Dragon Noir (Pixie for Hire Book 3)

by Cedar Sanderson

  Battlefield Meeting

  We popped out atop the grassy knoll I had staked out for Bella. It had a lovely view of the battlefield we were funneling the armies toward, and as I had told her, she wasn’t supposed to be in the thick of battle. Her presence was an encouragement, literally to be an inspiration. The dawn was breaking with a splash of color and light on the mountains that loomed in front of us. Bella was nowhere in sight.

  “Lug. Sending you to someone who can help the elf girl.” I barked at him, throwing a bubble around him as soon as he nodded. Ellie was the only person besides Melcar who might be able to do anything, and Melcar…

  I looked down into the valley. Melcar was down there, and likely so was my wife. Raven pulled off the eyepatch and rubbed his face.

  “They attacked early.” I looked at him, feeling the weight of the crown I still held. “I have to get to her.”

  He nodded. “Ready for this?”

  “No.” I hated this form of transport for so many reasons. “Let’s do it.”

  He transformed into a giant raven, towering over me, and stretched out a wing. I stepped back, and then ran lightly up it and onto his back. He leaped off the ground, and I clung to a feather for dear life, the crown clutched in my other hand. We soared into the air, and my eyes watered in the wind. It was cold up here, always was. How many times now had I traveled with him? Too many.

  He circled upward, wings flapping, and then soared out over the valley, balancing on a wind I could not see. I leaned forward and tried to look over his shoulder without off-balancing him. I knew very well there was magic in what he was doing, but it seemed the courteous thing to do.

  Far below us, the fields stretched out. It was late spring, and the river was no longer in flood. One side was ours, the other theirs. Vast camps sprawled within sight of it, and there was a line of troops drawn up on either side. Raven swooped toward them in a move that left me swallowing hard. I hate flying. I don’t mind airplanes, but I hate flying. My stomach was trying to crawl up through my mouth.

  The reality of battle is not what most people think it is. Part of what was going on down there was posturing. Trytion would be talking with Dionaea, trying to convince her to give up her plans. She would be reveling in this acknowledgement of her power. Above, in the age of guns, all this stylized gamesmanship was gone. But here, in a land full of virtual immortals, the days of blood and thunder still reigned. Raven banked, and I could see them.

  There was a pavilion set up, flags flying, the sides pulled back until it was almost a mere canopy. Ranks of men with torches stood around it. One side held the black silks of the Low Court, the other the sky-blue of the High. They would have been talking through the night, wearing on one another, while the flanks tried to jockey for position in the dark.

  That would be where she was. Raven circled, and the men looked up in alarm. I could see the pale ovals of faces in the torchlight, the dawn did not reach here yet. We were too high to recognize anyone. I didn’t see the monstrosity that was the Wendigo, and shivered to think he was inside the tent with Bella.

  Raven screamed hoarsely, the crowing war-cry grating across my nerves like a file. Then he stooped like a warbird, and I held on for my life. I could feel the feathers slipping through my hand, and then he spread his wings and almost stopped in midair. I sensed through my grip the flexion of his body as he landed with talons outstretched. I slid off onto the solid ground, panting a little.

  Raven launched himself back into the sky with another hoarse cry. I’d been well announced. I walked toward the tent, seeing the two women facing me. Trytion was not in sight, they were alone in the pavilion, each standing on opposite sides of a long table.

  There were chairs that made me think others had been there. I’d missed something. But at this moment, I had eyes only for Bella. The crown in my hand, hanging at my side, I strode to her, ignoring Dionaea, although I heard the hiss of her indrawn breath as she saw what I held.

  “You thief!” She looked like she might come right over the table at me. I still didn’t look at her. Bella held out her hands to me. She looked magnificent.

  Dressed in leather and armor, her hair pulled back off her face in an intricate braid, little tendrils falling out to frame her cheeks, she was amazing, and mine. I wrapped my free arm around her and kissed her quickly. No time for more.

  Dionaea made an inarticulate, angry noise, and I flicked an amused glance at her, still holding Bella.

