The Cursed Dragon

by Rachal M. Roberts

  From inside her mind he learned the red dragoness’ name, Ishida of Nikhadelos Dialo, finally a name for those diamid horns, feathered head crest that flowed like tongues of fire, and the long whiskers from her snout.

  Ravanan landed with her, far from the dangerous heat of her mate’s aura that was baking the mountain. By walking inside her mind he mentally examined her body, experienced and felt the egg growing inside of her, it was nearly ready. He placed his black talons on her soft underbelly, touching and feeling her scales, feeling the heat of the egg, loving the object that her red scales protected. It was life, a dragon egg, the most precious symbol of dragonkind was so close to him, only separated by her scales and flesh.

  Knowing Ishida’s egg was safe, he bit down hard on her neck but his fangs didn’t puncture her tough hide. She may have been young but she had already hardened her scales like most reds do to block any remedy-seeking bites.

  Ravanan was desperate, his stamina was gone. His blood was not able to clot and it started to trickle from his eyes, nose, and ears as the poison thinned it. It hurt to draw breath and his thoughts were drifting towards rest. His control over her wavered as the poison was disorienting him and making his eyelids heavy. He needed to get the antidote of her flesh. His bite would have to be from her belly, the only semi-hard place on a red dragon and his teeth hurt already from the first attempt.

  Ravanan laid Ishida on the ground and was about to strike again when he felt a stinging pain and heard a quiet SLIPH! as one of his back scales lifted and sheared away from him. The brown dragon was free from the hold spell and had hurled a cleaving disk at Ravanan.

  The razor of Kianthyx was coming again when Ravanan lost his control spell over the red dragoness.

  While still prone on the ground, Ishida cast “SILENCE” on Ravanan for a second time, putting as much duration to the spell as she could and armored herself again with water.

  All Ravanan could think about was taking that bite, he would get it no matter what it took. To not bite her was death.

  SLIPH! - another scale was gone. Ravanan roared and tackled Ishida with more force than speed. The ground trembled under the two fighting dragons. They wrestled but she was no match for Ravanan’s size, he pinned her and sank his fangs through her water-covered abdomen and carefully away from the egg before letting go and taking flight.

  Flying hurt so bad, and Ravanan’s breathing was wet with blood, even his vision was red. SLIPH! – he kept going as his third scale fell away.

  He was muted and still holding her flesh in his mouth. He kept low and struggled to get away. Ravanan heard her cast a spell and then an envenomed spear lodged into his exposed back. He recoiled and dropped even lower. As he searched for a large enough boulder to hide behind he noticed she was no longer looking at him and instead was moving towards Kianthyx.

  The once-brown dragon was armored with bloody mucus to counterbalance an acid attack. The blinded thief believed he was battling a green dragon and was still defenseless against shock – Ravanan’s trap had worked! He needed to strike Kianthyx now before he learned the truth but there was no way he was going to get close enough to use his lightning aura and he still was under the silence spell, so casting was out of the question.

  A new pain grabbed Ravanan when the enhanced neurotoxin took effect from the spear. By the time he landed his body was in spasms as the poison confused the muscle. After several failed attempts he reached and tore the spear from his back then broke it in two. Still holding the meat in his mouth, he laid down to rest and wait until he got his voice back, hoping he wouldn’t bleed to death before the silence spell ended. Closing his bloodied eyes, he listened with his ears and aura to know how far away the pair was, it was all he could do.

  His diaphragm and lungs were seizing up and threatening suffocation by the time the silence spell ended. With little time to spare he targeted the meat in his mouth and cast “ANTIVENIN”. Ravanan swallowed with relief. In that quiet moment of peace he cast “EVOKE ALOE EYES” Dark green crystal lenses covered his eyes. The faceted gemstones weren’t minerals but crystallized aloe Vera gelatin that emitted a faint green glow as they deadened his pain and made new blood for him. He was going to be alright. Soon the poison would be gone, he just needed to rest while the poison battled inside him. He hoped he had the time to catch his breath before they came for him.

