by Matthew Lang
“Go away,” he shouted, grabbing a small stone and throwing it upward into the canopy. There was a muffled squeak and a shuffle of feet, but somehow he doubted he’d get any privacy. Fuming, he stormed back up the stairs to the lower platforms, noting in satisfaction the large numbers of people scurrying away from him as he approached. Adam grabbed one of the slower ones, a young boy probably no more than thirteen. “Where are the stables?” he demanded.
The boy gaped at him. “The… the… stables?”
“Stables, yes,” Adam growled. “Where you keep the riding lizards.”
With a trembling hand, the boy pointed across to one of the large trees on the perimeter of the fortress complex.
“Thanks, now go and don’t follow me,” Adam said, turning on his heel and heading toward the tree.
THE STABLES turned out to be a series of hollows in the great trunk, although Adam suspected these had been artificially shaped rather than naturally grown. A few lizard heads poked out from the hollows, and Adam noticed most of them were tethered to something inside their stalls to keep them from wandering too far.
Spaced at irregular intervals, the individual lizard dens were accessed by a series of platforms and sloping walkways. Peeking into one, Adam retreated hastily at a baleful hiss and a pair of unblinking reptilian eyes. Catching himself on the railing, he took a deep, shuddering breath, and stared up the tree trunk. Only about thirty more to search. Then he walked around the trunk and stared at the other side of the tree, and he revised the estimate to closer to sixty.
Putting two fingers to his mouth, he whistled, and was relieved when an answering chirrup came from a stall two levels up, and a familiar crested head pushed its way out of the entrance. From there, it was but a few minutes work to saddle up his mount and ride out of the haerunwoln fortress, ignoring the shouts of the guards.
Outside, the forest enveloped him in its own form of silence, and he was surprised to find he had missed it. Here the near silent pad-pad-pad-pad of Zoul’s feet rang loudly in his ears, and the swish of the great lizard’s body through the fallen leaf litter even more so. Leaning forward comfortably in the now familiar saddle, Adam rested his right hand on the lizard’s warm neck and sighed. He wanted to go home, he did. But leaving Zoul behind was going to be tough. Still, for now the lizard allowed him a means of escape, and in wandering the forest, Adam found himself guiding Zoul closer to the sound of a forest stream.
Flowing gently east—or light as the locals said—the stream had carved a sunken gully into the soft forest floor, and its clear water was stained brown with the murk of decaying leaves. Here and there the long, hairy stem of a tree fern angled its way across, and large flat rocks lay here and there, looking for all the world like giant pads of greenish blue moss and yellow lichen.
Adam reined Zoul in, dismounted, and removed the lizard’s saddle and bridle. “You really don’t need me to tether you, do you?” he asked.
Zoul chirped in reply and butted him gently with his head, pushing against Adam’s hand until he reached up to scratch the lizard’s eye ridges.
“Now I’m thinking I should have brought something to eat,” Adam said with a sigh. “But I just had to get out of there. Thanks for coming along,” he added.
Zoul gave him a long, slow blink, cocking his head in a fashion that Adam had always considered as the reptilian equivalent of “you’re nuts, you know?” With a long yawn, Zoul wandered down to the river, staring intently into the water in search of silver scarabs or whatever other aquatic edibles might be present.
Adam, for his part, selected a large protruding rock and clambered his way onto it, his feet slipping somewhat on the damp moss. Pulling up his knees so he could rest his chin on them, he sat in silence, watching the water trickle around the rock below. He couldn’t tell how long he stayed there—although later he supposed he could have checked his watch if he’d a mind to—but in the strange unwavering red light of the motionless sun, Adam sat, huddled on the boulder, gazing into nothingness as he chased the same thought around and around his head.
He was going to have to fight a dragon.
He was going to have to fight a dragon to get out of this place alive. It was like Xavier had said when they’d first talked about going to Blackwater. To get the sword to kill the dragon, we have to get past the dragon. Only Xavier had likely been trying to sabotage their journey even then. If it really had been pointless, Xavier would have let them get Wyrmbane. He wouldn’t have killed Darius.
The loss hit him then. Properly hit him for the first time since he’d seen Darius’s burned body lying on the floor where it had fallen. Darius was dead. He wasn’t going to show up suddenly with a brace of spiders or flitterfish after a successful hunt, smiling broadly at his accomplishments and happy that he was able to feed their camp. He wouldn’t push Adam harder in training than he’d ever been pushed at the SCA, and show him techniques he hadn’t dreamed possible. Darius was gone, his ashes lying unburied in the basement of Blackwater Keep, and Adam had ridden off and left his friend behind. If anyone would have been able to fight the dragon, it would have been Darius. He would have smiled grimly at the challenge, but there would have been a glint in his eye as he sized up the best way to—
Was there actually a best way to do something this crazy?
