The Dragon's Blade_The Last Guardian

by Michael R. Miller

  Rectar’s figure dissolved, reappearing far away from Darnuir, near the Cascade Sink. He entered Dukoona’s mind again.

  ‘Come on, Dukoona,’ he raged. ‘Your people die outside. One by one they fall. There goes another. And another. And ano—”

  “Stop it,” Dukoona cried aloud, falling to his knees. “I will do it Master. I will do it. But I need the chance.”

  Rectar may have been distracted by the brief exchange, for he seemed sluggish in deflecting the Dragon’s Blade as it hurtled towards him. Rectar knocked it off course, sending it spinning towards the Cascade Sink. Darnuir had covered half the distance when his sword hit the well of energy and the blast sent him clean off his feet. A spike of raw Cascade lashed forth from the Sink like lightning, hit the edge of the cavern and exploded.

  The whole mountain shook. Dukoona lost his footing and fell. He rolled and spun and sought shadow after shadow as great hunks of stone crashed down. Everything was deafening bangs of breaking rock and painful vibrations. There seemed no end to it. Was all of Kar’drun crumbling around them?

  When it finally ceased, Dukoona blinked against the daylight that had been made hazy by the dust clogging the air. A gaping hole loomed in the mountainside, large enough that a cloud might have floated through it

  Darnuir was face down and covered by debris. Rectar was already on his feet, moving back to the Cascade Sink with a slight limp.

  The sounds of battle drifted in, notably regular booming blasts that Dukoona had never heard before.

  “Those humans are ingenious with their craft,” Rectar declared. “I shall deal with them while you recover, Darnuir. Or not, as the case may be.”

  ‘Do it now,’ Rectar’s voice burned in his mind.

  Dukoona looked to Darnuir, who was slowly stirring. His hand emerged first from the rubble and Dukoona saw the Dragon’s Blade zooming back across the cavern, seemingly unscathed from the explosion.

  Rectar reached the glowing well and extended the Champion’s Blade slowly towards it, as though hoping to tame a wild animal. Blue streaks of raw Cascade sparked towards the tip of the sword, then wrapped themselves around it, flowing up and entwining themselves around Rectar. The Sink itself started to shrink, as though the stored energy was being drained into Rectar, burning away like wood in a fire.

  And Rectar began to change.

  His arms stretched and arced, as he grew leathery sinew and hardened bone spikes. His body swelled, his skin turned to red-black scales, his neck lengthened, his face became a snout with a pit of razor teeth. His talons raked at the cavern floor as he landed, roaring in a way that snuffed out the courage in the hearts of mortals.

  He had become a full dragon; a beast from times this world had long forgotten.

  Rectar flapped his great wings and took off, flying out of the hole in Kar’drun to wreak terror on those outside.

  Any thought of resistance was shattered. It had always been a distant dream.

  Darnuir was on his feet now, bent over and coughing up thick scarlet blood.

  Dukoona melded across the numerous new shadows to his side. “I am sorry. I never understood the extent of his power. I thought there was a chance.”

  Darnuir groaned, blood dribbling down his chin. “I was close. I can beat him. I know it.” He groaned more as he tried to step forward.

  “How can you?” Dukoona said. “What possible way is there?”

  Darnuir pointed towards the Sink.

  “That is a risk,” Dukoona said.

  “What choice is there left,” Darnuir said. “We’ll all die otherwise. Your people and mine.”

  No, Dukoona thought. Not my people.

  He gazed again at the well of energy, bubbling away in the semi-distance. Darnuir took one small step towards it and Dukoona found himself behind the Dragon King.

  “You’d do anything to save your people from further harm?” Dukoona said.

  “Anything I could,” Darnuir said.

  Dukoona formed a dagger in his hand. “So would I.” He plunged it through Darnuir’s exposed neck. He drew it back and thrust it through the weaker join at Darnuir’s waist.

  Darnuir jolted, his body jerked around in a fit of shock. Dukoona had never seen such hurt and rage blaze across a face. Before Dukoona could make another assault, light and fire burst around Darnuir. Dukoona howled from the pain, barely escaping into a shadow with his life.

