The boy looked perplexed. Then I realized, even at fifteen – no, sixteen, now – he was in a battle against a dragon and an army of bloodthirsty goblins. He had killed grown men. He was no boy, and never would be again.
“A fart?” he suggested, unhelpfully.
Okay, maybe there was some boy left in there.
“If you can conjure up one that will irritate a dragon, great. Otherwise . . .”
He did have a point, I realized. Lady Ithalia had said that this was a baby dragon, essentially, that they took decades to mature into their intelligence. I was assuming that meant it was prone to the same limitations as any other baby would be: reacting instinctively, not rationally, to stimuli. It was hungry, it fed. If it was attacked, it fought back. When it was sleepy, presumably, it would sleep. It had (I was guessing) the same basic senses that we did, and being exposed to strong negative stimuli was one way to compel it to react.
I didn’t want to blind it, despite the temptation. A blind dragon could not see a threat coming and could not react to it. I had no idea what kind of smells would repel or attract it, and considering it made a habit of exhausting sulfur-laden jet of flammable gas from its mouth, I wasn’t sure I wanted to experience a smell strong enough to discomfort it. The way it was gobbling up fully-armored warriors told me it had an unrefined palate and a wide-range of taste tolerances. And that hide made tickling the thing as unlikely as hurting it.
That only left me with one option. I studied the big head as it darted back and forth across the bailey, howling and occasionally flaming the irritants who were trying to kill it. Not the full-fledged devastation of dragonfire, but gentle little licks of flame only sufficient to put a village afire, for instance.
“Can you manage a sound-proofing spell?” I shouted in Tyndal’s ear over the sounds of thunder, screaming, battle and an upset dragon. He looked puzzled but nodded. “Reach everyone you can in the bailey by mind. Tell them to do it, too. Quickly.”
Tyndal nodded again and closed his eyes. I did likewise, and in quick succession told Planus, Mavone, and Jendaran (who had wisely retreated behind some fallen masonry when his spell worked too successfully at attracting the dragon’s attention. All agreed to work the simple spell and pass along word to others.
Once they were warned, I got to work. Sound spells can be easy, if you know the principals involved. With a sophisticated ability to work with magical planes of force, vibration, and air currents you can eventually produce just about any kind of noise. The simplest way is to create a magical plane, solidify it just right, and then cause it to vibrate until it makes noise. It’s the arcane equivalent of ringing a bell, sort of.
This was going to be one big bell. Using power from my sphere lavishly, I cast a disc of force about two feet wide, and began it vibrating. As I poured more and more energy into it, the louder it got. I glanced at the dragon. No effect.
So I changed the shape and size of the disc slightly, and then again as I watched. The noise got loud enough to remind me I hadn’t done my own silence spell, so I slapped one on and kept going.
Louder and louder the whine came, and I kept adjusting the volume and frequency until I saw the dragon cringe. That’s when I knew I had a chance. I blew up that spell into a terribly frightful whine that made my teeth ache even through my protective spell.
Penny, get ready, I said, mind-to-mind, as I watched the dragon grow more and more upset by the noise. It looked about confusedly, its eyes whirling with panic, as it sought out the source of the hateful sound.
After snapping blindly in a few directions, the dragon shook its mighty head and finally lifted its head out of the baily . . . and right into the position Penny wanted.
Perfect, Min! she shouted in my brain.
The head is up, now what? I asked.
Instead of answering, I felt a wave of magic wash over me and do something interesting I couldn’t put my finger on right away. My defensive spells didn’t kick in, so it was probably not targeted at me. But then nothing in particular happened.
We’re still having a hard time getting a hook, she revealed to me a moment later. There’s just too much resistance! If we can’t get a target—
I groaned expressively at the admission. That dragon had been shrugging off our best spells like they were cantrips by a clown at a party. I saw Mavone launch what was probably a nasty and destructive spell into the dragon’s belly, when it was exposed. It barely reacted.
