by Marc Secchia
“Any time before suns-set will do.”
Helpful, Dragon. Pip produced a stonking mental snort.
“Pip! Pip, wait!”
“Now Yaethi?” said Silver. “By my wings, the day grows old.”
Her habitually cool and collected friend bounded down the steps from the infirmary, waving a scroll above her head as though it were some form of scholarly sword. “Pip, I found it. Stop. Don’t leave without this.”
No, I’m apparently stuck on the ground with a bunch of dithering women, said Silver.
I’ll gladly smack you and your lizard-halitosis later, Pip offered with exceeding generosity. “What is it, Yaethi?”
Yaethi rushed up to Silver, all a-fluster. “Here, Pip. Catch.” An accurate throw landed the neatly tied scroll in her lap. She rattled, “It’s a code-breaking scroll written by Kaiatha’s father. We knew it was somewhere in the library but it had fallen behind a scroll-rack and it took all of the night to find and you have to take the scroll with you, alright? I’ve added two sheaves of notes from Master Shambithion and I, which are tucked inside, so don’t lose them in the Cloudlands or you will not be a popular Pygmy any more.”
Pip raised her hands in mock surrender. “Message hawk received at high speed, Yaethi. May we leave now?”
“The royal permission.” Yaethi swept into a fluid Helyon bow, hands outstretched as though she were about to dive from a height into water. “Go burn the heavens, noble Silver. By the way, did you know there’s a mosquito strapped to your back?”
Silver chuckled dryly, “Go burn a few scrolleaves, Yaethi, Rider of Arrabon. We’re relying on you.”
* * * *
The snap-spring of Silver’s vertical take-off caused Pip to groan in pain, but the young Dragon adjusted immediately with a low apology, deliberately smoothing his wingbeat in order to jar her as little as possible. Still, the intense acceleration pressed her against the additional padding installed behind her back as a concession to a wounded Rider. The school receded as Silver rose fluidly into the dawn’s first suns-beams, orienting upon a flight of winged specks climbing toward a band of pink-hued cumulus clouds blanketing the mountains east of the Academy volcano. The plan was to skirt the northern shore of Jeradia Island before turning northeast, following the Spine Islands all the way up to Archion and Sylakia. This retraced the journey in which Pip had first flown Dragonback to her new school with the Red Dragon Zardon.
Then, Zardon had fallen to the Marshal’s forces. Pip sucked in her cheeks. Could she hope the feisty old Shifter had only been brainwashed into becoming one of the Night-Reds? If asked, could she fight a Dragon who had become her friend? Who had called her his Rider?
The horizon remained mute to her questions.
Silver forged toward the rising suns with a steady yet forceful wingbeat, visibly overhauling the Dragonwing ahead. The air was so fresh and cool, free at last of volcanic gases and grit, it made her shiver with pleasure. The view over Jeradia’s mountains was more than worthy of some of Nak’s effusive poetry. No wonder Dragons loved to fly.
She slipped off her shoes with a pleased sigh and stowed them in her starboard saddlebag. Even the wind on her bare toes felt lovely. Crescent Isles mud? That would have been perfection itself.
He said, “I didn’t make you cry, did I?”
Wretchedly perceptive Dragon senses! “I was remembering Zardon.”
“And you’re moved by the draconic need to avenge?”
She considered this. “Partly. Partly the wish to save my friends, or as many of the Lesser Dragons as possible. Partly the wish to prove myself. To prove my humanity … er, my dragon–how do you say that? Dragonicity? Dragonishness? Anyways, to prove that I will use the powers I’ve been granted to the best of my ability, for the greater good.”
“Noble thoughts,” the Dragon commented without levity or mockery. “You’re a jungle warrior. Do you see yourself as animal? You threatened to undo me with your animal powers, as I recall.”
“That was a bluff–well, not entirely. I suppose I am closer to the animal kingdom than some. Master Ga’am advised me not to fear a lack of humanity, but to turn my savage upbringing into a source of strength. Ay, he called me a savage. He didn’t mean it badly, I don’t think.”
The Dragon disagreed with a choked-off roar.
Pip patted his shoulder with her bare foot. “Thanks, Silver.”
