Witchbreaker (Dragon Apocalypse)

by James Maxey

  “What do you see?” asked Sorrow.

  “Nothing,” Brand said, sitting up and pushing aside more stones. “I need more light.”

  As he cleared away more slate, it soon became obvious that insufficient light wasn’t the problem. Instead, the coffin beneath the stones was made of smoked glass, almost tar black, hiding the contents.

  Brand brushed aside dirt, cupping his hands to block reflections on the dark glass, but shook his head when this failed to produce results. He blew on the edges of his hands where they’d touched the glass. “Ouch. That’s kind of hot.”

  “Hot?” asked Sorrow.

  “Everything feels hot to me right now,” said Brand. “A side-effect of digging holes. But this glass is like an oven.”

  “Climb out,” Sorrow said. She grabbed Trunk by the hand and said, “Lower me.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Brand.

  “I’m a glass weaver,” said Sorrow. “I’m going to alter the glass to make it transparent.”

  “Nice trick,” said Brand as he pulled himself out of the hole.

  Sorrow dangled from Trunk’s grasp until she was a few inches above the stones. She dropped down and knelt over the glass. She touched it carefully. Brand had exaggerated its heat. It was far shy of an oven, more like a freshly poured cup of hot tea.

  She placed both palms on the glass. Pulses of energy flowed into her shoulders, feeling almost like ants crawling just beneath her skin. “There’s extraordinary power here,” she whispered. “I’ve never felt anything quite like it.”

  “That would have been a very funny thing to say when we first exposed the contents of the other grave,” Brand said as he sat on the edge of the pit.

  Sorrow ignored him. She concentrated on the substance beneath her fingers. Glass was easy to manipulate. Ordinarily, it would yield to her fingers as if it were a slightly sticky dough. But she didn’t want to change the shape of the substance, only its color. There must be foreign material in the glass to create the smoky hue. Could she isolate this and draw it out?

  Her brow furrowed as she found that the foreign material was caked mostly on the interior of the glass. The exterior parts of the glass she was touching were actually transparent already, but backed with a dark substance that swallowed all light.

  She gave the glass a slight push, hoping to dislodge the darkness. She was pleased when it worked and a chunk of inch-thick sooty blackness fell away. Unfortunately, all this revealed was gray smoke swirling in the interior.

  Suddenly, she was tossed a foot into the air as the stones around her jumped, as if they’d been struck from beneath. She landed as black smoke billowed up from cracks in the stone.

  She tried to call out to Trunk, but wound up coughing violently. Her eyes clamped shut as the acrid fumes burned them. The ground beneath her surged again, throwing her onto her back.

  A man’s hands closed on her forearm. With a tug that felt as if it would pull her arm from its socket the unseen man lifted her, rudely throwing her over his shoulders.

  “Hold tight!” Brand called out, though not to her. She managed to crack her eyes open ever so slightly and saw that she was thrown over Brand’s shoulder. She twisted to see that he had one hand on a shovel thrust down into the hole. At the edge of the grave, Bigsby lay with his head and shoulders out over the pit, holding the handle of the shovel down. Brand grabbed the shovel and used it to climb. This resulted in an ungraceful tangle of limbs as Brand pushed Sorrow from his shoulder onto Bigsby’s back as he crawled out over both of them.

  She was too weakened by her inhalation of smoke to protest as she was sandwiched between the two men. They were all tossed into the air by a powerful shock wave that sent huge stones flying straight up from the grave. Another jolt followed swiftly. There was a loud SNAP and a chunk of smoky glass that must have weighed a hundred pounds shot fifty feet skyward before falling back into the grave and shattering with a loud crash.

  “Trunk, get us to safer ground,” Sorrow croaked as she wiped her stinging eyes. She didn’t even see where her golem was, but he proved to be within range of her commands. His gloved fingers closed around the belt of her pants and lifted her butt-first from the trembling earth. It was apparently too much to expect to be rescued with any hint of dignity today.

  Trunk paused to keep his balance as the earth shuddered again. Bigsby lay near the golem’s feet, flat on his back. Sorrow reached out to him. As Trunk started running, her hand closed around the dwarf’s fingers and she dragged him as they dashed for safety.

