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

by Hans Bezdek

  “W-What the…?!” exclaimed the red dragon, looking down at his exposed chest when he felt the weight slip off of him.

  The hesitation was a mistake. The two blue dragons wasted no time now that the red dragon’s armor was off, both of them charging his chest and ripping into it. The red dragon let loose a roar of pain, struggling to get the two smaller blue dragons off of him.

  My plan had worked!

  I flew up to the next closest Dar’Ka, this one a black dragon, and repeated the process. The straps and armor blended in a bit more on the black dragons, but I was still able to spot the straps without wasting too much time. Over and over again, I flew from Dar’Ka dragon to Dar’Ka dragon, coming up from behind or beneath them, tearing off their armor, and hurrying off to the next one.

  Instead of hearing only the frustrated cries of the blues, I started to hear a mix of the black and reds. The tide was changing. The battle was no longer so one sided.

  After cutting through the last Dar’Ka’s armor, I looked around to see which fight I should join first. While I had removed the main thing giving the black and reds a leg up, the fight was far from over. The blues had taken a lot of hits, and the Dar’Ka were still mostly fresh.

  “Kiera!” roared Darius’ dragon voice.

  I glanced over to the far side of the battle and saw a blue dragon dive in front of another. The black half dragon form of Ulrich collided into the blue dragon, digging his claws deep into the creature’s chest. It took me a second, but I realized Darius had run in front of Kiera to keep Ulrich from killing her.

  I beat my wings as hard as I could to reach the three, but the damage had already been done. Ulrich laughed and chucked Darius away, the blue dragon’s limp body free falling back down to Jiezvall.

  “Darius!” cried the dragon form of Kiera, tears welling up in her blue eyes. She was holding back her bloodied left arm, her wings looking tattered. It seemed that she was no match for Ulrich.

  “That poor fool,” taunted Ulrich. “I told you that you and that treacherous green dragon that you both were dead! That blue shouldn’t have stood in my way.”

  “You’ll never win!” hissed Kiera. “All of Yaerna is against you!”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” smirked Ulrich. “Not that you’ll get a chance to see-”

  I collided into Ulrich’s side, digging my claws into his chest as the two of us plummeted. The black half dragon let out a roar of pain, then headbutted me. Slightly stunned, I loosened my grip and Ulrich was able to push me off. Ulrich spun in the air, punching down at me and sending me closer to the ground. A dozen feet before I crashed, I pulled up and hovered where I was at.

  I glanced around, trying to figure out where we were. It looked like we were on the south side of Jiezvall, the stronghold a couple hundred yards away. I could see the thousands of Greeners continuing to push towards Jiezvall, the defenders line managing to hold them back for the time being.

  “I was wondering when you’d show up,” sneered Ulrich, grabbing my attention as he glided down towards me. He stopped fifteen feet away from me.

  “No armor for you?” I asked, looking him over. “I figured you’d want to wear the same outfit as the rest of your team. Not great for group morale.”

  “Glad you liked that little touch,” smiled Ulrich. “We have a spy within Jiezvall’s walls that was able to give us some much desired intelligence.”

  “Yeah, his name is Eluf,” I nodded, then hesitated and itched the side of my head. “Well… his name was Eluf.”

  The half dragon shrugged. “He accomplished what I needed him to. He was of no more use to me anyway, now that we’re taking the town.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” I said, partially bluffing.

  “Are you sure about that?” smiled Ulrich.

  “Pretty.”

  “Not only do our ground forces severely outnumber you, but there’s nothing the blues can do against my dragons.”

  “Are you sure about that?” I smiled.

  Ulrich looked annoyed for a moment, then put his smile back on. “Quite. The armor I’ve equipped them with not only blocks any damage they’ll take from the Zorikium arrows, but it also protects against a dragon’s claw.”

  “You’re right,” I nodded. “Too bad a good looking green half dragon went through and cut off all the armor covering their organs.”

  Ulrich’s smile fell away and he looked up at the other dragons. His eyes widened briefly when he saw I was telling the truth.

  Then he laughed.

  “Very good,” he chuckled, shaking his head. “You continue to impress me, even after disappointing me so deeply.”

