by Stephen Deas
‘Sorry to disappoint you,’ she spat at him.
The castle moved ponderously over their heads, burying them in shadow as black as night, lit up by the flicker of the purple lightning that flashed along the underside of the stone. The rope dragged through the dirt, thick as his wrist.
He tried again. ‘I can’t stay with you. I want to, but I can’t. There’s a dragon here that wants me. When it finds me, it’ll kill everyone who’s near.’
He felt her looking inside him, searching for the lie beneath his words, but there wasn’t one. Every word perfectly true.
She didn’t like it. ‘Leave me your sword,’ she snapped.
He gave her his sword, belt and scabbard and all, and tapped the back of his head. ‘Let me go.’
She looked at him as though he was mad. ‘Don’t be stupid.’ And turned her back on him, struggling with the sword and trying to lift the shit-eater up out of the mud all at the same time. Skjorl hesitated. But no, better for all of them that they part. Best to climb the rope back into the fortress. Lure the monster of Bloodsalt away.
He slung Dragon-blooded back over his shoulder. It could come after him if it wanted. Let his enemies fight each other. He could hide among them for days if he had to. Let the alchemist go. Wouldn’t last long without him and then he’d be free. Strange how he felt about that. Not gleeful at all. Sad, if anything, but it had to be this way. Best for them all.
Climbing up was a lot harder than climbing down, even without a shit-eater on his back. At least there were no dragons swooping on him. The air still shook to the occasional clap of thunder, but the battle looked to be over, the attacking dragons driven back. Would be worth learning how the men in the fortress had managed that. Maybe he could do something useful after all.
At the top, the smoke and the mist were clearing. There were still dragons, but they were high overhead or specks in the distance. He took a moment to look about, then climbed to the top of the sloping wall, careful not to be seen. Hardly any other soldiers around, none on the walls and only a very few below. Almost everything was smashed or burned, all the wooden shacks he’d seen the night before, the fire pits, everything. In the middle of the carnage was a dragon, sprawled across the ruins, the shimmering green one he’d seen fall. Both wings broken. A lot of other bones too, and it wasn’t moving. Eyes were open though. Below, closer to him than to the dragon, carefully out of reach of its fire, a couple of dozen soldiers clustered together. They wore dragon-scale; when their words drifted up to him from the bottom of the wall, he could understand them clearly. He listened, amazed, but there was no doubt. Adamantine Men, all of them. He almost called out, but then heard another voice, the man who carried the golden knife, who had somehow made him tell everything he knew, and so Skjorl hesitated, and then stayed quiet and watched instead. The man with the golden knife walked towards the dragon. He went with care, came from behind and moved with purpose. Stayed well clear of the dragon’s tail and kept a large shield — dragon-scale, Skjorl supposed — close to hand. The man reached the back of the dragon’s head.
Skjorl squinted. He couldn’t see what the man was doing. Fiddling with something. He saw the flash of a knife. Whatever he did, when the man came back, he wasn’t careful at all.
‘You can kill it now,’ he said, and disappeared into one of the passages that ran under the walls. The Adamantine Men shouldered their axes and picked up their shields. They closed on the dragon with the same care. As they reached its head they fanned out, but the dragon didn’t move. It just watched them.
The axes came out. Skjorl felt a surge of glee as they fell. His hand went behind him to rest on Dragon-blooded’s shaft. He understood, as only another Adamantine Man could understand, what a rare victory this was. No special rituals for killing a dragon. You took your chances as they came. Mostly you died trying and even if you managed to kill one, usually you died at the claws of another moments later. Like when Vish had gone, crushed. Or else burned. That was the way of being an Adamantine Man. So he watched them kill the dragon, watched its blood stain the stones and watched them leave, and felt a soaring joy. It would burn now from the inside, getting hotter and hotter for days if not weeks until its flesh and bone crumbled to ash and all that was left were scales and a few scorched bones from its wings. Scales for armour, bones for bows. No one had been able to harvest a dead dragon since the Adamantine Palace had burned. But these men would.
Amid the envy and the glee, he felt a pang of something else.
