by Jack Conner
Bitter tears welled in him. After all this, for her to die . . .
A large slab of Krogbur smashed into the floor near him, pelting him and the princess with shrapnel, and he knew it was only a matter of time for them both. The tower would fall, and he and Rolenya would be obliterated in its collapse.
A great winged shadow fell upon the terrace.
Baleron looked up to see a familiar form descend from the skies. Wounded and bloodied in a hundred places, weakened by his mother’s poison, Throgmar landed on the platform and inspected his father’s smoking remains, which could still be seen high up on the black stairs, smoldering.
In the air about the tower, the moat of dragons was breaking up and scattering. They felt their Master’s passing and knew that Krogbur was the wrong place to be at the moment. At any second it would collapse, killing anyone near it. Even the Borchstog army at its base was beginning to flee, though it was too late for them. The leaping fires of the Inferno spread, consuming all in its path, burning itself out. All was chaos and pandemonium.
Baleron could smell thick smoke on the suddenly-hot breeze. The Inferno must be close to the terrace. At any moment the terrace would be consumed in fire. The very air shimmered with heat, and the floor burned him. Its wet surface began to hiss.
Slowly, Throgmar lowered his horned head from inspecting the ruin of his father to regard the shape of Baleron cradling Rolenya at his feet.
Wind whipped Baleron and rain tore at his flesh, but the heir to the throne of Havensrike did not attempt to flee.
Throgmar met his eyes.
Thunder shook the tower, and another slab crashed right near the prince, spraying him and the princess with shards.
“YOU,” said Throgmar slowly. He did not seem to be in a rush. Indeed, far from it.
Rolenya’s flesh was growing colder. If she was still alive, Baleron had to get her to shelter quickly. As for himself, he felt sick from his contact with Gilgaroth’s blood. It felt as though a fire were spreading throughout his body. The Wolf might kill him yet.
He blinked, looking deep into Throgmar’s amber eyes.
“Help us,” he said.
The Betrayer just stared at him. The dragon said nothing. Wind shrieked through his horns.
“Or,” Baleron pleaded, “if you don’t want to help me, save her at least. She deserves better than to die like this.”
“FELESTRATA DESERVED BETTER THAN WHAT YOU GAVE HER, TOO.”
“But she did not exist!”
Heatedly, the Worm shouted, “SHE EXISTED TO ME!”
The rawness of his voice was painful to hear. Desperately, Baleron proffered Rolenya to him. “Take her. Fly her far away from this. Release her somewhere safe.”
“PERHAPS I WILL TAKE YOU AND LEAVE HER. THAT IS WHAT YOU DID TO ME.”
Baleron gnashed his teeth. Damn him!
A crack developed in the terrace to his right, and part of it fell away. Smoke from the Inferno drifted up, wreathing the platform. The soles of Baleron’s feet began to blister, as if he wore no boots at all.
“I will not go without her!” he said.
Ul Mrungona appraised the body of his father. “IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN ME,” he said, almost quietly. “I SHOULD HAVE HAD THE PLEASURE OF SLAYING HIM. FOR DENYING ME THAT ALONE, I SHALL HAVE TO PUNISH YOU.” Another chunk of Krogbur fell away, smashing into the terrace and taking some of the platform with it. “YET I DON’T HAVE TIME TO THINK ON IT HERE. I’LL HAVE TO TAKE YOU WITH ME, WHERE I WILL PONDER YOUR PUNISHMENT AT MY LEISURE.”
Warily, Baleron let the dragon scoop Rolenya up in one huge claw and himself in another. She still lay limp and smoking, like a doll that had been steamed, her eyes closed and her clothes plastered to her skin.
Throgmar chuckled darkly as, with a mighty pump of his wings, he lifted off from the terrace and flew away from a disintegrating Krogbur. Baleron watched the Black Tower recede through a gap in the dragon’s claws. Within seconds of Throgmar departing it, the terrace broke and fell away, flaming.
Its stump grew small with distance until it was lost in the chaos of the night. Baleron watched Krogbur collapse, one chunk at a time. The fires of the Inferno had consumed nearly its whole length. The tower was a rod of flame stretching from the ground into the lightning-rent heavens.
On the endless black stairs, Gilgaroth moved. He moved only slightly. Not even the tail twitched.
