Dragon Rule

by E. E. Knight

  NiVom had the flying escort circle the eyrie. Wistala and AuRon landed. Shadowcatch put his bulk on a precarious grip at the landing ledge. He closed off Nilrasha’s cavern like a door.

  “What brings you this far north, Ibidio?” the Copper asked.

  She rattled her griff. “I hoped to get some truth at last.”

  “I suspect you wanted to see the look on my mate’s face when she heard the news.”

  “What news, my love?” Nilrasha said, clearly nervous.

  “I’m no longer Tyr. The twins will rule the Lavadome. NiVom and his mate will take charge of the Upper World for them.”

  The rims of her eyes and nostrils went white. “What’s to become of us?”

  “Exile, I’m afraid,” the Copper said.

  Ibidio thumped her tail. “I came to see to this personally. Nilrasha, you have one chance to save your mate from disgraceful exile.”

  “Now, just one moment, Ibidio,” NiVom said.

  “Shut up, NiVom, or I’ll see to it that the twins choose another dragon to oversee affairs in the Upper World.” Ibidio turned back to Nilrasha. “Confess to the murder of Halaflora and face punishment. Then we’ll allow your mate, an innocent in your schemes, to remain among us.”

  What did poor Halaflora matter now? The Copper felt his temper flare. If he could just spit fire properly, he’d flame the old buzzard’s face.

  “Don’t say anything, Nilrasha. Ibidio, isn’t seeing me dethroned triumph enough for you?”

  “It’s bloodlines that matter,” Ibidio said. “I’ve had enough of rule by unknowns. Such a court! This RuGaard, a usurper, a foundling who mates a nobody from Milkdrinker’s Hill and then brings in a dragon who believes herself a Hypatian and a scaleless hermit to presume to rule as Queen. Arrogance!”

  “You think you will do better under the twins?” the Copper said. “You’re a fool if you think so, Ibidio. It’s the Red Queen’s old bargain. NiVom and Imfamnia will rule the Upper World. The Lavadome will exist only at their sufferance.”

  “They can be managed. The Ankelenes have the crystal. We’ll keep an eye on them. Imfamnia may be a greedy, vain ninny of a dragon, but she at least comes from a noble line.”

  “You nostril-clenching gargoyle,” Nilrasha roared. “With your precious bloodlines and family traditions. You’ve always resented me. RuGaard was perfectly acceptable as Tyr; you put him forward! Until he mated with me, that is. Then you started your whispers. Viper, you’ve spat your last poison!”

  With that Nilrasha charged, mouth agape.

  Shadowcatch threw himself in front of NiVom, who was moving in to protect Ibidio. Old Ibidio, who’d probably never opened her mouth in battle since she’d breathed her first fire at the end of hatchlinghood, froze in fury. Nilrasha struck her like a charging elephant and they clawed briefly, frantically, at the edge of the parapet before disappearing over the side.

  “Nilrasha,” the Copper shrieked, launching himself into the air. His throne didn’t matter. The only thing that counted was his mate.

  Together, the combatants plunged into the valley, bouncing off the sheer side of Nilrasha’s eyrie. Ibidio’s wings weren’t up to supporting both.

  He folded his wings and dove. If his artificial joint gave way, so be it.

  He heard a crashing of timber below. Startled black-and-white birds took to the sky, marking their fall.

  The Copper opened his wings, daring them to give way and stop him from striking the valley floor next to his mate. But Rayg’s engineering supported him.

  He found Nilrasha, bleeding from torn-away scale but otherwise miraculously uninjured, atop the broken body of Ibidio. Sightless eyes stared in different directions.

  So passed the mother of his first mate.

  “I can’t even die right,” Nilrasha managed between gasps. She licked him across the snout, exposing a broken fang.

  “You’re just lucky,” the Copper said.

  NiVom and his gargoyles came down at a safe pace, followed by Shadowcatch and the Aerial Host escort.

  “Well, Nilrasha, I suppose I owe you a thank-you,” NiVom said. “Ibidio and her clique would have given me some difficulties. You’ve just strengthened my hold on the Lavadome.”

  Nilrasha spat blood at him.

