Dragon Isle (The Legend of Vanx Malic Book 2)

by M. R. Mathias

  “My side, I think.” Darbon winced as he said it. He tried to get to his feet but the bed of rubble he was on shifted suddenly.

  Vanx’s heart sank. Darbon looked to be running in place for a moment as the ground beneath his feet began to spill away like sand. Then the boy fell forward with a yelp, and like a leaf going over a waterfall he flowed out of view.

  They brag and kill and waste.

  They call the earth their own.

  Never here, Oh never will they

  call our island home.

  – Balladamned (A Zythian song)

  “Rope!” Vanx yelled. “Give me an end and lower me.” He looked around frantically to make sure the others had heard him. They had. Zeezle was tearing through the pack strapped on Yandi’s back. Trevin was kicking at a projection of stone, testing its value as a hold fast. In a matter of seconds a length of rope had been thrown around the rock so that Zeezle, Trevin, and Yandi could use it as a pull point to lower Vanx over the edge.

  Vanx tied his end around his waist and waited only until the others snugged the slack before going over like some four-legged spider. They gently let him down. The descent was constant and smooth. The mouth of a good-sized cavern opened up before him, revealing the decayed carcasses of some small animals. Vanx hoped that whatever had consumed the creatures wouldn’t return anytime soon. The stiff-looking leathery hides and lack of any insect activity around the remains told him that it had been a good while since anything was killed or eaten there. Then the bottom of the opening was over his head and a moment later his feet found some loose, shifting rubble.

  “Darby!” he called out, but not too loudly. He had a feeling that nearby there might be dozens of niches like the one he had just seen. Logically he knew that many of them wouldn’t be empty, so with extreme caution he proceeded.

  “Can you hear me?” Vanx called again as he slid feet first in a semi-controlled manner down to the point where he had last seen his friend.

  He heard Darbon moan just as he saw the bottom of the young man’s boot. The boot was pointed straight up and wedged into a water-worn crack. It appeared to be the only thing holding the boy from a deadly headfirst fall. Vanx eased himself out to the edge and looked over. Darbon was head down, facing out toward the sea and trying to look back up at him.

  “Help me,” he managed to say before his bloody head fell back in a limp dangle.

  Using his dagger, Vanx cut a length of rope from the mainline and tied himself off to a dubious-looking cluster of roots. He made a slip noose out of the main rope’s end, and after a few tosses, managed to get it around Darbon’s free leg. He gave the line two short tugs and called out just loud enough for Zeezle’s Zythian ears to hear. “Pull him up, and then drop the rope back down for me. Take it slow. He’s upside down.”

  “Pulling,” came Zeezle’s response. It was louder than Vanx would have liked, but there was nothing he could do about it. He had to get his friend’s boot unwedged and couldn’t worry about anything else until it was done. Already the half-conscious young man’s body was moving upward in slow, rhythmic surges.

  It turned out that Darbon’s boot was barely holding him up. It came loose in a surprising crumble. The seemingly solid rock fell apart so easily that Vanx grew nervous and began inching his way in as close to the cliff face as he could get. His concern shifted back to his friend when Darbon’s head came up into view. It was a mess. Long, thin strands of thickening blood trailed out of the young man’s hair. A pair of white slits opened on the bloody face and Darbon mouthed two words before shutting his eyes again. Since he was upside down it was hard to determine exactly what Darbon said, but Vanx was certain it was, “Thank you.”

  Vanx started to say something to him but realized that Darbon had slipped back into unconsciousness. Up and up he watched his friend go. He had to move himself more than once to get out from under the steady stream of blood that was dripping down. Soon, though, Darbon was up and being dragged over the point where the rocks had initially given way. Vanx could no longer see him.