  “Wish I could say the same,” I shrugged, getting tired of speaking to the person responsible for the Great Oracle’s death. I crouched down and extended my claws. “Shall we?”

  “You honestly think you can take me in a fight by yourself?” asked Ulrich, amused.

  “Guess we’re about to find out!” I said, diving towards the half dragon.

  Ulrich brought his claws up as mine came in at him, blocking my strike and throwing me off to his side. I spun back around and threw my tail at his head. The black half dragon ducked, beat his wings, and tackled into me.

  He dug his claws into my back and side as he flew us back. I tried kicking him off, but wasn’t having the most success. Right as I got a foot close to his face, Ulrich gave a final push and let go. I crashed into a rocky slope, cutting up a bit of my back. Before I could push off, Ulrich dove into my chest feet first, driving me deeper into the slope and knocking the wind out of me.

  Ulrich grabbed me by my neck and lifted me up, choking me.

  “Still think this wasn’t a mistake?” he taunted, bringing me slightly closer to him.

  I kicked as hard as I could between his legs.

  Ulrich’s eyes went wide as he doubled over, letting me slip out of his hand. I swiped at his head, cutting deeply into his face with my claws, and followed it up with a left hook that sent him stumbling back. I stalked towards the black half dragon, bringing my claws back and trying to find an angle to go for his throat or chest. As I looked for it, I noticed Ulrich’s mouth open, and a spark of orange forming in it.

  “Uh oh,” I said, flapping my wings as hard as I could to get back.

  Ulrich looked up at me and let loose his flame breath. I managed to get out of the way in time, then circled back around to try and get an open shot on him. The black half dragon appeared to have recovered from my low blow and flew at me with extreme speed. I brought my arms up to block his hit, which sent me flying further back.

  I pulled my arms back to get a better look at the black half dragon, but he had already closed the distance on me. He grabbed my left arm, using it to pull me closer as he punched out with his right fist three times. Each swing hit me square in the face, knocking me woozier and woozier. He clasped his hands together over his head then brought them down on mine, sending me crashing down.

  I landed on another uncomfortable pile of rocks. I tried to sit up, but it felt like all the energy I had was gone. Ulrich landed next to me, blood dripping from the cuts I made on his face.

  “You’ve done nothing but make a string of mistakes ever since I’ve known you,” gloated Ulrich, putting a foot on my chest and pressing down, making it hard for me to breathe. “You and that elf let me get Ludek’s crown. You bought into the Great Oracle’s silly prophecy about the Winged One. You’ve turned down my invitation to join me over and over. To cap it all off, you decided to try and kill me by, quite literally, stabbing me in the back.”

  “Y-Yeah…” I wheezed. “I… I thought that was pretty clever.”

  Ulrich shook his head. “You could’ve had everything. Now… now you’ll have nothing. Not even your life.”

  I tensed up as Ulrich brought his clawed hand back, aiming for my throat.

  Then an object spun over me, connected with the half dragon’s face, and sent Ulrich flying off of me.

&n
bsp; Chapter 19

  “W-What was that?!” I heard Ulrich hiss.

  I leaned my head up, using whatever strength I had left to try and see what was happening. Ulrich was holding his face and struggling to get back to his feet. I glanced to my left to see what the object was that had hit him.

  “Me Mace,” said a dwarf bending down and picking up Grimkell’s Mace. “Pretty good toss if I say so meself.”

  “B-Braun…?” I asked, realizing that it was somehow the dwarf.

  “You’ll pay for that!” hissed Ulrich, beating his wings and rushing at Braun.

  Before the half dragon could reach us, dozens of tiny boxes fell down on Ulrich from the sky. The half dragon looked around at them, confused.

  “Maha!”

  Electricity shot out of all of them, shocking Ulrich and keeping him in place. I looked up and saw Dhot riding on the back of a blue dragon with an injured arm, circling above us. Kiera let loose a roar of approval.

  “Y-You i-idiots!” growled Ulrich, powering through the electric shocks and flicking the tiny boxes away. “I-I’ll k-kill e-every l-last o-one o-of y-you!”