He added, “In Herimor you’ll find many creatures that imitate Humans and Dragons, and many more varieties of Shapeshifters than you seem to have north of the Rift. We call these the many manifestations of life, for Herimor philosophy equates life with magic. In recent decades the Dragon Shapeshifters have risen to prominence above the other races. They rule the pyramid of power. And the Marshal himself is a White Dragon of great power and guile in battle.”
Odd how his Dragon spoke more formally than his Human manifestation. Pip had the impression he might even be quoting from scroll-lore.
“He’s a Star Dragon?” she inquired.
“No, but I have heard it said that he has legendary powers–Kinetic ability, for example, by which he levitated his Island, coupled with shielding capable of protecting us all during our perilous journey across the Rift. He seemed able to source power from the Rift storms themselves. Would you like to hear the tale?”
“Would a Pygmy love to fly?”
“Ay,” he chuckled.
Rumours of Marshal Re’akka’s discovery of a First Egg triggered an invasion by his bitter, lifelong enemy, Marshal X’arth, who at the head of an army of veteran Dragons razed seventeen Islands almost unopposed. Then, without any warning whatsoever, the proverbial Island flipped on its head. Re’akka rose. In his White Dragon manifestation, he rose against eighty-five powerful Dragons armoured for war, and singlehandedly struck half of them down with his opening blow. The balance, he ensorcelled with what Silver later came to realise was the Shadow-beast’s help, and lured them inside his Island of Eridoon.
X’arth’s defeat–a swift and punishing affair–so alarmed the other Marshals of the Northern Kahilate region of Herimor that they assembled six Dragonwings supported by six armies of Human troops, Heripedes and Jagok lizards. En masse, they laid siege to Eridoon Island.
Silver added, “We did not realise that the initial conflict had depleted Re’akka so severely. Then, he had only a fraction of the strength he possesses now. And had we understood his debilitation or his plans for the future, we might have risen to overthrow the Marshal. But he was cunning. Devious. He directed us to defend the Island, and a bitter, attritional siege it was. Months long. Battle after battle. Horrific injuries–you don’t want to know, Pip.”
The food shortage became so critical, some Dragons resorted to cannibalism. Pip gasped reflexively. Dragons eating Dragons? She had never imagined …
With the forces of the rival Marshals closing in relentlessly, Marshal Re’akka secretly gathered his strength and resources, while undermining the base of Eridoon Island with the help of fifty Dragons of Brown powers supplemented by a vast mass of rock-chewing dragonworms, one of the most basic and unintelligent forms of Dragon life in Herimor. The Dragon engineers hollowed out vast storage caverns and living areas within the Island, lightening the load. Thousands of Human thralls–men enslaved by the Marshal’s power and reduced to the mental capacity of dim-witted beasts–laboured night and day to clear the rubble. When they were no longer of use, Re’akka had them hacked up for Dragon fodder. Too many mouths. Extra baggage.
Re’akka unleashed his Shadow Dragon to devastate the enemy Dragonwings. Over a thousand Dragonkind streamed into the Island, some to sate the Shadow-beast’s appetite, but most to undergo the month-long, secret ‘imprinting’ process that changed their colour and mindset. Meantime, his battered forces laboured to fill the great caverns with stolen provisions.
Then, the Marshal flexed his gigantic psychic capability, and wrenched Eridoon off its foundations.
“Did the other Marshals just let him go?
” Pip asked.
Silver said, “No. They had retreated to lick their wounds, but not far, and not for long. We fled across the Rift ahead of their advance because the Marshal was concerned his rivals would find a way to steal the First Egg from him, or subvert its power to their advantage.”
“A pity we couldn’t just fly to Herimor and ask around about the source of his power, if it’s somehow native to your land,” Pip mused.
“And receive a properly poisoned dagger in the ribs, this time? Besides that we’re out of time, Pip, and the fact that crossing the Rift is impossible–”
“Save by egg-wielding Marshals and Land Dragons,” Pip said, drawing a snarl from Silver.
“–impossible under ordinary conditions. Anyways, I would not allow it.”
“You’d prevent me?”
“Ay. I rather fancy an alive and snarky yet unfailingly fascinating jungle maiden, as opposed to the ‘enthralled by the Marshal’ version, or worse, the ‘dead under the Cloudlands’ option which I and my forces attempted to ensure.”
