by Marc Secchia
Too far.
She dropped her swords.
“No, Lia …” That was Flicker, looking on from just a few feet away.
“And the forked daggers, girl,” said Ra’aba.
Hualiama tossed her Immadian forked daggers aside. “Let my father go, Ra’aba.”
“Go stand with him,” the Roc commanded, grimacing as he tried to rise.
That would put her within easy reach of Yulgaz’s talons. Lia wanted to scream. Again, she glanced to the west. Where was Sapphurion, the vaunted leader of the Dragon Elders? She saw Grandion, but not his massive, instantly recognisable father … yet she sensed him, a closeness of a presence she might have known as a babe. How could she force Sapphurion to intervene?
Pitching her trained singer’s voice to carry across the throng of Dragons overrunning the Receiving Balcony, Hualiama said, “Where is Razzior the Orange today, Ra’aba?”
He hesitated, the triumphant smirk on his lips fading.
“You see, when Razzior came to burn me that day, father, I recognised him. I recognised in him the same spirit that I see in you. You two are kindred spirits. Yet your primary ally’s missing, Ra’aba. Why don’t you summon him to your aid? Surely, by the power of ruzal, you could do just that?”
Here was the edge of the cliff, and she should tread with the utmost delicacy.
Ra’aba appeared to have no answer. His eyes flicked away to their right, to a spot which stood strangely vacant amidst the throng of Dragons.
Into her mind, Flicker whispered, Why then, do Dragons follow a Human?
Changing to the dragonet’s tack, Lia continued, “I wonder what Sapphurion the Dragon Elder thinks of this unholy alliance you’ve forged between Dragons and Humans? Why are these Greens so willing to follow a Human leader?”
“Get back, girl!” Ra’aba snarled. “Back to your father. Yulgaz, let him go. I have no need of Dragons to do my bidding. One false move, Lia! Just one, I swear!”
“Easy, rajal,” she soothed, closing the distance with King Chalcion. Perhaps she could protect him. “The Dragons follow you because you are possessed by the spirit of Razzior.”
“You’re mad!” he snapped.
“Stone skin, fiery yellow eyes, unearthly speed and the devoted attention of dozens of Green Dragons,” she ticked off on her fingers. “Does that sound Human to you? Ask any–”
Lia broke off as that vacant spot shimmered, resolving suddenly into the vast form of Sapphurion. When had the Dragon Elder arrived? Had he been hidden all along? Sapphurion stood twenty-five feet tall at the shoulder, visibly more impressive than any of the Greens in his immediate surrounds. Hualiama gasped, fighting an urge to bow before the depthless gravity of the Dragon’s demeanour, the clarity of his gaze and the sense of a mind reaching out to divide truth itself.
A trapped, feral mien seized Ra’aba. His fingers clawed. Lia could not understand the nature of the disturbance which had so visibly sunk its talons into her father. Why an intervention now? What had changed? Why Sapphurion’s naked menace directed not only at Ra’aba, but at her? Magic built darkly within him, Lia sensed. Here, in the space between her two fathers, beneath the burning gazes of dozens of Dragons, was a place of unimaginable peril. She must navigate it alone.
“No!” Her father cursed luridly. “You cannot take this from me, Lia, I swear–”
Carefully, Hualiama said, “I can, because I’m the child of the Dragon.”
In a low, terrible rumble, Sapphurion asked, “Ra’aba, how do you answer these accusations?”
“No … no!” Ra’aba insisted. “I am a man. I bleed like any man.”
Lia said, “You have children like any man. Ianthine confirmed it, and Dragons do not lie.”
“The Onyx Throne is mine!” Ra’aba screamed. Every vein popped out on his forehead; sweat streaked his neck and gleamed on his cheeks. “It is my right! Nobody can tear it from me!”
* * * *
Flicker perched on a plant a little aside from his Lia, watching the fungus-face with narrowed eyes and muscles primed to pounce. Trapped in his own vile scheme, Ra’aba at last recognised the hour of his fate, yet he could not accept it. The dragonet read that in the muscles of his throat, in the way his yellow eyes blazed, the mind behind them racing to imagine a way out of this mess.
Ra’aba rapped, “I’m the same as the girl, Sapphurion. Lia just demonstrated her powers. Her claim to be the child of a Dragon is insane. What prophecy is the girl blathering on about? Next, she’ll be taking philosophy lessons from a ralti sheep!”