  He fled desperately from shadow to shadow, leaping from one to another, trying to outrun the light and fire hounding him. He wanted a dark hold in the earth in which to hide. He hated himself. Hated his cowardly act. But the choice had been clear. The spectres would be free if Darnuir died. If he failed, then he’d failed them all, especially himself.

  Darnuir

  All the breath left his body as he fell to his knees. Fire and light died around him. Very distantly, he could hear a terrible roar. Blinking, his vision darkening, hands numb and cold, he dropped the Guardian’s Blade. Hot blood gushed down his back and chest, soaking under his armour and padding. He couldn’t breathe. Everything went numb as he scrambled half-blind for the Guardian’s Blade. He collapsed onto his stomach, hand still questing for the hilt.

  He found it.

  But he was dying, if not already dead. He couldn’t feel the Cascade, let alone reach out for the doorways. Death’s hand was ice cold, and only the warmth of his own blood let him know he could still feel.

  ‘It is not your time,’ a voice told him; the same voice he’d heard in his Cascade dreams, and his nightmares. A voice like many in one, and as soft as a whisper.

  Why say something now? If he was to die, he wanted to know.

  ‘Death breaks the walls between us, that or great power. Here there is such power, and yet even it is not enough.’

  So, I am dead then? I have failed.

  ‘Rise again. You have done so before.’

  Darnuir tried, yet his grasp upon the doors was so weak. I can’t, he told the voice.

  ‘Reach out,’ it said, though it too sounded faint. And Darnuir swore he felt another hand upon his within his mind, guiding him, helping him to turn the handle on one door.

  With a shuddering gasp he began to heal. The Cascade ran unchecked within him. Both his hands seared as the draining poison swelled in his veins. The Blades hummed from the efforts to process it and Darnuir winced as his body knitted back together.

  When he had finished, he felt more exhausted than he’d ever been in all his life; even worse than after he’d recovered from his addiction. After this, he’d be lucky to avoid it again.

  He forced himself to sit, arms shaking horribly as the residue raced towards the Blades. The veins on his hands had turned worryingly black. He tried to lick his cracked lips but there was no moisture left in his mouth. And through the throbbing head pain he had but one agonising thought, worse than all the pain.

  Dukoona had betrayed him; literally stabbed him in the back.

  What a fool he’d been to think they could have worked together. Hadn’t his childish hopes of bringing dragon and human together been naïve enough? To think that he had relied on a spectre.

  His anger was abated by a fresh wave of bone aching agony from the magic. The battle lust was already fading from him, letting his more rational mind return, sluggish as it was.

  Dukoona had deceived him. Then again, Dukoona probably thought he had no choice. He’d mentioned something about a promise he’d fulfil for Rectar. That must have been it. Dukoona loved his people fiercely, that was plain. It was for them that he’d abandoned all honour. Darnuir hated it but he could understand it.

  Jamming the Dragon’s Blade into the ground, he rose, placing his weight upon it like a walking stick. Though every step jarred his battered body, he went as quickly as he could to the diminished Cascade Sink. The closer he got, the more he felt a familiar tugging sensation i
n his mind, the same one he’d felt draw him towards the Basilica.

  Rectar’s echoing growls chilled his blood. How much damage would he be wreaking outside? Darnuir had to fight. Had to try. Everyone, everything relied upon him.

  And as he stood before the still towering well of energy, he heard the voice again.

  ‘We rely on you too…’

  Flexing his stiff fingers around the grips of the Blades granted him a precious second of delay. Rectar’s roaring reached him again. Just do it, he told himself.

  The Guardian’s Blade and Dragon’s Blade raised as he approached the Sink, just as he’d seen Rectar do. And the well answered. Raw magic coiled around his swords, and then him. The doors in his mind were ripped from their hinges, and he was drowning in power; yet it was sweet, not bitter; soothing, not painful. The feeling that his body was confining melted away as he grew, larger, and larger, his muscles booming with strength, his neck and head reaching high towards the cavern’s roof; hot fire, a true fire, burning deep within his throat.

