At the same time, the illusion blurred and darkened Iskar’s presence behind her. Invisibility was impossible, or even consciously approximating gnomish camouflage, but this would suffice, with the darkness and the distraction of the fire providing cover.
At least, Tane hoped it would.
“Stop!” The ogren man barked. His eyes flared bright with Astral energy, as if responding to Tinga’s flames with a fire of their own. And around him, several of Thorpe’s thugs had the same reaction.
“I won’t stop until every one of you burns!” Tinga’s voice resounded off the hillsides, captured and amplified by magic. She swept a hand across her body, and a curtain of illusory silver fire rose from the ground ahead of her. She strode through the flames, and her aura grew brighter still, almost blinding.
Worried muttering from the guardsmen now, licks of silver rising from their eyes. Some shifted uncomfortably, and several took a step back.
“Hold your ground!” the ogren man barked. “She’s just one girl!” He uttered a spell in the lingua, and a wave of silver force burst from his hand.
It dissipated against a translucent shield that shimmered into life in front of Tinga. She didn’t break her stride, barely even flinched—better than Tane probably would have done in her shoes. She knew how important it was to keep the ruse alive. Another wave of force from the guards, and then a gout of spellfire; the shield absorbed them all.
“Spellfire, she’s not stopping!” One of the guards, near to panic. Silver flames blazed across the guards at eye level now, and the mass of them seemed to be inching back with every step Tinga took.
It’s working. “Be ready,” Tane whispered to the others. “The moment’s coming.”
“There’s nothing to be afraid of, you idiots!” the ogren man shouted, although his own eyes shone as bright as any of the others. “She can’t cross the ward!”
So they’d erected a ward around the quarry. Tane had expected that—it wasn’t insurmountable.
Tinga was almost invisible now at the center of a silver conflagration. She crossed the remaining distance until only some ten yards separated her from the guards, and then stopped. Her outstretched hand must have found the ward.
“You think your little spells can keep you safe?” Tinga bellowed, fully embracing her role with all the verve of an actress on the stage. “Nothing stands before the fire!”
And that was the signal. Behind her, Iskar breathed deep—or a dim, blurred suggestion of Iskar that Tane could only discern because he knew to look—and then exhaled.
Dragonfire spilled from his open mouth.
It roared past Tinga’s shoulder, well to the right—he’d given her ample safe distance—but that was an easy thing for the mages to correct for with illusion. The conflagration around her was so great that her actual form was difficult to discern, and when Iskar’s flames emerged from the other side, they appeared to be spouting from her outstretched hand.
A great flash of silver-blue as dragonfire struck the ward, and then Tane felt a sort of shattering in the air as the magic gave way. It wasn’t always going to be the best course—more often than not, a ward had to be bypassed with discretion—but sometimes, when you had dragonfire on your side, the best plan was to use it.
A few of the guards drew ancryst pistols, took several desperate shots at Tinga, but her shield wasn’t even necessary—the magic surrounding her bent the path of the ancryst balls before they came close. And then Tinga was moving again, across the threshold of the broken ward.
“She’s coming through! Astra, I can feel it starting!” A scream rose from among the guards, and silver fire engulfed a dwarven man from the head down. He turned and ran as the flames consumed him.
He didn’t make it far.
Bellows of fear and confusion as more broke, fled, burned up. Not all, but enough.
That was their opening.
“Now!” Tane shouted.
Silver Dawn agents and Bastian’s men moved together, surging past Tinga toward the path into the quarry. Kadka and Vladak fell in with them, and from the trees on the hillside, Indree, Bastian, and the other mages emerged to join the charge. Those who had armed themselves with ancryst pistols led with a volley—the Astral fire was strong enough to curve their aim, but even so a handful of guardsmen whose eyes weren’t burning fell under the hail of pistol fire. A second wave of charmglobes followed, armed with flash and repulsion charms to cause chaos in the ranks, explosions of light and force sending guards tumbling blindly out of formation.
And then they met, and the fight began in earnest.