The dragonet shook. In a sense, Ra’aba was right. His favourite fire-eyes might not be leading a Dragonwing in revolt against her leadership, or wantonly destroying Islands and trying to take over the Island-World, but she did have a certain rare Tourmaline Dragon eating right out of her pretty little paw. Of course, Grandion just hovered there like a brainless lump of scales, like the rest of his kind, while this drama played out before them.
A dragonet might have to take matters into his paws, for the tension between Ra’aba and Sapphurion was unbearable. Something was about to break. He did not know what, or how, but his Lia had sparked the rage that was slowly and certainly driving Ra’aba off the proverbial cliff. The words she had spoken, the very magic reaching from her smoky eyes, demanded answers.
The Roc said, “Ask that whelp of a cliff fox how she found Ianthine–how she even knows about Ianthine, Islands’ sakes! Ask her how she survived being thrown off a Dragonship. She’s a liar!”
Did it hinge upon what the Dragons believed of Ianthine? Or on what Ra’aba’s manner exposed, the squirming and snapping of a trapped animal? Either way, the dragonet was amazed that fungus-face could still move, given the wound Hualiama had dealt him. So much blood! Yet he still seemed to cling on with preternatural strength.
Suddenly, the King of Fra’anior shouted, “Is this how the Dragons delve into Human affairs, Sapphurion? Sending spies among us in the guise of Humans? Shame on you!”
Flicker gasped at the accusation. Oh, by his fires, no …
Sapphurion growled, “We Dragons will judge these Greens. Yours is a dispute between Humans.”
Chalcion screamed, “First your Dragons sack this city, now you’re–”
“Shut your stupid, bleating mouth, Chalcion!” Ra’aba roared back. “You’re unfit to rule. Sending your daughter to do your dirty work for you. You never loved her!”
As King Chalcion bawled his defiance, Flicker detected a swirl of magic in Ra’aba, a darker, more brutal form of magic than he had ever sensed before. Fungus-face’s hand rose. A dark, Dragon-like shape winged forth, fuelled by all the hatred and fury of a tortured soul, of a man with nothing left to lose.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Hualiama leap across to protect her father.
Flicker leaped first, and faster.
Chapter 31: Sacrifice
AN EXPLOSION RIPPED through Flicker’s body. Lia saw only the start of his dive, then something black slapped her forehead and she found herself lying crumpled atop King Chalcion, with the dragonet draped across her right wrist. Her ears rang. Someone was shouting–bellowing, perhaps–but she could barely hear them. Liquid ran into her left eye; she wiped it absently, and came away with a handful of golden Dragon blood mingled with her own red blood, and bits of flesh that draggled between her fingers.
Flicker started to rise, but collapsed with a startled wheeze. Blood trickled from his muzzle.
“Flicker? Flicker!” Lia panted. “Oh, darling …” She began to lift the dragonet into her lap, but her hands froze mid-motion. “No!”
“My turn … save.” He exhaled.
Hualiama groaned. Flicker’s poor tail … his belly … his hind leg! Gone! Blown away by that madman, that Ra’aba!
Before she knew it, she was on her feet, screaming incoherently. Lia ripped two throwing knives out of her wristlet as she sprinted across the flagstones toward Ra’aba. He began to ra
ise his hands, but her roar paralysed him. No Human throat should have been able to produce such a sound. It punched into the Dragons gathered right behind Ra’aba, confounding even Sapphurion, the mighty Dragon Elder. Angling to rip his throat out with the blades, Lia slammed into Sapphurion’s paw.
“No!” she shrieked. “Let me at him! I’ll kill him!”
“No, little one,” Sapphurion growled.
Hualiama somersaulted over the Dragon’s paw, stabbing downward with all her strength. “Burn in a Cloudlands volcano, you fiend!” Sapphurion grunted as she stuck a blade between the knuckles of his other paw, which shielded Ra’aba’s head.
The Dragon growled, “Now just you–by the First Egg!”
Throwing herself backward, head over heels, Lia landed lightly on her toes. She sprang forward beneath Sapphurion’s startled swipe and drove in hard, stabbing her father in the gut, in almost exactly the same place he had stabbed her with an Immadian forked dagger all those months before.
