by Marc Secchia
In her mind’s eye, the slim face of that Dragoness dipped to regard her beloved, even though her physical manifestation gave no sign of the terrible, attritional war raging within. Asturbar’s mien was that of serene ferocity. Pure. Potent. Intensely noble. Iridiana could not bear to gaze long upon such love, though Aranya sensed she wished to with all of her hearts. She warred against her greatest fears; against the terror she must have suppressed since the very first time these uncontrollable manifestations came upon her. Fragments of memory streaked past her awareness like stars plunging into a void. A man killed. A lurking Dragon-Shifter … a Chameleon? A dungeon cell. Exile and torture and isolation, and then the overwhelming blossoming of love for this man she called Boots. The monstrous chains that still bound her soul.
Aranya offered a key.
A symbol of freedom? Trembling of paw, Iridiana reached out to seize the gift, crooning, Thou, my Asturbar, the beloved face of mine strength. Thou, o Aranya.
Thou, the myriad facets of mine love, he returned. Arise in strength!
What a way to express his devotion to her multifaceted being! The Amethyst celebrated within. Now, Iridiana. Unleash the Chaos Beast.
With a cry that was a knell of despair laced with notes of jubilation, the Dragoness transformed.
* * * *
Ardan had just sneaked up behind Gangurtharr and sunk his fangs into the Gladiator’s tail when an eruption of wild, capricious magic arrested them both. Gang’s snarl stopped in his throat. Ardan could not even bring himself to chew.
Where Iridiana had been, resplendent white fires flared within Thoralian’s paw. He thought for a second that she and Aranya had switched places. Was this not the untrammelled brilliance of her signature Star Fire? But the light modulated from that aching purity of starlight to assume a distinctly metallic, mauve quality that he recognised from the Iridium Dragoness’ scales. Fused together? He had not even begun to shift to the Thoralian’s aid when an incredibly rapid transformation snapped into being, catching them all unawares. A misty, transparent beast coiled about the stalwart Yellow-White Shapeshifter, its prodigious iridium coils shimmering with an unknowable, infinitely changeable power, whilst dozens of draconic heads sprouted from its length, far faster than the eye could follow. Twisting, shimmering, seething with the force of her fury, every last one of the ethereal maws struck simultaneously, unleashing their unbearably dazzling flares across the Dragon’s scales and passing through his flesh to inflame the innermost parts of his being. The effect was instantaneous. Thoralian ignited as if he had, unheeding, plunged into the heart of a star.
Mercy!
One devastating attack wrought his ruin.
For a second, the Shadow saw Thoralian’s skeleton outlined in an incandescent conflagration; his injured shell brother stumbled backward with a choked, incredulous splutter of horror. Then all was grey dust, puffing away as the Shapeshifter’s remains collapsed into a pile of ash.
Cremated.
What power could immolate the bones of a creature of fire and magic?
Returned to her Dragoness form, Iridiana’s eye fires guttered. Her tongue fluttered as she struggled for air. Then, she slumped as though all volition had been snatched from her muscles.
The watching Dragons were trapped like flies in amber. Gaping at ashes. Disbelieving.
After an unendurable hiatus, the chamber erupted into chaos. Gang bellowed his fury at Ardan, the Marshal dashed toward the fallen Dragoness with his intestines spilling over his belt, and Aranya hunted the surviving Thoralian with a lethal glint in her eye Ardan recognised all too well.
That same glint had broken the back of the Sylakian Empire, and seen its favourite Shapeshifter son Garthion spitted upon a flagpole.
Brother, o my brother! roared Secondary, shivering with the psychic backlash of their shell brother’s expeditious death.
Tertiary warbled, Thou art fallen! O Prime, how thy glorious flame hath flown …
The sundering of a bond so aged and profound was no trivial injury. The surviving Thoralian stumbled away in full retreat now, and it was Ardan who had to steady his Masters. While Asturbar fussed over his fallen Iridium Dragoness – may she perish for her deeds – he lent a shoulder to the limp-pawed, trembling Dragon and feinted several times to keep Aranya at bay. How could he tear from himself the power to slip away now? That would mean abandoning –
Stay, Shadow, the Thoralians hissed. Help me!
Aye, Masters.
