Excitedly, Jenka told Zahrellion about Rikky, and through her quelling anger she admitted her surprise. Then she lay back against her dragon’s cool scales, tuned out the rain as best as she could, and went into a trance. She tried to find Rikky with her mind, and her dragon tried to find Silva, but the rain was just too distracting for either of them. They both began to get the rest that they desperately needed, drifting off into an ethereal dream-world and falling fast asleep.
Jenka was elated at the idea that Rikky had bonded with a dragon. The news that Royal was still alive and working with Silva and Rikky at the grottoes, trying to help free Prince Richard was welcome, too. As soon as Crystal and Jade rested, they would all go that way as well.
Zah hadn’t decided what she would do yet, nor had Jenka, but one thought kept recurring in Jenka’s mind. It was about the one person he had known all of his years, the person who had raised him and loved him since birth, the one person he knew he could trust no matter the situation. It was the person who had sent him to Mysterian. His mother might have kept the truth from him about his father, but Jenka didn’t doubt her love for him. He felt he had no choice but to trust the things Mysterian had told him.
Crystal was exhausted beyond imagining from her two cross-ocean flights. And after leading Mysterian's chartered fishing boat into a sheltered inlet and carrying Mysterian and Herald a score of miles, setting them down near the old Mainsted wall, she was even more so. Jenka went out of his way not to wake either of the females. He used the time to debate what he was going to do.
For a long time, Jenka was too distraught to sleep, but Jade’s warm body was comfortable. Jenka fell into a slumber despite his worries. He slept like a babe, and when he woke to a warm sunny morning full of calling birds and clean sea air, he felt invigorated.
His mood grew even better when he saw Zahrellion sitting by the fire, sipping liquid from a gourd nut. She offered him one of the hard-shelled, fist-sized fruits and he jabbed a hole in it with her dagger. As he sipped the tart, tangy juice from the gourd, he thought about the fact that Zah was only nineteen years old. If that was true, then he wouldn’t have minded the kiss last night. The idea that she was elvish and old seemed ridiculous now. He decided to apologize, but couldn’t find the words just yet. Later in the day, the words did come to him, but it would be too late.
He was on Jade's back, holding on for dear life, as the young green dragon labored to fly with the weight of a passenger. The result was clumsy at best, and nothing short of dangerous for both of them.
They flew for half a day before they saw the Great Wall. They had passed over the western outskirts of Mainsted, too, and Jenka was amazed. Mainsted was massive when compared to the other cities he had seen. The outskirts stretched for miles and miles. The city itself was surrounded by its own circular protective wall. The harbor cut up into the heart of the metropolis like a knife thrust.
They flew high overhead past Mainsted. They would have just continued past the Great Wall towards Demon's Lake, which was on the way to the deep mountain valley where the dragon’s tear lay, had Jenka not spotted a mudged dragon. It was carrying a troll and was harrying the men atop the seemingly endless wall. Jenka first thought that it was Gravelbone and his nightshade, but Jade and Crystal both said that it wasn’t. They said they would be able to feel the taint of the demon and his hellborn wyrm. What they were seeing now was just a mudge with a troll atop its shoulders.
Since it was all Jade could do to stay airborne with Jenka on his back, Crystal and Zahrellion went diving after the creature. Jade spiraled down more slowly, and Jenka was thankful. When they saw the sheer number of trolls and goblins lurking out beyond the range of the wall’s bowmen, Jenka realized he might have been wrong about something. It looked like the feral goblinkin were amassing to attack at Midwal’s gate. Maybe Gravelbone wouldn’t be content to wait it out, because this didn’t look like the makings of a siege at all.
