Dragon Strike

by E. E. Knight

  There was something about the way the Tyr held his head. Was it that bad leg he propped himself upon? No, it was the droopy eye, it made him look rather stupid, half-asleep or—

  Blood and blaze. The Tyr. It couldn’t be.

  “Quiet, you fool dragons,” Nilrasha roared. “Quiet!”

  “Thank you,” the Tyr said, not looking at her. His eye locked on Wistala.

  Wistala found her reason again. She remembered the last time she’d seen her brother; she’d tried to kill him. She’d given him that injury to his eyelid and face—she almost smiled at the thought. How had he come so far, risen so high? Of course, anyone who would conspire with dwarves to kill his own family would be bound to rise. The ethics of the barbarian kings.

  DharSii spoke, as from afar.

  “I’m here to deliver a report. I recently passed over the eastern slopes of the Red Mountains near the pass of the Wheel of Fire. I have seen such a mass of men and horseflesh as has not struck earth since the time of Tindairuss. The Ghioz have gathered riders from across the plains and concentrate them in the Red Mountains to the north. I saw boat traffic, barges, all along the great river, though whether this is to aid the supply of the hordes to the north or shift this mass of men and horse to the south I cannot say. I come here with no expectations, and if my old crimes still hang about my name I am ready to answer the charges. I know, I know from being in her counsels, that the Red Queen means to claim the Empire’s upholds as their own.”

  “What do you care, renegade?” the old blue called.

  “I’ve heard you hire yourself out to the Ghioz Queen,” a battle-scarred red said.

  “That’s HeBellereth, captain of the Aerial Host,” Takea said, happy with the better view she had now atop Wistala’s back, clinging to her fringe like a lizard on a leaf.

  “The Upper World can tear itself to bits for all I care,” DharSii said. “Perhaps they just mean to ravage Hypatia, but if so they’ve chosen a strange place to gather, for the Wheel of Fire could hold that pass against any number.”

  Hypatia! Those old temples, the libraries, the towns full of flower, vine, and tree. Rainfall’s trees, each an old friend. Had DharSii said they were assembling at the old pass guarded by the Wheel of Fire? The Wheel of Fire were no more, thanks to her.

  DharSii spoke on: “But Ghioz is assembling such a force as could tear through every Uphold of the Empire. There is one more fact you should be aware of. The Queen has taken dragons other than myself into her service, with more recent knowledge of events in the Lavadome.”

  “Who?” Nilrasha asked.

  “NiVom the White and ImFamnia,” DharSii said. “I am not in their confidence, but between themselves they speak much of the Lavadome.”

  More arguments broke out, debate on whether NiVom had planned to seize the throne or whether the “Jade Queen” and NiVom had been lovers before his flight from accusations of treachery. Takea started to explain, but the Copper quieted his dragons.

  “NoSohoth, better send for more oliban,” the Copper said. “Matters grow heated. The griffaran guard will have the first dragon to draw blood, I promise. Double the guard.”

  Wistala glanced up at the fearsome-looking birds, perched just above the trophy banners. They wore sharpened metal guards on their claws and beaks.

  One of them, missing feathers from tears across his chest and with gaps in the trailing feathers of his wing, screeched. Other griffaran appeared from the shadows behind the Tyr and joined their fellows on the perches, an uncomfortable squeeze by the look at it, facing front and back so each looked at the assembly down the other’s long tailfeathers.

  “They tore an assassin to bits the other day,” Takea whispered.

  “Have them start on DharSii,” someone called.

  “He’s my guest,” Queen Nilrasha said. “Stop that talk. Any dragon who doesn’t recognize the favor he’s done us, or the courage it took, flying far into uncertain welcome, leave and don’t return.”

  DharSii gave her a brief bow. Wistala couldn’t see whether he shut his eyes or not.

  Wistala thought the praise a little overdone. Perhaps the Queen had sent him to lie to the Lavadome? She eyed Nilrasha, who stared at DharSii hungrily, as though he were a bullock turning on a spit.

