“L-let’s go, b-boy!”
The stuttering voice belonged to Alex’s cohort. A restrained regret wrinkled his brow when my stranger of a brother and I locked eyes. He pushed my sword back and hurried to catch up with the Advent. I would have followed him at any other time, but my sprint took me to Clarissa.
She squirmed and moaned from a five inch long wound cut just under her right ribs. Blood poured out from it in terrifying amounts. I held her hand tightly and used the other to try to block more blood from spilling out. Her placid eyes regarded me with less fear than I imagined I’d see, which only worried me more. I yelled for Ghevont, who was already on his way.
Clarissa opened her mouth to say something, but I said, “Just focus on breathing, okay? Do that for me.”
The scholar, whose nose was bleeding, fell on to his knees with a yellowish healing spell glowing around his left hand. He placed his bright palm over the wound while his right hand worked to evaluate the wound better. A light leather cuirass was all that protected her upper body, and this had been sliced through as though it had been made from shriveled leaves.
“Cut the leather off for me,” said Ghevont.
I pulled out a dagger and opened a larger breach in the covering. A big blob of curbed blood gushed out.
“Oh my. Vampires have less blood than humans. Losing this much this quickly-”
“But they’re harder bitches to kill, right?”
“Very much so. Organs mean less for her, so she only needs to refill her blood reserves. Find her vials. I’ll work on keeping the rest of her blood inside her.”
As I emptied her little pouch on the ground, Lucetta, who had a limping Lorcan leaning on her shoulder, walked up to us. “Shit,” she said. “She gonna be okay?”
“As long as-”
The volcano practically jumped a foot off the ground. Fissures on the floor reached a few columns and caused three to collapse. The soldiers near the stairs started shouting a retreat order. The lava barrier had failed.
“We have to hurry,” said Lucetta. “Can you carry her, Cyrus?”
“Ghevont? Can I carry her?”
“I need time to close the wound with bandages or a quick suture. Unless, of course, you want me to cauterize it. She’ll surely pass out from the pain with a wound this size, however. I’ll feel better if she got a little human blood in her first.”
“Human?”
He nodded. “Animal blood will keep a healthy vampire alive, but human blood is what their body needs to truly stimulate their superior healing ability and enhanced strength. If we’re in a rush, then a little blood from our kind will go far.”
I used the dagger to slice my left palm open.
“Er, I do have to mention that giving her human blood now will probably want her craving more in the future.”
“As long as she has one.”
I hovered my hand over her mouth, letting my blood flow into her parted lips. Her eyes had been closed, but she opened them to see where the blood was coming from. She almost choked up what was in her mouth, but I held her down.
“There’s no time to argue. Drink as much as you can. Enjoy it, ‘cause Ghevont’s about to hurt the shit out of you.” She resigned herself to my wish. Without taking my eyes off her, I asked, “How are you, Dad?”
“Just a twist of the ankle, no worries, son.”
“I’m pretty sure his whole lower leg is busted,” corrected Lucetta. “Also got sliced in the back shoulder. Good thing I poisoned the fucker before he hurt my baby anymore.”
“You wouldn’t have found the opening were it not for me!”
“That’s when he got cut. Bastard cast some strange-ass spells that made his shadow into solid weapons and shields.”
“Ah, that’s what paralyzed you,” said Aranath. “Your brother must have learned to cast a shadow spell or two. That explains why I could not counter the hex. His prana wasn’t interacting with your body to restrict your movements, but your shadow.”
“Hey,” continued Lucetta. “The barrier is gone.”
She was right. Dwelling on the meaning of its disappearance had to be suspended when a group of soldiers ran up to us, asking if they could aid us. Their presence reminded me about the others with us. Given that I heard no more trolls, I guessed their battle had finished.
“Dad, you and Lucetta get out of here. We’ll catch up.”
“I’ll see you catch up with my own eyes.”
“Lucetta, take him. The old man will slow us down dragging a lame leg behind him.”
