During all of this, Clover was regaining control of herself. She could smell burnt hair and she felt as if she had been roasted in the sun. Rising to her knees, she ignored the terrible pain in her shoulder and found the dagger she kept in her boot. It was a small one used mainly for skinning and carving, but it was a weapon. She reached out for Crimzon with her mind and was surprised to feel him there, fighting his revulsion to come to her aid. She didn’t doubt he would overcome the powerful sensation. It wasn’t in his nature to let her down. He would have to hurry, though; the wizard was choking the mutant now, and it had no idea how to focus the Dour that was flowing through it into a defense.
Clover stumbled to her feet and ran toward the wizard’s back with every intention of burying her blade there. But the mage won his tussle with the mutant and turned with the glow of the Dour showing angry in his eyes. He cast a spell that sent Clover flailing backwards into the block wall. She impacted with a lung clearing crunch. With wide eyes, swollen veins, and a clench jawed expression that showed he was now feeling the full rush of the Dour, he began calling out the makings of another spell.
Clover saw his eyes left no room for doubt. He was full of Dour, and about to kill her.
***
Crimzon tried flying back toward the tower several times, but every time he grew close, the feelings of revulsion overwhelmed his senses. The protective instincts his mother instilled in him took over, causing his wings to carry him away. Again and again he tried, but it was no use. Then he felt Clover reaching out to him. The relief he felt at knowing she was still alive was consumed by the amount of pain he could feel inside her. He had to do something, but what could he do?
Letting his rage lift him as much as the power of his wings, he began to climb into the sky. If the spell around the tower caused him to pull or turn away, he would just eliminate his body’s ability to comply to his instinct. It was all he could think to do.
***
Clover threw her dagger at the wizard as if she were practiced in the art. She wasn’t, but she was lucky. The butt of the knife thumped hard into Zekker’s forehead causing him to lose the spell he was about to unleash on her.
“You can eat her now!” the wizard yelled at his familiar. He rubbed the knot on his head and scrunched up his nose. “I’ve no need to bother with her now that I have it.”
“Mmm,” the ruined fae boy made a sound as if he’d just tasted something delicious. “Mmm, Mmm, Mmmmmm.” He wrung his hands as he started across the room toward Clover. She was backed against the curved wall, calling out to Crimzon with all the concentration she could muster. She felt her dragon. She felt him urgently trying to warn her, but his mind was distorted with the repelling magic of Zekker’s spell. She couldn’t understand what he was trying to tell her.
Balin Zekker seemed to have gained three feet of stature. He was drawing in the power of the teardrop. He was getting lost in its deliciousness. Had she not been in the middle of a battle for her and Crimzon’s life when she first held the teardrop, she would have been swept away by the Dour herself.
Just as Zekker exited the tower, Clover learned what Crimzon was trying to warn her about. The dragon came streaking shoulder first into the middle of the tower in such a way that it nearly stopped his momentum, but not quite. Crimzon had climbed high into the air and dove at the spire. He made sure he was moving too fast to open his wings as he came streaking in. The instinct to protect his delicate wings from damage overrode the urge to try and alter his course. Then he was there, crashing through the block and tumbling with the rubble and dust.
Clover felt, more than saw, the tower go tilting over her. She dove under the table board and was surprised to find the mutant there shivering in confusion, but snarling lustily at the blood flowing freely from her shoulder.
Without a second of consideration she jabbed her index finger into one of the beast’s eyes then pushed him out from under the table. Blocks and floor planks were falling all around them and soon the creature was lost in the dust and debris.
***
The spell Zekker cast around the tower was broken when Crimzon destroyed the structure, but the dragon was dazed and now floundering across the rocky terrain. Crimzon could do little as the wizard stalked toward him. The Dour was filling Balin Zekker, increasing his size as well as his ability. He was as big as a small giant when he finally made it down the steep slope to where Crimzon came to rest. He stopped just far enough away that Crimzon wouldn’t be able to whip him with his tail. With a look of evil intention raging across his giddy, power-lusting expression, the wizard began another casting, this one a spell that Crimzon knew would do him in.
