Firehurler (Twinborn Trilogy)

by J. S. Morin

Sir Kaelar had just spent half the morning delivering the claim of his lord’s cousin, sired by Emperor Dharus’s uncle Maolen. They had brought birth records, accounts of interviews with the lord’s staff, the travel itinerary of the emperor’s uncle on and around the time of the conception, and sketches drawn by some artist that Lord Avewind sponsored that purported to be both hauntingly lifelike and clearly show the resemblance to the boy’s supposed sire.

  Rashan had stood next to the emperor’s throne, a position he had attended on more court audiences than he cared to count. As regent, he felt it unseemly to take his seat upon the vacant throne, particularly as he heard one among the dozens of claims that were beginning to flow in from across the Empire. He was frankly astonished at the lengths the nobles went to document and verify their ruttings, both legitimate and otherwise. Astonished and sickened. They took no pride in their breeding, leaving to chance what sorts of nobles they ended up with as the generations passed, to say nothing of the emperors it engendered, when tragedies such as this occurred.

  The knight’s claim on his master’s behalf was at least well presented, if not wholesome and reassuring. Rashan suspected that there may have been dark dealings in the deaths of those who may have been able to present more legitimate claims. The Inner Circle had likely been taking its time and slowly culling the royal line out of the nobility, but he could prove nothing. His general calling for all claims on the throne was trouble from the start, as he knew it would be. He promised that no claimant should face retribution for bringing their case, however tangential, so long as they made no false representations to him. He also promised protection of all claimants, in the form of a personal investigation of any strange deaths.

  An army arriving at one’s castle gate and demanding to conduct an investigation was wholly anathema to a noble house. It affronted their dignity and took the shine from their reputation, guilty or not, and there was nothing to be done about it save meeting the army in the field. A warlock arriving at one’s castle gate and demanding to conduct an investigation was, if possible, less welcome. Whereas armies tended to be subject to misdirection, bribery and a rather unfortunate reputation for rigid thinking, warlocks were notoriously difficult to persuade to any path but the one they had chosen, and saw through ruses too often and too easily.

  “Very well, Sir Kaelar, I accept your claim as truth until such time—”

  “DRAGO—” a voice in Rashan’s head screamed, interrupting his thoughts, before being abruptly cut off.

  Curse that shoddy stone. I ought to have put more time into its crafting.

  “—as I have reason to believe otherwise,” Rashan finished his previous sentence after a brief hesitation. “I am afraid I must attend to an urgent military matter. I will hold audience in three days’ time.” Rashan figured that would be enough time to deal with whatever had befallen at Raynesdark.

  It seemed that the goblins had brought along one of their dragon-gods. It was an unusual addition to a goblin assault, and an unfortunate one. Dragons were lazy, indolent creatures, content to remain idle for scores of summers at a time while their minions amassed wealth to give to them in tribute. However, for all their sloth, dragons were the most ferocious creatures imaginable. The goblins would have been wiped from the lands entirely long ago had it not been for the pact they had formed with the dragons, elevating them as deities in exchange for protection. For a dragon to join in attacking Raynesdark, there must have been something that it wanted greatly.

  Despite his great age and vast experience, Rashan had never battled a dragon before, nor even strongly considered it. During his time as warlock—the first time, anyway—Kadrin was feared as a conquering, expansionist empire. None but Loramar had dared attack them, including the goblins. However, launching an attack on the goblin lands was nothing to be considered. While a single dragon taking initiative to attack a Kadrin city was troubling, invading them and having all the dragons of the pact allied against him was unquestionably stupid, unthinkable even.

  He knew he would need to gather aether before he left. The transference spell by itself required massive amounts of aether, and the area around the palace was always a bit dry of aether to begin with.

  Not to be helped, with so many sorcerers about.

  After that, he would need a reserve in case he ended up in the thick of battle immediately upon arrival. He had no misconceptions about sneaking up on a dragon—or even the goblins, quite frankly—when using a transference spell. They just caused too much disruption in the aether to pass unnoticed by anyone sensitive to it.

