Pillars of Dragonfire

by Daniel Arenson

  She shook her head wildly. Foolishness. There were no such things as prophecies. Requiem had always forged its own future—from the first King Aeternum to the great Queen Kaelyn and finally to her, Meliora, a daughter of their dynasty. Those old monarchs had defeated their enemies.

  "And I will defeat mine," Meliora whispered. "Requiem will not fall on my watch. She will rise again."

  Even if I must give my life to her, she thought and shuddered.

  She was about to lead the dragons down to the river, allowing them to dive and scoop up water before soaring again, when the shrieks sounded in the north.

  Meliora caught her breath. She stared ahead, eyes narrowed.

  She could still see nothing, but a stench filled the air, rancid, the smell of rotten meat and sulfur and mold. The distant cries rose again, reminding her of vultures fighting over corpses. When Meliora squinted, she could see a cloud rising from beyond the hazy horizon. Many dark specks flew there like flies over filth.

  "What are they?" Elory asked. The lavender dragon wrinkled her snout. "I can smell them even from here."

  Smoke washed across them, and with flashing red scales, Lucem darted up to fly between the sisters.

  "Meliora, you really need a bath," the young red dragon said. "The whole damn nation can smell your stink."

  Meliora glared at the dragon. "You're the one who's been living in the wilderness for ten years. But no, Lucem. This isn't dragon stench, as potent as yours is." She pointed her claws to the north. "Your eyes are sharp. What do you see?"

  Mumbles rose across the crowd of dragons; more of them were now noticing the cloud ahead. The dark flecks were flying closer, moving at great speed across the sky. Their stench churned Meliora's stomach, and their cries made her wince. The sound was so high-pitched, so cruel, it seemed to twist her very bones.

  "Whatever they are," Lucem said, "I wager they're not friendly. And sadly, not very edible, judging by the smell."

  Meliora looked over her shoulder and cried out. "Warriors of Requiem! Forward! Fly with me!"

  Dozens of dragons rose from the crowd, soon hundreds, then thousands. This nation of freed slaves—their freedom only days old—had no army. But they had already fought one battle, defeating the seraphim over Tofet, and already they knew who their warriors were. The stronger dragons now flew forth—those who had wielded pickaxes or hauled bitumen in the fields of their captivity. The elders, the children, the weak, the wounded—they moved back to fly behind the defenders.

  When Meliora looked across the crowd of fighters, she saw her father flying there. Jaren, a green dragon, was a healer, a priest, not a warrior. In human form, he was tall and haggard, and as a dragon he was long, thin, older than the others.

  She flew up to him. "Father, I need you to fly back, to protect the elders and children. I—"

  "I fight." Jaren stared at her, eyes hard. "I'm a healer, yes. And I'm old. And I'm thin. But my fire is still hot, and my faith in Requiem strong. I fight with you."

  The shrieks from the north rose louder now, morphing into twisted laughter. Meliora sneered. The distant beings were closer now, only several miles away. They had large, feathered wings, dark colored, indeed like vultures. They seemed the size of dragons, and she estimated their number at a thousand. Dark clouds gathered above them, as if the sun itself hated the sight of them, shielding its light from their wretchedness. With every mile they crossed, coming closer, disgust grew in Meliora.

  "Ugly buggers," Lucem muttered.

  Meliora swallowed the instinct to gag. She could finally see the creatures clearly. Indeed, they were as large as dragons, perhaps larger. Yet their bodies were humanoid, female and withered. Dented slabs of armor covered their chests. They had no arms, only wide wings with oily, rotting feathers, tipped with claws. The creatures' heads were massive, large as dragon heads, yet still human—the faces of crones, wrinkled, covered with moles, the noses long, the teeth sharp. Serpents grew from their heads instead of hair, hissing, tongues darting. Worst of all, however, were the creature's legs. While their bodies were those of giant women, the legs were those of vultures, ending with black talons the length of sabers.

  "Harpies," Meliora said. She spat out fire.

