by Marc Secchia
The weather had been fine, but this day had dawned grey and squally. Capricious winds yammered around the second-from-southernmost outpost, where Grandion commanded his battle-wing against Shinzen’s Giants and their supporting Eastern Dragons, over one hundred in number. Giants charged over the sodden ground, attacking the fortress with roughly-hewn scaling ladders and grappling hooks, while groups of their brethren provided cover via a steady pelting of boulders and their newest discovery, crossbow bolts pillaged from the downed Dragonships of Commander Hiro’s fleet.
Seven days of gruelling battle. Giants popping up like weeds amidst the tangled sarsens. The ever-present danger of shield failure, and the piercing magic he could not make muzzle or tail of–Grandion himself wore a four-foot, broken-off length of wood in his left upper thigh, and another bolt had breached his shield to puncture his lower left flank.
Already, he had lost thirty percent of his force to Shinzen’s Giants, his Dragons and Dragon Riders unable eventually to avoid the flurries of war crossbow bolts and magic-flung boulders in the heat of battle. No shield resisted this giant-magic sufficiently. Shinzen himself had vanished like Dragon flame snuffed out between clenched fangs.
Hualiama would have worked out this conundrum. GRRR!
Greens! Grandion ordered. Another pass.
Immediately, sixteen Greens formed up one hundred feet beneath him in a wide, double-V formation designed to facilitate a concentrated field of Dragon fire and acid spit. The Tourmaline led a sweep from the North, intending to clear that flank and give the defenders respite. Below, nigh two hundred Giants laboured like agitated ants to build a stone ramp leading to the fortress walls.
Go!
The Dragons wheeled and dived. Immediately, a flurry of boulders hurtled aloft, but with Grandion’s support, the Greens survived the backlash thanks to their primitive shields. Acid sprayed over the Giants, each Dragon instinctively picking a target or group of targets. Psst! Psst! The Greens shaped the acid-shots with their tongues and fangs. The attackers danced and dodged; flesh and rock boiled where the powerful acids struck. Grandion shot bolts of ice, keeping the covering Giant-mages hopping, spoiling their aim. Aye! One through the neck! Another, impaled through the abdomen by an eight-foot shard! His fires surged. Battle! Blood! Death dealt by his paw!
Yet Giants swarmed unceasing, ever more aggressive with their return fire. Bolts! The Tourmaline tilted his shields to deflect, but even so, young Tarbuzi to his port flank and his shell-father, Yenuko, took shots that snapped wing-struts. The Giants had become smarter still, baiting the crossbow bolts with wire hooks and the foul poisons they secreted from special glands in the pockets of their cheeks. To his starboard side, the wily Ryuki flipped between four converging bolts before snapping out with her paws, decapitating three Giants in an intricate manoeuvre. Defenders on the wall, too weary to cheer, raised hands in salute as the Dragonwing shot by overhead.
Suddenly–’Ware above! Grandion jinked upward, hurling himself bodily into the path of an ambush by seven enemy Reds. Two he scragged by the scruff of the neck and slammed together with his Tourmaline strength, snapping wings and bones. His muzzle snapped sideways, clashing fangs with a smaller Red. Grandion’s ice-slurry snuffed out the female’s fireball; he did not miss with an icicle-attack that ripped into the roof of her mouth.
Yenuko flipped past Grandion’s instinctive wing-tuck; the powerful Green hammered into his opponent, kicking open a quintet of bloody, golden trenches in his flank.
Roar! Snap! Thunder! The Tourmaline Dragon broke free with a triumphant, bugling challenge that rallied the Greens and the covering Reds higher up. Battle! Again, he drove upward, slicing into a secondary force of a dozen Dragons sidling in from the South and soon broke free from the melee, leaving a trail of destruction strewn along his flight path.
Powerful, praiseworthy deeds of paw and fang!
Grandion. Grandion!
His head snapped about. A hulking Blue–Raiden? Why have you abandoned–
We’ve been overrun. Came to warn you.
Raiden looked awful–he was blood-splattered, wearing a dozen fresh wounds. Fully a third of his right wing hung in tatters. Fumiko, on his back, raised her Eastern recurve bow in a weary salute. “Grandion.”
Grandion said, “Where’s Vinzuki?”
