by Ben Stovall
The remaining eleven skeletons were focused on his orc comrades, and that gave Torvaas more than enough of an opening. He struck their backs, hard and fast, shattering their rib cages with his magic blade.
When they were all defeated, he realized that only two of the orcs remained. The loss unsettled him—but not as much as when the three slain orcs rose again. He quickly lunged at them with his darksteel dagger. It’s too bad we don’t have more of these.
“Thank you, Torvaas,” said one of the orcs. The rogue only bowed in response. The soldiers moved with him into another gathering of skeletons and they made quick work of their unguarded backsides. More shambled in around them, and a mace slammed into Torvaas’s abdomen. He could tell it would bruise, but nothing had broken. He rammed his dagger into the skeleton’s mandible, and watched it fall apart.
He whirled around to strike again but found no more of the black frames around him. The rogue looked westward and gasped. Graal Wylan and Tayna had pushed too far ahead. The scaleskin general managed to stay closer to the gate than the commander from Daralton, but not close enough. They’d been dragged out of formation with too few men. And it bit them in the ass. Their left-side soldiers fell to the skeletons, and the black frames swarmed around their cadre. The onyx forms pushed the remaining soldiers onto the ground and began slamming them with their weapons and bony fists.
Torvaas flinched, remembering when the same happened to him at Imynor’s house. He began to move forward, to save their comrades, but … he hesitated. He didn’t know if he could save them both. No one would blame him for rushing to Tayna’s aid. No one would know if he let Graal Wylan die beneath the skeletons. Then the general couldn’t marry Lyvalla. Perhaps he would be named Nalar’torvaas, as his father had said he’d always been. Maybe the tribe would finally—
No.
He knew none of that was true. Valan Rivrak would find another “suitable” match for Lyvalla. And another one to become valan after his death. Graal Wylan was the best chance the Torgashin had at becoming a true part of the Gandari Kingdoms.
And Graal Wylan was his friend.
He surged forth with the soldiers in tow. They smashed into the skeletons and cut them down. They formed up into a protective circle around the two tribesmen.
Torvaas helped Graal Wylan up. He coughed a bit of crimson as he stood. “Thank you, Torvaas. That was foolish of me.”
“Don’t thank me yet,” Torvaas said. “Tayna was further out than you.”
Graal Wylan understood and nodded. Once again, they pushed forward. With precision strikes, they cut the skeletons apart and pulled Tayna and her remaining soldiers from the melee. She was in rough shape. Bruises and cuts marred her face and arms. Her chest plate had been entirely sundered by the black march, and blood was spilling out of it alarmingly quick. Graal Wylan looked to him with a frown. “She’ll make it, right?”
Torvaas considered the question. He sighed. “I hope so,” the rogue said. If only Fanrinn were here.
More skeletons rushed around the wall to their positions, and Torvaas readied his daggers. He dismantled his foes with decisive strikes and blows, sending their bones scattering around the docks. The bones began to pile up. A small mound of proof they were actually fighting back. A stack of trophies that said, “You can beat them. You can win.” Torvaas even believed it.
Then he heard a roar in the distance that shook the trees.
✽ ✽ ✽
The noise was unmistakable. Joravyn’s heart began to thump out of his chest. He caught Ulthan’s gaze ahead, and the paladin gave him a decisive nod.
The mage ran to the tower. He burst inside and sprinted up the stairway to the battlements. He needed to join Grand Sorcerer Lokriil before it was too late. Joravyn found one of the mages fast enough. “Where’s the Grand Sorcerer?” he asked quickly.
“Above King’s Way, sir,” the young man replied. Joravyn recognized the boy after he spoke. He was no more than seventeen, born and raised in Souhal.
“Thanks,” Joravyn said with a nod. He began to move toward the primary defense point.
He reached the tower halfway down the battlements to his goal, and found Ellaria and Fanrinn within, reloading their quivers. Fanrinn’s brow furrowed as Joravyn entered.
“That was the Dark One then?” Fanrinn asked. Every one of the defenders had heard the roar. Joravyn only nodded.
Ellaria bit her lip nervously. “What do you need to do, to ground it?” she asked.