But the eyes, the two burning portals to a vanishing Illistriv, opened, then narrowed in hate.
Summoning his last strength, Gilgaroth sent out his will to the brooding storm clouds that thronged the tower, and lightning struck down.
“Revenge,” said he.
A thousand bolts of lightning, the very last effort of Gilgaroth, split the skies. Their electric snake-tongues chased Throgmar as he fled the devastation. Air whistled through his claws as he picked up speed, trying to outrun his death.
In his one hand Baleron gripped a claw, steadying himself. This was the Wolf’s work, he knew. He could taste the stench of Gilgaroth’s hate on the heavily charged air.
Across the gap of Throgmar’s chest he could see the limp form of Rolenya encased in a mighty dragon-hand. She did not stir.
White whips struck all about the Worm, hounding him. Throgmar flew faster, frantic to be away.
Other dragons flew at him, breathing flame. Their fires scoured his armor, torching some patches of hair, but did no real damage. One blast came close to roasting Baleron but managed only to bring a flush to his skin. When the smaller Worms came close, the Leviathan’s own fires chased them, and his fires were more deadly. Some of the dragons fell smoking from the sky.
Throgmar flew ever faster—faster—but the storm was too swift, even for him. A bolt of lightning struck one of his wings, and he roared. Dove. Baleron’s stomach leapt to his throat. They were all going to die!
Another bolt of lightning speared the Betrayer’s back, and Baleron yelped as ribbons of electricity webbed Throgmar’s talon, then faded.
Another bright blue tongue struck the Worm, and another. It was a wonder he was still alive at all.
The other dragons put distance between them and Throgmar. His immediate vicinity was not a safe place to be.
He maintained the presence of mind, at least, to put himself into a large spiral, all he could do with the full use of only one wing, and it slowed them enough so that they would not necessarily die on impact. Baleron wondered if this is how Ungier had felt, falling from the terrace.
They fell forever. Down, down, down, Baleron had long moments to contemplate the coming darkness—or would it be darkness? What happened to loosed souls in Oslog now that Illistriv was no more?
The land pitched up at them.
Baleron gritted his teeth and braced himself.
Throgmar struck the ground with his chest, nearly horizontal to the land, and went sliding forwards across the blackened wastes, tearing a scrabbled swath. Baleron was bumped up and down, jostled terribly in the dragon’s fist, but Throgmar held him tight, fingers closed, sealing Baleron in.
At last the speed of Throgmar’s slide diminished, and he ground to a halt.
The roar in Baleron’s ears faded enough so that he could pick out individual sounds, but in the scaly enclosure of Throgmar’s fist, all he could hear was his own ragged breathing.
Throgmar’s fist half opened and Baleron could see the bleak surroundings, a flat wasteland of charred earth.
An avalanche of pebbles as Throgmar shifted his weight. Dust rose up. The dragon moaned.
Reeling, Baleron climbed out of the claw, coughing and wheezing; their landing had churned up a great deal of dust and ash. He saw that they were on an open plain cut through with many fissures, many miles from Krogbur, which still stood in the distance, a fiery line disappearing into a black sky. Piece by flaming piece the tower crumbled away, and the pieces were like fireflies filling the air around Krogbur.
Baleron looked down at himself in surprise. He was alive . . . at least for
now. Gilgaroth’s poison still coursed through him.
What of Rolenya?
Heart in his throat, Baleron made his way over to the other scaly fist and pried her loose of the Leviathan’s claw. Hefting her limp weight in his arms, he carried her some distance away and set her down as gently as he could on the plain of ash.
Her eyes were closed. She did not move. He stared down at her for a long time, praying.
The rain didn’t reach this far, and he shivered in the cool air, his skin still wet. For the first time he noticed that Rolenya was covered in gooseflesh.
His eyes widened.
Could it be . . . ?
He waited, staring, hardly daring to breathe.
Suddenly, her chest rose and fell. Relief washing through him, he raised his head and whooped in joy. Laughing, he kissed her forehead and cheeks.
“Rolenya!”
He looked around. The Great Army was far away, and the soldiers would be busy fleeing the earthquakes and leaping flames. The dragons had already broken off. Rolenya, he realized, was safe. He would die, yes, but she would not, and that was just fine.
