The Legend of Drak'Noir

by Ploof, Michael James

  “Please, master. I can heal him, just give me a chance.”

  Kazimir hit her with a spell that took her off her feet then pushed her right through the window. He focused on her cries until they abruptly stopped, and then moved to the window to make sure. The witch lay broken on the rocks below, and Kazimir spit out the window. “It is impossible to find good help these days,” he mumbled to himself.

  Zuul wailed until he was blue in the face, and Kazimir swiftly cast a dome of silence around the crib. He had planned on confronting the champions and setting them straight, but now it seemed there were more important matters at hand.

  “Darklings!” Kazimir barked, and the four shrouded spirits moved through the walls into the room as if they had been waiting to be summoned.

  “What do you want,” said one.

  “I need a new babysitter, and I need one quick. Seek out the witch, Hazel Wartly. You will find her in the Blight near the coast. Fly swiftly now, for there is no time to dilly-dally!”

  “We do not take orders from you,” said the closest darkling.

  “You always were a pain in the ass, you know that?”

  The darkling waited, floating a few feet above the cold stone.

  “You may not answer to me, but if Zuul dies, you sure as hell will. Do what I say, or else…”

  “One of these days, Kazimir,” said the darkling, his invisible body shaking beneath the tattered robes.

  Kazimir shook his watch with his wrist. “Tick-tock, you dark stains. Now go. Unless you want Zuul to die. He has signed everything over to me, you know, including your souls.”

  Without another word, the darklings disappeared, and Kazimir turned to check on the ailing Dark Lord. Kazimir could still see Zuul screaming, and he went to his many spell and potions books to try and find something to alleviate his pain and reverse the toxin. He realized grudgingly that he had acted too hastily with the witch, and he should have first asked her what she had done for the child and what kind of poison it had been that he ingested. Without knowing what type of poison was coursing through Zuul’s veins, Kazimir would not be able to treat him. He noticed with relief that a book lay open on the shelf near the bookcase, and a quill and ink jar sat beside an open scroll, scribbled with the writing of the late witch. He scanned her notes and soon realized that she hadn’t gotten far in discovering what afflicted Zuul, but she had recorded her attempts at a cure, and Kazimir at least knew what hadn’t worked. Potions had never been his strong suit, and he knew that the clever Zorromon would have likely enchanted the poison to become stronger if any spells were used to try to destroy it.

  With a wave of his hand, Kazimir dispelled the silencing globe. Zuul’s screams echoed through the chamber maddeningly, and between those hellish cries, his breath rattled in his chest. He was dying, Kazimir realized, and he glanced at his watch. If the darklings did not return soon with Witch Hazel, all would be lost.

  Kazimir picked up the swaddled Zuul and bounced him in his arms. “There, there, little Zuul, help is on the way.”

  Zuul screamed and pulled Kazimir’s beard.

  Kazimir cursed under his breath and paced the chamber, trying to silence the little terror. “Hush little Zuul-Zuul, don’t you cry, all your enemies are going to die. Hush little Zuul-Zuul, don’t say a word, or Kazimir’ll change you into a turd.”

  Zuul cried and thrashed, yanked handfuls of beard, and even vomited on Kazimir’s robes. Disgusted, Kazimir tossed him back in the crib none too gently. He tapped his robes with his wand and spoke a word, causing the vomit to disappear.

  “You are the Dark Lord reborn!” he yelled over the infant’s wailing. “Can’t you tell me what is ailing you?”

  In his fevered state, Zuul seemed not to hear a word, and Kazimir cast a silencing globe over him once more. Silence filled the room, and Kazimir sighed with relief. He went to his crystal ball and waved a hand over it, saying, “Show me Murland Kadabra.”

  The glowing mist inside the crystal ball swirled, changing color and slowly focusing on a hammock swaying in a large room. Murland appeared to be sleeping, and the other companions could be seen as well, including Valkimir, Caressa, and Hagus. Kazimir caused the image to zoom out and found that they were on the Iron Fist, which was sailing west somewhere in the North Sea. Zooming out again, he discovered that they were north of the Northern Blight.

