Hoping she had survived that landslide, Ridge looked back toward the water. A man popped to the surface right in front of him. Still wearing his hat.
Ridge reacted on instinct, firing first, knowing a shaman would have no trouble flinging an attack at him, even from in the water.
The Dakrovian jerked in surprise, trying to duck back down, but one of Ridge’s bullets seemed to catch him. In the arm? The shoulder? In the dark, Ridge had a hard time telling. He could tell that the subsequent bullets bounced away before striking the shaman.
“He’s over here,” Ridge said as his flier took him past the spot where the man treaded water. “He’s got his shields up. Some bombs might help.”
“Bombs always help,” Kaika said.
Ridge banked to come around again, hoping the shaman would struggle to keep his defenses up if he’d been wounded. He expected the Dakrovian to be gone, to have submerged again, where he would be an impossible target. Instead, the man continued to tread water. He glared defiantly as Ridge lined up to fire at him again.
The shaman raised an arm out of the water, something clenched in his hand. A grenade? Some chemical device?
Ridge could tell he was the man’s target, but he also remembered all the times Sardelle had warned him not to shoot while she had a barrier up to protect them, that the bullets would bounce back at them. If this shaman meant to throw something, that ought to mean his barrier would be down… at least for a second.
Ridge barreled ahead, meeting the man’s defiant glare. He gripped the triggers of his machine guns but held his fire until—there. As the Dakrovian hurled the object, Ridge held down the triggers and fired repeatedly. He tilted his wings as he rained down bullets and rolled sideways, hoping to avoid the projectile.
He was sure he’d timed it right, that the object would sail past without quite touching his flier, but the projectile changed its trajectory as it neared him. It darted to the side as if it were some living thing, right toward the cockpit. Ridge tried to duck, but it slammed into his shoulder.
He winced, anticipating an explosion, but the dull thump didn’t hurt as much as he expected. The object didn’t simply bounce away though. Whatever it was burst. A strange liquid or goo spattered all over him and the cockpit.
Ridge tried to adjust the flight stick, since he had passed the shaman’s spot and was heading straight for the docks, but it was a struggle to move his hands and arms. By the glow from his power crystal, he saw strings of white gunk all over him, and his stomach sank into his boots as he realized he couldn’t move. He was like a fly caught in a spider web, and he was going to crash.
18
Sardelle sensed Cas alive and in pain under the rocks, but she couldn’t imagine how she’d survived being buried by what appeared to be tons of boulders.
As Bhrava Saruth watched from above and shifted rocks out of the way, Sardelle picked her way down the slope as quickly as she could.
Hold, high priestess. I have not moved enough boulders yet. Allow the god Bhrava Saruth to expose your companion, so we can more easily help her.
Worried about Cas, Sardelle didn’t want to deal with the dragon’s pomposity, but she made herself pause. He was helping, and he could free Cas much more quickly than she could.
Before her eyes, dozens of boulders flew into the air at once, as if they weighed no more than grains of sand.
Sardelle conjured a light to brighten the slope, more for her benefit than Bhrava Saruth’s. As soon as she could see pale flesh—an arm—among the rubble, she hurried down, hardly caring that a few more boulders were still flying into the air.
“Cas!” she called. “Can you hear me? I’m coming.”
Sardelle didn’t get an answer. She realized Cas had lost consciousness. A blessing for her, given how severe her injures were.
As soon as Sardelle reached Cas, she knelt and rested a hand on the dirty, tattered shoulder of her uniform. Blood smeared Cas’s face, and lumps were already swelling.
Allow me to heal your companion, high priestess, Bhrava Saruth said. Your mate is in trouble and may need our assistance. Also, a shaman’s familiar just flew out of a wrecked underwater boat. We must make haste to join the fray.
“My mate?” Though Sardelle’s instincts made her want to heal Cas as quickly as she could, she couldn’t help but lift her head to look down at the harbor. The last time she had checked, Pimples and Ridge had been piloting their craft to hunt for the fleeing shaman.