HE SHOULD have noticed the change in the air. He should have noticed that the strange squalling calls of the flitterfish had risen to a panic and faded into the distance. He should have noticed the change in the light. He did notice the thick net of webbing that dropped suddenly over him, but by then it was too late. His cry of surprise turned into a scream of terror as the giant spider bore down on him, its head easily as large as his torso, a bloated abdomen pointing skyward. A long strand of silk as thick as his forearm reached up into the heavens, clasped by four of its chitinous legs. The other four were clutching the corners of the net that had dropped over Adam, sticky strands catching him even as sharp mandibles snapped inches from his face. Desperately, he reached for his weapons, only to find them gone, and he cursed himself for leaving them in Boolikstaad. Instinctively he lashed out at the spider with his feet and scored a lucky hit on its face, the sole of his sturdy hiking boot mashing into one pair of close-set eyes. As the spider recoiled, a heavy object fell out of his boot and whacked him on the chin, and he thanked his lucky stars for his reinstated boot knife, which he quickly applied to the sticky webs that bound him. It didn’t make the webs cling less, but it at least allowed him some movement.
Before he could get free, however, a leg slammed against his head, and he fell back onto the mossy stone, his vision blurring. Blearily, he stared up at the spider, swaying above him and staring at him with its remaining six eyes. This time the mandibles would not miss.
A bamboo spear ricocheted off the spider’s carapace and spun down into the stream, causing the arachnid to recoil, and Adam rolled off the rock and into the gully below, nearly braining himself again as he fell onto a bed of partially submerged stones. Rising to a crouch, he turned to face the spider, which was twisting around on its silken thread, legs gouging into the moss of the rocks as it scrabbled for purchase. Out of the corner of his eye, Adam saw the spear lying in a tangle of fallen tree ferns and lunged to grab it, then turned it around to face the spider just as the giant arachnid found its footing and leapt.
Desperately, Adam jabbed the stone-tipped spear repeatedly at the spider’s face, but its eight legs crowded around him, knocking him off his feet, and curled around his body, creating a living cage, and when it lunged… something was ever so slightly off. From above him, there was a thump, and the spider fell to one side, the spear plunging through its mouth and into the gooey center of it, and Adam found himself staring cross-eyed at a glistening fang, the point nearly touching his nose.
“Adam?” That would be Duin.
A toothy maw chomped down on one of the spider’s still twitching legs, and the spear was yanked out of his hands as the corpse was dragged off him.
The feeling of the spider’s feet skittering over his body was one Adam hoped he’d never have to repeat, but the fury in Duin’s eyes was worse than any of his physical injuries.
Duin stalked toward him, covered once more in his chestnut fur and forest-brown stripes. His fists were clenched, and the muscles in his neck were taut as a bowstring. “What in Selune’s name did you think you were doing?” he snapped.
“Getting away?” Adam said, wincing as his bruised ribs and battered skull made their pains known to him. “It was stifling in there. I just wanted a place where I wasn’t going to be stared at as a curiosity and have my every move scrutinized.”
“Why didn’t you just say so? I know lots of places that aren’t home to moon spiders.” Sighing, Duin squatted next to Adam in the water, his hands checking Adam’s body for injuries. “Your shirt’s torn.”
“I fell on rocks. What does it matter anyway?” Adam asked. “I’m dead no matter what I do.”
“We all are, in the long run, Adam,” Duin said, his hands surprisingly gentle as he helped Adam to his feet. “That doesn’t mean you need to go seek it out.”
“And what do you call fighting a dragon, then?”
Duin shrugged. “Suicide.”
“Well, thank you very much,” Adam said, pulling away.
Duin’s grip tightened as Adam wobbled. “Adam, you can always say no.”
“What? How the hell can I do that? If I don’t play nice, your elders will skin me alive.”
“So we leave,” Duin said with a smile. “We mount up Zoul and Hele, and we leave. Find a secluded part of the forest away from everything, build a tree house, and leave the religious fights to those who care about it.”
“You’d do that?”
“I’ve considered it before.”
Adam squinted up at Duin through a rapidly swelling eye. “Really?”
“Back before all this, I mean,” Duin said. “And I don’t want to go back to living the way I was before I met you. I… can’t.”
“You’d really leave home for me?” Adam asked.
“I would leave home for me,” Duin said. “But I’d hope you’d be around if I did.”
Adam smiled and winced as the throbbing in his head worsened. “Don’t take this the wrong way, babe, but I kinda hate your world sometimes.”
Duin gave him a light squeeze. “I know.”
THEY ARRIVED back at Boolikstaad—two men on lizardback, towing a giant spider carcass behind them with only two feet of spear handle protruding from its mouth—to a chorus of hushed whispers. Gravely, Duin turned the carcass over to a tall hook-nosed man and passed the reins of the lizards to a waiting groomsman. When he would have aided Adam up the stairs, Adam gave him a fierce glare. “Don’t you dare,” Adam hissed.
“What?”
“Heroes have to walk themselves home,” Adam whispered, pushing away Duin’s proffered arm and squaring his shoulders. “I’ll explain later.”
It was a long and painful climb up to his rooms, and Adam’s head was spinning by the time he pushed through the door and allowed himself to collapse onto the bed. Duin rushed in after him, lips taut, and started methodically removing Adam’s clothing.
