by Joey Ruff
It laughed: a twisted, mirthless sound.
“Indeed, I know who you are, Jonothan Swyftt, and while some may have come to fear the sound of your name, you cannot intimidate me.” It took a step forward, clicked its fangs together. “I AM FEAR!” it bellowed, the voice deeper and heavier than the walls that shook around us with fury. “Even now, I feel it,” Brom said, his voice calm once more. “You are right to tremble before me. To fuel me.”
Elensal started gathering air, its eyes flickered brightly, and I knew I only had a moment to act before it fried me crispy. I raised Grace to a firing position and squeezed her twice, fired both shells into the eyes.
It was no more effective than pepper spray, but the attack gave me just enough time to change tactics. I unclipped Grace’s shoulder-stock and pulled the leather sheath free of the machete’s blade. Gripped the knife tightly in my fist and charged the dragon. Its eyes were closed, head bowed low and shook side to side, taloned hands pawed at its face.
With a whoop, I swung the blade just as Elensal opened an eye and buried it to the hilt in the soft, white tissue.
The dragon hissed, swung blindly at me with both forepaws as a thick, translucent, milky fluid oozed around the edge of the rusty blade. I dodged, but wasn’t expecting the tail. It hit me in the knees, knocked me on my arse.
Elensal lumbered closer, raised a clubbed hand.
I heard, “Jono! Over here.”
Nadia stood just outside the circle of child-fuckers, over half of them now aflame. She waved wildly at me, and I managed to roll onto my stomach, get my feet under me, and put a few yards distance between me and Brom’s dragon before the thing spotted me with its good eye and started to charge.
I had never run with the bulls in Spain, but replace bull with severely pissed Bogey in the body of a wounded Manticore and Spain with Underground Seattle, and that was my moment.
My eyes focused on Nadia who stood straight ahead, felt the dragon closing the distance.
“Get down!” she yelled, and I threw myself forward at her feet as her hands hurled discs of fiery, red light.
The creature side-stepped, and the discs hit the ground in an explosive scarlet glow, casting light on the broad, flat head, the eye that burned like a cinder, the hungry, gaping jaws.
I didn’t see her throw another, but the dragon’s right forepaw glowed red for an instant and stopped moving. We scrambled to the side as Elensal, running at full gallop, came down on its foreleg, tripped over its own lifeless limb, and tumbled end over end.
With some difficulty and frustration, it attempted to gain its feet, found one didn’t work. It let out a long, low moan that shook the room and made the dancing flames of the pyre tremble and waiver.
Elensal reeled back on its hind legs, flexed its mighty wings and beat them downward, once, twice, three times, until it hovered several feet in the air.
The dragon took off like a jet, came straight at us. Nadia and I fell on our stomachs, and it passed so low strands of my hair moved as it passed above.
Once the shadow passed, I rolled over and looked at Nadia. “How long does that last?” I asked. “That crippling leg trick?”
She shrugged. “A few minutes at best. Especially on something that big.”
As it reached the far end of the cave, the dragon began to drip fire from the corners of its mouth, turned a mad arc in the air, and aimed for us again. Nadia and I leapt away as the column of flame split the ground between us in a narrow trench.
“Fuck,” I said.
“What do we do?” Nadia asked.
“If he circles again can you take out his wing?”
“I guess.”
“We need a little better than I guess.”
“Give the kid a break, Swyftt,” came Finnegan’s voice. He stumbled over to us, the blaze from Brom’s children backlighting him into a silhouette. He held his head.
“Welcome back,” I said. “And the others?”
“Passed out,” came the answer. “From what I could see.” I caught the flash of his white teeth in the dim light. “How do we hit this thing?”
“You don’t,” I said. “Let Nadia and I handle the dragon. I need you to see if you can wake the others. If you can’t, get them clear of the fire.”
Finnegan looked like he was going to protest, but stopped. Instead, he said, “Okay. Right,” and he moved back toward the growing flames.
Elensal circled for another pass.
“Get ready,” I told Nadia.
