Dragons, Power, Courts, And War (Book 2)

by Vic Broquard

  Karel chuckled, that idea he liked. After they all joined hands, Zoran again Shadow Walked the group, arriving in the entrance passage. Just before he materialized the group, he checked with Danika to make sure no dragons had arrived yet. None had. He set everyone down gently. “Cook is that way. The women, this way,” he called out.

  “I’ll put up a couple of Force Walls over the entrance and make it opaque. If any dragons should return, they can’t get in or see inside,” Zdenka suggested.

  “Oh my!” Verushka exclaimed softly as she entered the large cavern and saw the seventeen women. At the moment, they were leaning over the tables, gobbling up bowls of food that the cook had just brought in for them. Their arms hung uselessly at their sides. Their hair was a mess of matted hair and hay. While all wore the tops of whatever outfit they had on when they were captured, everything below their waists had been either removed or cut off, thus making it easy for them to squat over the latrine barrels that had not been emptied since they arrived.

  “Danika?” Zoran said, uncertain which woman she was.

  “Me. Thank you for helping us. We don’t want to die. None of us do. Please help us.” She was twenty-two, with shoulder length black hair and dark eyes. All of the women had dark bags under their eyes, and many were bloodshot from periods of crying. Danika was a tall, thin woman, but perky. She had been the mother of two young babies before the attack. The other women ranged in age from their late teens through the mid-twenties at most, he noted, just as Jakob had ascertained.

  “Jakob? Is that you too?” she called out, recognizing the Archmage of the warlord.

  “Yes, we’ve come to get you out of here, Danika,” he said boldly with an air of pride and satisfaction.

  Meanwhile, Jarka took out her lock picks and went from woman to woman unlocking their neck collars. Nadia entered bringing the thoroughly exhausted cook and she gasped at the sight. “Hey, I count only eighteen women, including the cook. We are short ten women, plus where are the two dozen men?” asked Jakob, growing concerned that this rescue was only partially complete.

  Danika acted as the women’s spokeswoman. “They were taken away by some Black Dragons. We don’t know where. We’ve not seen the men since we were all abducted and flying off into the sky with the dragons after the attack.”

  “Damn, damn, damn,” Jakob could not control his anger. “Now what, Zoran?” he asked.

  “We get these women to safety and come back and do some more searching,” he replied, unable to think of a better idea at the moment.

  As soon as the last lock was undone, Zoran began getting the Duskas organized to Shadow Walk the women back to his fortress. However, the women’s arms were just as Danika had said, useless. Apparently, they could neither move them nor had any feeling in them. As the various Duskas took hold of a woman’s hand, it felt strange to them. Zoran alternated one of his people in between the women so that they all could be brought through the Shadows by the Duska. This seemed to work, so he began having the Duskas take their groups back to Brn. He and Zdenka were the last to go. Satisfied that they were leaving no trace of themselves behind and with Zdenka using her spells to make sure that no dragon was behind their opaque Force Walls, the two canceled the many spells over the cavern’s entrance, and he Shadow Walked themselves back to Brn.

  They arrived in the infirmary — Jarka’s agreed upon location. Zoran had his two physicians there along with their four nurses. Thinking ahead, Jarka had also left two dozen healing potions there ready for use. As Zoran arrived, he overheard Jarka. “Okay, Danika, I’ll have your arms all healed up in a jiffy. Drink this; it is a healing potion.” She held the small vial up to her lips and poured the precious contents into her mouth.

  “Tastes good,” Danika commented. “We are always starving. It is so strange. After we were raped, it seems like we just cannot get enough to eat, not ever. How long will it take to get our arms working again?”

  Jarka was already touching her arms, though Danika still could not feel her touch. “Hum. Strange. It should be working by now. Are you sure you cannot feel my fingers on your arm?”

  “Nope, nothing. I can’t move them. It’s like they aren’t there,” she replied.

  “Well, maybe it will take a bit longer. Let me look after the others,” Jarka replied, quite baffled. It should be working already. Something was wrong.