His backward-facing grin was a study in apology, insult and humour, Pip decided, returning the favour with a grin that elevated fricasseed Silver Shapeshifter into first place on the menu she was rapidly populating. As Nak would say, double-bah with carnivorous slug-sauce poured on top. She’d teach him a thing or two about what might or might not be allowed in this relationship!
She said, “Not the naked and tied up in your arms affair you seemed to fancy a few weeks back, as I recall? Ay, Silver?”
He had the grace to make a draconic blush, a surging of his belly-fires followed by tongues of fire hissing between his clenched fangs. “I was supposed to capture you. I make no apology for your lack of decent attire at the time. Besides, I hear Mistress Mya’adara has secretly assigned Oyda to chaperone us on this trip. She hopes to warrant there will be no ‘incidents of a delicate nature’ between certain teenagers.”
“Incidents? The Mistress said that?”
“A touch more directly,” Silver admitted.
“She warned you, didn’t she?” His guilty wing-shiver told her all she needed to know! “Roaring rajals, where’s the trust around these Islands?”
“You do have a … reputation.”
“Reputation?” Her chuckle sounded more like a hound’s warning bark. “I suppose I do. Silver, I’m embarrassed to admit, I don’t even know–are you of age? How old are you?”
“Seventeen summers. Back in Herimor, the matchmakers would’ve done their work and I’d already be promised to a pretty Shapeshifter from a suitable bloodline. Probably one who knows to wear clothing on the odd occasion.”
Ooh, fighting talk. “Just keep storing up that volcano’s-worth of trouble for yourself, young Dragon.”
Thereafter, the conversation returned to Marshal Re’akka’s unique ability to draw magical power from other Dragons, the mysteries of the First Egg and even the magical Rift storms. Silver sketched their passage across the Rift as a weeks-long struggle against the sky-spanning, multihued storms that plagued the Rift; how chain lightning had raced across the skies and attacked the shielded Island with clear intelligence and design, of vast draconic cloud-creatures that swam and sported amidst the eternal tempests, and hundred-league vortexes capable of swallowing entire Islands with ease. Pip was pleased to learn the Marshal had almost died striving to forge that crossing. Any sign of vulnerability had to shore up her anaemic stores of hope.
They chatted on as they passed through a layer of cool, wispy cloud and rose slowly into the luminous suns-shine above, which reflected off the underlying layer of pristine white cumulus with blinding intensity. Between the patches of cloud, Pip from her Dragon’s-eye perch could look over the rugged mountain tessellations of Jeradia laid out like a stark warning to the unwary traveller, great bands of basalt and granite interspersed with unexpected hints of rose quartz and even glints of bronze and copper deposits. To the North, a second layer of cloud lay perhaps a league and a half beneath their altitude, the impassable, apparently impermeable Cloudlands. One could almost imagine walking out over that deathly tan carpet; no need to remind any Human or Dragon of the dangers essayed every time one chose to travel beyond an Island’s shores.
An hour’s flying caught them up to the Dragonwing, for the others had not chosen to wait for the tardy couple–or, Pip suspected, Silver had dawdled just a touch in order to spend time in private with her.
Shimmerith greeted them with, “School’s in session, class. Gather around.”
“School in the air?” Maylin groaned. “Pip, you put her up to this, didn’t you?”
“No, I did,” said Master Kassik, in his Dragon form a hulking Brown who looked capable of boring through mountains if the mood took him. “We’ll not waste a single hour aloft. Shimmerith will teach magical offensive and defensive techniques, Emblazon and Oyda are in charge of battle tactics, I will lecture you on Dragon lore until it oozes out of your respective ears and ear canals, and Master Balthion will cover the arts and cultures of the Crescent Isles.”
“What about me?” asked Nak, managing to sound affronted.
With great dignity, Kassik said, “You, noble Dragon Rider, are in charge of entertainment.”