I hung my head, feeling defeated. I was the most powerful human mage alive, and I couldn’t do anything productive against this worm. I saw my snowflake pendant from Sevendor, the one Rondal had given me, and I wondered whether or not I’d ever see my cozy little land again. That, at least, was defendable against dragons. Any worm who landed at Sevendor would find itself far less resistant to magic, and a lot more attackable. Too bad we couldn’t drag this one’s ass back there and dispatch it on the Commons.
That got me thinking, after I dismissed the amusing and dangerous idea of a dragon in Sevendor. It got me thinking about snowstone.
I had an idea.
Without saying a word, I jumped from behind my cover and sprinted away from the line, toward our support people near the wall. That’s hard to do in armor in a rainstorm when you’ve recently suffered a concussion, but I wasn’t going to let petty inconveniences get to me. I had an idea.
I skidded to a halt near to a very surprised Sarakeem, who was sitting, discouraged, on a fallen block, cradling his new Alka bow and waiting for more orders. I began talking, and then realized he couldn’t hear me while we were both wearing silence spells, so I dropped them both.
“Can you hit that thing?” I asked, breathlessly.
“The dragon? Of course, Magelord!” he said, indignantly. “I have hit it repeatedly. Yet none of my enchanted arrows can penetrate its hide. None of my spells are having an effect.”
I nodded. “It’s the resistance. And I think I have an answer. Give me an arrow,” I said, as I plucked the snowstone snowflake off of my chest, breaking the leather thong that held it. It took me a few moments to thread the shaft of the arrow through the small hole at its center, and in the end I had to use some shaping spells, but within moments there was a five-centimeter diameter piece of balanced snowstone three inches behind Sarakeem’s elaborately-enchanted steel bodkin point. “Can you hit it with this?” I asked, handing him the arrow back. “In the head? Hard enough to stick?”
The Merwini warmage blinked. “Of course, Magelord!” he said, grabbing the arrow. With one smooth motion he nocked, drew, aimed, and fired, sending the blue-and-black fletched shaft skyward towards the worm. If the additional weight of the snowstone hurt the flight of the arrow, I didn’t notice it.
What I did notice was how close to the dragon’s throat it stuck when it did hit. While the beast didn’t notice yet one more arrow in its armored hide, using magesight I was able to see it had jammed deeply enough into its armor to keep the snowflake pressed up against it.
I sighed, and contact Pentandra. Whatever you’re planning on doing, do it. You should be able to get a hook on it now, I said, explaining how.
She didn’t discuss it – she tried it. I looked up to see what the nature of the spell would be . . . just in time to see a massive bolt of lighting zig-zag across the sky. It emitted from the dark and foreboding clouds just overhead, and hit the dragon within inches of its snowflake pendant.
The beast howled with pain and shook uncontrollably when the bolt touched it. Its limbs went rigid as it convulsed, hurling its wings into the sky. The bolt was powerful, and in an instant the smell of burnt ozone joined the smells of blood, battle, smoke and dragon. The flash was incredible, a blinding bolt, and the peal of thunder that resulted nearly deafened anyone who wasn’t already wearing a silence spell.
That’s when Terleman’s group’s spell gusting the wind swept by, catching the two big wings of the paralyzed dragon like a sail. Between the sudden painful shock and the gust, the beast was forced
to retreat. Everyone in the castle watched in speechless horror as the dragon crumpled, sprang back and was pushed, all at once. One minute we were fighting an angry dragon, the next minute it was falling over the castle wall and rolling down the hill to escape…
…right into the middle of the goblin center, where it collapsed. And collapsed on a couple of hundred unsuspecting gurvani. Everyone who could ran to the wall to watch the beast convulse and contort over the top of its erstwhile allies.
“Now for the hard part,” I sighed, exhausted beyond comprehension. The spell that had reinvigorated me was already fading, and I could feel it. “We knocked it down. Let’s make sure it doesn’t get back up.”
Chapter Forty-Nine
The Dragonslayers
The sudden and unexpected arrival of several tons of unconscious dragon in the center of the battle had an interesting result. Everyone, human and gurvani, ran like hell away from the dragon.
That played havoc with the tactics of the situation. The goblin right was already falling to the charges of the cavalry, strengthened by the garrison from the castle. The left wasn’t faring much better, but was still intact as a military unit.