  “Hey, Jarka, get these three next. With no feeling in their arms, these three have somehow managed to break them, and the breaks look really bad to me,” Akira called out. She had been going around getting each woman’s name and ascertaining her current status.

  “Oh my, those are really bad breaks. If we don’t get them healed fast, gangrene is going to set in and that can be life-threatening,” one physician pronounced. The two physicians and Jarka attended to these three cases immediately. Then, one by one, they administered the healing potion to all of the women.

  After that, Jarka returned to Danika and tested her arms again. “Damn, still nothing Danika?”

  “Nope, nothing at all,” she replied bravely. “Can we have something to eat and drink? We’re starving.”

  The cook, they learned, was Bronya Casmir, who ran the now destroyed inn in Petr Falls. “I don’t understand it. No matter how much food I cook these women, they are always complaining that they are starving!”

  “Okay, let’s get them a meal pronto and then let’s get them all bathed and into clean clothes,” Zdenka took charge, adding, “hopefully by then, the potions will have worked.”

  A half hour later, although the group attempted to feed the women, all of them complained that they were going too slow. Ultimately, Zdenka dumped each woman’s plate into a bowl, and the women leaned over and gobbled the food frantically. “I don’t understand it,” she whispered. “They are eating as if they are utterly famished!”

  “It’s like a wave of panic is over them as far as eating is concerned,” Verushka added. “At least that went quickly. Okay, ladies, time to get you cleaned up and into some new dresses.”

  “Will there be more food when we are done with that?” asked Danika. “We’ll all be hungry again by then for sure.”

  While the women’s needs were being handled, Zoran decided that he needed to be here and help figure out the women’s true situation. “Okay, Tomas, Nadia, Dusan, and Verushka I want you to go back there and scout around some. Make sure that you are always invisible. See if you can locate the ten missing women and the two dozen men. They have to be somewhere.”

  “You got it dad,” Tomas replied, eager to have some action. He was rather appalled at the women’s situation and felt quite useless at the moment.

  While Verushka wanted to stick around, she knew that Zoran wanted two Archmages who were also Duska on this scouting trip. Reluctantly, she agreed. Zdenka whispered, “I’ll keep you posted via Chika.” She knew that her Message spell would not go off-world, but Chika was Duska and could relay her news.

  An hour later, the seventeen pregnant women looked human again, though the physicians said that they all looked like they were pregnant for forty-five days, not just ten or less. Zoran took careful note of this aspect. Somehow the dragon babies were maturing drastically faster than human ones, he found this quite alarming. Zdenka theorized that if the dragon fetuses were growing at ten times the rate for a human fetus, then that might account for the drastic intake of food. Indeed, none of the women looked at all overweight, rather the opposite.

  However, seventeen women looked human once more. Dressed in clean white cotton dresses and their hair washed and brushed, they felt human as well, which raised their spirits considerably. However, none of their arms had recovered, though the three whose arms were broken were on the mend. Jarka administered two more doses of her healing potions, hoping to speed it along much faster. Bronya, the cook, however, was now sound asleep.

  After feeding the women again, Zdenka and Zoran sat down with them and had the women describe what had happened in detail. They insisted t
he women tell them everything that the dragons had said or that they had overheard. The two needed some clues about the women’s physical condition now and in the not so distant future. One woman relayed that she had overhead one of the dragons saying that when the time came for the birth of the baby dragons, the baby would chew and claw its way out and then drink its mother’s nourishing blood. Of course, they all knew that would mean the death of the woman. This both shocked and frightened Zoran and everyone else. He’d rescued them, but unless something could be done about the dragons they were carrying, they’d die in spite of it all.

  At suppertime, the others returned from their Rehor scouting mission. They had had no luck at all. The ten missing women and the men were nowhere to be found. Even more curious, the bodies of the two dead women could not be found as well. Jakob cursed and returned home to his new tower in the north.

