Dragons Reborn

by Daniel Arenson

  "Domi!" he shouted, but he could not see her. Above, the firedrakes were streaming south, leaving the debris behind.

  The Templers had come here with ships and firedrakes and paladins, Gemini realized. Better armed, better organized, better trained, they had shattered the pathetic flotilla of the Horde, and now they moved on.

  Leaving me.

  The Temple's ships sailed away, growing more distant until they were only floating lights in the darkness like fireflies. The firedrakes flew above them, their shrieks only distant echoes, memories of their wrath. Gemini remained, bobbing in the rising and falling water, as all around him scraps of wood blazed, the last few masts sank into the dark depths, and men screamed as they slipped down, down, down into darkness and silence, leaving him too.

  MERCY

  She flew on her firedrake, hundreds more flying around her, hundreds of ships sailing below, and she saw it in the distance, a line of light upon the black horizon: the coast of Terra.

  The land that tried to topple us. Mercy tightened her jaw and clutched her lance. The land that harbored the weredragons. The land that sought to darken the light of my lord. She bared her teeth. The land I will destroy.

  Behind her rose the smoke and fire of the fleet she had drowned, the enemy she had vanquished. She had sent hundreds of ships down into the depths, slain myriads of warriors. She was a queen of conquest, a bringer of blood, a holy warrior of the Spirit, the vengeful blade of her faith. And still she flew onward.

  "I will not allow the Horde to recover, to nurse their wounds and their hatred, to seek vengeance against me," she whispered to her firedrake. "When you fight an enemy, you must destroy him. You must hit him so hard he will never rise again. If you give your enemy a bloody nose, he will heal and strike back with more vengeance than before. If you shatter his head against the wall and slay his brothers and children, none will ever contest your might."

  The white beast below her clattered and cawed, spurting out smoke. Mercy smiled thinly.

  "And so we will slay their brothers, their children, their wives whose wombs would bear new warriors. It will be a night of blood, a dawn of fire, the hour of our greatest triumph."

  She flew toward the coast—Lady Mercy Deus, Lady of Wrath, Lady of Dominion.

  The coast grew closer, and Mercy saw countless lights of campfires. Two massive statues rose ahead, shaped as rearing stallions with gilded hoofs, the firelight reflecting off them. The horses were still distant, but even from miles away, she could see them clearly. They must have stood hundreds of feet tall, as tall as the Cured Temple back home. Beyond the statues, even as Mercy and her army approached, she saw no civilization. No buildings rose ahead, no towers, no streets, no fortresses, as if the Horde—this massive mob of many nations—had spent all their effort and industry on raising two equine idols, then remained with nothing but poverty for the remains of their realm.

  They live in tents, Mercy realized as she flew closer. She guffawed. Tents in the dirt. Nomads. Barbarians.

  Dawn began to rise in the east, its red light falling upon the coast and the camp that sprawled toward the hills. This was nothing but a camp for refugees, for all those the Commonwealth had driven from their homes: the Tirans of the desert, the brutes from the swamps, the scattered remains of humanity that had somehow survived the slaughter in Osanna and the fall of the ancient Terran civilizations. The dregs of humanity. Heretics. Seaside scum, no more. Benighted barbarians who did not know the light of the Spirit.

  "But they will see our light now," Mercy vowed. "And it will burn them. The dawn rises, and so does the Cured Temple."

  She raised her banner high, letting the tillvine blossom shine in the dawn, and she shouted out for her army to hear.

  "For the glory of the Temple! For the light of the Spirit! Slay the heathens! Slay every heretic in the name of our god."

  Across the sky, hundreds of paladins raised their banners upon hundreds of firedrakes. Many of the firedrakes were missing scales, charred, cut from the battle over the sea. Many of the paladins were bleeding, their armor dented. But they were ready for more bloodshed, for more holy light. They cried out with her.

  "For the Spirit! For the Temple!"

  Their banners streamed. Their horns blared out their cry. Below in the water, hundreds of ships still sailed, the victors of the battle. Brigantines and carracks flowed forth, sails wide, and longboats oared between them like great centipedes. Horns wailed. Men cried out for glory. War drums beat. Cannons wheeled toward the coast.

