The Darkness of Old; The Ancient Crown; The Winged One

by Hans Bezdek

  The open space between us and Ulrich seemed much further now that we were actually walking it. The area inside the moat was at least a hundred yards, if not a bit more. When things went south, we’d need to hope the dwarves in the wall could cover all of it quickly. We’d also need to book it as fast as we could. Maybe I should’ve stretched out a bit more before we came out...

  We passed by the dwarven guards by the bridge, each of them nodding at us like we were walking to our deaths. That wasn’t the most encouraging thing.

  What was encouraging was seeing the red dragon take to the sky, then head back to the Dar’Ka line. Killing Ulrich was going to be hard enough, but doing it with a red dragon right next to us was going to be a bit much. Two large orcs with the Dar’Ka tattoo on their foreheads moved up and took the dragon’s place.

  “Maybe we should’ve brought Fulco with us,” I whispered to Kiera.

  “I’m not sure if I’d trust him not to kill one of the orcs before we were ready for him to,” smirked the blue dragon.

  “Good call.”

  We stopped talking as we got within hearing range of Ulrich and the two orcs. The Dar’Ka line was moderately far behind them, but still closer than our’s was.

  “I must say, Reimar, I’m surprised to see you here,” smiled Ulrich, arms crossed behind his back as we approached him.

  “I can’t say the same,” I said, pulling up to a stop.

  “Oh?” said Ulrich, tensing up. “You knew I would be here? How?”

  “I did,” I nodded sadly. “I heard about it from the Great Oracle. He told us that we’d need to come out to Jiezvall in order to fight.”

  “I see. And he told you this recently?”

  “Before… before he died,” I said, feeling tears forming in my eyes. While I was playing it up some, it wasn’t that difficult. Replaying the Great Oracle’s death in my head was bound to make me sad for the foreseeable future. The hard part of all this was hiding my anger towards Ulrich.

  “The Great Oracle is... dead?” asked Ulrich, visibly relaxing while trying to sound surprised. He was probably worried that he hadn’t actually finished off the Great Oracle, but now he had his confirmation.

  I nodded, deciding to make him feel even more confident. “He had been helping us with so much concerning this war… It’s a huge loss.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” said Ulrich. “Any word on who killed him?”

  “I’m afraid not,” I sighed. “We figured someone on your side is the one that targeted him. Maybe a spy in Durnskeep.”

  “I’ll have you know that I never ordered anyone to do such a thing,” said Ulrich, not exactly lying but not telling the truth either. “Whoever did that did so on their own. If I find out who, I’ll be sure that they get what’s coming to them.”

  “I… I appreciate it,” I nodded.

  Ulrich shifted his attention to my companion. “I may be taking a wild guess here, but you wouldn’t happen to be the leader of the blue dragons? Kiera, isn’t it?”

  So much for him not knowing who she was.

  Kiera nodded but remained quiet.

  “I see you have a thing for beautiful women that know how to fight,” said Ulrich, shifting his attention back to me and chuckling. “I believe I saw the elven woman on the wall with you, as well. Why not bring her with you?”

  My mind raced to give him something, anything, that might make him think it’d be easier to sway me. I decided to play up to his racism.

  “I’m sure you’ve heard about our excursion down at the Palace?” I asked.

  “That I have,” said Ulrich, his smile faltered slightly but he made a quick recovery. “You and your friends have a way of being a constant thorn in my side, I must admit.”

  I took the compliment.

  “After our time there, it was clear that Cassandra cares more about the stupid Queen of Aelric more than she ever has about me,” I said, spitting when I mentioned the Queen for added effect. “I’ve been keeping some distance ever since.”

  Ulrich nodded as if he understood. “That’s the problem with the lower races, Reimar. You can never really trust them, can you?”

  I broke eye contact and tried to look upset. “I’ll never make that mistake again. Kiera has been there for me since it happened.”

  Kiera placed an arm around me, perfectly playing her role.

  “I’m happy to see you making a more reasonable choice for your future, Reimar,” smiled Ulrich. “This is the sort of thing I want to see more of in Yaerna. Dragons need to look out for one another, even if they are of different colors.”

