by Terry Brooks
Before much longer, it would reach the defenders in the pass. On their right flank, the attackers were nearly to the first of the shields that stretched across the Aphalion’s heavily defended mouth.
Pushing forward to the wall itself, the boy crowded in beside Elven Hunters already in place and scanned the lines of attacking Trolls and the Elves resisting them.
That was when he caught sight of the Orullian brothers.
Mounting a counterattack, Tasha and Tenerife were leading a heavily armed contingent of Elven swordsmen from a split in the rocks perhaps a hundred yards downslope from the pass into the teeth of the nearest square. Where they had come from was anybody’s guess, but the boy supposed they must have found their way there by scaling the cliff walls inside the mouth of the pass and then descending again somewhere outside. What mattered was that they had managed it and were making a desperate effort to block the Drouj advance.
Xac Wen almost went over the wall in response to the rush of excitement that momentarily pushed aside his fear and fed him with a sudden, impetuous courage. But the realization that he lacked any weapon for close-in fighting stopped him from what would have been a foolish decision, and instead he drew back and held his position.
On the right flank, the Elves had reached the Troll square, and working in pairs just at the edge of the extended lances they used thin metal shields on which to impale the deadly steel points. Once the iron tips were caught on the shields, they could not be withdrawn without pulling back the shafts, and the Elves rushed forward between the clusters of useless wooden spear shafts in a sustained charge that took them right up against the Troll front. Tasha led the way, as big as any Troll and twice as fierce, howling the Elven battle cry, his great sword cutting into the vulnerable front line of the attack. Some of the Elves died in the attempt, but most got close enough that they were able to use Trolls at the forefront of the square as shields against those coming from behind. Shoving them backward in a dramatic show of sheer strength, the Elves broke down the attack and went right into the heart of the square.
But the victory was short-lived. Almost as soon as the first square disintegrated, two more appeared to take its place, positioned in a pincer movement so as to trap the Elves between them. Tasha saw what was happening and sounded a warning. The Elves withdrew, taking their wounded with them, leaving the Trolls with nothing but open ground and empty air. Longbows covered their retreat, and for a moment the attack stalled out.
Tasha and Tenerife came over the wall, bloodied and sweating and cursing in the worst language Xac Wen had ever heard—and that was saying something. The Elven Hunters at the wall moved aside to let the returning fighters get past and into the cool shadows of the pass, where most collapsed, throwing down their helmets and weapons and taking long drinks of water from a bucket and ladle being passed around.
The boy started over, and then hesitated, not certain that he wanted to face the Orullians when they looked so angry. But by then, it was too late. Tenerife had seen him.
“Xac Wen, you wolf’s pup!” he yelled at the boy. “What are you doing here? Haven’t we trouble enough without you adding to it? Where are Pan and Prue?”
Tasha was on his feet and on top of Xac Wen with a single leap. He took hold of the boy’s tunic and lifted him up to eye level. “You haven’t a brain in your head, you little lizard! Now, what’s this about? How did you get past the wall?”
Xac, sputtering and cursing some himself, demanded to be put down before he would answer. Only then, when Tasha had complied and both brothers were standing right in front of him, did the boy fill them in on what had happened to their friends.
“I didn’t know what to do when Prue disappeared, so I came here. I can go look for them some more, but I don’t know where to start. Tasha, it’s not my fault that this happened!”
Tasha nodded grimly. “No one said it was.” He looked at his brother. “I don’t think we can help them just now. And I don’t want to send this boy off on his own searching.”
“No, this will have to wait,” Tenerife agreed.
Shouts came from the defenses. The Trolls had broken through the last defenders stationed outside the mouth of the pass and were advancing in force.
Tasha glanced over his shoulder at the dark forms closing on their position. “Too many for us to stop. We have to draw back to the larger wall and hope that holds. Come, Tenerife. Let’s do what we can. Xac Wen, you get out of here right now. All the way out. Back behind the walls at the head of the pass. Now, you little guttersnipe!”
The boy took off at a run, not daring to challenge Tasha face-to-face. But as soon as he had gone a short distance, he stopped and looked back. The Elven Hunters at the defenses, Tasha and Tenerife among them, had formed up in a defensive line to stop the Drouj advance. Already, the boy could see the dark armored forms advancing on the pass, coming through the last of the outer defenses, scrambling over them and through the ravines and gullies, forming up their attack lines for a final surge. Already the boy could tell that when that surge came, it would sweep the Elven defenders away like dead leaves.
But the Elves had realized this as well and were prepared for it. Forming ranks three men deep, they notched arrows to their longbows, lined themselves across the width of the pass, and in sustained volleys fired into the Troll lines. The pull required to draw an Elven longbow was immense, and the velocity and force of the shaft once released massive. Xac Wen had seen Tasha put an arrow all the way through a tree trunk a foot in diameter. So when the arrows were released into the armored ranks of the Trolls, they went right through the protective metal to the flesh beneath. The Trolls died in clusters, impaled repeatedly. The Elves fell back, formed up, and fired into the enemy ranks again.
