Whichever, there was little time for speculation as I nodded to Neill, who held up one finger, and then made a big show of pointing at his eyes.
“He just wants one pass, to look at everything,” I reiterated for the benefit of Paxala, who again relayed those instructions through the tension-language I felt in the space between my ears.
“Grakkle,” Sigrid’s Green, Socolia, answered aloud with a whistling chatter.
“Skrey-eww-char-eww!” Paxala said, her tail lashing back and forth in the air as she started to beat her wings, and climbing to prepare for her swooping fly-by.
“What was that?” I asked, able to sense the humor emanating from the dragon beneath me.
“Socolia just wanted to ask what good allowing the human to look at things will do, when he can’t even see his own tail!” Paxala said with another chirrup of laughter.
“But humans don’t have tails,” I pointed out.
A moment’s silence from the dragon below me, and then, “Char shouldn’t worry about it, it’s dragon humor,” she said wryly, before, with a final flap, she filled her wings like a sail, hung almost motionless for just a moment, and then started to drop forward.
My stomach lurched, as the world tilted towards me, and the horizon swung upwards. Everything was so delicate and graceful for just one pure second, and then—
“SKREYAAR!”
We roared downwards towards the column of smoke, accelerating with every heartbeat. What was the cause of that smoke? My heart was in my mouth. Are we flying into battle? But already we were moving faster than a hunting hawk, or a killing arrow. We were speed incarnate.
Chapter 5
Neill, Dragon Rider
The black smudge became smoke, rising from a settlement, rising from the flames that engulfed a wooden tower that had once sat proud beside a long, thin lake. Sheerlake. My heart lurched, recognizing what I saw in front of me. One of the settlements of the Eastern Marches, almost all the way out on the edges of the Clan Torvald land. I was surprised at how quickly we had flown, and once again marveled at a dragon’s way to use the different air currents to speed across the face of the world. Farther ahead of us in the west rose the Gorstan Heights, a range of hills that turned wild and cracked, treacherous and heavy with woods and waterfalls. This was the extremes of the Middle Kingdom, where the laws and the dictates of Prince Vincent were seldom even heard, let alone obeyed.
And it was also the hunting place of bandit kings and renegade lords. Like the Blood Baron, I thought with a snarl as the world rushed up to greet me.
In just the fraction of time it had taken to register all of this, the tower had grown tall in my vision, and I realized that we were now flying lower than the smoke, in an arrow-sharp flight that would send us screaming low over the waters of Sheerlake, and right beside the wharfs and rickety piers of these lake people.
It wasn’t just the tower that was burning, however, it was the village itself. The houses were mostly wooden log cabins and halls (like many of the settlements in clan land), and the palisade walls had been breached – a large section near the wooden gates had been burst apart as if by a giant hand, and the ground was churned and blackened with mud and fighting.
And now there were small shapes amidst the wreckage. Bodies on the ground, most wearing the simple tunics and furs of Torvald clansmen and women.
“Char!” I called out from my seat behind her between the shoulder spines, in our makeshift saddle. I saw her worried expression and pale face nodding that she had seen it, but she also pointed to the collection of ferries and small fishing boats that clustered the tiny fishing port.
There was movement there. People still alive!
“Skreayar!” Paxala bellowed as she flew, although whether in fierce joy at her speed or in challenge I didn’t know. There was an answering shriek and echoing boom from behind us as the blue and green dragons kept their formation, and flew in our slipstream towards the wharfs.
The clanspeople of Sheerlake were engaged in a desperate rearguard action as they fought their way to the small flotilla of fishing vessels and boats; already there was a ragged line of boats and rafts making their way out into the center of the lake, away from the fire. Coming behind them, releasing a hail of arrows, came the bandits of the Blood Baron. As I watched, helplessly, the burly fur-clad warriors brandished their axes, mallets, and swords, preparing to cleave the last of the defenders of the ferries, as the Blood Baron’s soldiers sought to finish off their murderous campaign against the fleeing refugees. In one of those awful, perfect moments of stop-motion time that happens when flying at such speeds, I saw a black arrow skipping the water below the dragon’s belly as we flew over, churning the water in our wake, and zipping under the tower and out across the ends of the lake as Paxala shot back up into the sky.