  “Why don’t you just kill us and get it over with?” the Copper asked.

  “No, RuGaard. I want you to go live with cold memories, in hiding, as I did. As nothing but a memory, you’re bound to improve. The dragons will forget your limp and your stupid expression and only remember your victories. But you and your wretched mate aging in exile, growing ever weaker—that’ll take the glamour off your name.”

  “Then at least give me leave to live quietly with my mate, here in her eyrie. I can hunt and fish for us both. I’ll never enter the Lavadome again, or so much as offer advice to a young member of the Aerial Host.”

  “No, Nilrasha’s too clever. She’s been your brains for years. You two might get up to something. The best safeguard of your good behavior is your mate, here, where I can keep an eye on her—and you as far away as possible. The other side of the world would do nicely.”

  “You would forcibly part mated dragons?” Nilrasha asked.

  “Your mating, if those ridiculous ascents you attempt could be called a mating flight, is of dubious provenance,” NiVom said.

  “Now hear this, dragonkind. You are stripped of the honorable name RuGaard. From now on you’re just ‘Batty’ to us. It was good enough for you in the drakwatch caves, it’ll be good enough for the future. This is my bargain, a better one than I got: as long as you remain outside the Dragon Empire, you and Nilrasha will come to no harm. But set sii back on our lands and I’ll see to it that she’s thrown from her resort. Only this time, I’ll make sure she lands on something sharper than Ibidio.”

  Chapter 19

  They flew in stages, resting frequently in the cool sea. It was not a quick trip—their escort frequently demanded that they stop and argue the correct course so as not to pass too near the Hypatian coast, or to circumnavigate some island belonging to the Empire by map rather than actual occupation. AuRon thought it petty of their escort, and it reminded him of the Wizard Wrimere’s prickly vindictiveness. The escort left them near the great neck, turning home for Hypatia.

  “Fair winds guide you to rest,” one of them said. The Copper, prodded, received a final thank-you for his promotion into the Aerial Host.

  “Foolish of you, Father,” AuSurath said. “You’d think a dragon with no scale would be more sensitive to the direction in which the winds are blowing.”

  He was silent and thoughtful the rest of the flight.

  AuRon experienced the moment every dragon father must, when his son breathes fire into his face—metaphorically, of course, here in the windy skies of the Inland Ocean.

  Wistala said little on the flight. AuRon had heard much of her exploits. He believed this was the first time she’d been really defeated.

  His brother flew mechanically, as though strings controlled his movements. Or perhaps it was just the false joint midwing.

  Once they made it to the island, after a few days they’d decide what to do. AuRon found himself wishing he could have DharSii available—he was a strong, reasonable dragon who’d be a stout ally and a clear-headed counselor.

  To AuRon, the Copper seemed increasingly numb to all that had happened. He spoke less and less at greater and greater intervals, and when he did speak it was only a commonplace, such as that he was tired or hungry. AuRon suspected that were it not for Wistala and Shadowcatch nudging him along from either side, he would have just flown aimlessly until he dropped from exhaustion into the sea.

  Wistala tried to reassure him about Nilrasha, that she was still popular with some of the Firemaids and dragons from the less exalted hills; therefore NiVom had very good reason to keep her alive.

  “I did my best for them. I truly did,” he kept repeating.

  That’s the problem with the ambitious and ru
thless, AuRon thought. They’re thunderstruck when they meet someone even more ruthless and ambitious than they.

  “The Tyr gave his word,” Wistala said. “As long as we leave the empire in peace, we’re not to be harmed. More important for you, brother RuGaard, Nilrasha will stay comfortably in her eyrie. For you, brother AuRon, Natasatch will maintain her honored position, Naf ’s kingdom will be at peace under the wings of its Protector, and your offspring will continue their careers in security and honor.”

  “I just feel as though he has us by the throat, and we don’t have so much as a claw into him,” the Copper said.

  “Are you sure this is NiVom’s doing?”

  “What do you mean?” Wistala asked.

  AuRon, once again, tried to put vague suspicions and feelings into words. “Imfamnia. His mate. I can’t help thinking there’s more to her than we know. She’s so cursedly sure of herself.”

