How to Bond a Mage (Heir of Dragons Book 3)

by J. A. Culican

  Kaleb took flight, surging into the sky a good distance above Torrent, and prepared to send a rain of fire down upon him. Minx watched, breathless. Torrent looks faster, but there's no way he'll be able to outrun a barrage of Kaleb's fire blasts. Looking to the First and the other Fae, she wondered if they shouldn't seek cover. If Kaleb starts lobbing fireballs, we're going to be smack dab in the middle of it. We should probably get out of here...

  Before she could urge the others to seek cover, the first fireball was cast, however.

  And it didn't come from Kaleb.

  Torrent, sailing through the air, opened one of his clawed hands and held it out. His palm began to radiate with an orange glow, and as he rose in the sky to meet Kaleb, a tremendous orb of bubbling magma appeared in his grasp. He launched it upward as though it were a large stone, and in its brisk ascent it doubled—then tripled—in diameter. The fiery blast narrowly missed. Kaleb cut his speed and hastily descended to avoid being hit. Kaleb's flight was ordinarily so precise and elegant; the messiness of this maneuver bespoke not only frustration, but a lack of confidence against his airborne enemy.

  Not wishing to be knocked out of the air, Kaleb went on the offensive. His throat expanded as a tremendous column of fire rose up in him. His fanged maw flew open, belching out a lava-like spray. The projectile cooked the air as it streaked toward Torrent, and even as the Dark Mage stealthily dodged, Kaleb kept the stream going, adjusting the angle in pursuit of his target. The ground was dressed in fire, and as Minx had feared the flames threatened her and the others. “We need to move!” she cried, urging them back toward the barrier. Already, the Krah and Wuffs across the way had fled for their lives.

  The Dark Mage flew circles around his larger adversary, and upon gaining some altitude, launched another fire blast—this one faster and hotter than the last. The fireball, blinding as a miniature sun, crashed into Kaleb's scales as he struggled to turn around in mid-air, and the blow nearly knocked him out of the sky. Minx had never seen him engage in this kind of battle, and the fact that a fire dragon of the Pyra Clan might be burnt by another dragon's fireball was not a little shocking. Kaleb didn't lose control; he took the blow in stride, loosing a roar of pain and then gunning for Torrent with a fresh load of flame in his jaws.

  Already, Minx could see how this was going to play out.

  Kaleb is strong, but even in his dragon form he can't beat Torrent. He has too many tricks up his sleeve. We didn't anticipate his being able to fly... If not for this, maybe Kaleb would have been able to overpower him, to wear him down from above. Watching them both, it was clear that Torrent was more comfortable in the sky. He was smaller, could maneuver more tightly than the massive dragon could. Even had Torrent not bothered with further attacks, he could have won the battle by simply evading Kaleb's, tiring him out in short order.

  “Kaleb, come back!” cried Minx. “It's pointless... Just come down from there! You can't out-fly him!”

  Kaleb cut away from Torrent and began descending. Touching down on the field, he shifted back into his human form—and then dove to his right to avoid being roasted by a massive fireball from above.

  Minx raced past the First and the rest of the Fae toward Kaleb, who'd missed being hit by only a hair's breadth. The air was churning with heat and the soil was shimmering as vapor rose from deep within the ground. Clouds of choking smoke crept all about the battlefield, stinging their eyes and inciting Minx to cough violently. “Are you all right?” she asked as she took Kaleb's hand and helped him to his feet.

  The dragon shifter staggered away from the burning crater and palmed the soot from his face. “This guy is unreal... Just when I thought I had him pinned down, he grew wings!”

  “How did he do that?” asked Minx, watching the sky for signs of another attack. “Are you able to fly around like that—human, but with wings?”

  “No!” spat Kaleb. “Rub it in, why don't you?”

  The two of them followed the First and the others as they ran toward the borderline. Slipping out of Pandling Grounds and momentarily safe behind the wards, they turned to survey the skies. A new fireball was on its way, and it erupted just outside the shield in a blinding flash. Kaleb dove toward the ground, forgetting about the shield and fearing impact. Even after the explosion, he remained face-down in the grass, panting.

