Return of the Dragon (The Dragon's Champion Book 6)

by Ferguson, Sam

  Out of the corner of his eye, Gilifan saw that the dragon hunkered down as far away from the altar as it could get within the confines of the translucent shell.

  Gilifan spoke the words that Tu’luh taught him, bringing the dragon’s consciousness into line with his own. Then he switched into his own language and began the ritual of capturing souls. As it had on countless nights since the egg was brought into the chamber, the whole mountain seemed to vibrate with energy. A rushing wind swirled inside the chamber and the ground trembled. Lightning flashed down from the top of the chamber to hit part of the altar. The first victim cried out in fear just before Gilifan pulled her life force from her. Black lightning shot down and split the woman’s life force while Gilifan guided the bigger portion of the energy into his amulet and the smaller portion into the young silver dragon.

  The mercenaries were quick to toss the corpse aside and tie another sacrifice onto the altar.

  Gilifan repeated the steps. He first called the dragon’s consciousness, connecting it with his own before severing the life force from the sacrifice and placing it into the appropriate places. Over and over he continued the sacrifices. With each one, he could feel the force building within the amulet. He could also smell the tension in the air. The hairs on his arms and neck stood on end and his skin felt tiny shocks as the lightning struck each new victim. Soon, he would have enough power to move on to the ritual that would fuse Tu’luh with the young hatchling’s body.

  *****

  “What is that?” Maernok asked as he stared out the window.

  Salarion rose up from her bed. Her bare feet touched the floor and made no sound as she moved to the window. Her eyes saw a bright, violet glow to the east. “That is what we have been waiting for,” she said. “Tonight is the night that Tu’luh will rise again.”

  “Then we should move now,” Maernok said.

  Salarion shook her head. “Not yet. We have to wait for the ritual to be complete before we attempt to enter the mountain.”

  Maernok clenched his fists. “I am not accustomed to waiting. I think I have had my fill.”

  Salarion placed a delicate hand on his shoulder and pointed out to the street. “I have something else that will take your mind off of it,” she said.

  Maernok turned a questioning stare to her. “We go for the governor?” he asked.

  Salarion nodded. “Let’s go stick ourselves a pig.”

  Maernok slammed his left fist into his right palm and moved quickly to gather his weapons. Salarion gathered her clothes and changed into her armor. Her daggers and sword slipped into their places with hardly a sound and then the two exited the building.

  They stole their way across town. They slipped into alleyways and stuck in the shadows to avoid detection. The few guards they did encounter in the streets were so preoccupied with the growing light in the east that they hardly noticed anything else. More than once, Salarion had to stop Maernok from openly challenging the guards and remain focused on the task at hand.

  Each time, Maernok would explain that he was accustomed to slinking even less than waiting.

  They soon reached the governor’s manor. They circled around to the north side. Salarion picked the lock on a drainage grate and Maernok carefully pulled it free from its place. The hole was not large enough for Maernok, but Salarion was able to slip into it. The orc was forced to wait in an alley behind a large oak tree while Salarion moved toward the inside through the drainage tunnel. Salarion had told Maernok that it would take her roughly an hour to crawl through the tunnel and find the materials necessary to create a rope and toss it over the wall for him.

  In reality, she had no intention of using the orc’s help on this mission. A blunder at this point would disrupt their plans to slay Gilifan. That was a risk she could not accept.

  She kept herself steady with her palms as she slid upon her back, driving with her feet through the drainage tunnel. She knew it wouldn’t get her inside the actual manor. The governor’s sewer drainage was far below ground and would never be large enough for her to crawl through. This one however, was part of the drainage for the governor’s bath house.

  She snaked her way through the large pipe and then had to wiggle into a smaller section that curved ninety degrees upward. Her hands trembled as she maneuvered her arms upward. They came to rest firmly against an iron plate. She worked her fingers around the edges until she managed to tilt the plate. She slid a dagger free and pried against one side. The plate shifted, and after a few minutes it came loose. She use her left hand to guide the plate down to rest below her as quietly as possible. Then she squeezed herself up through the section where the plate had been. Once she was up, the pipe became a kind of bowl-shaped space just big enough for her to lay in if she curled around the edges. In the center of the bowl was another plate. This one was not going to be as simple as the first, however. It held the water for the bath. She gently placed the back of her hand to the plate. It was cool to the touch. That was a good sign. Had anyone been using, or planning to use, the bath it would have been hot.

  She worked her daggers around the plate-valve and managed to pry it open. The water coursed down into the drainage pipe below. Luckily, since she had removed the second plate, the bowl she was hiding in didn’t fill with water as it normally would have down before the weight of the draining water had opened the second valve. She still got plenty wet, but she could breathe while she waited.

  Ten minutes later, the bath was empty. She broke the top valve free, destroying both of her daggers in the process, and slipped up into the bath. The room around her was dark and smelled of cedar and sweat.

  She clambered out of the bath and exited the small building. It connected to a solarium that also served as a hallway joining the bath house to the main manor. She moved quickly through the hall until she found herself at a large, wooden door.