Away from the wall on the frontier side, big orc captains, and brigades of trolls and goblins were actually drilling with weapons and moving in somewhat organized formations. Jenka was about to scout westward down the length of the wall when a trio of smaller, dark-scaled wyrms came up, flapping madly out of the copse where they had been resting. Only one of them had a rider, but all three began winging toward Jade and Jenka. Jenka barely had time to notice the mounds of fresh dirt hidden out in the trees. There were piles and piles of fresh brown earth, but Jenka couldn’t think about that at the moment. It was all he could do to hold on, and all Jade could do to stay in the sky, as they fled back towards Crystal and Zah with the three mudged on their tail.
The dragon that Crystal was chasing was fleet and agile. It stayed well away from the bigger white wyrm, but made the mistake of swooping too low and took a steel-tipped arrow in its flank. It roared angrily and tore off towards the troops of trolls and goblins on the ground.
Zahrellion came to Jenka’s rescue. She let loose a primal display of her crackling, yellow druid magic. The blast not only startled the mudged dragons, it startled the men on the wall-top as well. Once she was certain that the mudged were fleeing, she had her big white wyrm lead them farther north, away from the wall.
Jenka felt a twinge of guilt for abandoning the men, but they had plenty of shelter inside the wall if it came to it. He was glad Crystal had gotten them away from the mudge, and he found tears streaking down his cheeks as he thought of all the terrible fates that could have befallen the people of Crag. He decided he would go to Kingsmen’s Keep to see about them before he went after the tear. He couldn’t even hope that Zah would make the trek with him. Not only was she still mad about his ignorant comment, but she felt that Prince Richard’s situation warranted her attention, not the dragon’s tear.
Jade felt Jenka’s sorrow, and that only made Jenka feel worse, for the young green-scaled dragon had already lost his mamra to the nightshade. The hole left in Jade’s heart was still deep and raw, and the young green wasn’t very keen on the idea of going to where his mam’s corpse lay rotting.
Jenka had just convinced Jade that the tear could help them, when he realized what those piles of dirt meant: The vermin were tunneling under the wall! He had Jade wing in close to Zah to tell her.
She nodded that she understood, and told him to go do what he was going to do. She said that she and Crystal would go back and warn the Walguard of the tunnels. Then they would try to find Rikky and Royal and see about freeing Prince Richard.
“I’ll see you in your dreams, Jenk,” she called over to him. “Be careful, and hurry. We will need you in the end. I’m sure of it.”
He wanted to tell her he was sorry for offending her but, “Aye, and you!” was all that came out of his mouth.
It was a full day and half of a night later that Linux finally found the solitude he needed to search the misty ethereal for advice. It was also the first chance he had gotten to rest. The goblins and trolls had been attacking the Port gates of the Great Wall the entire time. They hadn’t been successful by any standards, and they were easy to kill from the crenels atop the wall, but the mudged dragons and their daring troll riders were a menace. They were attacking along the entire length of the wall, in the city of Port, and out in the harbor as well. They had caused several dozen deaths, a few fires, and more than a little panicked mayhem.
Linux had been acting the king the whole time. The war council he called hadn’t had the chance to gather, and after hearing a few dozen reports, and visiting the wall-top himself, he came up with what he thought was a reasonable plan to defend the population of Port from the mudge.
He commissioned several crews of men to build a trio of massive, mechanical, crossbow-like spear launchers. Until then, the few dragon guns the Walguard possessed would have to do. The dragon guns were heavy crossbows that didn’t quite live up to their name, but they had a nasty sting if you could hit your target. They fired long, slightly-barbed, steel-tipped arrows and, after seeing them in action, Linux deduced that a b
igger version, built on a rotating pedestal, would be quite the deterrent. He reasoned that if the Walguard could score just one kill, even the mudged would grow weary of the sky over the city.
Linux put Master Trayga in charge of the task, which got the nosey elder out of his hair. He had Sir Wilmer, the king’s favorite advisor and friend, shadow Commander Wiklan of the Port Walguard, which he hoped would keep both men acting sharp. After that, he stuffed himself as he never had before, at a table Mayor Pandre had arranged. Then he retired to his private chamber with orders that he wasn’t to be disturbed.
