I wasn’t so sure. People usually were who they were.
“You’ll need an escort,” Hubric said. Someone who can help you find your friends and spirit them out of the city.”
“Someone to babysit me and make sure I show you that tunnel entrance, you mean,” Tor said with a wry twist to his grin.
Hubric laughed. “Well, you did say you wanted to ride a dragon and by that gleam in your eye, it might be all the incentive you need to get back here.”
“Really?” Tor asked, warily. “You’ll let me fly with you when I come back?”
“If you don’t bring the guards with you, sure. But Kyrowat is temperamental, so you’d better treat him with respect or he’ll flame the bottom of your breeches.”
I snickered at the mental image of Kyrowat doing just that. Where was he?
Hiding. He’s embarrassed and afraid to face me.
What did he have to be embarrassed about?
He wasn’t fast enough to save Haskell. He’s getting old.
I felt my heart sink at his words. None of us were fast enough in this war. None of us could prevent pain and evil and terror. All we could do was fight as hard as we could for the people we loved and be there to hold them and help them when we failed.
That’s not just how war works. It’s how all of life works. Accepting your limitations is important.
But so was rising above them. I gritted my teeth at yet another flare of pain from my wound. My old injury was giving me more trouble now that my good leg was injured, as if it was bearing more of the load.
Raolcan should go talk to Kyrowat face to face. Maybe if he saw that eye he’d stop hiding.
I hadn’t thought of that.
Vulnerability helped hurt people come closer. It helped show them they weren’t alone.
It’s not vulnerability, it’s a badge of honor.
Whatever it was, it might help.
Raolcan quietly snuck away through the tall trees and I watched as Tor and Ephretti loaded up on Tyalmae’s back.
“No, he’s not going to fly,” I heard Ephretti saying. “He’s going to sneak us down to the treeline so we can join the road and you can enter the city like a normal person. You’ll have to come back and ride Kyrowat with Hubric if you want to fly.”
“That dusty old corpse probably doesn’t fly as fast as you,” Tor said.
Hubric grunted from beside me.
“Don’t let him hear you say that or he’ll test your belly’s fortitude. Have you ever barrel-rolled over a city? It’s not fun the first time.”
Their voices were already fading out.
“I hope this path through the warrens really works,” Hubric said quietly. “Savette is in real trouble. Her forces are strong, but the Ifrits Starie has raised are numerous. Our people need help.”
As if her name had triggered it, I saw through Savette’s eyes for a moment. On a hill far away, a beacon of dark light descended on the hilltop. In its center a red-headed woman stood on the back of a golden dragon, darkness swirling around her and in the tangles of darkness, Ifrits clustered. They spread out around her like cattle on a hillside. I gasped and fell back into reality.
“Are they fighting every day?” I asked, tightly.
“Small skirmishes. Testing one another. The real live-or-die fight comes soon.”
“We need to be there.”
“Yes.”
I shook out my leg and stood, hobbling to the area where Vanika could easily be seen through the trees. It looked daunting, but tonight we would do our best to take it back for the Dominion.
“Are you ready for this?” Hubric asked. He’d followed me, sipping his caf as he followed.
“I think so.”
“Battles that you choose – sometimes they aren’t what you expect.”
I licked my lips, thinking hard. I didn’t’ know what else we could do to prepare that we hadn’t already done.
“And you really can call up dragons with a pipe?” Hubric pressed.
I pulled it from my message pouch to show him. “Yes.”
“Then I’d better make things formal. I’ve been ... thinking a lot lately. I don’t want to leave anything undone.”
I turned to him with wide eyes. “Please don’t talk like you’re dying! I just got you back!”
His gaze was misty as it drifted over the yellowing leaves of the trees. There was a tingle in the air of seasons changing. And that feeling of change made me nervous.
“War is uncertain. Amel. So is life. Sometimes, it’s full and blossoming. Sometimes, it’s a bare struggle. We never know what new, surprising gift is about to be given and what unexpected shattering is about to befall us. Nothing is ever certain. So, we strive, clinging to what we hold dear and being true to our word – because in the end truth is all we have.”
“Yes,” I agreed, my heart heavy.
“I have a gift for you. By my honor and the truth – which is all I have – I declare you complete in your training – a full Dragon Rider in all but name and you have my blessing to pursue that name with the Purple Council.”