  The First sheathed his sword and combed his long, sweaty locks from his face. “So, it is a loss, then.” He frowned, shaking his head. “We had no choice but to surrender more ground. He will continue pushing inland; I expect he will set his sights on Heilo Lake soon enough...”

  Minx grit her teeth, heart still pounding. He's going to take everything... First Pandling Grounds, then Heilo Lake and Pan. He'll rule over the entire continent before long, and there will be no one left to stand up to him. Whatever joy, whatever hope the Fae huntress had held onto up to that point, was gone as she stared at the burning fields outside the barrier.

  Chapter 19

  They stood upon the shores of Heilo Lake, looking silently at the choppy waters.

  The foaming waves were almost black; with every passing hour, the lake was growing darker in color. It disgusted her to see it, and she paced up and down the water's edge, trying to think of some way to ease the lake's suffering. Torrent's magic had taken root there only days ago, and the changes in it within that period were simply beyond imagining.

  Mau had reunited with Minx and Kaleb. She had stayed behind with Alla and the infected dragons while the two of them had gone to face off against Torrent. The Faelyr reported success in keeping the dragons from the tainted lake; Minx and Kaleb, however, had returned to the waterfront with their metaphorical tails between their legs.

  The dragons are resting in Alla's care, explained Mau. She's been speaking to Gloirs, too. How did things go back at Pandling Grounds?

  Minx turned away from the water, unable to look at it any longer. We were routed, she replied. Torrent was there. I thought we could make a difference. I never expected to beat him outright, but I'd hoped to... I don't know... delay him? Ruin his plans? Instead, he crushed us. We barely made it out alive after two encounters. He's still waging attacks on the shields outside of Pandling Grounds, and will soon be pressing in on the lake.

  The Faelyr fell into uncomfortable silence. Sorry to hear it, she finally offered before flopping down onto the sand. It was a good effort, at least.

  Minx left Kaleb by the water's edge and retreated to the treeline of the surrounding woods. Leaning against a tree, she did her best to keep it together and to decide on their next move. Everything was coming up in Torrent's favor, but even if things were hopeless they had no option but to fight to the bitter end. It was a matter of honor. She sighed, looking down at the forest floor. What's left? How can we move forward after these losses? What remains after so much devastation?

  She didn't need long to do the arithmetic.

  They had nothing left. Everything had been destroyed, spent, ruined, in the interest of defeating Torrent. The bulk of the Fae forces had given their lives to the cause and only a piteously small contingent of them remained. These survivors could only play at defending the lands of the Fae—even if they were all to seize upon the Dark Mage at once, they would be dispatched in an instant.

  The protective spell surrounding their territory had been a great hope of hers, once. She had been foolish enough to believe that its installation would drive away any enemy and bring her people a long-lived peace. In truth, it was barely effective. At that very moment, Torrent and his men were destroying the barrier she had pined for, and which Kaleb had risked his life to create. Like everything else they'd employed against the Dark Mage, it, too, would soon fall.

  She looked to her own strength, and to the strength of her closest friends and allies. Her skills, however admirable under normal circumstances, were of no use against an enemy as powerful as Torrent. Mau, Alla and even Kaleb could not stand up to him, either. Her father, plunged into senility by the tainting of the la
ke, was out of commission for the time being, and there was no telling whether the water from Gloirs' spring would actually return him to health. The dragons of the Talon Range had been helpful in the past, but they'd long since denied the Fae further aid, and were now struggling against troubles of their own in the form of a mysterious shadow spider virus.

  So, she asked herself a second time, what's left? What remains?

  She watched Kaleb, who was still standing on the shore, and suddenly began to weep.

  The only thing that remained, the only thing that hadn't been destroyed yet, was the love that they shared. She was thankful for it, would not take it for granted, but her realization that it was the only precious thing left in her life was not without pain.

