Dragonstar (Dragonfriend Book 4)

by Marc Secchia

  Liking what you see, Dragoness?

  Hualiama’s fires blushed. Aye, she advanced daringly. The sight of a well-defined trapezius or a bulging deltoid muscle never fails to turn me into a gabbling fool.

  He knew his smile warmed her Dragoness-hearts, because that feedback looped through their oath link. Don’t look further … the sight of my abdominals has been known to overthrow entire Islands full of maidens, turning them into screeching, gabbling flocks of windrocs.

  Shameless braggart. You’re so worth it. Before Grandion could celebrate, however, she said, Jinichi, will you kindly toss Grandion away from the cliff?

  “Whaaa …” Whap! “Hualiama!”

  “What’s the problem? Ready to go burgle a Palace, o Tourmaline troublemaker?”

  “Takes one to know one,” said Flicker. He flicked wingtips with Grandion. “Just follow our lead, Star Dragoness. Keep your nose glued to Grandion’s haunches, and you won’t go too far wrong.”

  * * * *

  Here, he had once winged with a girl upon his back. She had blasted him out of the mountain, befuddled his every draconic inch with her enchanting, smoky green eyes, and summarily recruited him to help rescue her family. Dragonback. The very first Human to dare such a feat.

  She had only discombobulated half of the Island-World in the doing. So far.

  What of Herimor?

  Legend told that Lia had single-handedly flattened Sapphurion and his Council of Dragon Elders, and that when she was barely sixteen. Now, she was twenty-two years of age. A Dragon fledgling. An adult Human.

  The slow, methodical pounding of Numistar’s renewed assault – this time, a decoy – formed a counterpoint rhythm to the Tourmaline Dragon’s wingbeat as the Star Dragoness perched in her now-customary position upon his right shoulder, with the dragonet in turn riding upon her shoulder! All they needed, Grandion reflected, was for him to stand upon Fra’anior’s shoulder. Greatest to smallest.

  In service of thee, noble progenitor of my fire-spirit, he vowed.

  Grandion drew of his strength and watched the Star Dragoness’ eye-fires clear even as their whirling accelerated. She whispered, Thanks, Grandion.

  She briefed the team steadily as the Dragons flew low, keeping below the rim on the caldera side. The lava level had risen noticeably, perhaps one-fifth fuller than before, and the heat was commensurately more intense. The timing would be crucial. Chago hoped that they might find allies at the Palace, that Azziala would rule by fear rather than the total mental dominance she exerted upon the Haters – a people who were used to the cerebral approach. Grandion kept scanning the caldera. Something smelled like a week-old rat. Where would Azziala be hiding? Why was she still waiting? Surely, she sensed the approach of her blood-kin with that fabled shell-mothering power of intuition?

  There were many Dragons aloft, but he and Hualiama had not spent untold hours perfecting shields and subterfuge to fall for any of their tricks. Within the hour, they approached Fra’anior City. No Dragonships. No Shill to check the Flow space which had proved so crucial, but Hualiama had informed him that she could perform that Chrysolitic Dragon function just as efficiently. Shocking. Hopeful? No, for according to their best knowledge, the Command-hold magic pervaded the Flow plane, too, like a ripple-effect at every possible level of existence – physical, spiritual, magical and plane-distinct. Nothing could escape the ambit of its power.

  Still, she had woven miracles out of pollen and stardust before.

  Soft-winged, the Dragons and Shapeshifters landed on the Palace roof, muffling the guards with magic before the Immadian saboteurs performed their task with commendable efficiency. They were good. Grandion’s eyes whirled in admiration. Barely a clink of armour as they subdued six Royal Guards – knocked out but not killed – and left them under Jin’s paw.

  That should keep most sane men silent.

  The Nikuko warrior-Dragon nodded slightly as the black-clad Immadians, led by Darrul and his quicksilver girlfriend, Nyzura, tossed ropes down the side of the Palace building, anchored by Sumio and Prince Qilong, and vanished over the edge like eager dragonets on a hunt. Hualiama padded silently after. Grandion checked on his fledgling charges, bidding Brazo adjust his shielding. Zanya was doing perfectly, but her heart rate was double what it should have been. No stamina, these youngsters.

  Isiki, meantime, treated the Queen’s broken nose. She would live, just as pretty as before. Right now, her eyes were underscored by two startlingly black bruises, making her appear to be wearing one of these face veils which were becoming popular with the Humans of the Isles, they had learned.