  “I used to think marriage was like being in jail.” I lifted the crown. “And then I learned that with the right woman, it is like serving a Queen.” I put the crown on Bella’s head as Dionaea let out a howl of rage and really did try to leap over the table.

  I turned to meet her, catching a look of surprise on Bella’s face, her hands going upward to feel what I’d just put on her… Dionaea sprawled on the table, tugging at the sword she was wearing. Like Bella, she was wearing leathers, but hers were red, blood red. The sword was far too long for her, and she gave up as she rolled across the table and launched herself at me, shrieking. I straight-armed her in the chest, watching her bounce backward into the table off me.

  She came up with rage in her arms, and a ball of fire in each hand. They were in the air before I had time to do more than throw up a warding spell, and they bounced off it. Her face twisted.

  “You are a cripple!” She spat. “How can you possibly…?”

  “He isn’t any more.” Bella was at my shoulder. Above me, the tent caught fire from the deflected energy blast. Bella pulled her pistol and leveled it at Dionaea. “It’s time for you to go.”

  She fired, and Dionaea vanished. I knew it was a bubble spell, but perhaps…

  I looked upward at the flames. “I think we need to go, too.”

  Bella nodded, holstering her gun. “Lom…”

  I caught her hand and ran as the silks seemed to explode. “What the hell?”

  Between us and the men with torches, who were mostly running away now, there was a familiar ugly shape.

  “A salamander!” Bella gasped. She reached for her gun. “You distract it!”

  We had done this before, well, not as a team that time. At least there wasn’t a dragon chasing me at the moment. I threw a bolt of energy at it, putting my weight behind it, so to speak. It squalled loudly and scuttled toward my wife. She leveled the gun and shouted. “Again!”

  I threw something else this time, having had time to think. A lance of elemental cold, not ice, but beyond that, and the creature screamed in mortal fear. This time, when it opened its mouth, she fired twice, and it pawed frantically at its throat, rolling over and thrashing. As the salamander died, it burst into flame, and I could feel the heat of it. Bella skipped backward quickly, still holding her gun and scanning the gray dawn for more opponents.

  Now that Dionaea had seen what I had done, I knew she would throw the full might of her forces against us. We were smack in the middle of the battlefield here, with the ford of the river right behind us. Most creatures Underhill hadn’t the power or the skill to travel via bubble. We did, at least.

  “Where’s Trytion?” I caught her free hand and she bubbled us.

  “Um.” Bella put her hand to her head. No, to touch the crown. I remembered how it had shocked me, and hoped that it hadn’t her. “He’s… she pointed. “I seem to be linked somehow to him.”

  “To his mind?” Maybe I ought to have left that magical symbol where it lay.

  She looked shocked. “No, just… like a compass.”

  The bubble changed direction. “Are you… why were you?” I wasn’t even sure what to ask her first.

  “Trytion had an emergency.” She sounded tired. “They sneaked a platoon… a unit? Anyway, a bunch of Trolls around behind our position in the night. So he called me to negotiate, while he led the troops in a defense.”

  “What was she looking for?”

  “Unconditional surrender.” Her face looked severe, and all the young, playful girl I’d fallen so h
ard for, was stripped away. This was the Queen, the core of steel Trytion had seen when he elected her Consort. “Surrender, or suffer the loosing of the Wendigo.”

  “That cannot happen.” I took her hand. “The crown…”

  “Is a channel.” She clasped hands with me and I felt the bubble land and drop. “I can tap into the accumulated power of the High Fae, Lom.”

  “Oh.” Here, and I’d been thinking it was just a symbol. No wonder it had been stolen so long ago. But there was no time.

  “Bella!” Ash was there, his face smeared with mud and blood. Not his, as he was moving easy, even missing an arm. “We need you right away.”

  I followed them at a trot to a big tent. Inside, elfglobes bobbed against the canvas ceiling, illuminating a scene from hells unimaginable below the floating lights. It was the hospital tent. Ash led us to a bed, where Trytion lay, his armor in a heap next to him, and his face twisted with pain. He reached out for Bella’s hand.