“I need to find the Grand Sorcerer.”
“I saw him,” Fanrinn said. “Let’s go.” Together the trio ran down the wall. The gate to King’s Way was having a hard time with their skeletons. Some had managed to climb the wall up to the rampart, harassing the rangers. Arrows flew from Fanrinn and Ellaria’s bows, knocking skulls off the battlements and scattering bones to the wind. Joravyn flung bolts of pure arcane energy where he could.
His ear began to twitch. A low buzzing sound could be heard from the west. His jaw tightened. “Get down!” he shouted. Ellaria and Fanrinn ducked behind the walls quickly, as did most of the rangers who heard him. Some, however, moved too slow, or didn’t hear him at all.
A wave of arcane energy crashed against the battlements. A few of the rangers survived the blow, merely being stunned from the rush of pure magic that crashed into them. Most were not so lucky. It seemed the necromancers knew more than how to raise the dead. Joravyn only hoped that the other mages had detected the spell as he had and saved the defenders.
They began a hard sprint toward the gate. The dead rangers’ bodies began to writhe as the necromantic magic started to take hold. It wasn’t long before their bones rose and drew the archers’ fire away from the main battle.
But the trio had to move on. The dragon could end this fight with a breath. They needed to be ready.
After a moment, they were on the wall above King’s Way’s gate. Joravyn saw the Grand Sorcerer ahead. Fanrinn and Ellaria took position at the wall and shot arrows into the battle below.
“There you are,” the old elf chuckled. His hair was a bright silver that hung down to his shoulders. He was a thin man, long slender arms hung by his side more akin to sticks. His eyes were a deep blue, and a thoughtful smile occupied his jaw. “I was worried you didn’t hear that beast’s roar.”
“I think everyone heard that,” Joravyn quipped.
“We’d better get started then,” the Grand Sorcerer said. The other mages nearby approached, and they began casting. The spell was ancient, from the Grand Sorcerer’s homeland Ulen.
Another roar echoed over the treetops, and he wished this spell could be prepared faster. Everything went quiet as the wingbeats of a titanic creature sounded over the battle. The Dark One flew out of the forest southward over the bay. His shadow essence left a trail of darkness against the orange of the setting sun as he soared. He banked to his left and flew over the battle, only beginning to turn back to the shore when he was past Souhal’s eastern wall.
Then, he heard the buzzing again.
“We need to get down, now!” Ellaria shouted.
“The spell is almost ready!” Joravyn yelled. The other mages, inexperienced in combat and not at all fighters, ran inside the tower leaving Lokriil and Joravyn to finish the spell on their own. He couldn’t blame them.
The dragon flew around the palace and made his way down King’s Way, soaring over the street toward the gate. The beast inhaled. A black torrent of flames engulfed the city as he flew down the road. The buzzing from the trees was reaching a crescendo. This assault would end them all unless they could bring the beast down.
“We have to get down, NOW!” Fanrinn yelled.
“You do,” agreed Grand Sorcerer Lokriil. “Go, all of you. I can finish the spell and bring the Dark One down.” Joravyn searched his eyes and saw the truth in them. With a nod, they ducked into the tower, watching the sorcerer and praying he could finish in time.
Then, a skeleton climbed over the wall, his wicked weapon held
high. Joravyn was stunned. He bade his feet to move, for if Lokriil was interrupted they were all doomed, but he couldn’t take the step out onto the battlements, not with the spell the necromancers had nearly ready to wash over them again.
And he didn’t have to. Fanrinn ran out and tackled the skeleton. Ellaria screamed beside him, and Joravyn had to grab her to keep her from going out after him.
“No! Fanrinn! No!” she screamed.
The Grand Sorcerer raised his arms into the air as the wave of pure magical force erupted from the tree line. The energy blasted into the Dark One and it screeched in pain. Its wings stopped, and it glided at an alarming speed. The dragon tumbled through the air before it collided with the northwestern corner of the wall. Marble bricks scattered over the battlefield from the crash, and the dragon’s momentum pressed it forward. He skipped across the ground, his form bounding twice before coming to a stop.