“Neill!?” Char was shouting just behind me. “What do we do?”
“Skrech!” Paxala rumbled, and, as she did so I saw the blue and green carrying Sigrid, and Terrence and Lila shoot past the tower just as we had done, and then rise in the air to follow our trajectory. The final two dragons – the riderless blue and the green had been following our flight formation, but broke off before they swept under the tower smoke, seemingly alarmed by the fires and the shouts and screams to break up their sharp swoop: they flapped and turned, seeking higher and cleaner airs.
Pheet! Pheet! More of the nasty black arrows soared up into the heavens – this time at the riderless dragons as the Blood Baron’s men changed their target to what was clearly a much more pressing threat.
“No!” Char shouted, as the offending barbs struck at the slowly moving, lumbering forms of the riderless blue and green dragons – but no harm appeared to have been done, as the dragons merely shuddered, shaking their scales in a rattling storm of noise as they flew higher.
“Dragon! Dragon attack!” the Baron’s fighters shouted as we circled the burning remains of Sheerlake. I didn’t have long, and so I tried to think. What should I do? What would a Son of Torvald do?
Trap them by the water’s edge, my father’s words rose unbidden into my mind, almost as if he were standing there right at my shoulder. I had spent years listening to his councils – whether as a child I would play on the bearskin rug as he conducted his meetings and strategies, or when I had been older, and actually allowed out onto the training fields along with my brothers.
That was what I would do if I had a force of warriors, I thought. I would use their own devastation and wanton destruction against them, turning the burning village into a trap which they had to defend if they wanted to live.
I was shocked at how coldly I was thinking. It had been a long time since I had thought like a ‘proper’ Son of Torvald; one who could make those sorts of life and death decisions with such casual ease. It was like listening to the dramatic boasts and exploits of my brothers Rubin and Rik. The long last month that I had spent in the Dragon Monastery had been a time of challenges and stresses, of course, but also of waking up every morning knowing that I was surrounded by allies and friends. I hadn’t been thinking with the language of blood and terror for a long time, and now I wondered if I had even missed it at all.
But I had to answer my father’s call. I gestured to Char that we should circle around to the other side of the tower, the land side, so that we could trap them there—
“Oh no.” I saw Char’s words as she mouthed them rather than heard them, and saw, over her shoulder, that the two riderless dragons were already coming to much the same conclusion that I had. The Sinuous Blue had snaked over the wreckage of the town to land in the smoke-free churned areas beyond, whilst the riderless stocky Green, still getting peppered with arrows from the marauders below, was coming down hard and fast in a fury of wings and claws.
“They’re going to attack!” Char shouted – and this time I did hear her over the roar of the wind as Paxala flew. She was right. Without any clear orders or direction, the two crater dragons were doing what their instincts dictated to
them: eliminate the threat.
It must be the long years of living under Zaxx the Golden’s terrible rule, I thought. They have learnt how to be cruel, and to defend themselves, and now that they have all of this giddy freedom of flying far beyond the crater without Zaxx bellowing at them, they were doing just what Zaxx would do.
But was it so bad? Wasn’t it exactly what I had intended to ask of them? I wondered as Char wheeled Paxala around to the far side of the village. It was, after all, just what a Son of Torvald would do…
WHOOOSH! The Blue, already landed, managed to roar a jet of dragon flame at the offending town that had challenged it.
Oh no.
Dragon fire isn’t the same as ordinary fire, it is not fragile and blown away with the wind or extinguished so easily with water and rain. I knew that they made it in their necks somehow, the sides of their lower necks swelling and becoming hot as they shot out a bolt of ferocious energy at their target. The fire could stick to buildings and people, before burning itself (and its target) away to nothing more than melt, slag, and ash. If the village of Sheerlake wasn’t already destroyed, then it would be in a matter of minutes.