She stirred.
“Sleep,” he told her, stroking her hair.
All of a sudden, he grimaced in pain, clutching a hand to his chest. His concentration wavered in and out. It was only a matter of time, he knew. He had to make the next few minutes count.
He returned his attention to the Leviathan. Throgmar lay on the charred ground, his body blackened in places and smoking, and he looked too weak to move. His amber eyes were partly open, and he and Baleron regarded each other for several moments silently, sullenly.
Unable to put it more diplomatically, Baleron asked, “Can you go on?”
Throgmar grunted. “I DO NOT KNOW WHY I TRIED.” He seemed to sag, and rested his weary head on the earth. Deflated and hollow, having perhaps killed his mother and helped the murderers of his father escape their rightful deaths, he seemed both angry and racked with guilt. At the same time, he also seemed strangely uplifted, as if a weight had been removed.
Blood from dozens of wounds along his massive bulk leaked into the blackened earth, and his scales glistened redly. Perhaps Mogra’s venoms were even then running through his system, finishing him off.
“Was vengeance sweet?” Baleron asked him, thinking of the Spider Goddess.
“VERY,” answered the Worm.
“So she is dead, then.”
Throgmar did not answer for a long span. His eyes clouded, and Baleron thought the dragon was likely imagining the moment he slew her. He must have been right, as the Worm soon said, “I DROPPED HER FROM A GREAT HEIGHT AND SET HER AFLAME. I DESCENDED AFTER HER, MEANING TO WATCH HER STRIKE THE GROUND, MEANING TO WATCH HER DIE . . . BUT A PLUME OF SMOKE ROSE UP AND I LOST HER . . . AND THEN A SCORE OF MY OWN SPAWN FELL ON ME, SHRIEKING THAT I WAS A TRAITOR . . . I SLEW MY OWN CHILDREN, BALERON. AND THAT IS AFTER I SLEW MY MOTHER! WHAT DOES THAT MAKE ME?”
“I don’t know,” Baleron admitted. “But I thank you.”
“DO NOT. I WOULD HAVE SLAIN YOU, AS WELL—IN TIME.” He added this last part sinisterly.
Baleron spread his arms wide. “Then, if these are your last moments, and you were going to kill me anyway . . . ”
Throgmar studied him for a long time, and Baleron waited.
At last the dragon lowered his eyes. “I LIED. VENGEANCE WAS ONLY SWEET AT THE MOMENT. TELL ME, WAS IT SWEET FOR YOU? YOU TASTED IT TWICE, IF NOT THREE TIMES.”
“Sweet the first time,” Baleron told him truthfully. “But afterwards bitter. And now I find out I didn’t kill anyone, not then, but . . . it hurt the intended target—”
“ME.”
“You,” he agreed. “So—the job was done. The second time? It feels great. I ached to kill Gilgaroth. I know he was your father, but . . .”
“OH, I HAVE HATED HIM FAR LONGER THAN YOU. MY HATRED IS OLDER THAN YOUR COUNTRY!”
Aloud, Baleron mused, “It’s hard to believe he’s gone. To live without the constant threat of war and oblivion will be strange . . . I suppose. Others will know that peace, not I.”
It was odd to talk with Throgmar like this, Baleron reflected, as though they were two old friends, but in a way that’s exactly how it felt, that they were two comrades sharing a last talk before their deaths overtook them. It was only a question of who would fade first.
“AND ME?” Throgmar said. “HOW DID IT FEEL WHEN YOU HAD YOUR REVENGE ON ME?”
“You? Oh, that was the best, the sweetest of all.”
Chuckling, Throgmar took a large deep breath and let it out in one great, melancholy sigh. His golden eyes dimmed.
Baleron waited for the dragon to take another breath, but he did not, and after a few minutes the prince realized the truth of it. He hung his head.
Silently, oddly morose, he closed the dragon’s eyes.
“Sleep well,” he said. “And may your spirit have no need of further vengeance.”
On the black stairs, Illistriv had burnt itself out, leaving only a smoldering husk where once had been a mighty being. Gilgaroth’s eyes were still half open, and they were still flaming, but the flames were dying. Within seconds, they would be out.
