by Paul Collins
Rakeem marvelled at their endurance. ‘You have done well, for barbarians,’ he said. ‘But I will take the dragonsight now.’ He stepped forward, hand outstretched.
Over their shoulders, Jelindel could see the dark shape of the Sacred One. When Rakeem mentioned the dragonsight it stirred and sighed.
Jelindel held up a leather pouch. Rakeem eyed it hungrily. ‘Give it to me willingly,’ he said, ‘and I shall spare your lives.’
Jelindel muttered something and blue flickerings engulfed the pouch. ‘One word from me, a thought even, and my magic will consume the dragonsight.’
Rakeem bristled. He forced himself to use an even tone. ‘You’re bluffing. No power on your puny world could best the dragonsight, much less yours.’
Jelindel forced a smile. ‘Luckily, I’m ever underestimated. Such a spell would consume me, granted. But I’m dead anyway.’ She tightened her grip on the dragonsight and bared her teeth. ‘What’s it to be?’
‘Name your price,’ Rakeem grated.
‘The antidote.’
‘Why, of course. You only had to ask.’ He gestured and a man stepped forward with a vial. ‘Take one mouthful only,’ he said as he handed it over. He reached for the dragonsight but Jelindel held back her hand.
Jelindel sniffed the vial cautiously then took a mouthful. When Daretor had taken a sip, she handed the vial back. ‘Have this taken to our comrade who guards the elevator on the upper level.’
Rakeem glanced at the shattered elevator. ‘As you wish, but doubtless he is already dead.’
‘Do it!’
Rakeem gestured to two of his men. ‘Do as she says. If he is unconscious, pour it down his throat.’ The men hurried off to a concealed door that opened on to a stairway. ‘There. It is done. Now let me have the dragonsight.’
‘In a moment,’ said Jelindel. ‘Let us see if the antidote works, or is itself another poison.’
They waited several minutes in an effective standoff. Shortly Jelindel felt her strength returning and the fever retreating from her limbs and brow. Daretor also looked much healthier. Part of Jelindel’s mind told her the antidote had been laced with a magic potion, hence its rapid effectiveness.
‘Enough,’ said Rakeem suddenly. He raised his hand and his men tightened their sword grips. ‘I have waited long enough. Give it to me.’
Jelindel threw Rakeem the pouch. Daretor stared at her in horror as Rakeem caught it and eagerly looked inside. For a moment his attention was taken. Jelindel drew Daretor to one side, away from Rakeem and closer to the Sacred One.
Then Rakeem looked up. ‘Guards. Kill them!’
The battle that followed was as swift as it was deadly. Jelindel managed to bind three of the fighters, but Rakeem’s magic blocked further use of that spell. She then used one she had tried once before, to great effect, and managed to temporarily blind several men. The odds were still against them, however. Dare-tor drove forward, toppling two guards and forcing the others into confusion. Jelindel fought off several attackers, but the outcome was never really in doubt. They were weakened and vastly outnumbered. Jelindel barely managed to deflect Rakeem’s spells; that merely distracted her from the battle. In one of these moments she lost her sword.
Reinforcements arrived, and they were surrounded by more than fifty fighting men. Rakeem stepped forward only when Jelindel and Daretor had their backs to the wall, and sword points at their throats. Daretor glowered, throwing down his weapon.
‘I salute you,’ Rakeem said. ‘You are great warriors, but I’m afraid the day goes to me. Now you shall die.’
Jelindel had noticed what the others, in their fighting fervour, had not. The Sacred One, old and feeble as he was, had crawled from his rocky island and dragged himself, with painful slowness, onto the narrow rocky bridge joining the island to the main chamber floor. But he could go no farther, the bridge being too narrow for his bulk, and too flimsy for his weight.
‘Well then, what if I should hand over the real dragonsight?’ Jelindel asked.
‘You bluff,’ said Rakeem, waving back the guards.
She reached inside her tunic and drew out the authentic relic. Rakeem gasped. He pulled an exact replica from the pouch, performed a quick exploratory piece of magic on it, then threw it away.
‘You bought very little time for the effort,’ Rakeem sneered. ‘Kill them!’
