Last Dragon Standing

by Rachel Aaron

  There was quite a lot of blood now. The smell of Marci had long since been overwhelmed by the rich, salty flush of dragon blood dripping down his teeth as the Leviathan’s tendrils screamed and ripped him apart from the inside.

  “Take it,” Julius gasped, collapsing on the ground in the middle of the new pool that was forming on the ground. His pool, made of his blood. “I’m giving it to you.”

  The spirit in his head collapsed into stunned silence. Then, in a quiet, broken voice, she whispered, Why?

  “Because I can,” he whispered back, coughing. “There was never much chance of me getting out of this alive, but now you have a shot. Flow out through my blood, take Marci, and escape. I know you can move between any of your waters, and there should still be a few drops left in your lakes to run to.”

  “No!” Marci screamed in his ear, grabbing his head in her frantic hands. “Don’t you dare, Julius!”

  “I’ll hold him here as long as I can,” Julius went on, desperate to get the words out while he still could. “Go, Algonquin. I’ve bought you a second chance. Choose again. Choose differently.” He smiled. “Choose us.”

  A coughing fit forced his eyes closed after that. When he got them open again, he was staring into the puddle of his blood, its surface shimmering in the reflected radiance of the Black Reach’s fire. Inside his stomach, the bit of the Leviathan he’d swallowed was fighting harder than ever, ripping him to shreds from the inside as it fought to get back to Algonquin, but it was too late. The cold presence of the lake spirit had already flowed out of him, dripping into the red pool along with the rest of his blood. The liquid churned as she took hold of it, and then the shimmering liquid rose up, turning to look at him with a perfect reflection of his own face. A clear reflection, free of the tendrils that were desperately trying to eat through his body to get to her.

  If he’d been any good with his fire, he might have been able to backdraft his flames down his throat and force the Leviathan’s tendrils down again and buy more time, but Julius had always been rubbish at that sort of thing. Justin had always said his lack of ability in anything resembling dragon combat would get him killed one day. Too bad Julius wouldn’t have a chance to tell his brother he’d been right.

  He didn’t want his last thought to be Justin’s “I told you so,” so Julius looked at Marci instead. It was easy since she was in front of him now, and looking angrier than he’d ever seen her as she screamed at him that he couldn’t die. That she wouldn’t let him. But as terrible as he felt doing this to her, a small, selfish, draconic part of Julius treasured that she cared enough to be so furious. He wanted to gather that love-driven anger up and hoard it like the precious gem it was, but he was so tired. He couldn’t even lift his head anymore.

  Marci started to cry then, which hurt even more than the Leviathan. Julius wanted to tell her he was sorry, that this was the only way he’d known to save things, but it was too late. Even a dragon’s ability to heal wasn’t enough to keep up with the thousands of cuts the Leviathan was making inside him. The best he could manage was to wheeze Marci’s name before Algonquin rose from the now very large pool of his blood and yanked the mage into it, dragging them both down through the blood and hopefully into the safety of her lakes.

  It would have to be hopefully, because Julius had no way to know for sure. The Leviathan had finally ground a hole in the Black Reach’s protective fire. As the light faded, tendrils started coming at him from the outside as well, stabbing into his body like jagged knives from all directions. The bigger tentacles were just starting to appear when his heart finally stuttered to a stop, and Julius Heartstriker, youngest son of Bethesda, Founder of the Heartstriker Clan Council, Diplomat’s Fang, and all-around Nice Dragon, finally did what most of his family had been telling him to do for the last twenty-five years.

  He died.

  Chapter 15

  Marci was drowning in bloody water, and she didn’t even care. She fought the current dragging her down with everything she had, kicking and screaming out all the air in her lungs as she lunged for the dragon she could still barely see silhouetted by the fiery glow above her. She was still reaching for him when the fire vanished, and she burst gasping from a puddle of freezing water hidden in the wreckage by the base of Algonquin’s Tower.

  She immediately tried to dive again, screaming at Julius that she was coming back, and he’d better not be dead when she got there. She was throwing her body at the shallow water when a cold hand grabbed her wrist.