  Their love could do many things, but it could not win a war. It could not overpower Torrent or drive him away. She wiped roughly at her eyes, stifling her sobs and taking in several steadying breaths. She'd had enough of battle, of tragedy and loss, but had nowhere she could run to. The love she'd once considered a refuge was no more resilient than any of the other things she'd once cared about. Like all the rest, it, too, could be crushed by Torrent—and if the two of them kept fighting without a concrete plan, she knew that it would be.

  But what plan could they possibly concoct? They had tried brute force, but had been woefully underpowered during each encounter. They lacked the strength in numbers to overwhelm the dark army, and hadn't the slightest insight into Torrent's weaknesses—if he even had any to speak of.

  The Fae had exhausted their resources. The Trading Center had fallen, interrupting the flow of goods into the territory. Her people—the ones that still survived—were on the verge of starving, and what little they still possessed was of no use in fighting a war. Attempts had lately been made to repair what had been destroyed and to gather whatever proved salvageable, but these efforts routinely ended in disappointment or more lives lost. Her people had been pushed to their limits; if things continued in this fashion, a flight into the wilderness, or even a surrender to Torrent, were not unlikely.

  She watched as Kaleb tossed a pebble into the inky lake. When the two of them had first met, she'd never encountered someone with such strength. In the form of a dragon, Kaleb seemed to her unstoppably powerful—a force of nature with razor-sharp claws and well-honed instincts. Even so, his most powerful maneuvers had proven useless against the Dark Mage—who'd merely donned wings of his own and lobbed sizzling fire blasts every bit as punishing as Kaleb's. A dozen dragons working together, perhaps, would even things up—but after all she'd seen, Minx doubted even those odds.

  She slumped against a tree trunk and dried her eyes. “We're lost,” she muttered. “If there's some way out of this, then I can't see it.”

  Chapter 20

  He was staring listlessly across the blackened lake when the voice called out to him from afar.

  Kaleb shuddered, certain at once that it was old Winterlimb speaking to him. He hadn't heard the ancient tree's voice in quite some time, and was more than a little shocked to hear its call as he stood contemplating the tainted lake. Oh, so now you feel like talking? He thought to himself at first.

  He'd been floundering for days, along with Minx and the others, in serious need of guidance, and had been none too pleased at Winterlimb's continued silence. If the great tree was finally ready to reach out to him however, that almost certainly indicated a matter of real importance. As such, he set aside his frustrations and listened. OK, Winterlimb. What's on your mind?

  The tree was slow in communicating. He stood by the water, the wind whipping his tousled hair and his ears filled by the babbling of the lake. Whenever words came in that low, deep voice, he usually felt them in his body more than he heard them. It was an odd experience, completely unlike anything he'd ever known amongst his own people. Kaleb was still baffled by the whole experience and wondered how it was even possible that the treasured ancient of the Fae could forge a connection with a dragon shifter.

  This time, things were different, though.

  The tone of that voice was weaker—noticeably thinner than in previous instances. Though Kaleb had received only a handful of messages from Winterlimb up to that point and was still becoming familiar with him, it was clear that the tree sounded different. His voice lacked strength, and his delivery was a good deal slower than the norm—so much so it almost pained Kaleb to hear him speak.

  My strength is rapidly diminishing, began Winterlimb. I come to you with a message of great importance. Time is of the essence. As the enemy's power grows, the window for action closes. I would ask you to hasten to me.

  Kaleb turned, looking back at the sprawling woods surrounding the lake. He wants me to go to him? What for?

  Winterlimb continued. Deep within me is buried a gift—a treasure that will be of use to you.

  The dragon shifter wasn't sure what was meant by this. Deep within you? What, am I supposed to cut you down, then? Have you been holding back on us this whole time, Winterlimb?

  The tree did not elaborate, only reiterated its request. You will find a valuable resource at the heart of me—but you must hurry. There is little time. The forces of darkness are crowding in, but I believe this treasure of mine can bring you victory.

