dirt.

  Fortunately for the second dragon- the one the color of star’s blood, who followed Andara like it was a sword for hire set on protecting him- the wizard hunkered down on the griffin’s back and leaned into its thick mane a moment before the winged-lion went through a series of elaborate maneuvers meant to lose the black dragon that kept hurling dark magic at them.

  Swerving away from the griffin that plummeted toward the ground displaying aerial expertise that was a wonder to behold, the dragon that was the color of star’s blood hurried to its companion and called out with a deep, growling voice. “Lylah, are you alright?”

  With the smoke flowing off the waterkynd’s dragon-shaped body diminishing as the individual sparks of Fires of Darkness vanished like tiny eyelids had closed on them, Lylah replied, “I’m hurt badly. But the rain is trying to make me well.”

  Indeed, the blessed precipitation was trying to close the gaping holes in the colorful scales that had been nearly burned away by the Fires of Darkness. Not fully being a part of the Warl of the Living where men, elves, giants, and hunchmen dwelt, nor feeling the pull of the Warl of the Dead at the time they expired, Lylah came to the conclusion that the Fires of Darkness wouldn’t impact a waterkynd in the same way it did the others on the battlefield. But the only way Lylah could find out just how they would affect a waterkynd was to put herself in harm’s way and let the Fires of Darkness touch her. Hearing about Andara’s mission to help thousands of Fane J’Shrym who had been mercilessly burned by the terrifying sparks the Evil One threw at his enemies, Lylah had come up with a plan to use her and Kaylan’s dragon bodies to shield the Healing Wizard.

  As it turned out, Lylah was correct: Fires of Darkness didn’t prove to be lethal to her, though they did affect her in unexpected ways.

  Kaylan and Lylah used the heavy rains to transform into their ice dragon shapes. Hardly thinking it was possible to make the change in this place, since he had only assumed an ice dragon form in the Warl of Ice where the transformation was forced on him, Kaylan had to take his mates word for things since she had experience changing into all three of the waterkynd forms in the only place such a thing could happen- the Warl of Man. And true to what Lylah said, the waterkynd magic he had absorbed while travelling between the Realms of Vapor, Water and Ice kicked into effect as he rode on her back straight into the teeth of the storm.

  Once inside the thunderhead, Kaylan and Lylah soared up and down on winds that climbed and fell precipitously as part of the clouds’ inner workings. When Lylah dropped so quickly that Kaylan lost his grip on her icy scales and was separated from her body for moment, he was surprised to find she was no longer beneath him as he reached down and more surprised that he quit falling once his wings filled with air, those he didn’t know where already there.

  Surprised at how much damage Lylah’s wings had sustained, Kaylan was surprised that she was able to continue flying once she got control of her tumbling descent. Made of overlapping, inticately designed, wafer-like sheets of crystal, the wings’ span had to be extremely broad to keep the bodies made of ice aloft, though only the head, tip of the tail where spikes were commonly found, and the spines were solid. The rest of the body was made with crystal-like structures that were much lighter than one would guess them to weigh.

  “Lylah!” Kaylan was aghast at the depth of the holes the Fires of Darkness had eaten into her body and how much color they had drained from her scales. The color scheme that covered Lylah’s body was beautiful: a violet-colored breast ringed with a swath of yellow, followed by a swath of purple that was surrounded by emerald green that covered most of her body. The yellow spikes protruding from the end of Lylah’s long, sinewy tail added an additional color splash. Her yellow eyes provided a pleasing symmetry to her appearance.

  Now all of that had been compromised by the burning Lylah endured, a burning that continued until the last of the horrible sparks had winked out of existence inside of her body only a moment before. Her vibrant, glossy coloring now looked as faded as paint on an old house long neglected. Her yellow eyes were glazed over with a gayish film.

  On the other hand, Kaylan’s body fared much better since he had taken only one dose of Fire’s of Darkness. His star’s blood coloring was only tarnished with a brace of burn marks that streaked along his body. The spikes rising above his back, those that tapered in length until they disappeared half way down his long whip-like tail, and the horns that protruded out of his triangular-shaped head were all intact. His red eyes continued to shine like rubies.