  She had heard of such creatures. Every son and daughter of the Thirteenth Dynasty of Saraph had. Thousands of years ago, they said, the ancient gods of Edinnu had tried to create life, to forge servants of beauty and holiness. Their first attempt had failed. Instead of beings of beauty and nobility, their creations had bloated, withered, rotted. The gods had envisioned pure immortals, their skin soft and unblemished, their hair golden and flowing. Yet boils covered that skin, and nests of snakes topped their heads instead of halos. Disgusted, the gods had caged their deformed daughters, deeming them harpies—cursed creatures. The gods had learned from their mistake. Their second creations flourished, the mighty seraphim. Yet the harpies lingered on, caged, growing mad over the millennia.

  And now they're here, Meliora thought, staring at them. Creatures of purest hatred, creatures who lived for nothing but slaughter. There was only one soul who could have freed them, who could command them.

  "The King of Saraph," she whispered. "Ishtafel. These are his servants now."

  The thousand harpies screeched and raised their talons. Their wings beat, blasting their stench onto the dragons. Their jaws opened wide, dropping halfway down their chests, exposing rows of fangs and white tongues. Their talons reached out, tipped with dry blood, and the snakes on their heads writhed and added their shrill voices to the chorus.

  "Weredragons, weredragons!" the harpies cried. "Creatures foul, creatures cruel. Slay them, slay them, sisters! Slay them for our master."

  The harpies cackled, and their saliva fell like rain. Their eyes blazed, bugging out, veined and bloodshot. They stormed forth, crossing the last mile toward the dragons. The creatures were outnumbered but seemed to know no fear, only rage and hatred.

  Meliora reared and blasted her fire skyward, her white pillar of light, a beacon of strength for her people.

  "Requiem!" she called. "Hear me, Requiem! A new battle approaches. Fight! Fight for your nation, for your stars, for your lives!"

  Meliora charged, roaring fire. Her fellow dragons flew around her, hundreds of warriors. Elory and Lucem flew to her left, fire blazing. Her father flew to her right. Above, bellowing with rage, flew Vale, her brother; the blue dragon blasted a great stream of fire that rained sparks.

  As the flames raced across the sky, the harpies opened their jaws wide. Jets of ice blasted from their mouths, casting out frosted clouds. The frozen pillars thrust toward the dragons, icicles the size of oaks.

  Fire and ice slammed together.

  The dragonfire scattered, dispersed into fountains that rained down as sparks. Some of the icy shards melted, but many spears of ice made it through the inferno, dripping and still sharp.

  Dragons screamed as the ice slammed against them. An icicle, large as a battering ram, drove into a dragon at Meliora's side; it pierced his chest and burst out from his back. The dragon screamed and lost his magic, returning to the form of a young man. The icy shard tore the smaller human body apart, and the man tumbled down, halved and gushing blood. Other icy shards flew all around, cutting into other dragons, ripping wings, tearing scales.

  Meliora howled. Instinctively, she banked left, dodging a pillar of ice. Guilt and terror filled her as the ice slammed into a dragon behind her, sending a woman plunging down toward the desert. More bodies rained. Smoke, frost, and fire filled the sky.

  "Burn them down!" Meliora shouted. "Burn them all!"

  She inhaled deeply, prepared to blow more fire. Ahead of her, several harpies emerged from clouds of frost and fire, cackling and flying toward her. Massive talons—larger than her claws—reached toward Meliora.

  She screamed and blasted fire, but her flames missed the harpies. She tried to bank but slammed into another dragon. Harpy talons scraped across her shoulder, ripping out scales. Blood sp
urted and Meliora yowled in pain. Another harpy swooped from above, landed on her back, and dug its fangs into her.

  Meliora nearly lost her magic.

  She growled, refusing to lose it.

  She swiped her tail like a scorpion, driving it into the harpy on her back. She felt the tail's spikes pierce rotted flesh, and gray blood sprayed. With a roar, Meliora swiped her claws, knocking back a harpy ahead of her. She blasted more fire, her wings scattering sparks and smoke, trying to hold them back.

  Yet the creatures were everywhere. Their faces, bloated to obscene size, leered all around Meliora. The eyes bugged out, bloodshot. The snakes on their heads thrust forward, snapping their mouths. Another harpy thrust its talons, slamming them into Meliora, cutting her again, ripping her chest. She yowled.

  She blasted more dragonfire.