But the center . . . the dragon had fallen through the south wall and rolled down the incline, smashing the gate, rolling over the moat like it wasn’t there, smack into the goblin rear – which was already under assault from the garrison infantry. Neither party fared well. In the aftermath we learned over seven hundred brave Gilmoran men-at-arms had been crushed in the dragon’s fall, and every time its tail jerked, another dozen on either side were in peril. The sprawling wings swept over the beleaguered left line, dashing it to splinters.
But it didn’t come steadily to rest. The beast was spasming, and every mighty tremor was an assault on its surroundings. That convinced everyone that getting out of the way was more important than staying to fight the battle. Man and gurvan alike fled the field at top speed, seeking any safe place against the gargantuan tremors.
“Are you sure it isn’t dead?” Tyndal asked, hopefully, as we started down the ruined causeway toward the dragon and the battle. “It looks dead.”
“It’s still breathing,” I pointed out. “It’s hard to tell under all of that armor, but you can see its torso rise and fall. Ragged, but it’s still breathing.”
“How did you manage the lightning, Master?” he asked, in an undertone. “That was bloody brilliant!”
“Thank Pentandra,” I dismissed. “But it didn’t do as much as I’d hoped. It did give me an idea, though. I used my snowstone pendant as a means of lowering the local resistance field, which let her hook the worm to her spell. It wasn’t a lot, but it was enough.”
“Do you think the pendant survived . . . that?” he asked as he gestured to the devastation before us.
“Probably not,” I admitted. “But if you recall, that’s hardly the only piece of snowstone on the field today.” Tyndal’s eyes got wide and he almost stopped, blocking the narrow path left of the ruined causeway, and earning a dirty look or two from the determined warmagi behind him. “So start contacting everyone you can, down in the battle, and relay these orders: every man with a piece of snowstone should do his best to get it in proximity to the dragon.”
“That might be difficult to accomplish,” Planus said, from behind me. “Most of our men seem to be running away from the dragon.”
“Still, that’s how we can do this,” I reasoned. “And we had better do it quickly, because if that thing wakes up before we dispatch it, we probably won’t get another opportunity.”
The word spread quickly, thanks to the facility of mind-to-mind communication, and within moments I could see men from all over the field hurling little white pebbles against the bulk of the dragon.
Penny, does that help matters? I asked, as I neared the bottom, where the gatehouse that had withstood a week of goblin assault had been reduced to a crater by the falling dragon.
Yes! Oh, dear gods, yes! she agreed, happily. I think we’ll be able to get something working on it soon. Dara is ready with the Thoughtful Knife. She’s been practicing, she added, a little hesitantly.
Practicing?
On goblins. We got an urgent message from Sir Roncil, leading the left flank, who needed support. Dara used the Knife. Min, it was . . . highly effective, she said, simply. Penny is unused to the horrors of war, despite being in a few battles by now. From all accounts, the Thoughtful Knife was hell on infantry, being able to slice through armor like cloth and flesh like butter. I thought of the massed goblinry on the left, and how a fast-flying blade might fare among them.
I hope she wasn’t too upset, I said, cautiously.
She’ll survive. She doesn’t like goblins.
She’s in good company. Have her try a run at the dragon, while it’s still stationary. And Penny? If that thing wakes up, don’t wait for the order. Run. Get your people out of there and withdraw.
Min, I—
That’s an order, Penny. That thing almost wiped me out with a flick of its tail, and it killed my horse. If it wakes up, it won’t wake up pretty. So get the hell out and let us deal with it. You’ve done enough – more than enough – today.
Oh, shut up, Min. I’m not going anywhere. Besides, if you die they’ll expect me to run everything, and I don’t want that job.
Penny, you run everything already, I pointed out as I drew Twilight. There was a group of goblins clustered just past the ruined guardhouse, either deserters or survivors or reserves. They weren’t looking particularly threatening, but then I wasn’t feeling particularly merciful.
Yes, but I’m not responsible for it, you are. I want the power. I don’t want the blame.
