Dragon Venom (Obsidian Chronicles Book 3)

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  He moved his hands up the shaft, squeezed, and thrust downward again.

  Thick dark blood welled up around the shaft, then spurted up on his hands and face, and the dragon collapsed beneath him.

  Bravely done, child.

  Arlian turned to see the other dragon still watching, still making no hostile move. He took a shuddering breath, then asked, "Will you attempt to kill me now, or will you continue to let me live for the sake of your offspring?"

  I think that Fate chose its agents well.

  "What?" He coughed as he pulled the spear from the already-decaying body of the dead dragon.

  What would I gain from your death? I came to destroy a godling, to preserve the freedom of my race; you have made that impossible. If Fate is working to restore the gods then it is nearing its goal. Oh I could eat your soul, and I would surely relish so rare a person as yourself but then my own child would be lost.

  As it finished this speech it began to withdraw its head. The collapsed kitchen ceiling was gone, and Arlian could see that the house above was entirely gone as well; he could see the dragon rear up its long neck and spread its gigantic wings.

  "Wait!" he called.

  He knew it was madness. He knew this was utterly insane. The

  dragon had just said it would let him live. It had just agreed to depart, to give up its attempts on Ithar—and he was calling it back.

  But he had a reason, a reason he had lived with since boyhood. This was not just any dragon. This was the dragon that had killed his grandfather. This was the dragon he had sworn vengeance upon a hundred times over the years. This was the dragon he had dreamed of for more than twenty years—and had dreamed of killing for more than twenty years. This was the dragon whose poison had robbed him of his humanity, replaced his own heart with obsession and hatred.

  He had let it live once, in the cave in the Sawtooth Mountains, for the sake of a greater good, but now, here, there was no such reason for restraint.

  The dragon, however, did not wait. It sprang upward, wings flapping, and the wind from its ascent knocked Arlian from his perch atop the dead dragon's spine; he tumbled and slid down the rotting black flesh to the broken flagstones of the kitchen floor, his head whacking hard on the stone.

  He lay dazed for a moment, staring up at swirling smoke and streaks of fire against a background of thick black clouds.

  With the dragons gone and the kitchen open to the sky much of the smoke had cleared away, and after a moment his head cleared, as well.

  He sat up.

  The Grey House was a ruin; scattered fires were still burning here and there in the wreckage. The dead dragon towered before him. filling half the kitchen, all of the kitchen yard, and a portion of the demolished stables, but its flesh was already shrinking and falling away, exposing corners and edges of bone.

  Arlian remembered what the dragons had said about killing gods; he would want to save some of those bones, just in case.

  Over the crackling of the flames he could hear screaming, roaring, crashing, shouting—the dragons had obviously not yet all departed Manfort. Some might have abandoned the hunt, but others apparently had not; presumably there were factions among the dragons, as among humans, and at least one faction still fought.

  And the dragon that killed his grandfather was still out there. It might be flying back to the Shoulderbone, or to some new, as yet undiscovered lair. It might be wheeling to attack the Duke's soldiers, or digging for Enziet's escape tunnel.

  And Arlian intended to And it and kill it. He had sworn as much over and over. The beast had let him live when it could have killed him, but that didn't matter—he had to kill it. He bad to.

  He could not get out through the kitchen yard; the dead dragon blocked that route completely. He would have to go out through the rest of the house. He turned, and stumbled toward what remained of the arched doorway into the passage to the dining hall.

  The little corridor was surprisingly intact, but the dining hall was gone—and he discovered then that there was more than one dead dragon in the wreckage of the Grey House.

  This one had been dead a few minutes longer, by the look of it; the catapult bolts that bristled from it were sagging, twisting the rotting skin, dropping free. The stinking mass nonetheless formed an impassa-ble barricade. He retreated to the kitchen and tried another door.

  That one was blocked by fallen stone.

  He tried every possible route, and all were barricaded by either debris or decaying dragon. He looked up at the fetid remains of the dragon he had slain and considered trying to climb over, or at least clamber up its skull to get up atop the piles of stone, but then another thought struck him.

  The dragon he wanted had surely gone by now—but so had Black

  and Ithar and the rest, and the hidden tunnel was a way out of this ruin.

  He could help Brook out, as well.

  With that, he turned, shoved aside a few blocks of stone, and found the cellar stairs. "Brook!" he called—or tried to; the smoke and strain had finally gotten to his throat, and he could not manage much more than a croak.

  No one answered. Arlian swallowed, trying to clear his throat, as he staggered down the stone steps.

  At the bottom he called again. "Brook!"

  "Ari?"

  He turned, and saw her in the shadows, rolling her chair forward slowly. "Yes," he said.

  "What's happened? Are the dragons coming?"

  "I don't think so," he said. "I think we should find that tunnel and get out of here—the house is a ruin."

  "Are you sure? We won't be leading them to Ithar?"

  "They can sense him—but they know they can't reach him in the tunnel. As long as Ithar is underground he's safe."

  "Then we need to warn them!" she shouted. "They'll bring him out at the other end of the tunnel if we don't!"

