Ben felt visceral fear course through him, the kind of fear prey feel in the presence of their natural predator. The drone turned toward the window and accelerated, hitting the glass at high speed and breaking a small hole through it without shattering the pane. It sped away from the temple, making a beeline for the tallest building nearby and landing on top of its chimney.
The view from the feed instantly changed, looking back at the temple.
The dragon glided in gracefully, landing on the topmost platform, tipping his head back and roaring again. All the world fell deathly silent. The drone feed went dark.
When Ben opened his eyes, everyone was looking at him, their faces deathly pale.
“Was that the dragon?” Imogen asked, her voice trembling.
Ben nodded. Even without the benefit of the augment, he knew that he would never forget what he’d just seen. Black as sackcloth, the wyrm had leathery batlike wings, a huge snout that opened into a maw filled with needle-sharp teeth, a long tail ending in a single barb, and eyes like those of a gigantic cat. The creature was enormous—sixty feet from nose to tail with a wingspan to match.
“That isn’t possible,” the augment said.
“Show me the footage,” Ben said.
There was a moment’s hesitation before the image appeared in his mind’s eye. He was starting to get used to the split reality the augment created for him, one set of images coming through his eyes, the other through his mind. As the image played out again, Ben noticed the rider.
“Stop … go back and stop.”
The image slowly reversed and then stopped at the best angle to see the rider.
“Can you magnify that image?” Ben asked.
The augment zoomed in quickly, revealing a rider that wasn’t human, at least not anymore. He was humanoid, but distinctly dragonlike, with a snout, horns, wings, and catlike eyes. His skin was scaled, and his fingers ended in inch-long black talons.
“What are we going to do?” Imogen asked, her voice sounding very small.
“We wait,” Ben said. “It’s all we can do.”
He went to his aunt and gave her a hug. She buried her face on his shoulder and wept.
The dragon roared again, this time more in anger than in announcement of his presence.
The drone feed abruptly resumed, shifting view rapidly until it had acquired the dragon again, flying toward the north end of town.
A streak of light suddenly shot up from the ground, brilliantly illuminating the early morning sky. The dragon rolled out of the way effortlessly, tucking his wings back and falling into a dive toward the place where the light had originated, breathing a gout of flame as he neared the ground, flaring his wings to break his fall and coming to a momentary hover in an instant.
For several seconds, fire roared forth from the dragon, thoroughly engulfing the ground. Then he turned away and began to gain altitude, craning his neck to see his kill. He roared again.
The drone shot straight up into the air, gaining several thousand feet in a matter of seconds, the image zooming in to view the spot where the dragon had breathed fire. The Warlock stood on a perfectly circular scrap of dirt that was entirely unscathed. Fire raged all around him, but within a radius of ten feet, the area was untouched.
He had a single Dragon Guard with him, the man clearly enchanted by his magic. The dragon roared again, banking for another attack when the drone refocused on the temple and darted forward, returning to the floor where Cyril was hiding, entering through a window that he’d opened. He sent it out into the hall and watched the guards run by, all of them heading for the lower levels.
After several moments of quiet, he sent the drone to the stairs and scouted the route to the nursery again. Only one guard remained on each of the floors above. He crept out into the hall, moving quickly but quietly.
A roar in the distance stopped him in his tracks for a moment, but then he continued on to the staircase. He waited at the bottom of the stairs, sending the drone up, moving it along the floor close to the wall until it came to the first door. The drone slipped under it and scanned the room, which looked like a small ritual chamber.
The drone rose several inches and then accelerated into the door causing a loud click when it hit. It backed up and did it again, and then again. Ben waited, wondering what was happening until the door opened and Cyril dragged a dead Dragon Guard inside and laid him down behind the altar, taking his sword.
When he opened the door to the hall, both he and Ben were startled to see a Dragon Guard standing there looking at the blood on the floor.
