“When do you think that will happen?” he asked. He continued without giving her a chance to respond. “I can tell you that a dragon will normally only produce one egg per year, and that egg can remain viable for hundreds of years. I can also tell you that a newly hatched dragon can reach full maturity anywhere between twenty years and a few hours, depending on the age of the egg. What I can’t tell you is why these eggs haven’t hatched, or how long it will be until they do.” He rested the sword on his shoulder and ran a hand through his hair, frustrated and weary merely thinking of the task at hand.
“Do you realize each one of these eggs contains a member of a species that was very nearly successful in removing ours from this world?” He paused, looking out at the rows upon rows of potential foes. “If even one of these dragons escapes this cave, its actions will be my fault.”
“You will come with us,” Marcus said. “In three days you and I will return here together to deal with this.” It wasn’t a request, or even a suggestion, and Logan had no illusions he had a choice. He let out a heavy breath.
“Three days?” he repeated, to which Marcus grunted and nodded. “Well, at least I’ll have someone here to talk to.” That prompted another grunt, but it was from Dartan, and it was actually a stifled laugh.
“Lead on, then,” Logan said, pushing the others from the room. He paused another moment, casting a last glance over the darkening room. He closed his eyes and felt for the pull, testing its strength. It was there, but very weak, almost like the nagging feeling he had forgotten something. It was nothing like the undeniable pull of the dragon that had led him here.
“Don’t anybody go anywhere,” he called out to the still room. “I’ll be back soon.” Only silence answered him, much to his relief.
The ropes were just as they had left them, and the question they faced now was how to get the box to the top of the cliff.
“One of us will have to wait,” Dartan offered. “Aliet has already touched the chest more than she would like, so I’ll secure it to my rope and Marcus can pull it up once he reaches the top. Frankly, I don’t trust Logan not to wander back into the cave if left down here on his own, so I’ll go last.”
“Frankly,” Logan said, grabbing the closest rope, “no one argued with you.”
Aliet put a hand on his arm. “I know I’m not going to,” she said and punctuated with a small kiss on the cheek. She took her own rope and began tying it around her waist. Dartan was watching the curves of her body being slowly revealed by the tightening rope, when his view was interrupted by the dragon-skin chest.
“Make sure it’s tight,” Marcus said, holding the box out to Dartan.
“Sure,” he said absently, taking the box from Marcus’s waiting hands. He wrapped his hands around the bone handles, and was surprised by how smooth it was. It was also cool under his palms, even though Marcus had just lugged it from the cave.
Realizing the others were well on their way to the top while he had been examining the box, Dartan moved to the fourth rope. He knelt to secure it around the box, ensuring it was tight. His hands brushed against the ridged scales, and he wondered what it would have felt like to soar through the sky on the back of such a beast. A small shower of stones and dirt from above disturbed the thought.
Looking up, he saw all three had now reached the top and were disappearing from view. He placed a hand on the rope, ready for Marcus to begin pulling, and he waited. And waited.
Something’s wrong. Should he call out? Not that he would be heard over the wailing wind, but it was something. Then, without warning, the slack left the rope and the chest began to ascend.
When it passed beyond his reach, Dartan stepped back, tracking its progress upwards. Strange. No sign of any of his companions at the top. No Logan peering over to check the box or steady the line. Not even Aliet, taking a chance to look down on him and perhaps tease him with the threat of just leaving him perched there. Nothing.
He stepped back to the very edge of the narrow landing, watching as the box reached the top. It hung for a moment under a small overhang, then, with a single reckless tug and another shower of dirt, disappeared from view.
I guess it’s a good thing it’s made from dragon scales, Dartan thought with a shrug. Although, the last dragon he had seen hadn’t faired so well against the side of a mountain. The thought prompted him to turn and peer down into the mist-covered canyon just beyond the tip of his toes. At least, he thought that dragon had met its end, but perhaps he assumed too much. He leaned over, peering further into the depths, and, there – surely some of that mist was really smoke. And wasn’t that the flash of a scaly red hide?