  She bent down and picked the lock. She moved in through the door and crept up a stone hallway. There weren’t as many guards inside as she had expected. She did have to duck into a doorway to avoid being spotted by a servant carrying a tray of food but otherwise there was no one to be seen.

  Guessing that the servant was taking dinner to the governor, she followed him. She was careful not to make any noise as they turned through several corridors and then made their way up two flights of stairs. When the servant disappeared in a room she heard a voice call out.

  “Did you bring me my spiced wine?”

  “Yes, my lord,” the servant replied.

  Salarion crept up near to the doorway and waited. When the servant came out, she sprang into action. Her right hand shot backward and caught the servant in the nose. The bone broke, snapping the man’s head back. Her left hand came in quick and hard in a knife-hand strike to the servant’s throat. The man fell to the ground.

  “Guards!” the governor shouted. His bulbous belly caught on the table when he tried to stand and ultimately knocked the goblet of wine onto the floor. The look of fear on his face only lasted for the two seconds it took Salarion to cross the room. Then she plunged her sword into his chest and the governor’s face twisted into one of pain.

  She ripped the sword free. She glanced to the other side of the room and saw a closed window. Salarion severed the man’s head and carried it by the hair with her as she ran to the window. She could hear shouting from out in the hall. She may not have seen the guards before, but they were coming swiftly now. She opened the window and checked her surroundings. She had hoped the wall would be close enough to jump over, or perhaps there might be a tree nearby, but there was no such luck. She could either climb down to the ground or up to the roof.

  Seeing as she had no idea how hard it would be to escape the gatehouse, she opted for the roof. Even carrying the severed head in her left hand she made easy work of scaling the side of the building. Once on top of the roof she ran to the opposite edge and then spied a large oak tree that might allow her to escape.

  Guards were shouting all around the groun
ds now and someone began ringing a bell. She would soon run out of time.

  Salarion ran toward the oak tree and leapt through the air. She landed lightly on a branch and gracefully rolled along the limb as only an elf could. Then she sprang up, circling the trunk and running out across a thick limb to leap onto the outer wall. Then she sat, flung her feet over the edge, and lowered herself down with one hand before dropping to the street. None of the guards ever caught so much as sight of her backside as she sprinted off to find Maernok.

  When she found him in the alley where she had left him, the scowl on his face was not a little intimidating. He looked down to the head and sneered wickedly.

  “You ever going to tell me the truth?” he asked.

  Salarion nodded. “We need to move, that is the truth.”

  Maernok grimaced and the two ran down through the alley. By the time they exited into another street, the city warning bells were ringing loudly. The turned around to the left and bowled right into a trio of guards. Salarion stuck one with her sword, and Maernok roared happily as he slammed the other two together to stun them. Then he kicked down on left guard’s knee, breaking it out backwards and punching the throat of the guard on his right. To finish it off, he drew his sword across them.

  The two continued running onward as some people began to look down from windows above and shout at them. Salarion threw the head into an open window and pulled on Maernok’s arm.

  “Why did you do that?” he asked.

  “We have friends there,” she answered.

  The door burst open within seconds and a score of armed men rushed out.

  “Fathers of victims?” Maernok asked.

  “And brothers too,” Salarion confirmed.

  They wound their way through the streets as bugle blasts sounded in several different houses.

  “The bugles mark our friends,” Salarion said.

  “When did you arrange that?” Maernok asked as they sprinted back to their hideout.

  “An elf has her ways,” she replied cryptically.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Erik made his way back to the Immortal Mystic. The snow was still all around, like a great blanket had been thrown over the realm, but it had ceased snowing at night so the snow that remained formed a crunchy crust. It made the trek much easier than it had been on the way down, not to mention warmer. Each day was a little longer than the last, bringing additional warmth and light. Not only did it help his body, but it lifted his spirits as well.

  It took several weeks, as it had before, to find the palace. As he rounded the narrow path around the mountainside he was struck by how different it all looked to him. Without the green grasses around, it almost appeared as though the palace itself was made of ice. It sparkled and shone bright in the sunlight, and was actually difficult to look at from some angles. He took a moment to admire its beautiful simplicity, and then he broke into a run.

  Jaleal was waiting for him at the door, grinning ear to ear and looking stronger than ever before.

  “What took you so long?” Jaleal asked.

  “It was harder than you might think,” Erik shot back.

  Jaleal grinned even wider. “Maybe for you,” he teased.

  The two went inside and Erik saw the Immortal Mystic standing before him. He pulled the Eyes of Dowr out and unwrapped them. “I found these,” he said. “They were trapped at the bottom of a brook, but Tatev helped me retrieve them.”

  “Tatev helped you?” Jaleal echoed quizzically. His bushy, white brows scrunched together.

  “What of the Infinium?” the Immortal Mystic asked.

  Erik smiled wide and slung his pack around his body. “I have it here as well. He reached in and pulled the thick book out from the other things he kept in the pack.

  “Have you tried to read it?”

  Erik shook his head. “Tatev was only able to read part of it, and he warned me about its dangers. If he couldn’t do it, then I figured I shouldn’t try.”