Thorpe’s guards weren’t close to ready for the assault. Those who hadn’t taken the elixir put up a fight, but most who had were too distracted by the flames roaring over their bodies. Some few of the enhanced thugs held their composure, though. The ogren man was still on his feet, and his strength multiplied by the elixir’s power was terrifying. A sweep of his cudgel sent two men flying through the air easily twenty yards before Indree and the other mages bound his arms with silver force, struggling to hold him back.
“We have this!” Bastian called out, fluttering at a safe distance above the fray. He uttered a phrase in the lingua, made a strained gesture, and tendrils of silver-blue energy yanked the ogren face first to the ground. “Go, my friends! Quickly!” Vladak and the others opened an aisle, forcing the guards that hadn’t already fled to either side of the path.
Which meant it was time for Tane to get involved. He wasn’t much good in an open brawl, but Thorpe’s machine was waiting in the cave under the quarry, and he didn’t trust anyone else to shut it down properly.
Tinga was already through the gap and heading down the path before Tane started moving. As he darted after her, Indree joined him, leaving the containment of the still-struggling ogren to Bastian and the goblin mage. Kadka and Iskar fell alongside, along with the two gnomish mages and a half-dozen armed men and women. The others would handle what was left of the guards here—there would be plenty more waiting inside.
The path down into the quarry was narrow, winding its way around the outside of the pit in a long spiral. They raced down as quickly as they could, caught up with Tinga so that the fighters could take the lead. When Thorpe’s men tried to get in the way, they didn’t last long in the face of Kadka’s knives and Indree’s spells. None were enhanced by the elixir. These weren’t the front line, just the men left behind to guard the path.
And then they were at the bottom, before the jagged mouth of a hastily dug tunnel. Magelight glowed ominously from within—just enough to cast the darkness in cold blue tones without brightening the way beyond a few feet in. Without a word, some shared sense of foreboding brought everyone to a halt.
“Come on!” Tinga urged. “We need to get in there!”
“It’s going to be worse inside,” Tane said. “I know Thorpe’s type, and after what we did to her earlier she’s not going to let her best security leave her side. Roark and his best men will be in there with her, and they’ll know we’re coming. I have a feeling we won’t get them to scatter so easily with cheap tricks. Are we ready?”
Kadka grinned. “Always.” And then she was moving, disappearing into the mouth of the cave.
“Well,” said Tane, “she probably can’t do it all alone. Let’s go.”
With a deep breath, he followed Kadka into the dark.
Chapter Twenty-two
_____
KADKA PASSED INTO the tunnel, and her orcish darksight immediately corrected for the too-dim blue glow cast by infrequently placed magelights. The others wouldn’t have it as easy, but that was part of why she’d taken the lead. Whatever lookouts Thorpe had left along the way, they wouldn’t see her before she could see them. They had to know someone was coming by now, but she might still get the drop on one or two before she reached the dragon’s lair.
She moved quietly along the rough-carved path, winding gradually down beneath the earth. Carver and the others followed behind her. Indree mur
mured a spell, and the sound of their footfalls ceased abruptly, letting Kadka move in utter silence. At the next bend, her orcish ears heard breathing just ahead; she held up a hand to stop the others.
Thorpe wouldn’t have left lookouts who couldn’t see, which meant she had to assume darkvision. That could be used. She beckoned to Indree, who crept up beside her.
Kadka pointed ahead, where the path turned, pantomimed a flash with her hand—a fist exploding into spread fingers—and then briefly clutched a hand across her eyes. Indree nodded, muttered a short spell under her breath.
Kadka closed her eyes as a burst of light exploded in the curve of the path. She saw pink through her eyelids, heard a startled cry from ahead. As the light faded, she opened her eyes, dashed around the bend, came upon a pair of dwarven men still reeling from the sudden assault on their darkvision. Neither of them had glowing silver eyes—Thorpe hadn’t wasted any elixir on her lookouts. The real muscle would be further below.
She darted in before they could react. A fist to the stomach bent the first dwarf over, and then she brought the hilt of her knife down on the base of his skull. He fell, unconscious or dead. She didn’t particularly care which. He’d signed on to help murder baby dragons—he deserved what he got.