  "Oh," Arlian said, suddenly feeling extraordinarily stupid. "They might." He looked around the cellars. An oil lamp was mounted on a wall bracket by the stairs, and Brook held a thick candle, but beyond that everything was dark—if the dragons had broken through from above anywhere, Arlian could not see it. "Where was the entrance?"

  "I don't know," Brook said. "That way, maybe?"

  Arlian peered into the gloom in the direction she indicated, and tried to remember where he had last heard Black's voice. "Maybe," he said. He moved behind Brook's chair and pushed.

  The two of them searched the cellars for what seemed like hours, investigating every dark corner and disturbed cobweb, before finally stumbling upon the butcher's cupboard with the double latch. Releasing the first latch let the cupboard door swing open, revealing a tin-lined interior where a rack of hooks held nothing but dust; releasing the second latch let the entire cupboard swing forward, revealing a door-sized opening in the stone wall behind it.

  As they searched, the house and city above them gradually quieted.

  When they finally inspected the butcher's cupboard for the third time they could no longer hear anything but their own breath and a distant muttering.

  Had Brook not finally noticed the child-sized fingerprints on the mechanism, they might never have discovered this entrance.

  "It was fortunate that your daughters are inquisitive little creatures,"

  Arlian remarked as he stepped cautiously into the opening. "I doubt an adult would ever have found that second latch." He held up a candle and studied the passageway.

  It was, indeed, a tunnel, dark and cool and smelling of stone, its walls seamless black. It measured perhaps four feet wide and six feet high; Arlian had to stoop slightly to avoid hitting his head on the arched ceiling. It did not, however, lead directly away from the cellars, as he had expected; rather, it paralleled the cellar wall, extending out of sight in both directions, offering him two choices.

  And to his surprise and dismay, the cobwebs had been torn away and the dust on the floor smeared by many feet in both directions. He knelt, candle in hand, and studied the footprints.

  There ap
peared to be more ot them to the right, and those were pointed in both directions; to the left all seemed to head away from his present location.

  "Ah," he said. He stood up and explained to Brook, "They went that way at first," pointing to the right, "but then turned back for some reason and came back and went on that way," pointing to the left.

  "The tunnel was probably blocked," she suggested.

  "Probably." He pushed her chair over the sill into the tunnel and turned her to the left. "Come on, then."

  "Hello!" she called into the darkness ahead. "Black? Kerzia?"

  No one answered, and Arlian pushed the chair forward into the gloom.

  The tunnel seemed endless. There was a bad moment when they

  reached an intersection where a side tunnel ran off to the right, but a quick look at the undisturbed cobwebs in that direction convinced Arlian and Brook to continue straight along the passage, following the footsteps of the others.

  Then, abruptly, Arlian stopped. "Listen," he whispered.

  Brook leaned forward in her chair, then smiled and shouted, "Here!

  We're here!"

  "Mother!" a distant voice replied, followed by the sound of running feet. Arlian made out a dim light, far down the tunnel but nearing rapidly.

  A moment later Amberdine was climbing into her mother's lap,

  while Dirinan clung to Brook's leg and Kerzia stood nearby. Behind her Ithar slept in his father's arms, and beyond that Arlian could see Stammer, Venlin, Lilsinir, and three or four others.

  "What happened?" he asked Black.

  "I would ask you the same," Black replied, with a crooked smile.

  "Your tale first, then mine."

  Stories were exchanged. Black's party had chosen to turn right at first, and had followed the tunnel for some distance before emerging into the burning ruins that they had only with effort identified as the remains of the Citadel. The defenses had been demolished, and the main structures burned to the ground; dragons were everywhere. Black had immediately turned the party around and led them back down the tunnel, through an opening in a structure so thoroughly devastated that he could not say with any assurance how the tunnel had originally been concealed.

  There had been some argument about whether or not to return to the Grey House, but the consensus had been to continue down the other way—a decision that had been assisted significantly by the discovery that they did not know how to open the butcher's cupboard from the back; there was no obvious mechanism.

  The left-hand tunnel had eventually brought them out in an empty house in the lower part of the city, not far from the wall; the exit was through the back of a large fireplace, and they had propped it open before emerging.

  Almost as soon as they emerged, however, the house came under attack. There were still loaded catapults in that part of the city, so Manfort's defenders had put up a fight, but Black had seen no point in staying where the dragons might eventually reach them, and had led most of the group back down into the tunnel. A few of the servants had scattered, with Black's blessing, to make their own way.

  "We were going to try the side tunnel," Black said, "and if that was no better we would simply stay down here until the fighting was done."

  "Wise, very wise," Arlian said. "It would seem the dragons can track Ithar, as they can track Brook and me. They are reluctant to dig down to this tunnel, however, as their size works against them in confined places." He glanced back the way he had come and did some quick estimating. "I would guess that the side tunnel leads to a certain abandoned establishment on the Street of the Black Spire," he remarked.

  "You could be right," Black said. "Now, though, tell us what happened at the Grey House."

  Arlian quickly explained, though he made no attempt to convey the entirety of his conversations with the two dragons.

  "Wh . . . wh . . . what do we do now, my lord?" Stammer asked.