  A figure jumped off of Kiera’s back and landed in front of Braun and me. Cassandra took out the Shattered Sword, the blue light flickering to life as she held it up defensively.

  “Good luck fighting all of us by yourself,” warned Cassandra.

  Ulrich looked a mixture of furious and conflicted. I could tell he was trying to decide if it was worth it right now or not.

  A new set of roars came from the west. All of us shifted out attention, worried at what that could be. Thankfully, Ulrich was the only one who had to be concerned.

  Dozens of blue dragons carrying leather straps came towards Jiezvall. The dragons carried the leather straps towards the middle of the Greeners, letting loose sprays of fire as they went. When they had cleared enough of a path, they set the straps down. Hundreds of fresh dwarven fighters from Feldarkr pour out, immediately jumping into the battle. The blues then set their sights up above and went to join the fight between their blue friends and the Dar’Ka dragons.

  “Looks like me people came just in time to join the fun!” laughed Braun. “They love killin Greeners, ya can trust me on that.”

  Ulrich’s clawed hands were balled up into fists, shaking from a mixture of anger and the shock boxes still hidden on him.

  “You’ve lucked out today, Reimar!” he spat, beating his wings and taking to the sky. “Your friends won’t always be there to save you!”

  “Maha!” laughed Dhot. “Actually, we will!”

  Ulrich glared at the goblin, then flew up between the Greeners and the Dar’Ka dragons. “Retreat! We’ll fight this battle another day!”

  Kiera landed next to me as we watched what remained of the black and reds fall back, dipping and diving in attempts to avoid the blues chasing after them. Off to the side we could see the mass of Greeners abandon their siege machines as they all scattered and spread out. Those that were caught between Jiezvall and the Feldarkr dwarves cried out as they tried to escape, but they had no chance of survival.

  “Can you change back to your human form?” Cassandra asked me as she put away the Shattered Sword. “It’ll be easier for us to put you on Kiera.”

  “It’s a dream come true for you, Reimar! Maha!”

  “H-How did you guys find me?” I asked, ignoring the goblin and reversing my transformation.

  “After you saved me, I watched where you and Ulrich landed,” explained Kiera as I reverted back to a human. “I broke my arm and knew I couldn’t be of much help, so I went to find your friends. I explained you might need their help and they hopped on.”

  “Fulco decided to stay back,” said Braun. “I think he was havin too much fun tearin through the Greeners. Can’t really blame him.”

  “I don’t,” I said, being helped up by Cassandra and Braun.

  They laid me on Kiera’s back near the base of her neck, while Dhot held on to me. The two climbed on and Kiera lifted into the air.

  “I’ll keep as low as is safe,” promised the blue dragon, keeping about as high as Jiezvall’s walls were.

  “Kiera,” I said quietly, but loud enough for her to hear me. “I’m sorry to ask, but do we know for sure if Darius made it or not?”

  The blue dragon shook her head, tears forming in her eyes but her voice stayed steady. “He didn’t survive.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, patting her. “I know he was one of your closer guards.”

  “I know he’s happy he died in combat and while protecting me,” she said, a tear rolling down her face. “He will not be forgotten by our people, nor will the others that lost their lives today.”

  By the time we soared over the battlefield, all the Greeners except for a few stragglers were dead or had run away. The Feldarkr dwarves were helping everyone move the dead, tossing the Greener corpses into the moat. Kiera took us to the top of walls, where Cassandra and Braun helped me off.

  “Well I’ll be!” laughed King Soeren, approaching us along with King Julfr and a few guards each. “Ye all made it out of the fight in one piece!”

  “It sure doesn’t feel like it,” I mumbled, leaning against Cassandra for support.

  “Braun!” cheered King Julfr. “Good to see ya, lad!”

  “Me King,” bowed Braun. “Ye showed up right when we needed ya most.”

  “Bah,” said King Julfr, waving the dwarf off. “More like bad timing. We showed up when the fight was practically already won! I only got to kill four or five of them Greeners before they started runnin away!

  “The fight would’ve gone on much longer if you hadn’t shown up,” said Kiera, now transformed back into her human form. “The reinforcements were much appreciated.”

