Dragon Apocalypse (The Berserker and the Pedant Book 2)

by Josh Powell

“Maybe Kitty moved it?” Pellonia suggested.

  “His name is Apocalypse.” The dragon sniffed. “And he would’ve eaten it.”

  “Where do you last remember having it?” Maximina asked. “That always helps me find things.”

  “Let’s see. I had it when I went in to see the maidens.”

  “Did you have it with you when you attacked the dragon?” the unicorn asked.

  “No,” Pellonia said. “He had the cursed sword with him then. No axe.”

  “I must have left it in the maidens’ room when I was changing into the plate mail armor,” Gurken said. “But I checked, it’s not there now.”

  “The maidens must have taken it,” Pellonia said.

  Gurken glared. “Davina Bloodhammer,” he growled. “We have to follow them to Arendal to get it back.”

  The dragon cleared its throat. “Pardon me, but can I go with you?”

  “You want to go with us?” Pellonia asked.

  “Apocalypse has hatched; he needs to spread his wings and get out. And so do I, to be honest. I’ve been cooped up in a cave for too long waiting on the little guy, and besides, the town is fresh out of maidens. There’ll be more knights coming for sure.”

  “I really don’t see how that worked,” Pellonia said.

  “What worked?” Ohm asked.

  “Wouldn’t kidnapping the maidens make more knights come, not less? You know, in order to rescue them?”

  The dragon and the unicorn looked at each other.

  “I, uh, suppose so,” said the unicorn.

  “I guess that’s why they never stopped coming,” said the dragon, shrugging. “In any event, I’m quite ready to leave now.”

  “I think you’ll make quite an impression in the city,” Maximina said. “Won’t they just attack you?”

  “Oh, I’ll be going incognito,” Ohm said. Ohm closed her enormous eyes and concentrated. A scale fell off of her snout and clattered to the floor, followed by another and another. Then all at once, every scale on her body fell to the ground. The golden scales fell into an enormous pile of gold, flowing into an overwhelming tide, sweeping them along. They came to a rest, buried in gold up to their shoulders.

  Maximina’s eyes grew as big as the dragon’s hoard to be and her mouth dropped open. “The dragon’s treasure!” she gasped. “I knew it had to be around here somewhere.”

  Standing with the pile of gold up to his waist was a shirtless well-toned man. His auburn hair was kissed with a golden sheen. A day’s worth of stubble caressed his cheeks. His bronzed flesh glistened with the light sweat of a moderate exertion and his chest heaved as he took in breath. He held a lute in his hand, raised into the air.

  “Behold!” he said, “Ohm the Bard!”

  Pellonia and Maximina stared at Ohm. Maximina bit her bottom lip and Pellonia’s mouth opened.

  “I thought you were a girl,” Gurken wondered aloud.

  Ohm shook his head, a mischievous grin on his face. “Mortals have such a queer fascination with gender.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Berserker and the Bard

  “I THOUGHT HE was a girl,” Gurken said. Gurken, Pellonia, and Maximina were walking north towards the floating city of Arendal. Ohm followed, riding the unicorn while playing his lute, the baby dragon Apocalypse resting on his shoulder. As they had travelled north, the weather turned. It grew cold, and the ground was covered in snow. A light snowfall drifted continuously to the ground.

  “I mean, she did have an egg,” Gurken continued. “Right? We all saw it.”

  “I like him much better as a man. I mean bard,” Maximina said, biting her lip and glancing back at Ohm. Ohm strummed his lute. If he noticed them at all, he gave no indication.

  “Ohm can change form,” said Pellonia. “I guess that means changing genders too.”

  Maximina’s lips turned up in a wicked grin. “Sounds fun.”

  “I guess.” Pellonia shrugged.

  “No, thanks,” Gurken said. “I’m quite happy being a man, thank you very much.”

  Maximina rolled her eyes. “Of course you are.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Just that you must not be very comfortable with your masculinity if the thought of being a woman makes you so uncomfortable.”

  “That makes no sense. In order to show that I’m comfortable being a man, I need to be comfortable being a woman?”

