The Riders of Thunder Realm

by Steven Lochran

  The Stitched Witch reached under the altar and removed an unusual dagger, carved from bone and etched with the same runes that adorned Thrall’s mask. As she placed her hand on the Questing Bird’s head, the animal let out a piercing shriek. It hit Joss in the heart like an arrow, making him flinch.

  The Stitched Witch raised the dagger. ‘You will have given me life.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  A SMALL SACRIFICE

  THE Stitched Witch pressed the tip of her knife to the Questing Bird’s throat. The bird, now unable to open its beak without being cut, made a small shrilling noise. It thumped its wings between the chains and the stone altar, but could move no more than that.

  ‘Leave her alone!’ Joss shouted, his wrists purple with how hard he was pulling against his manacles. The witch lowered the knife as she looked up at him, her head tilted at the same angle as the rest of her slanted castle.

  ‘You hope to give me an order? Are you so ignorant of where you are? In whose presence you bask?’

  ‘All I see is a twisted old crone planning to hurt an innocent creature,’ Joss said, hoping that if he distracted her long enough he might somehow think of a plan.

  ‘You really think it’s as simple as that, don’t you? You sweet, silly child.’

  ‘You mean it isn’t?’ he asked with a stiff shrug.

  The Stitched Witch stared at him, her manner as rigid and unwavering as a tombstone. Eventually she took one step away from the altar, and then another. Slowly she circled the table, lowering her knife so that she could drag the tip of it along the altar’s surface. ‘You may not think it to look at me now, but once – and not that long ago, all told – I was radiant. Powerful. A force with which there was no reckoning. No reckoning, that is, but time. Time is malicious. Time erodes. It takes greatness and makes it humble. It takes stone and turns it to ash. We are all victims of time in the end. Or so it would be, if time had its way.’

  Now standing in front of the altar, the Stitched Witch came to a stop. ‘This creature is the last of its kind.’ She pointed her knife at the Questing Bird as a schoolmaster might point at a chalkboard with a ruler. ‘Or it is now that your friend has played his part …’

  Looking up at Zeke, he found that his friend’s face had become as stony a mask as Thrall’s. It was like a stranger had sidled in and swapped places with him. He didn’t even budge when the dragon began to rumble from its place near the wall, the noise enough to prompt the witch back into movement.

  ‘Blood magic is a precise art. It has particular requirements and certain demands. And when performed, it is quite powerful. More powerful than even the vindictive thief we call Time. Powerful enough to give me back everything I once was. So you see, child, I am not some unreasonable monster. All I want is the same as anyone else. A longer life. And if this creature has to die to provide it to me, then I consider that a very small sacrifice indeed.’

  ‘Lady, I’ve heard a lot of muck in my time,’ Joss said. ‘But that has to be about the biggest shovel load ever.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I’m no stranger to bloodshed. I’ve delivered enough animals to market and put enough suffering creatures out of their misery to know that sometimes a job just has to be done. But this isn’t that. You’re right when you say that Time takes its toll on everyone. But you’re killing this creature and eliminating its whole kind from the world just for the sake of your own vanity. So my question is simple.’ Joss drew himself up on his knees to level his gaze at her. ‘What makes you so special?’

  ‘Hh!’ the Stitched Witch snorted, the sound escaping from behind her veil like a knock coming from within a coffin. ‘What makes me special, boy? I’ll tell you. I act where others hesitate. A claim that I’m all too happy to demonstrate.’

  Returning to her place behind the altar, she wielded the dagger with hardened resolve. The Questing Bird wailed in fear.

  ‘Stop! You can’t do this!’ Joss shouted at her in desperation. ‘My brethren … the other Bladebound. They’ll have tracked us here. They’ll stop you!’

  The Stitched Witch didn’t bother to respond beyond a dark chortle, while Thrall stepped forward in her place. ‘Your friends fled the moment we breached the city gates,’ he said, calm and resolute. ‘No one is coming for you.’

  Joss froze. Could it be true? Had Hero and Drake really abandoned him? Every fear, every worry, every doubt he’d had about them now rushed back with full force. Of course it was true. All he had done was treat them with suspicion. How could that have ever inspired any sense of loyalty, any bond of friendship? In the end, what were they to each other but strangers thrown together by circumstance? Certainly not brethren. If he hadn’t known that before, he was certain of it now.

  The witch was chanting under her breath, the words nothing more than sharp little sounds, expelled from the back of her throat like rocks thrown at a stoning. The noise of them thrummed against the walls of the chamber, lulling the Questing Bird into an unnatural hypnotic state.

  The Stitched Witch raised her knife. Her chanting grew louder. Joss turned his head, looking over his shoulder to keep from witnessing the final act. And that’s when he saw the mortar that held together the brick wall at the far end of the hall glowing.

  The light moved quickly, tracing the crooked lines. It sizzled. Sputtered. The bricks began to bulge, and then the entire wall exploded in a burst of flames. Joss had to squeeze his eyes shut to protect himself against the sudden cloud of debris that engulfed the hall. When he opened them again, he saw two silhouettes standing among the rubble.

