Cloak of Dragons

by Moeller, Jonathan

  All the while he fired bolts from his blaster rifle, hammering at my Shield spell. I gritted my teeth and held my concentration, trying to rip my way through Neil’s defenses to hit him or Edina. Neil shifted aim, firing through the fence to try and hit Riordan or Nora or Della, but I changed the angle of my Shield, deflecting the blaster bolts.

  Neil’s rate of fire began to slow, and I realized that he was trying to conserve ammunition. Or power, maybe? The blaster rifle likely didn’t use physical ammunition but ran off batteries or capacitors or something. That gave me an opportunity. If I could catch him when he had to stop to reload, I could end this fight then and there. Without Neil to protect him or the wraithwolves to attack his enemies, Edina was just a dumpy little man in a suit, and he couldn’t take any one of us in a straight fight.

  I just had to hang on until Neil’s weapon ran out of power, and he had to reload.

  I gritted my teeth and forced myself to hold the Shield spell as I pounded at Neil’s forcefield with magical attacks.

  ###

  The wraithwolves rushed through the gate, and Riordan fought to keep them away from Nadia.

  He spent most of his life holding his Shadowmorph in check, keeping its hunger locked away behind walls of self-discipline and training. Riordan had been doing that for so long that it had become almost second nature by now.

  But there were times when he could unleash the Shadowmorph, when he could draw upon its strength without hesitation, and Riordan did so now.

  A wraithwolf bounded across the concrete floor towards him, its claws rasping. Riordan stepped to intercept it, the Shadowmorph giving him speed beyond the human, and he swung his immaterial blade. The sword of darkness caught the wraithwolf in the open jaws, stabbing into its brain. The wraithwolf shuddered and fell over, its bony armor clicking against the concrete, and a surge of strength went through Riordan as his Shadowmorph fed. It could have become a euphoric, addictive feeling if he had allowed it, but he kept his emotions locked away.

  Which was just as well, because there were so many wraithwolves that if his attention wavered, they were going to kill him.

  One of the creatures bounded past him and lunged at Nora, jaws yawning wide. Riordan turned to come to her aid, but Nora was ready. She wasn’t as good with a sword as he was, but she was strong and fast, and her height gave her a great deal of reach. And against the wraithwolves, speed and agility were more useful than flourishing tricks with a sword. Nora slashed her Shadowmorph blade, and the weapon sheared upward, taking off the top half of the wraithwolf’s head. The creature’s body jerked and collapsed, slime leaking from the lower half of the jaw still attached to its neck. A second creature bounded at her and Riordan intercepted it, chopping it in half at the apex of its leap. The halves hit the floor and slid past Nora.

  She nodded her thanks, and fire exploded around them as Della cast a spell.

  The dragon didn’t have Nadia’s degree of skill. Likely her life had not involved decades of struggle inside an Eternity Crucible. But what she lacked in skill, she made up for in raw power, and she hurled blasts of fire at the wraithwolves. The burst of flame were sloppy but more than sufficient to burn the wraithwolves to smoking coals. Delaxsicoria could likely have achieved the same result while expending much less power, but the middle of a battle was not the place to lecture someone on magical theory.

  Nadia dueled Neil, magic snarling around her.

  He had seen her full power unleashed several times, and it was always impressive. A crimson Shield spell flickered before her in a half-dome, changing angles to deflect the blaster bolts when Neil shifted his aim. Lightning and fire burst from her other hand, racing to strike at Neil, but he always managed to get his forcefield up in time to block the attacks. Yet the cyborg’s rate of fire had slowed. Riordan didn’t know what powered a blaster rifle (some sort of high-capacity battery, no doubt), but it had to be a finite resource. Once his ammunition ran out, he was going to be in trouble, and Nadia could abandon her Shield spell and bring her full power to bear against him. He wondered why she hadn’t tried to use an ice spike or an ice wall against Neil, but his cybernetic limb was strong enough to deflect an ice spike and to punch right through a frozen wall.

  Edina seemed to have realized it as well. He was backing away, eyes wide in his sweating face, though he always made sure to keep Neil between him and Nadia.