  I still don't get it! pleaded Kaleb. How am I supposed to access this treasure? Is this some sort of metaphor, or is there actually something inside of you, Winterlimb?

  There was no reply. The ancient tree had relayed its message. All that remained was for Kaleb to act.

  With a sigh, he started from the shore, motioning to Minx. “Let's go for a stroll, shall we?”

  Minx, who'd been sulking at the edge of the woods, stood somberly. “Why?” Mau paced toward her, curling up at her feet as he approached.

  Kaleb grinned. “Well, I know it's going to sound crazy, but our old friend Winterlimb just reached out. He's got something in mind—a way to turn the tide against Torrent, I guess.”

  Minx's eyes brightened noticeably. “Winterlimb spoke to you? Well, what is it? What does he have for us?” A cautious smile spread across her lips. It was the smile of one who'd been starved of good news for far too long—one thirsty for hope.

  The dragon shifter gave a weak shrug. “You know Winterlimb... he's not the talkative type. He, uh... he wasn't too clear on the whole thing. But I don't imagine he would call out to me in this way if he weren't confident. He says there's a great treasure within him, and that it may be of help to us. He asked me to hurry over to him, so...” He motioned into the distance. “Let's see what he has in mind.”

  Minx appeared vaguely troubled by this news. “This treasure... it's within him? What does that mean?”

  Kaleb shifted into his dragon form, outstretching his massive wings and testing the wind. His nostrils flared as he drank in the warm air and his burning eyes scanned the treetops pensively. “I don't know, but I expect he'll walk us through it. Climb on, you two.”

  Minx and Mau took their usual spots on his back. With a grunt, Kaleb jumped into the air, catching a powerful breeze. He coasted over the woods, then gained a bit of altitude and sailed toward the edges of Pan where Winterlimb stood. The trip was a short one; within minutes, they would arrive at their destination—a destination which, thankfully, had not yet been threatened by Torrent's encroachment. Without the dark army breathing down their necks, they would have time enough to explore this supposed “treasure” in Winterlimb's shade before planning their next move.

  Kaleb knew better than to get carried away with excitement. He'd borne more disappointments during this war than he could count, and there seemed every possibility that this errand would prove merely another in a long succession of duds. Nonetheless, he was intrigued; the wise old tree, always enigmatic, was not one to call out without good reason. Maybe he's serious. Maybe he really has the goods. I wonder why he waited so long to tell us, though...

  The immense tree entered into view, its towering canopy dwarfing every other tree and structure in sight. Kal
eb descended rapidly, sailing downward and landing within several yards of its colossal trunk. When his passengers had disembarked, he returned to his human form—and it was then, as he began striding toward the tree with a mind toward exploring its secrets, that he first noticed its degradation.

  Minx and Mau, having taken one look at the tree, suddenly came to a halt. Kaleb staggered a little further on than the two of them, but the sight of the withered tree proved so alarming that he, too, eventually stopped. “W-What's happened to you, Winterlimb?” muttered the Fae huntress.

  Like so many things in recent days, Winterlimb looked threadbare. The tree, whose trunk was once a healthy brown, and whose foliage had been the most luscious shade of green, had been reduced on both counts to a sickly grey. Once-dense boughs had shriveled and heaps of dead leaves littered the ground at their feet. The treasured ancient appeared blighted, on the verge of collapse—and the change had been a swift one, occurring in the space of mere days.

  No wonder he sounded so hoarse earlier... Kaleb started toward the tree, clearing his throat. “All right, Winterlimb, here I am. What's going on?”

  The tree did not vocalize a response, though the clacking of its dried-out branches and the rustling of its dying leaves in the breeze resulted in something like a death rattle that was positively chilling to hear.

  “D-Did... did he say anything?” chanced Minx. She didn't have a connection with Winterlimb, and had no choice but to rely on Kaleb's reports.

  Kaleb shook his head. Approaching the tree, he reached out and placed a hand against its withered trunk, closing his eyes. What is it, Winterlimb? Why have you brought me here? What did you want to share with me?