  DharSii bowed to the Tyr. “What you choose to do with my observation is up to this fine assembly. I’ve done my duty to the cave of my birth and will leave you now. Unless the Tyr would hinder me?”

  “Only long enough to thank you. Have another mouthful of gold. You ate but one before. Or have some roast pork. There will be a banquet after this meeting.”

  “I didn’t come here for gold. But others may,” DharSii said.

  With that he bowed and turned. He glared at the dragons close around, and they parted for him, giving him a path to the door.

  He stalked toward the entrance, eyes traveling over the assembly. Most dragons looked away as his gaze fell on them. But one did not.

  DharSii froze in front of Wistala.

  “You! You live,” he said.

  “I was rescued by the Firemaids,” Wistala said. “They brought me here.”

  “I . . . I am relieved.”

  Takea slid off her back with a thud, righted herself, shaking her head.

  “I have oathed myself to the Firemaids,” Wistala said. “To repay my debt.”

  “Add impressed to relieved, then,” DharSii said. “I tried to tell you, once, years ago. Not that it would have aided your purpose. The dragons here aren’t much interested in the surface, except as a source of food and slaves.”

  “Who does he speak to, there?” Nilrasha asked.

  Ayafeeia, who had a longer neck than most, raised her head. “That’s Wistala, here for her presentation.”

  “What was that name?” the Tyr asked.

  DharSii gave a brief bow and stalked toward the door, as stiff as though someone had plunged a spear into him, Wistala thought. His tail just brushed her across the base of her neck as he passed.

  She watched every step, every swing of the neck as he left, but he did not look back.

  “What did you say was—” the Tyr asked, but the growl of conversation smothered the rest of his words.

  “My name is Wistala,” Wistala said. “Daugter of AuRel and Irelia, granddaughter of AuRye the Red and EmLar the Gray.”

  Another babble broke out. “EmLar? Didn’t explore . . .”

  She pushed forward in earnest, felt a slight thump as Takea landed on her back again.

  “AuRye,” someone murmured. “Weren’t he and his mate in that back-to-nature cult?”

  “No. They fled the civil war when Sofol hill was burned out . . .”

  “Anklene, wasn’t his mate?”

  She stared at her brother. “My Tyr,” she said.

  “Welcome to the Lavadome, Firemaid,” her brother replied.

  Nilrasha glanced from one to the other, as did Ayafeeia. Wistala couldn’t say whether she enjoyed the moment or loathed it. Her emotions were buffeted as though by a fierce spring thunderstorm.

  “Why, look at their snouts and teeth. They might be—” Nilrasha said aloud, but the words ceased as though snapped off like a brittle twig. Wistala felt the mind-speech more than she heard it.

  “Wistala, you live!” a voice shouted from a dark alcove.

  A dragon, smallish only by comparison to the great Skotl hulks flanking him, moved forward. Gray-skinned, he had a distinctive nub on his snout, his egg-tooth.

  AuRon! Had she gone mad? AuRon? Here! She extended sii and saa, dug them as hard as she could into the stony floor.

  This must be a dream. Surely she would wake, and vomit up some piece of wormy pork.

  But would she dream an AuRon with an oddly foreshortened tail, or a glowing jewel on a chain about his neck?

  “Our emissary from Ghioz has arrived at last, I see,” NoSohoth said. “Wise of you to bring him through the griffaran gate. My Tyr, may I present—”

  “AuRon, son of AuRel,”
the Tyr finished, stepping forward. “Griffaran! Be ready to kill. Who knows what sort of viper the Red Queen has found to thrust into our bosom.”

  Chapter 16

  AuRon felt . . . disinterested was the only word for it. There should be anger, hatred, but he felt none of that, nothing to make his griff rattle or make him imagine plunging his sii into the Copper’s throat or eyes.

  Perhaps it was the fatigue of the long underground trek. The mass of rock and earth above him—could the pressure of it be bothering him? The wonder of the Lavadome with its lava-streaked “sky” and unnatural outside-inside air, the smell of unknown dragons, these “griffaran” and tremendous bats and dragonelles who acted like a pack of wolves he’d once run with, only as disciplined as any of the Wyrmmaster’s riders. Quick meals of dry, tasteless meat, water with strange metallic or chemical tastes, in the endless mosslit tunnels, when there was any moss to be found with dragonelles feeling their way along by markers in the stonework.