Jelindel held the dragonsight up high. Just like Osric, all the fighters reacted in awe; many fell to their feet in an attitude of prayer or penance. Others took on a glassy look. Even Rakeem seemed momentarily cowed, but recovered all too quickly. He threw a spell at Jelindel even as she flicked the dragonsight high into the air. Rakeem’s spell altered its trajectory. It arced over the heads of the fighters and flew towards the glowing fissure.
Rakeem screamed and tried to grasp it with magic. Jelindel deflected his charm with her own.
The dragonsight was falling into the fiery chasm. Jelindel cried out, as much in disbelief as horror. For all their efforts and risks to end like this seemed harsh indeed, as if the gods themselves had turned against them.
She started to slump, as if giving up finally, but something was rising in her, words of an ancient charm that came unbidden from another mouth. The unfamiliar words jumped from her mouth of their own accord: Thaddeus Pike’s voice boomed: ‘Illorn ahn aksar!’
Energy flooded into her, sang through her limbs. Before she knew what she was doing, she broke into a run, dashing between Rakeem’s fighters. Many swung at her but their movements were slow and sluggish, as if they were moving underwater. Long slow oaths erupted around her like tiny muffled explosions as Rakeem’s fighters realised what was happening. Thaddeus’s charm had speeded her up to several times the normal rate. Now she moved like a blur, avoiding the sword strokes as easily as an adult outmanoeuvres a child.
The charm, Jelindel knew, would come at a great cost. For a few moments of heightened speed and reflexes, she would expend enormous amounts of energy and afterwards collapse, helpless.
Meanwhile, the dragonsight was still flying through the air. To Jelindel it moved with eerie slowness as it curved down towards the chasm. She saw that the Sacred One had dragged himself to the very brink of the ugly gash in the chamber floor, his one remaining eye fixed on the amulet, as if willing it to himself. Jelindel knew that dragon magic did not work like that.
She burst from the ranks of Rakeem’s defenders and sped across the chamber floor. Even with her increased reflexes it would be a very near thing. The dragonsight was falling, falling to its annihilation. Jelindel put on an even greater burst of speed. To Daretor and the others it seemed almost that, for a moment, she vanished from human sight, so swiftly did she move. Then in a blink she was at the edge of the chasm. But something was wrong. She was teetering. Her face was grey and drawn. Yet she managed to lean out, one arm outstretched, and pluck the dragon sight from the air.
With a roar, Rakeem leapt towards her. He was followed by his faithful. Daretor was ignored, but he sped along with the others, cursing that he was too far away to help Jelindel.
Jelindel had never felt so tired in all her life. Even thinking was an effort. All she wanted to do was sink to the floor and sleep. Peaceful sleep. Oh, how she wanted that! But the noise behind her pricked her mind back to some semblance of sharpness.
She glanced behind. Rakeem and his men bellowed towards her. Despite the fog in her mind she knew they must not reach her. It had something to do with the amulet now clutched in her hand. The amulet! She must give it to the dragon crouched on the other side of the bridge in quivering alertness, watching her.
She turned and staggered towards the bridge. Behind her Rakeem closed the distance between them.
Jelindel reached the bridge, stumbled on to it. It was arched, rising by some seven or eight feet as it towered over the fiery chasm below. She felt the hot breath of magma on her face, scorching her skin. The heat stabbed into her throat and lungs as she breathed the sulphur-laden air. She did not fal
ter. Somehow she kept going, though her tiredness made every step a labour.
She tripped on something and stumbled, falling to her knees. A howl of triumph rose behind her. ‘Get up. Get up, Jelindel,’ she said through gritted teeth.
But she could not rise. Lifting her head she looked across the crest of the bridge into the eye of the dragon. It seemed to beckon her. With a weary oath she started crawling towards it on hands and knees, oblivious to the jagged surface of the bridge tearing her flesh.
She reached the very top of the arch and there she slumped, unable to go any further. Raising the hand holding the amulet, she made to throw it to the dragon. As she did so the Sacred One lunged onto the bridge. There was a terrible cracking noise. The bridge shook, then started to crumble. Jelindel cried out in fear and grief, though not for herself; for all the things that would now not be undone … This was her last thought as she and the Sacred One plunged into the chasm.
