The Last Dragon

by James Riley

  And there were more, many more, in almost every direction, some so far away they were just tiny specks of light, like stars in the dark. A whole bunch of them were grouped off in one direction, and Fort wondered if that was the NSA, where Damian had originally practiced his Summoning magic.

  It didn’t matter. The only portal Fort was concerned about was directly in front of him.

  He turned back to this one, and slowly unleashed the magic, feeling the itchiness of the Summoning power flow out of his hands and into the ground. The glowing circle in his mind disappeared, and he took a deep breath, then opened his eyes to find the portal now glowing in real life, lighting up the rubble all around him.

  At first, it was just a circle of magical fire, but soon he could feel something opening, splitting the barriers between dimensions, creating a doorway to another world.

  Another world where his father had been waiting for almost eight months now.

  No. Don’t think about it. He couldn’t let the possibilities stop him. He was so close! Fort took a step closer to the edge of the chasm, his heart racing. No matter what he found below, he’d be bringing his father back.

  Another step, and he stood directly over the glowing circle. The darkness around the flames was so intense that he couldn’t see much in the other dimension, but he knew this was where the creature had come from. It had to be. It was also strangely quiet, but that was probably for the best: The last thing he wanted to do was land in a nest of the creatures.

  He checked to make sure his staff and bow were secure, and that the bag of food wouldn’t bounce around too much. This is it, he thought, quickly removing his amulet. Sierra, if you can hear me, I hope you’re okay. I’m going to get my father, and I’ll be back soon. Stay safe.

  But no response came, and he put the amulet back on, unwilling to wait another moment. Instead, he closed his eyes and stepped into the portal.

  But instead of passing through it, his foot came down on solid rock.

  Rock that filled the entire portal, completely closing it off.

  - TWENTY-FIVE -

  NO,” FORT WHISPERED, DROPPING to the stone and running his hands over it frantically. It couldn’t be true. There had to be a way in. The monster had emerged from this very spot, the portal proved it! How could it be totally blocked now?!

  “No!” he shouted this time, banging his fists on the rock. Pain shot through his hands, but he barely noticed it in his anger. “Let me in!” he shouted, hitting the rock again. “Let. Me. In!”

  But there was no response, and his voice just echoed eerily through the cavern below the former Oppenheimer School. He wouldn’t accept this. It couldn’t be true. Fort leaped to his feet, barely able to think. How could this be happening? There was no way he could get this close, only to lose his father again!

  Anger turned to rage, and he began lashing out, stomping on the rock with all of his strength, yelling, screaming at someone, anyone to open the passage. He cursed the monsters, Damian, the Oppenheimer School, Colonel Charles, and everyone else he could think of until he ran out of names, then just started screaming gutturally.

  After what felt like hours but was probably only minutes, his throat began to itch from his shouting, and his kicks and punches lost some of their energy. He slowly fell to his knees, fighting back tears.

  “This can’t be happening,” he whispered, shaking his head. “I’m so close.”

  For a time, he just knelt there on the rock, not sure what else to do. His anger disappeared as the minutes passed, replaced by a roller coaster of despair and determination.

  What was the point? He was never going to find his father. It had been far too long.

  But if he gave up now, what would happen to his dad if he was still alive down there?

  It wasn’t giving up if he couldn’t get through the rock! He didn’t have any other options.

  But there had to be some way through. He could teleport throughout the entire world, but a boulder could stop him in his tracks?

  But to teleport, he had to know the destination, and there was no way of knowing what lay beyond the rock, or where his father might be. No, he had to get through the rock somehow. There must be magic that would do it, a Destruction spell, or… or Ethereal Spirit, the Healing spell!

  For a moment, a fragile hope buoyed Fort’s spirits, and he stood back up. Ethereal Spirit turned your body insubstantial, letting you swim right through solid objects. He could relearn that, and…

  Except he hadn’t learned it. Sierra had stolen it from Jia’s mind without meaning to and planted it in Fort’s, back when he was trying to pass his Healing test in the original school. If he tried to learn it now, it could take months or longer to even reach the spell.