  “Kaylan!” Lylah’s shout sounded like hail hitting a metal shield. “Behind you!”

  Swinging his long neck around, Kaylan caught sight of the huge, bright yellow eyes that were rushing at him. Burn me to ashes, Kaylan chided himself for not making certain the Evil One had continued chasing Andara.

  “Quick,” Kaylan shouted with a deep, booming dragon voice, “head for for the storm. It’ll protect you.”

  Then he turned to face the massive black dragon that raced toward him on wings wider than seven longboats lined up bow to stern.

  Hitting Kaylan with a blast of dragonfire that was only intended to knock him off balance, the Evil One went for his prime target- Lylah. Sensing her waterkynd origins, though it didn’t have a ready explanation for what it was feeling, the evil entity recognized Lylah as being the more formidable of the two hindering dragons. With eyesight enhanced by the dark magic it practiced, the giant, black dragon recognized how badly Lylah was hurt. Confident she couldn’t survive another encounter with the Fires of Darkness, the Evil One chose to attack the waterkynd.

  Once the colorful dragon was destroyed, the Lord of the darkness Covering Half of the Warl of the Dead would return to hunting Andara down to remove his Healing Magic form the ongoing battle. In the process, it would demolish the horned-dragon it guessed would be foolish enough to continue to protect the doomed wizard.

  Slapping its massive wings together, the black dragon sent a broad swath of Fires of Darkness chasing after Lylah who was flapping her wings as hard as she could to gain purchase in the thunderhead Kaylan said would protect her.

  Slowed down by her wounds as much as she was, the dreaded sparks caught up with Lylah three heart beats before she reached the huge storm cloud’s greenish-black bottom. Enveloping her dragon body in a glowing net made with the deadly sparks and the light they cast off, the sound Lylah made was more a scream than a roar. A moment later, she disappeared inside the thunderhead, taking the Fires of Darkness with her.

  Silenced followed as Kaylan and the Evil One circled one another like two dogs getting ready to fight. Ten heart beats passed… ten more… and then another ten before Lylah emerged out of the storm far from where she had entere
d it. The Fires of Darkness were almost spent. Lylah’s body was ravaged so badly it looked liked like a string of islands surrounded by an ocean filled with swirling mists.

  Without saying a word or giving any indication it was pleased with how successful its attack had been, the Evil One ignored Kaylan like he was little more than a lap dog sniffing at his heels and wheeled about and renewed the hunt for Andara.

  “Lylah,” Kaylan gasped out his mate’s name as he skimmed beneath the thunderhead’s dark underbelly in a star’s blood-colored blur as he raced to catch Lylah as she fell from a sky her tattered wings could no longer carry her through.

  “Kaylan.” Lylah’s voice was hard to distinguish from the rain that fell harder like the thunderhead was weeping over all that had been done to her. “My Dear Kaylan. Don’t weep for me or regret that you let me to stand by your side during this troubling day.”

  Kaylan couldn’t keep either one of Lylah’s requests. The tears that came out of his ruby red dragon eyes looked like snowflakes that eventually melted and joined the rest of the rain drops that fell to the ground below. And as for regrets… he had more than a few. Kaylan regretted giving Elamor the sword he remade on Vlad’War’s Anvil for safe keeping while he followed Lylah to go off and protect Andara. The Healing Magic that was infused in the weapon, when Andara’s Tears were melded with Vlad’War’s power as the sword was remade, could have been used to help Lylah. He regretted being the one responsible for Lylah leaving Mythoria where the Evil One could never touch her. He regretted that he couldn’t take her place. But he could join her as her body was turned to steam by the last of the sparks. A process that could no longer be stopped.

  “I won’t let you leave me,” Kaylan’s dragon visage took on a look of pain as he gathered Lylah’s waning body in his arms. Holding them both aloft with wings that moved just enough to keep the two airborne, Kaylan held his mate close. As he did, the remnant of the Fires of Darkness began to burn his body too; but there wasn’t enough of them to consume him entirely. In time, all that was left of Lylah was her spine and head whose lips keep mouthing his name as her glazed-over eyes lost any trace of intelligence in them. Eventually, even Lylah’s solid ice vertebrate and skull was turned to mist that Kaylan let caress him like it was a parting kiss.