“Intruder!” the Dragon Guard yelled, going for his sword. Cyril stabbed him in the face, driving the point of his blade into the man’s skull, only stopping once it hit the inside of the man’s helmet.
“Shit,” Cyril muttered, catching the man’s body and dragging him into the ritual room.
He waited and listened, sending the drone into the hall to watch for approaching guards, but all was quiet, save for the battle raging in the distance.
Sword in hand, he quietly closed the door and went to the stairs, following his drone into a long empty hallway. On tiptoes he moved toward the nursery. Approaching an open door, he slowed and sent his drone to look inside. Two priests stood on the balcony, watching the battle between the dragon and the Warlock.
Cyril crept past, only moving more quickly once he was certain that they wouldn’t hear him. He reached the nursery without being noticed and carefully opened the door. The room was dark, the early morning light casting a very dim glow through the curtains.
Cyril smiled down at his sleeping grandson. “There you are, my little namesake, I’ve come to take you home,” he whispered, reaching down to pick the child up.
“Hello, Cyril,” an oddly familiar, yet strangely inhuman voice said from off to the side. “I knew you’d come here eventually.”
He whirled, leveling his sword at the voice.
As the drone panned to take in the scene, Ben felt a jolt of horror course through him.
Britney Harper stood in the shadows, her hair dirty and disheveled, her face grimy, her clothes torn and tattered. She stepped into the dim light.
Her eyes were completely black.
“Oh God, Britney, what have they done to you?” Cyril whispered.
She smiled, her once-beautiful teeth now yellow and stained.
“Britney doesn’t live here anymore … but I can still feel her anger at you, at your family … I can still feel how betrayed she felt. That’s why the high priest gave her to me. He knew I would feel her hatred for you and your family. He knew I would be able to track you anywhere.”
“I can help you,” Cyril said.
“Help me? How would you help me?”
“I can try to bring you back.”
“You don’t understand. If Britney came back, I would have to leave. Why would I want that? But you can help me. You can tell me where your grandsons are, especially Frank. He tricked Britney into helping you when she wasn’t supposed to. That’s why they did this to her.”
Cyril stepped to the side, giving himself more room to work and to distance himself from his grandson.
Britney laughed. “Did you really think you could get out of here alive?”
“That was the plan,” Cyril said. “Just out of curiosity, how did you know it was me?”
“I can always find my prey … it’s like a sense of smell, only better. I’m drawn to your essence, the energy that animates you.”
“Interesting,” Cyril said. “I didn’t know they could make a person into a stalker.”
“When it suits them,” she said, stepping into a low crouch.
“I don’t want to hurt you, Britney, but I will if I have to.”
“I told you … Britney doesn’t live here anymore.”
From a standstill, she leapt into the air and landed on Cyril. He had just enough time to run her through, driving the sword into her chest and out her back as she crashed down on top of him.
“I
love you, Ben,” Cyril shouted, as he struggled to throw Britney off of him. “Run!”
She screamed in rage, grabbing him by the shoulders and smashing his head into the floor over and over again until his eyes went blank and blood began to splatter. Enzo’s body went limp and still.
Ben felt a kind of fear that he’d never known before. He raced to his grandfather’s body, catching him as he slumped over.
“No, no, no,” he said, fumbling for a pulse, shaking his head, trying to see through the tears streaming from his eyes. It felt like his insides were trying to claw their way out of his stomach. He laid Cyril down, listening for breath … but there was nothing.
“No,” he said, laying his head down on Cyril’s chest and weeping uncontrollably. Imogen was there a moment later, breaking down in hysterical sobbing and then letting out a blood-chilling scream a moment before she fainted and crumpled to the floor. Ben ignored everything except the grief that had so suddenly flooded into him, permeating every fiber of his being.
He didn’t know that anything could hurt so deeply, a visceral pain that was all-encompassing. He was vaguely aware of Homer lying right beside him, whimpering quietly, his nose just inches from Cyril. Ben’s whole world felt like it was crumbling out from underneath him.