  They arranged the last lap in the hopes that they might arrive at the Isle of Ice with the sun setting, then spend a quiet night in AuRon’s cave. With strength renewed by sleep, they’d see about finding some food in the morning, if Ouistrela hadn’t eaten all the sheep.

  But the Copper flagged again and a spring storm threatened, so they rested on an uninhabited piece of rock. There were crabs and other shellfish to be had in the clear, cold water. Even Shadowcatch, who’d never quite broken the habit of having his food brought to him by humans, managed to come up with a few.

  As matters turned out, it was just as well they rested.

  They arrived midday. AuRon and Natasatch’s cave looked quite primitive. The dragons used to smoothed corners and holes bored for venting and drainage there. But still, it felt safe and warm for the travelers, and they settled in for a long nap, albeit in a cave sized for two dragons rather than four.

  A faint howling of wolves woke AuRon from sleep, slightly squashed between bulky Wistala and even bulkier Shadowcatch.

  He roused his fellow exiles with tail slaps.

  “The wolves have some news for us?” Wistala asked.

  “They’re far off, I can’t pick up what’s being said, the echoes are confusing the sounds. It’s a danger call,” AuRon said.

  AuRon hadn’t had reason to creep to his own front portal in all his years on the island, but this time he did.

  Staying in the shadows, he peeped out. Ouistrela stood there, a male AuRon didn’t recognize beside her. Hard to believe Ouistrela had taken a mate.

  There were men, shaggy barbarians of the north by the look of them, behind and before her, the ones to the front with evil-looking spears, the ones behind with great bows and heavy dragon arrows.

  “Ouistrela, what’s all this? You’re standing on my doorstep with armed men?”

  She was bristling for a fight and clearly enjoying her moment. “I’m here to evict you at last, AuRon. You and your pitiful band.”

  He sensed the others falling in behind him, tensing.

  “What right and what cause allows you to tell me to leave my own cave?” AuRon asked.

  Glittering green alighted next to her. Imfamnia!

  “You have visitors, I see,” AuRon said. “Imfamnia, we’re keeping our side of the bargain. We’ll live here quietly.”

  “I’m afraid not, AuRon,” the once-and-future Queen called back. “Remember that clever trick you pulled in Uldam? NiVom and I did. You’re looking at the new Protector of the Isle of Ice. Ouistrela will find the duties light and the meals hearty. The Isle of Ice is part of the Grand Alliance. It is you who broke the arrangement, not I.”

  “It’s a trap,” the Copper said. “Fly for your lives!”

  Wistala and Shadowcatch led the way, by virtue of their bulk and heavy scale, shielding AuRon and the Copper.

  A ropy mass fell atop them from the upper rim of AuRon’s cave.

  Nets! No ordinary fishing nets, either, but dragon-nets of chain and barbed hooks.

  Falling on them like an oversized octopus, the nets engulfed Wistala and Shadowcatch. AuRon worked one side with sii, trying to untangle them, listening as arrows sang through the air.

  The heavy net may have held one powerful dragon. But two, such as Wistala and Shadowcatch, tore it to pieces. Pieces of it encumbered them still, but they stood on sii and saa ready to fight.

  “You!” Ouistrela said, spying Shadowcatch.

  With that Ouistrela launched herself at the black.

  Her fury spoiled the aim of the blighter and human archers. Some loosed anyway in their excitement and struck their own leader.

  The heavy, unknown red stood stupidly, not knowing if he should join the contest below or wait for the archers to bleed their enemies.

  “Idiot!” Imfamnia shrieked, backing away from the fighting. “Griffaran, tear their throats out!”

  “AuRon, ware! Griffaran,” the Copper called.

  Colorful, taloned lances swept down from the heights. Five.

  “Only you have a chance against them,” the Copper said.

  One against five? AuRon admired his brother’s definition of “a chance.”

  Wistala was shielding AuRon with her muscular bulk. Arrows and bolts and heavier projectiles bounced off her armored skin the way rain ran off a cliff face. He could achieve little on the ground—he jumped into the air, beating his wings madly to gain speed and altitude.

  The griffaran swerved, coming at him from either side.

