The Assassin and the Knight

by Rick Bonogofsky

  “Plus, it’s the one place you know could help that you also don’t mind risking the safety of,” she quipped.

  “There is that,” Adrian admitted. “With any luck, there won’t be any problems.”

  The student rolled her eyes and shook her head. She marked her place in her book and set it aside. Adrian saw this and sighed again, knowing that she was preparing for a much longer conversation.

  “Are you sure it’s going to work?” she asked.

  “If it doesn’t, I’ll figure out what to do then,” Adrian responded. “Otherwise, I’m just going to do whatever I have to make sure my brother is alright, even if I have to murder a bunch of people.”

  “I’m sure you mean well enough, but do you really want to start yet another war on Earth? I mean, the top rulers of this little blue planet are all itching to kill your kind on sight, so they won’t be caught unawares again. The general public may have forgotten about you all, but those who hold real power haven’t.”

  “What’s your point?” Adrian asked.

  “My point is, if the vampires brainwashed your brother, there may be a larger threat in place. Maybe their plan was grander than you think. Vampires rarely plan for the short term. Did you burn the labs when you left wherever they were holding your brother?”

  Adrian started to answer, but he realized he had never said anything to her about the labs. It was possible she had spied on him and the old man. Deciding against using the woman’s slip against her, he played along. “I did not…” He kept his voice even despite his obvious chagrin.

  “Then, you may have made your problems even worse for your people.”

  Adrian stared into her eyes, searching for a sign of anything amiss. He saw only confidence and a hint of cunning. She was either unaware that she had given herself away, or she had done it on purpose to see how the assassin would react. At this point, it was a game of chess. “You’re right. Then again, I wasn’t part of the initial attack. That was a separate group.”

  “Either way, your people made a huge mess. It’s all over the news. On the human-controlled channels, they’re calling it a hoax, or filing it under unexplained phenomena. Everyone else is reporting the truth. Even dragons got involved! Do you even comprehend how deep this goes?”

  That cemented it in Adrian’s mind; she was definitely not a simple student of Scholomance. She was obviously far too well informed. “I don’t really care as long as my brother is safe,” he said. It was not entirely untruthful, but it was a lie nonetheless. He felt a tingling in his mind that he quickly realized was the truth field trying to keep him honest, but it was failing.

  “You should care,” she said haughtily. “If this turns into another war, your people will suffer the most, and your brother may be the one who brings it all about.”

  “And how would he do that?” Adrian asked. “If he shows his face in Hell, he’s dead. If he acts out in Heaven, he’s dead or banished. If he’s left on Earth, he lives a longer life without the interference of either side. Unless you think there’s a reason to believe otherwise. We’ve been going in circles here, so if you know more than you’re letting on, just spit it out or leave me alone. I’ve been through way too much recently to want to waste my time with some pretentious little girl.”

  Stung, the woman sat back in her chair and glared at Adrian. She opened her mouth to speak, but quickly changed her mind.

  “That’s what I thought,” Adrian huffed. He sat in merciful silence for a few more minutes before a gnawing thought nagged at him until he could no longer contain it. “Alright, how did you know about the labs under Globe Tech?”

  “They held me prisoner there while they experimented on me,” she pouted.

  Adrian felt like he had made a terrible mistake. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I thought you were a spy or something. I was considering how best to kill you.”

  “You didn’t know,” she sighed. “But I feel like you should have. You don’t recognize me, do you?”

  Adrian took a closer look and found that he did, in fact, recognize her, although he could not think of how he knew her. “I’m sorry, you do look familiar, but I don’t seem to remember you.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I suppose the great hero of Hell, Prince Adrian wouldn’t remember some poor peasant girl who came to the academy to learn how to fight. You trained me and a bunch of others how to be assassins. I wasn’t in the academy for very long, but I managed to get onto guard detail at the weapon caches here on Earth. I was a loyal assassin for years, until the vampires showed up and took me prisoner.”