Her scream rose to a ragged pitch, as if torn from her chest by a Dragon’s talons. “You killed him! You killed my friend!”
A paw plucked Lia into its irresistible grasp. “Fierce little hatchling!” exclaimed the Blue Dragon leader, smoothing out an unfortunate smile at her antics. “Peace, little one. Peace!”
“No! Oh, please, Flicker–let me go!”
Sapphurion shook Hualiama for emphasis as he snarled, “I will take this man to meet Dragon justice, that I promise you, little one. Go see to your pet. It is over.”
“Pet?” Lia shook her head absently, hating Sapphurion. She hated the anguish in her heart, deeper than the Islands reached beneath the Cloudlands. “He’s never been anyone’s pet.”
King Chalcion was saying something about the state of the city. Griping. Her feet touched the ground, but had no feeling left in them. Lia moved to Flicker; knelt by his side. She glanced back to see Ra’aba trapped in the Blue Dragon’s paw, slumped in defeat. Was it truly over? How could she ever have imagined that beast was her father?
Over Lia’s back, Sapphurion called to Chalcion, “Be grateful for the restoration of your Onyx Throne, o King of Fra’anior, and take pride in a daughter whose mighty deeds have won this day. I will delegate a Dragonwing of Brown Dragons to help with the rebuilding of your city, and Greens and Reds to help clear the streets.”
As the Blue Dragon began to turn away, Lia blurted out, “O Sapphurion, is there nothing that can be done for Flicker?”
The great eyes gleamed regretfully, red-tinged. “I sorrow with thee. Seldom has a nobler paw, nor a braver deed, graced the annals of our Island-World. Honour him well.”
“But … Qualiana?”
Sapphurion’s muzzle lowered, yet still, he addressed her from a height of over fifteen feet. He growled, “My mate was unable to make the flight, little one. We had our own problems back at Gi’ishior. Were it not for the exploits of my shell-son, all would have been lost.”
He said, Come home, Grandion. You are most welcome.
Grandion arched his fang-punctured neck, showing his obedience and gratitude. I shall follow as soon as I am able, noble shell-father.
The Dragons began to lift off in twos and threes, buffeting the small crowd gathered atop the Human Royal Palace. Monks stood shoulder to shoulder with Royal Guards. Hualiama’s eyes briefly followed Sapphurion’s ascent, Ra’aba’s solitary form grasped in his right forepaw. Dragon justice? She had been fully prepared to give her father all the justice he deserved. Even that had been stolen from her. Little Lia had held out her hand, and grasped nothing.
Nobody cared for a dragonet, not even one who had just saved the King’s life.
Oh, Flicker … Tearing off her tunic top, Hualiama tenderly wrapped his ruined body, trying to stanch the bleeding. Incredibly, the dragonet still breathed. Are you in pain, darling?
He said, Not … much.
The dragonet’s eyes remained closed, his flanks rising and falling too rapidly. Never in her life had Lia imagined a pain like this, a pain akin to the white-hot core of a Dragon’s fire, yet which consumed utterly without leaving any visible mark. The entire Island-World should weep with her, yet what she saw were men and women dazedly returning to normal life, despite the wreckage. Grandion’s brethren winged away, already receding into the swirling vapours crowning Fra’anior’s caldera. The dawn was bright and fair. It felt so wrong.
Flicker’s sacrifice had purchased this?
Grandion offered Hualiama his paw. Come, my Rider. There’s only one who can help him now.
She stared up at him. Dragons were fire, yet his emotions radiated from pellucid pools which mirrored the cobalt hues of the early day. Her mind became still. Grief gleamed, acknowledging her loss. Hualiama knew that one Dragon saw her truly, down to the living pith of her innermost being.
Her shoulders bobbed. We can’t. All these people …
I will shield us. I have not my father’s mastery of the art, but it will suffice. It must.
Flicker’s body seemed so tiny in her arms, so broken. The cloth was already sodden. Lia stepped into Grandion’s paw and allowed him to fall away off the palace roof, to be whisked through the air at an increasing velocity, until Dragon and Rider seared the dawn skies with a fire of their own.
Flicker, why did you jump in front of me?
His lips curved just a touch. Because you’re my dearest girl. My straw-head.