Blood, staining the stones. Dragon blood.
He grinned to himself, a huge grin, and started looking among the ruins for what he would need.
42
Kataros
Nineteen days before the Black Mausoleum
Letting the Adamantine Man go felt strange. A part of her was sad to be rid of him. That was the part that had learned alchemy, that knew which ingredients in what proportions would have how much of an effect and had been taught to think not of the now and the tomorrow, but of what would happen a year away, a decade, a century even. The part that knew there were more perils ahead of her than behind and had learned the value of a strong and loyal sword.
Another part, the part that had always been her, the part that thrilled to the raw immediacy of blood-magic, was sad too, but only that she wouldn’t have the pleasure of seeing him torn to pieces by whatever dragon was hunting him. She had her blood, her magic. Let that be enough.
She had no idea what to do with the sword she’d taken. The belt didn’t fit her. However she tried to wear it, it ended up slipping down around her ankles and tripping her up. Even when it didn’t fall down, the sword somehow slipped between her legs and tried to catch her that way. Then there was Siff, the outsider the Adamantine Man had carried so easily but who turned out to weigh more than she did, even as wasted as he was. She had no idea how to move him. She tried dragging him. She tried lifting him. She managed to get him over her shoulder once, but then the sword tripped her and tipped them both in the mud. Through it all he didn’t stir.
She looked for a place to hide, but the best she could find in the darkness beneath the castle was a ditch filled with long grass with a few inches of slime at the bottom. It would have to do. There wasn’t much else for it but to wait until Siff came back from wherever he was.
She knew the Adamantine Man was near again before she heard him. The blood-bond told her, which meant she’d been looking for him without even knowing it, and that was troubling all on its own. She peered up out of the ditch and there he was, haloed in purple lightning, staring at the ground and walking right towards her.
‘Why are you here?’ she yelled at him. ‘Why are you here if there’s a dragon hunting you?’
He looked up, caught in a moment of surprise. Then he grinned at her and waved something. A large rag. A shirt maybe. Dark and wet. ‘Dragon blood,’ he said.
It took a moment for what that meant to sink in.
‘Dragon blood,’ he said again. ‘You can make the potion. To hide us all from the dragons. You said you needed dragon blood.’
Dragon blood and her own. She touched the cloth and reached into the blood and yes, it was true, it really was what he said, however impossible it seemed. Dragon blood. Fresh. ‘Yes.’ For a moment she caught herself looking at him in a way she’d never looked before. Mixed in with the loathing was a touch of awe. There had to be, didn’t there, for a man who could bring you blood from a dragon?
‘Water,’ she said, and glanced up at the underbelly of the castle, still moving slowly overhead. ‘I need clean water.’
‘Will it take long?’
‘And somewhere to keep it.’
‘Will it take long?’
She stared at the castle. Yes, it would take long to do properly, but there was a quicker way. She climbed out of the ditch and gave Skjorl back his sword. ‘Hold out the blade.’ When he did as she asked, she ran a finger along the edge. A drop or two of blood was all she needed. She dripped it onto a corner
of Skjorl’s cloth. A shirt. It was a shirt. ‘My blood. Dragon blood. Now give me a moment.’
Blood was a path, nothing more. A way in. A way to touch the dragon, or what tiny essence was left of it, although even that was huge, an immense thing she could barely encompass.
‘Are you done yet?’ The castle had almost passed from overhead.
She sucked on the corner of the shirt and passed it to the Adamantine Man. ‘As soon as the sun sets, we find some shelter where I can make more and do it properly. Enough to take us to the Raksheh.’
Skjorl sucked on the shirt too. His lip curled. ‘Oh, I remember that taste.’ He waved the shirt at her. ‘That enough?’
‘To get the three of us to the Raksheh? More than enough.’ She took the shirt to Siff. Forced the corner into his mouth.
‘It’ll be dry by night.’
‘Then you’d better find me some water.’