  “So, your friends have told you the truth of the quest, yet you still sail west to certain doom. What is your game?” He stroked his beard in thought, wondering what he should do next. Surely Hinckley had found Murland; why then was he still with his friends and not coming to destroy Zuul once and for all?

  He pondered this and many other things as he paced the chamber, waiting impatiently for the darklings to return.

  ***

  Headmaster Hinckley ended the spell and inspected his work. The young wizard that he had been working on smiled up at him, looking relieved. “Thank you, Headmaster.”

  “You are quite welcome. Now get some rest. I have reset the bone, now your body needs to heal on its own.”

  Hinckley rose from the side of the sick bed and surveyed the many injured wizards, thinking how lucky they had been. Seven wizards had died during Kazimir’s retaliation, and many more had been hurt. The floating college still sat smoldering atop the Wide Wall, and though the many skilled high wizards were hard at work reversing the damage, it would be many days before the college could once again take to the sky. The rare and powerful levitation crystal that powered the floating college had been shattered, and fixing it would take the combined efforts of every wizard not laid up in bed.

  “There you are,” said High Wizard Fracco.

  “Here I am,” said Hinckley, leaning on his staff and ambling out of the medical tent that had been provided by the guardians of the Wall.

  “Well, what happened? Where is Murland Kadabra?”

  Hinckley chuckled and leaned against the battlements looking west. He lit his pipe before replying, “He told me to go to hell, in more colorful words.”

  “What? Why would he say that?”

  “Because he has character. He cares too much for the other companions to leave them to a fool’s fate. What’s more, Princess Caressa of Magestra is with him.”

  “And they plan on continuing with the quest, knowing that it is doomed?”

  “Ain’t that some shit?” said Hinckley, unable to help a laugh.

  “But…surely they are doomed. Who then will stop Zuul?”

  “Murland Kadabra will, after he helps to defeat Drak’Noir. Or that is his plan anyway.”

  Fracco rubbed the back of his neck and paced. “Is it even possible to defeat the dragon?”

  “Who is to say? We have never tried. But I believe that it is time for the wizards of Fallacetine to help be rid of this threat once and for all. Kazimir cannot march fools to her forever, and if not us, then our ancestors will be left with the problem.”

  “You don’t mean…”

  “I do. Once the levitation crystal is repaired, we fly to Bad Mountain.”

  Chapter 14

  Tales From the Crow’s Nest

  Gibrig held Hagus’s braided beard as his father puked over the rail. Hagus hacked and spit, wiping his mouth and pulling his head back up over the rail.

  “Sorry ye be gettin’ so seasick, Pap,” said Gibrig.

  “Ain’t yer fault.”

  “Well, I mean, ye wouldn’t be on the ship if it weren’t for me.”

  Hagus regarded his son with his good eye, adjusting his patch as he composed himself. “Now why ye always be feelin’ guilty ‘bout everythin’?”

  Gibrig shrugged, thinking of his mother, and Gillrog.

  His father regarded him knowingly and looked out over the choppy waters, where the reflection of the moon danced and shattered, only to be reborn again on the choppy waters. “What be on yer mind, lad?”

  Gibrig swallowed hard, and his eyes teared up. He wiped them with his sleeve and glanced at his father
, but the old dwarf rested leisurely, elbows on the rail, hands busy packing a pipe with Vhalovian tobacco.

  “When I was dyin’…I ended up on the Mountain in the Clouds.”

  Hagus regarded him disbelievingly, pipe hanging precariously from his chapped lips. “No.”

  “Aye, it be true. And I saw me gran’pap, Forgor.”

  “Ye be fibbin’ lad?”

  “I swear on Mother’s mossy grave.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned. What did me pap say to ye?”

  “He told me how I had a choice to be makin’. I could either stay in the Mountain forever, or return to the world o’ the livin’.”

  “Ye tellin’ me that ye turned down paradise,” said Hagus, arms spread wide, “for this shithole?”

  “Aye. But he told me somethin’ else, Pap. Somethin’ ‘bout Gillrog.”

  Hagus’s eyes went wide, and he grabbed Gibrig by the shoulders. “Did me Gill make it to the Mountain?”