As his attention flickered to the fallen Iridiana, it seemed for a fraction of a second that he saw Aranya present in her place. They were both growing fledglings, and possessed a slender, balletic grace of form that delighted the draconic eye. The Iridium had metallic silvery scales to Aranya’s most prepossessing amethyst, but otherwise, the resemblance was striking. He must be more dazed than he had thought, but the impression refused to fade.
As the gigantic Marshal sobbed over the fallen Dragoness, imploring her to live, his instinctive jealousy triggered with a violent jolt – it should be him touching Aranya and comforting her, not that man! Fractional inattention. Clearly cognizant of his momentary weakness, Aranya slammed a great bolt of chain lightning into his left flank which sparked over to Thoralian, flipping him off his paws with a devastatingly precise combination of electric and kinetic powers. Separating the two male Dragons with a driving smash of her right shoulder into his lower flank, the Amethyst Dragoness rebounded to pursue her quarry. Meantime, Ardan found himself the unwelcome recipient of Gang and Huari’s attention to the tune of a monstrous buffet across the ear canals and a complimentary lightning strike that somehow paralysed his left hind leg and left it dragging behind him, as he retreated with an ignominious flap-flopping motion of his wings. He had to regroup. Gather his strength. Breathe!
Power! I need more power, shell brother, snarled Secondary.
Give it to me, Ardan demanded. I will spirit us away.
What … the monk! He could not tell which Thoralian had spoken, but he saw the monk summoning a cloud of seething, glittering onyx potentials to himself. The magic wreathed his limbs like coiling snakes, potent and mesmerising.
What now?
“In the name of Fra’anior the Onyx, I forbid you to leave for the eternal fires, Iridiana,” Ri’arion declared in his singsong accent. Golden blood seeped from the stricken Dragoness’ tongue. Ardan grimaced. The backlash had not only damaged the Thoralians. Such a surfeit of malign power imbued their flesh, an act of destruction must surely unleash some consequence. Hopefully, lethal consequence for that freak of a Chaos Beast!
The monk cried, “With me now, Asturbar. Your Dragoness needs you – good. You must bind her very soul. Iridiana, I bid you rouse all that is Dragon within you! Gird up your courage, mighty one, for I declare with the authority once given me as the Nameless Man that –” You are a daughter of Fra’anior! You shall stand against evil, and prevail, and no paw or power even unto death shalt overmaster thine purposes!
Ardan shuddered as if those words were spears cast into his third heart!
Viscous, bloody droplets of sweat splattered off the monk’s brow as he flung himself bodily upon the pair, howling, THOU WERT SHAPED FOR GREATER THINGS AS YET UNSEEN!
The thunder of Fra’anior’s promise!
This once-warrior of the Western Isles knew that voice, and knew too his own disobedience to one whose service he had accepted. The psychic shackles hissed and spat as his mind writhed, rebelling against the Thoralians’ demands, but the bonds were still imbedded far too strongly. He could not resist. Magic flooded his being as Tertiary prepared him for the act of Shadowing away another Dragon, singing strangely through his veins. What must a glut of such fey Egg magic do to a Dragon? Was the constant exposure not dangerous?
Aranya roared, “Give me the Egg, Thoralian!”
“No! You cannot have it!” shrieked the Yellow-White, launching himself awkwardly into the air. “I will destroy you all before I let you have it. Shadow! Take me hence –
what? What’s the matter …”
The Shadow Dragon writhed in shock. Those wretched white mosquitoes! Led by Aranya’s perennial favourite Sapphire, the septet of dragonets had sprung an unanticipated trap, surrounding him with a gleaming, pearlescent shield that appeared no more substantial than a bubble upon a lava lake, yet although he triggered his power multiple times until he flickered like a guttering candle, he could not pass into his Shadow space! They formed a neat three-dimensional heptagon about him, and he could not touch them, for their shield was some arcane transposition of the very power he enjoyed to travel through what the scientists presumed was a parallel plane of draconic existence.
Chrysolitic Dragons. The thought popped clearly into his mind. The Dragonfriend’s lore spoke of such, did it not, of Dragonkind of the farthest North that claimed a power akin to his?
GRRAAA-GNARRR!! he thundered, shaking only himself.