  Adrian listened to her and felt his pulse quicken. He had completely forgotten to continue his search for the other person who was at the cache that had been robbed. “Your name is… Rose, isn’t it?”

  The woman nodded and she gave a faint smile. “So you do remember me…”

  “Not a lot,” Adrian admitted. “Then again, if my brother hadn’t killed me, I may have killed you by mistake.”

  Rose’s face screwed up into a horrified scowl. “What? Why would you kill me?”

  “I would have thought you were a traitor to the kingdom, and… Wait, why did you pretend to not know me?”

  “What?” came the innocent reply.

  “Don’t play dumb. You acted like you didn’t know me. And since you’re one of my assassins, why the hell are you here instead of back at your post?”

  Rose sighed and shook her head. “I’m afraid that if I go back, I’ll be labeled a deserter and banished. Even after I got away from the vampires, I knew I probably shouldn’t have gone back home, so I wandered Earth for a while. I bumped into a wizard in England and he brought me here. Alighier let me stay, and he let me join the classes here. It’s been very nice.”

  “Who’s Alighier?” Adrian asked.

  “The old man,” Rose said as if it should have been obvious. “The one who runs this place?”

  “Ah… I suppose I should have learned his name by now. So, you actually are a deserter, then.”

  Rose tensed up.

  “I’m not going to kill you,” Adrian stated flatly. “But, if you really are happier here, then I will banish you. If you come back to Hell, make sure no one recognizes you.”

  Rose considered the words of the assassin and nodded, offering him a smile for his generosity. “Thank you, my lord,” she whispered.

  Adrian shot her a baleful look. “I’m nobody’s lord, Rose. Remember that.”

  Rose nodded and remained silent. She briefly considered speaking up again, but decided against it, resuming her studies. Seeing her pick up the book again helped Adrian relax. It was turning into a strange day. He never would have guessed that he would run into Rose here, of all places. He had forgotten that there were two demons who were framed for the break in of the cache of angel weapons. With everything that was going on, it hardly seemed to matter anymore. After he had killed Anna - and was summarily killed by Vincent - Adrian felt that the matter was resolved, especially after learning that the entire ordeal was orchestrated by the vampires. But if Rose was right, and the vampires only ever made grand, long term plans, then what were the implications of the vampires gaining those weapons if not simply to have the ability to kill demons? And what about the false advisor who had been signing off on the reports that led everyone astray? Adrian rubbed his eyes out of habit, rather than actually being tired, and realized he was far more mentally exhausted than he ever was physically. The thought occurred to him that the false advisor was quite possibly still in place and wreaking untold havoc. He swore quietly to himself and stood from his chair. Rose looked up at him in surprise but kept quiet. She recognized the look the master assassin had in his eyes, and she knew better than to try to stop him. He walked away, moving down the hall to the private quarters.

  “Alighier!” he shouted, banging his skeletal fist on each door he passed. Students came out into the hall as Adrian looked for the school’s headmaster. “Alighier, I need to talk to you, please.”

&
nbsp; Toward the end of the hall, the old man walked out of his room and addressed the assassin. “What is it?” he demanded, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

  Adrian walked up to him and made sure none of the students could hear him. “I need to leave right now. Please, and I cannot stress this enough, please make sure my brother is free of whatever the vampires have done to him. I just realized there is something incredibly important I have to see to at home. I’m trusting you to keep my brother safe.”

  Alighier nodded and patted Adrian on the shoulder. “I will do what I can, I promise.”