But the Trolls kept coming, using shields to absorb or deflect some of the arrows, keeping their ranks filled with new bodies as dead and wounded fell by the wayside. They had seen most of what there was in the way of defensive tactics in their time as soldiers, and they were not about to let the Elven bowmen stop them now.
On they came, and slowly but steadily, the Elves gave ground.
Xac Wen gave ground with them, retreating amid a cluster of others who were not at the forefront of the fighting, making his way back through the twists and turns of Aphalion Pass toward the defensive walls at the far end. He held his bow and arrows ready, prepared to fight if it became necessary, aware of how fragile the line of fighters ahead of him would become if a sustained rush were mounted.
Shouts and the brittle clang of metal weapons echoed through the defile walls, a din so cacophonous that it threatened to overwhelm the boy’s courage.
He lost track of where he was, moving back in fits and starts, jostled by those about him who were doing the same, trying hard to concentrate on not stumbling and falling. He was afraid if he fell that the crush might stop him from rising again in time to avoid the wave of fighters coming after.
Then, suddenly, he was bathed in an unexpected wash of sunlight, the walls parting abruptly to form a huge arena space within the center of the passageway. It was here, he realized, that Tasha and Tenerife, leading the little company of friends from Arborlon and Glensk Wood, had come looking all those weeks ago to discover if the protective walls of the valley were really down.
It was here they had encountered the dragon.
Without even thinking about it, he lifted his gaze toward the gap in the cliffs that opened to the sky.
And thereby witnessed a miracle.
AT DECLAN REACH, earlier that same day, the sun rose with a bright glow behind the wall of the mountains, bathing the lands west in a faint sheen of silvery light that just managed to chase back the last of the night’s shadows and illuminate the features of the battlefield where the dead lay in heaps. The demon, still wrapped in his Skeal Eile disguise, took a moment to look about at the carnage he had created. Acres of bodies spread away before him, stretching from the mouth of the pass for hundreds of yards downslope toward the empty fla
ts and rough hill country beyond. The last of the Drouj survivors picked through the remains in search of spoils, gathering up bits and pieces of lives gone dark, carrion in search of an unspecified sustenance. Only Arik Siq stood apart, his gaze shifting between the Seraphic on the one hand and the dark mouth of the pass on the other. What he was looking for was difficult to say. Perhaps he was trying to make sense of things, realizing that in some way he had transgressed beyond even what he had thought himself capable of doing. Perhaps he was just trying to stay alert to whatever else might be coming his way.
Whatever he was doing, the demon thought, it wouldn’t save him from his fate. In the end, he was just another sacrifice waiting to be led to the altar and butchered.
The demon sat off to one side, away from the mangled corpses and the stench of death, consciously separating himself from these creatures he despised so thoroughly. Even dead, they were an abomination. But he suffered them because they were the food on which he feasted and, in this instance, the lure that would bring to him the bearer of the black staff. The demon would suffer anything to get his hands on the bearer’s magic, and he would suffer it for as long as was necessary. The entire focus of his life, for the moment at least, was on waiting for that to happen.
It won’t take long. The bearer will hear of this. He will hear of it and he will come. And I will be waiting to put an end to him and to take from his lifeless hands the black staff he carries. And then the magic will be mine.
He believed himself a simple creature with simple needs. There was nothing complicated about him. He was single-minded, and he was driven. He craved power and immortality—insofar as such things might be attained—and dominance over all living things. He understood this about himself, and he believed that what he craved was only what he deserved. He had made the pact required long ago so that this could come about when he shed his human skin. He thought nothing of the exchange in retrospect; he barely remembered making it. Travel down that road far enough and you forget entirely where you came from. The journey becomes the destination in a twisted sort of way. The need to acquire more of everything, to possess as much as there was to possess, was insatiable.
He watched the Drouj some more, moving through the dead, gathering their precious trophies. Stupid creatures. Beasts of low cunning. Some were bleeding from wounds they had not even bothered to tend, so eager were they to gain possession of something they could point to as a remembrance of this day.
Arik Siq walked over to him, the flat, featureless face in sharp contrast with his own disgust-etched countenance. He saw the Troll hesitate and quickly smoothed away the offending wrinkles. Even so, he gave the other a cold, impatient look. “What is it?”
“We are done here,” the other said. “We should go, my Drouj and I. We’re too few to hold the pass, too few to do anything that matters. We need my father’s help.”
The demon brushed the demand aside with a wave of his hand. “You need nothing you don’t already have. You need only me.”
“But what is there to be accomplished …?”
The demon rose, standing so close to him that even though he was much bigger he took a quick step back.
“Are you questioning me?”
Arik Siq shook his head. “No. But I don’t see …”
“You don’t need to see. You just need to do what you’re told.”
The Troll stared at him and then shook his head. “I grow tired of this.”
The demon smiled. “Do you?”
“What game are you playing? Whatever game that is, I want no further part. The Drouj are strong enough without you. If you care nothing for the valley and only for the black staff, then there is little we can do to help each other more. You will gain the staff quick enough without my help.”
“But I like keeping you close,” said the demon, “so that I don’t have to worry about you. I’ve heard you are fond of poisoned darts fired from blowguns—that you favor long-distance killing weapons that allow the user to stay safely hidden.”