I could feel the wind against my face a heartbeat before the smoke and fire shot between us again. I took aim with Grace and fired a bolo round at one wing as Nadia’s glowing red hands released two more blasts at the other.
It tried to pull up to circle again, but the wings didn’t respond. Instead, it collided with the back wall and collapsed on its head.
I looked back toward the priest, saw him dragging Anderson to a nearby building. The fire was spreading. I looked at Nadia. “Go help Finnegan.”
“Are you serious? You can’t…”
“Go!” I snapped. “It’s down. I can handle it.”
She gave a heavy sigh and jogged off, reluctantly.
I stalked up to the downed beast and chambered two more bolo rounds. I was maybe twenty feet from it when it shook and writhed, shifted until it found its feet and was able to get them underneath itself again. Slowly, it stood, and the one malicious eye focused on me.
I charged.
Elensal moved faster than I could register. His tail struck across my waist and flipped me onto my back, leaving me breathless and gasping for air. My entire body ached and writhed, and as it neared and stood over top of me, all I could think of was that I would finally get the rest I so badly needed.
I closed my eyes, could smell the hot sulfur of its breath.
Volcano steam puffed against me, and I turned my head to the side, opened my eyes and gasped for air. There was Grace, not three feet from me. I just had to stretch.
I felt the weight of its leg against my chest, light at first, then my breathing became harder, shorter, and the weight grew and sagged against me. I tried to ignore the pain and reached with my arm, tried to wrap my fingers around the grip. I held out hope that I could put a single shot through its eye socket and into its brain before the dragon knew what was happening.
The problem with that plan was that Elensal wasn’t stupid. It turned and saw my arm, my fingers scrambled across the bricks, their tips just tickling Grace’s handle. The dragon roared, and shifted its weight from my chest, giving me the freedom I needed to grab hold of the gun. My fingers latched around the handle, and I spun the barrel around.
The forepaw sprang down on the middle of my arm. There was a sharp crack, and fire coursed through my arm from fingertips to shoulder. I screamed.
It lifted its other taloned hand and brought it to my chest, tracing down my stomach as the reptilian lips smiled sadistically at me, watching, savoring my expression.
I felt a razor-heat and bone-cold in my gut and heard Nadia’s voice screaming my name. Smelled sulfur as Elensal leaned its huge, flat head in close and bared its dagger fangs.
37
Two brown streaks leapt over me with a chorus of angry growls, and the dragon’s presence began to diminish.
Nadia fell at my side in a harried rush, propped me up against her knees so I could just see what was happening. I was too weak to respond, too weak to maybe even fully register what was happening. Yet I watched as Nadia held me, sobbed and shook with her arms wrapped tight around me.
Two Rhodesian Ridgebacks clung to the neck of the beast. Elensal roared fiercely, threw its head back, roared, and backed away, shaking like a wet dog. Thai and Taboo clung like leeches the whole time.
An arrow split the air with precision and hit the beast in its good eye, blinding it completely. Ape’s Groundskeeper, Crestmohr, hurtled from a tall window and landed in a cloud of dust and glory somewhere between me and the sightless beast.
; The dragon shook the hounds loose, and the two dogs rolled through the dirt and debris, the ash filtering through the air from the pyre. They rebounded quickly and snapped back, went for its hind legs, tore the fabric of its wings.
Crestmohr rushed the beast, bolt after bolt flying from the massive, repeating crossbow he held, screamed like a berserker, and drove Elensal back like wounded cattle.
Nadia shook harder and cried louder. “Jono,” she sobbed. “Oh God. I can’t believe you, you… You’re so stupid. What were you thinking?” She rocked as she held me and continued to chant and cry in a mantra as if by sheer will alone she might save me.
“You can’t do this to me,” she said, and her voice was laced with raw, cracking emotion. “Don’t do this. I can’t lose you, goddammit. Do you hear me? I’ve already lost one father. Jono, I can’t lose you, too. You’re all I have left. Hang in there. You have to hang in there.”