  Exhaustion and lack of sunlight had numbed him.

  He wondered how much the Red Queen had known about him, and his brother, when she selected him for this assignment. What would be the effect of an emissary from Ghioz making an assassination attempt on the ruler of the Lavadome—this mass of restive dragons, hidden beneath a volcano, forgotten or half legend to the world above? How would they react to such an attack? Would they unite and fly as one to Ghioz?

  What would meet them there?

  Wistala. Had the Red Queen arranged this too? What trick of fate had brought her to this place, at this time, mixing anger with joy, regret with regard? Where and what had she been all these years? Had she somehow found the Copper and come with him deep into the earth? If Wistala hadn’t been there, would he have leaped, sii and saa ready to rend and tear?

  The moment overwhelmed him.

  Perhaps that’s how it was for the other two. Each waiting for a third to make a move.

  Say something.

  His thoughts felt strange to him, as though from a voice in his head not his own. Mind-speech from Wistala? But it wasn’t her voice either.

  “I hope your subjects know what kind of king they’ve put upon their throne,” he finally said. “A patricide.”

  “AuRon, don’t,” Wistala said. She stepped up, putting herself between AuRon and the shelf where the Copper rested. The Copper’s mate took a protective step forward as well.

  “Give us this message from Ghioz,” the Copper said, glancing about.

  Was the Copper gauging the reaction of the other dragons in the room or looking for somewhere to run?

  “Fine one to speak of vipers,” AuRon said. “Do they know your history?”

  “If you’ve come here to plant some lie about my mate—” Nilrasha said.

  “He can’t hurt us, my love,” the Copper said. He set himself as straight as a dragon with only three sound legs could. AuRon pitied him for a moment. The overdevelopment of muscles on the good side had left him almost twisted. “Say your piece. Then I will say mine.”

  AuRon hardly heard even breathing from the assembled dragons. Perhaps they were hoping for a fight.

  Well, say it. Challenge him!

  “Your Tyr bargained with dwarves for the murder of his parents and family,” AuRon began. “He saw the murder of his parents, hatchlings sold into slavery or death. One treachery resulting in three deaths.

  “For the truth of this, ask Wistala. She’s of your own band, it seems.”

  “Ah, truth,” the Copper said. “Truth is a messy business, shaded and colored by experience. Now, sister, let’s have your truth.”

  Wistala’s tongue went dry. It clung to the roof of her mouth like a dead bat, too frozen to drop.

  She felt the attention of the dragons on her scale. “I can only speak to a mouthful of knowledge. The dragon who stands before you is my brother, of that I’m sure. I’m not so sure I was ever sister to him. I know I didn’t try. In fact I begrudged every mouthful of food or bone he stole. Ours was a bare cave during a harsh winter.

  “He did conspire with dwarves. It resulted in the death of his mother and sister. I don’t know that he expected them to kill Jizara—his sister—and myself, however. I believe the dwarves came to capture hatchlings and take an older vengeance on our parents.

  “My father died in honorable battle against a man who aided the dwarves, called the Dragonblade. Later I destroyed the dwarves and forgave the Dragonblade.”

  She heard a stir and gasps at that.

  Wistala raised her voice. “I have no business holding a grudge against a crippled, hungry hatchling. As Tyr, you know the whole of him better than I.”

  “Strange fate,” the Copper said. “That I would end up avenging my father in turn. I killed the Dragonblade, though it very nearly came to him killing me.”

  Wistala looked around, but no one argued with that seemingly impossible statement. The Dragonblade came to the Lavadome? What madness!

  “You still had a tooth in the murder of our mother,” AuRon said.

  “You accuse me of murdering my family,” the Copper said. He raised his voice so all could hear. “I reply they were no family to me.