  Her white flames washed over the harpy assaulting her. The creature's wings ignited. The snakes on its head burned. For a moment the harpy seemed like a phoenix, woven of nothing but fire. Then it fell. Another flew forth, and Meliora spun around, lashed her tail, and drove the spikes into its head.

  The harpy's head shattered, leaking its innards, but the snakes upon it still lived. They coiled around Meliora's tail, biting her. Pain pierced Meliora. Poison spread through her. She bellowed in agony, twisted around, and blasted more fire.

  Her own flames washed across her tail, burning the snakes, cauterizing her wounds. The shattered harpy fell.

  For a brief moment, Meliora could breathe, could spare the battle a glance. It seemed barely any harpies had fallen, yet the corpses of Vir Requis still rained. Hundreds already covered the desert below. Whenever the dragons blasted fire, the harpies responded with clouds of ice, blocking the flames. Whenever the dragons charged, the harpies spat out their icicles, piercing scales. Every instant, another dragon lost his or her magic, falling down in human form, frozen, bleeding, dead or dying.

  We're not an army, Meliora realized, heart sinking. We're only freed slaves. Too weary. Too famished. Too weak. They will slay us all.

  She tossed back her head and roared.

  If we die, we die fighting.

  "Light the sky with fire!" she cried. "Dragons, fight for your stars! Fight for your lives! Fight or Requiem!"

  She beat her wings with all her strength, driving forth toward the enemy.

  Her family fought with her. Her sister, a slim lavender dragon. Her brother, a great blue dragon, his fire a mighty stream. Her father, green and wise, now roaring with fury. Hundreds of other dragons—they were all her family now.

  A harpy flew toward Meliora, blasting not icicles but a cloud of frost. The frozen miasma flowed across Meliora, and her scales chipped, and her muscles stiffened. She could barely breathe, but she managed to blow her dragonfire, piercing a way through the frozen cloud. She stormed forth, snapped her jaws, drove her teeth into the harpy's neck. She pulled back, tearing out rotted flesh. The harpy fell. More flew around her, freezing her scales with their breath. Meliora spun in circles, spreading her fire, melting the ice. Her claws lashed, scattering the gray blood of the creatures.

  Her blood spilled but her hope soared. Slowly, one by one, the harpies were falling. Elory roasted one with dragonfire. Vale cast another down, tearing the beast open with his claws. Lucem and Jaren fought back to back, flames forming a ring around them, burning the harpies. Thousands of other dragons fought with them, finally overwhelming the enemies. Meliora's flames were down to sparks, and her blood dripped, and with her final drop of strength she slew the last of the creatures.

  She had vowed not to land until they reached Requiem, but Meliora could barely cling to her magic. She flew down and all but crashed onto a rocky plain. Corpses spread around her, some smashed beyond recognition; what the harpy claws hadn't done, the fall from the sky had. Meliora released her magic and lay among the dead, lacerations and frostbite covering her.

  Other dragons landed around her and released their magic. They too were wounded. Gashes bled across them, left by talons and fangs. Frost covered some, and others nursed swelling serpent bites. Hundreds of wounded lay among the dead. Healers rushed among them, bearing what meager supplies they had—the bandages and ointments they had taken from their humble huts in Tofet.

  So many dead, Meliora thought, staring into the eyes of the fallen around her. Only three days out of Tofet, and so many fallen already.

  Jaren came walking toward her, back in human form. The tall priest still wore his burlap robes from Tofet, and he leaned on his wooden staff, limping from an old wound. Frost covered his beard, melting as the clouds parted and the sun emerged. He knelt above Meliora.

  "I will pray for your healing, daughter." He placed his hands upon her.

  "No." Meliora struggled to her feet, removing his hands. "Heal the others first. Heal those who followed me to war. I'll wait."

  Those words hurt him; she saw that. She could see the thoughts in his eyes.

  You are my precious daughter. I lost you before you were even born, only to meet you twenty-seven years later. I can't lose you again.

  "I'm fine," she whispered, though every word hurt to utter. "Pray for the warriors of Requiem. They need you more than I do."

  As he turned toward the others, praying to the stars to heal their wounds, Meliora raised her eyes, seeking more harpies in the sky.

  Instead she saw two distant figures—dragons, their scales bright—approaching from the south.