“My mate’s fighting rear-guard,” Raiden called. “Shinzen attacked. Five hundred Giants. Dragons you’ve never seen before. Orange … with two green heads each.”
“How long do we have?” Grandion snapped.
“A quarter-hour,” Fumiko and her Dragon responded simultaneously.
The Tourmaline grimaced, but his heated reply was forestalled by a peculiar break in the weather. Coincidence? Grandion shivered delicately as the storm clouds drifted apart in concert with his scrutiny of the final fortress; indeed, all along the line, the weather-front showed signs of breaking up. His gaze, however, was fixed at maximum magnification upon that fifth and final fortress. Sickly green mists drifted over the scene–poison gas, his initial analysis suggested. Seventeen Kaolili Dragonships beat away at a full retreat, while more slowly to their rear, the Warlord Shinzen’s bulky transport-Dragons flapped ponderously beneath the weight of six Giants each, transferring them to the next Island.
His hearts lurched with an injection of battle-hormones. Two miles above, a vast, dense mass of orange scales rippled across the sky like a many-legged, green-spotted centipede, chasing a battle-group of Dragon Riders and Western Dragons led by Akemi upon Yukari. The Oranges were so many and flying in such a tight formation, Grandion saw not a hint of sky between their ranks.
Yukari was about to be overhauled.
“What happened?” he grated. Dragons! To me!
Swiftly, Raiden described the attack. Oranges had bombed the fortress with poison-gas fireballs. Those defenders who were struck directly died agonisingly, their liquefied flesh bubbling through their armour; those indirectly affected were incapacitated by violent vomiting followed by paralysis. The Giants, apparently unaffected, had ravaged the remnant of the defenders within minutes. Skyward, Shinzen’s Orange Dragons attacked with unconventional ropes–like spiderweb, Fumiko put in. The burning ropes and gluey webs entangled Dragons, forcing them to land; direct poison-gas strikes on heads and muzzles had blinded or paralysed other Western Dragons. Those that landed, the Giants tore apart.
“We must help Yukari,” Grandion decided aloud.
Fumiko, dark and lithe upon Raiden’s back, waved her bow and uttered an Eastern word the Tourmaline did not recognise, but the tone was unmistakable. He whirled to follow her gesture. Null-fire worms! he swore feelingly.
Orange-and-Greens. A second Dragonwing numbering four hundred plus Dragonkind beat toward the Shintori Archipelago from the Southeast, less than two hours distant and closing fast.
Calculation was unnecessary. His small battle-groups could not oppose these numbers, not separately and probably not together either. Grandion bawled, Yushimo! Sound the retreat below. Subayi–the Northern fortresses. Vathi, brief Commander Hiro–he won’t enjoy retreating. Convince him.
Raiden said, What about Yukari?
The Tourmaline Dragon swung about again, eying Shinzen’s advance. Raiden was right. His duty was to his Elder. Sweeping his right wingtip forward until it pointed directly at the foe, Grandion roared, DRAGONS! ATTACK!
* * * *
Dragons, attack! But not blindly; not without forethought. As he led thirty-two Dragons in a southward sprint to relieve Yukari, Grandion grilled Raiden and Fumiko on the tactics of these new Dragons. Lizard-Dragons, Raiden sniffed. Their bites were also poisonous, in a way the Blue had never seen before–they appeared to inject a necrotizing toxin from a pair of long, tubular fangs in the upper jaw, which ate through flesh and muscle like a Dragon supping on a delicious haunch of deer. Grandion hated to admit it, but closing with these Dragons in traditional forms of battle was probably … unwise. His scales itched.
Blue-star, what would you
do? he inquired of the oath-magic within, dark-fires despairing.
Penetrative shielding.
The thought formed so clearly, with a hint of well-remembered laughter, that Grandion’s wingbeat snarled up. What? Hualiama? Where are you?
Silence. But the nuances of that thought were unmistakably external. Lacerate-those-enemy-worms? That was not a concept shaped by Tourmaline neurons. By his wings, if the Blue-star was with him … Grandion lifted his muzzle to see Fumiko and Raiden staring at him with identically quizzical expressions.
Raiden said, “Do you often talk yourself into a stall, mighty wing-brother?”
