by Vic Broquard
Jarka was stumped, as were the two physicians. All three suspected the long healed little punctures on the women’s shoulders might have had something to do with the arm situation, but they had no idea what. “Gang, I am afraid that I am way out of my league with this arm situation. My potions ought to have worked, yet they obviously have not.”
“Let’s find a corpse and do some dissection, shall we?” one physician finally suggested. For him, this was a last resort and one not taken lightly. They needed Zoran’s permission to dig up a grave, and he begrudgingly gave it for the sake of the women.
Jarka wanted no part of this, however, and left the two men go their way. Instead, she visited the women and apologized to Danika and the others, “I am so terribly sorry that my healing potions have not helped your arms. I have failed you, and I am so sorry that I have. I cannot fathom what the dragons did to your arms, and I am at a complete loss about how to heal them. Please forgive me. I will keep on trying, but right now, I have no more ideas at all.”
“That’s all right, Mage Jarka. We are more worried about what’s going to happen to us in a few more days when these foul, evil beasts want to be born. I really don’t want to die. Maybe you can work on that for us,” Danika suggested bravely. The other women agreed with one pointing out that having their arms working again would do them no good if they died giving birth to these evil, wicked beasts growing rapidly inside them. She agreed with them and began helping the Archmages with their research.
“I wish that we could actually see what the developing thing looks like,” Verushka declared somewhat exasperated. More days passed and the various Archmages were no closer to understanding the situation than when they started. There simply were no records, no hints, and no ideas about dragons interbreeding with humans. For that matter, about the only item on dragons was old Archmage Oldrich’s treatise that they’d read when they were magic students of hers well over twenty years ago.
The women’s bellies were growing almost daily or so it seemed. The only data that they had was the fragments of comments the women had picked up from their captors — not much to go on. Still, they refused to give up all hope.
On the other hand, the two physicians were having a marvelous time dissecting several corpses. While they saw much that they did not understand, they had no real sense of what they were actually trying to find. The only conclusion that they reached was that the human body was awfully complicated, far beyond their knowledge and means.
Lacking any real progress, Zoran finally decided to see if his allies could find out anything that might help. Besides, he was overdue in informing them of the latest treachery on the part of the dragons. Shocked. That is the best way to describe the reactions of the other allied barons and baronesses when they heard what had happened. After the horror reactions and anger subsided, Baron Leo made an interesting suggestion. “You know, if we are going to find anything written about dragons, it is going to have to be in the most ancient records that we have. Obviously, there have not been dragons on our worlds ever, since their founding, but our founding barons came from somewhere else. If there is going to be any records or data on dragons, it would have to come from that era, if such even exists.”
His suggestion triggered a new wave of research by the barons of the allied planets. Zoran still had the many ancient volumes penned by the original founder and baron of Adapazan, Baron Valentýn Vladislov. Further, the Zars also had volumes and volumes of the ancient writings of Bandar Zar, the creator of the Circles of Ascension from those founding days. Zoran Messaged his daughter, Jarmila and her husband Miroslav Zar. Both came for an extended stay and began searching through the huge number of volumes that were stored in the secret extra-dimensional room near Zoran’s Circle of Ascension.
Further, following another suggestion of Baron Leo, Zoran sent all those who could be spared over to the main ancient Castle Dorumova and the original Circle of Ascension here on Adapazan, where Baron Jan Vavrin reigned. The mission: perform another exhaustive search for ancient books and scrolls and to look for hitherto for unknown secret chambers which might hold more records. Baron Jan, however, was hoping to discover more gold and gems hidden away in these forgotten hiding places.
Day thirty came, bringing Aldrick by to report. “Damnable reds anyway. Blacks too. I swear that they are lying to me. Both leaders claim that they know nothing at all about any raid on Petr Falls. They know nothing about any captive women or men and tried to sound appalled at interspecies breeding, claiming it was news to them as well. I don’t believe a word that they said! Yet, I can find out nothing for you, Zoran. I’ve decided to send out spies. I haven’t done that for nearly two hundred years now, but this is the vilest treachery imaginable. We will see if we can locate the missing women and men somehow. I must apologize for my failure, Zoran. Such has not happened to me in hundreds of years. This is not going to turn out pleasant, I am afraid, especially if we catch those dragons responsible.”
“Thanks, Aldrick. I know that you are doing all that you can to help out,” Zoran said gracefully and the big gold left, teleporting away.
Later that day, Baron Leo dropped by to personally show Zoran what they’d found. He was excited. “Look, we’ve been going through all the most ancient documents that we can find. Lida has been a big help with this. She is working tirelessly on the project. We came across this one passage written by our founder, Baron Leopold Matous himself. Here, the writing is pretty faded, but you can read it for yourself.”
Zoran read:
The conflicts with the worms have escalated to the point where we could no longer live together. I chose, with many others, to follow Bandar Zar’s suggestion and have led the exodus of the Matous clan to this, our new home, free of all worms.