  Vanx realized then that the rope couldn’t be lowered all the way to him. If Zeezle and the others just let it back down it would catch and coil up on the ledge. He decided that if they tied a rock to one end and then threw it well out from the cliff face it might clear all of that and make it down, but it would have to be a good throw and he might have to move horizontally one way or the other to get to it. He was contemplating this and using his keen eyes to spy out possible handholds and footholds when he heard a dragon’s roar. It froze him in place and he had a hard time even getting his eyes to move to study the misty sky beyond the cliff. He didn’t see anything and didn’t dare make a sound. He thought that lying there on the beach, just under the stream of dragon’s breath, had been unnerving enough, but this was worse. He was exposed and helpless. His weapons, save for his dagger, were all in a pile above and he couldn’t flee if he had to. He could barely move a few feet in either direction.

  A span of time passed; a moment, the turn of an hourglass? He couldn’t say. He listened for the voices of his companions above, the sound of the rope sliding against the pull point, something, anything, but all he heard was silence.

  The next roar came from far too close. It nearly startled him over the same edge from where he’d found Darbon dangling. A dark shape whooshed by out in the mist, blue or black, he guessed, and fairly large. He heard the faint sound of a fracturing rock, and then a storm of pebbles and stones, none bigger than a man’s fist, came raining down over him. He found he was holding his breath and had been for too long. Just before the rushing of his blood filled his ears, he heard flesh being stripped from bone in long, wet tears. It was followed by more smacking and chewing noises. He waited for the next rip of meat and let out his air. Using the sound he was hearing to cover his heavy breathing, he tried to settle himself. He hoped that it wasn’t Darbon up there being eaten. He had no idea if the others had the time to get the boy up to where they were, but he knew they would have most likely heard the beast and fled. They had a task to complete. After telling them of Sir Earlin’s sacrifice, he doubted whether any of them, even Zeezle, who cared very little for human affairs, would abandon the quest. He could only hope they’d gotten the boy up.

  He waited where he was, but after a while decided that he was on his own. He would have to find a way to catch up to them by himself.

  Trevin and the seaman had just worked Darbon up over the ledge when the dragon first roared. Zeezle helped haul the young man to his feet and then they half-dragged, half-carried him up to the cavern. Once there, they huddled in utter silence, waiting.

  They all heard the dragon’s second roar and Zeezle heard the sound of the dragon tearing into its meal afterward. He spared the others the details and had to fight back a tear. “I think it got him,” he whispered hoarsely. “We have to go while it is feeding because it might come after the scent of that devil goat or Darbon’s blood next.” Now the tears did come, and he turned away from the others to hide them.

  Trevin’s cheeks were wet as well, but his determination to save Gallarael clearly overrode any sadness he felt for the loss of this half-breed friend. “Help me wrap his head, Yandi,” he whispered. The gash was as long and wide as a finger, but the skull itself didn’t seem to be broken.

  The seaman nodded and hurried. They made a headband out of material torn from Trevin’s doublet. Zeezle led them upward again. He cringed at every scuff of boot or tumble of rock that his keen ears could hear. Dragons could hear just as well and there was no lack of noise from their passage. He hoped the fresh devil goat carcass would draw it away from them.

  Zeezle was having a hard time figuring why his lifelong friend had so readily exchanged his life for that of the young smith. Darbon was likable, but his whole life would pass like a month of Vanx’s existence. This entire affair confounded his senses. Already a handful of men had died, or been injured. For what? To save a single girl? Why was her life worth so much more than th
eir own? As far as Zeezle was concerned it wasn’t. He had half a mind to just abandon these fools and row the longboat back to Zyth. He could do it. If it came down to trading his life for these fools over the stuff that might or might not even save the girl, he’d just have sore shoulders. For Vanx’s sake, though, he’d stick it out. His friend had died for this, as had Sir Earlin. He owed his friend that much. Still, if his own life came to more risk than he felt he could manage, he would stay alive. Besides, the idea was starting to sink in that if he let Darbon die now, then Vanx’s life would have been wasted. That fact, and Trevin’s sheer determination, was enough to keep him on task for now.