Always, Ardan had relied upon his unique capability as both the ultimate weapon and the ultimate last resort. Other Dragons could not touch him when he Shadowed. He could lurk, ambush and spin away untouched. But with the Thoralians’ unrelenting demands exerted upon his psyche, he had been unable to battle as he wished – also, he felt enfeebled by the events of the last weeks. This surge of power he now enjoyed was nonetheless like pouring water into a leaking vessel.
Gangurtharr rasped, “Having a spot of trouble there, Shadow?”
“Feral fools!” roared Secondary, finding his wingbeat at last. “Have the beast, then. I have absorbed all I needed of his knowledge into my mind anyway. I’ve no further use for filth like him, nor for your whimsical nonsense, o child of Chaos!”
He dismissed them with a derisive paw gesture. “Follow me to the Rift if you dare. I promise I shall wipe out your entire pathetic bloodline one creature at a time, if needs be. Our battle is far from done, Aranya – for I shall rise again, yea, upon my word as a Dragon! All that you have accomplished is to create space in my triplicate for the newest member of my clan, the Ancient Dragon who tarries inside the First Egg, awaiting that glorious day I shall absorb him into mental harmony with my souls! Fear that day, little Star Dragoness. Fear it, and tremble!”
Aye, such a day should mark the summit of his ambitions.
Lashing out with claw and fist, fire and fury, the Shadow Dragon staked his claim upon the last stand he wished to make. He would never lie down. Never say die! He was a warrior born, dishonoured but proud. Aranya would not see his muzzle dip, not to her nor to these Thoralians.
He was Dragonkind!
* * * *
Zip swatted her friend’s mind. Oi! Trouble-icious! Planning to just let Thoralian wing away?
Watch.
Uh, right. Are we a tired Dragoness-petal? She spoke fondly, but felt an all-too-fleeting spurt of annoyance briefly stoke Aranya’s fires. Aye, her friend was finished – finished for this day, anyways. Acid disappointment stuck in her craw. She should give her a –
Zip screeched an unintelligible note, recoiling as a thunderbolt whistled down from the gloomy clouds above, passed through the broad hole in the hall’s roof, and speared into the bent back of Azhukazi’s beast. GRAAABOOM! Grey flesh and bone erupted from a shocking wound, splattering about the chamber and decorating Gangurtharr’s nose with a gobbet of flesh that made him look comically surprised. Like the other Dragons, he stepped backward charily as the beast vented a great groan and paused its hammering. Gang’s retreat turned into a scramble as the creature began to swell like a Dragonship balloon inflating in seconds rather than long hours.
“Freaking feral windrocs!” howled her monk. Zip wished she could actually frown, or better still, sink her fingernails into those tasty biceps of his and shake some sense into the man. Since when did he become rattled during battle?
“Aranya, what shall we do?” roared Gang.
Huaricithe had the right idea. Clobbering Gangurtharr in the jowls with her tail as she darted past, she cried, “Run, you worthless lump of Dragonflesh! Run!”
Eyes not her own rapidly assessed the situation’s dangers. The swelling, splitting seams of Dragonhide were being renewed from beneath. Its shoulders already pressed up against the walls of the Marshal’s great hall. The hulking flesh pressed aside two remaining oil lamp fittings, pouring flaming oil down its body. The creature did not appear to notice. The fierce fires flaming in its eyes betrayed the fact that far too much of the Necromancer’s power raged in its flesh, joints and bones, forcing growth at a fantastic rate.
Her hostess’ head swung toward the trapped Shadow Dragon. Longing. Hoping. “Ardan!”
The Shadow Dragon glared at her with soul-stopping loathing. “Do your worst, o feckless minion of the Onyx.”
Mercy … Zip felt Aranya shove that pleading mental voice away, thinking, ‘Mercy? She would hold him to his oath, thrall of the Thoralians or none!’
Aranya snapped, Gang! Pick up the Iridium and be careful with her! Sapphire, bring the Shadow and whatever you do, don’t break your shield formation. “Marshal Asturbar, get on your feet! Now!” She had forgotten he spoke Dragonish; the giant warrior waved off a paw’s offer of aid. Leandrial, time of arrival? Any chance of attacking the Thoralians out there? “Marshal, what happens to these Islands if they split?”
“I … don’t know. Never seen one split.”
“What happens?” she snarled, making the seasoned soldier balk at her tone. Iridiana, stay with us. Zuziana, monitor her closely. Asturbar, snap to it!