Her eyes bulged as she spotted one of their fliers—Ridge’s flier—skipping across the water like a stone. A stone heading straight toward the docks.
She sensed that Ridge was conscious but angry and alarmed—for some reason, he couldn’t move, not enough to manipulate the flight stick.
Help me, Jaxi. Sardelle drew on her power to create a stiff wall of wind in front of Ridge’s flier, hoping to slow it down.
But she was more than a mile away and struggled to affect the air from that distance. Then Jaxi’s energy flowed into her, increasing her power. The wind gathered, pushing against the nose of the flier. It started to slow, but Sardelle grimaced, certain it was too little too late.
Then a third being added energy to theirs. Bhrava Saruth.
The flier halted, its propeller inches from the end of a pier. Sardelle sensed Ridge’s relief, though he was still frustrated that he couldn’t move and couldn’t go help the others to make sure the shaman was dead and the submarine destroyed.
Given time, she might have been able to figure out how to disintegrate the strange magical webbing that held him, but Cas groaned, and Sardelle had to shift her attention back to her.
Ridge, we’re coming to help, she told him telepathically. We just need to heal Cas first.
I believe you already helped. His response was dry despite his frustration. Don’t think I don’t notice these things.
She smiled. It would be a lonely wedding if you weren’t there with me.
You think so? I keep getting requests for extra invitations. I think there are going to be a lot of people there.
“Sardelle?” Cas rasped.
“Yes, I’m here.” Sardelle still had her hand on her shoulder, and she examined Cas with her senses only to find that the grievous wounds had already been healed. Only a few superficial scratches remained.
Yes, Bhrava Saruth announced. I was interrupted when I realized that the mate of my high priestess and my first worshipper in this time was headed for certain doom. And now I must go assist him again, because an overly large bird is flying toward him with evil intent.
Bhrava Saruth leaped into the air, the wind from his wings stirring Sardelle’s hair as he flew past her. She looked up, worried anew for Ridge, but she told herself that Bhrava Saruth could handle any shaman’s familiar. Still, she would hurry down to help as soon as she could.
“How are you feeling?” Sardelle asked Cas.
“A lot better than expected.” Cas eyed the rocky sides of what had almost become her grave.
“Can you get up? Our people are still in trouble.”
A boom floated up from below. Kaika dropping another explosive, Sardelle assumed.
“Are in trouble?” Cas tried to push herself into a sitting position. “Or are trouble?”
“Both of those things.” Sardelle helped her sit up.
“Cas!” Tolemek called from the road above. “Where are you?”
Sardelle had let the light fade, and she reignited it so he would see them down here on the slope.
“And where’s my sword?” came another demand. Therrik stood up there next to Tolemek, and a steam carriage waited behind them.
Sardelle sensed that both men were in pain from injuries. Whoever this shaman was, she was glad she hadn’t had to battle him herself, though she felt guilty for arriving late to the fight.
“We better get up there,” she told Cas. “They both need a healer, and they have a carriage that can take us down to the waterfront more quickly than climbing.”
&n
bsp; Cas rose to her feet, a touch shaky. Sardelle would heal the rest of her injuries as soon as she knew that nobody else was in more dire need.
The shaman levitated himself down the rocks, Jaxi said.
How lovely for him.
I could levitate you if you aren’t comfortable doing it yourself.
The steam carriage will be fine.
How pedestrian.
“The sword.” Cas groaned and looked back. “I can’t leave it down there.”
“Yes, you can. You’re injured.”
“Not that injured. Thank you for that.”
“You have Bhrava Saruth to thank actually. He was faster than I.”
Cas wrinkled her nose. “Does that mean I have to rub his belly?”
“He’ll probably try to get you to worship him too.”
Rocks shifted above them. Therrik was picking his way down the slope while grumbling about lieutenants presumptuously taking his sword. He shot dirty looks at both Cas and Sardelle.
Maybe she would let Bhrava Saruth heal his injuries. Then he could be indebted to the dragon. She wondered if Bhrava Saruth would like to have his belly rubbed by a surly colonel.