  “There is another cavern just up ahead,” he whispered to the others. “We’ll stop there for a bit and clean those wounds better while we rest. We still have a long way to go before we top the ridge. A bite of meat and cheese, and a few sips of that watered wine will go far toward getting us all there…” He started to say, “in one piece,” but thought better of it when the idea of Vanx being torn limb from limb and chugged down a hungry dragon’s gullet stopped him. He was glad that he was leading, for now the tears streaming down his face were flowing freely.

  Vanx stayed there against the cliff face as still and quiet as he could. He hoped that when the dragon finished its meal it would go off somewhere, but he wasn’t that lucky. Not long after the sound of its feasting died away he heard the beast growling about and grunting. It finally left its niche, but only for a heartbeat or two. The whole time it was gone, Vanx imagined it seeing him and coming around to snatch him from the rocks.

  The dragon came swooping back in and sent another crumble of scree over him. Soon it was feeding on something else. The sounds of tearing flesh and cracking bones, along with the wet smacking, gave Vanx the cover of noise he needed to explore the handholds and footholds he’d spotted earlier. Whatever the dragon was eating now was sizable, for it was still munching a good while later when the ledge on which Vanx huddled broke away with a loud, cracking rumble.

  The sensation of falling, and the helpless panic that came with it, overwhelmed him. But that wasn’t the most intense of his feelings. The dragon’s feeding had stopped, and its wings had snapped open. Vanx knew that as soon as he hit the ground it would devour him.

  The dragon belched his fire

  and the knight he did a dance.

  It was for naught, the fire was hot

  he didn’t have a chance.

  – Dragon’s Song

  Coll looked down at the trio of guards sleeping soundly on the wine-colored marble floor. The spell that had rendered them that way was a simple one. They would wake in a few hours and not even remember falling into the potent state of slumber. The fact that they had not been warded against such an attack gave Coll pause. He had to assume that a more formidable spell was protecting the Blood Stone from theft. Even though he was reasonably sure he hadn’t been recognized for what he really was, Coll knew Quazar wasn’t foolish enough to leave such an artifact unprotected. Or was he? The elder wizards of Quazar’s order sometimes grew lazy and overconfident in their protected stations. The old white-beard probably couldn’t imagine anyone or anything with the gall to try to subvert his will. For the most part, Coll had to agree with that. Very few would dare steal something from one of Parydon’s nobles or their wizards. Then again, very few had the mettle to do more than lick boots and follow orders.

  The last thought caused Coll to chuckle. He cast a detection spell on the worn but stout-looking iron-banded door. He was glad he did so, for there was the simplest of alarm spells set on its unlocked latch. Coll shook his head, growing more concerned with each passing second. Surely the old wizard hadn’t let one of his apprentices ward the Blood Stone.

  He dispelled the magical working on the door latch and opened it. Was the old man losing his edge? No, from what he had heard, just yesterday Quazar had driven back the ogres at the western gate in some wild display of blue lightning and wizard fire. Those were no easy forces to summon. Maybe the old man didn’t think the artifact was in danger of being taken. Maybe this was a trap, but for whom?

  No seasoned dabbler in the arts would have touched that ward without checking it first. Maybe…

  His thoughts trailed off when he sensed the power radiating from the real protective ward Quazar had placed over the Blood Stone. It emitted a force field of glassine lavender that encompassed the blood-red pebble in a crackling glow about as big around as a fat man’s waist.

  The stone itself was sitting like a droplet of blood atop a belt-high marble display pedestal on a white satin pillow. Coll knew better than to reach into the magical orb to grab the prize. If he did, one of several horrible fates would greet him: bone-melting heat, paralysis, a surge of heart-stopping voltage, possibly even being transformed into a pig or a goblin. It all depended on the power and creativity of the caster. Coll decided that Quazar probably wouldn’t go for anything imaginative. He’d be struck dead, or more likely charred to an ashy husk like the ogre they’d come across out in the Wildwood.