Any other words she might have said were drowned as her tears came more forcefully. Her muscles tightened around me, holding me close, closer than I’d ever been held. There was something in her quiet desperation, her determination to hold on.
She looked up and called, “APE!!”
Ape didn’t hear her. Sword in hand, he leapt to Crestmohr’s side, slicing, hacking, cutting, the amaranthine light blazed in the cave, sparked and ignited against the armored scales of the beast. He was a blur of arms and steel and light and feral barking.
Peters staggered to her feet in a daze, shook her head and fell against a nearby wall. She massaged the heel of her palm against her forehead. She watched the dogs howl and snap with a certain look of confusion, saw them back the dragon away one step, then another. From the dust at her feet, she salvaged Glory and emptied the rest of her ammo in a shower of sparks and a chorus of rapid beats.
Bullets sparked like flint mosquitoes across its hide, and the purple blaze of the ancient sword branded its mark like fire in a thousand burning marks apparently no more deep or annoying than paper cuts. Elensal didn’t notice anything but the Ridgebacks; it swatted at the dogs, thrashed its tail wildly, and spewed clouds of flame that hung in the air like mustard gas. One giant paw connected like a heavy club against the side of Taboo’s head, sent the pup rolling in a whimper.
Finnegan roared out of the shadows, his Colts firing like a drum roll.
Elensal swept Peters’ legs out from under her with its tail.
Thai lunged at the dragon, pounced atop its flat head, and sunk its teeth to the gums in the softer tissue around its eyes.
The head fell forward heavily, slammed the dog against the old brick road, and Thai bounced into the air with a rhythm and a pop and fell near Peters’ feet. There was a sudden, sharp intake of breath, and the flame that followed was hot enough to turn the sand between the bricks underfoot into glass.
Peters gave out a scream of agony and caught fire like a Yule log.
Finnegan ran for her, but as he neared, the ammunition in one of his guns ignited, and a brilliant flair of light leapt at his eyes. He fell to the ground in anguish and grabbed his face, which was little more than a sizzle of blisters and wet dough. Ape caught him as he fell, but Elensal didn’t let up, charged, threw razored talons out before it.
The Chinook leapt in front of it, fired bolts from the hip and cried out in mad defiance. The claws hit the brick, and the dragon shook its head in a harsh shiver, snorted and backed up once more.
“Is he okay?” Crestmohr called to Ape.
There was a heavy moment where Ape didn’t say anything. Instead, he just lowered the shuddering priest to the ground.
Then he rejoined the groundskeeper. Ape rent the air before him with his sword. The Chinook held his crossbow up in the image of a cross. Elensal couldn’t see the symbol to know to be wary of it, but there was something else at work, some kind of ancient magic, that cowed the beast and sent it sprawling back, shying from its attackers. Head bowed, it shook and snorted, took one step away, then another.
“Ape!” Nadia cried again.
And I slipped away.
I was somewhere else entirely, swimming in blackness, staring up at the distant twinkling that part of me took to be stars and another part understood to be the private heavens of the saints. I felt a warmth spill across me, spread over me, and for a moment the pain was gone. It occurred to me that if the specks of light really were heaven, I’d never reach them in time.
I was so tired, and there was nothing to distract me anymore. I closed my eyes and welcomed the quiet, serene bliss. I thought of Anna. So many years ago, I clutched her little body to mine and rocked and prayed to any god that would listen. There were so many sleepless nights where she cried because something hurt and I held her and wished somehow to take the pain away.
I couldn’t help but think, as I drifted, that maybe Anna, in her passing, had seen exactly this same thing.
There was a fleeting moment where I felt nothing but relief, understood what was happening, that I was dying. I felt the warmth of joy I hadn’t known for years, a sense of fulfillment and purpose, and thought, “Daddy’s coming, Anna. Daddy’s coming.”
But there was a voice from somewhere close, soft and still, that said, “Not yet.”
I saw Adam Gables. He stood over top of me, studied my face, head cocked to the side. He said nothing, and nothing but darkness surrounded him. There was no light, only those flecks a million miles away, yet, somehow, I saw him with perfect clarity.