  “Exactly. See, you understand.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  It was a dreary, overcast day, the fog settled over the forest like a blanket of cotton, disguising the encroachment of snow banks as they journeyed north. The cold bit into their feet as they crunched through the snow, even as the maudlin light chipped at their determination.

  “My feet are cold!” Gurken said. “I didn’t bring any snow boots, it was summer!”

  Pellonia’s teeth chattered and she wrapped her arms around herself for warmth. Ohm strummed his lute, shirtless atop the unicorn, warmed by inner dragon fire.

  Maximina strolled atop the snow wearing a pair of snow shoes over winter boots that she’d conveniently pulled from her magic sack. She was covered in a thick winter coat made from the pelt of winter wolves, her ears and head covered by a furry hat made from the same, also from the sack. Pellonia and Gurken eyed her enviously.

  An enormous wall loomed through the fog as they approached. They were a hundred feet from it as it pierced the fog and came into view. The wall stretched as far as they could see in every direction, including up. A wooden door thirty feet tall was embedded in the wall.

  Gurken walked up to the door and pounded on it with a mailed fist.

  “Gurken!” Pellonia whispered.

  Gurken turned around to see Pellonia and Maximina glaring at him. The music of the lute stopped as Ohm ceased to strum and he looked at Gurken with curiosity. The unicorn turned its head to one side.

  “The element of surprise!” Maximina said.

  “Oh. Sorry.”

  Above them, obscured by the mist, came a booming voice. “Ko ide?”

  “Ko ide?” Maximina said. “What kind of language is that? Hold on a minute…” Maximina rummaged through her magical sack and pulled out a scroll. She opened the scroll and read it aloud.

  “Transferendum linguae ignotae!” The runes on the scroll glowed a deep orange and floated from the parchment, swirling in the air in a linguistic vortex. The sound of a child whispering filled the air and the runes twisted around and around and down and about and flew into Maximina’s mouth. She choked on them, coughing. Then she stood up straight, looked into the air, and called out.

  “Zao mi je. Kazu da jos jednom,” Maximina yelled.

  “Ko ide!” the voice bellowed.

  “They said, ‘who goes there?’” Maximina translated.

  “What language are they speaking?” Pellonia asked.

  Maximina shrugged and looked up in the air again. She yelled, “Koji jezik ti govori?”

  A confused sounding voice yelled back, “Istim jezikom govorite.”

  Maximina nodded.

  “What did they say?” Pellonia asked.

  “They said that they’re speaking the same language I’m speaking.”

  “That’s not very helpful,” Pellonia mused.

  “Ali, ono sto se zove,” Maximina yelled upwards.

  The still very confused voice said, “Jezik hladnog divova.”

  “Oh,” said Maximina. “That’s more helpful. They’re frost giants.”

  “Ask them if we can pass. We need to go through the wall to get to Arendal.”

  Maximina coughed, glowing runes flying from her mouth, dissolving into the air. She held up a finger, asking for a moment.

  “Maximina, quickly! Before the spell runs out!”

  “Molim te dole!” Maximina coughed out one last burst of runes.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I could only manage to ask them to come down. We’ll have to try something else.”

  “Do you have
another scroll?” Pellonia asked.

  “Sorry, that was the only one.”

  Pellonia looked at Ohm. “Do you speak frost giant, by any chance.”

  “Sorry, Pellonia,” Ohm said, a handsome smile on his chiseled jaw.

  Pellonia looked at the unicorn, who shrugged, bouncing Ohm on her shoulders.

  The sound of wood creaking against wood came from behind the enormous door, followed by the echo of an enormous wooden beam striking the hard icy floor. The door groaned against the iron hinges as it creaked open. An enormous blue figure with an icy white beard strode out, wearing the gray pelts of enormous dire wolves.

  Pellonia, Maximina, and the unicorn backed away reflexively. Gurken stood his ground. The giant craned his neck down and spoke.

  “Dobro upoznala mali prijatelju. Kako mozemo biti od pomoci,” the frost giant boomed.

  Gurken considered the frost giant and how to best communicate his desire to cross the wall. They did not seem to understand the common tongue of the land, so it seemed best to resort to pictographs and gestures. Gurken drew an axe loaned to him from the dragon’s hoard and used the tip to draw a line in the snow. He pointed the axe up at the giant and growled quite loudly so the giant could hear.