Grr! He must save his strength, and mute his draconic belly-fury for the moment. Grandion assessed his group, questioning them with telepathic fleetness. Shield-skills. Higher magical functions. Magical reserves. He had three Greens, two Reds and Raiden the Blue, who might be capable of producing and sustaining such an elegant yet power-draining shield construct. He thought-projected the required forms with them. The rest? A feint. He shared and refined the strategy with his battle-group as they winged along at over thirty leagues per hour.
This is undraconic, said Raiden.
It will take mighty courage and firmness of paw, Grandion snarled back. Aye, there’s nothing noble about this type of warfare–save that for the ballads and praise-songs. This is survival.
The other Blue nodded slowly. Songs are sung only by survivors.
Closer. An orange-scaled tide about to swallow Yukari’s Dragonwing. The two-headed Oranges were gnarly monsters, clearly based on some lizard-like ancestry, in all likelihood Dramagon-spawned crossbreeds. One hundred and twenty foot wingspan. Eastern double-wing anatomical structure, four in all, as if the wings had been duplicated by some process beyond Grandion’s ken. Their scales were rough, spike-edged platters with no pretence of aerodynamic slickness, and the two heads of each beast, from midway up the long, sinuous necks were a brilliant lime-green colour, a poisonous hue.
Closer still, Grandion could make out the curved fangs of their smiles. They must think his battle-group feral, thirty-two taking on over five hundred, by his estimate.
Ready … he called. Shields solidified around him. Courage, Dragon-kin. Trust in the magic.
Like stars, said that inner inkling–not even a voice. Not a telepathic call. Something deeper still, a means of communication outside of all Dragon lore, the Tourmaline suspected.
He flashed the construct to his fellow-Dragons. Fall upon the enemy like fatal talons of starlight!
Raiden understood. BLUE-STAR!! was his battle-challenge, immediately echoed by every Dragon in Grandion’s Dragonwing as they speared toward Yukari’s force. The air, cool. The rush, thrilling. Three hearts pounded inside his throat like a troop of maddened Human log-drummers. Grandion’s paws tightened into fists. Hualiama had better be right about her penetrative shields, or this would be the shortest, most idiotic frontal assault in history.
The Orange Dragonwing loomed before them in a wall of living Dragonflesh, struck agleam by the twin suns’ peering through the clouds. The forces flashed toward each other at a combined speed of over sixty leagues per hour. The Tourmaline sent Yukari a tightly-focussed thought–Stay your course! Above, his diversionary teams split off at angles, thundering challenges and insults at the massed Oranges. Fireballs seared the sky. Acid sprayed from the Greens, coupled with a boiling-glue attack from the solitary Grey in Grandion’s force, the fierce and striking Dragoness Makani. The trailing Dragoness of Yukari’s group bugled in dismay as a set of fangs clamped into her tail. She and her Dragon Rider vanished into the oncoming wall of orange scales as though swallowed up, never to be seen again.
The Oranges’ eyes ignited with fury and wonder, clearly unable to accept the vector of attack. Necks writhed in confusion; the realisation that the impending collision would kill those Dragonkind foolish enough to sustain such an impact head-on. Even Yukari’s wingbeat stuttered.
SPLIT! Grandion roared. Every muscle in his body tensed. NOW!!
Shimmering wings of shield-magic sprang from his body, bending backward slightly at the tips due to the momentum of his flight. Five shining blades like the arms of a five-pointed star, they were, fronted by a single spike that extended fifty feet ahead of his muzzle. White-fire power rippled into being as Grandion shot by above Yukari’s back, so close that his trailing shields-arms came within a foot of brushing her upward wing-stroke.
For a millisecond, he was a living star.
SHOOP! SHOOP-SHOOP! Each Dragon he pierced was a sharp tug against his mind, the strain on his magic, unprecedented. SHOOP-SHOOP-SHOOP! He sliced through wings and tails and necks like a Dragon clamping his fangs into the tender underparts of his prey. Grandion sensed the Orange Dragonwing folding around each point of entry as the cutting edges of Hualiama’s unique shield-magic exacted a dreadful toll, yet the effect was a kind of friction, making him feel as if he swam through mud. A Green and two Reds of his force fell away, stunned and overwhelmed. He must help! Stalling deliberately, Grandion turned to the aid of Raiden and the others. As he corkscrewed through the fray, the impacts came faster and faster, battering his mind and strength. Paws and jaws swung toward him. In response, he barrel-rolled rapidly, creating a vortex of destruction that washed a world of tough Orange Dragon bodies with golden blood; body parts exploded around him, a welter of injuries so horrific, even Grandion’s mighty hearts baulked.