  Brand was left behind, but by now he had managed to make it to his feet, nimbly dodging the heavy stones that fell to earth around him. He danced across the shuddering landscape, leaping up to grab a low hanging vine. He used the makeshift rope to pull himself up into the branches of a swaying tree, then leaned out to peer into the smoking grave. The plume was so thick Sorrow wondered if they’d somehow dug into an active volcano vent.

  A bony black claw rose from the pit, digging into the earth. This was followed moments later by an ebony reptilian skull snaking through the billowing fumes. The eye sockets were lit by flickering embers.

  “Greatshadow?” she whispered.

  The beast opened its jaws, and jets of black smoke poured out. It looked as if were roaring, but no noise came from the beast save for the clatter of bone against bone and the sizzle of damp earth as it dragged its skeletal body to the surface.

  The creature now stood revealed as a skeletal dragon, as tall as a warhorse, perhaps thirty feet in length from the tip of its snout to the last smoldering vertebra of its serpentine tail. Within its blackened rib cage roiled organs of smoke and flame. The beast spread its bone wings and flapped, a futile gesture as it had no flesh to catch the air.

  Brand was almost directly above the dragon, stretched between branches, now utterly still.

  Before the beast could gaze in their direction, Sorrow shouted, “Trunk! Stop!” The wooden man instantly froze. She froze as well. She wasn’t certain, but there was a strong possibility the dragon was an expertly constructed bone-golem. In the absence of their creator, these mindless beasts would obey predetermined criteria as to whom and what it should attack. “Anything that moves” was one likely criteria, so until the beast turned its gaze elsewhere, she wasn’t twitching an eyebrow.

  Unfortunately, Bigsby didn’t share her caution. He twisted free from her grasp and ran for a pickaxe that had fallen nearby. He brandished the tool overhead and cried, “For the glory of King Brightmoon, I smite thee!” The “thee” trailed off into a high-pitched battle-shriek as he charged the dragon.

  The beast whipped its head toward the dwarf, extended its neck, and let out a whirlwind of smoke. Bigsby disappeared in the swirling smog, but his cry continued undiminished. To Sorrow’s surprise, Bigsby leapt up from the smoke a yard away from the beast’s snout, swinging the pickaxe with both hands to drive the tip into the monster’s nose. Sparks flew as iron bit into bone. The creature jerked its head sideways, throwing Bigsby in a spinning arc through the air. He landed with a bounce, bounced again, and wound up tumbling into the grave where the naked man had been uncovered.

  The dragon turned toward the grave, apparently intending to give chase. Sorrow ground her teeth. As tempting as it was to not hear Bigsby’s voice again, she couldn’t sit by and watch him get slaughtered. She commanded Trunk to put her down and pointed at the dragon. “Stop that thing!”

  Her golem lumbered forward, but she could see he would never cover the distance in time before the bone-dragon dove into the pit and finished off Bigsby. As the beast reared back to lunge, Brand swung down on a length of vine and kicked the creature’s right hind leg out from under it. The beast stumbled, craning its neck around to see who had attacked it. Brand somersaulted backward as the beast snapped at him, then scrambled up into the trees with the speed of a hyperactive monkey. The bone-dragon’s jaws bit into bark where his feet had rested half a second before.

  The dragon dug its cla
ws into the tree and started to give chase. Brand eyed the surrounding vines, planning his next leap. But before the beast could force him from his perch, Trunk reached the bone dragon and grabbed the creature by the tail, yanking it from the tree with a loud clatter.

  The dragon spun around with its jaws spread and neatly clipped off Trunk’s right arm. The golem swung with his left, delivering a blow to the side of the beast’s skull that send a cloud of soot flying from the creature’s bones. The dragon responded with a swipe of its dagger-like fore-claws, tearing Trunk’s wooden-bucket head from his torso.

  Sorrow circled through the trees, then darted toward the bone-dragon from behind. She had no direct command over some other witch’s golem, and her power of decay would have little effect on smoke-cured bones. Her one hope was that the beast’s skeleton had been fixed together with iron or copper wires. She could command these metals to corrode, reducing the beast to a pile of disconnected bones.

