Gold Dragon Codex

by R. D. Henham

  From a distance, it almost seemed that the blue dragon was laughing. He threw himself gleefully into combat, leaving behind the gray tower where he had been about to land. On that tower, beyond the blue dragon’s lashing tail, Sandon could see the shadows of men moving about—Kine and Vilfrand, he guessed, still locked in swordplay. He glanced toward the floor of the plaza, trying to see if his father was still standing, but he didn’t have a chance to see anything more in the flicker of time before the mighty blue dragon’s body blocked all sight of the tower.

  Lazuli must have thought that the smaller gold dragon was real, for he yelled out in a booming voice, “You dare invade the territory I have claimed?”

  Shoving the handles down, Sandon twisted the construct to the right, feeling the bottom fall out of the world again as the construct dived. Lazuli gave chase, roaring in glee.

  That didn’t make Sandon feel any better. In fact, it made him feel worse.

  Swifter than the Blue, Sandon’s golden construct flitted up through the bigger dragon’s claws. Lazuli roared in frustration as he clamped his forepaws together on empty air. Once above them, Sandon felt the gold dragon shudder again, off balance in a sudden gust of wind. He frantically tugged at levers and twisted knobs, wishing he had some idea what to do—or some kind of magic to help him keep the construct afloat.

  All he had to do, he reminded himself, was get Lazuli’s attention and draw him away from the keep. The moment he left the valley, the ancient spell would take hold again, and Lazuli wouldn’t be able to go back unless he was invited a second time. “Fat chance,” Sandon growled. “If I have to, I’ll destroy the horn forever before I do that!”

  Lazuli closed on the construct, his powerful wings carrying him forward in half the time of the contruct’s swift, precise beats. He couldn’t maneuver as well, but he had more thrust in the air, and worse—he knew what he was doing. The blue dragon hissed, lightning crackling around his mouth. Sandon could have sworn that Lazuli smiled when he opened his jaws. A bolt of lightning as thick as a wagon was wide came snapping out. Sandon yelped as he caught sight of the bolt from the side as he turned the construct in a tight spin. The lightning was by far faster than he, and the air around him steamed and hissed with the stench of burning ozone. Sandon rolled the dragon construct to the side, struggling not to flip it over—he had no idea if the construct could fly upside down, but he rather doubted it.

  The lightning bolt screamed past only inches away from the construct. Sandon felt the electric charge of it race along the construct’s metal frame and into his fingers. Jolting sparks shot brightly along the metal plating holding his seat in place. It snapped in brilliant blue arcs from lever to lever, and he heard distinct pops within the metal body behind him. “Aiee!” Sandon yelped, shaking his numbed hands.

  Definitely a problem. While he might be able to outfly the massive Blue by doing cartwheels in the air, he’d never outfly that lightning. Sandon maneuvered the construct toward Lazuli and slammed his hand down on the button marked “fire.” If it had worked against Malaise …

  Fire roared out of the golden construct’s mouth. Once again, Sandon felt the heat of it behind his chair, the flames rushing through the dragon’s extended neck from somewhere deep within the frame. Fire exploded out of the hinged mouth in front of him, scarlet and orange and yellow, so bright that Sandon had to squeeze his eyes shut and hope for the best.

  Lazuli howled in pain, and Sandon hazarded a peek. The fire had been only slightly more successful than the other dragon’s lightning, igniting across the Blue’s knuckles and searing the back of one of Lazuli’s front paws along with his glittering sapphire forearm. Sandon took his hand off the button.

  The fire didn’t die out.

  It kept rushing down the construct’s throat, fueled by some reserve beyond Sandon’s knowledge, roaring with increasing heat through the metal frame of the neck. Sandon could feel the gold dragon’s frame heating up as flame poured through it. The blue dragon’s lightning must have knocked something out of whack inside the construct! Terrified, Sandon pounded the flame button, hoping it would dislodge whatever was stuck. The frame shook, popped, and there was a cry as of metal grinding on metal somewhere behind him. Another thump on the side of the maneuvering levers, and the construct hiccuped loudly. The flame thinned as it came out the dragon’s nose and mouth, gasping and spluttering, then died out completely. Sandon breathed a sigh and sank back into his slightly melted leather chair.