  In his mind, Grandion followed Hualiama down several corridors as the dark-clad shadows, easily picked out by her superior Dragon sight, flitted ahead of her. Fourteen Royal Guards, three misplaced maids helping themselves to the royal berry-wine vintage, and a random snoozing courtier later, and they stood outside King Chalcion and Queen Shyana’s bedchamber, unnoticed and unmolested.

  A Dragoness’ paw rose to grip the huge, ornate brass handle.

  She levered the door open.

  Stiffened.

  Grandion swore beneath his breath; his view bobbed as Hualiama turned her head aside, and vomited uncontrollably. Chalcion was dead. He hung from the crossbeam of his bed, his face already mottled and set in an eternal scowl. At this gruesome sight, even a Dragon’s hearts careered around a few Islands.

  As agreed, they did not speak even via private telepathy, but he projected warm strength and compassion. Another parental death. How would she handle this?

  The Dragon gasped as the shadows shifted.

  * * * *

  “Little Lia.” Uncle Zalcion moved into the light. “It is you, isn’t it? Small blue lizard, they said. You were banned from this Palace.”

  Hualiama shuddered. “Where’s my family, Zalcion?”

  “No lizard is family of mine.”

  His face twitched strangely. He had always acted peculiarly when stressed, but she did not remember his tic moving quite so. For a frozen heartbeat of time as they faced off, Hualiama wondered if she saw a glimpse of Azziala’s parasite reflected in his features. This was a man who had once thought to force himself upon her. Perhaps this was just an echo of his innate malevolence.

  Her Human said, Dragonsoul, we’re not after revenge. Please.

  Shouldn’t we be? Her talons clenched, scraping unnervingly across the marble floor.

  Zalcion said, “Be that as it may, Chalcion killed himself with no help from me. Azziala said he would. She said, after this, they would crown me King – as I undoubtedly deserve. How many years have I not served Fra’anior from my brother’s shadow? I am the true strength of this kingdom. Now is the hour for my star to rise.”

  The Dragoness said, “You are Azziala’s underling.”

  “No. I was her lover.”

  “You?” Hualiama forced a laugh, but the sound emerged false and choked. “Even Azziala has better taste, Uncle.”

  “She loved me! She loved me truly. It was only Ra’aba’s interference that kept us apart.” His face twisted again, the strangeness closer, like an infection lurking just beneath the skin. She felt paralysed and witless, a young girl frightened by her creepy uncle. “I saw it in her eyes. I knew, the way she always looked at me … she had to feel the same way. I know how she feels about me, even now. Even after all these years. I shall be King, and Azziala will ascend the throne as my queen. All that stands in my way is you.”

  Twisted. All about him was twisted and hateful.

  His right hand jerked downward.

  A blur. String? Hualiama flinched backward, but it was Nyzura who intervened, her swords but a smudge against the semidarkness. She heard: Ting! Ting! Then a dull sound, as if a dart had struck wood, and a curtain’s hem jerked near the bed as if a child’s playful hand had tweaked the material. Zalcion gurgled in surprise. He clutched his throat.

  “Nyzura?” Her voice grated in the semidarkness as if it belonged to another Dragoness.

/>   “Fine. Untouched,” said the woman, slinking forward like a cat.

  From Lia’s other flank, Darrul essayed a grin. “Girl’s faster than me. I only used my shield.” He tilted it to show her a dart embedded near the edge, in the wood. Poisoned, doubtless. Even Dragons might fall prey to the right toxins – draconic toxicology was a whole science in itself.

  Nyzura watched Zalcion as she might have watched a feral Dragon.

  At length, he produced a long, ghastly gurgle. He tried to fall against the bed, but slid heavily to the floor instead, his face set in a rictus of mortal pain. Hualiama forced herself to watch him die. Her Dragoness had been so close to exacting a long-overdue revenge, but now that the deed was achieved by a chance ricochet, relief made her stagger against the door frame. Clearly a trap, using her dead adoptive father as the bait. Uncle Zalcion was cunning. Perhaps he had used a poison borrowed from the Dragon Haters’ arsenal of Dragon-unfriendly surprises; his schemes had backfired upon him at last.

  Nyzura laughed hollowly. “Three crossbows set to fire at the door. I guess … I guess I killed the King?”

  Hualiama watched the man give one final shudder. His eyes glazed over.