  While quickly eating his bulls, Ravanan considered using his anchor and coming back another day to finish the fight but he knew as time went on that Kianthyx would find a way to regain his sight. He had hurt Kianthyx badly and needed to finish the job before the dragon recovered. He was exhausted. But at least seeing everything in hues of green was a comfort to him. He would finish this fight now and get his gold back, he may be weak, but his enemy was too.

  His rest was brief, they were coming. Ravanan felt them enter his aura, it wouldn’t be long before they found him. They seemed to be headed straight for him as if they were smelling him with enhanced senses. They knew his location now, so there was no reason to try to keep quiet. He charged his aura full of spidery lightning. It was no good, he could feel that his aura didn’t harm either one of them.

  He didn’t want any more poison, he had to protect himself with a better armor. The one he chose was a more difficult armor to cast and wouldn’t last nearly as long as the simpler air armor he was using but it was better. He whispered, “AIR BARRIER”. The whitish bubble covered him, it was noticeable, but that didn’t matter, he was safe from heat, poisonous air, and projectiles so long as they didn’t understand the tight molecular bonds. It was such a delicate armor and if one knew the right way they could restructure the air molecules and bring it down. He hoped they weren’t that schooled.

  Still laying down, he felt the approach of their warm auras.

  Then he saw little poison needles fly past and flick off his armor. He needed to move immediately. With every heartbeat he could see the ground getting brighter as it heated up; Kianthyx was with her and rage didn’t even begin to describe the emotion that Ravanan felt coming towards him. The ground kept getting hotter until it began to melt. Somehow Ravanan’s hiding rock didn’t seem big enough as it too became gooey with lava. He was lying in a puddle of orange lava conserving strength. The aloe eyes were helping, but not fast enough for any major spell or battle.

  Using what little strength he had left Ravanan resorted to using a weapon and cast “EVOKE HEXDEATH”. Six brilliant blades appeared and hung in the air in front of him. He untied their leather binding which set the blades to spinning. He hated using weapons, but in this case he needed to, there shouldn’t have been a second dragon to fight.

  The severely acid-burned Kianthyx came around the melting rock first.

  With a flick of his wrist Ravanan pointed Hexdeath at his foe’s neck, their white enchantment easily passing through the brown dragon’s armor. The blades pricked the neck radially and sank deep as all six tips came together with a metallic ringing inside Kianthyx’s neck. Then moving like a wheel the blades went to work, one after the other they sliced through it, clean and neat.

  Ishida roared in protest when she came upon the stunning death of her mate and the gleaming sword collar that was killing him.

  His brown head spun and toppled to the ground. As with all dragons, the body and severed head faded away with his burial spell to reappear at the bottom of the deepest ocean trench to be erased from the Earth.

  Ravanan’s vicious blades returned to him, circling him, awaiting a task.

  Ishida froze for only a heartbeat, looking at Hexdeath. She opened her mouth, inhaling to either breathe fire or cast a spell but Ravanan cut her off with grave words.

  “I don’t like being forced into a corner.” The command and force in his voice was more like a spell than a simple statement. With another flick of his wrist Ravanan sent the blades to her, dazzling and gleaming in the morning sun as they teased and sliced through her water armor. Hexdeath threatened her egg, her life.

  I
shida had to think. She dropped her aura, seeing that it wasn’t hurting the blue dragon, and changed some of her water armor to ice only surrounding her ribcage and torn-open, egg-laden abdomen. Casting silence again would not prevent her death. She was smart enough to know that the blue dragon didn’t need a voice to command those horrible blades. By the time she cast any offensive spell the blades would be slicing her up. If she tried to flee, the blades would follow, lunging at him would also mean falling onto the blades. Ishida wondered to herself how to gain the upper hand, and she studied the odd white bubble around him, looking for a way to make it fall apart.

  Ishida started to speak but again the blue dragon cut her off, only this time it was with a spell.