He backed away quickly, his imagination getting the better of him. He stopped only when his back touched the cliff wall. He looked up, searching for his rope, but still saw nothing. The wind shrieked by, tugging his cloak, reminding him of the dragon’s roar. He wondered, could he feel the emptiness, the void, left where a dragon filled the space? He shuffled back to the edge, and peered over into what now appeared more like a smoking pit. He started to reach out, searching for the dragon, then a thought occurred. If he could sense the dragon, could it do the same to him?
Without another thought, his back was pressed tightly against the rock wall again. “Any time now!” he called up when there was a sudden break in the wind. His eyes remained fixed ahead, hoping not to catch a glimpse of anything creeping up from the canyon. When the spool of rope landed on his head, he was thankful for the renewed vigor of the shrill winds, which covered his own shriek of surprise.
Rope secured to his waist, he gave it a tug and began his ascent. He had barely put foot and hand on the wall though, before he began to be hauled up.
Must be more than just Marcus pulling, he thought as the top sped towards him. The image of the box crashing in to the overhang flashed in his mind, followed by similar visions of his body colliding with it. He didn’t think his body would withstand the abuse as well as the box.
“Whoa! Whoa!” he called out, and the pulling stopped, leaving his head just below the top and his legs swinging in the breeze. He carefully reached over his head, searching for purchase, when his hand - no, more like his entire forearm - was enveloped in the strong grip of a single hand. Are Marcus’s hands really that big? It was what he was thinking just before his entire body was lifted into the air. That is definitely not Marcus, and then his mind went silent, unwilling to process what was right in front of him.
As a boy, one of Mother’s favorite bedtime stories was one she called ‘The Boy Who Cried Troll’. She told it often, and she told it well. As he got older, Dartan recognized the story for what it was – a cautionary tale about the dangers of lying, especially to gain attention. As a child, however, Mother’s telling left him with the impression it was more of a cautionary tale about the danger and cruelty of Trolls. Perhaps it was because in her version there were no villagers left to scold the child for his false claims of Troll, as the real Troll had eaten them all. As a result, Trolls became a frequent fixture of his childhood nightmares, even with Mother’s assurance they were rare creatures that lived far from them in the Northern Mountains.
So, it came now as no great surprise when he came face-to-face with one, he could not even summon the breath to make the word his lips were trying to form – Troll.
From his vantage point, dangling over ten feet in the air, he had a good view of everything around him, but his mind refused to focus on anything beyond the beast in whose grip he now found himself. It held Dartan at eye-level, which appeared to be the only part of its body that hadn’t sprouted hair, and regarded him with yellow eyes.
“Not much to look at, is he, Reginald?” The question came from somewhere in front of Dartan, but the answer was a disapproving snort in his face. The stench nearly brought tears to his eyes.
“I guess it’s true what they say about becoming King,” the voice continued. “It’s all about who you know.”
“Tell your troll to drop him, Roal!
” It was Marcus, from somewhere to Dartan’s left. He turned in the direction, but saw only a large pile of boulders.
“You had your chance to talk, Marcus,” Roal called back. “You weren’t interested in my offer. Remember? It’s too late now.” Roal, a thin and pale face peering out from a heavy hooded cloak, appeared beside Dartan. “Come along, Reginald. It’s time we introduce our guest to King Jarel.”
Reginald replied with a growling laugh, which was interrupted by a high whistle, changing it into a roaring scream. The grip on Dartan’s arm released, and he fell to the ground. Above him, the hulking Reginald was holding his arm, now pierced with an arrow.
“I told you to put him down,” Marcus’s voice came from the boulders again. Reginald fixed his glare on the pile, snarled, then snapped the back of the arrow off and pulled it from his arm.
