The Sylvalla Chronicles

by A. J. Ponder

  Trembling, Francis nocked another arrow …

  Sylvalla yelled, and rushed the creature, hacking at its vulnerable flank.

  Not to be outdone by a girl, Jonathan ran to attack the morpholag’s other side. If this was meant to distract the creature, it didn’t work. Despite both Jonathan and Sylvalla’s assault, the creature continued to focus on Dirk.

  Dirk, for his part, kept the morpholag well-occupied. He feinted and lunged, fancy footwork that confounded the creature.

  He ducked, and sliced at the lightning-fast paws, but he was tiring.

  Claws raked his arm.

  Seconds later, a glancing blow gashed his head. Blood pouring down his face, Dirk fought on with increasing finesse as Sylvalla and Jonathan hacked and slashed.

  Sylvalla, sweating freely, blinked in an effort to see the distorted creature in front of her. Was something wrong with her vision? Arrows appeared to fly right through the beast, and sometimes, against all expectations, her sword missed. At other times she’d hit when she was least expecting it.

  Ungainly as his swordsmanship was, Jonathan had better luck than Sylvalla. His sword often finding flesh, biting awkwardly, and proving difficult to remove.

  There was something odd about this battle. Dirk couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Or more to the point, his sword in it. It was as if the creature were part illusion.

  Dirk closed his eyes, thinking blind-fighting would be more effective.

  He was knocked backward, the creature’s claws raking across his chest as it attempted to bite his head off. Dirk was not stupid, not at fighting. His eyes flew open. And just in time. He needed all his formidable skill to lash out, recover and keep the ferocious beast at bay. Dirk took some comfort in seeing the morpholag’s nose was bloodied. Surely, Dirk thought. It’s not just my blood dripping from the creature’s maw.

  Meanwhile, bloody nose or not, Dirk was more than a little mortified that Jonathan was doing most of the damage. Somehow, Jonathan’s sword bit into flesh, when Dirk’s could not. Even Sylvalla was getting the hang of it.

  And still the piebald morpholag focused on Dirk, as if recognising his skill.

  It was a compliment Dirk could have done without.

  §

  Lunge, parry, riposte, sixte, prime, guarde. There were no pauses. Dirk’s blade flowed in and out of fencing positions with the fluidity of a sword moving really fast through fencing positions. The morpholag watched for a pattern. She attacked low and observed the response. She attacked high, then low. The morpholag thought she could discern a pattern, but Jonathan and Sylvalla were seriously sapping her strength.

  So, Christopher decided to change her tactics and get rid of them. One snap and Jonathan was on the ground. Her jaws dripped over her prey. At least I can rid myself of a small nuisance and get back to the real threat.

  §

  Dirk saw the lack of attention. He saw his target with preternatural clarity. There was nothing else within his vision. Only the morpholag. It was an all or nothing shot, the kind of stupidity that wins big, or loses everything. Dirk’s sword, aimed just above the creature’s eye, wasted no time slipping through the dragon’s skull and straight into its brain.

  Everyone (except Mr Goodfellow Senior) gaped in surprise as the blotchy brown and white bunny-rat thing morphed to reveal a green scaly lizard-like creature with iridescent gold-tinged wings.

  There could no longer be any doubt as to what they’d been fighting. The combatants froze in a kind of delayed shock, as with its very last breath, the juvenile dragon screamed in pain.

  Sylvalla was the first to recover. Ignoring her twinges of doubt, she whooped, “We did it!”

  She’d actually done very little indeed, but she’d worked very hard to do it. Which is almost certainly why everybody was happy to agree, and smile, and take a moment to celebrate their victory.

  And it was just a moment. A small, sweet moment of triumph, before Jonathan stepped back in horror, a terrible realisation dawning on his face as the full import of their deed became all too clear. “Did we just kill a baby dragon?” he asked plaintively, wishing to be half a world away, perhaps on the scorching dunes of the Arakian Desert.

  Sylvalla clapped her hands. “We need proof. Let’s take a tooth! This is amazing! Unbelievable! Fantastic!”