  Gibrig shook his head, hot tears wetting what few whiskers grew on his cheeks. “Gan’pap said…he said that Gillrog be stuck in the In-Between.”

  “No,” Hagus breathed, and his hands tightened on Gibrig’s shoulders painfully.

  “I keep havin’ dreams o’ Gill all alone and cold in a deep black nothingness. And I know it be me fault, Pap! I shoulda said somethin’ different up there on Ruger’s Ridge. I shoulda done somethin’ different. Even afore that. I shoulda stopped them boys from teasin’ him so. But…but, damned me to all hells, I didn’t want that terrible attention on me. So, I let Gill take the worst o’ it. Might as well o’ been me who pushed him over that ledge!”

  “Ah, Gib,” said Hagus, and he pulled his son tight, kissing his head. “It ain’t yer fault. Ye hear me?”

  What came out of Gibrig’s mouth was a primal, incoherent cry of misery. He wanted to say that he was sorry, that he would trade places with his brother if he could, that he would trade places with his mother if he could, but all that came out was a childlike mewling in deep sobs that left him breathless.

  “There, there, Gibrig. It ain’t yer fault. Ye hear? If anyone be at fault, it be me. I be his father after all, and it was me job to keep him safe, to keep ye both safe. I shoulda seen the change in him. I shoulda known what them other boys done put ye through.”

  Gibrig and his father cried in each other’s arms until there were no more tears left. At length, Hagus released his son and uncorked a silver flask. He handed it to a sniffling Gibrig before producing yet another and uncorking it as well.

  “To Gillrog,” said Hagus, voice cracking. “May his spirit find the Mountain in the Clouds.”

  “To Gillrog,” said Gibrig, tapping his father’s flask and drinking down the entire contents.

  He wiped his chin and burped, then put a hand on his father’s shoulder, instantly feeling the effects of the strong rum. “I be gettin’ Gillrog out o’ there. I swear it on me mother’s soul, before ye, and before the gods themselves. I be swearin’ it.”

  Hagus straightened and offered his son a nod of respect. “And I’ll be right there by yer side.”

  ***

  Willow sat back against the smooth wood of the poop deck, listening to the two dwarves. She had overheard their conversation and ducked below the rail, wanting to give them privacy. She had meant to give it to them, but found that she could not move. She listened, enthralled and saddened, and she had cried with them.

  Even the wheelwoman, who stood like a sentinel, steadily steering the Iron Fist, sniffled and wiped at her eyes now and again.

  Willow thought of her own child, Fern, whom she had given up to the blue-skins of South Swamp. She would be what, two years old now? Fern would be walking and talking, and Willow wondered, who did she call Mamma?

  Sorrow choked her and tears spilled on the deck as she crawled to the short staircase. She picked herself up, hoping to go unseen, and headed for the stairs that would bring her belowdeck. Thankfully, neither Hagus nor Gibrig seemed to notice her. Sulking, she lumbered past the mess hall, past the common room, and into the dimly lit hallway leading to the many storage bays. She opened one and hurried inside as the tears began to fall.

  Willow cried in the darkness, but then a small blue light lit the room, revealing sacks of sugar, flour, grains, dried meats, and barrels of drinking water, cider, and spirits.

  “Dingleberry, that you?”

  “Yup yup,” came the happy voice of the sprite. “I’m caught handed red-red.”

  Willow looked closer and gave a weak laugh when she saw the sugar covering the sprite’s face. “McArgh catches you in here, she’ll have your wings,” she warned.

  Dingleberry landed on Willow’s shoulder, looking concerned, and stroked Willow’s braided head with her tiny hand. “What-what’s got you low-low, Willow?”

  “Just thinking about Fern again.”

  “Oh,” said Dingleberry, hanging her head.

  “Ever since the Long Sand and the blasted jinn, I’ve been dreaming of her every night.”

  Dingleberry sighed, leaning against her. “Well, it’s never too late-late. Maybe, once we’ve defeated Drak-Drak, we can go-go to the tribe of blue-blues.”

  “What if…what if she don’t like me?”

  “Silly Milly, what’s not to like-like? You’ve got a big-big…heart, and you’re fun-fun, and brave-brave.”