  “I like the sound of that,” said Kiera.

  Ulrich’s eyes brightened and his smile spread. It looked like she had said exactly what he wanted to hear.

  “That would be nice,” I agreed. “But I can’t let you come and harm these innocent dwarves.”

  “What are these dwarves to you?” asked Ulrich. “Do you really think they’d come and defend your land from outside invaders? Hardly! But if their lives mean so much to you, I can arrange it so that nothing bad happens to them.”

  “I’d like that…” I said slowly, narrowing my eyes as I looked at him. “What’s the catch?”

  “There’s no catch, only an opportunity,” smiled Ulrich, using a line straight out of a used horse salesman’s playbook. “There’s no reason that we can’t be working together. Just like dragons should look out for one another, so should half dragons. I want us to be on the same side of this new Yaerna.”

  “I don’t know…” I said.

  “Wait,” said Kiera, placing her other hand on my chest. Even though I knew it was an act, my heart beat a bit faster. “Let’s at least hear out what he has to say.”

  I sighed and then nodded.

  “Beautiful and smart?” grinned Ulrich. “You can’t let this one go, Reimar. I know what I’ll do. Once we have taken over Yaerna, I’ll give the two of you land to rule as queen and king. Imagine it! You’ll have power over not just the blue dragons, but all the lesser races that would be paying their taxes to you two. Your little blue-green dragonlings flying around in safety and peace, all thanks to their mom and dad.”

  “That… that does sound nice,” said Kiera, looking up at me.

  “It does,” I conceded.

  “Why don’t we do this?” asked Ulrich, snapping his fingers. “How about I back my forces off of Jiezvall for the time being, and the three of us can work on a new plan together? We can try things your way for a while, and if they don’t work, we’ll figure something else out.”

  “That seems reasonable,” Kiera whispered to me, just loud enough for Ulrich to hear her.

  I played up thinking about it for a couple of minutes then nodded towards Ulrich. “Okay. I think we’re willing to give that a shot.”

  “Perfect!” beamed Ulrich. He turned his back and began speaking with the two orcs. “Go tell the others there’s been a change of plans…”

  Kiera took a step back and nodded at me to do it. I pulled out my dagger and ran forward, pulling my arm back as I did. Right as I got into range, I leapt forward and punched out, dagger in my goblin glove hand. The rockets went off, giving me an extra kick forward and driving my blade deep into Ulrich’s back.

  “Gah!” cried out Ulrich, lurching forward.

  “This is for killing the Great Oracle!” I hissed at him, twisting my dagger.

  The two orcs rushed me. The one on the left was met with Kiera and her curved blade, while the other tackled me. I managed to hold onto my dagger, but the blade came out of Ulrich and went with me as I was shoved to the ground.

  Ulrich stumbled forward a few paces, then began to change.

  “He’s transforming!” I shouted to Kiera. “We’ve got to stop him!”

  “Working on it!” she shouted back, unleashing a flurry of strikes on her orc. The creature was doing all it could to keep up, but the blade kept sneaking around his defenses and cutting him badly.

  I got to my feet and tried to get
past my orc, but he had pulled out two daggers of his own by the time I reached him. I took out the Time Shield and barreled forward, hoping to push the orc out of the way so I could focus on Ulrich. Unfortunately, the orc was much stronger than I was. He continued to beat against the Shield which, while it didn’t hurt me, wasted more of my time.

  He hit the Shield in a predictable pattern, so when we reached a point where he paused I pushed the Time Shield up to his face and stabbed at his midsection. The orc grunted as I landed a hit, then jumped forward and kneed me in the face. I rolled backwards, quickly getting back to my feet.

  The orc was now holding his stomach with one hand, keeping his dagger pointed at me with the other. Knowing we didn’t have much time left, I ran at the orc and pulled my fist back. When I jumped at him and punched out, the boost made me reach the orc fast than he expected, letting me stab into his throat before he was able to bring his weapon down. The two of us tumbled to the floor, and I landed a few quick hits to make sure he was finished.