  All the silence within her echoed with lamentation. Chalcion had trusted this man. In the end, there was nothing left of their brotherhood but a loop of rope, and a failed trap.

  She said, “He was never the King upon the Onyx Throne.”

  * * * *

  Questioning the guards revealed that Queen Shyana had been relocated to Gi’ishior under heavy Dragon guard and incarcerated there. They liberated Hualiama’s siblings Fyria, Ka’allion and Fa’arrion from their barred and guarded rooms. Chago, who had served on the King’s Guard, selected a group of trusted men to hide the royals in a location not even known to the King himself.

  Her siblings did not know who she was, nor did Hualiama wish them to know. Not yet.

  As false dawn began to pink the sky, the Star Dragoness conferred rapidly with her small Dragonwing. Gi’ishior was too dangerous to try to penetrate, infested by Dragons loyal to Azziala. Again, Lia wondered at the openness of the Palace. What was Azziala playing at?

  It was almost too easy.

  Almost, inviting the gambit that must ensue.

  At length, as the first hints of gold began to glimmer upon the eastern horizon, announcing the coming day, there was no longer opportunity for delay.

  Princess Hualiama, Shapeshifter Dragoness, stood upon the roof of the building in which she had spent her formative years, and raised her slender muzzle to the sky. She closed her eyes. She gathered her powers and concentration in a single, unending breath, until her wings quivered and her vision blackened slightly at the edges. Here came the fell stroke.

  In Ancient Dragonish, she cried:

  LET THE CHAINS OF BROTHERHOOD BE STRUCK ASUNDER!

  The Islands shook, not with her outcry, but with the backlash of Air Breathers sundered from their close bond of co-operation. The great Dragons rocked and wailed their agony to the waning stars, the notes of their keening an insufferable lament.

  The Dragoness crashed to her knees, sobbing. Oh, Grandion. Oh, I cannot bear it …

  Riven for grief.

  Her soul, thus torn for her Island-World. For freedom, were such an ideal not too risible; an unattainable dream.

  In the North, a terrible bellow split the dawn. Numistar Winterborn shouldered a Land Dragon aside, kicking it away, toppling the mountain. At last, the strokes of her paws fell with the savagery of the winter she represented, unhindered at last by the almighty shield of the Air Breathers, and Hualiama heard the stricken Dragon cry out once, and die.

  Setting her forepaws and secondary forepaws about the third Island East of Gi’ishior, the Dragoness exerted her mighty strength.

  BEGONE, WHELP OF FRA’ANIOR!

  For a second, Hualiama thought she was the target of the Dragoness’ battle challenge, but it was not so. With a monstrous flexion of her long, sinuous white body, Numistar Winterborn wrenched the mile-wide Island off its foundations and tossed it aside like so much chaff. Smoke billowed up from the rent as, Lia imagined, the lava pent up in the caldera finally spilled over – but only so far as to hiss and steam against the advent of the Dragoness, who filled that gap with ease, slithering snakelike into the simmering lava lake.

  White scales upon a field orange. A Dragoness of incalculable cold was forced to swim through fields of smoking lava. Numistar paddled with seeming ease, yet even her immensity did not fill the caldera as Fra’anior’s legendary presence was said to. How she longed for that day! Hualiama watched as the Dragoness searched with all her senses alert. Her entire length threw up gouts of steam as the terrible cold of her body reacted against the equally colossal heat of Fra’anior’s favourite realm. Closer. Closer still. Holding up the First Egg in order to drink deep of its powers … angling more westerly now … toward Ha’athior Island, and the Natal Cave. Aye. Of course.

  The distance was mighty, perhaps sixteen leagues across the heaving caldera, but no Dragon could have missed the moment Azziala revealed her forces, ranged above and flanking the holy Island of Ha’athior. Holy no longer, Lia reminded herself, thanks to Amaryllion’s departure – but a perfect choice of location for this showdown. Once again, Azziala demonstrated a draconic flair for the grand, historically impeccable gesture. Out with the old order. In with the new. Without a word being spoken, she had just declared herself ruler of the Island-World.

  Numistar had a mile-long nose, and the entire length of it was summarily put out of joint, Flicker noted with irreverent accuracy.

  Chuckling, Grandion said, “Well, shall we fly to the aid of our ally?”

  Hualiama had never appreciated his sarcastic streak more.