  “SILENCE!”, he yelled.

  Then he rose up and walked out of the cooling lava puddle he was in.

  In her quieted world, Ishida backed up, rethinking her attack plans without the heat aura of her brown mate to help. She wouldn’t mourn a fool of a dragon that she had only known for a season. She should have trusted her first opinion about the brown.

  Re-seating himself on dry ground and knowing his armor was about to end, with a foaming mouth and bloody face Ravanan spoke to Ishida calmly, his blades still ready to strike - “You hurt me to the point of death, you know this don’t you? I imagine right now you’re plotting how to finish me, the dragon who murdered your mate. If I wasn’t so weak right now, things would be different, but as the situation is not in my favor and my blood is fighting your poison, I NEED TO CONTROL YOU.....”

  Ravanan really hated doing that to Ishida again so he decided to not reveal his presence in her head. Before controlling Kalara, he had never wanted to control another dragon. It just didn’t seem right. And now here he was doing it again. Why? And why did he feel like it was his only option?

  The first time with Ishida was to save his life, but this time he could have done something different to her. Yes he was good at control spells, an expert of experts, but he shouldn’t treat his own kind like cattle. Kalara was one thing, she was ruined anyway, but this..... Had he changed somehow? Perhaps he just didn’t care anymore. And he had to admit that controlling his enemy was the easiest, most-rehearsed choice at the moment.

  He had Ishida fly him down to the lair. Once at the bottom he knew full well that it wasn’t the actual lair, but merely the bottom of the hole. After his body healed up he would go exploring to find his gold and get some answers but for the moment he needed somewhere safe to rest away from humans and especially away from Kalara.

  Chapter 17

  The seer pool within Black Blade Lair screamed in pain when its glassy surface became painted with the visage of the door opening.

  Kalara had been in the main lair when a sharp pain stabbed her right breast. She ran at the sound of torrents of water splashing.

  “Ravanan!” she yelled, thinking he had finally returned with food. She could see bright light coming from the seer pool chamber as she ran to it.

  When Kalara arrived at the seer pool it was a storm of commotion. Ravanan was nowhere to be seen. She didn’t know what was going on. All she could do was watch the water splash around vehemently as she rubbed her chest to soothe the strange pain. It wasn’t from hunger, she knew that at least, and the pain seemed to be lessening. She didn’t know what had caused it. And yet the water continued to splash on....

  It was dark after the rock wall closed behind him, Jeremy had a moment of worry. It had all happened so fast when he wasn’t sure it even would. There was no time to think about it but now he was thinking it was probably a bad decision to follow his client through the odd door.

  Annette was the first to grab her flashlight.

  “Annette, we’re not equipped for spelunking. You should have mentioned something yesterday about this. I have never done this.”

  “We have ropes and lights, we’re fine.” She started whistling.

  Jeremy stood there, running his hands over his pack, there were too many zippers on it.

  Annette kept whistling and he was getting annoyed. Finally he found his flashlight.

  “What are you doing?” he demanded.

  “Calling bats. Now be quiet.”

  She wasn’t the best whistler.

  Jeremy could stand it no longer, “I can help. I’m a better whistler than you.”

  “I’m not whistling, I’m calling bats.”

  Before long a little bat fluttered furiously around them. Annette kept whistling and held her finger out for a perch. The bat landed. Quick as lightning Annette grabbed it in her hand. The bat squeaked in protest. Annette offered some spit to Mother Earth for the bat and blessed the bat’s spirit.

  It squeaked for the rest of its life, which ended a minute later at Annette’s pocket knife. Then she knelt down to use the rocky ground as a cutting board to cut off the bat’s ears.

  Jeremy said nothing, but there was shock in his eyes. He wondered if there was anything Annette wouldn’t do.

  Annette held the little bloody furry ears in her hands and said a prayer “Great Spirit, hear me, your daughter, Annette. Use these ears to bless your children as we navigate this cave. Protect us from falls, crushing rock, water and bad air, anything that might keep us from our goal. Let us be as the bat in your dark worlds.”