  “Sorry, m’dear. But…”

  “His hip was slashed open to the bone.” Melcar broke in, appearing on the other side of the bed. He laid a hand on Trytion’s forehead. “He wouldn’t let me operate until you arrived.”

  “Sent a messenger…” The king groaned. “You must take the banner.”

  He didn’t seem to see me, behind her.

  Bella bent over him and kissed his forehead. “I shall lead them, my king, and you must let them give you surcease.”

  He closed his eyes, and Melcar beckoned to another elf, who pushed past us and began to work on the king. I backed out, Bella with me, and headed for the outside, where the peachy light of dawn was beginning to give enough light to see. It had been a very long night. I took a deep breath, purging the foul odors of the tent. It wasn’t dirty, but blood, vomit, and shit accompanied violence everywhere.

  “Bella.”

  She put a hand on my arm and looked me in the eye. “I must, Lom.”

  “This isn’t what you signed up for.”

  “No. But it is what I must do.” She looked over my shoulder. “Ash. I need a mount.”

  I could hear him trotting off. “What can I do?”

  “Be my general. Rally the troops. They respect you deeply, husband, and would follow you into the fires.”

  “And you?”

  “I will take the banner to war.” She turned away from me, and I saw that Joe had come up while we were talking, a long silk-wrapped pole in his arms. I’d seen it before, hanging over the thrones at High Court. She took it and set the butt in the ground by her feet. “I need my helm, and a horse.”

  “Not a horse.” The deep voice of the Huntsman made me startle and my hand go to the butt of my gun without conscious thought.

  Behind him, a black shape loomed. As it walked closer, I could make out details. It was being led by one of the Hunt, a faceless knight in matte black armor. How they could walk noiselessly wearing that heavy plate was beyond me, magic was the only conceivable way. But the beast he led… was also armored. I could hear a clank as it swung its head from side to side, glaring with red eyes. It snorted and lowered the horned head at the Huntsman, who gave it an affectionate buffet on the nose.

  “Your rider. Take care of her.” He ordered it.

  I choked. “You… you…”

  Bella laughed. “It’s magnificent.” She walked forward and patted it on the nose as well, and it dipped the massive horn which grew from its forehead and nudged her with its nose, gently enough to not even move her. I spluttered. “I shall call him Brutus.”

  I found my voice. “You will not!”

  She looked at me. “Can you think of a better name?”

  “You are not riding a rhinoceros into battle!” I didn’t like the way the black beast was looking at me. Or at her. Only… She patted its nose and walked to one side of it, and it awkwardly buckled a knee. She looked at the harness for a moment, then grabbed straps and swarmed up the side of it with the device that looked like a rope ladder hanging from the saddle. Setting into the high-cantled seat, she looked down at me.

  “I love you, but I must.” Her voice was soft, and almost sad.

  I stepped back and she picked up the reins. Be damned if it wasn’t a good idea. Who the hell was going to stand before a charging armored rhino? She looked at the Huntsman and nodded.

  He looked at me. Or so I assume, since he turned his helmeted face in my direction. “We ride with her. I cannot promise no harm will come, but it must pass through the hunt first.”

  I sighed. “I suppose I owe you thanks.”

  He laughed, a gravelly sound. “I shall collect after it is done.”

  “Where is Raven?” I wasn’t really asking her, just letting her know what I was doing when I tipped my head back and looked skyward. High above us, I could make out the dark silhouette of the spirit. He would be looking for the Wendigo now that we’d delivered the crown to Bella.

  “Bella, where is Beaker?” This time I really did need to know.

  “I set him to guard the children. He is wrapped around the garden along with what I think must be all of the wood elf women.” I could see her smile. Ash trotted up with a simple silver helm.