“Thank you,” I said, my eyes misty. Having him declare me ready ... the honor was so real it felt like I could touch it. But I was thankful for more than that. I was thankful for the strange but powerful way that he had trained me. Not with words – though there had been words – but with his example and his way of being a Dragon Rider. I couldn’t even think of doing it any other way.
Chapter Twelve
It was tense moments as dusk fell and we waited for Tor and Ephretti. I sat on Raolcan, glad to have time to adjust my straps after he helped me mount him. I was going to have to get used to this new way of doing such a simple thing.
“Remember the plan,” Hubric said again. Kyrowat was grumpy under him, letting off puffs of smoke in irritable impatience.
He’s doing better. He told me losing an eye would be good for me. That maybe I’d be less cynical if I only saw half as much.
“Amel flies up high,” Hubric continued, not distracted like I was by Raolcan’s interjection. “And uses the Pipe to call and direct the dragons.” Although actually, it would be Raolcan directing them. But that was a secret for Purples only. “She’ll lead the center charge while we stagger out to lead the edge of the attack in a long line. One pass where we hit the walls and towers, and then we circle back and try again. There will be Magikas. There will be archers. This is a city with a serious line of defense, not a ramshackle encampment or a few scattered Ifrits.” Ha! Like fighting Ifrits was ever easy! “We give it our best shot and hit the hardest we can right from the beginning. We don’t want any casualties in the citizenry. We’re only attacking the defenses and the Dusk Covenant.”
My stomach was bunched in knots. This wasn’t what I’d trained for. None of us was Red. This just wasn’t what we did.
Dragons have fought men before. They make easy targets.
That wasn’t very comforting. What about the people like Tor who were just caught up in it? What if someone innocent died because of my plan to do this?
A lot more will die if you don’t.
There were Magikas down there,
The Magikas are more of a challenge since they throw fire back, but it’s all the more satisfying to singe one.
And the Ifrits? Did he have something glib to say about them?
Well, their a little insubstantial, aren’t they?
Oh, ha ha. There was a crashing sound of someone walking through the low bushes and then Tyalmae poked his green head out through the trees. Like most Greens, he had a very triangular head with very little mane, almost like a horse. Ephretti looked like her patience was exhausted and she practically threw Tor at Hubric.
“Take him.”
Hubric chuckled and turned to Tor. “Climb up into the stirrups. That’s it. Now, these straps are cinched tightly around your hips and those around your shoulders. These ones are for thighs. Don’t look at me like that, I’m not strapping them for you. You do your own wo
rk around here, boy.” Then in a quieter voice. “Are you friends safe then?”
“Yes,” Tor said. “Let’s go, old man.”
“You don’t want me to double check your straps?”
“I’m younger than you. I don’t need my food fed to me on a spoon. I can take care of myself!”
“Uh huh.”
I didn’t catch anything else Hubric said, but I saw the wicked gleam in Kyrowat’s eye and saw Raolcan shaking with laughter as they launched into the sky. Kyrowat barrel-rolled almost before he had enough height for the maneuver, brushing the tops of the trees with his wing tips and loosening Tor from his saddle. He was dangling by one strap and yelling when we streaked past. I wasn’t worried. Hubric wouldn’t actually kill him while he knocked sense into him ... would he?
Doubtful. He finds the boy as entertaining as I do. Wants to make a Dragon Rider out of him, which would be a good idea. He has the guts for it. And he could use a dragon to keep him in the right place.
And where was the ‘right place’?
In the sky of course!
And with that, I was loosened out of my nerves and we were streaking away from the mountain lake and toward the city as I fumbled in my bag and pulled out the Pipe. Hubric – always cleverer than I was – had offered me a gift while we waited – a narrow leather strap to loop it around my belt.
If you lose your seat or get knocked around, you don’t want to lose a thing like that.
I blew the first note with shaking fingers, watching as the dragons on the hills leapt into the air. Was it right to call them this way?
Just stick to a few notes. That calls us like a horn to battle, but we can still resist. It’s then you play a song that it’s irresistible.
Their silhouettes surrounded us. I could feel the wind from their wings as they joined us in the sky. At first, there were only a few, flapping beside us, soaring through the cool evening air. Then there were a dozen, thirty, a hundred. By the time we approached the city walls, they had all joined us. It was strange to think so many had been hiding in the hills waiting, as we chose our time to carry out this plan. What made them so patient?