On the chamber floor, Rakeem and his followers skidded to a stop and gazed at the spot where the dragonsight and the Sacred One had been moments before. Daretor let out a single sobbing gasp, not believing that he had lost Jelindel.
Then a great gout of flame shot up from the chasm and all groaned. Some fell to their knees, knowing that the Sacred One and the amulet had struck the magma far below. In the silence that followed there was a new noise, hard to place. A soughing, like wind in trees.
Something rocketed out of the chasm and swooped about the chamber, before coming to a stop above Rakeem. It was the Sacred One, its left eye socket no longer empty. Jelindel slumped on the dragon’s neck, barely able to hang on.
Rakeem screeched in anger.
As they watched, all realised that the Sacred One was no longer old and feeble, nor partly blind. The gaunt frame filled out with youthful flesh; his wings stretched and flapped powerfully, and a deep crimson hue appeared on his leathery skin. It spread and deepened, until it was an iridescent glow such as no one had ever seen on a dragon.
Fire gushed from the old lungs; it was no feeble spray of sparks, but a furnace.
Zimak arrived via the stairs and joined Daretor, who was still facing off a squad of Rakeem’s men.
‘Put down your weapons and yield!’ Jelindel called out, her voice harsh with exhaustion.
Rakeem snarled angrily. ‘Yield? Yield! I do not yield to scum or to mindless beasts of the air!’
Jelindel was too weary to reply.
The Sacred One was not. A great gout of flame shot out and consumed Rakeem where he stood. The dragon’s head swivelled towards the fighters and all but a few threw down their weapons and abased themselves in supplication. Those left standing were turned to char from the knees upwards.
Thus the enslavement of the dragons of Q’zar came to an end. Nor, as Fa’red had thought, did they return to their paraworld at once. Fa’red had not realised that the dragons had dreamed of returning to their fabled home. Besides, three gallant Q’zarans had freed the dragons and returned the dragonsight. Dragons knew honour and gratitude. They also took very badly to being treated as pawns.
‘Pawns?’ asked Jelindel as she stood in audience with the Sacred One. ‘How can beings as powerful and wise as dragons be pawns?’
‘If you have been enslaved, anything is possible,’ the rejuvenated dragon replied via mind thought. ‘Fa’red stole the dragonsight to bring us here, I am fairly sure of that. He knew that Rakeem would move the kingdom. Using the dragons he would have conducted a campaign of terror to get the dragonsight back. If he had failed, we would have been freed, and therefore turned on our masters; then returned to our paraworld. The question is who would want a campaign of terror?’
Jelindel thought for some moments. Only one man stood to profit from frightening the entire continent witless.
‘Someone who wished to unify the kingdoms of Q’zar under his rule,’ she responded. ‘Fa’red. It is my feeling that he visited every monarch within hundreds of miles, demonstrated his airliner power, then told them that it was their only hope against an invasion of dragons that was soon to come. He then stole the dragonsight, knowing that Rakeem would follow, bringing the dragons with him. When the nobility of the lands hereabouts learned of their coming, they fell over themselves to provide Fa’red with enough soldiers to grow and tend his squadrons, along with thousands of tons of chickenfeed. He would have insisted that the combined squadrons be placed under his direct command. When the dragons vanished, he would have said that he managed to vanquish them by magic alone, and still have the most powerful military force in history at his disposal.’
‘And if the dragons leave, he will still be able to achieve his ends,’ said the Sacred One. ‘I believe that you will need some help.’
‘Until we bring Fa’red to book, no one will be safe, that’s true,’ Jelindel mused.
For several days after that, no dragons were to be seen on or over Dragonfrost. Humans still went about their business in the tower, and guards were visible building defensive walls. Huge flying objects were certainly in evidence above the plain, however. Through her farsight Jelindel could see the chickenriders scrutinising the castle with their own farsights.