  Over dinner, Zoran discussed their meager findings with his entire group. Finally, he made some decisions. “Jarka, you and the physicians work on getting the women’s arms working again. Verushka, Zdenka, and Nadia, you three study the women’s bodies and see if you can work out any way under the sun, moon, and stars to save them from death when the dragons are ready to be born. I am going to pay a visit to Aldrick and see if he can shed more light on our serious problem and see if he can find out where the missing men and women are located. Perhaps he can get them back for us, if they are still alive. The rest of you are to help care for these women’s needs, which seem to be huge at the moment.”

  One doesn’t become an Archmage without knowing a tremendous amount of and about magic and its energies. It didn’t take them long to discover that all seventeen women were now radiating heavy amounts of magical energies, quite unlike the cook who was not pregnant. Using every spell that they knew, they ascertained that there was some kind of very unique phenomenon going on between the human women and the alien dragon fetuses that they were growing within their wombs. However, they factually discovered little else. They spent all night going over every possible magical tomb in Zdenka’s massive library, but found little there that could help. Defeated, they finally went to bed around three in the morning.

  On a sadder note, after dinner, the women had finally calmed down enough to ask about their own families. Danika asked if her babies survived, though she had seen her husband being burned alive and held no hope for him. To help, Neda came by to visit with Danika, her old babysitter. The seventeen women cried long into the night, knowing that only Neda survived the attack. Their homes, families, and lives had been destroyed, shattered in only a matter of minutes.

  “I know that I’ve only the one arm now, Danika, but Archmage Zdenka is teaching me magic! I am going to be a Mage when I grow up!” Neda excitedly explained. This brought the first real smile to Danika’s face.

  “You go ahead and do just that my Little Weed,” Danika encouraged her, using the playful nickname that the two had invented for Neda, some years ago.

  “I will and I promise to come and help you too, just as much as I can,” Neda added. After that, Neda spent all of her free time each day chatting with Danika and the other sixteen women — all of whom knew her and she, they.

  Zoran contacted Aldrick and the great gold agreed to see him in his lair with Sofie, his mate. “Well, we have a really big problem. You’ve heard about the dragon raid on Petr Falls up north?” he began.

  “Yes, most unfortunate. I really thought that I had the dragons’ agreement to stop such raids.”

  “Well, it is far, far worse that the mere killing of over two thousand men, women, and children. This time, Aldrick, they have gone too far. It was a band of reds, blacks, whites, and greens who made the raid. However, they took thirty young women and two dozen strong men away with them. We’ve managed to locate twenty of the women. It seems that the dragons have impregnated these women and that the women are now carrying baby dragon fetuses! We have no idea where ten other women are located or the two dozen men who were abducted.”

  “Oh good god! Is such even possible, Aldrick?” a startled and quite shocked Sofie exclaimed. “We dragons only produce an egg about every ten years. I’ve never heard of dragons breeding with you humans. It sounds awful. How is it even possible?”

  “Probably they took human form to breed, dear. There is no other way. I highly doubt that they Morphed the women into dragons to breed. I didn’t know that such interspecies breeding was even possible, Zoran. I will look into this. It cannot be good for the women.”

  “No it isn’t. They are eating ten times the normal amount of food that we usually eat. They also paralyzed the women’s arms.” Zoran went through a lengthy detailed account from the discovery of the raid through the rescue and their current state. “What concerns me is what they overheard would be happening when the babies are born.” He outlined what they had said.

  “Oh those poor women!” declared Sofie.

  “Say, I know one old gold who might know something about this. Stanislaus is getting rather old, close to five hundred sixty now and a might feebleminded. Still, it is the only thing that I can think of, Zoran. Come on; let’s pay him a visit,” Aldrick suggested.

  A quick teleport spell later, Aldrick entered a cavern high in the mountains of far western Adapazan. After getting Stanislaus’ permission, he Messaged Zoran to come on in, the aged dragon would see him. Zoran noted that the old dragon’s hide was spotted and no longer golden. He moved slowly and Zoran suspected his joints ached. “We’ve come for some ancient wisdom, old dragon,” Aldrick began. “Interspecies mating between humans and dragons. Is it even possible? If so, how does it work?”

  “Interspecies mating? My, I haven’t heard those words for a very, very long time. Seems to me I heard something about that. No, maybe I read something about that. No, maybe someone told me something about that at one time or other in my youth. I can’t remember exactly.”