  “Linije u pijesku, ti mi preti?”

  “Yes, I do believe you understand,” Gurken said. Then he pounded the axe against his chest and stepped over the line, to indicate his desire to cross the wall he had previously drawn.

  As Gurken stepped over the line in the proverbial sand, Pellonia said, “Oh, no.” Maximina’s eyes grew wide in fear and she rummaged around in her magical sack.

  The frost giant’s eyes grew wide with anger and he sneered at Gurken.

  “Kano se usudujes me threanted!” the giant bellowed. He crouched over and screamed at Gurken, who stood there quite confused.

  “Is that a yes? We can cross?” Gurken asked.

  The giant pulled back a leg twice Gurken’s height, and kicked the dwarf. Gurken flew up, sailing along the winter breeze. Pellonia and Maximina watched him fly overhead and out of sight.

  “Ohm, do you think you can do something to help us out?” Pellonia asked.

  “Absolutely!” Ohm played a tune with a fast tempo on his lute.

  “What are you doing?” Pellonia yelled.

  “Playing an inspirational battle ballad!” Ohm said.

  “That’s not helping!” Pellonia said.

  “That’s because you’re complaining, not fighting,” Ohm sniffed.

  Maximina pulled three vials from her sack.

  “Aha! Found them!” she said, dropping the magic sack and brandishing three vials of liquid, one gold, one blue, and one clear. “Potions of telekinesis, flight, and gaseous form. I will fly around and fling the giant about with mental powers and it won’t be able to touch me!”

  She pulled the stopper out of the vial with clear liquid and quaffed it in one gulp, then pulled the stopper on the second vial and poured the golden liquid into her mouth. The liquid dropped through her body and splattered into the snowy ground, then the vial fell through her hand and into the snow. The other vial fell from her other hand, shattering on an icy spot and spilling blue liquid about.

  “Oooo,” Maximina said, her body turning transparent and diffusing slightly into the air. “Drink the potion of telekinesis first, then flight, and only then the potion of gaseous form. Sorry, Pel.”

  Pellonia smacked herself on the forehead.

  “I’ll see if I can distract them while you get away,” Maximina said, floating through Pellonia and over to the frost giant.

  The giant leaned over and bellowed at Maximina, a cold wind blowing through her body. He reached over and snapped a dead twenty-foot pine tree off at the base, shearing the branches off by running it through a huge meaty fist. He slammed the newly fashioned club down on Maximina, but it passed harmlessly through her body as if through a thick fog. Little whorls of mist swirled off her.

  “Hey, ya big oaf,” Maximina yelled, waving her arms about. “That the best you can do?”

  The giant swung the club through her a few more times, the foggy substance of her body flowing away as the club passed through and then flowing back together again.

  “Ha! You’ve got nothing!” Maximina yelled.

  “Maximina,” Pellonia said, “how long does that potion last?”

  “I… uh, that’s a good question. I’m not really sure. You better get out of here fast.”

  The giant sucked in a huge breath and exhaled an enormous freezing wind at Maximina. Insubstantial as she was, the cold chilled her to the core. She’d never felt so cold. She tried to get out of the way but found her limbs wouldn’t follow her thoughts. She couldn’t move; she was frozen in place. “Oh, no,” she thought as the frost giant’s club shattered her into a thousand tiny pieces.

  “Ohm! Help us, you’re a dragon! Breathe fire on the giant or something!” Pellonia pleaded.

  Ohm chuckled. “I can’t do anything like that, Pellonia. I’m a bard. I’ve never been a bard before. I have to play by the rules or I’ll never get to experience being one. I’ll do what I can to help as a bard though.”

  “Ahhhh!” Pellonia yelled in frustration.

  Ohm strummed his lute, cleared his throat, and sang in a beautiful, deep baritone.

  Sa Gradacca b'jele kule

  Zmaja od Bosne

  sokolovi zakliktali

  kajde zalosne

  The frost giant stopped its rampage and listened to the song. Ohm looked at Pellonia and whispered “It’s an old frost giant folk song about a dragon.” Ohm continued to play and sing.