“I’ve had enough of you!” Arik Siq snapped. “I don’t care what you claim to be. Maybe you are a demon and maybe not. Whichever it is, I waste my time here. If you want the black staff, go out and find it yourself! I am going back to my father. Find someone else to do your killing for you!”
He started to turn away, but the demon reached out and touched his arm. Just the brush of those fingers against the fabric of his tunic was enough to cause Arik Siq to stop and turn. “Let me go.”
The demon nodded. “I intend to. But I want to tell you something important first.”
The Drouj gave him a look. “What is it?”
The demon crooked one finger, beckoning him to come closer. Warily, Arik Siq leaned in. One hand held a dagger not ten inches from the demon’s throat. “Be careful that you don’t cause my blade to slip.”
The demon smiled. “I am always careful.”
His hand whipped out, and he disarmed Arik Siq so quickly that the other barely knew what was happening. In the next second that same hand was closed about the Troll’s neck, squeezing. Arik Siq tried to free himself, but all of his strength had gone out of his body, leached away like water from a dry streambed.
The demon brought his face—Skeal Eile’s face—close to Arik Siq’s. “I am tired of you. There was little enough reason to keep you alive in the first place and no reason at all now. You asked me to let you go? Very well. I will fulfill your wish. Good-bye.”
He brought his other hand up and placed it on the Troll’s head, fingers tightening. A jolt went through Arik Siq’s strong body and his arms and legs began to shake. He thrashed momentarily, and then steam began to leak from his eyes and nose and mouth and ears. A terrible look of anguish crossed his rigid features, twisting them into a grotesque mask. The demon kept smiling at him, increasing the pressure. The Troll’s thick skin resisted his efforts far better than the soft skin of humans, but in the end it only prolonged the agony.
He took a long time to die, but in the end his heart gave out and he collapsed at the demon’s feet. The demon looked up and saw the other Drouj watching him in shock, either unwilling or unable to intervene in what they had just witnessed.
He shouted at them. “Get out of here! Go back to his father and tell him what has happened to his son!” He used his boot to roll the body away from him. A strange sense of rage filled him. “Tell him I’ve decided I will keep for myself the valley he wants so desperately!”
The Trolls hesitated and then quickly began moving away, glancing back at him in fear and loathing, causing him to smile. Stupid creatures, like all their kind. Beasts.
He surveyed the carnage anew, and then he sat down to wait.
THERE WERE MOMENTS OF PANTERRA QU’S LIFE THAT were frozen in his memory, perfect crystalline pictures made bright and clear, capable of recall as if they had happened just seconds ago. He never planned on keeping them. He didn’t even choose them. They chose themselves, embedding in his consciousness and reappearing and fading on a whim. Some lingered because of their emotional impact, and some found a home for reasons he knew he would never fully understand.
But a special few were there simply because it was impossible to forget them, and he would not have chosen to do so if he could.
Such was the case with that singular moment in time in which the dragon descended from out of the bright blue of the afternoon sky and settled to the earth directly in front of him.
The weight of the creature surprised him. The dragon caused the ground to shake and clouds of dust to rise not only from the beating of his huge wings, but from the broad splay of his feet, as well. Pan took uncomfortable note of the size of the hooked claws, each as big as one of his legs. He watched awestruck at the complex way the leathery wings folded in on themselves and then a second time against the armored body. His eyes roamed across the staggered blankets of scales that covered the great body, aware of how they grew uniformly smaller toward the ends of its forelegs where they joined to the gre
at claws and to the places where the neck joined to the head. The dragon’s skull was encrusted with knobs and horns, his eyes buried deep beneath jagged brows, and its massive jaws studded with clusters of broken teeth that protruded from blackened gums.
But it was the sheer size of the beast that overwhelmed him. The dragon was too big to take in all at once, and he could not seem to bring himself to believe that such a massive creature was possible. Even though Pan had seen him once already. Even though he was standing right there in front of him, looming over him like some great cliff. Even so.
The dragon held himself perfectly still for long moments, his eyes shifting between Panterra and Phryne Amarantyne, as if deciding which to eat first. It was a terrifying thought, but an inescapable one. Dragons ate meat, the legends said. So why wouldn’t he think about eating them? Yet he didn’t seem interested in doing that. He studied them in a way that suggested he was looking for something else.
“Oh, you beautiful thing!” Phryne said softly.
They were the first words she had spoken since the dragon had landed, the first indication she had given that she wasn’t in total shock. The tremor in her voice caused Pan to look over at her in surprise. She wasn’t shocked; she was excited.
To Pan’s horror, she took a tentative step toward the beast, her hand outstretched. “Phryne!” he gasped.
“Stay where you are, Pan,” she said at once. “Don’t move. Don’t alarm him. I think I know what’s happening. Just stay still.”
No part of him thought that this was a good idea, but it was too late to do anything but what she asked. She was too far away from him to stop.
“Beautiful creature, are you the last of your kind? Are you all that is left? The only one?” Phryne was cooing at the dragon, no longer advancing, but still holding out her hand. To his shock, Pan realized she was holding out the Elfstones.
