Hush (Dragon Apocalypse)

by James Maxey

  HUSH

  BOOK TWO of the DRAGON APOCALYPSE

  JAMES MAXEY

  SOLARIS

  First published 2012 by Solaris

  an imprint of Rebellion Publishing Ltd,

  Riverside House, Osney Mead,

  Oxford, OX2 0ES, UK

  www.solarisbooks.com

  ISBN (ePUB): 978-1-84997-370-0

  ISBN (MOBI): 978-1-84997-371-7

  Copyright © 2012 James Maxey

  Cover Art by Gerard Miley

  The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Also by James Maxey

  Books of the Dragon Age

  Bitterwood

  Dragonforge

  Dragonseed

  The Dragon Apocalypse

  Greatshadow

  Hush

  Witchbreaker (coming soon)

  For Dona and Jesse,

  explorers of abstract realms.

  CHAPTER ONE

  A DANGEROUS SPLINTER

  A PRINCESS, A shape-shifter, and a ghost walked into a bar.

  The room fell silent as all eyes turned toward the princess. The bar was the Black Swan, the most prestigious saloon in the boat city of Commonground. While the house wasn’t as packed as it would be come midnight, there were scores of hardcore gamblers crowded around the poker tables. Ordinarily, you could march a two-headed tiger through the joint and the players wouldn’t glance up from their cards. They made an exception for the princess, known in these parts as Infidel, who was much more dangerous than a tiger, no matter how many heads it might have.

  Infidel was an imposing figure as she stood in the doorway with the evening sun providing a backdrop. The first thing anyone would notice about her was that she wore her three decades well, with sculpted curves, generous platinum curls, and enigmatic gray eyes. The money-hungry men in the room wouldn’t linger long on her face, however. She was dressed in the priceless Immaculate Attire, crafted for Queen Alabaster Brightmoon nearly three centuries before. Formed from the hide of the last unicorn, the legendary armor was milky white and trimmed with silver. The enchanted leather clung to Infidel’s body like a second skin. Slung over her shoulder was another famed artifact of the Silver Isles, the Gloryhammer, glowing with a pale white light.

  Despite her impressive armaments, it was Infidel’s reputation that brought the room to a standstill. On her first night in this bar, ten years ago, she’d ripped the arm off a bruiser twice her size. The whole town soon learned that the young woman possessed magical strength and skin so tough that swords couldn’t scratch her. Of course, even as her fame grew, her beauty tempted many a fool to a place an unwelcome hand upon her. Commonground possesses an unusually high population of one-armed sailors.

  I say this as the biggest fool of all. My name is Abstemious Merchant, though everyone in Commonground called me Stagger. For ten years, I was Infidel’s constant companion, moon-eyed in my adoration, but far too cowardly to confess my love. Yet fate can be kind to fools and cowards. Beneath Infidel’s white leather gauntlet, on her left hand, she wears a ring of woven gray hair. This is my hair. I wear a matching small braid of platinum-hued locks. These serve as our wedding bands, since at the time of our betrothal there were no jewelers handy.

  Fate’s kindness, you see, is balanced by a wicked sense of humor. In this unfolding joke, I’m the ghost. In death, as in life, I follow her everywhere.

  As a phantom, I’m unseen and unheard. If I could have spoken to Infidel, I would have advised her to wear a cloak and cowl into this place, despite the tropical heat outside. Wearing the Immaculate Attire in this city of thieves was the equivalent of walking through a lion’s den wearing a suit sewn from steaks. Worse, someone in this town might be smart enough to ask why she was bothering to wear armor at all. She’d recently lost her magical strength and invulnerability. If word spread, her former enemies would turn out in droves. Plus, as her husband, I wasn’t thrilled with the way the skintight armor accented her breathtaking assets. For supposedly Immaculate Attire, the outfit certainly lent itself to dirty thoughts.