The attack came out of a clear blue sky the next day. Alarm bells began to ring as sentries reported several great V-formations flying over the mountains in the distance. Everyone immediately ran for the shelter of secure rooms deep inside the castle. Jelindel, Daretor, Zimak and Osric were watching from the mouth of a cave some distance away as the first wave of airliners came in, diving fast. Dark pots fell from their cabins as they passed over the castle. They burst into flames as they struck the roofs and battlements.
‘BUK BUK BUK-CAW!’ the airliners crowed.
‘Those things could make sieges a thing of the past,’ said Zimak. ‘Even the very best of castles couldn’t withstand such an attack for more than a few hours.’
‘What worries me is that there must be two hundred of those things,’ said Jelindel.
‘Hie, Fa’red and Hargrellien must have sent their entire force.’ ‘Arithmetic has never been your strong point, has it Zimak?’ said Jelindel. ‘Two hundred airliners is a mere fifth of the force that we saw in Fa’red’s staging grounds.’
The castle burnt fiercely after no more than fifty of the living battle machines had attacked. It was at this point that the surprise was sprung. All around the castle, from peaks, rocky outcrops, and ruined towers, boulders unfolded to become dragons, hiding within their own folded wings. Of a sudden, it was a hundred dragons against the two hundred war galleys of the air.
To be fair, this wave of airliners was not equipped for what came next. They were loaded with firepots filled with soap and lamp oil, and had only a few archers aboard. The dragons attacked by flying up under the vulnerable airliners, where arrows could not reach them. The dragons set the huge feathered wings aflame, so that the airliners dropped from the sky, trailing smoke. The crews leaped for their lives and unfurled simple wicker and canvas wings to slow their descent. Still, it was not all one-sided. Many of the airliners flew in a staggered formation, so that they could cover each other and to allow their archers to fire at anything attacking from below. Not many arrows penetrated the dragons’ scales, but those that did sent the great creatures plummeting to their deaths.
‘Why do they fall prey to mere arrows?’ asked Daretor, staring in disbelief.
‘Probably poison on the tips,’ Jelindel said worriedly.
‘But I was hit, and suffered no ill effects,’ said Osric.
‘You are a creature of the natural paraworlds. Dragons are partially magical. Poisons that affect you or me do not affect them, and the reverse is true as well. It reeks of Fa’red’s cunning.’
‘Still the dragons are winning three to one – oh no, look over there!’ Osric exclaimed.
They gazed in dismay at the hundreds of airliners that were now visible in the distance.
‘Gah,’ Zimak snorted. ‘A thousand more of them.’
‘Eight hu
ndred,’ said Daretor, who had a talent for estimating ranks of warriors, ships, or anything military at a distance.
‘With such numbers involved, is the difference important?’
‘Two hundred less to kill,’ said the pragmatic Daretor.
As the newcomers joined the battle, it became evident that they were loaded with archers instead of firepots. Fa’red had not only built his squadron to bomb castles, bridges and warships. They really were equipped to kill dragons. More and more dragons plummeted out of the air, plunging thousands of feet to be smashed to bloody flesh and splintered bone on the rocky highlands. Fiery wreckage rained from the sky.
‘BUK BUK BUK-CAW!’ thundered a giant airliner.
‘Look, that huge airliner, the one that looks like a battle galley of the air,’ said Jelindel. ‘That has to be Fa’red’s flagship.’
‘Why so?’ asked Osric.
‘His crest has been painted on the side of the structure,’ said Daretor. ‘He must be here to savour his triumph. With one dragon killed for every three of his airliners, Fa’red will win and still have more than half of his force left over.’
‘Dragons are being brought down by mere arrows,’ pondered Jelindel.
‘Such a humiliating defeat,’ said Daretor. ‘It’s not honourable for something so big to be brought down by something so puny.’
‘So puny,’ said Jelindel thoughtfully. ‘Too puny to kill a dragon, and poison would not paralyse them instantly. There is some sort of magic cast into those arrows.’
‘Well once they hit the ground after falling three or four thousand feet it hardly matters, the result is still a dead dragon,’ Zimak observed.
Jelindel snapped her fingers. ‘We’re fighting the wrong way!’ she cried. ‘The arrows aren’t killing the dragons. Hitting the ground at high speed is doing it.’