Skjorl climbed down into the ditch with her, carefully not too close. ‘Back where we came from then. The tunnel to the Pinnacles. All the water you want and safe for as long as you need. We could tip the raft down the falls and ride the Ghostwater to the Yamuna. It’s only a few hours away.’ He pulled Siff up out of the ditch and slung him over a shoulder. ‘Best we stay under this… thing. Until dark. Castle will keep us hidden from dragons. Dragons will keep the castle soldiers safe in their beds. Works out nicely for us both ways.’ He offered her his hand. This time she very nearly took it, almost without thinking. It didn’t seem to bother him that she didn’t.
He turned and started to walk. ‘If your potions fail, alchemist, we’ll be dead out here in days. If they do what they should, I’ll get you to the Raksheh. No promises after, but I’ll get you that far. Night Watchman’s oath.’
Which, she knew, meant he’d do it or he’d die in the trying.
43
Blackscar
Nineteen days before the Black Mausoleum
Dragon battled dragon in the skies, a thing that Blackscar remembered from its first lifetime and then never since. The old ghosts in the half-made sky-home were silent. Hidden once more. Even the little one, the sorcerer who carried a touch of the broken god.
Strangeness upon strangeness. As it dived upon the eyrie and set its innards alight, a part of Blackscar tried not to give itself up to the battle, to the fury and the joy of it. Too many things to consider.
It failed. Thunder and lightning rose up to greet it, battering its skin. Fire swept in a wave before it. Little ones screamed and burned. It felt their fear, delicious like honey. It felt the little one it was looking for. Running. Fleeing. It turned and came at the sky-home again. There. Standing by the edge, rising out of the haze of smoke and mist and steam.
You are mine.
The little one saw it coming. Knew its end. Nowhere to hide. Fire swept towards it, yet at that moment another dragon fell from the sky, teeth and claws and tail, ripping and tearing. Small. Barely more than a hatchling. A year old, half grown at best, but it came nonetheless and the dragon knew it must turn to meet it or be taken crashing to the ground, and either way, the little one was granted a miracle and would not burn, not now.
But soon.
It met the other dragon, tooth and claw. Victory was certain, yet the other came with a furious zeal. A certainty of purpose. A righteousness, even, the sort that belonged in the head of little ones and their foolishness, not within a dragon. Not within a creature that had seen such zeal almost shatter creation.
But there nevertheless.
They skimmed the edge of the sky-home, cracking its shell with their wind and their tails. It saw the little one fall, but the creature’s thoughts did not fade and flicker and so the dragon knew that it lived on. They crashed into the castle together and hurled themselves back into the sky. Blackscar threw the other dragon aside. Gently. Or gentle as a dragon could be. Wings intact and no bones crushed beyond repair. It turned for its little one once more, but now there were more dragons. Lightning struck it, sent it plunging spiralling through the sky. When its wings were its own again, the dragon turned its thoughts to the sorceries of glass and gold that spat thunder. The little one could wait.
Lightning met him, a storm of it. The little ones; and then their half-grown dragon servants fell from the sky and tore their own kind to the ground with teeth that struck to kill.
Dragon servants. Its rage could melt mountains. Fill seas and burn skies. Yet it withdrew. Some did not. Could not. One by one they fell.
Defeated.
The thought was enough to pierce any fury. It had never, in any lifetime, been left to savour the word.
A surge of something ancient burst from the sky-home. It echoed across the plains and faded and died. The dragon felt it. Saw it. Saw something cut loose. Saw one of its own kind it had known for fifty lifetimes lying crippled and broken in the folds of the sky-home’s womb and then die at the touch of an old goddess who always took something away.
The other dragons murmured among themselves. One by one they left, but the dragon called Blackscar lingered. One last thing. The little one was still there and so the dragon watched and waited, carefully and from a distance, touching the edges of the little one’s thoughts as it climbed back down from the sky-home to the ground. Watched as a magic made of dragon blood blinked its mind away and the little one it had hunted for so long vanished, finally, from its sight.
Such a thing might drive another to rage, it mused, but for once the dragon was unmoved.
After all, it knew by now exactly there this little one meant to go.