  Infidel’s silver-trimmed boots clicked on the polished oak floor as she walked across the room. Ordinarily stone-faced poker players openly gawked and drooled, though I tried to assure myself they were hungering for the Gloryhammer in all its refulgent splendor. Glorystones are fragments of the sun. They’re rarer than diamonds and twice as hard. The Gloryhammer is literally priceless; all the gold in the world couldn’t buy it. The Tower clan, a family of famous knights, had passed down the weapon for generations. Alas, the last surviving man of the line had recently been reduced to soot. Infidel now owned the hammer, under the legal precedent of finders, keepers.

  Infidel didn’t look back at the gawking crowd as she arrived at the bar. Battle Ox was bartending. Battle was a half-seed, meaning his mother had visited a blood house to imbue her yet-to-be conceived child with animalistic traits. If the magic was done properly, a half-seed ox child would be big, strong, and tenacious. Do the magic wrong, and you get Battle Ox – a full blown minotaur with horns wider than his considerably broad shoulders.

  In the more civilized parts of the world, an infant born with a bovine face would have been put to death as a horrid abomination against nature. In Commonground, Battle’s visage seldom merited a second glance. Despite the name inflicted by the pun-happy denizens of Commonground, Battle was a rather gentle vegetarian. While he would willingly eject a rowdy patron if the need arose, his true calling in life was drawing beers with perfect heads of foam. My mouth watered at the smell of the amber fluid.

  Battle nodded at my wife. “A lot of people here won’t be happy to see you back” he said, in his gruff, bass voice. “Odds were running ten-to-one that Greatshadow would fry you.”

  Infidel leaned on the bar. “How did anyone know we were going to slay the dragon? The mission was a secret.”

  Battle shrugged as he picked up a glass and a towel. “The Black Swan started taking bets on the outcome of your dragon-hunt the second you left town. The volcano’s been belching lava for the last week, so we figured Greatshadow is still alive.”

  “Well, maybe he is and maybe he isn’t,” she said. “The Black Swan will get the full details. Tell her I need to see her. Now.”

  Battle put down the glass he was cleaning. “You ever learn the word ‘please’?”

  “Don’t mess with me. I’ve got one hour to get back to the Freewind and don’t have time to waste. I’ve got something the Black Swan needs to see immediately.”

  Battle shook his furry head. “No can do. She’s already in a meeting. Going to be a lot longer than an hour.”

  Infidel unclasped the top three buttons of her leather armor and peeled it back, showing the top of her cleavage. Battle’s eyes bulged.

  “You see this?” Infidel pointed to a black speck the size of an apple seed that nestled in the ampleness of her décolletage.

  “Uh...,” said Battle, his mouth hanging open.

  “This is Menagerie. What’s left of him.”

  Remember the shape-shifter who came into the bar with us? Menagerie used to be the most feared mercenary in Commonground. A blood-magician of unparalleled skill, Menagerie could turn into any of the scores of animals t
hat used to decorate his tattooed flesh. Menagerie had barely survived our dragon hunt. Since shape-shifting into tick form, he’d yet to change back into a man. A telepath of our acquaintance informed us that Menagerie had been so traumatized by his brush with death that his mind was shattered.

  Battle couldn’t know any of this, of course, but Infidel didn’t have to produce any further explanations. Men are willing to believe almost anything while they’re looking at a woman’s breasts.

  “I’m the only one that can hear him since he’s latched onto me,” she said, while his eyes were fixed on her. “The Black Swan has a potion that will change him back to human, and he has to drink it within the next five minutes or he’ll die. Do you want to tell the Black Swan she’s lost her most valuable employee because you were too timid to interrupt a meeting?”

  Battle frowned. No, no he did not want this, was what I was seeing in his eyes. But he also looked as if he had his doubts. Infidel wasn’t particularly gifted at lying. If Battle asked any follow-up questions, Infidel would probably be in trouble.

  Fortunately, Battle was too cleavage-addled to notice any holes in her story. He grunted, “Wait here,” then went through the curtain covering the doorway behind the beer kegs, leaving Infidel alone. At least, as alone as a woman can be, with a brain-damaged shape-shifter sipping her blood and her disembodied husband hovering close behind.