  It was a superb display of magical skill and power…and Riordan’s admiration was tempered by the fact that he knew what a horrible price his wife had paid to acquire that skill.

  Two more wraithwolves lunged at him, jaws snapping. Riordan dodged to the right, raking his Shadowmorph blade through one wraithwolf. The second pivoted and tried to spring on him, only to meet Nora’s attack. A flicker of her Shadowmorph blade took off the wraithwolf’s head, and it bounced away.

  Another explosion bloomed through the basement, and Neil staggered. Riordan saw small fires dancing on his sleeves and shoulders. Nadia’s latest spell had blasted through his force shield to singe him. Riordan suspected that Neil’s weapon had a limited capacity, but maybe his forcefield needed time to recharge between uses.

  Nadia wasn’t giving him that time.

  “Get me out here!” screamed Edina, jabbing a finger at his phone. No, not his phone. The control until for the computer inside Neil’s head.

  Neil jumped backward, covering a half-dozen yards in a single bound, and landed next to Edina. As he did, his free hand dipped into his coat and came out holding something cylindrical. He flung it towards them, and it hit the floor in front of the gate.

  “Grenade!” shouted Nora.

  Nadia reacted at once, casting a spell. A sheet of white mist rose before them and hardened into a glittering wall of ice, ten feet tall and a foot thick. About a half-second later the grenade exploded, and with far more force than Riordan would have expected. The floor shuddered beneath his boots, and he saw the fiery burst through the thick ice. Cracks spread through the frozen wall in a massive spiderweb pattern, and some pieces fell loose to shatter against the floor, but for the most part, the ice wall held back the blast.

  Riordan killed a wraithwolf, looked around for his next foe, and realized that all the wraithwolves were dead. Their carcasses dissolved into puddles of black slime that would evaporate in a few hours. The creatures that Della had burned were crumbling into dust, which would likewise disappear in short order.

  No wonder Edina had decided to retreat.

  “He is escaping!” said Della.

  “No, he’s not,” said Nadia, and she raked a hand before her. The ice wall dissolved into mist and vanished into nothingness. Riordan saw Edina and Neil disappear into the stairwell door on the other side of the basement.

  “Come on!” said Nadia, and they ran after their foes.

  ***

  Chapter 18: Dragon Wings

  I sprinted across the basement, my heart thundering in my chest, fatigue rolling through my mind. But I wasn’t sweating beneath my coat and ballistic vest. Intense magic use tended to leach away body heat, and I was cold, cold, cold. And tired. I wanted to lie down and sleep for a day or two.

  But not yet. Not until I had gotten Edina and Neil.

  I might have been cold, but my blood was up.

  Edina had pissed me off with all that talk about making a better humanity. Nicholas Connor had used to make speeches like that, and his plan for making a new and shiny humanity had involved nuking New York City and knocking the Skythrone to the Earth to cause catastrophic impact waves in the Atlantic Ocean. What did a few billion dead people matter when you were trying to build a better world? Guys like Nicholas and Edina talked a good game and spun a pretty tale, but when it came down to details, to them a few million dead people here and there were collateral damage.

  Fourteen people in New York killed by a restauranteur who had bought a copy of the Summoning Codex?

  Or Malthraxivorn, who as far as I could see had been guilty of nothing but being rich and enj
oying fancy toys?

  Besides, if we killed the High Queen, who would take her place? People like Nicholas Connor and Charles Edina? Yeah, I could just imagine what kind of world they would create.

  Besides, Tarlia had arranged for Russell to be healed, and as far as I was concered, that was that. I owed her.

  Though it definitely helped when she sent me after people like Edina.

  “Let me go first,” I said, gasping it out between breaths. “Shield spell.”

  Riordan didn’t look happy about that, but he nodded. We reached the door to the stairs, and I cast the Shield spell, calling the hazy half-dome of crimson light before me. I went first, Riordan right behind me, and Nora and Della brought up the back. The stairwell was empty. No doubt Edina was fleeing as fast as his legs could carry him, and…

  Or he had told Neil to set an ambush.