Good to know that, I replied. Now get busy with whatever creative nastiness you can think of that might affect that mountain disguised as a lizard before the gurvani get regrouped.
The skirmish at the bottom of the causeway was brief and brutal – the gurvani weren’t expecting such a powerful attack from within the wreckage of a burning castle. The first six of us that made it to the bottom slaughtered two score gurvani in a burst of frustrated enchantment. Jendaran the Trusty was particularly effective, using an invisible field to stun the goblins before using a freezing spell to clog their throats with ice.
But after that exercise, the dragon’s massive butt lay before us on the cobbled plaza, the tail still twitching dangerously. I could see hundreds of white pebbles around it already, and I tried to hook a simple spell to it. It was still very resistant, but in the end I could push through.
“Everyone,” I ordered, as the other warmagi began to collect around me, “I want binding spells on this thing. I want it asleep. I want it dead. Whatever you can think of, now is the time to try.”
“It’s still breathing!” Rondal said, incredulously, as he joined Tyndal and I. Taren and Mavone were right behind him. “What can take the full force of a lightning bolt and survive?”
“A dragon,” Tyndal pointed out, condescendingly. “Obviously.”
“The snowstone is helpful,” Mavone noted, “but it isn’t ideal. Not unless we want to try to dissect it from the arse end to try to kill it. I don’t recommend that,” he added, helpfully.
The problem was that the head was on the other side of the remnants of the goblin left flank (which was on our right, now that we were approaching the battle from the other side), who were still reeling from the Thoughtful Knife attack and suddenly very aware that the unconscious head of a very large, fire-breathing dragon was pointed in their direction. Of course that was also keeping the Bovali attacking them at bay, but I doubt that was much solace. One sleepy belch and they were in the fire.
But that also kept the number of snowstones near the head light. And the head was still the most vulnerable part of the dragon.
I ordered my warmagi into some semblance of a formation and we quick-marched back around the goblin left until we were almost near the oak tree by which we’d begun our attack. That’s when a sudden kick by th
e beast dug a nine-foot furrow into the cobbles of the plaza and a half-dozen infantrymen trying to get their stones close enough. The rain chose that moment to start coming down in sheets.
“We need to get some stones right in its face!” Taren shouted over the wail. “If we can do that we can get something lethal inside!”
“And how do you propose to do that?” Mavone asked.
“Sarakeem managed to get an arrow into it,” he pointed out. “What if you could sneak a stone inside it?”
Mavone chuckled, despite himself. “That would be an amusing foray,” he admitted. “By all means, good luck to you.”
Before Taren could respond, the Thoughtful Knife zipped by so fast it was a blur.
We all stopped speaking to watch the deadly magical bird dive into the mass of gurvani and effortlessly use its delta wings to slice limb from limb. It made a bloody spiral through the goblins closest to the dragon, then for good measure tried repeatedly to plunge into the allegedly-thinner skin near its throat. And while it did penetrate as much as six inches, that did little more than cut the dragon superficially.
Again and again Dara retreated the Knife and tried again. It was impressively effective in slicing through goblins. But even at its thinnest, the dragon hide was just too resilient for even its enchanted edge.
“So much for our secret weapon,” sighed Mavone.
“There are limits to the enchantments of even the Alka Alon,” agreed Taren. “Pity.”
“Bah! They gave us antique toys,” Mavone said, shaking his head. “Lovely toys, but hardly their finest weaponry.”
“Better than we can fashion,” Tyndal pointed out, boldly. “Master, could we stick that thing’s head in the moat and drown it?”
“An intriguing idea,” Mavone said, after consideration, “but impractical. The moat isn’t deep enough, and somehow I think it would take a lot more water than that to fill its lungs to capacity.”
We were still debating as we were joined by another group of warmagi – Terleman, the Knight Commander, and a score of his Horkans. He looked tired and hard-pressed in his battered black armor, but Terleman has the regal bearing of a king and the iron will of a seasoned officer. The fact that he’s a brilliant warmage is just secondary. He was helmetless, but he bore his mageblade and a broad, plain black roundshield.
The Spellmonger Series: Book 03 - Magelord Page 90