  Infidel turned around, leaning back against the bar.

  Every eye in the house was staring at her.

  The Black Swan may have the classiest joint in Commonground, but it was still a den where desperate men gathered to try to make an easy fortune. Their already questionable judgment was numbed further by generous tankards of booze. Ordinarily, order was maintained by the Swan’s infamous hired muscle, the Three Goons. Even when the Goons weren’t present, their reputation kept most people in line.

  Of course, aside from Menagerie, the Goons were now dead. If the patrons knew about the dragon hunt, did they also know that the bar’s most feared enforcers weren’t coming back?

  Infidel reached over her shoulder and grabbed the Gloryhammer. Instantly, its enchantment kicked in. Her skin glowed faintly as she rose off the floor ever so subtly. In addition to granting her flight, the hammer also enhanced her strength. The boost was nothing like her former arm-ripping power, but anyone looking at her had to be sizing up their odds of getting their skulls smashed.

  The odds were too high even for this room full of hardened gamblers. One by one, all eyes looked back at the cards in their hands. The roulette wheel was spun again, dice were jiggled in cups, and in less than a minute the saloon had resumed its normal routine. Infidel slowly drifted back down to the floor.

  Then Hookhand and his Machete Quartet walked in from the street. If I had a heartbeat, it would have skipped. I had history with Hookhand. When I was alive, my primary revenue came from locating ruins in the jungle and salvaging lost treasures. Hookhand used to make his living by having an uncanny knack for showing up just as I was climbing out of some god-forsaken tomb with a sack full of artifacts, which I would trade in exchange for not being nailed to a tree and flayed. This arrangement lasted for years, until Infidel started adventuring with me. In the intervening decade, there’ve been about seventeen different members of the Machete Quartet. Infidel normally doesn’t let them suffer for too long. Hookhand hasn’t been as lucky. When he first came to Commonground, he was known as Fairchild the Nimble. Now, he’s got one eye, his nose is squashed against his cheek, and he walks with a prominent limp. He’s got maybe six teeth left, and, of course, where he once had a right hand, he now has a hook, a big nasty one, the sort you might use to gaff a large fish.

  Despite a decade of serving as Infidel’s punching bag, Hookhand was a feared figure in the city. His gang was made up of street urchins he recruited just after they hit puberty, when they’re strong and agile enough to swing a machete like it’s a dagger, but too young to have any fear of life and limb. Once they join the quartet they become Kid White, Kid Blue, Kid Green, and Kid Black, based on the color bandana they wear. Hookhand doesn’t like to waste a lot of time memorizing names.

  In theory, the black bandana is worn by the gang member with the most seniority, but I didn’t recognize this kid at all. If I’d seen him before, I would have remembered; the boy was obviously a half-seed, part hound-dog by the look of him. He had an ugly pair of canine teeth, but any air of menace was diluted by his floppy ears.

  “Well, well,” said Hookhand as he spied Infidel. “If it ain’t ol’ Ripper herself. I see you killed the knight. Quite a prize, that hammer. Quite a prize indeed.”

  Infidel nodded. She leaned forward, resting her hand on the shaft of the Gloryhammer like it was a cane. She said, “Surprised to see you back in town. I thought you were up on the mountain, robbing pygmies.”

  “The volcano’s been spitting lava ever since we saw you and your friends fly out. Looks like you made the dragon mad. I made the executive decision to place some distance between us and the caldera.” Hookhand looked around the room. “Where are your friends?”

  “Who are you talking about?” Infidel asked. “I don’t have time for coyness.”

  “Zetetic the Deceiver. He was right by your side, carrying a baby dragon.”

  “Your eye’s playing tricks on you.” Infidel shook her head. “Never met the guy.”

  “Zetetic has a large red ‘D’ tattooed in the middle of his forehead. He’s easy to recognize, even two hundred feet in the air.”

  “Your depth perception isn’t what it used to be,” said Infidel.