  I looked up, shifting the angle of my Shield as I did, just in time to see Neil swing his rifle down to aim at me. Two blaster shots hammered against my Shield, and I swayed a little on my feet as I felt the strain of blocking them roll through my mind. God, but that rifle could hit hard. It could probably shoot through a steel block without much trouble.

  Neil whirled and vanished, and I heard his footsteps clicking against the main corridor.

  “Go!” said Riordan.

  I hurried up the stairs, my Shield spell still in place, and ran back into the main corridor next to poor Hamilton’s office. I saw Edina disappear into another door a few yards down the corridor. Was he heading to the truck dock?

  “The roof!” said Della. “He’s going to the roof!”

  Now that didn’t make sense. Why the hell was he running for the roof? I thought he must have a car parked out back, something he could use to attempt an escape. Why run for the roof?

  Maybe he had a weapon up there, something he thought would give him an advantage. Or maybe it was something that actually would give him an advantage. Neil had killed Malthraxivorn for him, and that gauntlet had let Edina summon a whole hell of a lot of wraithwolves. Perhaps he had something even nastier waiting on the roof.

  I wrenched open the door to the stairs, still holding my Shield spell ready, but the stairwell was deserted. I started up, maintaining the Shield, moving as fast as I could while remaining vigilant. I didn’t hear anyone on the stairwell above us. I did, however, hear a low thrumming whine, a thrumming that got louder as we passed the second and the third floor.

  We reached the fourth floor, and then scrambled up the final set of stairs to the roof. I pushed open the door, Shield extended before me. I expected Edina or Neil to attack at once, to unleash a blaze of blaster fire or another mob of wraithwolves. Or maybe some other cunning trap.

  I did not, however, expect to see the helicopter lift off the roof and rise into the gray autumn sky.

  It wasn’t a big helicopter. It was one of those little two-seater craft that get used as training vehicles or the personal transports of rich men and their pilots. Once I had been driving across the Great Plains on one of Morvilind’s little errands, and I had seen ranchers using three small helicopters like that to help corral a massive herd of two or three thousand cattle. In its bubble-like cockpit, I glimpsed Neil at the controls, his expression impassive, and a panicked-looking Edina sitting in the passenger seat.

  Even as I ran onto the roof, the helicopter soared away, heading east towards Brooklyn proper.

  “Damn it,” snarled Nora as the helicopter picked up speed.

  “Can you blast them out of the sky, Worldburner?” said Della.

  I started to gather magical power to do just that, but I stopped myself. With a helicopter that small, I could force it down any number of ways. Congealing an ice wall over the main rotor. A fire blast to the fuel tanks. Or a volley of lightning globes to fry the control systems.

  Trouble was, anything I did to the helicopter was going to make it crash. The deaths of Charles Edina and Neil Freeman would not trouble me very much, though I suspected that Neil had been coerced into this against his will. But I couldn’t control where the helicopter landed, and Brooklyn was a crowded place. It might land in the street. Or in a storefront.

  Or on a bus full of kindergartners.

  And even a small helicopter carried enough fuel to make a big fireball.

  “I can’t,” I said, and Della cursed. “It might crash into someone. If it hits a bus or a store or something, it could kill a lot of people.”

  “We’ll head back to the SUVs and pursue,” said Riordan, turning back towards the door.

  “No,” said Della. “They will escape by then. I shall pursue them myself.”

  With that, she started to strip naked, then and there on the roof. She was going to return to her true form, take to the air, and hunt down Edina’s helicopter herself.

  “You won’t have any protection from the blaster rifle, Lady Delaxsicoria,” said Riordan as she tossed aside her underwear. I was kind of relieved that he didn’t stare at her impossibly beautiful body. But he knew that her human shape was not her true form. “If Neil shoots you through the head, I think that will kill you even in your true form.”

  Della paused, golden light beginning to play up and down her toned limbs. “That is true. Worldburner, will you accompany me?”

  I blinked. “I can’t fly.”

  “You shall know an honor that few of your race have ever known,” said Della. “You shall ride upon my back.”