  Maybe he really did need Jia or Rachel, just to get through to the other dimension. But that would mean one of them would be lost, and he wasn’t willing to even consider that. Besides, Cyrus had said Fort alone could rescue his father, if he was willing to not make it back himself. How was that possible if this obstacle stopped him?

  That meant there must be a way through, and all he had to do was think of it. He sat back down on the rock, racking his brain for ideas. Unfortunately, every new possibility that occurred to him would have required one of his friends, and he slammed his palm down on the rock, the frustration and anger coming back quickly. There had to be a way he could do this alone! If he couldn’t bring one of the other students, then maybe a magical item. He felt around to the staff and bow on his back, but a fireball wasn’t going to damage the stone. The staff’s Healing magic would be just as useless, and the only other item Fort remembered in the armory was a shield, which didn’t seem like it’d accomplish a whole lot here either.

  But maybe there were other items? Didn’t he hear someone talking about a hammer? He tried to home in on that memory, but could only bring to mind the bathroom, for some reason. Wait, that was it, the bathroom, and Chad and Bryce talking on either side of his stall.

  Trey had wanted to switch to Healing, that was it. But before that, they’d mentioned what he was working on. A hammer.

  A hammer infused with an earthquake spell from the Destruction book.

  Fort climbed back out of the portal so fast he almost tripped over his staff. He immediately opened a teleportation circle back to the weapons room and leaped through it, emerging into darkness once more. He clicked on the light again and started his search.

  Fort glanced around, finding row upon row of staffs, more bows, a lot of bandages and amulets on chains, but no hammers.

  There were a few items covered with cloth on the tables in the room, too small for Fort to have bothered with before. But at this point, he was running out of options. None of the covered stuff looked big enough to break a rock, but magic wasn’t really about size.

  The first item he uncovered was some kind of metal sculpture, almost like a small turtle. That for sure wasn’t it, so Fort kept moving, finding a large black key next, then a pin of tiny wings, like pilots would sometimes give out on airplanes, and finally…

  Finally, a tiny silver hammer lying on top of a pillow. It couldn’t have been more than three inches long.

  Fort peered in close and found a note attached to it with a small piece of string, almost like a gift tag on a present.

  The Earthshatterer, the note said. Work in progress. Don’t touch! EXTREMELY dangerous!

  Really? This was the Earthshatterer? He picked it up in his hands, and nothing happened, no glow like when he’d grabbed the staff and bow earlier. Maybe it wasn’t done yet, like the note said.

  But as of right now, he had no other options. He might as well try it; if he went back to the cavern and the hammer didn’t do anything, he wouldn’t be any worse off than he was now.

  Of course, if the hammer did too much, it might collapse the whole cavern, sending a few tons of rock down to bury him beneath the old Oppenheimer School.

  But Cyrus said he’d bring his father back alone. If the cavern collapse
d, his dad wasn’t going to get back through. So it must be safe… ish.

  Either way, better to put himself in danger than his friends. Like Gabriel said, protect the ones you love, no matter the cost.

  But that didn’t mean he shouldn’t be prepared. Fort grabbed the hammer and created another teleportation circle, this time back to the room with the dragon skeletons, where he’d hidden the Summoning book. Now that he’d cast Restore Dimensional Portal, the words had reappeared on the page.

  He wouldn’t need it again, he hoped. But better safe than sorry, especially if he did end up taking the entire cavern down with him. If he cut off this portal, there was still the one below the National Mall in Washington, D.C., and he’d need the spell again to try there, if the unthinkable happened.

  After the itchy magic filled him once more, he hid the book, then teleported back to the cavern below the old school. There was the glowing portal, just as he’d left it, and he stepped inside, then got down on his knees to confirm there weren’t any cracks or fissures in the rock, somewhere he could aim the hammer. Unfortunately, just like before, the stone looked completely solid.