  “We promised to help Yaerna, didn’t we?” chuckled King Julfr.

  “Speaking of which,” said King Soeren, smiling at our group. “Now that ye helped us survive, I suppose me people should be offerin their services to ya as well! What do ya call yerselves?”

  We all blinked at him.

  “Uh, excuse me?” I asked.

  “Ya know,” shrugged King Soeren. “What do ya refer to yerselves as? Yaerna’s Resistance? The Five Territories? Reimar’s Crew?”

  “Oh, I like the sound of that last one!” I said, getting a little too excited and almost pulling Cassandra down with me.

  “We aren’t going to be named after you!” scolded Cassandra.

  “Aw…”

  “I’d have been fine with it,” shrugged Dhot. I nodded my thanks for getting my back.

  “What about the Collective?” offered Cassandra.

  We all shared neutral looks.

  “I mean… I don’t love it, but it’s okay,” I said.

  “I like it,” said Kiera, still nursing her arm. “I also think you’ll have more luck convincing others to join something called the Collective over Reimar’s Crew.”

  “There we have it, then,” nodded King Soeren. “It looks like the Collective has won the first battle of the Second Dragon War.”

  “I guess we did, didn’t we?” I smiled.

  “By the way,” said King Soeren, looking me over curiously. “What in the world happened to ya when ya came up the stairs lookin like a monster? Was it some sorta spell?”

  I took a deep breath. He had seen me, so there was no point in hiding it any longer. It was time to share my secret.

  “I’m a green half dragon,” I explained. “I can turn into that form, as well as a full green dragon. I fight best in my half form, so stuck with that when I went to help the blues.”

  King Soeren laughed and shook his head. “What a strange day it’s been. Well, whatever ya are, I’m glad to have ya on me side.”

  I smiled at the dwarf.

  “Wait a minute!” said King Julfr. “So that green dragon that save ya all in Feldarkr was actually you the whole time?”

  “Good memory,” nodded Braun. “Sorry we didn’t tell ya earlier. Reimar’s been tryi
n to keep it a secret. Don’t want any poachers comin after him.”

  “Nay, I completely understand!” said King Julfr, shaking his head. “I ain’t mad, just surprised. Never thought ye things existed, no offense.”

  “None taken,” I said at the same time as Dhot.

  “Maha! Sorry,” laughed the goblin. “I’m so used to being the one saying it.”

  Our group looked around at all the damage that the war had brought. The bridges would take some time to fix, the corners of the stronghold even longer. The outside of the walls had chips in it all over, and some of the dead red and black dragons had crashed into the courtyard, destroying some buildings.

  “Nothin we can’t fix in a week or two,” said King Soeren after looking over it all. “We’ll be ready if the Dar’Ka return.”

  “You shouldn’t have to worry about them for a while,” I said. “Now that they don’t have their armor to protect against your arrows, I have a suspicion they’re going to move on to another part of Yaerna.”

  “That’d be nice,” he nodded.

  “We’ll get out of your hair soon, but would it be okay for us to stay in Jiezvall for another day?” I asked. “I think it’s going to take some time for me to feel up for traveling again.”

  “Ye can stay here as long as ye would like,” said King Soeren. “That goes fer ye and yer dwarves, too, Julfr.”

  “Yer too kind,” bowed King Julfr.

  “Let’s tell everyone to just sleep in the same rooms tonight as they did last night,” I said to Cassandra. “Assigning rooms was infinitely more worse than getting my butt kicked by Ulrich. I can’t go through it again.”

  The elf laughed. “Works for me.”

  Chapter 20

  After quite a bit of struggling, Cassandra and the others led me back down to our room. We ran into Gerard along the way, who explained that the Shadows and Tumblers lost a total of twenty fighters. I apologized for the losses, but he told me there was no need to. Everyone was happy that the battle had been one, including the rest of the Durnskeep forces.

  Kiera had gone off to confer with the other blue dragons, as well as prepare burials for the dragons they lost in battle. She promised she’d come see me later, and that we’d need to figure out our next moves soon. Cassandra agreed that we shouldn’t rest for too long, since we could be sure Ulrich wouldn’t.