Hualiama could not breathe. She stroked the dragonet’s muzzle tenderly, beneath the ruff of his spine spikes where he loved it best, and tried to imagine that if she only looked at the upper half of his body, he was still whole and perfect, and not dying.
After a time, Flicker’s well-loved eyes cracked open. You’re leaking. My soul is content, Hualiama. I see it now. You will live. The power of that fungus-faced man’s ruzal did not touch you.
Flicker–her lower lip trembled–I want to die, too.
He gasped, struggling for breath as Lia soothed him with the softest words of a shattered heart.
The dragonet rasped, Then, what of the starsong? To whom would the Islands bow? The prophecy …
My world is ended.
Yet he had touched her fear and named it. What of the prophecy? What of the invisible, unrealised third race of the Island-World? As if sensing the questions burdening her heart, the Tourmaline Dragon stirred, his paw flexing to cradle Lia more completely.
“Through his allies, Ra’aba had organised enough votes in the Council of Dragon Elders to block my shell-father’s desire for action,” Grandion said. “My presence wakened their fires. You can imagine the heat of an argument between Dragons; imagine a huge cave filled with shouting, quarrelling, fire-breathing hotheads! Then there was worse, an ambush during the back-cave negotiations. Dragons were killed. War erupted on Gi’ishior. The Greens and their allies under Gemugaz the Dragon Elder attacked, having tricked the men of Yorbik into joining their cause. Many fine and noble Dragons were killed, but we prevailed.”
“It was that simple?” Lia asked, waking for the first time to Grandion’s condition. Fire-blackened scales, more talon cuts than she could count, and a detectable twinge in the action of his wings.
“Easier than bolting down a haunch of ralti meat,” he said. “Many a battle-song could be sung, but there is more.”
“Tell me.”
“I promised my shell-father I would fly with him to campaign against the Greens of Merx, Lyrx and Syros, to bring them to heel.”
So, the die was cast; her future, bleaker than ever. “You will go away.” Hualiama felt faithless to Flicker, considering her response to this new loss. How could she think of herself at a time like this?
Grandion said, “I will fly with my kin. Hualiama …” I’m speechless. Bereft. Will my Rider watch the skies for a Tourmaline Dragon?
I will, my Dragon.
A storm raged over Ha’athior. A cap of dark, suns-fired clouds lay over the Island, as though the Ancient Drag
on’s wrath at his kindred’s deeds had leached into the atmosphere. Around the holy Isle, rainbows shimmered with the endless intermingling of heat and moisture, making Lia conceive of elemental Dragons dancing upon the wings of storm winds. Only the wind soughing across Grandion’s wings reminded her that there was life, of a beating of hearts so ravaged by grief, it seemed even their gentle throbbing sullied the perfect dawn.
Flicker whispered, My soul takes wing upon its last flight.
Flicker, don’t say that, said Lia. We’ll get you to Amaryllion. He’ll heal you.
The dragonet snuffled against her hand. Such an incurable straw-head, Lia. His voice grew fainter, as though his soul already sought to fly. It’s been a grand adventure. Ever since you fell into my lap … didn’t I do well? Took you in paw … sewed your pretty hide … taught you to speak, didn’t I?
She sobbed, You did! The dragonets will sing your praises through the ages–o Flicker, friend of Humans, saviour of Fra’anior, a Dragon-soul whose fires burn brighter than the twin suns.
Silly, beautiful fire-eyes. Flicker tried to purr, but his lungs rasped appallingly, and a trickle of fresh, golden Dragon blood welled from his mouth. Stupid egg-head’s no good for you. Choose the Dragon. He’s a rascal, but a noble one–
I am listening. Grandion’s mental voice smiled at the dragonet.
You’d better take care of my best girl, Grandion. Consider yourself warned. Still, Flicker conversed with them. Incredible. Lia heard agony in every syllable, yet he struggled on, Would you sing for me, Lia? My favourite song: Alas … faraway something–
“I know it,” Lia said. How could she sing? Yet she must. Neither she nor Grandion had any healing powers. They must rush beneath the storm to Amaryllion. He alone could perform a miracle now.
Whisper-soft, singing for her Dragon friends’ ears alone, Lia battled her way into the verse:
Alas for the fair peaks, my love, my fierce love,