And then there was nothing.
Chapter 38
He woke slowly at first, until he remembered. And then he was wide awake, rolling over and vomiting onto the floor by his bedroll.
“What happened?” Frank demanded. “I want to know everything and they won’t tell me, so you’re going to.” He was standing over Ben, looking down at him with an expression of anger, disgust, and betrayal.
“Shut up, Frank.” Ben curled into a ball and started to cry again, his whole world seeming to unravel. Cyril had been the center of his whole life—his parent, his teacher, and his friend all rolled into one … and now he was gone.
“Get up and answer my questions,” Frank said, hauling Ben to his feet.
He came up in a surge, his grief transforming into rage in an instant. He hit Frank hard in the center of the chest with an open palm. His brother staggered back, his mouth opening as if he were a fish out of water.
“All right, Frank, you want to know what happened, I’ll fucking tell you. You killed Britney. You tricked her into getting us out of that jail cell and then the high priest turned her into a stalker. And then she killed our grandfather.” Ben shoved him.
Frank staggered back a few more steps, a glimmer of fear in his eyes.
“Our grandfather was the Wizard … yeah, that one, the one who fought the dragons and nearly won. He lost two wives and a daughter, our mother, in the bargain, so he took us into hiding, to protect us. But he couldn’t tell us the truth because you’re such a piece of shit that nobody trusts you.
“He hid the egg and he kept all of this from us because he knew that if he told you, you would betray him, you’d betray us all, just like you betrayed Britney.”
“So where’s the egg now?” Frank demanded.
Ben lunged into him, hitting him in the chest with his shoulder, knocking him to the ground.
“You just don’t get it, do you? You killed Britney … you killed our grandfather!”
“No, I didn’t,” Frank said, scrambling to regain his feet. “She helped me because I asked her to. And it got you out of prison.”
“And it cost her everything … but you don’t even care, do you? All you want is the egg.”
“It’s rightfully mine,” Frank said. “I’m the eldest—”
Ben’s sword came free, pointing at Frank in a instant, just inches from his face.
He stopped talking, holding very still, looking at his brother with renewed fear.
“By a minute and a half,” Ben said. “But that doesn’t matter. You will never have that egg. Our grandfather left it to me.”
Frank backed up, pushing himself across the floor with his feet. “Bullshit! He always gave you everything, but not this time.”
“Stop,” Hound said, stepping forward with a warning look to Frank. “Cyril made it crystal clear that the egg goes to Ben. That’s just the way it is, so I suggest you get used to it.”
“I thought you were my friend,” Frank said.
Hound chuckled mirthlessly, shaking his head and sighing sadly. “Cyril was my friend. He hired me to watch over you, not to protect you, but to protect the world from you. He knew exactly what you are, Frank, and so do I. So let me say this clearly: If you try to take that egg from your brother, I’ll put you in the dirt. Got it?” Hound said, with a very pointed look.
Frank regained his feet, shaking his head sadly, donning the mantle of the victim. “All my life, everyone I thought I knew has been lying to me.”
Ben snorted derisively, sheathing his sword and shaking his head as he went to Cyril. He took his tech pistol and ammunition, sword, knives, and money, along with the last ex-plus charge and two grenades. His confrontation with Frank had shoved his grief into the distance. He’d detached from it for the moment, but it was like a monster stalking him in the night … eventually it would catch up with him and crush him utterly, but right now he didn’t have time.
“You’re going to take everything else too, huh?”
“Yeah, I am,” Ben said, turning to face his brother again. “I have a purpose for all of this other than buying whiskey and whores.”
He strapped the revolver on and moved his shotgun to the other side behind his sword, then tossed his empty revolver to the ground at Frank’s feet. “You can have that one … it’s out of bullets anyway.”
“Hate to break up the family drama, but we should be going,” Annabelle said.
Ben looked at her as if remembering that she was even present and nodded. “Are you still willing to take us to safety?”