  "For the glory of the Spirit!" the warriors chanted across the hosts.

  And on the coast, Mercy saw them: the women and children of the Horde. They were pointing. They were crying out. And they were fleeing.

  Mercy allowed herself a thin smile. She stroked her firedrake, and she spoke softly to the beast. "Burn them all."

  With the cries of firedrakes, the beating of drums, and the chanting of holy warriors, the Temple fleet reached the enemy coast.

  "Cannons, fire!" Mercy shouted from above. "Tear them down!"

  In the ocean, the white warships of the Temple turned their guns toward the coast. Men lit fuses. With smoke and roaring fire, with a sound that cracked the sky itself, hundreds of cannonballs flew toward the Horde.

  Flying above on her firedrake, Mercy watched and smiled.

  The cannonballs tore through the heretics. They drove through tents. They drove into fleeing women and children, scattering gobbets of flesh and bone, crushing people like melons. Screams rose across the camp, and the people began to flee. Thousands emerged from the remaining tents like ants from a disturbed burrow. Wailing, they began to race inland.

  "Fire!" Mercy shouted.

  The guns blasted again, shaking the ships, flattening the water, blasting out smoke, and the cannonballs flew toward the beaches. Tents shattered. Chunks of human flesh flew through the air. Some of the heathens survived; they crawled forward, missing limbs, spilling their entrails. Fires blazed across the camp. Cannonballs thudded against the great horse statues, chipping the stone, deforming the proud stone faces of the beasts.

  Mercy reached down to stroke Talis's white scales.

  "Burn them," she whispered to the firedrake. "Burn them all."

  Talis spread his wings and flew higher, tossed back his scaly head, and roared to the sky. Mercy roared with him.

  "Burn them all!" she cried. "Firedrakes, attack!"

  With thudding wings and shrieks, hundreds of firedrakes flew across the water and swooped toward the heathen hive of Hakan Teer.

  The people screamed, fled, cowered, prayed.

  And Mercy burned them.

  She burned all that she could.

  She plunged from the sky, and her firedrake spewed down his fire. The blazing stream crashed into tents, consumed sheep and goats in their corrals, slammed into fleeing women and children. They screamed. They fell. Some ran to the beaches, burning. But mostly they died. Mercy laughed, dug her spurs into Talis's tenderspots, and they soared toward the sky, then dipped again, blasting down fire. More heathens burned.

  All across the tent city, the firedrakes streamed. They shot down flames. Some women and children were running to the hills, and Mercy flew toward them, burned them down, then dived back toward the tents and burned some more. Smoke and fire enveloped the world. The screams of the dying filled the air. Hundreds of firedrakes flew all around, sending down their death.

  Mercy laughed as she fought, as she conquered. Her banner streamed behind her, and she was a figure of light, of piety, of holy victory.

  "For the Spirit!" she cried. "Burn them all! Burn the heathens!"

  She gritted her teeth as she flew, as she burned, as her drake screamed beneath her.

  I lost my child. She clenched her fists. And so they will lose their children. They will lose everything they've had. In your name, my fallen daughter, I will conquer this world, and I will shine the light of the Spirit upon the Horde's skeletons.

  A group of children
were running ahead, heading toward the hills. One among them, a little girl, was missing her legs; they ended with shattered, spurting stumps. Her brother carried her, and they all ran, wailing, seeking safety. Mercy swooped, prepared to burn them down, a goddess of wrath, when the roars rose from the north.

  She tugged the reins, pulling Talis upward, and stared toward the sea.

  A smile spread across her face.

  Mercy laughed and raised her banner high as the city burned beneath her.

  "Hello, weredragons!" she cried. "Welcome to the Abyss!"

  They flew out from the dawn's light, six weredragons, a dozen griffins, a dozen salvanae. A ragtag group of bandits. A group she would burn.

  Let the death of their Horde be the last thing they ever see. They will die knowing the depths of their failure.

  "Burn them, Talis!" Mercy shouted, digging her spurs deep into the beast. "Slay the creatures! Paladins of the Spirit, rise! Rise and fly! Slay the weredragons!"