  Blaine – The Plains of Kar’drun

  The battle had been faring well enough; not badly, but not brilliantly either. Human muskets and cannons kept the brunt of the reds at bay, yet the enemy were quick to close distances and all too often dragons were needed to prevent the humans being routed. The arrival of the spectres had been – and he cursed himself for thinking it – welcome. They had moved at speed throughout the red dragons, able to cut many down unseen from their shadows. They had even drawn the attention of the enemy onto them. Blaine did not complain.

  It was a fragile balance, but it would suffice, so long as Darnuir succeeded.

  From the back of the legions he watched the battle unfold, directing events where he could. Then a chunk of Kar’drun blasted outwards.

  Blaine watched in astonishment as rocks the size of buildings flew. The explosion was on the eastern slope, far away from their own armies. A mercy, which he thanked the Gods for.

  Then the roar came.

  All on the battlefield paused when they heard it; dragon, human, spectre, fairy and red dragon alike. The muskets and cannons fell silent. The world stopped.

  Something in Blaine recognised the sound. Some ancient part of his very being, deep in his blood, knew that sound.

  A dragon of black and red scales hurtled from Kar’drun like an arrow. It shot high above the clouds, out of sight, roaring all the while, then descended, soaring down to their armies. Everyone panicked. They looked to Blaine for orders, but he was utterly speechless.

  Rectar, for it must have been him, swooped over the battlefield. His wings cast a great shadow, his jaws snapped at fairy flyers, his tail pounded into dragon shield walls. He turned, gliding over the humans next and bathed them in molten flame, igniting all the powder and flesh in his line of attack.

  Burning flesh and acrid, sour smoke blew across to Blaine as he watched Rectar nestle into the Brevian ranks and begin a slaughter the likes of which he’d never seen before. Hails of bullets rebounded from him. Cannonballs bludgeoned him but caused no harm.

  Like any dreadful horror, Blaine found himself transfixed, unable to turn away. Rectar roared anew and his red dragons followed suit. Assured of their victory they redoubled their attack on the legion lines, jumping over shield walls without a second thought.

  In the midst of it all, Lira appeared by his side, blood running from her nose. “If it’s over Blaine, we should go out fighting.” She offered her hand to him.

  Blaine nodded. He drew out the regular sword he’d acquired; such a plain and simple thing, so light both in weight and in burden. It felt flimsy, then again, he felt flimsy too.

  He ran with Lira to the front, and his presence seemed to lift the spirits of those he passed, if only by a fraction. The Praetorians still fought the fiercest, with all the spirit of fighting a hopeless cause that youth is cursed with.

  Blaine joined them, landing a lucky stroke against a red that had stuck its neck too far forward to taste the blood of its last kill. Legionaries began to rally to them for one last stand.

  “This is the end,” Blaine called to them. “The end of all things. But I would have us make a worthy end. Stand with me. Take as many down as you can. To the death.”

  “To the death,” many chanted.

  Blaine felt a great sense of relief knowing it was over. There was something darkly comforting about knowing that this was where he would die. In the end, he’d done all he could. Any grief he felt for Darnuir’s loss was not now felt, kept at bay by the rush of battle.

  A good clean death. That was what he desired now.

  A fresh roar sounded from closer to the mountain. Rectar must have finished with the humans, perhaps flying around to make a pass at the dragons next.

  An answering roar came, this one from the west and south, where Rectar had last been seen. Soon the roaring was all Blaine could hear, drowning out even the enemies right before him. The roars were distinct, the second lighter, higher, younger; it bolstered the spirit rather than sapped it.

  Could it be?

  Blaine backtracked through the Praetorians and legionaries, nearly falling in his haste. He looked up in time to see a golden-scaled dragon soar overhead, homing in on the great red-black beast.

  Tears welled in Blaine’s eyes, as Darnuir, in dragon form, crashed into Rectar talons first, driving their enemy to the ground.

  Arkus

  “You must fall back, sire,” a Chevalier cried, tugging at his arm.

  Arkus shrugged him off. “No. I will see this.”