  Dirk shook his head. He was still dealing with after-images of rodent. Maybe it was the sight of the hideous rat-like bunny burnt into his brain, but he didn’t feel quite himself. Not now, when it was all too obvious how his father had killed a dragon, and then failed to live much longer …

  “You do it, princess,” Jonathan said, his voice dead as the full impact of what they’d done kept on sinking in. Glancing over at Mr Goodfellow Senior didn’t exactly raise his hopes. The old wizard was peering intently up into the sky.

  “Isn’t it wonderful? Unbelievable!” Sylvalla babbled, scrabbling to pull a tooth from the dragon’s maw. The tooth sparkled in Sylvalla’s hand, as her smile cracked the drying blood on her face. In all the excitement, she didn’t notice the stench of death. Which was ironic, because miles away someone was offended by the smell.

  §

  Timing is everything.

  Dothie believed his sense of timing was impeccable as he approached his quarry. The monster had been slaughtered, the heroes were exhausted. They stood and stared wide-eyed at their kill—the Morpho … dragon!

  Dothie readied a Drosophila spell.

  Fergus drew his blade.

  Arrant picked up a rock.

  §

  The earth shook as the mother/father of the dead creature roared and heaved herself out of her sleepy little hollow. Butterflies and Quests—they should have been warning enough, and now her baby was dead. Butterflies and Quests.

  She screamed in rage. The rules had changed. This time there was no thief. Not a real thief—just merchants and horse-thieves and boys sneaking into the night. If only she’d realised they counted.

  §

  Mr Goodfellow Senior stopped scanning the sky and said two words. Words that at other times, and in other places, have comforted billions of squalling infants. “Mummy’s coming!”

  The gathered heroes quailed. They had, at great personal effort, managed to slaughter something four times their size. And now something older, wiser and larger was about to arrive? I’m sure Fergus’ horse would have thought of a few good epithets, but that is probably why horses are prey animals. Sylvalla and company didn’t waste their breath.

  Although, talking of horses, maybe they’re not so stupid. Sylvalla, Jonathan and Francis’ horses had had the sense to scatter when the first dragon had burst into the clearing. They’d cleverly run a long, long way away, as far and as fast as their legs could carry them. In contrast, the people were still there, and moving relatively slowly.

  “The caves,” Goodfellow Senior yelled, setting off into the rocky bluffs nearby. “We’ll be safe there. A full-grown dragon will not be able to squeeze in.”

  “How big is a full-grown dragon?” Sylvalla asked prospectively.

  “As big as your father’s castle—if you’re lucky, young lady. Better to ask how far away those caves are. Now, do you think we could run? Or should I pass around cups of tea?”

  “I’ll run,” Sylvalla said firmly. Her words seemed to release the adventurers from their torpor. They all ran in earnest, except Mr Goodfellow Senior, who slipped back to grab some more dragon teeth while no one was looking.

  “You do know where you’re going, don’t you?” Sylvalla called over her shoulder.[34]

  Insulted, Mr Goodfellow Senior caught up and retorted, “Young lady, I might have lost my youth, but the grey matter is intact, you know.”

  Sylvalla couldn’t think of a reply; she was too terrified, and too oxygen deprived. She needed to save her breath.

  Despite his detour, Mr Goodfellow Senior was already sprinting ahead, hardly raising a sweat. Even Dirk was trailing him when a terrible piercing, cutting, fear-soaked shriek ech
oed around them.

  The exhausted party looked over their shoulders toward the sound that was a mother’s howl of anger, and a father’s vow of revenge.

  A dragon.

  Seeing their oncoming fate arriving in a fury of wings, and claws and teeth, they managed to run even faster.

  Running Away

  The princess and her companions were turning from the beast they’d killed and running toward the mountains. And what was their wizard doing? Pulling teeth?

  “Where are they going now?” Arrant asked, tossing down the rock in exasperation.

  The thurgle shrugged and Dothie didn’t reply. Unless swearing counts. He’d just watched his Drosophila spell fizzle. Somehow, their poxy wizard must have protected them all.