  Mercy grinned as the firedrakes shot forward. She steadied her lance. The dawn rose upon her and her firedrakes, a dawn of glory, of holiness. She had defeated the Horde in one of the greatest victories of her faith, and now—on this very dawn, the dawn of Mercy's ascension—she would slay the last weredragons.

  She would bring about the Falling.

  This dawn the Horde falls, she thought as she streamed forward, the wind roaring around her. This dawn King's Column will shatter. This dawn the Spirit himself will descend to the world, and I—Lady Mercy—will become a saint, a seraph, a daughter of the Spirit.

  "A dawn of light," she whispered. "A dawn of victory. A dawn of dominion and falling marble."

  Roaring and blasting out fire, the weredragons flew over the beach and charged toward her. Laughing, Mercy and her hundreds of firedrakes stormed forth to meet them.

  FIDELITY

  She had never seen such destruction.

  As Fidelity flew over the blazing city, this mass killing field, tears filled her eyes, and her breath died in her lungs, and her ribs seemed to wrap so tightly around her heart they could still its beat.

  Thousands dead, she thought, the world a haze. Her eyes were weak, especially in dragon form with no spectacles to wear. But she did not need sharp eyesight to see the fire, the mountains of corpses, to smell the burning flesh, to hear the screams.

  Mercy did not come here merely to conquer, to defeat an enemy, Fidelity realized. She came here to kill every last man, woman, and child in Terra.

  And Mercy, eldest daughter of Beatrix, heiress to the Cured Temple, now flew toward Fidelity on a white firedrake, and a hundred other paladins and firedrakes flew with her.

  Fidelity tossed back her head, spread her wings wide, and roared for battle, for rage, for fear, for hope. She roared the word forbidden in the north, the word she had always fought for, her battle cry, her never-ending dream.

  "Requiem!"

  She charged toward the enemy, and her family flew with her. Korvin, her father, a great gray dragon, the strongest and wisest man she knew. Roen, a green dragon of the forest, the man she loved, the man she had loved since her youth. Cade, a new hope for Requiem, a young golden dragon with light in his eyes. Amity, a red dragon, a great warrior, a heroine Fidelity admired. Domi, a spirit of fire, a living flame, her sister. They flew with her now; they would always fly together, the last survivors of Requiem, their ancient kingdom's warriors and torchbearers. They stormed across the beach, and they roared for their homeland, and they blasted out their flame.

  Six streams of dragonfire shot across like the sky toward Mercy.

  Mercy's white firedrake rose higher, then plunged down. Countless other firedrakes swooped with her, blasting forth their flame.

  Fidelity screamed.

  She flew through a blazing sun, through the death of a nation, through the burning of a world, the shattering of souls. All was fire, heat, sound, rage, pain, light. She screamed. She flew blindly. She shot out from the fire and smoke, spun in the sky, and saw endless fangs, claws, eyes. More fire rained upon her. She cried out. Her scales expanded and broke, a dozen cracks like splintering wood. All around the firedrakes attacked. She spun in rings, blowing her dragonfire, trying to hold them back. She lashed her tail. She snapped her teeth. She clawed at her enemies. The few griffins and salvanae who had survived the battle over the sea flew above and around her, falling, burning, crashing down.

  And still the cannons boomed.

  Still the firedrakes sent down their inferno.

  Still the people below died by the thousands.

  Fidelity spun through the sky, seeking Mercy again, but could no longer see the paladin, and other riders kept flying toward her, blasting fire her way, and Fidelity soared higher, dipped through the air, knowing she could not fight them all, knowing she would die here, knowing everyone below would burn.

  I must save whoever I still can.

  She clenched her teeth and dived down.

  I must save the women and children of the Horde.

  "Domi, Roen!" she shouted. She spotted the two fighting farther away. "We have to evacuate them! We have to gather whoever we can and fly!"

  She pulled her wings closer to her body and dived.

  A firedrake flew up toward her. Fidelity bathed it with fire. Another beast flew from her side, and she lashed her tail, whipping the firedrake's rider so hard she shattered his armor and tore off his arm.

  She kept diving, heading down toward a group of running children. One among them had no legs; he ran on stumps, screaming, before falling and crawling onward.