The energy wave crashed into the wall, and the Grand Sorcerer was flung from the battlements. His body disintegrated from the blast as he flew above Souhal. The magical surge slammed into Fanrinn, and he yelled in pure agony for a moment, before he fell to the ground lifelessly.
Ellaria thrashed about in Joravyn’s arms. Kicking him, scratching at him, and screaming for him to let her go to him. He felt numb to it all as he cradled the young elf. She began to cry into his chest and balled his tunic in her hands so tight she nearly ripped it.
Joravyn felt a sob wrack his body as he cried with her. He wished they could stay like that … but there would be time to mourn later. He consoled himself and searched for the right words.
“Ellaria … w-we have to go. We have to go kill that dragon,” he stammered.
Her only response was a sob as she stared at her brother’s corpse. He held her tightly. “We have to go, or it’ll get back into the air, and he’d have died for nothing,” he said. He couldn’t fight the shakiness in his voice.
Ellaria wiped her tears away as she hardened herself. “We’re going to kill every last one of them.”
Joravyn nodded. “We are.”
Seventeen
Ulthan watched in awe as the titanic dragon crashed to the ground. Joravyn had done it! He looked to Captain Sholar. “You have command of this force. Keep the skeletons out of the city,” he said. “I have a dragon to kill.”
The captain nodded. The men rallied around him as he fought his way through the battlefield. They cut a swathe through the skeletons, bones crunching beneath their boots as they pushed forward. It wasn’t long before Tyrdun and the soldiers from King’s Way were beside him, followed shortly thereafter by Ellaria and Joravyn. The moment Ulthan saw their faces, he could tell what they’d lost. What all of them had lost.
He ran faster. The soldiers all kept pace. Their boots stamped the song of their arrival out for all to hear. The Dark One rose from the ground ahead. Purple energy surged all around it, striking the ground intermittently. It wouldn’t last forever, but they had hundreds of swords to use to destroy its wings.
He lifted his shield. The orange glow of the sun caught the metal and brightened the inlaid symbol of Solustun. A fireball erupted from its surface at Ulthan’s call, flinging into the Dark One. It enraptured the beast in fire, but it seemed to have little effect, if any at all.
“For Souhal!” the defenders shouted as they ran into the beast with their swords high. Tyrdun ran with his mace straight to one of the beast’s large legs. He brought it down as hard as he could, no doubt trying to break bone. Ellaria and the other rangers shot arrows into the beast. Very few of them pierced its thick hide. Ulthan ran with the soldiers toward the dragon’s right wing.
The men and women drew daggers and stabbed them into the beast’s side, leaving them behind as they made their way up like a ladder. The dragon hissed, shaking to try and throw the climbing soldiers off. The spell kept the dragon subdued well enough for their work, and Ulthan noticed the beast seemed to be favoring his right hind leg over his left. Ten men and women made the climb before Ulthan did. The soldiers carefully balanced themselves on the dragon’s spine as they made their way to the wings. Once there, a few of them stabbed their swords in as far as they could reach, then held onto the handles and swung out from the beast’s back. Their weight pulled the swords down, ripping the leathery wing. Many of them wailed in pain as they collided roughly with the ground.
The paladin put his blade and shield away and drew the bastard sword from its sheath. He lined the blade up against where the wing met the Dark One’s massive body and swung. It cut deep, and the dragon lurched to one side.
“Clever,” the Dark One admitted. Ulthan gasped as it spoke.
It lurched backward as it rose to stand on its two hind legs. Ulthan reached out and held on to the bone he’d been trying to break. Some of the soldiers managed the same, but most fell to the ground.
Then, the spell arced against the dragon again. The Dark One’s left hind leg buckled under the sudden shock and slid out from under his bulk. It screeched in pain as it was brought to the ground. The paladin was stunned for a moment, before he rose and swung again. He could see the bone through the scales and meat now. He struck again. The bone cracked from the effort but did not break. Again. The bone remained.
Again. Nothing.
He roared as he swung. He put all the strength he could muster into the blow, flames engulfing the blade and—crack! The wing flattened against the beast’s side, limp. The Dark One’s admission of pain echoed throughout the treetops.
At first Ulthan was happy the necromancers would see that their dragon was falling. Then, the dead soldiers began to shamble upright.