“It’s not only you. We have to find the rest of our crew as well.”
“I agree with Cyrus,” said Lucetta. “You won’t be able to outrun a lake of lava in this condition. Get Lorcan out of here, boys. I’ll stay and make sure everyone gets out.”
Lorcan verbally protested being handed over to a pair of soldiers like an unwanted sack of grain, but he was in no physical state to do more than that. Lucetta took the newly open path to find out what happened to Eudon and the others. Two soldiers remained with us.
After having numbed the area around the wound with an ice spell, Ghevont said he was ready to perform the emergency cauterization. A small, intense flame was cast at the end of Ghevont’s finger. Clarissa appeared more alert now thanks to my offering, but that meant she became even more aware of the incoming pain.
“You could still leave me behind,” she said weakly.
“That’s plan B.”
“Jackass. You taste awful, by the way.”
“Brace yourself,” said Ghevont.
I put the cloth-enwrapped handle of my dagger in her mouth. A smear of my blood still clung to her lips. Both the vampire and her skin hissed when the flame made contact. Her hand gripped my uncut hand like a vise. My bones could have fractured, but I knew that was nothing compared to what she was experiencing. Her shut eyes squeezed out a salty brook.
Clarissa’s head slumped to the side when the medicinal torture finally ended. Contrary to what Ghevont believed would happen, the vampire groaned with alertness and tried to mutter something.
“Damn,” said one of the soldiers. “She’s pretty tough to not pa-”
Another big shake of the mountain. Rubble from the fracturing roof drizzled over us. A couple of fissures brightened and expanded to the point molten rock began to pour down near the center of the hall. They were thin torrents that could still be circumvented. I carefully lifted Clarissa—getting a case of vertigo as I stood up—and handed her to the stronger looking soldier.
“Teleport her out of here. I’ll go find Eudon. Go!”
The soldier nodded and left his comrade behind with us.
When we entered the next passage, I asked Ghevont, “You’ve memorized the teleportation rune we’re using, right?”
“Of course. I’ll only need three to four minutes to carve a personalized rune, depending on soil consistency. I’ve even been given a prana crystal to cast teleportations for those too weak to provide their own prana.”
The chamber beyond the vanished barrier was somewhere between a tunnel and a hall with its short roof, fifty foot length, broad width, and stout columns. At its end were two descending stairways, one on the left and one on the right. This would have presented a dilemma were it not for the scratches and burn marks next to the right stairway. Choosing the right stairway took us thirty feet down. Light here was provided by torches attached to the wall.
Waiting at the bottom was Lucetta standing next to that blasted black barrier, which had been cast on an entrance twenty feet tall and eight feet wide. On the other side of it were flashes of spells striking it without much effect.
“This is a strong one,” said Lucetta. “Can’t even hear Eudon’s lightning arrows, and one hit from my sword made my whole right side numb.”
“Stand back,” I said.
When she gave me room, I knelt alongside the barrier and summoned a pyramid of rocks two feet high. Keeping in mind that removing the barrier would place me in harm�
�s way if I stayed in front of it, I backed up to the steps and told Ghevont to place his strongest ward in front of me. I gradually torched the stones from top to bottom, making sure I didn’t lose control over the aggregating flames. Several stones popped before I could ignite them, but the majority burned without incident. My prana level was dropping fast, and my blood loss made concentrating a challenge.
At any rate, the barrier wrinkled and heaved wherever the flames touched. I tried keeping the inferno’s density focused within the barrier’s first few feet, thinking I just needed to make one little tear so that the flames could latch on as before. An audible sign of headway came when the resonance of crashing and bespattering spells in the other room began breaking through. I pushed the flames to their utmost. The temperature soared. I didn’t even know I was about to tumble forward until Lucetta grabbed my shoulder and helped keep me steady. She got the soldier to hold my other shoulder.
Something that sounded like a granite wall ripping like parchment befell right before I sensed the compressed blaze forge an exodus. Then I saw Ghevont’s magic shield blow apart.