  It was sorely tempting to draw the aether right out of the Sources of the useless slackwits that had been inflicted upon him. Of all those at court, he could count a handful worth the space they took up: Lord Dergh was a shrewd and keen man, the Duchess Wensaka had sent a reliable knight to court in Sir Darwey, and there were a pair of house sorcerers he would have much liked to recruit back into the Imperial Circle … perhaps a few others but no more than that few.

  It was tempting to rid himself of them and use their aether to go into battle with, but no, he would not. Murder in the name of justice, and you might find yourself ruling a kingdom. Murder in the name of convenience, and you find yourself a pariah, no matter how powerful. He might hold the Empire together for a while through fear, but eventually alliances would form against him and he would not survive the aftermath.

  Instead Rashan dashed down the stairs of the dais and quickstepped across the large audience chamber, watching as a path presented itself in the direction he faced, courtiers elbowing and jostling each other to remove themselves from his way. A few tried to ask questions or favors of the regent as he passed, but he studiously ignored them.

  I am in charge, at least for now. When I say an audience is at an end, there are no further petitions.

  Once free of the press of bodies in the audience chamber and free of the rather ill-defined obligation to maintain decorum, he broke into a run. The dark jest he had played out in his head about the Sources of those courtiers had given him an idea.

  * * * * * * * *

  The lizard was an obstinate beast, unused to the weight of a human on its head. It bore Jinzan’s heft but disliked having to. The lizard and rider were both camouflaged with magic, appearing as little more than a distortion of the air to those at a distance, no more substantial than the wavy look the air gets above a fire. The complex system of bladders and tubes that wound around the lizard to keep warm was well-heated by Jinzan’s aether, and the creature carried him, but he had to take a harsh hold on its reins to keep its willfulness in check.

  He had taken it on a northerly vector, heading away from the main body of the goblin army. The walls were not so damaged to that side of the city, where worked stone met unworked. The cannoneers had wanted to breach the central area of the wall to best make use of the road for the approach, and the far northerly and southerly ends of the wall had taken fewer shots than had the rest. But it was to the north that his destination lay. Between the city wall and the castle, there was an entrance to the old upper mines. There was no map that showed the location of the Staff of Gehlen, but it was known to be in the upper mines.

  Chapter 33 - Dragon Goddess

  Down the corridors Rashan raced, as fast as his legs would carry him without expending magic to quicken his pace. Palace servants fled at his approach, and a few even threw themselves to the floor to escape his path. For all his lack of stature and smooth, youthful features, he was a terrifying sight when focused. White hair and black cape streamed out behind him, the latter billowing, and his vile sword bounced at his hip, occasionally tapping the floor with its scabbard. It was the eyes, though, that frightened. They were cold, unblinking, staring eyes that saw a destination and brooked nothing pass between him and it. None who saw that gaze wished to have their own visage reflected in it.

  He came to the flight of stairs he sought, heading down into the dungeons below the palace. Not slowing his pace, he hopped as he reache
d the corner and kicked against the wall to make his turn. He touched just one stair and leaped down the rest, then repeated the maneuver as he descended two more flights.

  The halls of the lower levels were much as he remembered them from a few days earlier, when he had darkened the mood with flickers reminiscent of torchlight. He turned not to the special wing of the dungeon reserved for sorcerous prisoners but rather toward the cells where plainer men were left to rot.

  He slowed his pace to a brisk walk as he entered the cell block. The jailor on duty he dismissed with a wave of his hand and a perfunctory “begone,” which was more than enough instruction to set the stout man to flight.

  The first door the warlock came to was of solid iron, with a small, barred window at an average man’s eye level. The window was too high for Rashan’s eyes by more than a head, but he could easily discern the Sources of the men locked up within. They were nothing special, these Sources, save one simple distinguishing fact: they were expendable.