  The simplicity of the old mage’s warding on the latch and the lack of protection for the guards made sense now. One who didn’t understand the more powerful ways of the arcane might think that it was the stone’s power that was radiating the field around it and try to take it, especially after being able to just walk through the door. When the latch was opened, a trinket Quazar kept on his person was supposed to glow or get warm. Coll had deactivated that warning. Had he not, Quazar could have then spelled the tower’s exits.

  Coll laughed at the simplicity of it. It would work on just about anyone who didn’t understand magic or expect the unexpected. Even some of the more professional thieves might have reached for the stone if they had gotten this far, but Coll wouldn’t.

  He circled the pedestal slowly, taking it in through a spell of true seeing. It was the pillow, of course, that was enchanted to radiate the protective glow. The stone itself pulsed and shimmered like a glass of cool water before a man in the desert. Coll felt it pulling at him, calling him to reach out for it. These feelings only made him yearn for it all the more, for it had to be darkly enchanted to reach for and attract him in such a manner. It was as if it knew the deadly globe was around it and that he was there and lusting to possess it.

  No, Coll decided, he was just hungry for power. The stone was just there pulsing and throbbing and waiting to be used. It was his own lust doing the attracting. He let out a long sigh. Subverting Quazar’s trap would be no easy task, but he was certain that he could do it.

  He glanced about and for the first time took in the rest of the room in which he stood. There were two tall, narrow-arched windows, both heavily curtained. Against the dusty paneled oak walls a few other pedestals stood as if forgotten. Atop one of them was an old brass helmet with a plume of bright orange fur running over its crown. On another sat a rat-gnawed, leather-bound book: some general’s memoirs or something. The rest of the display spaces were empty, save for a rack hanging on the wall holding a wooden flint-tipped spear.

  “Hah!” Coll caught himself saying rather loudly. Rock, wood, water, and most other naturally occurring substances could penetrate some magical protective fields. A magical barrier formed to protect one from flying arrows and such had to be cast differently from other protective barriers. If Quazar hadn’t gone through the extra motions and offered up the components needed to make the shield impervious to objects such as a spear shaft, he might be able to knock the pillow off the pedestal, or at least separate the stone from the pillow.

  With a devious grin, he glanced at the crackling field of energy hovering around the top of the pedestal. The marble dais wasn’t activating the spell and yet the field was passing through it.

  Coll laughed then. He hadn’t thrown a spear in years, then only as a glory-dreaming boy, but he figured he could hit the pillow and knock the Blood Stone from it without much trouble. Without another thought he snatched the spear from the wall. The second it was in his hand
s he knew his mistake.

  The world around Coll grew hazy and the air became thick like mud. His lungs labored to pull in one last breath as his every living fiber was quickly turned to stone. From deep inside him a primal surge rose up quickly, but the evil force wasn’t fast enough. The rush of malevolence and brimstone was trapped in the statue Coll had become.

  “I cannot let you past,” the dungeon master persisted nervously. Denying the will of one of Parydon’s nobles wasn’t something he had to do often, but Duke Elmont and his crazy old wizard had personally come to give him the order. They had specifically pointed out that Duke Martin wasn’t to be allowed into the dungeons.

  “I’ll have your head, man,” Duke Martin snapped. “I only want to see the one-handed whore who came in a few days ago.” He smiled a conspiratorial smile. “She has a few talents you might like to be aware of.”

  “I’m sorry, my lord.” The guard wiped a swath of sweat from his forehead with his arm. “Duke Elmont specifically said that you were not allowed down here.”

  “And Duke Elmont is what? A duke of this realm?”

  “Yes, my lord,” the guard answered with a gulp.

  “Am I not also a duke of the realm? You are but a simple gaoler. Did you not swear to follow the orders of your superiors?”

  “Yes I did, my lord.”

  “Then you will let me pass, for my order holds as much weight as Duke Elmont’s.” He started to shoulder past the dungeon master but was surprised when the man moved to block his way.

  “No, my lord.” The gaoler gulped again. “I swore an oath to Duke Elmont, not to you. As long as he fills my pockets I will do as he says.”

  “So it is coins you want, then?”