“I think you made him mad,” Roal said with a smile. Reginald drew from his side a sword as long as Dartan, and charged towards the boulders. With Reginald’s massive form out of the way, Dartan now saw the remaining Northern force of just over thirty men. They too were headed for where Marcus, and he assumed Aliet and Logan, lay hidden. Forgetting about Dartan for the moment, Roal turned to watch the massacre unfold. “You brought this on yourself,” Roal added. “All we wanted was the box and the boy, but now we’ll have your lives as well.”
Being plucked from the side of a cliff, dangled in the air by his arm, and then dropped into the snow had left Dartan’s mind a little sluggish. Seeing his friends being surrounded and threatened snapped everything back into sharp focus. He had to do something, but what?
Reginald. He was obviously the most imminent threat as Dartan noticed even Roal’s men had slowed their advance to watch the brute at work. He stood on top of the pile, feverishly poking his sword into cracks and crevices, bent on chopping up those responsible for his arm, then eating them bit by tasty bit from the end of an arrow.
“Come out!” the beast growled, followed by an unintelligible scream. He threw the sword aside and started moving rocks, tossing them over his shoulder and into the canyon below. He was not careful, or even picky, about what rocks he removed, and the pile began to shift under his feet. The remains of a previous slide, the pile ran all the way to the cliff’s edge, and Dartan wondered what it would take to push more of it over the side.
Reaching out, he could actually feel it. The desire to break free, continue its frozen path, and tumble through the air was almost palatable. All it would take was a little push.
All eyes were on the Troll now, but Dartan was watching the rocks. Here, now was his chance. The Troll lifted the largest rock he had found yet, and the toothy grin told Dartan that his friends had been uncovered. His mind already on his prize, Reginald absently twisted and swung his arms to toss the boulder over the edge. That was when Dartan pushed.
The gleeful rage on the Troll’s face changed almost instantly to confusion. The sliding rocks under his feet tipped his already off-balance body over. He landed hard, stunned for a moment, but his progression towards the cliff edge didn’t slow. He dug his hands in, looking for something solid, but everything was moving, and he was swept head first over the edge in a river of swiftly moving rock and dirt.
Rocks continued to spill over the ledge well after the Troll’s screams had faded, but it was the only movement in the otherwise still valley. Roal and his men stood rooted in place, staring at the empty space which only moments before had held a Troll. Dartan focused on the spot where the last boulder had been removed, waiting. Coaxed out by the silence, three heads cautiously rose out of the hole. Dartan caught Aliet’s eyes and returned the smile of relief he saw on her face. It was quickly erased for both of them.
“What are you idiots staring at?” Roal roared at his men. “Stop standing around and get them!” The command broke the paralysis gripping them, and the men scrambled to gather themselves. It wouldn’t take them long to cover the distance. Dartan needed to find a way to stop them.
He was still on the ground, near the cliff’s edge where Reginald had deposited him, and the wind from below suddenly blew past him. It picked up loose snow, sending it swirling in dizzying circles towards the advancing Northern force. It recalled to his mind the memory of a wide circle of leafless trees, and he smiled as he reached out to give the wind some encouragement.
The wind howled up from the canyon floor, sailed past Dartan, and blasted into the front line of men, pushing them back into the rest. Growing in intensity, it picked the men up, swirling them around like dancing snowflakes. They whirled and crashed into one another, only coming to a rest when Roal raised his wand and dispelled the wind.
“You!” Roal pointed his wand directly at Dartan, heading towards him. It was the first time Dartan had ever been threatened with a wand, or by a wizard for that matter. With the cliff’s edge behind him, Dartan had little choice other than to stand up, brush the snow from his clothes, and face the advancing wizard. “You did this. But how? You can’t be a wizard,” he insisted. “No one said anything about you being a wizard.”
“Technically,” Dartan said, “I’m still an apprentice.” Probably not the most threatening thing he could say, but he had no idea how to fight a wizard. Should he even bother drawing his sword?
“Apprentice?” Roal couldn’t get the word out without laughing. He adjusted his grip on the wand, keeping it pointed squarely at Dartan. “Where’s your wand, apprentice?”
“I don’t have one,” he said with a shrug.