  Just as Sandon relaxed, something slammed into the side of the construct. There was a horrible shriek of metal, and one of the rear legs of his dragon construct spun out of place. Sandon saw cogs scattering all about like a golden rain just below him. Four tremendous claws wrapped about the construct’s belly, matched by four more from the other side. The construct jolted again, torn out of flight by the larger dragon.

  Lazuli’s head snaked down over the gold dragon’s shoulder, sniffing at his prey. The blue dragon’s head was twice as large as the wedge-shaped skull framework of the golden construct. His paws were planted on the construct’s back, just behind the wings, and his long claws reached nearly to meet one another around the construct’s belly. “What have we here?” Lazuli hissed, his breath smelling of ozone and static charge. Sandon could see one big eye as the dragon’s head slid down toward the construct’s chest and peered in at him.

  “Aha!” Lazuli chortled. “You’re no dragon!”

  Sandon was thrown forward. The big Blue wheeled above him, dragging the construct through the air and shaking it vigorously between his claws. The light-bodied golden construct was no match for the Blue’s strength. Sandon heard springs break within the internal mechanisms, and long pipes of gold and steel shattering, hissing out internal coolant the way an animal might bleed. Sandon yelped as he was thrown forward against the grated front of the pilot’s chamber, clutching the thin bars that held him inside. The construct spun out of control, wings flailing uselessly. They beat against Lazuli’s scaled sides but the Blue only laughed. “Puny human! I do not know how you managed this strange feat of magic, but it will avail you not. I will crack this flimsy statuette open like the shell of an egg!”

  He could do it too. Of that, Sandon had no doubt.

  Hurling himself back into the still-smoking chair, Sandon started pushing levers and buttons desperately, seeking some means of breaking free of Lazuli’s hold. The construct fought, claws extending and contracting, slashing at Lazuli’s forearms, tearing open the burned flesh where the Blue had already been seared. Lazuli screamed and squeezed harder, and Sandon heard one of the wings tear free of the construct’s body. Part of the sail spun past, fluttering away toward the keep that appeared to spin sickeningly far below. For an instant, Sandon imagined himself swirling down with it.

  The forged pipes that made up the bones of the construct creaked again, and one side collapsed like a shield dented by the blow of a massive hammer. Sandon heard the blue dragon straining, pushing all of his force onto the construct’s frame. The little pocket where Sandon sat was starting to narrow, the sides pressed by the force of the big dragon’s paws. With a horrible crunch, the body finally gave way. The head of the construct drooped, hanging on a shattered neck. The clawed arms ceased scratching at Lazuli’s flesh and fell limp. The Blue’s laughter rang through the air once more, and the sparkling electricity of his breath lit the dim twilight sky. “The sky is for dragons, boy!” he roared victoriously. “I condemn you to the earth!”

  Lazuli let go of the broken construct, and the crumpled golden machine—with Sandon inside—slipped through the dragon’s claws and began to fall.

  andon slammed his hand down on a button marked “safe eject” and felt the pilot’s seat lurch. The grate across the front of the construct’s chest fell away with a sharp clang, and the seat tipped forward. Screaming, Sandon grabbed onto the seat, feeling the warmth of scorched leather burn into his palms. This was a safe eject?

  The seat careened out of the construct w
ith Sandon clinging onto it for dear life. He looked up and saw the broken golden frame. The remaining silk wing sagged around shattered boning, and the amber eyes were light-less and dull. Sandon could see that the entire center section of the construct had been torn away. Inside were tremendous gears, twisted metal piping, and tanks of liquid fuel dripping cold, waxy resin onto torn golden scales. Beyond the sadly rent construct, Lazuli’s eyes glowed with sadistic glee, his claws open, shaking off the last little bits of golden cogs and springs. He stared up because he was too terrified to look at the rapidly approaching ground—

  Something in Lazuli’s eyes changed. They widened, lost their luster, and became as dark and unfocused as those of the wrecked construct. Sandon looked for lightning crackling around Lazuli’s mouth again. The evil dragon wasn’t content to see his enemy fall to the ground. He has to barbecue me too! Just when Sandon was squeezing his eyes shut so that he didn’t have to see the lightning bolt, he was struck from a completely unexpected angle.

  Claws, brilliant and shining like the lost sunlight, skimmed past the leather chair and wrapped around Sandon. A golden head as large as Lazuli’s rose behind him. The wind slowed, and Sandon felt gravity reassert itself, pressing him down into the palm of the dragon’s hands. A gold dragon. Sandon gaped.