Cas frowned after Therrik, probably feeling she should have been the one to go after the sword. Sardelle put an arm around her back and pointed her up the slope. Tolemek waited at the top, looking like he also meant to pick his way down, but Sardelle sensed a lot of pain from him, so she held up a hand, hoping to stop him.
As she and Cas made their way up, he insisted on coming down partway to meet them.
“Tolemek was shot in the shoulder,” Cas told Sardelle. “He needs your help, too, please.”
“The enemy shaman?” Sardelle asked.
“Yes.”
As soon as he was close enough, Tolemek rushed forward and hugged Cas with one arm. “The guards said you were completely caught in an avalanche,” he said, his voice agonized.
“I was hoping nobody saw that,” Cas said.
“Sit down, please, Tolemek.” Sardelle hated to hurry their reunion, but she wanted to get that bullet out of his shoulder as quickly as possible in case Bhrava Saruth had more trouble with the hawk than she expected. Or in case nobody could figure out how to get Ridge out of his flier before it sank.
Alarmed at the thought, she glanced toward the pier where he’d almost crashed. His craft was floating on the water rather than sinking down, its light weight and the wings keeping it aloft. Good.
“Sit?” Tolemek let go of Cas. “That sounds difficult. Mind if I just collapse?”
“Not at all,” Sardelle said.
She and Cas helped him to a relatively flat spot, and Sardelle set to work on his injury.
The flier bobbed quietly in the waves of the harbor, the propeller bumping against the end of the pier. Ridge still had power, as the glowing energy crystal attested, but the craft wasn’t going anywhere until a crane lifted it out. Unfortunately, Ridge couldn’t go anywhere, either, not until someone came along to lift him out. Or cut him out, more likely. It might take a soulblade to do it—the magical webbing had hardened, and moving seemed more impossible than ever.
Booms came from out in the harbor. Ridge hoped that was Kaika and Pimples dropping bombs on the head of the shaman—and that they were getting through the man’s barriers. He wished he could help. Or even turn to look.
As the last of three explosions died away, a piercing screech came from behind Ridge, from closer than the explosions had been.
Reflexively, he tried to spin his head around to look for the source, but of course, he couldn’t move. Another screech sounded. Closer, this time. He groaned, certain the shaman’s familiar was back. If he was its target, there was not a damn thing he could do.
The ropes of webbing smothering Ridge and the entire cockpit abruptly burst into flames. He let out an unmanly squawk, terrified the crazy familiar was going to burn him to ash. But the flames disappeared without harming him—he barely felt the heat—and the webbing disappeared with them.
Though he wasn’t sure what had happened, Ridge didn’t hesitate to grab his pistol and whirl in the direction of the screeches.
He was in time to see a golden dragon-shaped arrow slam into the side of the feathered creature. They were so close to the flier that Ridge lifted his hands to protect his face, expecting blood and guts to spatter him. But Bhrava Saruth’s momentum carried the hawk all the way to the next pier before they splashed into the water. Feathers flew as the dragon tore the hawk to bits. As large as the bird had been, it was small compared to Bhrava Saruth, and its magic couldn’t compare to that of the dragon.
Ridge looked away, trusting that particular nemesis wouldn’t rise again.
“Sir?” Pimples asked over the communication crystal. “Are you all alive over there?”
“Surprisingly, yes. I’m not even injured.” Ridge turned in the direction of the other flier, finding it against the dark sky by its propeller noise. “I don’t suppose you have good news about the shaman?”
“Actually, I think we got him, sir.”
“We?” came Kaika’s voice from his back seat. “I was the one dropping bombs on his head.”
“But I flew you close so you could do so, ma’am. I’m integral to missions. Everyone says so.”
“Is that true, General?” Kaika called.
“Well, I imagine at least someone might have said so once.”
“Ha ha, sir.”
I can confirm, Bhrava Saruth announced into Ridge’s mind, that the enemy shaman and his pesky pet bird are dead. Also, their underwater boat has filled with water and now rests on the bottom of the harbor. It has been my pleasure to assist you in this manner.