  Annette handed an ear to him and said “Eat this.” Then she placed the other in her mouth, and started chewing.

  He didn’t think twice about it and tossed it in.

  Just as the Great Spirit foretold, the journey through the rock was daunting, it was pitch black and the cave wouldn’t end. The further from the entrance Annette walked the more her fear grew and Jeremy was not helping to calm that fear. When the Great Spirit said Kalara would be inside the rock Annette thought that meant Kalara lived in a cliff dwelling similar to ancient Native Americans of the Great Southwest, nothing like this dark hole - it was unexpected.

  The cave kept going deeper inside the mountain, where people don’t live. Why would Kalara be there? Annette was glad she had packed extra food and water (thinking Kalara would need it), even when Jeremy had told her not to because the extra weight would hinder their climb, and now he was thankful too, even apologetic – repeating ‘if I had only known’.

  He was a full believer in the Great Mother Earth now and was going to make a fine student. Annette thought about how Jeremy and Todd would get along, ‘probably not very well’ – she answered her own thoughts.

  She looked Jeremy up and down, he was a good ole’ city-bred white boy, you could tell by the way he used his equipment, he was fighting the environment instead of living with it. She could almost hear Todd laughing.

  “How could your friend be in here?” Jeremy asked her during a rest break.

  Annette had no answer for him. It didn’t make sense but she trusted the Great Spirit and knew she was on the right track.

  She had to be right in this. Of course Kalara was in there somewhere deep inside or else that rock wall wouldn’t have been a doorway. Kalara was near and she would find her.

  Like the doorway, the traps Annette found were unnatural, they were more than just subterranean hazards, and the energy coming from them gave further evidence that Kalara was there and that her spiritual gifts had returned to her. Annette could only imagine how Kalara must be growing, remembering her past and regaining her blessings from the spirits. She wondered just how powerful Kalara could be, she prepared herself for the worst, always keeping in mind that horrible day.

  That night they settled down to sleep. Annette’s body found rest. It had been so long. She actually dreamed real dreams, the type of dream that tells you you’re getting enough rest. When Annette woke she knew Jenniffer was dead. In the dark cave a smirk crossed her face as she thought, ‘it was fun while it lasted’.

  Solving Kalara’s traps only made Annette’s thirst for power grow stronger. Yes, she was able to get past them with her spiritual blessing and ingenuity but how much more could she learn from Kalara? Or even learn from tha
t man in the blue shirt who was with her? – Annette thought about him for a moment – she was sure that he had somehow helped Kalara regain her memories, though it was odd how he had just disappeared while she was watching in the peacock pool. She wondered if he would be with Kalara now and if he also shared a strong connection with the spiritual world, he had to. Annette’s heart skipped a beat in excitement.

  The pair of spelunkers came upon a sheer drop, a chasm with no apparent bottom. Their flashlights were not strong enough to penetrate the strange blue mist that had been hanging in the air for some time now. Annette tried a couple of times using different ideas to throw light down the hole but nothing worked.

  Although it was odd for her spells to fail it wasn’t unthinkable. She knew there were those few times when nature was not willing to bend and this had to be one of them. Thankfully they had Jeremy’s expertise. They safely descended into the hole and hours later they were climbing out on the other side.

  It wasn’t long after the big chasm until they approached a grand hallway. Flashlights were no longer needed as there were strangely-convenient sconces on the walls that flickered brightly with flame, welcoming them. Annette knew she was close now, and her fear-laced eagerness grew with every step.

  The far wall was guarded by two giant black pillars in each corner and glittering blue mist filled the chamber.

  Annette squeezed the fear from her heart and pressed it into the dried cat hearts in her hand.

  Jeremy kept walking towards the nicely lit room. “Wow, are you seeing this??” he asked her.

  Annette spoke out “Jeremy, stop. Don’t go any further just yet.”