  ‘That’s our Bladebound brethren you’ve got chained up there,’ Drake said, brandishing his spear while Hero held aloft one of her zamaraqs. ‘We’d kindly like him back.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  A CRASH AND A CRY OF PAIN

  'KILL the intruders!’ the Stitched Witch ordered Thrall, wasting no words. Thrall wasted even fewer as he drew his sword. His blade was a curious object, its metal tinged red and twisted like a snake’s belly. Spinning it around himself in a fearsome display, he marched towards Drake and Hero.

  ‘Fancy weapon,’ Drake enthused as if paying Thrall a genuine compliment. ‘Mine’s fancier.’

  Hitting a button on his spear, Drake stood back as a mechanical hum filled the air. Even masked, Thrall’s surprise was obvious as his sword danced out of control before him. The blade wavered through the air, pulling against Thrall’s grip as it sought out Drake’s spear. The two weapons met with a clashing of metal, Thrall’s blade adhering to Drake’s.

  ‘Magnetic conductor. Just a notion I had.’ Drake grinned as he yanked the sword from Thrall’s grip, only to have the masked man smash him across the face with a gloved fist.

  ‘The last you’ll ever have after I’ve crushed your skull beneath my heel,’ Thrall snarled, kicking Drake in the ribs as he stumbled backward. Joss winced at the severity of the attack. All he wanted to do was rush over to help, but his chains held him steadfastly in place.

  ‘Keep still,’ someone whispered beside him, and Joss looked to see Hero crouched behind the pillar with a set of lock picks in hand. She had moved so swiftly that Joss hadn’t even noticed that she’d disappeared. ‘The less you move, the easier this’ll be.’
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  ‘Hurry! She’s going to kill the Questing Bird!’ he told her, turning his attention to the altar. The witch had dropped her knife in the explosion, but now she had snatched it back and was advancing on the bound pterosaur once more.

  A blur of motion caught the Stitched Witch by the wrist, pinning her to the wall. Her knife clattered to the ground. Joss gaped. The zamaraq glinted as the witch howled and fought to pull her hand free, but Hero had buried the throwing weapon far too deeply into the brickwork.

  ‘I told you to keep still,’ she said to Joss, adjusting her bandolier as she knelt down and continued with what she’d been doing. After only a few more twists and turns, the lock clacked open and Joss’s chains loosened. But there was no time to celebrate.

  ‘Stop them! They’ll ruin everything!’ the witch screamed, still straining against the zamaraq. Joss wondered who exactly she thought would be taking up her order. Thrall and Drake were still locked in combat, with Drake doing his best to fend off the masked man’s attacks with the use of his spear. Though he was struggling to hold Thrall at bay, he was still keeping him occupied.

  And then Zeke stepped forward, brandishing his shock rifle.

  Joss rose from the floor and the discarded chains that circled him. ‘Zeke … you don’t have to do this,’ he said, his hands raised.

  ‘Don’t I?’ Zeke replied. Though his finger was on the trigger, he hadn’t yet levelled the weapon at Joss or any of the others. Instead he held it at an angle, the barrel pointed at the floor. ‘I’ve come this far. Why not a little further?’ He raised the rifle. Powered it up.

  Joss said the first and only thing that came to mind. ‘Because we promised we’d watch out for each other. Remember? Or did all that mean nothing to you?’

  Zeke hesitated, the rifle whining in his grip. He didn’t blink as he stared at Joss, and Joss didn’t flinch as he stared back.

  ‘Enough talk,’ Hero said, raising a chrome device the size and shape of a pen. ‘This is a trigger. It detonates the bombs I set outside. Drop your weapon now or I turn this place into a smoking ruin. Well, more of a ruin … This place could really do with a good tidying.’

  ‘Hero, are you –?’ Joss started to ask, then paused. What would his question even be? Was she bluffing? Or just crazy? And did it even make a difference? There was no other way out now.

  Zeke scoffed. ‘You wouldn’t dare,’ he said.

  Hero tightened her grip on the trigger. ‘Wouldn’t I?’

  ‘But … but you’d die too. And the bird as well!’ Zeke replied.

  ‘I’m comfortable with taking my chances. Are you?’ She rattled the trigger at him.

  There was a crash and a cry of pain from behind them. Thrall loomed at the far end of the throne room with both his sword and Drake’s spear in hand. Drake was laid out on the ground before him, a gash in his head oozing blood. He didn’t stir in the slightest, not even as Thrall stepped over him to stalk his way across the hall.

  Joss looked over at Hero, caught her eye. He looked at the trigger, as did she. When she looked back up at him, Joss nodded.

  Hero scowled behind her goggles, then pulled the trigger.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  A LAST SURVIVOR

  THE throne room erupted, but all Joss could hear was a high-pitched ringing. His flesh felt like it was on fire, the fine hairs on his knuckles and the back of his neck as sharp as needles as they first stood on end and then were singed off. The ground pulled away from his feet, debris pelted him, the world spun upside down. He landed with a painful crash halfway across the room, and coughed up a thin mixture of blood and bile.