  “Hold on, Sandon,” the Gold growled, its voice warm like a down cover on a snowy night. “This might get a bit rough.”

  Before Sandon could ask how the magnificent dragon knew his name, Lazuli had swooped down onto them. The Blue’s claws tore into the gold dragon’s shoulders, slashing at its wings. The Blue was enraged to see a real opponent, his tail sweeping back and forth wildly as he engaged.

  The Gold was long, sinuous, with slender wings that had faint patterns in their leathery length. The paws were wide, and the claws, broader than sword blades, gently cupped Sandon between them against the dragon’s chest. He could hear the loud thumping of the dragon’s heart, like a battle drum calling men to war. The Gold opened its mouth, but instead of breathing fire, as the construct had done, it spoke ancient words of magic that rang with power. The spell swept upward in sparks on the wind and flowed around the Blue above them.

  Lazuli screamed as the sparkles blinded him. He clawed at his eyes, shaking his head wildly, wings thumping the air in frantic strokes. The Gold bowed its head over Sandon and slammed its shoulder into Lazuli’s belly. Sandon heard the wind howl out of the Blue’s lungs in a choking gasp.

  The Gold rolled past, lithely flexing its serpentine body past the Blue’s chunkier, more lizardlike bulk. Lazuli flailed, clawing at it, but the Gold easily evaded. Sandon expected the Gold to take advantage of the other dragon’s blindness, but it simply disengaged. Scrabbling to the edge of the Gold’s claws, Sandon looked over at their enemy. His hair flew in his face and made him squint. Lazuli was recovering, shaking the blindness off and turning to fly up toward them. “Why didn’t you claw him?” Sandon pounded one hand on the gold dragon’s claw. “Bite him? Breathe on him?”

  “I don’t kill.” The gold dragon frowned, long lips curling back.

  “Even though you know he’s going to kill us?”

  “Even then.” Looping its body, the Gold rejoined the combat against the enemy, twisting its body to foul Lazuli’s wings. The Blue screamed in rage, slashing at the Gold. His claws pierced golden scale and drew blood along one rib. Sandon felt the Gold shiver in pain. The good dragon spoke more words in the lilting tongue of magic, and a fierce gust of magical wind rushed up beneath Lazuli’s wings and shoved the blue dragon away.

  This wasn’t going to end well. If the Gold wasn’t willing to kill its enemy, this was nothing more than a war of attrition. Lazuli was too stubborn to give up, and he was the only one wounding his opponent. The Gold would be worn down and eventually fall before the greedy Blue’s savagery.

  “Dragon!” Sandon pounded his fists on its claw again to catch the Gold’s attention. “You have to make him follow you! Get him out of the valley!” He wasn’t sure the metallic dragon had even heard him. The Gold twisted and coiled, striking out at Lazuli, slamming its head into the Blue’s jaw just as Lazuli was preparing to breathe electricity again. The chromatic dragon choked, swallowing back the vivid light behind his teeth.

  The ground whirled beneath Sandon. He and the Gold spun in the air, leaving the blue dragon behind, and swooped down toward the village. Enraged, Lazuli chased them. “No!” Sandon screamed. “There are people in the village!” He might as well have swallowed the words the same way the Blue had swallowed his lightning—the Gold wasn’t listening at all. It swung down in a great arc with the blue dragon on his heels.

  Lazuli didn’t try to breathe lightning again—as best as Sandon could tell, if he did so while diving, he’d fly right into his own breath weapon—but chased them eagerly, claws out and wings sweeping the air in pounding thrusts. The Gold lengthened, stretching its form above the houses before twisting and flowing up again, the pull of gravity meaningless to the dragon. Not so to Sandon, of course, who was thrown back against the dragon’s chest to stare up at the dark sky. The stars were starting to come out, twinkling in a misty sky. It felt as though they might go up, up, up—right through the clouds and into the starry mist above.

  The Gold finally turned, sheering off to the side as a bolt of white hot lightning raced past. Lazuli was winded, breathing heavily as he pursued his prey, and his pale eyes shone in the darkness. “You’ve always been a coward, Acinyoshu! You always will be! Hold still and I’ll make this quick!” He spat a second bolt, but this one was even farther off its mark, crackling past more than a dragon’s length from the tip of the Gold’s outstretched wing.