His magic stuttered. A dismembered head struck him in the chest, the piercing fangs automatically pumping venom into the muscle near his first heart. More bites, upon the wings, tail and paws.
Pain seared above the adrenaline-rush of battle. He sensed a magical poison mutilating his body even as he had torn into the enemy Dragons. The taint spread insidiously.
Darkness gathered in his fires, around his eyes, his wings folding like the weakest of hatchlings.
Hualiama …
* * * *
One moment Hualiama was eating lunch, the next, she found herself lying face down in a bowl of thin, unappetising vegetable soup, which smelled strongly of orrican fat.
“Uh … what?”
Elki hooted, “Lia! Did you just fall asleep mid-sentence?”
“I–did you hear … something?” she stammered, pawing at her face ineffectually. “Grandion?”
Her adorable brother reached out to pluck a stringy green vegetable from her hair. He popped it into his mouth. “Nope. But this is tasty. Missing your flame, your muse, that blue-scaled prowler of stormy skies?”
Lia flicked another unidentifiable chunk of vegetable at him. “Funny.”
“Not as hilarious as planting our oh-so-cutesy royal nose in a bowl of nasty soup,” he suggested, but then sighed and stirred his own bowl as if wishing to stir Shinzen’s intestines with a red-hot poker. “No progress on releasing Mizuki?”
Across the table in their quarters, Saori laid her hand warningly on the Prince’s arm. “Don’t add to the pressure your sister’s already under. Please. The Empress wants access to her head. Learn to think like a warrior, Elki. Our job is to keep that head intact. Nothing more.”
He said, “Stop imagining your spoon is a sword, Saori, and my sister might actually relax.”
“Um. I’m not hungry anyway.” Saori pushed her bowl away moodily. “I hate the waiting. No sign of dragonets. No Numistar. No word from the Land Dragons, Affurion’s Dragons or any other kind of Dragon. Just blood, blood and more blood. Your pet’s cute, though.”
Hualiama stroked the dragonet sleeping on her lap. “Saori, you’re besotted.”
With an angry shriek, the Eastern Isles warrior leaped to her feet, jolting the table. Lia caught her own bowl, but Saori’s abandoned portion flipped end over end, drenching both the dragonet and the lap holding him.
Eep! Eep! cried the dragonet, leaping into the air.
Stupid Human! Hualiama flung the bowl back at Saori, striking her on the shoulder.
The warrior flushed with anger. “Now, listen here–
”
Eee … the dragonet screamed at such a pitch, Lia clapped her hands over her ears. Rigid, he dropped almost to the table, before catching himself with a last-instant wing-flip.
“Oof!” Lia coughed as a white mite thumped into her stomach. “Claws in, you little …” To her shock, the dragonet ripped open a button of her blue dress and dived beneath the fabric, as if he wished to return to the inside of his egg!
“What’s the matter with him?” asked Elki, pointing at the quivering lump beneath the dress. “And, why’s your hair just turned blue, out of the blue, so to speak?”
“Roaring rajals!” Lia pulled a blue hank over her shoulder, shocked out of her draconic fury. “Right, weird magic …”
Focussing within, she asked, Dragonsoul, what’re you doing?
The dragonet’s terrified. What did you–
“Numistar!” Lia cried.
Hualiama bolted for the door, leaving Saori and Elki in her wake. Flinging herself into the tunnels, she retraced the route that she had taken as a Dragoness to view the comet’s onset. Short legs and a recovering body she might have, but the heart of a Dragoness beat in her chest. She heard two pairs of running feet fading behind her as she sprinted along, one hand cradling the dragonet against her body, the other arm pumping with all of her strength.
As she ran, thoughts galloped through her mind as though pounded into being by her boot-shod feet slapping against the smooth, stone-carved tunnel floor. Seven days. Six forays so far. Not a single dragonet’s egg had been found deep within the Land Dragon, Yiisuriel, but only four of sixty exploring Dragons had returned alive. Lia wondered if fifty-six frozen carcasses now lined the inside of the Land Dragon’s nostrils. Or had a greater danger emerged from the deeps?