Crimzon tried to move his wings and was overcome with white-hot flashes of searing pain. One wing was likely broken. His mother’s troubled voice filled his mind, as it often did, and urged him into reciting the words of a protective spell. He wasn’t fast enough.
A silvery-white swath of raw Dour shot forth from Zekkers hands and began freezing Crimson’s bulk as it swept across him. Within the span of a few heartbeats Crimzon lost consciousness and was frozen into a solid mass, his mind and soul held imprisoned in a frigid, magical stasis.
His last attempt to move his tail ended in more terrible pain as the solidity crept down to its tip causing it to nearly break away from the rest of him. Along with the pain came blackness as thick as lava. In the blackness there was nothing.
***
After the crumbling pieces of block and mortar stilled, Clover coughed the dust from her lungs and peeked out from under the table board. She was surprised more of the tower hadn’t collapsed on her. She heard a hissing, crackling sound and staggered out of the mess. What she saw chilled her blood almost as much as Zekker’s spell was freezing Crimzon’s. She didn’t have a weapon, but she grabbed up a stick of broken timber that was as big around as her arm and charged the wizard. He had his back turned to her and was caught up in freezing the dragon, so he didn’t see her as she raced down the valley slope.
It wasn’t until she grew closer that she saw he was growing larger by the moment. Already he was as big as an oak tree, with bulging muscles and throbbing veins. It didn’t stop her. She had to save her dragon.
By the time she swung the timber at him, Balin Zekker was over nine feet tall and crackling with the power of the dragon’s tear. He stumbled from the crack of wood against the side of his skull and lost control of the spell he was casting. He growled as he turned and backhanded Clover to the ground. She missed the rocks and rolled across one of the only turf-covered spaces in the area. When she came up, she had a fist-sized rock in her hand and she threw it as hard as she could right at Zekker’s crotch.
As usual, Clover’s luck held true and she hit her target with far more force than she could have hoped. The wizard roared out in pain as he doubled over.
Clover knew from firsthand experience that the rush of the Dour was an awesome thing to feel. It had almost consumed her a few times. At the moment though, her dragon was all she could think about. Crimzon had to be terribly wounded, if not dead.
Before Zekker could gather his wits, Clover took a quick step forward and kicked him hard in the face. His nose crunched under her boot, but he just put his fists on his knees, lifted his head, and stared at her. Fresh scarlet blood ran down his chin and stringed away, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“I’ve had about enough of you,” he spat. His eyes were beginning to clear, as if he was gaining control of the Dour that was raging through him.
Oddly, Clover could feel the Dour too. She used the teardrop at least a dozen times over the three years that she’d had it. And now, thinking about it, she realized she hadn’t held the teardrop in her hand every time she used its power.
Immediately she drew upon the Dour and called forth a sharp blast of kinetic energy. She threw her arm forth, pointing at Zekker. A fist of energy impacted him squarely. He took a cart-wheeling step backwards, but caught himself before he fell. The momentary look of shock passed from his ey
es far too quickly. She saw his mouth moving to cast another spell.
Clover called forth a shield in front of her, but found she didn’t need it. The tricky wizard wasn’t about to blast her again. He was smarter than that, and she soon found the Dour she had been feeling slipping away from her like water flowing out a drain. Zekker drew up to his full height. Standing nearly ten feet tall, his body burst through his robes and his once plump form was now bulging with lean muscle. Sparkling tracers of energy flashed and sizzled across his skin. In his right fist he held up the dragon tear and began calling out the words to conjure something terribly destructive. His left hand pointed directly at Clover, who was now trembling so badly that it was a struggle to stay standing.
“Kneel before me, wench!” Zekker commanded. Against her will Clover fell to her knees. An angry red cloud was forming around the upraised teardrop. “Your run of luck ends here and now!”
A streak of energy the color of blood shot down at Clover. She clenched her eyes shut and curled into a ball, anticipating her end.