“What’s a worm?” Zoran asked.
“We honestly don’t know, but it sounds promising. Perhaps our ancestors called dragons worms. Some of the snake-like dragons could be called accurately a worm. Lida thinks so anyway and is now cross-checking everything looking for anything written about worms. I think that we might be on to something vitally important here, Zoran.” Baron Leo was very animated and excited.
“Okay, I’ll see if we can find anything here about these worms of yours. It sounds plausible. There is no reason that the ancient word for the beasts has remained the same. After all, as far as we are concerned, dragons are a recent arrival.” Since Leo was so excited about this finding, Zoran summoned everyone else to come have a look for themselves, which pleased the young man. After he left, everyone hit the records once more, this time looking for anything that mentioned the word worm.
Several days later, four such passages appeared in dis-related documents. Essentially, all four suggested that the original founders were fleeing from worms, backing up Baron Leo’s discovery.
By day forty, the seventeen women’s problem grew worse, requiring the Archmages’ full attention, and Zoran had to drop this research project to help out. The growing dragons were now kicking and moving around within the women’s wombs causing them terrific discomfort and pain. “Good god, imagine one of those four legged creatures with huge claws and enormous wings and giant tail inside them moving around,” Archmage Verushka explained. “I am amazed that the women are not being seriously injured by the baby dragons! We have got to start to do something, Zoran, we just have to.”
Mention of the form of the babies got Zoran to thinking or rather imagining what was going on inside the women, just as Verushka had intended. However, it also got him thinking along an entirely different line of thought. “Say, Verushka, if the babies are moving around and actually have a basic Red Dragon body form, what would happen if we cast a Morph Other spell on them, turning their bodies into a human form? Wouldn’t that settle them down and make it more like a regular pregnancy?”
“Brilliant Zoran! Yes, it just might work. If we can force them to assume their human shape, the pain and discomfort ought to alleviate almost at once! You are a genius. Now then,
how do we do it?”
“In this case, we will be morphing dragons into human forms. Since a dragon has this ability natively — say, it just occurred to me — why would a dragon have this as a native ability — to morph into human form any time it desires? Anyway, there is a good chance the spell will fail with these highly intelligent dragons. So we must be prepared to cast it several times just in case. Then, if it works and the women get relief, we can keep at it. Probably at some later point in time the dragon may well revert back to its dragon form again. We may have to keep on casting the Morph Other spell frequently,” Zoran explained.
“Hey, I wrote that one down to research later, Zoran. Just why should a dragon be able to inherently morph into a human form? Okay, let’s get all the Archmages together and have a go at it,” Zdenka suggested.
Ten minutes later, they all gathered in the infirmary. “Okay, ladies, we are going to try something that we hope will alleviate the pain and discomfort that you are experiencing,” Zoran explained to the seventeen women who were moaning and groaning, holding and rubbing their large bellies rather awkwardly with their feet. Their arms still hung uselessly at their sides. “Danika, we’ll use you as our test subject.” She managed to flash a slight grin. Obviously, she was in great discomfort and being unable to use her hands only made things far worse for the brave young woman.
Verushka cast her first Morph Other spell. As the magical energies flashed, Danika felt immediate relief! “Oh, that is so much better! Thank you!” she exclaimed, greatly relieved. All the Archmages grinned and set to work on the other sixteen women. Several times the spell had to be repeated, but within ten minutes all felt the enormous relief of having a normal human shaped baby in their wombs.
Zoran then explained what they had done. “We cast what is called a Morph Other spell. It allows us to change the recipient’s body into that of any other species we can think of. In this case, we morphed the dragon body into a human body. Now the problem is that dragons can do this anytime that they so desire. So don’t expect them to stay this way. It is likely that sooner or later the baby will of its own accord morph itself back into its dragon form. When that happens, let us know and we will morph it back into human form again.”
“Thank you. Just having this much relief is wonderful,” Danika replied.
As the time of birthing was rapidly drawing near, the group thought it wise to start preparing. Somewhere around twenty days or less remained. “When the time comes, we could cut the foul beast out of them,” suggested one of the physicians.
Zoran rejected that idea, except as a very last resort. The vast majority of women who had to have their babies cut out died as a result of the operation. Surgery was in its barest infancy within the Federation at this time. Zdenka pointed out another consideration which also moved this idea to that of very last resort, “Look, it is a dragon after all. If we go cutting it out, might it not feel threatened and let loose a blast of its fiery breath on us all?” That sounded terribly grim, particularly to the physicians who would be doing the surgery. None knew at this time that a baby dragon’s breath weapon was not fully developed at birth.
Verushka made the best suggestion. “Say, since this morphing is working, when it is time for the birth, why don’t we continue to keep the dragon morphed into human form until it is out of the woman? That way, it would seem to be a normal birth.”
Lacking any other viable idea, they decided to follow this approach. Zdenka insisted that between now and the time of birth that they keep accurate records for each woman, noting each time that that specific baby dragon had to be re-morphed back into a human form again. That way, when it was time, they would have a better idea how this would work out. All were worried about pulling out a flaming dragon with their hands.