As I watched, the stocky Green dragon landed, crashing into one section of the still-standing palisade wall with its back claws, ripping the wooden stakes and beams apart as easily as if it were kindling for a hearth fire. Now on the ground, the Green roared its challenge into the sky, and its neck started to swell.
Your father had wanted aid in defeating the Blood Baron, that small, cold and cruel part of me that had been raised by Rubin’s and Rik’s beatings advised. What could be a more surer destruction of that hated figure, than turning the captured village he cowered in, into a towering inferno?
“No,” I said, as much to the memory of my brothers as to what I saw was about to happen. “Char – we can’t let them do this!” I shouted, and I saw that she understood, nodding. The wails of the last survivors of Sheerlake out on the lake rose to my ears, and it sounded like a plea for help.
This destruction is not how I wanted the Dragon Monastery to operate, I thought. I wanted the people of the Middle Kingdom, of all of the Three Kingdoms, of the entire world to look upon dragons as I knew that Char and the other students and I did: warily, but with respect and wonder, even with friendship.
What are the survivors of Sheerlake going to say now about what happened here? That the dragons of the Draconis Order were flown here, and that they destroyed the village and everyone in it? The hope that Rudie’s arrival had brought for our future would be dashed before it had even begun.
But Char, it seems, had already communicated with Paxala, as I felt a pressure against my mind as I always did as they talked, and Paxala made a whistling, shrieking noise as she dove down towards the riderless Green and Blue.
“Screch-ip! Ip-ach-ech! Skree-Skree!” She whistled and shrieked as she swooped to an elegant landing beside the Blue. The riderless Blue flinched and lowered his head, backing away from the much larger Crimson Red.
“Vsss!” The Blue hissed at Paxala, but Paxala just snarled and stamp-scratched at the floor, causing the Sinuous Blue to lash its tail as it took a few more steps back.
“I’m telling Paxala to call off the others,” Char was saying ahead of me, and I could already see that it was working. Far above us, the other two dragons (Terence and Lila, and then Sigrid on her Green) circled the tower, unsure what to do. As Char and Paxala negotiated, I waved to the higher-up dragons, indicating that they had to go to the far side of the town, the lake side, to try and help the refugees, as well as to block any escape for the Blood Baron’s soldiers. We could arrest the Blood Baron’s warriors when they realize that they are surrounded, I thought. No more have to die this day, if they recognize the strength that we have…
It was frustrating, waving and signaling to them from on the ground as Paxala was already busy arguing with the hissing and stamping riderless green. There has to be an easier way to do this, I reasoned, until eventually I saw the Sinuous Blue bearing Lila and Terence take the hint, and the team darted down to the other side of the lake, and Sigrid on her Vicious Green wobbled a little unsteadily after them.
Phew! This dragon-wrangling was proving a lot harder than I had originally thought.
Pheet! Pheet! More small arrows shot out from the burning remains of Sheerlake, as some of the warriors, seeing the dragons descending to the water line there decided to try and escape in our direction. I watched as one of the arrows splintered on stone, and another landed in a still-standing section of palisade wood with a loud thock!
“Hsssss!” The Vicious Green lashed its tail once more in fury at the challenge, dismantling a hovel as it did so.
“Easy!” Char shouted across to it, raising her hands in that universal calming gesture. Below her, Paxala was also making a lowing, gentler noise at the Green, who raised her snout defiantly, but did not fire on our attackers.
Pheet! Another arrow skittered across the rocks.
“Really!?” I shouted into the ruins at wherever our attackers were crouching and hiding in the ruins of Sheerlake. “We’re on dragons. You can’t scare these dragons off. You cannot drive them away.”
The arrows stopped coming at us, but there was no answering call.
“Char…?” I muttered under my breath to my friend ahead of me. “Can you stop these dragons from killing the next humans they see, just for a moment?”