  Reaching up, Rashan grabbed the door by the little window that was the only opening in the solid iron plate that constituted its bulk. With a quick tug, he ripped the door from the wall, tearing thick iron bolts from the stonework in the process. He tossed the heavy iron door down the corridor ahead of him, and it rang with a great clatter of iron on stone.

  The prisoners within mistook the violent opening of their cell for a jailbreak and clamored to reach the door. The first two to do so dropped dead at Rashan’s feet, as the warlock tore the vital aether completely from their Sources. Even down in the depths of the dungeons, men had heard of the warlock’s return, and seeing their fellows fall at his whim was enough to turn back the rest and set them begging mercy of the demon.

  There was none to be had.

  Rashan cleared that cell of living prisoners and two more after it. The screams had set the dungeons into a panicked frenzy. Violent, desperate men lashed out when the door to their cell were ripped open, but they were pathetic wretches—murderers, rapists, and thieves, not a warrior among them, not that it would have mattered. Rashan scythed their aether free of them and built up the power he felt the need to bring with him to the battlefield that Raynesdark had become.

  Not bothering even to levitate himself free of the ground, Rashan formed the sphere of aether around him that would swap places with an identically sized spot at his destination. Should the dungeons in the emperor’s palace sport a sod-filled hole a demon’s-height deep, so be it.

  The aether surged into Rashan as he drew in whatever remnants were left about after draining the prisoners, and then suddenly the sphere vanished.

  I come for you, dragon.

  * * * * * * * *

  The defenders scrambled to avoid the path of the dragon’s flight as she banked and turned toward the city to come at them from the northwest. The stone-built houses became their battlements in the new fight to hold off the dragon while the goblin infantry poured into the city. The cobblestones thumped beneath thousands of booted feet in what had turned into a large-scale version of the children’s game hide-from-his-lordship, with the dragon playing the part of the lord, seeking the humans and scolding them with fire instead of words.

  It was the dragon’s third pass. The first two had left wide holes in the Kadrin defensive lines and shallow, smoldering channels where the dragonfire had melted the streets and washed the newly molten rock away.

  “Engage the goblins!” Brannis ordered. “Keep close to them so the dragon cannot burn us at will without hitting her own forces as well.”

  Brannis hoped that his knights were relaying his orders as he gave them. He lacked the vantage necessary to see the bulk of his troops, with them running in and between buildings, ducking for cover as the dragon approached. They stopped at any opportunity to hold their ground against the goblins or push them back from a small area.

  Will it even matter? Brannis wondered. If we kill every one of those goblins, we still have no plan to deal with that dragon.

  The dragon was the size of a tavern, or a warship, if you did not count the massive wingspan or the tail. Her maw could swallow men whole, with fangs the size of swords. Brannis had gotten a close view on the last pass, as Jadefire flew past just above the rooftops not ten paces from him.

  Brannis had been issuing orders and checking on the goblin advance, and neglected to take account of the dragon’s approach. He turned when he heard the great intake of breath that preceded her blasts of dragonfire. She was bearing down right for him, picking out his gaudy armor as a likely enough target for her fiery breath. Brannis was caught in the middle of the road, with no time to make it to cover on either side before Jadefire closed in to incinerate him.

  Brannis prepared to die.

  * * * * * * * *

  The sphere of aether appeared on the plains before Raynesdark, near the city, but still on flat ground among the advancing goblins host, near the rear. Most of the goblins had already reached the mountain and were either on the road or already within the city’s walls. A pair of severed spearheads lay just outside the stone circle of the dungeon floor that Rashan had brought with him.

  All across the battlefield, aether-sensitive combatants took note of his arrival. Several had noticed the power that was unleashed with Iridan’s hellfire spells, but the transference the demon performed had just ripped a chunk of the world loose and transported it across half the Empire. The aether necessary to accomplish that was more than any of them, save the dragon, could have even channeled. The aether shook with the force of his arrival, and the currents of the sea of goblins around him shifted.