Roal laughed again. “Pity,” he said, raising his wand to the sky. “You could have learned something from me, boy.”
Clouds gathered above, and a rumble of thunder rolled through the valley. A crackle of electricity filled the air, and Dartan experienced something not unlike what passed between Logan and the dragon. He could feel the lightning Roal was pulling down, almost hear it actually. More than anything, it wanted to streak down from the heavens and strike the earth below. Roal had to give very little to bring it down, but then he was directing it through his wand to force it on a path to Dartan. That part was taking much more force, because what it really wanted to do was go straight down into the ground. Dartan wondered, what if he just gave it a little help?
The lightning left the clouds and funneled into the upraised wand, which Roal then planned to unleash upon Dartan. He never got the chance. Dartan reached out and gave the captured power the little boost it needed to continue on its desired path.
It hit the ground mere inches from Roal’s feet, knocking him several meters through the air and onto his back.
“What I meant to say,” Dartan clarified, “is that I don’t need a wand.”
Roal’s men had detangled themselves from the pile they wound up in, but had not advanced. In the silence that followed, Dartan’s companions left the relative safety of the boulders and moved towards Dartan. Roal stirred.
“Get them!” Roal managed to croak. His men rustled and mumbled amongst themselves, but made no move. Roal sat up and pointed his wand at the group. “Now!” he commanded. “Or deal with me.” Smoking and disheveled on the ground or not, there was still a real fear of Roal among them. They drew their weapons and headed towards the small group. Roal looked back at Dartan, determined not to underestimate him again.
“I’ll handle the wizard,” Dartan said to his friends.
“We’ll take care of the rest,” Marcus added, drawing his sword. Aliet and Logan nodded in agreement and stood beside Marcus. “Stay close to Dartan,” Marcus said to Logan before they got too far away. “Know how to use one of these?” he asked, handing him a crossbow.
“Point and shoot, right?”
“Try not to point it at one of us,” Aliet said.
Logan fired a bolt into the closest man, dropping him to the ground dead. “I’ll do what I can.” He loaded another bolt and dropped back beside Dartan, who barely noticed. His eyes were fixed upon Roal.
“You know,” Dartan said to Roal, “you did teach me somethin
g.” Thunder rumbled above and the clang of clashing swords started to ring out as Marcus and Aliet began to dispatch the Northern mercenaries.
“Really?” Roal replied absently as he pushed himself up from the ground. “And what might that be?” A bolt of lightning came straight down from the clouds and hit next to Roal, knocking him back onto the ground.
“When it comes to nature,” Dartan answered, “keep it simple.”
Roal began to laugh while lying on his back, staring up into the sky. “Glad to have been of service to you,” he said. Thunder boomed again and Roal sat up. “Perhaps I could teach you one more lesson.”
“An apprentice is always eager to learn,” Dartan said with a smile.
Roal returned the smile and said, “Try this one.” He lifted a chain from around his neck, and Dartan caught a glimpse of some flat charm slipping into his palm, but he could feel nothing of its intentions. “Don’t play so close to the edge,” Roal growled, slamming his palm down to the ground. It sent a ripple through the ground towards Dartan, who still stood at the cliff’s edge. The buckling ground picked him up and threw him backwards through the air.
“Protect the King!” he heard Marcus yell. The cliff edge was falling from view and then he saw Logan dive over after him. It was the last thing he saw before his world went black.
Chapter Twenty-seven
The darkness dissolved slowly into swirling grey, which transitioned to blurred shapes, and eventually settled into lines and points on the ceiling above him. Where am I? How did I get here? The questions were his first thoughts as consciousness returned, and the memories followed. The box, the Troll, Roal, the Northern force, falling – what had he done? He had left them all above. He had left–
“Aliet!” he called out, sitting straight up. The darkness threatened to claim him again, his vision narrowing while his head swam. He was steadied by a firm hand on his back and chest.
“Easy now,” Logan’s voice calmed as his hands guided Dartan back to a lying position. “You landed pretty hard, and you’ve been out for a while.”
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