The City of Ravens

by Baker, Richard

  “The Orb of Khundrukar! Hidden in Cedrizarun’s grasp, literally!”

  “Is it magical?” asked Brunn.

  “Very much so,” Zandria replied. “although I am unsure of its properties.” She took the Orb, wrapped it in a soft silk cloth, and tucked it into a pouch at her waist. “Help yourselves to the rest of the hoard, then. I have my prize.”

  Jack took that as his cue to slip out the door. It would take them some time to sort through all that treasure, enough time for he, Anders, and Tharzon to set up a careful pilferage of the treasure as the Red Falcons transported it back to the surface. Of course, he would have loved to get his hands on the Orb, but he’d settle for a king’s ransom in gold and jewels. He was just setting up the operation in his mind when he heard shouts of alarm and the clash of arms from the other end of the passageway.

  “Anders must have decided to rush the sentries,” he realized. Quickly he dashed ahead to take the priest and the warrior from the rear, hoping to silence the fight before it spoiled his plans. Jack reached the staircase leading up into the outer rotunda and started to climb up, when suddenly Anders and Tharzon appeared at the head of the stair, leaping down in utter flight.

  “Seal the door! Seal the door!” Tharzon bellowed.

  An instant later, the priest Thieron followed the Northman and the dwarf. “Who in Tyr’s seven hells are you?” he bellowed after them. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Out of the way, you idiot!” Anders yelled. He reached up and started to haul at the great stone slab that covered the hidden stairway.

  The priest gaped in indecision, and then something outside made a kind of long, wheezing grunt and slithered close. Jack couldn’t see it, not with Tharzon and Anders and the priest tangled up at the head of the stairway, but Thieron could.

  “Tyr’s hammer! A dragon of the deep! Durevin, flee!”

  From outside Jack heard hissing and the soft scrape of scales on stone. Suddenly a great roar sounded, and a man screamed high and horribly. A sword dropped down the staircase, ringing as it clattered from step to step to land at Jack’s feet. Half the length of the blade was gone, leaving a charred, corroded fragment that smoked and sizzled. He looked up again, just in time to see Anders, Tharzon, and Thieron the priest come down the stairs in a bouncing, swearing knot of limbs and weapons. He tried to scramble out of the way but was caught and knocked flat by Tharzon as the dwarf rolled down the steps. A hard-driven elbow knocked the wind out of him, and the collision spoiled his spell of invisibility. Jack saw stars.

  When his vision cleared, he found himself looking up the now-empty staircase at a great crocodile-like snout and gleaming yellow fangs. The dragon was a small one, as these things go, probably not much bigger than four or five draft horses lined up nose to tail, but its head was as big as a sixty-gallon tun and its eyes gleamed with intelligence and malice.

  “More rats in the hidey-hole,” the creature hissed. “Don’t worry. I’ll be down in just a moment.”

  Jack scrambled backward on his hams about ten feet, staggered to his feet, and ran for his life. He risked one quick look over his shoulder and saw the monster gliding down the staircase. It was very snakelike in build, with no limbs to interfere with its passage and a pair of great black gleaming wings that folded back along its length. He picked up the pace and passed Tharzon and then the priest Thieron, joining Anders as he raced up the stair at the other end of the passageway that led up to the vault.

  The three thieves and the Red Falcon piled into the treasure room in an explosion of armor and oaths. Brunn and Maressa drew weapons and leaped forward to defend their find against the invasion of strangers, but Anders and Tharzon ignored them, instantly turning to the wheellike door and kicking out the spike in order to roll it closed. The great valve boomed shut just as the slithering dragon-snake appeared at the bottom of the stairs.

  “Come out, come out!” the creature laughed. “I think you have locked yourselves in, little mice. I shall be most cross if I have to come in after you!”

  Jack, Anders, and Tharzon turned away from the door only to find the Red Falcons lined up against them. Zandria stepped forward, her face livid.

  “What in the hell is going on here?” she demanded.