  He still had no idea how that was possible. Could the monsters have some sort of magic that restored whatever they tunneled through? Or maybe worse, was there something else down there with them that could ? Maybe the red-eyed things from his dream?

  It didn’t matter. His father was in there somewhere, which meant Fort was going in too.

  He leaned forward, careful not to accidentally tap Earthshatterer against his own body at all. He assumed the earthquake spell only worked on, well, earth, but it wasn’t something he was willing to bet his legs on.

  Now just inches away, he pinched the tiny hammer between two of his fingers, then brought it slowly down toward the rock, sweat dripping down his forehead from the tension. Suddenly the weight of the rock above him seemed to be stifling, and he couldn’t figure out how it hadn’t fallen yet.

  No. Don’t think about it. Concentrate on how it’s going to open the portal for you.

  “Please, Earthshatterer,” he whispered to the hammer, trying not to roll his eyes at the name. “Just split this rock below me, that’s all you have to do. Don’t go all crazy on me, okay? If I get buried here, you do too.”

  With that, Fort closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then gently tapped the hammer against the rock below him.

  With a sound like an explosion, the rock vaporized into dust, sending Fort tumbling into the darkness below.

  - TWENTY-SIX -

  FORT SCREAMED IN SURPRISE AS he fell into an enormous open cavern from such a height that he could barely see the ground as it rushed up toward him. Right before he hit, he was able to concentrate enough to cast a teleportation spell and opened an entrance and an exit right next to each other, just above the ground.

  He dropped through one circle and shot in the opposite direction from the other, his momentum sending him high into the air, up toward the glowing portal leading back home. As he neared it, he began to slow again, until he reached the pinnacle of his flight, and started to fall once more.

  Quickly, he canceled the two teleportation circles, then cast the spell again, this time creating one below him, and the other standing vertically on the ground.

  He dropped back through the circle, but this time it sent him skidding out on the cavern floor, which fortunately was relatively smooth. The landing was still rough, but he hadn’t dropped far enough for it to be dangerous, and he managed to not bruise himself too badly. After he came to a stop on the ground, he lay there in place, trying to catch his breath while his heart threatened to explode out of his chest.

  The light from the portal was just barely enough to see by, illuminating his strangely shiny surroundings. The rock nearby looked so shiny, in fact, that he would have thought it was wet, even though the ground felt dry. Whatever the rock was, it was oddly dark, almost black, even, just like the ground beneath him. Was this some kind of obsidian, or…

  The ground beneath him rumbled, and Fort’s eyes widened.

  This wasn’t stone he was standing on.

  A giant eyelid opened beneath his feet, sending him flying. A blazing red eye watched him go, and a roar shook the cavern.

  He’d landed on one of the monsters.

  His flight crashed him into more of the shiny rock, which he now recognized as the creatures’ scales. Which meant he’d just been thrown into another of the monsters.

  Fort frantically tried to catch a grip as this next creature also began to rise, but the scales were too smooth, and he fell out into open air. Looking down, he now saw that the actual ground was still hundreds of feet below. He quickly opened another circle directly below him and spat himself back out into the air in the middle of the cavern, hoping to get a better look.

  But when he emerged from the teleportation circle this time, all he could see were shiny black scales moving everywhere. From wall to wall, the entire cavern was full of the monsters, all curled up with each other.

  “Oh, this is bad,” he said as he dropped again, only to quickly open another circle directly below him which led to the actual ground this time.

  He emerged right beside the massive feet of the monster he’d initially landed on, who had now stood. Unfortunately, it wasn’t done making noise, and its roars shook the room, rousing the others. The enormous foot in front of Fort rose into the air, then reversed, coming straight down on the spot Fort was standing.

  As it hit, Fort opened another circle, barely escaping before the creature’s foot slammed into the ground. His spell sent him back into the air, falling into the now writhing mass of creatures, all of which were struggling to stand as well.