  Adrian nodded his thanks and ran back out of Scholomance. Once outside, he drew a teleportation circle and left Earth.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Jake and Sara walked down the stairs in the main house in the gardens and made their way to the gigantic cavern under Miami. Several dragons had shown up over the past few days and the last one finally flew in that morning. It was time for the meeting to start. Sara confided in Jake that she was nervous, and he assured her that things would be exactly as Montgomery had told her. He was only going off of what his mentor had said, but he felt it was accurate enough. There was no sense in making her feel worse about the whole thing, especially as they had grown closer to each other in the time that they were together. Jake was certain the budding romance was a lasting one, and the thought excited him. All his life he had hoped to find the woman he was destined to be with, and he felt as if Sara was that woman. She admitted several times to feeling strong feelings for him as well, making his excitement that much stronger. They were inseparable. She delighted in watching him transform into a dragon, and had even climbed onto his back to accompany him as he flew around the city. With most of the city’s residents dead and turned to ash, the need for secrecy was greatly lessened, allowing the dragons who lived there to more fully enjoy their freedom. Only a few vampires remained, and those were mostly paid servants of the dragon residents. With the city under water, and believed by the humans to have been destroyed, there was no need to keep their existence a secret.

  At the bottom of the stairs, the sounds of gargantuan beasts could be heard. Jake and Sara looked on in open amazement as they beheld the wondrous sight in front of them. Dragons of all shapes, sizes, and colors were gathered in the cavern. There were those types that were made famous by ancient European artwork, as well as those from Chinese and Japanese cultural art pieces. There was even one he recognized as the serpent from Norse mythology. In his youth, Jake had found an interest in studying the fanciful tales of dragons, but he was openly amazed by the sheer number of different types of dragons in the cavern. He was so amazed that it took him a moment to realize all of the gathered dragons had grown silent and were staring at him and Sara. The couple stood on the landing, petrified, until Montgomery strode forward. While he dwarfed Jake’s own draconic form, he was far from the largest of the dragons present, but it was clear he had the respect of all of the others.

  “Come forward,” he boomed. Jake and Sara tentatively stepped forward. “Jacob, assume your true from and join us. Sara, come to the middle of the gathering and we shall begin this meeting.”

  Sara nodded and squeezed Jake’s hand before letting go. She walked to the middle of the gathering and waited. She watched Jake transform into his emerald scaled body and smiled. Even being surrounded by so many majestic and terrifying creatures, she felt safe with the man she loved standing nearby.

  Once Jake had entered the circle of gathered dragons, taking a place between a large Lung dragon - a serpentine beast with four legs and large, elk-like antlers - and a group of diminutive dragons the size of cats, their butterfly-like wings glimmering in the soft light of the cavern, Montgomery called the meeting to order.

  “We of the Firstborn’s eldest members have come to this place to discuss matters of great importance. As this is the first meeting we have had since the end of the third World War, and seeing as we have two new faces, let us all introduce ourselves. Step forward and give your name. I will begin. I am Robert Montgomery to the humans, but my birth name is Nidhogg.” He stepped back and the dragon to his right came forward.

  This dragon, a large, blue and silver serpent with feathered wings slid toward the middle. His voice came out in a sharp hiss. “I am Quetzalcoatl, ancient ruler of the Aztec humans.” He went back to his place in the group.

  Another dragon stepped forward on slender, three-toed legs and his voice rolled like ocean waves from his maw. “I am Ryujin, from the ocean near Japan.”

  Next came a smaller, wingless dragon. “I am Fafnir, feared by the Norse.”

  “I am Typhos, hailed by the ancient Greeks as a god.”

  “My name is Zilant of Kazan.”

  “Jormungandr, known to the humans as the Midgard Serpent.”

  On and on the introductions went, with each dragon coming forward and stating his or her name. Jake noticed that there were four dragons in the back of the cavern that kept silent until the end. They were by far the largest of all the gathered dragons, with countless battle scars crisscrossing their bodies. They waited until Jake made his introduction before they stepped forward. The first was a gargantuan white and silver beast with wise old eyes and a booming, commanding voice that shook the very earth.

  “My name is Kur, the first of the Firstborn, and the lord of all dragons.”

  The next dragon, a serpentine form that slithered to rise next to Kur, easily matching his height with only a third of her great length, spoke next. “I am Tiamat, second of the Firstborn.

  After Tiamat came another large, winged dragon, nearly the size of Kur. He was covered in gleaming bronze scales and where age or battle left him without some scales, it was clear he had replaced the lost bits with small plates of metal. “I am Abzu, consort to Tiamat, and third of the Firstborn.”