Chapter 5: Ambush
ON ITS NoRTH-EASTERN tip, Jeradia Island carved away into the Cloudlands with a final, defiantly jutting headland that seemed to indicate the way to the Spine. Sultry black granite and obsidian cliffs three miles tall dwarfed the Dragonwing as, following an hour’s rest on the ground, the Dragons hurled themselves bodily into the void. Pip and Maylin whooped for joy as their Dragons raced neck-and-neck in a mile-and-a-half vertical plunge before swerving away into a horizontal sprint that whipped a warm breeze through Pip’s unruly curls, and turned Maylin’s long, glossy hair into a raven’s wing behind her head. Not far behind, they heard Arosia’s unrestrained laughter bubbling away as Chymasion pulled out of his dive, followed by a duet of wild yells from Kaiatha and Durithion. A characteristic bugle trumpeted from Tazzaral’s throat, resounding off the cliffs. A quarter-mile overhead, Kassik, Emblazon and Shimmerith forged stolidly into a brisk headwind, leaving the shenanigans and foolery to the juvenile Dragons.
“This is how to cut class,” Maylin yelled across to Pip.
“Don’t tell Emblazon. His idea of teaching fledglings aerial combat prowess is to shoot fireballs at their rumps.”
Silver put in, “Some people do rather beg for it.”
“Thanks for the support, boyfriend.” Silver had positively awoken since his thrashing at her paws, not half as serious a character as she had judged him to be. Pip said, “I wonder if the Spine continues under the Cloudlands all the way to Jeradia? Maylin?”
Maylin pretended to clap her hand to her forehead in realisation. “I knew we shouldn’t have left Yaethi behind. She’d have consulted a centuries-old scroll of secret Dragon lore inked by the Ancient Dragon scientists in order to memorise the precise measurements of every possible landmass within a thousand leagues. In lieu of which–”
Silver said, “We look for disturbances in the Cloudlands. Clouds swirling about a half-hidden peak down there could be a clue, or smoke and outgassing from volcanic vents, or at night, a shallow, active volcano may backlight the clouds from beneath. In Herimor, it is common for Islands to float due to the action of hentioragions–that is, a large family of swarming Dragon species which infest the underside of Islands in their millions and builds nests from skin-covered, helium-filled nodules. We call them Bloats.”
Unexpectedly, Emmaraz performed an aerial half-bow. “Thank you for the instruction, Master Silver.”
Pip, Maylin and Emmaraz burst out laughing.
“Ah, but I have barely begun to disseminate the all-conquering vastness of my wisdom,” said Silver, suddenly changing his wingbeat so that he imitated a fowl strutting through a village, “for the ragions are a vast class of sub-draconic creatures notable for their extraordinarily effectual gas-producing physiologies, some specime
ns of which float lazily through the air like your Dragonships, while others literally employ gas propulsion using rearward-facing, sphincter-controlled orifices–a novel use of bodily functions. And trust me, you don’t want to fly downwind from one of those, either.”
“Stop, have mercy,” hooted Maylin, clutching her stomach. “Whatever you do, please don’t tell that story to Nak. We’ll never hear the end of flatulent Dragons.”
To the tune of Silver protesting the accuracy of his teachings and Maylin pulling his wings until the young Dragon howled with mirth and rage, the students and their young Dragons swept across the khaki-tinged Cloudlands, rising to a flying altitude of two and a half miles above that deathly realm, which the balladeers called ‘the blight of the Island-World’. No-one, not even the Dragons, knew why the base of their world was covered in an everlasting, impenetrable layer of gases, but everyone knew a terrible end awaited anyone or anything that fell into the Cloudlands. Their acidic wash afflicted even the lowest-lying, hardiest lichens. Only Land Dragons dwelled in those toxic depths, Pip believed, able to survive the immense pressures and heat, and the poisons of their native demesne.
In her heart, she cried, Leandrial, how will we defeat this enemy? How will we return the First Egg to you?
Nothing stirred. The Cloudlands brooded in immovable majesty. Life clung to the paltry rocks peeking above that vast, rolling cloudscape, a precarious perch between the billows below and the rain-bringing, life-giving clouds above. Why had the Ancient Dragons chosen to carve their Island roosts out of such a forbidding landscape? Simply because this was where they had arrived? Was the whole Island-World like this, or did the rumour of a world beyond the Rim-Wall Mountains convey the nub of an inexpressible truth?
Pip turned in her seat to gaze back at Jeradia. A farewell. A bastion of life, of her brief history, already slipping away into the horizon. All that mattered out here was the will to keep flying across an unconquerable domain, the strength and magic of a Dragon, and the spread of great, multi-jointed wings upon the warm, redolent breeze.