  Umrla je vjerna ljuba

  Husein-begova

  jer izgubi gospodara

  srca svojega

  Ohm whispered to Pellonia, “The melody is really quite touching, I wish I knew what it meant.”

  The frost giant sniffled, a tear running down the side of his face and freezing to his cheek. “A tuzne pjesme, molim te unutra,” the giant said. He turned and strode back into the great doorway as Gurken came running back through the snow, wielding the borrowed axe above his head and roaring a battle cry.

  “Woah, woah, woah!” Pellonia shouted, stepping in front of Gurken and waving her hands. “It’s okay, we’re going inside.”

  Gurken pulled to a stop in front of Pellonia. “Oh,” he said, lowering his axe. “What happened to Maximina?”

  “She drank a potion and became an insubstantial fog, got frozen by the giant’s breath, then shattered by its club. She’ll probably come back together again if she melts.” Pellonia said. “I hope.”

  Pellonia looked up at the baby dragon sitting on Ohm’s shoulder. She patted her thighs with her hands and made kissing sounds at the dragon. “Come here, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty,” Pellonia sung.

  Ohm furled his brow. “His name is Apocalypse and he is to be feared! He is the harbinger of the en-” Ohm stopped mid-sentence as the little dragon jumped off of Ohm’s shoulder and fluttered down to land in front of Pellonia. Apocalypse made a croaking sound and rubbed his head against her hand as she patted him. “Who’s a good Kitty?”

  Gurken nodded in understanding. “Kitty Apocalypse, perchance you might magic us some flame?”

  The dragon let out a sound like a cross between a frog and some sort of bird, and let loose a gout of flame over the area where Maximina had been frozen and shattered. The little chunks of Maximina melted and dissolved back into a fog and floated together.

  “Oh, thank you,” Maximina said. “That’s so much better. I thought I’d never come together again. My thoughts were so fragmented.”

  Inside the great wall, the frost giant led them to a great hall. It was enormous and carved from solid ice. They sat at a great table, also carved from the ice, with animal skins on the seats to provide some protection from the cold for guests. A frost giant woman sat at one end of the table and stood up as they came in. The giant kissed her and turned back to the party.

  “Posdravi
. Ja sam Mirza,” he said, gesturing to himself. “Mirza.”

  “Your name is Mirza?” Pellonia asked, gesturing towards him. She pointed at herself and said, “My name is Pellonia. Well met, Mirza.”

  The giant nodded and said, “Ovo je Alja,” while gesturing towards the frost giant woman. “Alja.”

  “Alja,” Pellonia said, nodding her head. Pellonia introduced the rest of the group and they all sat at the frozen table. They had a great feast of roasted meat on sticks, served with onions and flat bread, a large pot of stew, and a sweet bread twisted into a spiral and also served on a stick.

  “They sure like their food on a stick,” Maximina said. “It’s quite tasty though.”

  “Perhaps it keeps the heat of the food off of their hands,” Pellonia remarked, mouth full of sweet bread. “They are frost giants after all.”

  After dinner, Ohm played more music, including songs of the frost giants, while they sipped on fruit brandy. The frost giants, Mirza and Alja, were quite charming hosts, and having not had guests in such a long time, were overjoyed. They were rather overgenerous and made gifts to our heroes.

  They bestowed upon Gurken a mystical ice axe, Sjekira. It was made from solid ice that, they assured our friends, would not melt and was enchanted to freeze any foes it struck.

  Pellonia was gifted a bracelet called Narukvica, that bestowed on its wearer an immunity to cold. Whoever wore it would know no chill, no matter how deep the freeze.

  Maximina obtained the mystic hammer Cekic. Any that struck her in combat would freeze in an instant, and one blow from Cekic would shatter them.

  Ohm turned down any offer of a gift, saying he was perfectly happy with what he had and had no wish to deprive their hosts. He did eventually relent and accepted some salted cod for Apocalypse, who, to Ohm’s consternation and Pellonia’s delight, purred with satisfaction while consuming it.

  After staying the night and breaking their fast with a small meal, they wished their hosts farewell and continued on to the floating city of Arendal.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The Berserker and the Bag