  “True enough.” Hookhand slowly limped toward her. His gang spread out to the far ends of the bar. There was no way that Infidel could keep all four of them in her field of vision. There was a time that wouldn’t have mattered; a machete would have bounced off her invulnerable hide. While the Immaculate Attire protected her body, at some point in the convoluted chain of ownership from Queen Alabaster Brightmoon to Infidel, the helmet had disappeared. Infidel’s head and neck were completely vulnerable. But Hookhand couldn’t know this, could he?

  Hookhand stopped about eight feet away. Infidel didn’t look perturbed. Was this just for appearances, or was she really that confident?

  “I want Zetetic,” said Hookhand.

  “You want to turn him in for the price on his head? Old news. He’s working for the Church of the Book now. They don’t want him dead any more.”

  “I thought you didn’t know him,” said Hookhand.

  “I don’t,” said Infidel. “But you know I bounty hunt. I stay informed.”

  Zetetic had split company with Infidel shortly after getting back to Commonground. He’d promised Brokenwing, the only other survivor of our ill-fated dragon hunt, a visit with a former teacher who was the world’s foremost authority on dragon anatomy. Since Brokenwing was a rather badly mangled young dragon, they’d departed on their quest with understandable alacrity.

  “If you like to stay informed, here are a few facts for you,” said Hookhand. “We saw eight people go into the Shattered Palace. You were part of a dragon hunt organized by Lord Tower and Father Ver.”

  Infidel laughed. “Father Ver’s a truthspeaker and Lord Tower’s the most respected knight of the church. I, as my nickname implies, am a notorious infidel. A knight and a priest wouldn’t be caught dead in my company.”

  “I think getting caught dead is precisely what happened,” said Hookhand. “You were disguised as some kind of mechanical woman to fool them. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened. You and Zetetic betrayed the others. You’re carrying Tower’s hammer and dressed in armor that used to be worn by Ivory Blade. I didn’t see Blade go into the Shattered Palace, but I’m guessing I’d find his corpse if I went poking around.”

  Blade had died a good week before we reached the dragon’s lair. But, although his conclusions were off, Hookhand had some surprisingly good intelligence. How did he know so much?

  I studied his thug
s closer. In addition to Kid Black being part blood-hound, Kid Green had distinctly hawkish features, including freakishly alert eyes and feathery sideburns. Kid Blue’s overly long arms clued me in that he had some monkey blood. Kid White had some jaguar in him, judging from his cat-eyes and the mottled patches in his close-cropped hair. A hound, a hawk, a monkey, and a jaguar would make damn good spies out in the jungle. Kid Black, the dog-boy, and Kid White, the half-jaguar, had reached the opposite ends of the bar, machetes drawn. There was no way Infidel could watch both of them at once.

  Infidel retained her cool as she pressed a gauntleted fist into her palm and cracked her knuckles. The sound echoed around the room. Half the gamblers abandoned their chips and headed for the door. Infidel’s brawls were hard on bystanders.

  Infidel took the hammer in both hands, and once more her skin went luminous. She said, “Lord Tower could fly. He had impenetrable armor made of solid prayer. If you take your accusations seriously, you might tell these children to get where I can see them. If I could kill someone like Tower, what makes you think these kids stand a chance?”

  “Tower wouldn’t fight dirty,” said Hookhand, snapping his fingers. The Machete Quartet lunged, but Infidel had anticipated the signal. The hammer flared to solar brightness as she shot up ten feet, snapping to a halt inches beneath a broad ceiling beam. Most of the machete blows hit her boots, leaving little more than scuff marks that were swiftly erased by the armor’s magic. Kid Blue, the monkey boy, dropped his machete and hooked his long, skinny fingers into the heel of her right boot. He used his momentum to swing his legs up, grabbing her belt with his toes, then flipped up to grab the shaft of the hammer with both hands. Kicking into her chest, he grunted as he tried to pull the weapon from her grasp. The speed and power of the assault caught Infidel off guard and she lost her grip with her left hand, though her right hand held on.