  Jack started to answer, but Thieron spoke first. “Durevin and I were standing watch, when all of the sudden the dwarf and the big one came running up the outer passage, screaming ‘Dragon! dragon!’ At first I thought it some kind of ruse or ambush, but they ran right by us into the hidden staircase. When I looked up again, I saw what they were running from—a deep dragon, as fast as a racehorse and as big as a coach.” The priest’s voice faltered. “Durevin tried to check its advance. He had time for two, maybe three swings, and then the creature dissolved him with its breath. He’s dead.”

  The door boomed with a great hollow sound. “That would be the creature just outside the door?” Zandria asked.

  “Yes,” said Thieron. “I am sorry, Zandria. We didn’t have time to do anything but flee.”

  The mage absorbed the information with an expression of irritation, as if the priest had told her that a dress she liked had been ruined in the wash. “Understood. Everyone, get ready for a fight. The dragon’s breath may be powerful enough to eat through the door.” Then she turned to Jack and said in a cold voice, “Now what are you doing here? And who are these two?”

  “Why, we were engaged in a routine exploration of the upper halls of Sarbreen,” said Jack, “when we had the great misfortune of encountering the monster who now batters at our door. Deeming discretion the better part of valor, we chose to search for a more advantageous position to stand our ground. Unfortunately, we fled into the very dead end where your two companions stood guard. We advised them of the situation and took the liberty of using the passage you’ve found.”

  “ ‘Advised us of the situation’?” said Thieron. “You ran past screaming ‘dragon’! Or those two did, anyway. I didn’t see you until we came down the stair.”

  “Well, you were advised that there was a dragon in the vicinity, and that we had elected to execute a minor tactical withdrawal,” Jack replied. He looked around at the great golden hoard that surrounded them, as if noticing it for the first time. “Dear me! Zandria, by any chance are we standing in the Guilder’s Vault?”

  “Why yes, Jack, so we are,” the mage replied. “I don’t doubt that you followed us here quite intentionally.”

  “Really? Why, I should hope that you were here on some other business altogether, dear Zandria. If you came to the vault without me, well, that would seem to imply that you had decided not to live up to our agreed-upon bargain of two-elevenths of the treasure.” Jack allowed himself a smug smile. “Now who was going to steal from whom, I wonder?”

  “Choose your words carefully,” grated Brunn. He stepped forward. “There are five of us and only three of you, and we’re better armed.”

  Anders met the swordsman’s gaze levelly. “I guess we’ll find out about that, now, won’t we?”

  “Silence!” Zandria’s voice cracked like a whip. “We all share a much bigger problem. There is a dragon at the door, in case you’ve forgotten.”

  “Oh, don’t mind me,” hissed the dragon, its voice distant and muted through the door. “I am enjoying this tremendously. It’s quite uncommon for my prospective meals to argue with each other in this fashion. I’d like to see how it turns out. Do continue.”

  “If there is anyone on the face of this world that I would rather not be caught in this predicament with,” Zandria said, “I think it might be you, Jack Ravenwild. But I cannot change that now, so I suggest that we consider how we might cooperate to get out of this.”

  “Very well.” Jack looked around. “First things first. There are eight of us now here. I suggest eight equal shares, should we survive, and Zandria, you and I as the leaders of our respective parties shall dice for the Orb of Kundugar.”

  “That’s the Orb of Khundrukar, you idiot, and that is comp
letely unacceptable,” snapped Zandria.

  “On what grounds do you reject my proposal?” Jack said with hurt in his voice. “It’s actually quite fair. In fact—”

  He was interrupted by a sudden blast outside, muted by the thick door and the dense stone. A faint whiff of something sulfurous tainted the air; the great silver door began to blacken and sizzle ominously.

  Zandria snarled in anger, “Damn, I don’t think that door will hold. Jack, you and your accomplices have two choices. You can stand and fight alongside us, or you can stand and die like sheep. There’s no exit from this chamber, so you’re out of places to run.”

  A small hole appeared in the door; a great black dragon snout rammed into it, buckling the portal and breaking free great, slagged slabs of the door. The dragon drew in its breath, preparing to fill the small room with its horrible corrosive vapors again.

  “Wait!” called Jack. “Don’t do that. This chamber is filled with treasure.”

  The dragon paused. It wriggled and shifted, so that it could peek through the holes widening in the melting door. “Why, so it is! And I might have ruined it all. Thank you for bringing that to my attention.”