After casting a spell that dampened the senses to the world around the huge body he was in, he went searching in the dreamy ethereal. He found Mysterian first, for she was searching for him. Then the two of them reached out to their counterpart, the Outland wizard, Vax Noffa. He didn’t respond to their call, but both Jenka and Zahrellion heard it in the back of their minds. So did Crystal, Jade, and Silva, though none of them knew exactly what they had heard.
“I’ve assumed the king’s body, Mysterian,” Linux told the old Hazeltine. “I’m not sure what I’m doing, but I didn’t want him marching all these fools he brought to the mainland out into the demon’s madness.”
“Since Vax doesn’t seem to care about these happenings,” Mysterian replied, “I say you keep defending the wall. Your girl, Zahrellion, and her dragon are trying to save the prince,” her voice faltered then, for she had spent many days watching over Prince Richard, and had gone far to keep the boy’s meetings with the mighty blue dragon a secret. Now Royal was supposedly dead, and it hurt her heart because she knew that Gravelbone had long ago poisoned the crown prince’s mind.
“Is it too late?” Linux asked. “Could Richard have kept himself sane for so long?”
“I’ll not assume, Linux, but I fear the worst. I want to see him for myself before we go that far, so at this point it matters not what we think.”
“I agree, for now,” said Linux. “What are we going to do about King Blanchard? Where is Jenka? He is our man, is he not?”
“He is, and I hope he rises to the occasion,” Mysterian responded. “Don’t get yourself killed in Blanchard’s body, or he will stay trapped in yours for the rest of your body’s life.” The last came with a heavy-hearted witch’s cackle, but a cackle nonetheless. “I hope the queen’s ship wasn’t lost in that storm.”
“By Dou,” Linux cursed under his breath. “I won’t be able to fool her when she arrives. What do you think I should do?”
In answer, Mysterian cackled again. “That is your mess, Linux, but I’ll help when me and this hard-headed King’s Ranger get ourselves somewhere.”
Just then, Linux was jarred violently out of his reverie, as a man burst excitedly into his chamber.
“So sorry to wake you, Your Majesty.” The man groveled. “Both the commander and your man, Sir Wilmer agreed that you had to see this for yourself. They ordered me to wake you.”
Linux was thankful for the man’s deep fear of offending his king. Linux would never have awoken in character as the king without the reminder. As it was, he had to search his spell-weary mind for why the man was treating him like a king. When it finally came back to him he began acting as King Blanchard would.
“You’d better be convincing me why my new headsman’s axe shouldn’t bust its maiden’s head on your melon! Speak up while I dress. Tell me what you know!”
“There’s a dragon hovering high above the wall, a silver wyrm with a rider. He ran off some of them other wyrms. He even braved our arrows and swooped close enough to call out his name. He says he has word on the prince. He says that Ranger you’ve got men looking for knows him well. He—”
“Quit babbling and tell me his name before I have you flogged, man!” Linux barked as he pulled a huge cloak over the king’s wide shoulders and fastened it.
“His name is Rikky Camile. He says that even you might have heard of him from—”
“Does he have only one leg?” Linux was astonished. Master Vahlda had told him that Rikky’s wagon was one of the ones that never made it to the wall when they had evacuated Three Forks.
“Aye, only one leg, and a peg for the other!” The man seemed as surprised as he was relieved to find out that the king did actually know the dragon rider.
“I’m coming behind you, man. You tell Commander Wiklan that any man who fires on that silver wyrm or rider will be tossed off the wall to feed the goblins. And send a man to fetch Master Vahlda. There is no doubt that he will want to see this!”
“Yes, Majesty,” the excited man said before he backed out of the door and tore away at a run.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
When Zahrellion and Crystal returned to warn the men at the Midwal gates about the tunneling, she was just in time to see the earth burst open in the middle of a cluster of tents on the protected side of the barrier. Like ants boiling out of a disturbed hill, dozens of child-sized, gray-skinned goblins began pouring out of the tunnel. The hole was five or six paces wide, and getting bigger as the little beasts threw the dirt out and away and surged forth. A troll emerged among the goblins, then another. They crawled over their smaller kin and started after any human unlucky enough to be caught in the proximity.