A day later, they began to have a good idea of how long a dragon baby would stay morphed into human form. On the average it was six hours per spell, some longer, some shorter. On the sixth day of this, Archmage Karel came up with an improved variation. He also cast the Make Permanent spell on the morphed dragon. Of course, he knew that it would not really be permanent. After all, on anything other than a dragon, the morphing would be permanent anyway until the magic was dispelled by a mage. However, this extra push extended the average time by four hours, giving everyone a nice break — ten hours, more or less, between re-castings.
As the sixtieth day approached, Verushka had another fear. “Look, what are we going to do if all these women go into labor at the same time? We’re going to need seventeen spell casters here just in case the spell has to be re-cast over and over while the baby is being born.” That was a sobering thought and Zoran commandeered all of the other Archmages on Adapazan who were in the employ of the warlords. Zdenka had trained them many of the younger ones and now she called for their help. Jakob and four other Archmages joined the throng in the infirmary, all patiently waiting for the women to go into labor.
November 25th came and Verushka’s worse fears materialized. That morning, woman after woman went into labor! Worse, the babies continued to attempt to morph themselves back into their natural dragon form, but the Archmages continued to re-cast their morph spells and adding to it their Make Permanent spells. However, the duration now ranged from a half hour to an hour at most. The casters and the women had a very long, arduous day of it all. Each had to stay alert. By now, the women could tell when their baby dragons were about to morph back into their dragon forms and alerted the casters who intervened before it could fully take place. It was a race between dragon and caster and woman.
Late afternoon, the sounds of a newborn baby’s cry echoed off the stone walls of the infirmary! Danika’s dragon was born. At once, Zoran cast his Vanish spell, depositing the dragon just above the sun. The physicians immediately began examining her and Jarka poured three healing potions down the woman’s throat as fast as she could. A huge round of applause from the Archmages, mages, and others accompanied the physician’s pronouncement, “Hey, I do believe that Danika is going to be just fine. Everything looks absolutely normal with her now! Incredible!” The relief on the young woman’s face told all. She would have clapped too if her arms would have been working.
One by one, during the next two days, the other women gave birth to their baby dragon, without mishap. Zoran, Jarka, and the physicians repeated their actions sixteen more times before everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
After the last woman was pronounced fit, Zoran said cheerfully, “Ladies, congratulations. With your help, we’ve done it. We’ve saved your lives. Way to go ladies! I am extremely proud of each and every one of you. You never gave up hope and neither did we. Well done! By the way, I would be honored if you would all consider staying here in my fortress in Brn. However, if you wish to return to Tratky, that is fine too. Either way, I will see that you all never want for a thing for the rest of your lives. Never have I seen such bravery in the face of certain death!” Now that they knew that they were going to live, he desperately wanted to help them continue to survive and to perhaps establish new lives here.
Danika said to the other women, “See, I told you that Baron Zoran would save us.” She had never doubted him these past fifty or so days and had constantly worked to convince the other sixteen women, keeping their morale up as well.
“Yes, but what about their arms?” asked Neda, who had come to watch and hold Danika’s hand, even though she knew that Danika could not feel her hand.
“Ah yes, that,” Zoran sighed. “As you ladies know, getting you through this birth process took priority. As Danika pointed out to me days ago, ‘What use are arms if we die when the dragon is born?’ We’ve necessarily have put that on the back burner so to speak. We will all get onto that now that you are all safe and sound. However, in all good faith, I must say that we are at a complete loss about what they did to your arms or how to repair them. Still, tomorrow we will get back onto that project. Ladies, how about a bath and a move into real bedrooms for you all?”
The
women were all for that. While the others began handling the seventeen women and Neda lending her single hand, Zoran, Zdenka, Jarka, and the two physicians met in his room to discuss the women’s arm problem. He had not told them the full truth, not just yet. While their full attention had been on trying to save their lives, they had also been working on their arm situation, gathering more data and making more observations. At this point, none of it was good. As expected, their arms continued to atrophy due to zero movement and exercise and their highly escalated metabolism. Worse, their arms continually got in the women’s way and several more fractures had occurred.
One physician pointed out the rather obvious conclusion, “Look, it is way too dangerous for us to leave their arms as they are. If they break them accidentally, which has already happened five more times, then they risk getting gangrene or worse. With no feeling in them whatsoever, they can be broken and the woman won’t even know it. They could get a cut and bleed profusely, and unless they spot the blood, they’d never know it had happened. Honestly, these arms are going to be incredibly dangerous for them. They will have to keep healing potions with them at all times and have someone ready to dispense it at the first sign of trouble.” Although Zoran, Zdenka, and Jarka hated this line of thought, this was a rather obvious conclusion that they had more or less seen for themselves these past weeks.
“What are you saying? If we can’t restore their arms back to normal, then what?” asked Zoran.