  "You wait here—you, and Ithar, and Brook, and the children. I am going to go aid in the battle you describe, down by the wall, and see if I, as warlord, can give a few orders. And when the fighting is done I will return for you, if I can, or send someone, if I live but cannot come myself—or if I die, I would suggest you wait here until thirst and hunger become a serious issue, and then find your way out as best you can."

  "Yes, my lord."

  "I'm g o i n g . . . " Black began. Then he looked at his wife, his four children, and the long, empty tunnel. "I'll stay here, if you don't mind,"

  he said.

  "I entirely approve," Arlian said. "You have always been a protector, not a dragonslayer. Guard your family, and see that Ithar lives."

  Then he pressed past Brook's chair and children and trotted quickly down the tunnel.

  A Harvest of Death

  50

  A Harvest of Death

  Arlian emerged from the cold fireplace into yet another firelit ruin one face of the house had been torn away, and the stinking black remains of a rotting dragon, bristling with spears, now lay across the broken stones of what had once been an entryway, one of its tattered wings stretched upward to where the tip of the wingbone had caught on a jagged fragment of cornice.

  The rest of the house was largely intact, and the effect was somewhat disorienting—dusty drapes hung undisturbed, and closed doors guarded rooms that were now open to the street.

  Arlian picked his way across the scattered stones and past the dragon's staring dead eyes, then stopped in his tracks as a drop of venom fell from its jaws and hissed on the pavement. He stared for a moment, then turned and headed back into the house, searching.

  A moment later he returned with a glass jar in his right hand and a kitchen knife in his left, and knelt to slit open the venom sac at the base of the dead monster's jaw. He filled the jar, then stood and made his way carefully out into the street.

  The fighting had moved on again, as he had expected—the drag-

  ons were tracking Ithar, flying above the city out of catapult range, waiting for the infant to emerge again. He could neither see nor hear any actual combat at present, though he could see flames and smoke rising from the Upper City, and there were still soldiers hurrying through the streets, their white and blue uniforms bright against the gray stone and black smoke, black-tipped spears in their arms.

  "Ho!" he bellowed, as best he could with his dry throat. "You there, guard!"

  A soldier stopped and demanded, "Who are you?"

  "I am Lord Obsidian, the Duke's warlord," Arlian replied. "I have new orders."

  "Orders?" The entire party of half a dozen soldiers had stopped now, and turned to listen. "We don't have any orders; we're just fighting the dragons and the fires wherever we can, and gathering up spears we can bring back up for the catapults to use anew."

  "Good man! I commend your courage and initiative. I have instructions, though, that might put an end to the dragon's attacks."

  The guards traded uncertain looks.

  "How do we know you're the warlord?" one of them asked.

  Before Arlian could reply another said, "That's Lord Obsidian. I was with him at Norva eight years ago."

  "I've seen him in the Citadel," another confirmed.

  The others did not appear to be completely convinced, but they turned their attention to Arlian without further protest.

  "You live in Manfort, all of you?" Arlian asked.

  The uncertain looks became more hostile. "Yes, we live here," one man replied. "What of it?"

  "You have family here?"

  "Some of us. Why?"

  "Are any of your wives or sisters expecting children? I have a magic that may drive the dragons away, but it requires pregnant women—as many of them as we can find."

  The soldiers stared silently at him for a long moment; then one said,

  "My aunt is expecting a child."

  "Excellent!" Arlian lifted the jar of venom. "Take me to her."

  "What will this spell of yours do?" the soldier asked, not moving.

  Arlian hes
itated.

  The temptation to lie was strong, but he resisted. He was trying to create a new and better world from the ruins that surrounded them; to found that world on a lie would be wrong.

  uIt will make the mother-to-be a dragonheart," he said, "and it will make die child a god."

  The disbelief was plain on their faces. One turned away in disgust.

  "I have done this before," Arlian said hastily. "I have made a god of my steward's child—that is why the dragons have broken the truce and attacked Manfort, because they fear these godlings above all else. They sought to destroy the one I made, and kill me before we could make others."

  The departing soldier ignored him, but the others exchanged

  glances. "You caused this?" one soldier demanded, waving his spear at the surrounding chaos.

  Arlian glanced around at the tumbled walls, the scattered spearshafts and shards of obsidian, the broken shutters and shattered tile strewn in the streets; he took a deep breath of the smoky, dusty air.

  "The dragons did this," he said, "and whatever my part in it, it is too late to undo it. The dragons have come, and they seek to kill the child, even at the cost of many of their own kind." He gestured at the rotting black hulk behind him. "But if there were many children—dozens, or hundreds, spread through the city—the dragons could not destroy them all before they, themselves, are slain, and in a few years we will have divine assistance, gods who will guard us as the dead gods did thousands of years ago."

  "I don't believe in the gods," another soldier said.

  Arlian grimaced. "Whatever you believe, at least offer your aunt the chance to become a dragonheart, and transform her child into something magical and new."

  The guards exchanged glances again.

  "I want no part of this," one of them said, turning away.

  "This is all madness," said another, "but the world has gone mad."

  "How do we do it?" asked the man with the pregnant aunt.

  Arlian smiled, and explained.