  “Come on, I’ve had enough of this—” Arrant’s mouth opened to continue his sentence, but his vocal chords simply stopped as the scream of an angry dragon cut through his frustration. Cold fear slid through his viscera, turning the contents of his stomach to icicles. Suddenly, he found his voice again. “Oh Shhhhi—”

  “Run!” shrieked Dothie. In his terror, he’d forgotten his all for one policy and was encouraging his business partners to escape. Stupidity. They might have diverted the dragon’s attention for a few seconds.

  Dothie, Arrant and Fergus could hardly control their feet—they didn’t exactly want to—their feet were running, racing for the hills after Sylvalla and the rest of her party. Not with any expectation of catching up and killing anyone, but simply in the desperate hope that the people ahead might have some kind of a plan.

  §

  “Here?” Sylvalla searched the foothills for an entrance. “The caves are here? You sure?”

  Mr Goodfellow Senior nodded vaguely, so that it was obvious to Sylvalla, and the rest of the party, that either the old man’s memory was failing, or his wits had become befuddled by lack of oxygen and paralysed by increasing fear.

  As they searched, Asumgeld veered into view, red-gold scales glinting. The party gasped collectively. She was an extraordinarily beautiful sight—if you could forget just how unbelievably, incredibly, stupendously dangerous she was.

  “Quick, this way,” Mr Goodfellow Senior yelled.

  They scrambled into yet another narrow ravine from which there appeared to be no exit, egress and, more pertinently, no escape.

  The long shadow of the dragon fell on them.

  Fire spewed from her gaping maw, hot on their backs. The stench of blackened wood rose from gnarled old trees. Most refused to give up their purchase on the inhospitable stone, until they were naught but cinders blowing in the air.

  Asumgeld, the dragon, landed.

  The earth shook beneath her weight, disturbing small rocks and stones. They tumbled down the sides of the ravine.

  She clawed at the ravine walls, desperate to reach this pitiful band of murderers.

  A large boulder fell end-over-end, plummeting toward the party.

  Dirk ducked. Sylvalla rolled away—acquiring multiple bruises on the unforgiving stone. But Francis and Jonathan froze. Mouths open, they watched the boulder fall, until Mr Goodfellow Senior shoved them aside in a moment of wizardly hang-time.

  The dragon swiped at the stone surrounding her. The canyon crumbling under her assault, she edged closer, her fire scorching the party, even from a distance.

  “Hellfire and damnation!” Jonathan screamed over the noise of disintegrating stone. “The cave entrance had better be in this pass. Where by the seven gods is it?” In his panic, Jonathan couldn’t shut up. He was only sad that he couldn’t think of the hundred and one more appropriate insults he believed the old man deserved for allowing his memory to fail at a time like this. “By the seven hells, surely you can remember where the gods-forsaken entrance is?”

  “There are entrances almost everywhere, young fool,” his father yelled. You’ve just been too busy panicking to see them. Keep looking! You know, I taught you better than to swear like that. You never know what powers you might awaken with your foolishness.”

  Jonathan sighed. Now his father had started, he didn’t stop muttering about the evils of swearing and panicking. Then, as if to rub salt on Jonathan’s pride, he muttered that while some were terrified out of their wits, he was made of sterner stuff.

  Nobody took any notice. They had other things on their mind.

  Mr Goodfellow Senior urged them toward a small offshoot of a ravine they’d already searched. In their panic, they hadn’t seen a cave entrance, but Capro was sure there was one.

  Dirk, Francis and Sylvalla ran, stumbling and grazing themselves on rocky outcrops as they fled, unaware of everything except the dragon, so close now.

  Mr Goodfellow Senior wondered if he might have left things a bit late for a happy conclusion to his little plan. After all, foolish, last minute, cobbled-together plans, and dragons, are not a good combination.

  The ear-splitting sound of breaking rock alerted the party something was wrong.

  Turning, they saw Asumgeld forcing her bulk into their tiny corridor of rock. The heat from her flames licked along the walls of rock, so they charred and crumbled.

  Dirk climbed onto a rocky projection, intending a last heroic stand. He pulled two daggers from his belt.

  “At least try to find some cover,” yelled Goodfellow Senior. There was a cave entrance near. Why couldn’t he see it?