  “Let me see the glasses for a moment,” Jaleal said. He put out his small hand expectantly. Erik glanced to the Immortal Mystic and then offered the glasses to the gnome. Jaleal put them on and looked around. He started giggling softly to himself and then handed them back to Erik. “Put them on,” he said.

  Erik shot a puzzled look at Jaleal and slowly turned the glasses around to place them on his face. When he placed the magical glasses on his face, he staggered backward and would have surely tripped had he not backed into the door.

  The three of them were not alone. There were many people around them. They were all dressed in fine silk robes of white, red, green, blue, and yellow. Feeling Erik’s stare, many of them turned to greet him with nods or simple waves. None of them stopped to talk with him though. They were all busy walking through the palace. Erik couldn’t be sure what each of them were doing, but it was apparent that they had places to go and tasks underway.

  “What do you see?”

  Erik wasn’t listening. He walked farther into the palace to get a better look at things. Not only could he see men and women, but he was starting to see that the palace was not as empty as he had first thought. There were bookshelves, filled with books and scrolls, lining the walls of several rooms. There were pedestals, tables, chairs, and large carpets and tapestries throughout the inner palace. As he watched some of the people gather inside of a small room and grab a couple of books from the shelves, something strange happened to the walls themselves. A light blue energy flowed through the glass, humming sweetly and creating additional light within the room where they were reading from the books.

  A gentle hand fell upon Erik’s shoulder. It wasn’t so rough that it broke his focus as he watched what was happening, but it was hard enough so that he was not startled when the Immortal Mystic spoke to him.

  “They are studying,” he said. “The energy that comes to the room helps them to be prepared for further enlightenment.”

  “But, are they dead?” Erik asked. “Why can’t I see them without the glasses?”

  “They are spirits,” the Immortal Mystic replied. “As for why you cannot see them, well that is because your mind is weak. With your dragon blood, you have the ability to see not only the auras of living things, but the spirits of all that have passed on.”

  “But what of the books?” Erik asked. “Furniture and books have no spirits, so why can I not see those things without the glasses?”

  The Immortal Mystic laughed softly. “All that exists physically, also exists spiritually. It is something you will get used to as your mind expands. “Come, I have something to show you.”

  Erik moved to take the glasses off, but the Immortal Mystic told him to keep them on. He then led him down the first corridor on the right. They walked for several hundred feet, passing chambers and rooms on either side of the hallway. Erik would look through the glass to see groups, or sometimes individuals, deep in study. At the end of the hallway, the Immortal Mystic opened a door that led to a stairway spiraling down into the ground.

  As they descended the stairs Erik realized that the light was coming from the light blue energy flowing through the walls, the stairs, and the ceiling above. It was almost as if the palace was not made of glass, but of this energy and that the glass was a covering for it.

  They descended deep into the mountain. The air remained warm and dry, but they walked downward for nearly thirty minutes before they finally reached the bottom. The Immortal Mystic put his hands on the door, which even though it was also made of the same glass as the rest of the palace, had so much energy flowing through it that it appeared nearly solidly blue in color.

  “What I am about to show you may come as a bit of a surprise,” the Immortal Mystic said.

  The door moved silently as it glided open.

  Erik’s eyes were assaulted by an exceedingly bright light, far whiter than anything he had ever seen before in his life. He raised his arms up to shield himself from the brightness while at the same time he felt an inviting warmth
wrap around him. He felt a gentle push from behind.

  He walked through the doorway and heard a powerful roar. He moved his arms enough to peer around them while still trying to adjust to the light. The room, if it could be called that, was so large that Erik could not see any walls except the one behind him. About thirty feet in front of him stood a massive dragon. Its legs were blue and gray. Its snout was covered in shiny scales that only accentuated the sharp fangs protruding out from under the lips. A thick pair of horns grew up and back from the rear of the skull, ending in sharp points that would put any spear to shame.

  The dragon growled, but not in a menacing or threatening way. Then it turned aside and let Erik take in the full sight beyond.

  There were dozens of dragons. All shapes and sizes mixed in together in a giant chamber that seemed endless. There were blue and red skytes darting about through the air like sparrows. There were wingless drakes that walked upon all fours and breathed fire and wisps of smoke. There were greater drakes that had wings, larger dragons, and then there was a group far in the distance that appeared to be as large, or much larger, than Tu’luh the Red.

  “What is this place?” Erik asked.

  “Behold, the true source of knowledge and wisdom of the mystics!” The Immortal Mystic stepped around Erik and gestured out to the dragons. “This is where the prophecies originated. The dragons can read the very threads of time and fate, and they interpret them and pass them out as dreams and visions. Sometimes they also personally speak of their insights to the mystics.”

  “How many are there?” Erik asked.

  The Immortal Mystic smiled. He took Erik’s hand and the two floated up into the air as if upon a large platform. As Erik was lifted up, he saw not dozens, not scores, but hundreds of dragons.

  “There are more dragons here than can be counted by a mortal. They use their combined wisdom in an effort to guide the mortals of this world. They all seek the same thing as you.” The Immortal Mystic turned and pointed to the Infinium. “They wish to stop the four horsemen from destroying this world.”