  I blinked several more times.

  “What?” I said.

  “Fear not, I shall not permit you to fall,” said Della. “I am excellent at flight, but we must hurry.”

  It wasn’t falling that bothered me. With my levitation and telekinetic spells, I could probably manage a landing with only a few bruises, maybe a broken bone or two. But the thought of riding on Della’s back was just too damned weird. I know she was a dragon and all, but still…

  I glanced at Riordan, hoping he would have an objection to the plan.

  Sadly, he was too sensible, and he knew me too well. “We’ll follow you in the SUV.”

  I looked at Edina’s helicopter receding in the distance. I thought of his talk about merging men with machines, and how he controlled Neil like a slave. I thought of how Paul Ricci had killed fourteen people to unknowingly create a distraction for Edina.

  Goddamn it.

  “Fine,” I said. “Fine, fine, fine. We’ll do it. Just one condition.”

  “What is that, Worldburner?” said Della as the golden light engulfed her human form.

  “Don’t call me Worldburner.”

  The golden light flared, and Della’s human form vanished and swelled into the mighty shape of the great green dragon, her leathery wings flexing.

  “Very well, Nadia MacCormac,” said Della. It was still strange to hear her beautiful voice coming from that huge reptilian head. “Climb upon my shoulders at the base of my neck. You may grasp the spines there for additional stability.”

  “See you guys on the ground,” I said to Riordan.

  “Be careful,” he said, his face solemn, but I saw the worry in his eyes.

  “I’m always careful,” I said, which was an enormous lie. “Good luck. I love you.”

  If I was about to get killed by falling off a dragon, I wanted that to be the last thing I said.

  “I love you, too, Nadia,” said Riordan. For just a moment, his grim expression softened. Then he nodded to Nora, and they both sprinted for the stairs.

  I took a deep breath, stepped forward, and jumped. As I did, I cast the levitation spell, just enough to boost my leap, and it carried me onto Della’s shoulder. I settled into the faint indentation between her shoulders, grasping one of the bony spines there for balance. The spine felt like stone, and the scales beneath me were feverishly hot. Given how cold I was, it was a pleasant feeling.

  “Your husband,” said Della. “He smells of his desire and love for you.”

  “That’s good, but this is not the time,” I said. “Let�
�s go get the man who killed your uncle.”

  Della raised her serpentine neck and roared, loosing a basso roar that I assumed was her hunting cry. Her great wings unfurled, and she leaped into the air.

  The warehouse shrank beneath us, the wind tugging at my hair, and I rode a dragon through the skies over Brooklyn.

  ***

  Chapter 19: Man Or Machine?

  I hadn’t known this, but it turns out dragons can fly really fast.

  Especially considering how big Della was.

  Not that I want to make disparaging comments about a woman’s weight, but her true form had to weigh at least five or six tons, maybe more. She had a wingspan as wide as her serpentine body was long, but that couldn’t be enough to keep her in the air, and her wings were flapping swiftly, but not enough to explain how fast we were moving.

  But dragons were innately magical, so no doubt magic was involved. I would have taken out my aetherometer and checked, but that would have meant taking my hands off the spine in front of me, which wasn’t happening. Flying two hundred feet over the ground with no seat belt is not an experience I recommend. I had a good position between Della’s shoulders, and I don’t have any particular fear of heights…but I was still two hundred feet above the ground without any straps.

  But her speed meant we were gaining on the helicopter.

  It had dwindled to a speck on the horizon by the time Della got airborne, but her wings drove us forward, and the helicopter drew nearer. Della loosed her hunting cry again, and I winced. Neil might be able to hear it over the roar of his craft’s rotors.

  Then again, he might happen to look over his shoulder and see the giant dragon gaining on the helicopter.

  I wasn’t exactly sure where we were – over Crown Heights, maybe. I saw the green of Prospect Park behind us when I glanced over my shoulder. I thought Neil was piloting the helicopter towards JFK Airport in Queens. Likely Malthraxivorn had a private jet stashed there, a jet which Edina would use to make his escape and disappear with a big chunk of Malthraxivorn’s cash.