  This ping-ponging up and down wasn’t working—he had to get out of here! He quickly sent himself teleporting across the cavern, over toward one of the walls, but things didn’t look a whole lot better from that side.

  He needed some kind of safe place to stop for a moment, because he couldn’t keep teleporting around like this. The ground was out, at least if he didn’t want to be trampled. Trying to land as far on the other side of the cavern as he could see, he emerged from a teleportation circle to find a red glow coming from a narrow ledge, still hundreds of feet away.

  Whatever was there, it looked like it was at least out of the monsters’ reach, which meant he could catch his breath, if nothing else. Fort started to cast another teleportation spell, only to get swept out of the air by a giant hand slamming into him, massive claws curling over his form and yanking him back down toward the ground.

  The hit knocked Fort for a loop, but he managed to clear his head just in time to look down into the open jaws and oversized teeth of one of the creatures. Frantically, Fort tried to grab ahold of one of the fingers, but it was too huge, and the monster shook its hand, dislodging Fort instantly.

  He tumbled down into its mouth, spinning wildly as he fell. He tried opening a teleportation circle right above the tongue, but his now-dizzy aim was completely off, and the circle ended up around the creature’s nose.

  Instead, he landed on its slimy tongue and slid toward the throat, catching wind of a smell weirdly like fireworks bubbling up from its stomach. The creature reared back to swallow, sending Fort flying down its throat.

  He screamed and quickly opened a circle below him, emerging back out in the cavern, still falling, but at least not heading for stomach acid. Another creature lunged for him, and Fort disappeared into a circle, then shot up from the ground again, only to slam into a third monster’s leg. He frantically tried to catch himself but failed, and fell backward right into the same circle, popping out just as the first creature’s hand passed, landing on the back of it.

  The creature immediately felt his weight and shook its hand, sending Fort flying off upside down, straight at one of the walls. He winced and created a circle on the wall, leading to a spot directly below the ledge on the other side, hoping his momentum would carry him up. He came rocketing out of the second c
ircle and into the air once more, only to just miss the edge of the ledge before falling back to the ground.

  With a grunt, he opened a circle directly below him leading to the ceiling above the ledge, just as a new creature rose up, its open mouth coming straight at him. It closed its jaws around the circle right as Fort hit it, but he emerged safely out of the ceiling above the ledge… if still falling much too fast.

  With no time to open another circle, Fort hit the ground hard and let out an enormous groan of pain. He lay there for a moment, unable to move, all the air knocked out of his lungs. The last few minutes had been a haze of terror and adrenaline, and now that he was safe, if broken, he let the horror of what he’d just gone through wash over him, and he shivered.

  The shivering only made his body hurt worse.

  When he could finally breathe and convince his poor body to move once more, he crawled to the edge, where an elaborately worked metal railing had been built to keep someone or something from falling over it. That was interesting, as there was no way the monsters below could have made anything like that. So who else was down here, then?

  He pulled himself up by the fence and glared down at the creatures below, now all roaring in annoyance.

  “I hope I woke you all up,” he said, giving them a death stare. “And I hope you don’t get back to sleep any time soon!”

  One of the creatures slammed a hand into the wall below him, and Fort had to catch himself on the fence to keep from tumbling back into the cavern. Realizing he was pushing his already terrible luck, Fort quickly backed away and tried to figure out where he was now.

  Red circles of light with the intensity and color of exit signs lit the ledge, and Fort realized for the first time that the ledge’s opening looked like it’d been purposely dug to be too small for the creatures’ arms to reach into. With their massive claws, he figured the monsters could still dig a larger opening, but they hadn’t bothered for some reason.

  In fact, it was odd that they would all stay put in that cavern. Granted, it was pretty huge, but there were a lot of them crammed in there, and they didn’t seem like the most peaceful of monsters, at least not in his experience.