  Dust roiled before him, choking him and stinging his eyes. Only when it had settled was he able to struggle to his feet, pain enflaming every nerve. Hero lay motionless beside him, her head turned away. He couldn’t see Drake, or Zeke, or Thrall.

  But he could see the Questing Bird.

  It lay untouched on the altar, struggling only feebly now, with the Champion’s Blade unsheathed on the ground near it. Joss winced as he limped over to the sword and picked it up. The gold blade – the aurum blade, if what the Stitched Witch had said was true – quivered in his grasp like a tuning fork.

  Even in the midst of all this chaos and destruction, it felt good to have the sword back in his possession. Walking up to the altar, it occurred to him that while he had carried this weapon with him across the country, having had it stolen and mourned for and now thankfully recovered, he still hadn’t put it to a proper test.

  That would have to change.

  The Questing Bird recoiled as it caught sight of the sword. It cried out as Joss raised it. And then it yelped as Joss brought the blade down, striking the chains and sending sparks flying. Again and again he hit the bird’s bindings, the sword eating away at the iron with every blow. The sound of it was like standing inside a temple bell as it was struck, the tone loud enough to be heard even through the buzz in Joss’s ears. And loud enough also to awaken the Stitched Witch’s dragon.

  The skeletal creature rose up as if from the grave, snapped its jaws, and charged. It moved so quickly that there was no way to evade it. But Joss didn’t flinch. He stood his ground and waited for the moment when the creature’s leash went taut, throttling it to a standstill.

  Though the dragon thrashed and roared, it couldn’t get free. Joss returned to striking the Questing Bird’s chains, and with one last ringing blow, they were cut. The bird immediately jumped up, splaying its wings to cast the chains clear of its body.

  ‘Go!’ Joss cried out, and waved his arms to shoo it away. ‘You’re free! Get out of here!’

  The pterosaur cocked its head as it looked at him. Letting out a shrill squawk of what seemed to be gratitude, it flapped its wings and with much effort flew through one of the many holes that had been torn in the building.

  ‘Noooo!’

  The scream was harsh and bloody. It had barely left the Stitched Witch’s lungs before she was on Joss, her pointed fingers scratching at his eyes, her breath like venom in his face.

  ‘Do you have any idea what you’ve cost me? Do you?’ she demanded, her robes torn in the explosion to reveal patches of pale blue flesh that had been sewn together using severe staples.

  The Champion’s Blade was thrown from Joss’s hands as she grappled with him. Doing all he could to escape her grasp, he kneed her sharply in the ribs. She gasped, allowing him to pull away. He saw the ceremonial dagger in her hand, saw the murderous rage with which she wielded it.

  ‘It’s over! The bird is gone!’ he shouted at her, though she just shook her head with the crazed denial of a fanatic pushed too far.

  ‘Oh no, no, no. No! Not at all. I might not be able to sacrifice the last Questing Bird …’ She lunged at Joss, driving him back towards the jaws of her ravenous monster. Between them, there was no escape. ‘But I still have the last survivor of Daheed!’

  The air itself shuddered. The witch’s flesh crackled as a bolt of electricity coiled around her, dropping her to the floor. A gasp leaked from beneath her veil as she went limp. Joss looked up in shock.

  Standing behind the fallen witch, Zeke blew the smoke from the barrel of his rifle. ‘In case that
wasn’t clear enough, my lady,’ he said, hefting the weapon up to rest it on his shoulder. ‘I’m calling off our deal.’

  There was a loud and sickly groan as the skeletal dragon behind Joss tensed, trembled, then started to fall apart. Its bones scattered in every direction across the black waves of the floor, the magical link with its mistress severed. Its skull was the final piece to rattle to the ground. It rolled and hopped and bounced until it came to a halt at Joss’s feet, grinning blindly at him. Joss picked up the Champion’s Blade before kicking the skull away. The action was enough to make him lose his balance, and he struggled to remain standing.

  Zeke offered him a hand. ‘Here,’ he said, but Joss didn’t accept the help.

  ‘I’m fine. We should check on the others …’

  ‘I think you have more pressing concerns, Prentice Sarif,’ a voice boomed from the other side of the throne room. Joss and Zeke both looked up to see Thrall standing in the shade between two beams of light that streamed in through the punctured ceiling. Though he’d lost Drake’s spear, he had reclaimed his sword. It flickered in his hand like the tongue of a hungry reptile, ready to taste blood.

  ‘In case you hadn’t noticed, ugly – and I have to assume you’re ugly, walking around wearing that mask as you do – your employer is out of business,’ Zeke called out, his hand cupped around his mouth.

  Thrall took a step forward. Then another. His blade swished beside him.

  ‘Thrall, listen to me!’ Joss now said. Even to his own ears, his voice sounded unfamiliar. Deeper somehow. More certain. ‘You’re weakened. Outnumbered. You’ve lost. Do what your mistress couldn’t. See sense!’