  A firedrake came flying from the other direction, ready to blast fire, to roast the fleeing children. Fidelity roared. She beat her wings, soaring above the children, almost knocking against them, and blasted forth dragonfire. She slammed into the firedrake an instant before it could burn the children, snapped her teeth, clawed at its rider. Her jaws closed around the firedrake's neck, tore out flesh, and she spat. Fidelity bellowed, blood in her mouth, and the firedrake crashed down dead.

  She shot fire skyward, holding back other drakes, then landed on the earth.

  One of the children already lay dead, flesh burning, legs gone. The others ran, fleeing Fidelity, wailing.

  They don't know I'm Vir Requis, Fidelity realized. They see the blue dragon and think I'm a firedrake.

  She leaped upward, knocked down another firedrake with her claws, and landed in front of the fleeing children.

  "Wait!" she called out. "I'm a good dragon! Listen to me!" The children wept, screamed, and turned to flee again. Fidelity slammed down her tail, cutting off their retreat. "I'm here to help you."

  Several firedrakes shrieked above, plunging toward her, and opened their jaws to blow fire. Fidelity grimaced, prepared to feel the heat, when Roen and Cade shot overhead. The two dragons, green and gold, roared and slammed into the firedrakes, knocking them down. They blew their dragonfire skyward, sealing Fidelity in a blazing shell.

  She took a deep breath and released her magic. She stood before the children as a woman.

  "See me?" she said. "See? I'm like you. You have to trust me." She looked up. "Cade! Cade, land here!"

  The golden dragon nodded, swiped his tail against another firedrake, then landed beside her.

  "Cade, get them out of here!" Fidelity shouted, still in human form. "Take them over the water, fly north! Fly over the sea."

  "To where?" he shouted.

  "Anywhere!" she cried out as firedrakes and dragons roared above, as blood rained. "Anywhere that's safe. Fly! I'll find you in the Commonwealth!"

  Cade cursed. "It's a big place, Fidelity. Where will we meet?"

  "Draco Murus!" she said, choosing a name from the old book. "Fly to the ruins of Draco Murus! You remember!"

  He nodded and lowered his wing. The children still wept, and at first they resisted, but Fidelity urged them onward, goading them up Cade's wing. They sat on the gold dragon's back, fourteen in all, clinging together.

  "Now fly
!" Fidelity cried. "To Draco Murus!"

  Cade nodded and took flight, wings churning smoke. He dipped, rose higher, blasted fire at a drake, and cut a way through. He vanished into the smoke.

  Fidelity shifted back into a dragon and soared, joining Roen. She blew her fire skyward, ascended through the blaze, and crashed into a firedrake. As the beast bled, she grabbed its paladin in her jaws and bit deep, punching her fangs through the armor, tearing the man out of the saddle, and finally spat him out. Roen thrust his horns into the firedrake's neck, goring the reptile, sending it tumbling down.

  Shrieks rose behind her, and Fidelity spun to see a hundred or more people fleeing, women and children and elders. Three firedrakes dived down, paladins on their backs, and blasted forth their fire. The fleeing people burned, fell, rolled, screamed as they died. Their skin peeled back like bark, falling from their flesh, and the flames dug deeper, eating down to the bone.

  All across the blazing camp, people were fleeing only to be torched or cut down. Some firedrakes were swooping, lashing their claws, scooping up people and tossing them into the air. Other firedrakes pounced onto children, bit down, tore the little bodies apart, scattering limbs. Several firedrakes stood above hills of dead and wounded, feasting on human flesh. One girl wept, lying in the dirt, as a firedrake chewed on her severed arms. A firedrake above tossed its head around, and a foot pattered down onto Fidelity, then the head of a woman, mouth opened in a silent scream.

  How can I stop such horror? she thought, eyes burning. How can I stop this bloodshed, this killing, this theater of death?

  "We have to save more, Roen!" she cried, eyes damp. "They're burning them all!"

  The green dragon nodded. "Fly with me."

  They soared together, crashing through enemies, burning through a falling sky, a collapsing heaven descending into chaos and light and dancing shadows, a world of demons. Domi and Korvin flew in the distance, back to back, holding off the enemies. Far below, Fidelity saw more people racing across the land, heading to the hills, leaping over the corpses of those who had already failed to flee. Fidelity knew they wouldn't go far, not without help.