  “Here.” He stepped back quickly as the rhino bared a mouthful of seriously carnivorous-looking teeth at him. “Um…”

  I took it from him, thwacked Brutus on the snout, and stepped up onto the ladder thing. Bella took the helmet. “Pull this thing up, so attackers can’t board you.” I told her, and pulled one hand to me. “Come back to me, princess.” I kissed her hand and jumped down, turning my back on her and feeling my throat contract painfully.

  “Ash. I need a horse.”

  “Got one already, boss.” He was smiling at me, and I suppressed a growl. Everyone thought it was cute I’d gone all mushy.

  “Which direction to the kitsune?” I asked, stepping up into the saddle of the solidly built chestnut he’d beckoned forward. The groom handed me the reins.

  Ash pointed down the hill and toward the field of battle. “I sent them to left flank.”

  I’d start with them, then, and work my way across the field. I could hear the drums, now, and the light was more golden than pink as the sun rose. Across the valley, a sudden howl of raw voices screaming and skirl of trumpets told me that action was imminent.

  “Let’s get to it, then.” I kicked the horse and he broke into a startled trot, and as I got out of camp, a canter.

  The Fog of War

  Even with magic, there is no way one mere mortal can see the whole field of battle at once. Magical messages might fly faster than any messenger from one end to another, but the ability to micro-manage was something that had been strongly discouraged from before I could remember in High Court army doctrine. That led to defeat in detail, I’d been taught, and from what I had seen in two centuries of human combat Above, no truer words had ever been spoken.

  I didn’t know about Low, but the High army was given directions, and initiative. The commanders of each part of the field further delegated downward, until each unit was not a rigid gear existing only as part of a machine, but an autonomous tool that could be wielded by itself.

  I realized that my nerves were coming out in absurd metaphors, and dragged my focus back to the other side of the river, which I could see across the clear field. The kitsune were supposed to be in this area, but I didn’t see them yet. There was a thick patch of willows that stretched all the way up to the river bank.

  My horse shied as a big red fox popped out of the willow thicket. With four magnificent plumy tails, he was likely one of the men in charge. I pulled the horse to a halt.

  “Hai.” I greeted him. “How goes it?”

  “Well, milord.” I decided not to correct him. Dukedom or no dukedom, I was woefully unqualified to be in charge of anything, much less appointed a general on the field. But this much I did know. That would wait until later, right now they needed to have a figurehead. If she wanted me to play mascot, I’d take it to the hilt.

&nbs
p; He was wearing samurai armor, sans the helmet at the moment, although I suspected it was in that tangle of brush. “Your plan?” I asked. Not much I could do about it now, but I was curious.

  He bowed slightly. “The plan is to draw the enemy as they ford the river, in what will look like a rout, and then…” He bared his long teeth. “We hamstring them.”

  Guerilla warfare, use the countryside against the enemy. I don’t know why I had worried, the people of the islands had been perfecting that for some time now. I bowed slightly in return from my horse-borne vantage point. “May your knives always find tendon.”

  He laughed, and I turned the horse away, wondering if I would see him again. I’d known, in the past, men who had died under my command. But that was the key. I had known them. I had known they were warriors, who met the end with valor and purpose. But today, I didn’t even know the big kitsune’s name, much less that of his men. I was sending them to die wholesale, and it hurt.

  Across the river, I could see a force of mounted men riding toward the ford. I watched them come, feeling the force of their charge even though I was too far away to hear them. I reached into the nospace and pulled out a pair of binoculars. Now, I could see them more clearly, from the armored fairy man in the lead, with his sword held out in a classic charge! Gesture, to the men behind him with open mouths, screaming something as they leaned into their horse’s necks and hit the river in a spray of foam and hooves.

  I felt detached, analyzing the charge as being an act of sheer foolhardiness. Unless… even if they had scouted the ford, hitting it at a gallop was a good way to get someone killed even before contact with the enemy. I scanned the group, and saw that, yes, one was down. The horse he’d been riding was kicking wildly, straining to get up again, but the man was gone, out of sight entirely. I let out a huff of breath, and slung the binoculars. The charge was already losing steam, and from a tightly grouped force, it was down to a line of straggling horses that could easily be flanked.