  Rashan found himself surrounded by infantry, startled to be sure, but accustomed enough to magic that they recovered their wits and brought spears to bear against him. The warlock allowed a spear tip to slide off his shielding spell and reached out absently to grasp its owner by the top of his head and twisted, snapping the neck. He was not so much as looking at the enemies all about him, but searched for the reason he had come so far to join the battle. With his highly developed aether-vision, he was able to locate the vast and powerful Source, even as it was obscured from his view by the buildings of the city as it flew low above them.

  Ahh, found you, Rashan thought.

  Then something curious happened. There was a twisting in his gut that he had not felt in a long time, since before he had become a demon. It was a feeling that he had thought lost to him, a weakness that he had overcome permanently.

  He was afraid.

  He had led armies into battle for over a hundred summers in the service of the Kadrin Empire, had thrown down castles and slaughtered kings and armies alike, and hardly remembered the fear that came in deadly conflict. He had faced the horrors of Loramar’s dead horde, and vaguely recalled a similar unease to what he now felt. But a century of placid existence among others of his kind, and the occasional killing of those who were unable to threaten him, had softened his heart. Worse, it had taken away something that might possibly have been necessary for true bravery: the knowledge of mortality. A man who accepts death as his inevitable fate will not shy from spending his death well; it was the stuff from which knights and heroes were forged.

  But Rashan had unlocked the ultimate secret: eternal life. He was not indestructible, though he was formidable in every way he knew possible. But the thought whispered inside him that rather than risking just the manner and timing of his death, he risked the fact of it entirely; he had hundreds, if not thousands of summers or more of his existence ahead of him, and the possibility of losing that hit him in a manner he had not anticipated.

  He saw the great Source and knew the creature it represented. A dragon was the best the gods had created, more formidable, longer lived, and with a stronger Source than any other race they had forged. Like him, they were nearly impervious, save for extraordinary means, and their vast ages ought to have given them a perspective similar to his own. Their supreme arrogance was the thing that goaded them to combat for the satisfaction of greed and p
ride; they mostly believed there was nothing that could truly oppose them.

  Perhaps he could use that, if he could convince the creature he was dangerous enough.

  Rashan did not engage the dragon but instead turned his focus fully on the enemy army that surrounded him. Without even paying it attention, he had been killing those who got too close to him.

  Lightning stabbed out from his hands, shattering goblin bodies by the score. Superheated chunks of goblin gore splattered the snowy plains and fellow goblins alike. Turning, he unleashed a shock wave of air that sent even more goblins to their deaths, pinwheeling into the air like leaves before a gale, spears and limbs becoming missiles to further maim their comrades as the pieces landed.

  An aether bolt took him in the side, hammering against his shielding spell but not getting through.

  A strong one, for a goblin, Rashan mused.

  He turned and used the hellfire spell he had taught Iridan, noticing a slight resistance from two goblin sorcerers caught in the blast, as their own shielding spells were crushed just before their bodies burned. With the failing light of dusk, the lingering flames of the dead goblins’ clothing and spear shafts stood out against the growing blackness. In the city above, hitching posts, rain barrels, and the thick woolen coats of the unarmored militia provided similar light to Raynesdark as night set in.

  * * * * * * * *

  Ni’Hash’Tk dove low for the shining knight, lining up for a killing blast of dragonfire, speeding low above the rooftops as she approached. Her lungs filled, and she drew aether to give her dragonfire its power. Before she loosed her deadly breath, she noticed just how fine was the armor the human knight before her wore. She saw the sword in his hand, and saw not a deadly weapon but a priceless masterwork of aether-forged steel.

  Rather than ruin the spoils of her conquest—and aside from having the city for her son’s lair, this knight’s armor and Avalanche were the finest prizes she had seen—she belched a halfhearted gout of flame down a side street as she passed, her momentum carrying the flames in a strafing run along several buildings. The stones blackened with the heat, but without concentrated fire, the buildings did not melt or topple as had so many others under the dragon’s withering assaults. Dropping even lower, she prepared to scoop up the shining knight in a claw and kill him carefully, lest she damage the armor needlessly.