My next complete thought was realizing I lied dazed on the steps. I checked the back of my head for blood. Finding none, I rose to check on the others. Through the settling dust I saw that they imitated my unsteady state.
As I went to help up Ghevont, shadowy figures crossed into our side, coughing and gasping for air. A strong odor of rotting skunk dipped in piss pulled out my lungs and punched them a few times before shoving them back down my throat. Unlike the soldier, I kept the contents of my stomach inside me.
“Gods!” said a gagging Lucetta. “What the fuck is that?”
Ghevont actually took a big breath of the rancid stench. “It seems the Advent have learned to channel a concentration of volcanic gases into this next chamber.”
Eudon stumbled to his knees. He dropped his bow and slammed his bloody fists down, cratering the ground. I avoided him and looked for someone recovering their air and composure the fastest. That person turned out to be Turell, who helped the others cross the threshold.
“Lieutenant, what happened?”
“We followed the Advent here and proceeded to battle him. He summoned seven or eight fire sprites to aid his cause. Not everyone made it. Master Sheridan was killed by the Advent’s strange sword. Two of my men were killed by the sprites.”
“What happened to the Advent?”
“We were closing in on him, but his sword somehow causes thorny tendrils to sprout from the ground. He used a mass of these to shield him from our attacks. By the time we breached it, he was gone. That’s when the gases started coming through. What happened on your end?”
“The lava barrier has failed. We need to teleport out of here. Ghevont, clear a space and carve a teleportation rune.”
“One of my rune carvers survived. I’ll get him to aid your friend.” I was going into the chamber he had exited, but stopped when Turell asked, “Master Eberwolf, is what the Advent said true? Do your flames come from a dragon? Did you summon one in Alslana?”
After thoughtfully staring at him for half a moment, I shrugged and said, “Sure, why not? But now is not the time to get into what that might mean for anyone outside of myself, all right?”
He nodded and dashed off to help his former king back to his feet.
I put a hand and part of my cloak over my mouth and entered the chamber. I expected the hollow to resemble the hall or living space, but what I stepped into looked more like a huge natural cavern, or possibly a long empty magma chamber. A little light came from big braziers hanging from the high, irregular ceiling, but most had their fires snuffed out. Other than the lingering stink, the cavern suddenly gave the impression I stood a world away from the volcano’s upset stomach.
Sticking out from parts of the floor were the thorny tendrils Turell spoke of. They looked like brownish vines as thick as a child’s arm covered in rose thorns. One of these war vines had been wrapped around the left arm of Menalcus while a twin tendril had pierced straight through his chest. At roughly the center of the cavern was a ten foot tall mass of creepers that brought to mind a closed flower bud. Its bottom center had a still smoking breach.
“Better quicken the pace, boys!” said Lucetta’s echo. “That liquid fire crap is coming down the stairs!”
Deciding I needed to head back, I turned around. Scaring my heart into my ass was Yang Hur.
After saying “Fuck” in my head, my out loud words asked, “What is it, Yang?”
He twitched his head to the left and said, “Your sword understands more words than us, yes? I noticed unfamiliar markings on that mound. Could mean something.”
“I guess they could. Show me.”
I was taken to the darker side of the cavern. The mound the pirate spoke of did not appear to be anything more than a pile of rocks three feet tall, four feet wide, and fifteen feet long, but a closer inspection did reveal an unnatural roundness to it. One particular rock at the foot of the mound turned out to be a black block the size of a headstone. It was here Yang Hur pointed to symbols etched on to its surface. Half of the twenty-something symbols reminded me of the spiraled runes that cast the disorientation spells. The second set of symbols brought to mind raindrops but with an aura of flames surrounding them.
“Impossible,” said Aranath under his primordial breath.
“What’s impossible?”
“Nismerdons.”
“What?”
“Ancient beings with skin like bark and bones like iron. Even to the oldest dragons they belong to the annals of myth. I was barely more than a hatchling when I first heard fables of them and shown remnants of their language. Dragons brought a few of these fables to Orda, so humans do have a broad term for nismerdons in the shared tongue.”