“You’re the Wizard now,” she said. “My father will want to meet you as soon as possible.”
“All right, what’s your plan?” Ben said, numbness settling into his soul.
“We have a warehouse across town with a shipment bound for K Falls leaving today. They’ll transport us to Rocky Point, where we have a boat waiting to take us across to the north end of the lake. From there, I have a contact with fresh horses. If all goes well, you’ll be having dinner with my father in a few days.”
“Fair enough, but we still have to get to your warehouse without attracting attention.”
The dragon roared in the distance. Everyone stopped talking for a moment.
“I thought we’d go around town outside the markers,” Annabelle said.
“Better than going through it,” Ben said. It felt surreal. In the back of his mind, he knew that his grandfather was dead, a fact that would forever change his life, but he couldn’t bring himself to feel anything at the moment except numbness and a dull-but-building fury.
He could see in a glance that his rising anger was easily matched by his brother’s. Before, on the trail, when he’d considered killing Frank, he’d been revolted at the prospect. Now, detached, numb and cold-eyed, he knew that it might come to that if he was really going to confront the dragon.
“Get your gear, we’re leaving,” Ben said.
“What about my father?” Imogen asked through tears. “We can’t just leave him here.”
Ben felt a pang of guilt. She was right, Cyril deserved far better than they could give him.
“The best we can do is burn him,” Frank said, all trace of his hostility and anger strangely gone. He walked over and picked up one of the dragon-fire rifles.
“I wouldn’t do that,” Hound said.
“Why not?” Frank said, not waiting for an answer as he pointed the rifle at Cyril and fired. A gout of flame erupted from the barrel, engulfing Cyril’s body in fire and completely consuming him in a brilliant conflagration.
The moment Frank pulled the trigger, he cried out in pain, dropping the rifle and looking at his right hand in disbelief, his face a mask of agony, his whole body trembling from th
e sudden pain of a dragon rune burned into his hand. It was an angry welt, the flesh burned away, the wound cauterized by the sudden heat.
“That’s why, dumb-ass,” Hound said. “Come here, let me see that hand.”
Frank didn’t move, his face still a mask of shock and pain.
Hound grabbed him by the wrist and shook his head.
“We should probably get out of here,” John said, gesturing to the growing fire as it started to lick at the back wall of the warehouse.
“Grab his pack and gun,” Hound said to Ben, leading Frank out of the building.
“Zack, take my grandfather’s pack,” Ben said. “You’ll need some gear.”
They had just stepped out into the space between the warehouses when the dragon soared into view flying toward the temple. Everyone stood mesmerized by the sight. It was magnificent and terrifying all at once, a primordial creature of magic and ferocity. Somewhere in the back of his mind Ben’s reason began to question the wisdom of attacking such a beast, but his building rage easily overpowered such rational thoughts.
“He has the Warlock’s staff,” John said, handing his monocular to Ben.
Sure enough, the winged man riding the dragon was carrying the dragon-claw staff. He handed the monocular back to John and hoisted his pack.
“So much for the Warlock,” Hound said.
“What’s a Warlock?” Zack asked.
“Someone you really don’t want to meet,” Ben said. “Let’s go.”
“Wait,” John said. “Shit.”
“What?”
John handed the monocular to Imogen and looked down, closing his eyes and shaking his head sadly.
Her face went white and she started to tremble as she looked at the dragon. “No,” she whispered.
The dragon launched into the sky, the high priest on his back carrying a baby.
Imogen dropped the monocular and slumped to the ground.
Ben knelt in front of her, gently lifting her face by the chin. “I know it hurts. I know you’re afraid, but I need you to set that aside for now. Once we’re safe, once we have a chance to arm up and make a plan, I’m going after that goddamned wyrm, I’m going to kill it and I’m going to get my nephew back. But right now, we have to run.”
The Dragon's Egg (Dragonfall Book 1) Page 36