The Dark One opened his maw one last time and groaned, a long, sad groan of lament, and then his fire faded.
Krogbur broke around him. The fires of the Second Hell engulfed the whole of the Black Tower and consumed the last of Gilgaroth. In the end, his own Inferno claimed him. And then it too went out.
The cold shadow in Baleron’s chest throbbed once, swelled, and he heard a horrible cry inside him. Then something left him. It was as though there had been a cloud on him for years, so long he’d grown used to it, had not even been aware of it, when suddenly it was no more.
It shocked him, and he staggered, almost drunken.
Gasping, he looked toward the Black Tower. Gilgaroth must be dead. Really, truly dead.
The Doom was no more. Baleron . . . was free.
For a little while.
Returning to Rolenya, he found her still breathing. As he bent over her, he brushed dark hair from her face, and she stirred. He continued to sit beside her, and it was not long before her blue eyes opened.
“Thank the gods,” he breathed.
She gazed up at him tearfully. She must have been having a nightmare, as she looked panicked, frightened. He stroked her head to calm her.
“Did we . . . die?” she asked.
He shook his head. Tears leaked out. “Not yet. There is none to claim us. Gilgaroth is dead.”
Wonder filled her eyes. “Truly?” When he nodded, she embraced him tightly. “Oh, Baleron! You did it!”
“No,” he told her solemnly. “It was—”
The Black Tower exploded.
With Gilgaroth’s death, the energies he had stolen to raise and bind the tower were loosed, and that coupled with the destructive element of the out-of-control Inferno . . .
Baleron and Rolenya watched with astonishment as the immensity of Krogbur, flaming like a torch, flamed suddenly brighter, then erupted in a shower of fire and molten stone in a line from the ground to the sky, an immense eruption that showered millions of tons of death out over the wasteland . . . and the army camped at the tower’s base. Baleron and Rolenya, even many miles away, could hear their screams. The army that would have spelled the end of the Crescent was no more. A few dragons still wheeled about the spire, but as it exploded it took them with it.
As the countless pieces of the tower smote the wasteland, the earth split and broke, laying ruin to mountains and fields of ash and filth, burning them all away in a bath of fire and red hot magma. Baleron never could have imagined the BOOM or the shock of the rushing air that followed. He could feel it in the very land, feel the vibration as the shockwave swept outwards. The wind of it ruffled his hair, burned his skin.
He and Rolenya huddled tighter as the devastation drew nearer. More wind howled around them, carrying with it the spirits of demons and innocents loosed
by Illistriv’s obliteration, as well as the heat from the Inferno’s fires.
Such a huge cloud of dust and ash billowed up from the ruin that Baleron could hardly see what happened next, but he did. All the volcanoes in Oslog seemed to erupt at once, jetting lava into the sky and sending glowing rivers of the earth’s blood down their black slopes. Great earthquakes were triggered, and the land was broken again and again. Lava spewed up from the ground. Old mountains fell and new ones thrust up. The world was sundered and remade.
Baleron and Rolenya, frightened, looked all about at the breaking land. The destruction that radiated out from the site of Krogbur’s fall edged closer and closer. Baleron tensed. It looked as though the ruin would swallow them.
“I love you,” Rolenya whispered, and held him tight.
The destruction rolled toward them, closer and closer. He could feel the earth vibrate. His teeth rattled together.
Then, suddenly, miraculously, the destruction ceased rolling in their direction. The earth continued to split and quake, but the devastation came no closer to the two lovers. They seemed to be too far away to be in immediate danger, even though the ground still shook beneath them, and he could still smell the smoke of the fires.
At last the earth calmed as much as it could, and the former brother and sister breathed sighs of relief.
“It’s over,” Baleron said. Wind howled in the silence that followed. “They’re gone. Gilgaroth and Mogra. Dead. The Black Tower fallen.”
“We . . . won.” She said it in a small voice, sounding surprised.
He almost didn’t believe it. For a moment he was absolutely convinced that this was yet another trick of the Dark One’s, and that any second all this would go away and he would be back in Krogbur’s pits, hallucinating, Ghrozm standing over him with a scalpel.
“We did,” she said. “We truly did.”
He winced as a sudden jolt of pain nearly knocked him over, and he had to hold on to her tightly to steady himself.