  The fourth dragon, a great black behemoth, stepped forward, dwarfing the rest. His sheer size was difficult to measure, as he was forced to stoop to avoid raking the cavern ceiling with his thick horns. His thundering voice came out like a primordial rumbling that resonated throughout the cavern, seeming to shake the very foundations of the planet itself. “I am Enlil, the first dragon to ever awaken on this earth. We are the founders. We four are the only remnants of the original Firstborn, and the oldest beings on this planet. It was our hands that shaped this world into what it is, and our deeds that brought life to this world. Our children’s children were the dinosaurs, and we are the first gods the humans ever worshiped. We are older than Heaven or Hell, and will live on until the end of days.” Jake and Sara looked on in awe, not able to truly comprehend the immensity of Enlil’s words.

  With the introductions out of the way, the meeting was able to finally commence. Montgomery reported what had happened at the Globe Tech headquarters, and how the demons attacked, leading to the deaths of millions of vampires around the world.

  “Genocide!” Fafnir roared when Montgomery was finished with his report. There were some nods of agreement, but only one or two other dragons seemed to actually care. The majority of the dragons seemed angrier at the fact that demons had attacked again. More so than Jake, they remembered what the world was like before Hell’s minions came forth and the bombs fell.

  “We need to invade while they have no king,” Ryujin shouted. “The demons are weakened and in disarray.”

  “No,” Kur boomed. “We are not going to invade Hell.”

  “To do so at any time would be folly,” Jormungandr agreed.

  “There is no need,” Typhos added. “If Hell has truly broken any laws, the true gods would punish them.” At the mention of the true gods, many of the dragons gave derisive snorts and skeptical looks.

  “The gods fell over a century ago,” Quetzalcoatl hissed. “What power have they to strike anyone down anymore?”

  “Artemis has the power,” Tiamat stated.

  “But none have seen or heard from him since the end of the war!” Ryujin countered. “He does not care about what happens
to our world. We need to reclaim control over creation!”

  Enlil silenced Ryujin with a look. “We never lost our control. We simply allowed the humans to grow and evolve as they would, with us guiding their varied civilizations as we saw fit. Whatever choices they make are their own, even if we influence the outcome to favor our ends. As for Artemis, we should not worry about him. He is busy with matters beyond our capabilities.”

  The entire cave grew silent. None said a word against Enlil, no matter what disagreement they may have harbored. It was not until Montgomery spoke again that anything could be heard.

  “The question is not what to do about the demons, but what to do about the remaining vampires. With so few left, I fear they may begin to turn more humans. I do not need to tell the vast majority of us in this cavern what a vampiric outbreak could mean for humanity. We don’t want another ‘New England vampire panic’ on our hands.”

  “Don’t forget the witch trials two hundred years before that,” Quetzalcoatl muttered.

  “Right,” Montgomery agreed. “My point is, we need to focus more on what the vampires are about to do than what the demons might do. Of course, we will be keeping a keen eye on any demon activity that may occur on Earth, but the vampires are the more immediate problem. With only a few thousand left, they are in danger of extinction. If left alone I fear they may attempt to expand their numbers exponentially before proper leadership has a chance to be put into place. If that happens, the human population would take a severe hit and may also risk extinction. And, with the rise of vampirism in the world, I worry about the potential for werewolves to become agitated and launch a preemptive attack against the vampires. We may be worried about the demons starting another world war, but the possibility is all too realistic with our own world’s denizens.”

  His words were met with agreeing nods and a few grunts of approval. Many of the assembled dragons were beginning to see how the vampires posed a very real potential threat, much greater than that of the demons. More newborn vampires meant the possibility of feral vampires as well, which could easily spell the doom of humanity. While vampires were generally calm and composed, newborns could be vicious and arrogant, believing themselves to be immortal and attempting to overthrow governments. There had been several newborn vampires in the past who had made the attempt, only to be put down by either the Firstborn or groups of well-armed humans.