Thank you, Bhrava Saruth, Ridge said with genuine gratitude, knowing he’d been close to becoming a hawk snack.
You may leave your gratitude in the form of baked sweets at my temple when it is completed.
Ridge slumped back in his seat and closed his eyes. I’ll be glad to do so.
Excellent. You are a very good worshipper.
Ridge snorted and wondered if pastries from Donotono’s Bakery would do or if the dragon expected homemade goodies.
Tolemek sat among the rocks, his eyes half-closed as he watched the harbor and Sardelle worked on his shoulder. It itched like mad, but the wound already hurt less. She had removed the bullet, leaving the bloody lump on the ground beside him.
Cas sat on his other side, her arm around his back, lending her support. It seemed odd that she was the less injured of the two of them, thanks, he understood, to Bhrava Saruth. His heart had dropped into his boots when he’d heard from the guards that the shaman had dropped tons of boulders on top of her. He’d resolved in that instant not to worry about the future and children again, so long as the gods saw fit to keep her alive and give her back to him.
Irritated grunts came from below as Therrik, Kasandral in his hand again, climbed back up toward the road. Tolemek didn’t know how the sword had ended up way down there, but he admitted smug pleasure that the colonel had been forced to retrieve it. Therrik must have decided the battle below had wrapped up sufficiently and that he and the blade weren’t needed.
“I learned something tonight,” Cas said.
“That life is short—and can sometimes be prematurely shortened—and that one should appreciate it with the people one loves, rather than arguing about small matters?”
“That Dakrovian shamans are hells to kill.”
“Ah. Also an important lesson.”
Cas smiled and patted his stomach, careful not to disturb Sardelle, whose hand rested on his warm, itchy shoulder as she sat beside him, her head bowed.
An Iskandian ironclad belched smoke out of its stack and left the dock. It was at the far end of the harbor from where all the fighting and bombing had taken place, but the captain must have decided to wait to leave until any potential obstacles had been cleared away. Tolemek was surprised the ship was departing at night.
The sky brightened behi
nd Tolemek. He twisted his neck, half-expecting some magical attack or bomb dropping.
Distant claps and cheers erupted from the men and women still crowding the dock. The castle was alight, almost blazing with light. Sconces all along the outer wall beamed, and white illumination poured from the windows of the higher levels and towers visible above it.
Tolemek snorted. “I guess someone determined that the lights would go on tonight, no matter what else happened.”
“One can’t let the schemes of enemies interfere with one’s festivals,” Cas said.
An explosion tore through the night, and Tolemek jerked his gaze back to the harbor. His first thought was that Kaika had somehow set one of her bombs off by accident. But more explosions followed, and they didn’t come from the pier where the two fliers were parked and other soldiers had gathered. No, they came from that ironclad.
It had almost reached the mouth of the harbor to head out to sea. But it wasn’t going anywhere now.
Whatever bomb had been set off had opened up a huge hole in the side of its hull, and flames still spilled from it. Tolemek suspected its coal bins were burning down in the boiler room.
“Uh, that didn’t appear to be accidental,” Cas said. “I’ve heard of catastrophic boiler failures before, but…”
Sardelle lifted her head and gazed down at the flames pouring from the ironclad.
“That was no accident,” she said grimly. “That’s the ship that was carrying the dragon blood to… wherever Angulus meant to hide it.”
“How do you know?” Tolemek remembered the carriage that had left the castle. Had it been taking its secret cargo down to the harbor to load onto that ironclad?
“I sense it. I didn’t before the explosion, but the iron it was boxed in must have been destroyed, because I sensed it strongly there for a moment. Now… I believe all the vials were destroyed, and it’s dissipating into the water flowing into the hold.”
“Did the shaman do it?” Tolemek asked, feeling confused. Yendray had wanted the dragon blood for himself, not to see it destroyed.
Oaths (Dragon Blood, Book 8) Page 27