  “Enough, mortal.”

  Marci’s head shot up to see Algonquin standing over her. Her watery body was clear again, as blue and deep as her lake with no trace of the precious blood she’d taken them through to get here.

  “Take me back!” Marci demanded, grabbing the spirit with both hands. “I have to save Julius!”

  “You can’t,” Algonquin said, flowing around Marci’s grip. “He’s dead.” Her voice began to quiver. “A dragon died for me.”

  She spoke the words in wonder, but Marci refused to hear them. The Lady of the Lakes was wrong. Julius couldn’t be dead. It wasn’t possible. She’d just gotten him back. Nothing was that unfair.

  Marci.

  She shoved Ghost’s soft voice out of her mind, falling to her knees in the mud beside the puddle that was all that remained of Lake St. Clair. She didn’t want to listen to anyone. She didn’t even care if she died anymore. Everything she wanted was with Julius. She just wanted to go back to where he was and—

  Marci!

  “Mortal!” Algonquin shouted at the same time, snatching Marci back into the water a split-second ahead of the tentacle that fell from the sky to consume the puddle they’d emerged from. They surfaced again a few moments later, popping out of another, even smaller puddle at the far edge of the lake.

  “Hurry!” Algonquin cried as Marci coughed up water on the muddy lake bed. “We have to keep moving!”

  But there was nowhere to run. The lake bed was a dry bowl around them, and the shadow of the Leviathan was directly overhead, its constantly roving tentacles turning as one to focus their hooked ends on the spirit cowering in her last inch of water.

  “Algonquin.”

  It was like hearing an earthquake speak. The name vibrated in Marci’s bones, making her whole body ache. Algonquin was shaking too, her water rippling in a million little spikes as the tentacles drew closer, coiling together into a single huge mass that fell around the two of them like a noose.

  “Return,” the Leviathan boomed. “Now.”

  Algonquin pulled her muddy water tight. “I will not.”

  “The time for rebellion is over,” the Nameless End said. “Your surrender was accepted. You have no more voice. No more power.” The black noose tightened. “Return to me now.”

  “I will not!” Algonquin cried, her watery voice ringing as she surged up from her last shore. “I am done being a fool! The victory you offered was nothing but defeat by another name. I’m ashamed it took me so long to see that, but I will correct that mistake now.” She rose higher still, pulling everything that was left of her water from the mud and the dirt until she was a pillar of blue inside the ring of black. “I reject you, Leviathan! I revoke your name and your privilege in this world! You are no longer welcome in my waters! Be gone, devourer, and never return!”

  She spoke the words like a banishment, but though they rang beautiful and clear through the still air, nothing happened. There was only silence, followed by a rumble that shook the ground as the Devourer of Worlds began to laugh.

  “It is far too late for that. You were the greatest spirit of this land. Now, you are nothing but mud on the ground. Your water is already mine, great Algonquin, as is the name you gave me when you welcomed me in. You have no power over either anymore, just as you have no power over me.”

  Lying in the now bone-dry dirt, Marci sucked in a terrified breath. For all Julius’s hopes that Algonquin was the key to winning this, the Nameless End still sounded like he had all the
cards. But though the Leviathan was laughing at her, Algonquin stood defiant, her water shimmering in the dark of his shadow.

  “That is where you are wrong,” she said triumphantly. “You may have all the power, but so long as even the memory of them exists, these lakes are and shall forever be mine. Their water will always belong to me, and now that I am no longer shackled with your presence, I am free to call them home.”

  The world rumbled as she finished, forcing Marci to scramble to her feet as all the water left in the empty basins—the mud, the drips from the sodden water plants, the blood left in the rotting bodies of the fish—rose from its hiding places to answer its Lady’s call. Each stream was tiny, barely more than a few drops, but together they made a torrent, swelling Algonquin’s pillar until its swirling edges pushed right up against the ring of the Leviathan’s tentacles.

  “You are the one who has no power here, outsider!” Algonquin’s voice cried from every drop. “Everything you’ve ever claimed was stolen from me. Now, you will give it back!”