“Which is?”
“Giants. This mound implies a giant over a dozen feet tall, but tales told of the largest being able to use grown trees as clubs. Exaggerations, I’m sure, but… The Advent said his master had awoken, yet this mound is untouched. We need light, quickly. Spread dragon stones further into the darkness.”
As the lieutenant announced that the rune was ready, I summoned a handful of stones and tossed them randomly into the cavern. Then I ignited them. Almost every lit flame exposed either intact mounds or, much more significantly, five that had been exhumed.
“Let’s go, Cyrus!” called Lucetta. “Your dad will have my ass if you’re not with me! And not in a good way!”
The pirate and I ran back to the entrance, where a bright orange light radiated from the top of the stairway. The rune had been carved large enough to fit a pair of people at a time. Lucetta and I thus went together.
“Hold your breath,” said Ghevont. “It’ll help make the shift of space less shocking.”
With his fingers touching the outer rim of the rune, the scholar triggered the teleportation spell by pouring his prana into the indentation. The prana crystal fitted in the center of the rune glowed blue just before it vanished and instantly replaced by a different patch of ground. The colder outside air rushed toward me and chattered my teeth. My eyes wanted to roll backwards and my skin tightened, but the expeditious trip could have kicked me in the nuts and I still would have appreciated getting out from under a godsdamn mountain.
Chapter Twelve
“That’s everyone,” said the lieutenant, who had teleported in with Ghevont.
“No,” said Lorcan, whose right leg was being tended to by a healer outside the rune. “Where is Menalcus?”
“I’m sorry, but Master Sheridan did not make it.”
My father lowered his eyes and nodded dolefully. In a rare show of tenderness, his wife knelt beside him and planted the softest kiss a woman could bestow on his cheek.
“Dad,” I said, getting on a knee to resist my lightheadedness and reach his eye level. “The Advent I fought, the one who hurt Clarissa, it was Alex.”
“What? Are you certain?”
“Yes. He looks a lot li
ke me. More than that, he recognized me, he remembers his past.”
“And why didn’t you tell me this sooner?! I could ha-”
“We were kind of busy, if you remember. I would have asked for your help if I thought it possible to attain it. There’s something else. He’s corrupted. He’s lucid, but there’s no doubt he’s corrupted. I tried getting through to him, but he sounds either confused or afraid when he talks.”
“Or perhaps he’s under the influence of a mind rune.” I knew better, but I nodded anyway. “At least he’s alive. We have a chance to save him.”
Clarissa lay rested near the pirate cluster. She was being looked after by a healer and now Ghevont. I sought to check up on her, finding the vampire squirming whenever someone touched her anywhere. I hoped the sunlight continued being blocked by the growing ash cloud billowing overhead. Ghevont began giving her what remained of her animal blood supply. My gift to her was not on her person. Not wanting to possibly lose it in the mountain had compelled her to hand it over to Leo for safe keeping.
“How long before she recovers?” I asked the scholar.
“Depends what parameters you’re using to track her progress. Walking won’t be advisable for another two or three days, and surely not over rugged terrain for at least a week. A steady stream of animal blood should strengthen her faster than regular food would for a human, but a full recovery of her energy is likely still two weeks away. I’d normally worry about infection if she were a human, but as she isn’t, the wound itself is more about pain tolerance, which she seems to have plenty of.”
“Should I give her more of my blood?”
“It would indeed fortify her more than the animal type, but if you wish for her to not gain a strong addiction to humans, I highly recommend abstaining from the impulse.”
“She said I taste terrible, though.”
“True, but let me put it this way—if you ate one bad orange, would you give up on the fruit altogether or attempt to seek one with a better flavor?”
“All right, point taken.”
“Diminish in unease, Mercer. As soon as the most intense pain dulls in a few hours, her personality and pleasant company will recover much faster than her physical state.”
Flight of the Dragon Knight Page 15