Crystal dove of her own accord. Zah followed her dragon’s intention and started speaking old and powerful words from memory. She knew immediately, as soon as the magic began to form into being, that Crystal was lending her strength to the destructive spell. The potency of the pure-blooded dragon’s magic tingled through her body like lightning.
A score of the goblins broke from the main force, and they did their best to avoid all confrontation as they moved southward towards Midwal proper. It would only take them a few moments to reach the second largest city in the realm. Another day’s ride south — two days on foot — was Mainsted, the largest city, and supposedly the future seat of the kingdom. What the little goblins would do when they got to Midwal and found the city guard’s archers standing on the modest wall that ringed around the city, Zahrellion had no idea. She would have gone for those vermin first if the sky hadn’t suddenly filled with dark-scaled, feral dragons.
Four, no six, of the nearly black-scaled mudge were swooping on the wall-top archers, keeping them from protecting the people below. At least three had trolls riding on their backs, throwing stones the size of fists and larger. Another dragon, a fiery red that still had some scarlet luster to its scales, was breathing wide swaths of terrible orange flames across the confused refugees as they fell out of their tents and scrambled for cover. All the while, more goblins, and now more trolls, continued to pour out of the hole.
From some distance, a battle horn sounded. Men from one of the many keeps that had been built in the area before the construction of the wall must have finally seen the attack and were sending men forth. A few dozen armored horsemen galloped out of an open gate, and a score of pike men marched after them. Another horn sounded from somewhere else, but Zah couldn’t concern herself with any of it.
Crystal came, streaking toward the opening in the earth, and Zahrellion focused her attention on the knotted mass of seething goblinkin scrabbling up from it. Her fingers traced a pinkish lavender symbol in the air before her, and then she threw her hand forth pointing at the hole. The very world seemed to pull inward toward her fingertip before the magical energy released into a warbling yellow flow that went streaking into the enemy. Crystal cut a sharp veering turn away from the area and managed to spew a jet of her glacial breath over some of the goblins. Frozen in place, they slowly cracked to pieces.
With a gut vibrating whooomp! and a bright, violent, flashing concussion, dozens of gray goblin bodies and a few trolls flew out and away from the hole. Some were screaming in pain, others were in gruesome bloody pieces. More than half of the goblins in the mouth of the opening were limp and lifeless, their bones and guts pulped by Zah’s powerful spell. When Crystal pulled around and cut an arc through the sky back towards the wall, Zah saw she had
caused quite a bit of carnage, but had really only succeeded in widening the opening for the vermin.
More of the filthy trolls came out with the goblins now. Many of them were holding their heads, as if their ears had been ruptured by the blast, others had clubs or sling sacks full of throwing stones.
Zah saw an orc come growling out of the tunnel then. It began calling out orders in the strange language the goblinkin all shared. The vermin started forming a protective ring around the passage Zah had just widened for them.
Suddenly, Crystal lurched through the sky into a spinning horizontal spiral. She narrowly avoided a streaking mudge. Zah was dislodged from her position between spinal plates. She started to lift away from Crystal’s chilly body and there was nothing she could do about it.
Crystal felt Zah slipping and at the last second curved back up into her bond-mate, forcing her body to press back into her seat. It caused the relatively large white dragon to take a swath of the similar sized scarlet fire drake’s heat across her belly, which hurt her deeply. They went careening through the air, avoided a hurled stone the size of Zahrellion’s head, and almost collided with one of the wall-top archer’s barbed steel shafts in the air.
“Away!” Zah yelled to her wyrm. “Get away from them. We can come back around after you’ve gathered yourself.”
The Royal Dragoneers: 2016 Modernized Format Edition (Dragoneers Saga) Page 25