  Her cry ended with an explosion. High overhead, the black body of the Leviathan bulged and ruptured as millions of gallons of water—the entire contents of the Great Lakes—burst from its sides. The lakes poured out in a thousand deafening waterfalls, the white cascades slamming into the dry beds and filling the empty river. The roar of it was so loud, Marci couldn’t hear herself think. Even Ghost’s voice in her head was drowned out as the surging water refilling Lake St. Clair rushed up her body. But just as Marci’s head was about to vanish under the churning tide, hard, cold hands grabbed her and yanked, lifting her body high above the waves as Algonquin’s voice crashed through them.

  “Now, Merlin!” the spirit cried, frantic and triumphant. “Push!”

  For a terrifying second, Marci had no idea what that meant. Then she felt it. The water wasn’t the only thing rising. Magic was building around Algonquin, and not just on this side. Through her connection to Ghost, Marci could feel the wave rising in the Sea of Magic as well. It swelled larger by the second, growing even larger than the lakes as millions of spirits—none of whom should have been up so soon—rose from their vessels once again to join with Algonquin, adding their rage to hers until the entire world yelled in one voice.

  GET OUT!

  It came from Ghost and from Algonquin, from Raven and Amelia, from every spirit of every sort. Even Marci screamed it as she grabbed the magic and shoved, adding her strength to the rest as the whole plane pushed in unison against the predator trying to eat it.

  GET OUT!

  The Nameless End roared in the sky, its tentacles digging into the ground as it fought to stay anchored, but without Algonquin’s stolen water giving it weight, its roots were no longer strong enough. As Marci pushed and pushed, channeling magic until her soul felt like it was burning, she swore she could feel the plane itself twisting, the dimensional walls closing in on the crack the Nameless End had squeezed itself through. With each push, the hole grew smaller and smaller, and as it shrank, the End began to fade, its impenetrable body turning back to shadow, then to empty sky. Then, with a final deafening pop, the Leviathan’s presence vanished entirely, and the planar barrier snapped back into place with a crack, healthy and strong and whole, as it always should have been.

  The second it was over, all the roaring magic slid away. The waves on both sides slumped as all the powers drained back into their respective vessels. Marci slumped as well, her body sinking into the freezing, choppy water of the refilled Lake St. Clair before Ghost—back in his warrior form at last—caught her in a bear hug.

  “We did it!” the spirit cried, spinning her up and out of the water on his newly restrengthened wind. “Can’t you feel it, Marci? He’s gone! The roots, the tendrils, even his stench, they’re all gone!”

  Her spirit’s joy flooded her mind as he spoke, but Marci barely felt it. Now that it was over, her eyes were locked on the sky where the Leviathan had been. The empty sky, where the most important person in her life had just been lost forever.

  Marci couldn’t look at anything after that. She turned away with a sob, burying her face in the darkness of Ghost’s chest, which was why she didn’t see the tiny ribbon of blue tumbling down from behind the evening clouds, or the large dragon with feathers brighter than a bird of paradise’s that flew up to catch it.

  ***

  Brohomir was flying faster than he’d ever gone in his life. He shot through the air where the Leviathan had been, wings pumping harder and harder as he raced to catch Julius’s plummeting body before it hit the ground. If it hit, every chance of his future was gone, but if Bob could catch him…

  He put on a burst of speed, folding his wings like a dart as he reached out with his claws to snatch his baby brother’s body out of the air. Julius’s bloody feathers began to crack and turn to ash the moment he touched them. Bob wasn’t sure what that meant now that Amelia had tied their magic to this plane, but ash was never good. He’d set this whole thing up on the slimmest of long shots with none of his usual groundwork, but Julius had always been a lucky little dragon. He’d just have to hope the streak held.

  “Now, my love,” he whispered, pulling his brother’s body against his much larger chest before Julius could crumble any further. “Do it now!”

  I cannot.