  “Reimar!” called out Kiera.

  I pushed up to my feet and looked over at her. She had killed her orc, and was holding her sword up defensively in Ulrich’s direction. Where the man once stood was a black scaled half dragon, the hole I had made in his back completely sealed up.

  We were too late. He accomplished his transformation and had healed over my backstab.

  The black half dragon lifted into the air and out of reach.

  “You’ll pay for this!” hissed Ulrich. “You two could’ve had everything! Now you’ll only find death.”

  “Working with you would be a fate worse than death!” I shouted up at him.

  This infuriated the half dragon. He looked like he was going to respond, then turned and flew back towards the Dar’Ka.

  “Attack! Attack!” commanded Ulrich. “We won’t be finished until every single soul here is wiped out!”

  The green masses surged forward.

  “We were so close…” said Kiera, shaking her head.

  “This isn’t the part where we think about what could’ve been,” I said, grabbing Kiera’s hand and pulling her after me towards Jiezvall. “This is the part where we run!”

  Chapter 16

  “Open the walls!” I shouted, Kiera running beside me. “Open the walls!”

  Thankfully, the others on top of the wall must’ve seen what happened and told the dwarves to attack. All along the wall, small holes appeared and out came dwarven warriors, an occasional Durnskeep fighter mixed in with the rest. I pushed my way through them on my way towards the wall, looking around to see if I could find any of my friends.

  “Reimar!” I heard Cassandra shout off to my left. Turning, I found her and the others nearby among the mass of dwarves. “Are you hurt?”

  “Not yet!” I called back, heading towards them. Kiera pulled back on my arm, grabbing my attention. “What’s the matter?”

  “I’m going to join my people inside,” she said, suddenly bringing me close and hugging me. “Be safe out here. May we both see the other side of this fight.”

  I felt my ears burn and I hugged her back. “Er, uh, y-yeah. See you soon.”

  “We’ll have to play king and queen some other time,” she said, breaking off the hug and winking at me. She hurried off, saving me from embarrassing myself with a response.

  “Aw, that was cute,” taunted Braun, my friends joining me.

  “Shut it,” I said, spinning around and moving towards the front with the others.

  “Maha!”

  The Greeners weren’t far behind Kiera and me and soon crashed into dwarves that met them on the bridge. The dwarves of Jiezvall clearly knew what they were doing, forming a wedge in the middle of the bridge. The goblins that reached them first didn’t know how to fight on such a narrow platform, and began nudging one another off of the sides and into the moat. Unfortunately for them, the moat was incredibly deep. King Soeren had mentioned nothing that fell in ever came back out.

  “The Greeners are spreading out!” called out Cassandra, trying to get some of the dwarves and Durnskeep fighters to run to the closest bridges on either side.

  “Let’s help them,” I said to the others, running off to the bridge on our right.

  We watched the Greeners fan out as we ran. The bridges kept our forces from being overrun by their numbers, but I was worried that would quickly change once the black and reds came. A large chunk of Greeners arrived at the bridge before we got there, but with the help of some dwarves we were able to cut them off before they could cross.

  Cassandra, Braun, and I pushed forward. Using the Time Shield as a kind of battering ram, I kept my head down behind it and ran forward, careful to keep towards the middle of the bridge. As I pushed through goblins I saw a number of them go tumbling off the sides, just as I had hoped. Once I made a nice dent, I quit pushing and began working my way back to the Jiezvall side of the bridge.

  Goblins tried to cut in behind me, but that’s what Braun and Cassandra were for. The blue glow of the Shattered Sword could be easily seen over the green and red mass, carving a path to me out of any goblins foolish enough to have tried to be sneaky. Braun sent more goblins flying as he swung Grimkell’s Mace off to her side, kicking some of the dead goblins out of the way so he wouldn’t lose his footing.

  The path now clear, I ran back to join the others. We repeated this process three more times to the same amount of success, clearing out scores of goblins without taking too much effort. Once the orcs and trolls joined the fight, we knew it wouldn’t work anymore and needed to switch up our strategy.