  “Don’t mention it,” Jack muttered. “Umm, would you consider a modest bribe to leave us alone? Say, half the treasure in the room?”

  Zandria and her companions muttered angrily, but they held their tongues. The dragon was silent for a few moments, evidently considering the offer. “If you strip and leave your weapons and gear in this chamber, I’ll allow you to leave,” it said. “All of the treasure, of course, would have to stay.”

  The humans and the dwarf exchanged glances. “I don’t believe it for a moment,” said Tharzon. “Dragons are notorious liars.”

  “Why, I would offer my sacred bond to any who threw themselves at my mercy!” the dragon replied. “I value my word very highly.”

  “We decline,” said Zandria. She studied the chamber quickly; the door was at the bottom end of the southern arm. She gestured sharply and sent the surviving Falcons back to the west arm, then hissed at Jack. “You three to the east.”

  Jack, Anders, and Tharzon retreated to the east arm of the cross-shaped room. Jack wasn’t a great tactician, but he appreciated the arrangement at once. The dragon wouldn’t have anyone standing right in front of it when it forced the door. It would have to enter the room bodily and then turn to attack the Falcons on its left or the rogues on its right. One band or the other would have the opportunity to attack the creature from behind.

  The dragon snarled in rage and threw itself against the ruined door. The ancient dwarf-made valve held for a moment and then failed utterly as the very stones it was anchored in were jarred from their place. Metal shrieked and groaned, stone cracked like thunderbolts, and then the creature was inside the room, a great dark serpent lunging forward with incredible speed and power. Its wings battered the walls, knocking treasure in every direction. It glanced once into the east alcove, its carious yellow eye gleaming, and then it hurled itself toward the west and the Red Falcons.

  “Die, monster!” shrieked Zandria.

  She worked a spell of lightning, blasting at the dragon with a brilliant blue bolt of energy. Thieron began chanting a priestly spell to summon strength and fortitude against the creature, while Brunn and Maressa leaped forward, blade and battle-axe flashing. The dragon drove them back with huge snaps of its fanged maw.

  “Come on, Tharzon!” shouted Anders.

  He leaped forward with his greatsword in hand, the dwarf only a step behind, war-axe high. The two struck at the gleaming dark flank of the dragon, barely marking the creature’s scaly armor, and then the dragon twisted with a powerful motion and slammed its long, whiplike tail through the alcove, sending both Northman and dwarf flying as it pulverized them. Jack leaped over the lashing tail and conjured a ball of magical force, hurling it at the dragon’s back. The detonation brought a roar of pain from the monster. It twitched its tail and upended Jack, too.

  “This isn’t going all too well,” he mumbled as he picked himself up from the stone floor.

  He looked up just in time to see both Anders and Tharzon knocked off their feet again by the dragon’s tail, while across the room Zandria—now levitating in the air and blasting at the dragon with darts of brilliant magic—was suddenly swatted across the room by a wing the size of a small sail. She hit the stone wall hard and fell stunned to the ground on the east side of the chamber.

  The dragon’s lashing tail suddenly twisted away from the alcove, replaced by one dark wing. The half-elf Kale was dragged into view, caught in the coils of the deep dragon’s body like a small animal trapped by a constrictor snake. The thief screamed shrilly, feebly stabbing at the dragon with a small dagger, and then something cracked loudly enough to be heard over the dragon’s bellows and the shrill ringing swords. Blood started from Kale’s mouth, and he dropped his dagger, his head vanishing beneath the dragon’s coils.

  Jack looked around. The door was dicey, but he had other ways to leave. He picked himself up from the floor and then darted forward to set one hand on Tharzon and the other on Anders.

  “Come on, lads! Let’s quit while we’re ahead!”

  “But the dragon—” Anders began.

  “Is not our fight,” Jack finished.

  He summoned the energy for his travel spell, shaping the chaotic spiral with care; this spell taxed him, and he’d never tried to carry two companions at once. The dragon whirled about, sensing that something was happening, but before it could strike again, the room faded into mist and darkness—

  —and they were somewhere else, falling to the cold stone floor in silver light. Jack landed heavily and lost his breath. Anders and Tharzon fell to the ground right beside him, their weapons ringing on the stone. His head swam with dizziness, but Jack staggered to his feet. As he thought, they were in the outer rotunda. The silver light still caged the room, but against one wall a great smear of smoking, bubbling stone showed where Durevin had met his end in the dragon’s vile corrosion.