The other was blinking to clear his eyes, and he backed off a step, swinging his axe to keep her at bay as he chanted some spell. She feinted right, went left around his wild swing. Buried her blade in his shoulder. His weapon fell from nerveless fingers. She yanked her knife free, stabbed him again in the side of the neck. He went down. Kadka wiped her blade clean on his shirt, and signalled the others to follow with a low whistle.
Indree looked at the two men on the ground, then up at Kadka, a slight frown on her face. She said nothing, just gave a short nod after a moment, and waved Kadka on. Bluecap training and instinct tended toward non-lethal force, and Kadka usually tried to respect that, but they both understood that this wasn’t going to end without blood spilled. On both sides.
The tunnel was long, and deep. By the time they reached the bottom, Kadka was more conscious than she liked of the sheer weight of stone and earth above her head. But she couldn’t afford to worry about that now—there were greater dangers ahead. Coming around the last bend, there was a short straight stretch before the path opened into a huge cavern. Kadka halted the others and crouched low behind an outcrop of rock at one side of the tunnel to peek inside.
What she saw took her breath away.
In the center of the cavern, a great silver dragon lay sleeping, her tail curled around a clutch of two large eggs like the one Thorpe had stolen. She was the largest living creature Kadka had ever seen, massive even compared to the manticores and other magical beasts at the Conservatory in Rosepetal Park. Great silver spines ran down her back, and her claws were like lances. A pair of huge shimmering wings sat folded against her back—unfurled, they looked like they would span some fifty feet, near to half the width of the cavern.
Kadka didn’t notice Thorpe and her guards at first beside the majesty of the dragon, but after a moment they drew her attention—the only motion in the cave. The strange machine that could find even Kadka through the Astra had been set against the broad expanse of the dragon’s side, surrounded in magelights that gave the cavern a dim blue glow. Its cylindrical glass reservoir was half-full with glowing silver fluid. Felisa Thorpe bent over the console below the big brass orb, fiddling with dials, and a deep blue panel of light hovered above her head, displaying silver silhouettes that moved as she and her men did. Roark stood by her side, a heavy broadsword in his hand.
Around the machine, a faint silver shimmer in the air betrayed the presence of a shield-spell, and a circle of perhaps eight armed men—without a goblin or kobold among them—kept watch around its perimeter, their eyes gleaming with Astral power. Two more stood guard over a huddle of men and women who had been bound at the wrists and ankles. The prisoners all wore dirty, tattered clothing. Almost certainly the missing people taken from the Nest and elsewhere.
An old man in a patched coat sat shackled to a chair beside Thorpe, one wrist manacled to her machine. His head lolled forward between his shoulders, and now Kadka noticed the high-pitched whine in the air she’d heard from Thorpe’s machine before. It was already working.
“Astra, what are they doing to her?” Iskar whispered. He’d crept up beside her to get a look, along with Carver, Indree, and Tinga.
The man in the chair slumped forward further as they watched. Thorpe motioned to her guards. “Bring me another. Quickly! Whoever triggered the detections above could be here at any moment, and it is vital that my experiment be completed before they interfere.”
Roark—Kadka recognized his broad shoulders and thinning hair—directed two of his men to take the prisoner and bring another. They led the old man away, and he let them do it, barely reacting to their presence. His eyes stared blankly ahead at nothing. Riven, like the ones at the warehouse. They put him back with the others, and hauled a girl up to replace him—a young human with blonde hair, shaved on the sides and braided along the top of her head. She struggled as the men with silver eyes dragged her over and shackled her down. “No! Let me go!”
“Cestra,” Tinga breathed. “That’s her. We need to get in there now.” She was already rising to her feet.
Kadka grabbed her arm and pulled her down before she could give away their position. “We go together.” She beckoned to the others, and led them back around the bend to where Iskar and Bastian’s men were waiting.