It never came. Instead, she heard a loud clacking sound followed by a slow building scream. She opened her eyes to see Zekker still standing over her. He was looking at where his right arm used to be and screaming. Behind him was Crimzon, his left wing splayed at an angle that was painful to look upon. Dangling from his maw was the stump of Balin Zekker’s arm, the dragon tear still in its hand.
Clover scrambled away from the wizard. The sudden lack of Dour in his body was causing him to shrink. The process looked so terribly painful that Clover asked Crimzon to end it. The dragon spat the wizard’s arm toward her. Only after she had the teardrop in her hand did he comply. A searing gout of dragon fire consumed Zekker. The smell of fresh, cooked meat competed with the brimstony smell of the dragon’s breath, but the terrible sounds of the tricky wizard’s agony faded into the sizzling of his flesh.
***
Over the next few days, Clover built a crude room with the broken block from the tower. She used the hammered sheet metal from Zekker’s spire for a roof and actually constructed a comfortable place of shelter. She’d even salvaged most of the wizard’s stores and books, as well a decent bow and some good hickory tables. This was good, because they were going to be there for a while.
Crimzon was in no shape to fly. Setting his wing back into shape was a gruesome happening that tested the limits of their friendship, but it was done. Even with the aid of the teardrop’s Dour, only time could heal Crimzon now. Feeding him became a full time chore for Clover, but she hunted as often as the weather would allow.
The mutant fae somehow survived the destruction. The first few weeks he stayed around the rubble, but would only venture close at night. Clover tracked him to a hollowed out tree trunk in a neighboring valley, but couldn’t bring herself to shaft him with an arrow. He was pitiful and afraid. When fall set in, and the nights grew cold, he disappeared altogether.
It was late in the winter when Crimzon finally braved the pain and took his first flight. By spring he was fully healed and ready to go feast on the antelope and mountain goat herds that roamed the mountains outside of Vell.
Clover was ready, too. She’d read most of Zekker’s books and practiced casting the easier of the spells she found in them. She understood magic quite a bit better now, but knew she needed guidance. After she brought her new designs to the saddler and Crimzon sated his hunger, she intended for them to fly to the distant city of Harthgar to find a wizard to teach her. For now though, she was happy to nestle between Crimzon’s spinal plates and feel his muscles churn as the wind whipped through her hair. Her luck was holding true. Her dragon was well healed and she was thankful for it.
To be continued...
Crimzon & Clover III - The Grog
Crimzon & Clover IV - The Wrath of Crimzon
Crimzon & Clover V - Killer of Giants
Crimzon & Clover VI - One Bad Bitch
Crimzon & Clover VII - The Fortune’s Fortune
M. R. Mathias has several other titles available from Amazon, including:
The Legend of Vanx Malic
The Legend of Vanx Malic Book One - Through the Wildwood
The Legend of Vanx Malic Book Two - Dragon Isle
The Legend of Vanx Malic Book Three - Saint Elm’s Deep
The Legend of Vanx Malic Book Four - That Frigid Fargin’ Witch
The Legend of Vanx Malic Book Five - Trigon Daze (Coming Summer 2015)
And don’t miss the huge International Bestselling epic:
The Wardstone Trilogy:
Book One - The Sword and the Dragon
Book Two - Kings, Queens, Heroes, & Fools
Book Three - The Wizard & the Warlord
The Saga of the Dragoneers:
The First Dragoneer - Free Dragoneer intro novella
The Royal Dragoneers - Dragoneer Saga Book One
Cold Hearted Son of a Witch - Dragoneer Saga Book Two
The Confliction - Dragoneer Saga Book Three
Confliction Compendium - Dragoneer Saga 1-3 plus The First Dragoneer novella
The Emerald Rider - Dragoneer Saga Book Four
Rise of the Dragon King - Dragoneer saga Book Five
Blood and Royalty - Dragoneer Saga Book Six
Dragoneer Saga - Royalty Trilogy Boxed Set (Books, 4, 5, and 6)
Find out more at
Wardstone.info
Dragoneer.info
Mrmathias.com
And/or ReadFantasy.Org
Blood and Royalty: Dragoneer Saga Book Six (The Dragoneer Saga) Page 15