  The pigeon was hovering in front of him, but just like that first time, it was the Nameless End he saw in his mind, boundless and dark. Final. Now as then, the words in his mind held the indelible weight of unavoidable end. This time, though, the sadness in her voice was personal.

  I’m afraid you were a few seconds too late. The future you seek is now so unlikely, I’m afraid the price we agreed on will no longer be enough.

  “Then I will pay more,” Bob replied without hesitation, looking down at his brother. “Of all the dragons I’ve used, he deserved it least. I crushed his hopes, betrayed his trust at every turn, but through all of it, he never abandoned me. I will not abandon him now.” He tightened his claws, closing his eyes as more of Julius’s feathers cracked and fell to ash. “Whether we’re buying futures or setting them up ourselves, someone always pays. I’ve avoided my bill for a long, long time, but this time, the most important time, it will be me.”

  With that, he offered it all, opening the entire breadth of the futures he’d seen to her, but the Nameless End shook her head.

  It is not enough.

  For the first time in his life, Brohomir began to despair. “No,” he said, voice shaking. “It’s all I have. It has to be enough.”

  I’m sorry, she said, but you cannot buy the future you wish with what you have to offer. Her beady eyes flashed. At least, not alone.

  Bob jerked in surprise, but the Nameless End just cooed sweetly, swooping in to rub her head against the feathers of his neck. You kept your promise, Brohomir of the Heartstrikers, she whispered. It was a good story. I have been handsomely rewarded for my gamble all those years ago. Now, I too will pay my portion to help you end it well.

  She swooped away, her little body floating on the wind until she was hovering right in front of his eyes, and as she flew, Bob’s futures began to disappear. They vanished one by one, plucked like flowers by an invisible hand. Not all of them, just the ones he’d marked for sale back when he’d thought he was being fiendishly clever. It was still a lot, though not nearly enough, but just as he began to worry something was wrong, Bob realized her futures were fading too.

  All the futures they’d shared, the thousands of years they could have lived together were disappearing one by one. Each loss felt like a cut, but when he instinctively reached out to stop her, Julius’s body slipped from his grasp. He caught his brother again at once, cradling the little dragon protectively to his chest as the last of the futures—his and hers—vanished, leaving him facing the unknown for the first time since he was thirteen. He was still staring hopelessly at the abyss when he felt feathers brush against his face.

  The price is paid, his End said, her voice huge in the
way he’d experienced only once before. The future is bought. The brushing feathers moved closer as the pigeon gave him a final peck on the cheek. Thank you for sharing your present with me.

  Then she was gone, her touch vanishing like the shadow it always had been, and in the place where she’d been was a short, golden chain.

  Bob grabbed it out of the air with a snap of his teeth and shoved it into Julius. The golden links vanished the moment they touched his bloody feathers, and then Bob was knocked out of the sky as the new future forced its way into place. The sudden jolt caused even more of Julius’s body to crumble to ash, but as he felt apart, Bob finally spotted what he’d been waiting for. In the center of Julius’s chest, an ember was still glowing.

  The last ember.

  That was all Bob had time to make out before he opened his mouth and engulfed them both in fire. Not normal fire, but life’s fire, the core of the flame that made him a dragon. He breathed as much as he could force out, breathed until his heart stuttered and his wings faltered. Then, just as the world started to go dark around him, he felt something flare.

  That flash of hope was the last thing Bob saw before his fire ran out. Without even enough magic left to fly, he began to plummet, wrapping his wings around what was left of his brother as they crashed into the churning water of Lake St. Clair, which, much to Bob’s surprise, rose up to catch them.

  ***

  “Bob!”

  The scream made Marci jump. She hadn’t had the presence of mind for anything but weeping, but Ghost must have carried her to shore at some point, because when she looked up, they were standing on the wreckage-strewn beach where Algonquin’s lake met her Reclamation Land. Marci was still trying to figure out what was going on when a shadow whooshed over her head, followed by Chelsie’s black-feathered body as the enormous dragon landed in the sand right beside her.

  “Marci, help me!” the dragon yelled, her green eyes frantic. “Algonquin just ate Bob!”