  “What did you hear? Is it possible?” asked Aldrick.

  “Oh yes, it is possible, if I remember it right. Male dragon and female human, I believe. I don’t know if it is the other way around though. Memory is not so good anymore, Aldrick. Perils of growing old, I’m afraid.”

  “Okay, so what happens to the human female? Does she give birth to a dragon or is it a human with some kind of unusual properties that usually associated with us dragons? I can’t imagine what the baby would be like.”

  “My memory is a bit fuzzy, but I seem to recall something about the baby being a dragon anyway. You know, my great-great-great grandfather, he had a tomb on such things. I seem to have a memory of some kind about my dad showing me the book in his library back on Voss. Is Voss still there? I wonder what happened to Voss after we left it. No more food, yes, we ran out of hoofers, didn’t we, and had to come here.” His mind began wandering again. “We used to go for swims in the ocean. Now that was fun. Perhaps I ought to go for a swim here. I’ve seen the ocean when I am out flying and hunting sometimes. I don’t think that it is too far from here. Aldrick, care to go for a swim like I used to do when I was a young dragon?”

  “Not just now, Stanislaus. We need to find out more about this interspecies breeding. Some reds have done it with some human females and they are having an awful lot of troubles.”

  “Well, I should think so. We are not supposed to interspecies breed, you know. Why would the reds do that anyway? There are a lot of reds around. I’ve seen them a couple of times now. Didn’t you say that the reds have their own world now and are not here with us?”

  “Yes, that’s right, Stanislaus. About the tomb. Any idea where it might be at? Any idea whatever happened to that tomb?” he asked.

  “Don’t know. Last I saw of it was four hundred years ago when I left home to make my own cavern home. I think it was on Voss, wasn’t it? We did come from Voss, didn’t we, Aldrick? I keep forgetting things it seems.” He seemed confused again.

  “Yes, we came from Voss. So it was last seen in your dad’s cavern?”

  “What was las
t seen there? Dad? Why yes, I said goodbye and he told me to live a long and prosperous life. I seem to have done just that, Aldrick. You know, that is a fine thing to say.”

  Aldrick was a little annoyed, but he knew patience was needed with the old dragon. He and Zoran worked with Stanislaus for several more hours, but in fact got little more useful information from him. Regretfully, the two headed back to Aldrick’s home, where Sofie had prepared them a hearty drink, human style for Zoran’s benefit.

  “Our gestation period is sixty days, Zoran,” Sofie explained. “So if interspecies breeding is possible, then I would expect that you will be having births in sixty days as well. That would make sense. What are you going to do with seventeen baby reds, that’s what I’d like to know? Reds are worthless dragons anyway.”

  “Honestly, I don’t know, Sofie. Right now, I am more interested in finding a way to save the lives of the seventeen women. Say, can I ask you both about how dragons give birth? I know nothing at all about your reproductive systems. Perhaps I can find some clues in it that will help me with our women.”

  Another two hours passed as Sofie and Aldrick shared the information with Zoran. Ordinarily, they’d never tell humans such intimate details, but both felt that they owed it to him, since rogue dragons had gone ahead and done this despicable action. It was late when he finally returned home, his head filled with exotic images, but no closer to a handling.

  The twelfth day came with no change in the women’s arms. Their voracious appetites were finally being satisfied, thanks to some astute suggestions by Verushka, who insisted that the pregnant women eat very healthy and balanced meals more frequently. Zdenka swore that she could see their womb size increasing each day, though.

  Jarka, on the other hand, was terribly upset that her healing potions had not helped the women’s arms in the slightest. While the three broken arms were now a thing of the past, having healed up well, the women were still in danger of breaking arms by accidentally sitting on them or other means. They simply had no feeling, no sensation, no control over their arms, which dangled about like some useless appendages. Worse, Jarka and Neda swore that Danika’s arms were definitely shrinking, losing muscle tissue, and she was afraid that soon their arms might be little more than skin and bones. Atrophy was setting in rapidly, probably accelerated by their heightened metabolism.