The Raksheh
An expanse of largely unbroken forest that occupies the south-west corner of the realms, the Raksheh stretches over several hundred miles from Drotan’s Top and the Gliding Dragon Gorge in the north to the Sea of Storms in the south. Its east-west borders are less sharply defined: in the west the forest merges with the valleys of the Worldspine, while in the east the wooded areas peter out more gradually into the plains of the Silver City. Several large rivers flow through the forest, ultimately draining into the Yamuna and emerging close to the town of Farakkan. Numerous large round lakes dot the more mountainous western fringe of the forest; from the air these are similar to the Mirror Lakes of the Purple Spur. Various deep gorges and several spectacular waterfalls have been reported by dragon-riders who have ventured to cross the forest. The best known of these are those around the Aardish Caves.
The forest is largely uninhabited, although rumoured to give shelter to numerous settlements of outsiders and other feral tribes. Bandits and outlaws also frequent the fringes of the forest, particularly in the north.
The forest may be the home of many unique creatures. Earthworms as large as horses have been reported, together with six-legged lizards of various sizes ranging from the minuscule to the giant. Several breeds of venomous snakes and poisonous frogs are known to inhabit the forest. Snappers are also a constant danger, although their numbers are less than in the more northern fringes of the Worldspine. For those of our order, the forest offers a concentration of valuable and unique ingredients the like and diversity of which can only otherwise be found on the distant Oordish Moors. Frogsback, for example, is harvested from the southern fringes of the Raksheh Forest.
With the exception of the rather arid northern section close to Drotan’s Top, the forest has the distinction of being one of the wettest places in the realms, surpassed only by the southern reaches of the Worldspine itself.
Bellepheros’ Journal of the Realms, 2nd year of Speaker Hyram
44
Jasaan
Twenty-one days before the Black Mausoleum
Bloodsalt made him a hero. Bloodsalt earned him everything and then hoisted him by his own shirt and dropped him in a cesspit.
On the moors he and Skjorl had gone their separate ways, something that had been coming ever since Scarsdale. Jasaan then tried to get on with the business of walking and eating and walking and sleeping and walking and drinking and not being caught in the
open by a dragon; and most of all not thinking about Skjorl and how small and subtle were the differences between them. As far as Jasaan knew, Skjorl had meant to stick stubbornly to Yinazhin’s Way, so Jasaan picked his path down to the Sapphire valley. There was water, food if you knew where to look for it, not much but enough and plenty of fish. He drank his potions and hid in the day and walked carefully at night and took each sunset as it came, quietly assuming he’d die somewhere beside the river and get nowhere near the Purple Spur; and then, somehow, he’d reached Samir’s Crossing. It wasn’t even that difficult.
No one had ever thought Skjorl or any of his company would come back. People didn’t even come back from the moors any more and Bloodsalt was three times the distance. At Samir’s Crossing the Adamantine Men who watched the skies and the plains to the north and south made him a hero. They welcomed him with open arms and poured praise over him like wine at a desert wedding.
He waited a few weeks — they gave him that luxury — but Skjorl never came back. Skjorl was dead. Eventually Jasaan believed it. And all the while the stories he told of Bloodsalt made delicate and tiny changes to themselves. Quiet Vish and Skjorl always killed the dragon, but his own part changed, maybe became a little more how it might have been than what actually happened. Yes, Skjorl and Vish had wielded their axes, but it was no accident that the roof had collapsed where it did. The dragon had been lured to its doom by the cleverness of men. By Jasaan.
Adamantine Men did what needed to be done. That was all. They didn’t make themselves into heroes, and so it wasn’t a surprise when the alchemists under the Purple Spur found him something else to do. There was to be an attempt to reach the Pinnacles. Alchemists would be going. They would need guides. Soldiers to protect them, soldiers who understood the ways of dragons. Most particularly, they needed soldiers who had survived out in the open, who knew how to stay alive with no vast roof of stone to shield them from the skies. They needed an inspiration, someone the other soldiers, the alchemists even, would believe in. And Jasaan, since he was a hero, couldn’t deny them, no matter how much he never wanted to go out in the open again. Who else could they choose? And what else could he do but go?