  “Mith dare,” slurred the Immadian Queen, who was sounding worse rather than better. Against orders, Lia sidled toward her. Just one little touch. Just one.

  Brazo and Zanya cut her off with firm headshakes.

  “Pair of brats,” she sneered.

  “Mind I don’t polish my teeth with your scales, hatchling,” growled Brazo, looking rather taken aback as his draconic nature clearly took the fore. “Uh … with all respect, Star Dragoness.”

  Chortling, Zanya clapped him on the shoulder. “Why don’t we respectfully kick her impudent behind, shell-brother dearest?”

  “Because it’s so unfeasibly cute,” Brazo protested.

  Hualiama snapped toward the other Dragon, who was only three times her size.

  He sat backward with a thump that shook the Palace. “Mmmaaarrggh … sorry, noble Grandion, that just – sort of – uh, really sorry. Grovelling.”

  With a wild whirl of his fire-eyes, the Tourmaline hissed, “Dragons don’t apologise. I agree. Hualiama is in every conceivable respect the cutest Dragoness in the entire Island-World, including all of Herimor. But if you aren’t in the air in ten seconds together with all of your Riders, Brazo the Ice-Blue, I shall feed you your own sorry tail!”

  Eep, eep, eep, snickered Flicker. “Dragons!”

  Chapter 24: Never Trust a Dragon

  Birdsong Swelled as the twin suns’ dawning cast adumbration far across the Cloudlands, the golden-orange hues of a volcanic daybreak shimmering over the heated cone and the luxuriant jade Islands fringing its rim. Ever after, the Islands would be one less. Grandion thrust sentimentality aside. Necessity must make the toughest decisions. From the North, white specks of Ice-Raptors poured over the rim like a motile wisp of cirrus cloud. Dragons surged out of Gi’ishior and its neighbouring Islands to attack them. A posse of fast Welkin-Runners and hazy green Mist-Runners breached the gap, running to join their ally as she swam with stately mien toward Azziala. Thick, multi-coloured clumps of allied Dragons crested the southern rim Islands as well, but Affurion’s forces faced a heavy Dragon Hater presence. Hundreds of Dragonships. A coalition of nations acting to protect its Empress.

  Azziala was embedded somewhere in that mass near Ha’athior. He estimated over
two thousand Dragonships and a greater number of Lesser Dragons. She must have been recruiting. Her Haters held these Dragonkind fast, and their numbers had swelled dramatically.

  There. Front and centre of her formation, Azziala had taken for her throne the back of a hovering Green Dragon, one of the Elders of Gi’ishior – former Elder, the Tourmaline thought spitefully – ringed by myriad of her blue-robed Enchanters. The stance and disposition of that many-layered, ovoid array of magic-users curiously reflected the convex petals of a flower.

  The bloodletting must have filled terrace lakes to supply the power that shimmered over that assemblage.

  Grandion’s group skimmed rapidly across the thermals. The Dragons’ wings tilted to catch the hot breezes, swishing back and forth with a deceptively slow wingbeat. He checked behind and to either side. Jin to port, intent. Zanya upon his starboard wing, slipstreaming efficiently. Her eyes seemed clear, almost serene. Brazo behind, as overexcited as a hatchling trying his wings for the first time.

  THE COPPER!

  He grinned as Mizuki gaily Shivered the dust out of a group of Dragonships, seven miles off his starboard flank. She would make the finest of mates for Affurion. Well. He should not imitate his shell-father’s patriarchal views too closely. The Brown Overmind would have to work hard to catch her gorgeous wings – long may their romance burn!

  Eschewing ceremony, Numistar heaved herself upright out of the lava and hurled a devastating spray of ice shards at the waiting Hater fleet.

  The response was as if the entire caldera had drawn breath. Plumbing the mental power of a nation, supplemented by the conclave of Air Breathers, Azziala flicked her attack away like a woman swatting flies.

  One might as well have dangled bloody fodder before a starving, feral Dragon. Numistar Winterborn’s response was as predictable as it was immense. Hail. Lightning. A blast of breath so frosty, it darkened the lava in a swathe eight miles wide. She waded in with her many paws swinging, the talons crackling with cold, and the Island of Ha’athior shook and shed boulders and trees behind the Haters, but the blue robes drew together in that flawless fusion of minds that made them such deadly enemies. They held Numistar at bay with a pale, glistening shield grounded in the perfection of their psychic network.