  Tharzon sat up slowly. “What happened? Where are we?”

  “I used a spell of transport,” Jack answered. “The range is short, no more than a hundred yards or so. I thought we’d get around the dragon by returning to the nearest safe place I could reach.”

  “You dragged us out of the fight and abandoned Zandria to that monster?” Anders asked. “The Guilder’s Vault was ours! All we had to do was beat the dragon, and we would have walked out of there with a king’s ransom!”

  Jack pointed at the open stairway leading down to the long corridor. Sounds of battle echoed up from the opening. “The fight’s still going on, Anders, not more than thirty or forty yards down that hallway. Please, feel free to rejoin the fray. I doubt that the dragon’s going anywhere.”

  Anders stalked in a circle, frustrated. “But all that gold!”

  “All that gold does not serve a dead man at all,” Tharzon remarked. “Did you line your pockets at all while we were in there, Anders?”

  The Northman nodded. “I scooped up a handful of trinkets before the dragon broke down the door.”

  “As did I, and as did Jack,” Tharzon said. “Come on, friend Anders. You aren’t leaving empty handed, and it was only a morning’s work.”

  Jack caught the Northman’s arm and pulled him toward the entrance to the rotunda. “We would be well-advised to absent ourselves from the scene. Zandria and her friends will defeat the dragon, in which case it may come this way again, or they will be defeated, in which case it may come this way again. Either way, I mean to be in the Cracked Tankard enjoying an ale by the time that comes to pass.” He laughed and patted his pockets. “In fact, I will even buy the first round. Now let me tell you about the plan of genius I hatched to pilfer the treasure from the Red Falcons before that oversized snake ruined it all.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Jack, Anders, and Tharzon celebrated their escape from the Guilder’s Vault with steins of beer and flagons of win
e for most of the rest of the day. Between the three of them, they had pocketed a handsome amount of dwarfwork valuables. Jack did not see fit to mention the small brandy bottle nestled safely inside his jacket. He didn’t know whether to sell it (Cedrizarun’s work was doubtless worth many hundreds of gold crowns, possibly thousands), share it with his comrades, drink it himself, or give it to that old sot Ontrodes for a lark.

  “That weighty decision must be delayed until I have given the issue due consideration,” he told himself. “The tragedy of using this irreplaceable liquor poorly would haunt me for the rest of my days.”

  Now that he’d had some time to reflect on their narrow escape, he seemed to recall that a month or two back the Lady Mayor had issued a proclamation offering a generous reward, a very generous reward, to the plucky soul who braved Sarbreen’s awful dangers and hungry deep dragons in order to recover various artifacts from the depths, including the Orb of Khundrukar. Something to the effect of a noble title and ten thousand gold crowns for recovering the dwarven device …

  “Perhaps she might pay handsomely for a ring, a dagger, and a bottle of the most superior brandy residing in mortal hands today. Failing that, perhaps she might pay handsomely to learn that the Red Wizard Zandria had recovered the Orb or perished in the attempt,” Jack mused.

  Jack bid his partners a good night and left to find a bed. He even left his fair share of the night’s tab on the table and sauntered off into the cool spring evening, humming a merry air as he strolled down the streets leading toward home. Perhaps he’d purchase a small manor out in the countryside, nothing ostentatious or crass of course, a few dozen acres and servants to maintain his modest yet comfortable lifestyle.

  “Women such as Illyth or Zandria might prove eager to attach themselves to a person of my status and dignity,” he mused. “Why, I might—”

  Someone threw a cloak over his head from behind and wrapped it tight in the blink of an eye. A flurry of punches and jabs battered Jack through the heavy coat, and he was wrestled and dragged a few steps only to fall into a muddy, foul-smelling pool of water. He flailed about, trying to defend himself, but hard-driven fists hammered into his head, shoulders, and back, knocking the wind out of him and pounding him mercilessly. Jack gibbered in panic.