  The dragon’s tail whipped unpredictably as it continued to tear Trunk apart. Despite her best efforts at dodging, the tail caught Sorrow in the gut, knocking her backward. Her fingers briefly closed around a vertebra, but she sensed no metal at all within the creature. The smoky bones were held together with enchanted sinews. She fell to her hands and knees, unsure of what she would do if the dragon turned its jaws toward her.

  Fortunately, the dragon was distracted as Brand leapt from the trees and rolled in front of it. He darted away from the beast, waving his arms and screaming, “Over here!”

  Sorrow wondered if this was to save her, then saw Brand glance toward the open grave where Bigsby had fallen. The dwarf was climbing from the pit, in full sight of the dragon. The dragon crouched, eyeing the struggling dwarf like a cat stalking a mouse. Brand waved his arms even more vigorously, and the beast’s glowering eyes turned to study him.

  For a few seconds, the dragon paused, its arcane programming unable to choose between two inviting targets. Sorrow struggled to her feet, running toward the tall tree Brand had climbed earlier. Her powers of rot might not be able to affect the dragon directly, but with luck she might yet be able to strike a blow. The beast had gouged thick claw marks into the wood as it had chased Brand. With a grunt, she drove her hands and boots into the splintered wood and climbed, scrambling to reach the thick branch Brand had stood on, a good thirty feet off the ground. The dragon’s hips were almost directly beneath the branch. Breathlessly, she stretched her right arm up until her fingers touched the thick limb, almost a tree in its own right. She felt Rott’s dark energy flow through her into the tree. In seconds, there was a loud CRACK as the branch snapped from the tree.

  Unfortunately, the beast had by now decided between its targets as Bigsby reached the top of the grave and stood, shaking the dirt from his tangled wig. Something about the shimmering locks triggered the dragon’s instincts to strike. The dragon leapt in a graceful arc like a tiger, its jaws opened to consume the dwarf. Luckily, the falling branch caught the last few vertebrae of his tail as it fell, robbing the creature of momentum. Instead of landing on Bigsby, the bone-beast tumbled snout first into the open grave. There was a crash as the glass casket shattered beneath the dragon’s weight.

  Brand ran and grabbed Bigsby, tossing his diminutive sibling over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Bigsby waved his fist at the dragon flailing in the grave and shouted, “We must not retreat! The honor of the Brightmoon name demands victory!”

  Brand probably wasn’t persuaded by this argument, but it proved not to matter. Graceful as he was, he stumbled on the uneven ground, thrown off balance by his flailing brother. They both slid down the leafy hillside just as the dragon fully emerged from the grave. Sorrow scrambled down the tree, planting both her feet firmly on the ground.

  She placed one hand on the tree trunk. She knew that if this didn’t work, she was dead. She waved with her free hand and cried out, “Dragon! Face me! I’ve come to steal your treasures!”

  She felt a curious thrill as the monster turned toward her.

  “Come and get me,” she growled, as she sank her fingers into the thick tree trunk. The entropic force flowed from her and she tore out chunks of crumbling wood by the fistful as the dragon charged. The tree began to creak. She was reaching into the core, up to her shoulder now, and the tree groaned as it leaned in the direction of the dragon. At last, the wood splintered, snapped, and fell. She nearly laughed that her plan had worked, until the falling tree came to a halt at a thirty-degree angle, its upper branches tangled in the branches of its neighbor.

  By now, the dragon was mere yards away. She stared into the beast’s open jaws. What exquisite irony that her quest to restore the weavers to their full glory was to be brought to a premature end by this unthinking relic crafted by her predecessors.

  The creature jerked to a shuddering halt, its jaws snapping half an inch from her nose. Soot and cinders washed over her face. She fell to her knees, blind and gasping. The beast sounded like a thousand castanets clacking as it wheeled away from her.

  Low to the ground, she forced her eyes opened. Through tears, she could barely make out a large, naked man standing in the first grave, his muscles straining as he held the dragon by the tail. The man let go as the dragon turned in its tracks, its open jaws aimed for the warrior’s head.