  “I know, but I gave her up,” said Willow. She started to cry again and wiped her wide nose with the back of her hand. “I gave up that beautiful little ogre, just so my parents wouldn’t know I made whoopy out of wedlock.”

  “What they going to care-care when you return home a champ-champ?”

  “They might not say they do, but I know they will be disappointed in me.”

  Dingleberry gave a sigh. “Sometimes, what’s done is done-done. If they love you, they will forgive you.”

  “Like your parents?”

  “No-no. They still mad as hell-hells. No going back-back for Dingleberry.”

  “That’s not true. You know, Sir Eldrick seems to be pretty close with the queen of the fae. Perhaps he can get her to lift your sentence.”

  “You think-think?” said Dingleberry. She fluttered into the air and did a spin. “That would be…maybe you could come-come, see Faeland too.”

  “It’s a date,” said Willow, smiling.

  Chapter 15

  The Eye of the Storm

  The Iron Fist sailed west with the wind at her back and clear skies overhead for two days. On the morning of the third day, however, dark, foreboding clouds began to gather in the north. The wind picked up toward the afternoon, and a blanket of angry clouds covered the sky. No rain came, and no lightning, but Ravenwing warned that war was brewing between the sea gods, and that by the witching hour, many upon the Iron Fist would be fed to the ocean.

  Caressa was shaken up by the news, and she watched the gathering storm closely through the porthole in the companions’ quarters. Hagus, on the other hand, dismissed the dark sorcerer’s prophecy as gibberish, saying that there weren’t no gods of the sea, only those of the mountain. Sir Eldrick knew better than to disregard a magic user’s words of warning, and so he too kept a vigil, and sat most of the day in a crow’s nest with Akitla at his side. Murland comforted Caressa, though he wondered about Ravenwing’s powers and whether or not she foresaw the death of any of the companions. Willow was more concerned with dinner, and saying that she was in the mood for “comfort food,” had disappeared to the kitchen with Dingleberry to help whip up a hearty dinner—one that many joked would be the last for some on the ship. Indeed, the lady pirates seemed calm, even excited in the face of the grave prediction.

  A few hours before nightfall the wind died down to a lull, and the thick curtain of low-hanging clouds seemed frozen in time, ominously hovering above the ship and its crew.

  “Maybe the sea gods have come to a truce,” said Akitla with a half-hearted laugh.

  Beside her in the crow’s nest, Sir Eldrick watched the silent skie
s. “No, this is but the calm before the storm. I believe that Ravenwing is correct, it is going to be a bad one.”

  “Have you ever experienced storm waters?” his daughter asked.

  “Yes, many times. I was even thrown overboard once. I was drunk, of course, and woke up two-hundred miles away on the shore of an island inhabited by pygmies.”

  “Pygmies?”

  “Yes, peaceful enough little people. I spent two weeks with them before a Magestrian anthropological team found the island and me. They said that I had been the first Fallacetine to set foot on it, and I had therefore discovered it. To this day it bears the name Eldrick Island.”

  Akitla stared at her father in playful disbelief. “I cannot tell if that is the truth or a lie.”

  “It is the truth, I swear on the life of the queen.”

  “What queen?”

  “Well, my…” he began, and was about to say his own queen, the beautiful Elzabethalynn Winterthorn, but she was his queen no longer. “It is a figure of speech, is all. It is about as high a swear to truth as you can make, aside from that of your own kin’s souls.”

  “But it is just words,” said Akitla. “I like the Shivermoorian way much better. If a man lies, he dies. Easy enough. And it keeps people honest.”

  Sir Eldrick laughed. “I bet it does. But what if a woman lies?”

  She shrugged. “There are no laws against it.”

  “What about you? Do you lie?”

  She glanced at him with a strange scowl, as though she had either never considered it or thought him rude for asking. “Are you trying to determine whether or not Mother brought me up…what is the word, honorably?”

  “I would be a liar if I denied it,” he said, offering her a quick wink.

  “And you would be put to death,” she said with a devilishly cocked brow. “But no. I do not lie, neither to others nor to myself. For that is the greatest sin.”