  “Acinyoshu?” Sandon looked up at the gold dragon’s triangular jaw. The dragon pelted forward through the clouds, diving again with the Blue right on his waving tail. Lazuli roared, and it echoed from high cliffs. They must be near the mountains.

  The metallic head turned slightly, eye closing in a wink. Again, that deep, wonderful voice purred in the chest behind Sandon, rumbling loudly enough for him to hear the words over the wind. “I’m going to need your help now, Sandon.”

  “Help?” Sandon nodded, hoping the dragon could see him even if he couldn’t hear the boy. “Anything! Just stop Lazuli!”

  The mountains spun past beneath them, sharp spurs of rock flashing past a finger’s length below the Gold’s belly. Acinyoshu flattened out, wind rushing past faster and faster. Sandon could hear his wings thrumming, flicking up and down so fast that the boy could hardly see the tips moving on either side of the dragon’s form. Suddenly, the Gold twisted to the right, throwing his whole body sideways. “Now, Sandon!”

  “What? What do you want me to do?”

  Acinyoshu looked down at the youth held delicately to his chest and murmured, “Invite me back into the barony. Quickly, before Lazuli reaches us.” His voice sounded desperately weary, worn out by the speed at which he had flown for so long to reach the other side of the mountains. If Lazuli caught up to them now, Acinyoshu would surely go down before the heavier and stronger Blue.

  “But … I can’t! I don’t have the horn!”

  “You don’t need the horn, Sandon. You just need to be of the baronial lineage.” The boy could swear the gold dragon was smiling. “So long as you are a member of the baronial family, you can invite me in anytime, just by saying so—just by asking me to come to you in dragon-form. I just made the horn so I could hear them calling from far away.” The metal scales on the dragon’s face and neck reflected the first silvery rays of moonlight from the moon Solinari. Sandon shivered in the rush of wind that blew back the long, silken whiskers on the dragon’s face. “Therefore, I’m asking: will you invite me into your barony, Sandon, son of Lehna?”

  “You’re invited!” Sandon breathed. He shouted it a second time in case there was some magical reason it had to be heard by the whole world.

  The dragon smiled. “Thank you, Sandon.” Acinyoshu doubled back on himself, snaking his for
epart over his tail to face the blue dragon. With a lizardlike grin, the Blue opened his claws and roared his eagerness, crossing the mountain range to reach his opponent at last. The two circled, snapping, Acinyoshu edging Lazuli farther and farther across the line of mountain peaks.

  “I am Lazuli of the Iron Wing!” the blue dragon snarled, pulling up when the Gold was only a few feet from him. “You will die!”

  “No, Lazuli,” the Gold said soberly. “Nor will you return to this valley. These people are safe from you.”

  “Why? Because you will guard them?” Lazuli laughed. “You are a coward, Acinyoshu! You gave up the war when your knight died. I tore him from your back the way I will tear your valley apart!”

  Acinyoshu stiffened. “It takes more courage to leave your enemy alive and hope they will change their evil ways than it does to kill them.” He began to speak words of magic, enunciating them from the depths of his body much the way the construct had poured fire from the heart of its frame. Lazuli howled and charged him, but just before he reached the Gold, he slammed into an invisible wall of force at the edge of the barony.

  “NO!” Lazuli roared. “You will not escape me!”

  Acinyoshu’s voice rose, his chanting turning into yelling, yelling becoming a full-fledged roar. In response, Lazuli spat one more burst of lightning directly at them from across the sharp stones. The flash of light blinded Sandon, who tucked his head under his arms when he saw the lightning coming. He looked up again a second later when nothing happened.

  The blue dragon’s electric breath coursed over an invisible barrier that spread between them, along the edge of the mountain peaks. Acinyoshu’s voice fell, and the barrier gleamed in a broad dome over the valley. Sandon gasped to see it—he’d almost stopped believing the spell existed. Now it shone with brilliant twinkles all across the valley as it took hold, strengthening the magical barrier that kept Hartfall safe. The magic twinkled like stars, shimmering in waves between the mountains on either side of Hartfall, glittering over the keep and the little village. “You will never enter here again, Lazuli, no matter how you harass and threaten these good folk. My spell forbids you—even if you are invited. Now, be gone before I forget my pledge of peace.”