  Oh, will you!

  AuRon felt his wings and spine protest at the backbend, reversing course like a cracking whip.

  The griffaran had evidently never flown against a scaleless dragon before. Their heads came together with a satisfying konk!

  The third overshot. AuRon got on his tailfeathers. Rage at Imfamnia’s betrayal made running a line of fire down the bird’s back easy.

  It screamed as it burned and fell.

  AuRon turned to race after Imfamnia, who was putting as much sky between herself and the fighting as possible.

  A hard punch struck him across the back. He looked back; a griffaran had its claws dug into his middle back. It extracted a set of bloody talons and reached for the wing joint, ready to tear out his wing—

  A flutter of feathers and whoosh—the griffaran’s head was off and the body, dragged by the wind, fell off behind him in a shower of blood.

  AuRon, astonished, saw another griffaran drop its comrade’s head.

  His brother and sister needed him below. He turned and dove, coming in behind the archers trying to score a hit on Wistala or Shadowcatch without striking Ouistrela.

  It felt good to at last to loose his flame. He flapped hard with his wings, arresting his dive and creating a whirlwind of pebbles and dragonfire. The archers shielded their faces and either tried to burrow into the hard earth or fled.

  The red dragon, not eager to fight, was jumping up and down and exhorting some human spearmen to close. AuRon whistled to him. When the red turned his head, AuRon struck him across the snout with his tail.

  His strange griffaran savior raked the red across the throat. The red yelped and bounded away, calling on dead griffaran to save him. The griffaran fluttered down to come to the aid of the Copper, who was alternately breathing fire and kicking rocks at a line of spearmen trying to close in.

  The red ran for his plump life, knocking archers left and right. If that red was representative of NiVom and Imfamnia’s backers, perhaps his brother should have stayed in the Lavadome and fought.

  Shadowcatch and Ouistrela grappled and tore at each other still, swishing tails and batting wings keeping the barbarians from closing in on the little party by the easiest route. Straining saa loosed boulders that rolled and bounced down the mountainside in front of their hatchling’s old cave. Madly whipping tails sent showers of pebbles into enemy eyes.

  The biggest boulder of all was green and metal-protected. The clattering bangs of light war machines firing their spear-sized projectiles sent Wistala into a rage.

  Ouistrela, much torn about, saw that her support
from the Grand Alliance had vanished. With a contemptuous flap of her wings, she backed away, throwing fire this way and that.

  AuRon watched the Copper dragon fight. His brother continued to amaze him. The Copper was no great fighter—his limited vision, dragging limbs, and general off-balance awkwardness put him at a disadvantage against any dragon near his own size. The Copper wasn’t stupid—he had his faults, but he wasn’t stupid—he must be aware of his disadvantages in combat.

  Yet he threw himself into battle regardless. And he didn’t fight with the fury of a dragon with his blood up, he didn’t throw himself upon the nearest enemy and lose all his wits in a red madness; he fought craftily and cannily, using wing and tail to both strike and defend.

  The barbarians, lacking the support of the dragons they counted upon, quit the fight, running in little groups with shields held over heads and spears up to ward off aerial attack.

  They needn’t have bothered. AuRon had no flame left, anyway. Long flights on short rations tended to dry the firebladder. He settled for making threatening dives to hurry them along.

  AuRon turned back to what was left of the fight. Shadowcatch was in a poor way, his wings had bites and tears in them. But he still raged, smashing dead men and broken spears into splintered pulp. Wistala looked a little like a ragged porcupine, with numerous arrows and spears stuck in her. Very little blood ran from the wounds, however, so AuRon expected there would just be the painful work of extracting broken-off tips. His brother had a number of men gathered like a herd of sheep in surrender, begging for their lives with upraised palms.

  “Gather all the dropped shields and weapons left lying about, put them in a pile here, then you may return to your boats, or however you came here,” he said in rather faulty Parl, holding head high and standing square. AuRon repeated the instructions in the northern tongue and they fell to their knees and cried out in gladness at the dragon’s mercy.

  AuRon thought his brother carried off that lordly, implacable air rather well. Better than he himself could have, at any rate.