The Marshal looked as if he expected the Amethyst to explode into some Chaotic manifestation any second.
Poor man. He was just not used to Aranya’s ‘take charge of the Universe’ mode.
Chapter 13: Tipsy Unto Death
As they dashed further into the fortress, Aranya began to appreciate just how many people were hidden away down here. It was a mini-nation of thousands – support staff, warriors and refugees, she assumed, but they would take a dint of saving if the Thoralians even intended to grant them a sniff of a chance. She doubted that. His choice of style would involve total revenge; annihilation by Drake packs was the obvious assumption.
LEANDRIAL!
Sheesh, deafen a girl, Zip complained. Let me talk to her. You focus on Mister Big Boots over there, keep his guts inside his body, and try to get him to believe I’m actually a real person, alright?
Right, Zip. He’ll learn.
Aranya was certain her friend did not enjoy the ramifications of that statement.
Asturbar panted, “Enough damage, they’ll flip. Maybe stabilise. Maybe, if we’re lucky. More likely the momentum will start the pieces rolling slowly end-over-end. Dump us in the Cloudlands. Get Yuaki –”
“On it.” Yuaki. Evacuation report.
Four hundred fifty two away, seventy-one in transit.
When she repeated the information for Asturbar, he swore unhappily. Still, he was on his feet after incomplete surgery. The man had to have the constitution of a Dragon. She explained rapidly that they had allies incoming. She simply did not know how close they might be as yet.
“With us!” he summoned his men. “Evacuate!”
The fortress was neatly designed within, many different levels of solid stonework forming warm habitable spaces joined by well thought-out stairways and broad corridors. It had the ambiance and odours of very long occupation, and was lit by near-smokeless oil lamps set in sconces or depending from brass lavers hung on chains from the ceiling. No foetid warren, this. Compared to Sylakia’s infamous Tower, it felt positively homely. Still, to move thousands was no trivial task. They quickly ran into knots of people straggling on the stairways; Gang took to bellowing behind them, which did rather hurry up the process but threatened to trigger panic, too.
Aranya thought the Marshal must be worrying about Iridiana, but he abruptly blurted out in stress-broken Dragonish, Incoming Dragons can play catch? When – timing? People need to brace against the rolling, or walk the walls in chambers that don’t have large furniture. Can you a
lert everyone?
You’d have people jump?
Those who can.
Checking. Aye, time of arrival … seven minutes. How long does it take to fall – she ran the physics through her head with the familiarity of one who had once been strapped to a boulder by her boyfriend and forced to learn about terminal velocity the hard way – well under thirty seconds per mile, I make it, after they reach maximal velocity –
They’re dead.
No, said the Star Dragoness. We’ll turn every one of our Dragons into gliding freight vessels. This time, she had Asturbar gaping properly. Heavens, he had a huge mouth. Swallowing dragonet eggs was clearly not a feat beyond this man. Buy enough seconds, we save these people. Every life counts!
The Marshal’s oversized boots pounded along. He glanced at her body as if deeply puzzled by something. Not her scars. What …
With a firm headshake, he said, Issue the orders, Dragoness!
She did. As they clattered down through the fortress, Aranya applied herself to what – with all due modesty, Zip snickered inside – she was best at. Multitasking. Prioritising. Sifting through and evaluating strategies whilst coordinating the actions of their allies at a brain-rattling velocity.
Good thing I have four brains inside of me, isn’t it, Zipster? she snorted after a moment. Get to work, you lousy no-good Princess of Waywardness!
Ooh, a new title? I like it, Zip laughed. Hit me with your best, o Spangled Potentate most Plenipotentiary.
Princess jokes? Sanity preservation – that was Zip’s talent. Drawing a bated yet grateful breath, Aranya plunged back into her work. Rapid checks by Yuaki the Brown Shapeshifter on the Island’s structure revealed fault lines developing as the growing beast crushed cavern walls and levels, expanding like a wedge inserted into the floating Island’s heart. The route ahead was now heavily crowded, but the agitated people pressed aside for the fast-moving, grimly purposeful Dragons. Where they could, they glided off staircases that entered junction caverns, which were built for defensive purposes, making easy pinch points possible for a defending Commander to blockade with troops or Dragons.