The dragon head lifted from the ground, the eyes glaring at all the men in front of its maw. It inhaled deeply and loosed a torrent of unmitigated fury. The blast of un-light ripped through Ulthan’s soldiers, a void that swallowed them all. Nearly half of them perished.
The paladin began to move toward the beast’s head. The other soldiers found a way down and picked up fighting from the ground. As Ulthan reached to steady himself with the dragon’s horns, the Dark One shifted its weight from one leg to the other, shaking violently. His feet slipped out, his hands probing for purchase. He felt the wind rush around him, a streaming whistle the song of the paladin’s descent.
His arm was nearly wrenched from its socket as his descent came to a sudden end. His eyes shot open. Joravyn had used magic to stab his sword in, an ethereal hand holding the blade in place. The paladin drew his other blade and stabbed it in, climbing back onto the dragon’s spine.
The Dark One laughed at him. “Are you really still up there?” it asked, its baritone drowning out all other noise. “I guess agony is all you easterners understand.”
The shadows that exhumed around the Dark One’s scales began to cover Ulthan’s body. He was frozen in place. He tried to breathe but he wheezed in only darkness, like he was in a burning building and drawing in only smoke. The tendrils wrapped around him, tightening, restraining him. He struggled against them, but even for all his considerable strength, they didn’t budge.
Solustun, please, he prayed. Light burst from the paladin’s body. The shadow essence broke on him and he fell to his knees. He clutched the dragon’s sides with his hands, dropping his sword to the ground. It took him all of a minute to catch his breath. Knowing he could do no more from the beast’s back, he swung down onto his bastard sword’s handle, and his momentum dragged it down the dragon’s haunch. If it hurt the Dark One at all, he made no acknowledgment.
As the blade’s descent came to an end, he jumped. He picked up a random blade from the ground and ran to Joravyn.
“You have a plan?” he asked.
“Yes, but … I’m not so sure it’s a good one,” the mage said.
Ulthan didn’t need to hear anymore. “Tell me what you need.”
“Get Tyrdun and a few of the soldiers that aren’t preoccupied with the skeletons. Stab as many swords as you can find into the dragon.” With a nod, Ulthan was o
ff.
✽ ✽ ✽
Tyrdun wailed as he slammed his mace into the Dark One’s hide. The beast’s feet were bloody from his efforts; he struck every time he had an opening. But the dragon remained standing. He smashed his hammer down again and again, hoping each new strike would be the one to finally break bone. None did.
He lifted his hammer with both hands, when someone grabbed his wrists. He turned to see Ulthan standing behind him. “Tyrdun,” he said, “Joravyn has a plan.” The paladin was accompanied by ten other soldiers: two orcs, an elf, three dwarves, and four humans. “We need to get as many blades under his hide as we can.”
Tyrdun blinked, nodded slowly. The twelve of them picked swords off the ground where necessary and rammed them into the dragon’s leg. To ensure they were deep enough, Tyrdun hammered them each with his mace.
The Dark One did not enjoy the sensation. It turned to face him and inhaled deeply. “Everyone get down!” Tyrdun shouted.
The beast’s maw erupted as before, spreading a black nothingness over everything it hit. Two of the dwarves and a woman from Daralton fell to the assault. “Ulthan,” Tyrdun called. “Those daggers in his side—I’m gonna hammer ‘em in too!”
“Be careful,” Ulthan advised.
The dwarf nodded. “Third dragon this month,” he grumbled. Tyrdun rushed to the makeshift ladder and climbed it to the top. His vision caught the now distant ground, the sight causing an unwelcome queasiness. The last of the daggers above him, he readied his hammer and slammed it into the beast.
It screeched in response, shaking. Tyrdun held on and screamed. He descended another dagger and hammered again. The Dark One brought his maw around to face him. His eyes radiated contempt.
“Give me your name, dwarf. I would tell others of your foolishness,” the dragon commanded.
The dwarf scowled. “Tyrdun Rokvan of Aljorn. The Stonehammer and Defender of Daralton. Son of Pydan, captain of King Tyldor Thorstan’s crown wardens.”