“I don’t think this is the time, babe,” Adam said shakily. “Need sleep.”
“What you need is a healer,” Duin said firmly, tucking a pillow behind Adam’s head.
“Wha? No, ’m fine,” Adam mumbled, staring down at the red line scored across his chest.
Duin’s face swam out of focus, and his voice dropped away into static nothingness. “I don’t think that was from a rock….”
Chapter 17
WHEN ADAM next woke, he felt as weak as the proverbial kitten, and Duin was applying a cool cloth to his forehead.
“How long was I out for this time?” he asked, squinting against the brightness of the light.
“A few sleeps,” Duin said, tugging the cloth down over his eyes. “Keep your eyes closed—moon spider venom makes things bright for a while.”
“I noticed,” Adam said, coughing. “Water?” he asked plaintively.
“Here.” A trickle of water reached Adam’s parched lips.
Adam drifted in and out of consciousness for another two sleeps, waking long enough to have some soup and use the chamber pot. Funnily enough, now that he was in a city, as opposed to roughing it out in the wilds, he found he missed the convenience of modern plumbing even more. Either the lack of constant danger allowed him to miss his creature comforts, or his illness made him wish it wasn’t a trek down a few hundred steps to get to the bathing facilities. Or that it made him near incapable of enjoying the sponge baths Duin gave him—even if it was less sponge and more rough towel.
“What have I missed?” Adam asked when he was finally able to stay awake for more than a few hours.
“A lot of talk, mostly,” Duin said. “Princess Esmeralda and the Council of Elders are discussing strategy. Hunter Joeri wants to train you—or train with you—as soon as you’re able. I’m not sure which one.”
“Do I want to train with Joeri?” Adam asked.
Duin shrugged. “If I had to pick someone to take on Khalivibra, it’d be Joeri,” he said. “I would have bet on Darius, but….”
“I always thought it’d be him doing the fighting,” Adam said. “And here I am. Running from kanak, fighting with slasherclaws, taking on a… moon spider?”
“You know, running away is still an option,” Duin said.
“Is it?” Adam asked. “Is there anywhere here so safe that we can grow old together and not risk it all if a kanak scout wanders past at the wrong time?”
“If we go underground, yes,” Duin said. “But that’s not what you meant, is it?”
“If we stay here, just you and me, all it takes is one mistake and it’s over for one or both of us. No healthcare—healers. And realistically, if we’d gone out and fought that moon spider by ourselves, would I be here talking to you right now?”
Duin picked up the tray from Adam’s lap and shoved it over onto the bedside table. “I—maybe,” he said. “I could always come back, ask for help.”
“And if they said no?”
“Can we not talk about that?”
“I think we have to,” Adam said softly. “Either we take our chances against the dragon and form some sort of life here or… there afterward,” he said, glancing at the still open windows, “or we cut ourselves off, and if we make one mistake….”
“You’re saying it would be better to take our chances with the dragon?” Duin asked. “You’re saying it’s better to go into battle and risk dying now even if running away means we’re guaranteed to live longer?”
“Longer isn’t always better,” Adam said. “And if we’re doing this, you and me—I want everything, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit by and watch you die if I fuck up at life here.”
“And if you ‘fuck up’ when fighting the dragon, I get to watch you die?”
Adam shook his head. “If we fuck up when fighting the dragon, I think we both die. I just… I just figure we’ve got a better chance at beating the dragon with everyone else fighting alongside us than making it on our own if we take on everything else plus the dragon if she ever swings by.”
“You’ve worked that out?”
“Not really,” Adam said. “I just figure with everyone else around, there’s more targets to hit that aren’t us. Basic probability.”
Duin shook his head. “See, this is why you’re the hero.”
“What? A callous disregard for everyone else’s safety and a drive to survive?”
A small lopsided smile lit up Duin’s features. “I just call that bravery.”
“If you say so. Can I have a hug now?” Adam asked.
“But—” Duin started, glancing at the windows.
“If they were listening in, it’s a bit late. Please?”
Duin smiled, and Adam was happy.
HUNTER JOERI turned out to be the lean hook-nosed man who ha
d taken the moon spider’s carcass from Duin all those sleeps ago, and he cut an imposing figure in supple armor of purple-green lizard leather and black spider chitin. Like most haerunwoln, his skin was a pale alabaster, marred only by the raised lines of old battle scars. Coupled with his large brown eyes and thick mane of black hair, he put Adam in the mind of a woodland spirit, an impression accentuated with the way Joeri slipped through the landscape, seemingly leaving no trace of his passing.
In their first official meeting, neither said much; instead they sized each other up the way a hunter would prey. Later, Adam could never be certain what Joeri saw, but eventually the man grunted.
“I have something for you,” he said softly—Joeri said almost everything softly, as if to avoid startling the person he was conversing with. “You are the first person in many years to have brought down a moon spider.”
“I had help,” Adam said.
“I know,” Joeri said, his grin showing even white teeth. “But even so, it was an impressive feat. I know none who have escaped its net alive.”
“In your words, Adam, take the compliment,” Duin said from where he was sharpening a set of elegantly curved daggers.