  “Our parents believed, I think, a strict code of isolation and barbaric survival by wit and wing and claw rather than through civilization. We know of a few dragons here who argue for the belief, even if they lack the courage to leave the Lavadome, with its thralls and its herds and its aid, to go off and fight for a cave of their own.

  “Understand, I was not born into the Lavadome, where a hatchling who happened to survive the hatching duel could end up adopted into another cave. For me, the only dragons I knew cast me out. Why, they did not even offer me the dignity of a name.”

  “You deserved a name,” Wistala said. “I had nothing to do with that. I know our parents told you to leave the cave.”

  “Did they shelter me, as Tyr FeHazathant did?” the Copper asked.

  He looked at them, but spoke to the assembly. “Did they reward duty with honor? Did they lay down rules and traditions? Offer advice as to how to survive in the world? Give me even a mouthful of silver so that my scales might come in thick enough to turn a dagger? No, I starved in silence, never hearing the voices of my kind.”

  Nilrasha rushed to her mate’s side and buried her snout in his flank under the wing.

  “My love, my love, you should have shared this with me!”

  “No,” the Copper said, though whether he was answering his own questions or his mate Wistala couldn’t say. “Our parents abandoned these things, or never learned them. Perhaps they or their grandsires abandoned other ideals when they left the Lavadome.

  “Tyr FeHazathant and the Imperial Line gave me a name and a station and taught me what it means to be a dragon. Have the two of you forgotten? Wistala, what bargains did you strike in the Upper World to allow your survival? Were you fed like some overgrown guard dog perhaps, or fitted for a saddle?”

  Wistala felt the blaze in his eyes. She knew she had little cause for guilt, yet guilt she felt nonetheless. Perhaps for not making more of an effort on her brother’s behalf. Jizara had once spoken to her about their Copper brother, that perhaps they should make an effort to meet with him and feed him, in secret as they hunted for slugs on the cave floor, but she’d seen him then as another mouth and there was already little enough food to go around.

  “AuRon, you come here like a messenger-thrall, and you don’t even do that task properly,” the Copper said. “You’ve given us no words from Ghioz. Or was the Queen’s message that the dragons of the Lavadome should doubt and despise their Tyr? I wonder why she might wish for that?”

  Wistala could no longer read her brother. The stripes on his gray skin darkened—in layout they were not that different from DharSii’s, perhaps a little thicker. He shifted his weight from one side to the other.

  The Copper raised his head high and asked the assembly: “Does any dragon here have a complaint about how I carried out my duties in the Drak
watch?”

  “No,” a few dragons murmured.

  “I’ve never had luck in duels. I did not fight for this throne, but for all the dragons of the Lavadome. They trusted me with this title, and if they want it back, knowing all this, I will quit it.”

  At this Queen Nilrasha raised her snout, glancing around alarmed as though afraid of a fight or a challenge.

  No dragon stirred. “I am not a hatchling,” the Copper continued, “maimed by my hatching, starved in sight of my own egg shelf, taken and broken by iron rods in the hard hands of dwarves. I am fortunate, today, in having the luxury of choices.”

  “Father’s gold drove you to your choice more than the rods of the dwarves,” AuRon said.

  Ayafeeia spoke up. “It does not matter. In the Lavadome, whatever you were as a hatchling, or as a drake, is never mentioned again if you enter the Drakwatch or Firemaidens and grow into an honorable set of wings. The outcast is equal to the scion of the Imperial Line. My mate-brother RuGaard went into the Drakwatch and served, shed blood in battle, and rose to the position of Upholder. With that record I couldn’t care less for the details of what came before. Wistala, settle down. You’ve no need to bristle so. There’ll be no fighting. Or if there is”—she glanced up at the alert griffaran, leaning down and ready to drop—“it won’t last long.”

  Wistala hardly heard her. She couldn’t take her eyes off the jewel AuRon wore about his neck. It emitted a soft glow of a peculiar white shade, something between the pale luminescence of reflected moon off the snows of the north and the glitter of starlight.

  “So did you come all this way just to accuse me of murder, AuRon?” the Copper asked. “Or is there a message from the Red Queen?”

  AuRon felt his hearts hammering. His mind clouded.