  Sorrow blinked. Her vision improved slightly in time for her to see that the man was definitely the person who’d been buried in the glass coffin. His long hair whipped behind him as he leapt from the grave to meet the dragon’s charge. He held a slab of slate the size of a shield in his hand, one of the roofing stones she’d barely been able to move.

  The man thrust the slab into the dragon’s snapping jaws. The stone shattered, but took with it several of the dragon’s teeth. The beast’s mouth opened again, and the grave-man thrust his hands into the gap, grasping the upper and lower jaws. His face contorted as he forced the dragon’s jaws open wider, then wider still. The warrior showed no sign of pain as the beast’s fore-claws slashed out and tore bright red ribbons across his chest. With a SNAP, the right half of the beast’s lower jaw broke free, leaving the warrior holding a long, toothy club of bone.

  Sorrow made it back to her feet, wiping her eyes, coughing out the last of the smoke, only to have her vision blocked as the dragon unleashed another torrent of black vapors, completely engulfing the warrior. From the black cloud came a succession of grunts and bangs and cracks. Suddenly, what was left of the beast’s skull spiraled into the air, landing thirty feet away.

  Unfortunately, decapitating a golem wouldn’t kill it. As impressive as the warrior had been so far, the fact that he’d bled when cut hinted to her that the dragon would likely emerge the victor. She looked around, but couldn’t see Brand and Bigsby anywhere. Sorrow wondered if it might not be time for her to make a strategic retreat.

  A voice called from above, “Get out of the way!”

  Brand was in the vines overhead, with Bigsby struggling to climb to his level. They both had knives, and were slashing at the vines and branches that held the tree she’d attempted to topple. The dragon was still well-positioned to be crushed. Unfortunately, so was the warrior, although she couldn’t see his exact location within the smoke.

  “You’ll crush the man!” she yelled, as Brand sawed through the sturdiest vine holding the tree.

  “These things happen!” Brand cried.

  Sorrow had no time to argue, as the vine snapped and the tree lurched down, gaining momentum as more and more of the smaller branches holding it broke. She ran clear as the massive tree slammed to the earth behind her. She spun, and saw a tornado of smoke rising. Shards of black bones bounced in every direction across the broken ground. The tree had fallen dead on, crushing the beast’s rib cage.

  Off to one side, a black claw twitched as the magic that animated it drained away. She ran to the fallen trunk and clambered over it, searching for the warrior.

  To her relief, he hadn’t been crushed. He was on his feet, looking down at the
jawbone in his hand with glazed eyes. His chest and arms were striped with blood from dozens of gashes. His once white flesh was now black with soot. Perhaps the loss of blood had weakened him, for he swayed on his feet, his legs trembling.

  “Are you all right?” she asked, standing on the tree, looking down at him.

  He didn’t look at her. He looked down at his arms, coated with soot and blood. He lifted his hands, and silently stared at his long, curling nails. His brow furrowed in confusion.

  She felt confusion all her own. Even though the man was plainly alive and breathing, she still couldn’t detect any hint of a life aura. It was as if she were looking at a walking corpse. Hesitantly, she asked again, “Are you all right?”

  “Aye,” he whispered, then collapsed, landing face down in the leaves.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAMBER OF SECRETS

  “OKAY, WHAT JUST happened?” Brand asked as he dropped from the tree.

  Sorrow shook her head as she climbed down to the fallen warrior. “You know everything I do.”

  She knelt over the man. He was still alive, despite his wounds and missing aura. She could see down to bone through the neatly parallel slices across his ribs. Blood gushed freely from a deep gash on his left arm.

  “Give me your shirt,” she said. “We need to stop the bleeding.”

  Brand obeyed, though his shirt was sweaty and covered with dirt. “He’ll get infections unless we use clean cloth.”

  “I think the more urgent problem is his imminent exsanguination,” said Sorrow, tearing the shirt into strips. “Once we staunch the bleeding, I can clean and stitch his injuries.”

  Brand dropped to his knees and wadded up one of the shirt rags, applying pressure to a nasty wound on the man’s thigh.