  Dhot tossed dozens of small boxes at the creatures, covering nearly half of the bridge with them. When an orc got close to him, the goblin brought out a switch and held it up towards the creature.

  “Maha!”

  Click.

  Electricity shot through all of the boxes, shocking many of the Greeners on the bridge and the orc closest to him. The dwarves were merciless and cut into the stunned and paralyzed Dar’ka, Braun running up and ending the orc in front of Dhot with a few quick swings of his Mace.

  “Neat tricks, goblin,” came a voice behind us.

  We turned and saw Fulco approaching, his hands casually resting on his sai hilts.

  “T-Thanks…?” replied Dhot, unsure if the troll was being insulting or not.

  “I’ve got a few tricks, too,” said Fulco, a wicked smile returning to his face.

  We all took a few steps back as the troll pulled his weapons out, approaching the new round of Greeners on the bridge.

  “This is gonna be good!” cheered Braun.

  Fulco reached the middle of the bridge, nodding at the dwarves behind him to give him some space. Rumor of what happened to Eluf had spread like wildfire, so these dwarves were more than happy to not stand too close to the troll.

  A few goblins and an orc approached, stopping when Fulco shook his head.

  “No!” he roared at the Greeners. “I don’t want your scraps! Give me a challenge!”

  The goblins backpedaled quickly and even the orc yielded and took a few steps back. Taking their place, six orcs and three trolls stepped forward, all huge and with Ulrich’s tattoo in the middle of their heads.

  “Should we help him?” I asked the others.

  “I don’t think we should make him mad,” cautioned Dhot, shaking his head furiously.

  The nine Dar’Ka rushed at Fulco as one, each swinging their weapon down at him at the same time. Our ally sidestepped about half of the attacks, crossing his sai in front of him and catching the other half. The Dar’Ka fighters all pushed down, trying to overpower the agent of Xerath.

  He wasn’t budging.

  Pushing his weapons to his left, he caused the enemies that still had their weapons on him to step forward in surprise. In what seemed like just a blur to me, Fulco pulled back his sai, then sliced up and into three of their exposed necks. The four Dar’Ka that hadn’t had their weapons on the troll tried to close the distance before h
e could kill the other two, causing him to jump back and away from their blades.

  One of the orcs leapt towards him and brought his axe towards Fulco’s side. The troll effortlessly blocked it with one of the sai, throwing the other one right into the middle of the orc’s face. I couldn’t help but notice the sai pierced right through the middle of the orc’s tattoo… Was he actually just toying with them?

  With only one sai left, two of the Dar’Ka figured he’d be less dangerous now and rushed in to attack. Fulco blocked each strike in turn with his remaining sai, then reached his free hand out towards the Dar’Ka troll’s face. The enemy troll tilted his head in confusion at Fulco’s open hand, then got knocked out as the sai that was once in the dead orc’s forehead sailed back through the air and into Fulco’s hand.

  “H-He’s got magic weapons?!” shouted Dhot in surprise.

  “It’s almost not fair...” I said, shaking my head as my mouth hung open.

  Now with both sai in his possession, Fulco let loose a blur of jabs and strikes at the Dar’Ka still on him. One of the dozens of shots that landed did the trick, and the orc fell backward, dead. Fulco spun on his heel and drove both weapons into the downed Dar’Ka troll’s back, killing him before he got a chance to return to the fight.

  Everyone stared at the two remaining large Dar’Ka, a troll and an orc. The two looked at each other, turned around, and ran back for the safety of their line. Fulco chucked both sai at once, connecting point first with the back of both of their heads before they made it.

  The battlefield around us grew quiet for a beat as both sides stared at the unscathed Fulco in disbelief.

  Fulco held both hands out, and the sai returned to him.

  “Next up?” he asked, looking around for his next opponents.

  “He wasn’t bluffing when he said he was worth a hundred men,” I mumbled.

  “No,” said a stunned Cassandra. “No, he was not.”

  I snapped out of watching Fulco’s dance of death and noticed a lot of the Greeners running around further to our right. It looked like they were going to continue flanking.