  “I’ve found good cover,” Jonathan yelled above the crunching of stone, and the hiss of fire and dragon.

  “Good man!” Dirk said. His spirits rising with fresh hope, he jumped down from his perch just before the air he’d occupied was engulfed in flames.

  Jonathan was madly gesturing behind the best cover anybody had yet found: an outcrop of solid rock.

  Sylvalla and Francis scrambled to join him.

  “It’ll get you all char-grilled!” Mr Goodfellow Senior yelled—wondering if he’d let his mice run around enticing the cat too long. “We need—”

  “It’s more than good cover,” Sylvalla bellowed to be heard over Mr Goodfellow Senior, and the sound of dragon applied to stone. “It’s an entrance to the caves.”

  “Thank the gods.” Dirk leaped over a stray boulder before ducking after the others into the cavern.

  Stones clattered down around them, as Dirk, Sylvalla, Jonathan and Francis fled blindly into the dark. None of them so much as glanced back. They were completely unaware that one member of their party had stayed behind. Mr Goodfellow Senior. He stood in the entrance, forcing himself to stay and face their assailant.

  Prudence

  The day started well for King Phetero and his men. Camp had been broken early, and the soldiers were marching in a way that made Phetero proud, although not quite as proud as the two days previously.

  Before they got far, an awe-full piercing scream rang out.

  Terrified, the soldiers stood rooted to the spot[35] and searched the sky, with a primal, deep-seated and unreasonable suspicion that the distant sound had to be the furious howl of a dragon. After all, everyone knew dragons were extinct.

  Horses reared and threw their riders. Others galloped off. Many of the soldiers began running too. Scattering in every direction. The remaining soldiers began pointing to the sky with the kind of dawning terror that can’t be pierced by reason, and the stampede truly began.

  King Phetero looked over his troops in disgust. As far as he was concerned, they were running in the wrong direction. It was only a little dragon, and he had his pride to think of. He and his generals tried to discipline the soldiers, by firing warning arrows into the rear of the army.

  It might have worked, except someone chose to yell something very crucial about the distinctive, but not enormous, silhouette on the horizon. “It only looks small from here, Sarge. I reckon that dragon’s the size of a castle.”

  Phibiam’s stomach turn to jelly. He thought of his old advisor whose motto was, A prudent man knows fear and runs like hell.[36]

  There was nothing else for it. He sounded
the retreat and turned to his aides. There was the slight matter of saving face. “We must return home and protect our people from the dragon. We will kill those kidnappers another day!”

  His personal guards’ cheer was whole-hearted, but somewhat shorter than usual. Spurring their horses in utmost haste, they escorted the king back to the city by nightfall. The majority of the cavalry were not far behind, leaving the foot soldiers to straggle in somewhat later. Every single one of them was greeted as heroes as they came in the gates. How else do you greet soldiers who are offering to save you from a ravenous dragon?

  The poor, terrified wagoneers were left way behind—too scared to think, and definitely too frightened to stop and ditch their expensive loads. Not after what was rumoured to have happened to the messenger and the other wagoneer. When they arrived back at Scotch Mist, weary and exhausted, nobody cared.

  §

  Now, you’re probably wondering what happened to Arrant, Dothie and Fergus? Had they been eaten? And if not, why weren’t they spotted? After all, they’d been running not so far behind the adventurers, and not so far in front of a dragon.

  The answer is, in fact, very simple: the adventurers did not spot the miscreants because none of them were looking hard enough to notice two puny humans and a thurgle when they were being pursued by something the size of a small hill that had the propensity to drop out of the sky bellowing fire.

  Besides, our anti-heroes didn’t really wish to be spotted. Not under circumstances where they failed to have the upper hand. So, when Sylvalla’s party was dodging in and out of small passes and canyons at the foot of the mountains, they were careful to duck out of sight behind rocks.

  Coincidentally, they ducked behind the very same spur of rock Jonathan found a short while later. And that’s how Dothie’s party discovered the cave system before our adventurers. This information hardly matters now, although it will later, so let us return to the real action with all due haste. Where, just outside the entrance to the caves, an old man is facing a dragon—alone.

  Truth or Dare