He smiled at me, understanding in his eyes, a look that seemed to say he understood me without ever even knowing me. He touched a finger to my forehead. And was gone.
Something pulled me. A tug on the nape of my neck grabbed hold of me and pulled me backward, fast and hard, and the flecks of light were sucked away like water spiraling down a drain, replaced with the faces of other children, girls and boys ranging in age from two to ten. One with sandy brown hair and freckles on her nose. Another with short blonde hair and glasses. A fraillooking boy, head completely bald, eyebrows shed, and ears slightly bigger than natural. And it went on. Hundreds of faces, maybe thousands, paraded around me, scrolling as if on a marquee. Most of them I didn’t recognize, but every so often I saw one I knew: Julie Easter, Toby Emmerich, James Wright. And every one of them smiled at me.
I stood there, looking in to the eyes of so many innocents, felt the pain return in my arm, in my side. Felt something else as well, bubbling up: something pure and feral and angry.
I knew, the way you understand things in dreams, that the star lights had not been heavens, but these faces. These were the victims of Brom: past, present, and future. Children whose lives were snuffed out like candles in the night. Or would be. And the ones not yet victim numbered into the tens of thousands, multiplied like rabbits before my eyes. The casualties to come were endless. If Brom wasn’t stopped.
As I watched their faces, the pain in my body grew until I doubled over, screamed in pain, and fell to my knees.
All around, voices taunted me, assaulted me. Among them, Brom’s in that cold, malicious laughter, pronounced himself an undefeated god.
Adam Gables said, “Not yet.”
Then Eric’s voice said, “If anyone could help, it’s you.”
Quietly, I answered. “I’m tired. And I’ve failed. I’m done with this.” I had to grit my teeth for the pain. “You can all just piss off.”
Silence for a few, long heartbeats, and then a still, small voice – either in the back of my mind or borne on the wind – said, “You can’t give up.”
The faces of the children marched before me, and I dared to gaze into their hollow eyes and ask, “What am I supposed to do?”
“Mr. Swyftt,” came another voice, and Adam stood next to me.
I looked him in the eyes and said, “I’ve failed you.”
Gently, he shook his head. “Not yet.” There was a warmth that defied his years, oozed from his every pore and hung about him like a warm rain. I shook my head, but his fingers found my chin. Held my f
ace in his hand gently, looked into my eyes. “You can’t keep running, Mr. Swyftt. Don’t you see that I need you?” He motioned to the faces scrolling around us. “That all of these children need you?”
“I can’t help them,” I said. “I can’t help anyone. I couldn’t save my daughter. There’s no fucking way…I can’t.”
I felt so weak. I sounded so weak.
“Kid…”
And yet I heard Alara’s voice from decades ago pleading in a broken, desperate voice, “You don’t give up on her like that. There’s gotta be something. There’s just GOT to be…”
“No,” I said and felt the burning in my eyes as the tears blurred my vision. “There’s no hope in Atlantis.” I shook my head. “Not this time.”
Her voice echoed from so far away. “Let’s go. Let’s really, really go.”
I felt Adam’s eyes on me, studying me for a moment before he said, “I’m here, Mr. Swyftt. I’m very close. Don’t give up. Not yet.”
“Where are you?” I said.
“Close,” Adam said. “With your daughter.”
I felt my entire body prickle with electric light.
“Anna’s here, Mr. Swyftt.”
38
My eyes opened.
Ape and Nadia were bent over me. She cried, and both his hands were pressed against my chest where he’d been administering CPR. Despite Nadia’s tears, she said, “It’s not your time. You can’t go yet.”
The warmth of where I’d been faded, replaced by the cold of the Underground, the hard brick under my arse, the smooth, moist cheek pressed against my own.
“Nadia,” I said. My voice was hoarse, dry. “You can fucking let go.”
She sniffled, but lightened her grip on me, allowed me to look in her red, puffy eyes. Tears streamed down her cheeks.