“I have no idea,” my friend answered. “But Paxala is threatening all sorts of things if they do not listen up and start thinking.”
Good. It’ll have to do, I thought, as I turned to address the burning ruins of Sheerlake beyond us.
“We are the new Dragon Order, and these dragons have come to the aid of the people of Sheerlake. Lay down your weapons and come out, and I promise you that you won’t be harmed.” I hope.
Still, no sound from the ruins. I would just have to try again.
“Blood Baron! You are responsible for crimes against the Eastern Marches, against the Torvald Clan, against the Middle Kingdom and the people of Sheerlake here. Do not add a whole brood of angry dragons to your list of enemies!” I demanded, half rising from my seat to shout at him. “Now come out, hands up, weapons down, and I promise that you will get a free and fair trial. I will give you to the count of three to respond to my offer – we can go in after you on the back of these dragons, but I think that you will find that you are surrounded, and none of you wants to fight an already angry dragon, do you?”
Silence, save for the burning of wood and the collapse of weakened timber.
Oh hell, I thought. This was also not what I wanted to happen. I wanted the dragons to be a force for good in the world, not always to be doing the bloody and terrible work that would make them feared.
“One,” I shouted, my eyes scanning the wreckage for any sign that they were about to follow my demands. Nothing.
“Two…” I called again, starting to sweat as Paxala tensed beneath me, anticipating violence.
I raised my hands to my mouth to shout the final number, when suddenly there was movement from the smoke-filled wreckage. A clang as a shield and an ax hit the floor, and out came running a large warrior, his beard and face blackened with soot.
Damn, I need some ground soldiers to be able to round up the prisoners, I was thinking as the man ran out, terrified, and immediately started to edge away from the dragons to run into the wilds. Before I could say anything, the riderless Blue a little behind us growled and half-pounced, landing with a thump a few meters in front of the warrior, snarling.
“Aii!” the warrior wailed in fear, falling to his knees with his hands still above his head. “Don’t let it eat me – please! Don’t let the thing cook me or eat me!”
“Thing…?” Char snorted in indignation, but before I could smooth over the situation, there were already other soldiers running out of the fog of war and burning Sheerlake. They, too, dropped their weapons as they ran, first in any direction at all (away fr
om the fire) until they saw the fury of the Vicious Green, her head low and her tail slapping the ground behind her, raising up clods of dirt with every swipe. With low groans and fearful moans, they backed towards where their friend was already shuddering on the floor.
It's working, sorta! A glimmer of hope sparked in my heart as the warriors knelt on the floor, their arms in the air.
“Where’s the Blood Baron?” I asked them. The men glanced among themselves but none answered. In frustration, I slid from Paxala’s back to the ground below, striding towards them.
“Neill – be careful,” Char said, but I was angry. I was angry at these warriors for choosing to protect their murderous lord, and I was angry at myself for having to act like this. I didn’t want this for myself, I kept thinking, as my frustration and anger mounted. I don’t want the Draconis Order to be the arbiters of justice. I just wanted us to round up the monsters and the bandits and hand them over to my father for judgment.
Now, it felt like these Blood Baron men, in their unthinking loyalty to their lord, would force me to act to try and threaten and intimidate them. Is this what a lord has to do? A ‘master’?
“Where is the Blood Baron!” I demanded again, now that I stood under the snarling snout of the riderless Blue. I knew the Blue could sense my own anger, and was only adding to it with his own snarling rage. I wonder if I felt then an echo of that dragon’s rage as well, making me want to teach all of these stupid bandits, thugs, and killers a lesson that they could never forget…
“Here,” growled a voice, as one of the warriors who had fled with the others stood up slowly. I was shocked at how old he was. He looked not a little like my own father, but with fiery red and sunburst hair and beard (now laced with white), one eye gone milky, and a barrel of a chest that came from decades of fighting and harsh living. He leered at me with blackened and broken teeth. “I am the Blood Baron. What are you going to do, little boy?”
Dragon Mage (The First Dragon Rider Book 3) Page 3