  Balack came next, bow in hand and quiver near empty. “It’s too dangerous. You should not be here.” He spoke with a confidence far above his station. Well, that was his own fault for engendering it in the boy.

  Arkus opened his mouth, but his half-formed words were drowned out by the two true dragons. One of them, the black one, had the other’s tail between its teeth. Arkus tried again.

  “When I say I shall stay, I shall stay. Think yourself fortunate Balack that you still walk free after aiding Raymond in his thievery and sticking an arrow in the back of my closest Chevalier. Go and fight, for that is all you’re good for now.”

  Balack scowled and ran off.

  Arkus returned his attention to the battle. Still a fair distance away from the thick of things, he was close enough to have felt the slaughter by the black dragon deep in his heart. All those people, burnt to cinders or blown to pieces from exploding powder. All in a second. If this was Rectar, their so-called great enemy, then he earned that title. The golden dragon was Darnuir, Arkus assumed, but how he’d managed to transform into such a creature was beyond him.

  Magic. All his woes came back to magic, and those who wielded it.

  The two dragons took off, flew high, scrambled at each other in the air, then began to fall back down, still scratching and biting while spiralling towards the earth. A second before impact, Darnuir twisted up and away, beating his powerful wings and leading Rectar away from the battlefield.

  Arkus scanned over the rest of the dragon army. So many thousands of them still, and if they were all capable of turning into such beasts – if Darnuir had found the way to transform back again, then, well, humanity was doomed.

  How he hated them.

  The human lines faltered in the wake of the destruction wrought by Rectar. Artillery fire was still helping to cover the dragon front lines. Not for much longer, he decided.

  “Send word to Adolphus, all cannon fire is to assist human companies only.”

  “That will concentrate the enemy directly onto the legions,” a Chevalier said.

  “What of it?” Arkus spat. The Chevalier gave him a grim look then got upon his mount and rode off without further question.

  The man was right enough. Before long, with the artillery focused solely upon supporting the humans, the red dragons turned t
heir attention entirely towards the legions. Golden armour shimmered and flashed, and shrank in number with each heartbeat.

  Blaine would be amongst them. Perhaps he was already dead. Arkus smirked, the closest he’d come to a smile in weeks.

  Every fallen dragon was a blessing. For how could humanity ever live in safety while powers such as Darnuir and Rectar walked freely? What good could men and women do against such vast power? Nothing. They would die. As easily as so many had at Brevia. And wasn’t it his duty to do all he could to keep humanity safe? A cruel joke, for he’d never been able to keep his own family from harm.

  Thane’s cold body, already turning blue, flashed before him. The grief, still too near, threatened to choke, deafen, and blind him. He didn’t know why he wrestled with his desires anymore. Before him was his justification. The dragons were too dangerous.

  As more fell, Arkus’ smirk crept further up his face. It gave him more pleasure than he’d felt in years.

  Darnuir

  Above the clouds the air was chill, the sun seared. He climbed higher, as high as he dared to fly. Each stretch and beat of his wings grew harder and his tail became a dead weight behind him.

  He barely thought. All was instinct and some ancient primal knowing. He simply knew how to fly, to turn, how to dredge fire from the depths of his belly.

  He could still feel at least; the euphoria of flight, the panic of the battle. Fear shook him for a moment too; what if he could not turn back?

  Rectar’s roars signalled he was still in pursuit. Darnuir pressed on but when the air thinned, and the sky darkened, he felt he could climb no more. He swooped around, hoping to catch Rectar by surprise.

  Rectar pivoted, a breath of black fire billowing from his mouth. Darnuir spun, like an arrow spinning through the air, missing the flaming breath as it whooshed past him. Rectar’s tail clubbed him, cracking into the bulk of his body. Darnuir roared, slashing at the tail with talons that were as thick as ship masts. He cut into the meat of Rectar’s tail and black, smoking gore poured forth like bile.

  Locked again, neither could beat their wings, and once again they fell through the air, all the while biting and tearing at each other; trying to get purchase with tooth or claw. Turning all the time, Darnuir only saw the ground rush to meet them in flashes.