“Same plan as before,” Carver said quietly. “Tinga tries to scare them to start. It won’t work as well this time, but it’s something, and we need whatever edge we can get. When they attack, try to stay out of reach, run circles around them, whatever you can do to avoid getting hit. It won’t be easy with their speed, but if they catch you with the kind of strength they have, they probably kill you. Mages, slow them down as best you can. The more we force them to exert themselves, the more likely the elixir burns them up. We need to get Iskar to that shield so he can bring it down, and then I’ll see what I can do with the machine.”
“And fighters, protect them,” said Kadka. “Helps nothing if we get to shield and can’t break, or reach machine and no one can stop.”
“That too,” said Carver. “I’d love to live through this.”
Iskar took Kadka’s hand. “But please, be careful. I… I don’t want to see you get hurt protecting me.”
“Will try,” Kadka said. “But is more important we save eggs.”
He bowed his head. “I… I am so sorry, Kadka. That I have to ask for this. That I didn’t say anything sooner. I should have—”
Kadka put a hand under his chin, tilted it up, and kissed him hard to shut him up. “Will talk after, dragon man.” She was still working through everything he’d told her, but in that moment, against the odds they were about to face, showing doubt wasn’t going to help anyone. Instead, she grinned. “I am not so easy to kill.” Then, turning to the others, “Come. Is time.”
They strode into the cave with Tinga in the lead, already shrouded in illusory silver fire. “Thorpe!” she shouted, her amplified voice echoing off the cavern walls. “Let them go, or you all burn!”
Thorpe looked up from her machine, her face drawn and anxious. “Roark! Take care of them! I can’t be interrupted now!”
Roark strode through the shield, pointing his broadsword directly at Tinga. “With me!” he bellowed, and the men around the perimeter fell in beside him. “Pistols!” With his free hand, he drew the ancryst pistol from his side; the others did the same.
Indree was faster than they were, speaking a quick spell. A sheet of silver energy rippled into being, and a volley of ancryst balls bent and curved their paths in the air to avoid it, pelting into rock on either side of the cavern.
“Anyone who gets in my way burns!” Tinga swept her hand through the air in front of her. A gout of illusory fire sprayed forth across the space between her and
the advancing men, stopping a few yards short. Several of them halted their step, and the silver glow in their eyes grew brighter.
But they didn’t break, and at Roark’s command, they kept advancing. “Remember, her power is dampened! She can’t burn us all!” Apparently Thorpe had spent the time since their escape bolstering the lies she’d told him. “Shield!” he ordered. With a low muttering of spellcraft, his men erected their own half-dome of translucent silver in front of them, moving as they did.
Just like above, Iskar and Bastian’s men began with charmglobes, assaulting the approaching men with repulsion and flash charms. They weren’t nearly as effective, this time. The shield stopped the bursts of silver force, though at least Roark and the others slowed, exerting themselves a little bit more to keep the spell up. The flash charms had more effect, but these men had enhanced reflexes and speed—many were able to block their eyes from the worst of it.
And they were getting close now; only a dozen yards away.
Time to fight, then. Kadka drew her two heaviest blades—the long knife from her back, and a shorter, thicker blade from her ankle.
“Surrender now!” Tinga’s flames flared high and bright; Kadka could barely stand to look at her. “I’ll show mercy if you drop your weapons!”
“Get her,” Roark growled, and jabbed his sword at Tinga once more. “Before she hurts anyone else.” His voice betrayed no fear, but the silver gleam in his eye was bright enough that Kadka couldn’t see the whites behind. Brandishing his sword overhead, he charged at Tinga, leading his men into the fray.
Kadka dashed forward to meet him, and caught his downstroke between the crossed blades of her knives. “Maybe should worry more that I hurt you,” she said, baring her teeth in a half-grin, half-snarl.
Roark’s eyes pulsed with silver energy, and he pushed back hard. His strength was colossal. Kadka didn’t even try to match it, just leapt back, using the power of the shove to create distance. She landed a dozen feet away, bent her knees to absorb the jarring force of the landing. He came at her again; she pulled a flash-charm from her pocket, closed her eyes, crushed it in her fist. Roark grunted, fell back behind his men to blink his eyes clear as Kadka recovered her footing.
The Dragon Machine (Magebreakers Book 3) Page 16