  A red dragon and a black dragon. Meliora's breath caught. She raised her hand, summoning them.

  The two dragons flew closer and saw her signal. They spiraled down and landed before her, winded, puffing out smoke and spurts of flame. Both were young and slender, their scales clanking as they breathed raggedly. When they had caught their breath, they released their magic, becoming two young women clad in white livery—one with dark hair and olive skin, the other pale and sporting red stubble on her head.

  Meliora stepped closer to them. "Kira! Talana! Tell me what you saw."

  A lifetime ago—stars, it had been only months!—the two young women had served Meliora in the palace, her loyal handmaidens. Meliora still felt shame at remembering who she had been then—a pampered, ignorant princess who had treated Kira and Talana as one might treat pups. She had saved them from Malok, the bronze bull, and burn marks still covered their arms, the scars perhaps permanent. That had been the day Meliora had changed, the day her innocence had burned away in the bronze bowels of Malok. Today Kira and Talana served her not as handmaidens but as scouts, two of the fastest dragons in Requiem, their eyes sharp, their wings swift, their loyalty unquestionable. As the nation of Requiem flew across the wilderness, Kira and Talana were its eyes in the distance. But the two looked not to the north, their destination, but south—back toward Tofet, the land they were fleeing, the land where Ishtafel still lurked.

  "My queen!" they said, kneeling before her. "You're wounded!"

  "I'm not queen of Requiem," she told them. "I am her beacon, her voice in the wilderness. Never mind my wounds. Tell me what you saw."

  They rose, eyes darting.

  "We saw an army," Kira whispered, her black eyes wide. "A great army that darkened the sky, with more warriors then grains of sand in the desert."

  Talana shivered, even more pale than usual. "Ishtafel leads them, my que—I mean, my lady. But he's no longer fair. He's all clad in steel and gold—not just armor but new skin, even covering his face, and his wings are now featherless like the wings of a bat. But the creatures he leads are even fouler." She hugged herself. "They . . . They . . ."

  "They look like this," Meliora finished for her, voice soft, and pointed at the steaming corpse of a harpy.

  The two scouts turned to look and shuddered. The harpy lay only a few yards away, the size of a dragon. Gray blood and maggots seeped from its wounds, and its tongue hung from its mouth, long and white and bustling with ants. A few snakes still lived on its head, hissing and spitting venom.

  Kira and Talana
nodded.

  "Harpies," they whispered together, for they too—once slaves in the palace of Saraph—had heard the tales of these creatures.

  Meliora stepped closer to her scouts and placed her hands on their shoulders. She looked into their eyes, one after the other.

  "How many were there?" she asked. "By your best estimate, how many?"

  Kira gulped. "More than the seraphim who flew against us in Tofet. I'm good at counting. I always used to count seraphim from the window of the palace. But here is a greater army than I've ever seen, ten times the size of the greatest garrisons of Saraph. A million harpies fly toward us, moving fast. As fast as dragons."

  Talana nodded, lips trembling. "A million."

  Frost seemed to flow across Meliora again. She stared into the bulging, bloodshot eyes of the harpy corpse. Her wounds flared with pain, and the voices of the dead Vir Requis seemed to cry out to her.

  You promised us freedom! You promised us a home. Now we die. Now we all die.

  Meliora turned away and closed her eyes.

  A thousand harpies ravaged our ranks, she thought. A thousand nearly tore through our defenders, nearly reached our children, nearly crushed our hope. A million will kill every last dragon.

  "We must rise," she whispered, opening her eyes. "Jaren! Vale! Raise the dragons. Let the wounded ride on those dragons strong enough to fly. Rise, dragons of Requiem! Fly! Fly with all your speed. Leave the dead."

  Meliora tried to shift into a dragon, tried to fly with them, but she was too weak. Her magic petered away. Elory rushed forth to grab Meliora as she wavered.

  "Ride me, sister," Elory said, turning into a dragon. "Ride me until you're well enough to fly."

  A few dragons began to rise. Others were digging quick graves—with dragon claws and sandy soil, the work didn't take long—and soon they too rose.

  Perhaps Meliora would never know how many had died here—thousands, perhaps tens of thousands. But as the dragons of Requiem flew onward, she knew one thing: If Ishtafel caught them, none of them would survive.