Good leadership. I’ve always been an excellent leader.
Was there anything he wasn’t a master of?
I’m not very good at table manners, if you must know. But I think we should revise the rules for those, anyway. Points should be awarded for clear enjoyment of food and overall enthusiasm.
And how would he award points in the coming battle?
Everyone who survives gets a point. Make sure you get a point, Amel. That’s an order.
He was silent after that, clearly focused on directing the dragons. More than one fight broke out between them and a single clash of his mighty jaws or half-snarl towards them was enough to stop the fight immediately.
My grip on the saddle was moist, but I kept the Pipe in one nervous hand, just in case. On our final approach toward the city, I kept my back straight and my gaze level. The walls – made of timber, chunks of rock and crumpled sky steel – were formidable despite our dragons. There were so many places for the tiny figures below to hide.
Magikas and archers scrambled for places on the makeshift walls and towers, letting off arrows a little too soon, so they fell before they reached us. They followed up immediately with a raft of fireballs, as if to announce their intentions. They knew they were under attack and they were ready to fight.
Raolcan’s emotions through our connection were almost giddy as he swooped toward the choppy wall, his dragon cohort at his back. He flamed dramatically, setting the part of the wall aflame in our first pass. Behind him, dragon after dragon set their flames loose on the towers and walls.
I hadn’t seen rain since I’d returned to the Dominion – even longer than that perhaps, and the timbers were dry. They went up like a fire made of aged split wood. This close to the first frost, there were usually rains and mud. I hadn’t really thought about that until now. I hadn’t factored in wall-burnability to the plan. But with them so easily set aflame, it was almost too easy!
I was already beginning to celebrate when I heard a cry from Hubric. I spun in my saddle to follow his pointing finger.
Flames leapt from the burning walls, licking up the towers as men leapt from their heights to the ground below. I gasped as the first one dashed on the rocks. Even from a low tower, the height was too high to survive.
My grip tightened on Raolcan’s saddle, and I watched, helplessly, as the flames kicked up in the wind like waves crashing into the shore. They swirled into the make-shift shanty-like structures behind them, consuming a dozen in a single breath and rushing further.
Wait! No! It wasn’t supposed to go this way!
My breath was growing faster as my gaze flickered from one scene of horror to the next. The dragons hadn’t stopped – they were still flaming towers and walls further into the city. I fumbled for the pipe, my fingers too thick to grab it the first time. I brought it to my lips the second time but paused, uncertain about what to do. I knew how to gather them up, but how did I make them stop?
They had to stop!
There was a tall building – two storys high – the base of it on fire. Like a vision from the Troglodytes, it flashed into my vision and then out again just long enough to see a mother passing her children to the building beside it. I gasped as Kyrowat skidded to a landing within the inferno, Hubric and Tor rushing into the building the children were being passed to. It was already smoldering. They’d been passed from one danger to another.
I never expected this. This wasn’t the plan!
I spun to the side to see Ephretti, frustration on her face, signaling sharply to me to stop this.
Dax was nowhere to be seen. He must be in the flames like Hubric. It would just make sense that his soft heart would leap to help.
I put the pipe to my lips and blew the first note I could think of, but nothing happened. I blew and blew as gnats filled the sky.
Panicked, my fingers fumbled with the lever. I must have accidentally bumped it. It wasn’t set to dragons anymore.
Raolcan! Help!
Trying... too much for me...
They must not be listening to him. They needed help. I adjusted the wing with trembling hands and blew again, seeing the dragons on the edges of the city swirl toward me. That must be right. For good measure, I kept blowing, and blowing and-
Stop! Stop!
I stopped.
It’s too much! They aren’t thinking now!
A cluster of Magikas on the far end of the city fired in unison, their fireballs surrounding a white dragon whose expression was in a daze. He crumpled, falling from the sky like burning ash over a campfire. He fell to the ground, breaking the buildings beneath him and setting them on fire as the magenta, sticky Magika fire spread from him to the area around his fall.
I’d gone too far in the other direction!
Dragons were falling as quick as I could spot them. Dozens of them. Each fall lit a new blaze.
Help! I screamed to Raolcan. Help!
Trying.
Help!
THINK.
The message of the Troglodytes pounded in my brain like a nail into wood. I shuddered. Think about what? But the message wasn’t for me. Around us, I saw dragons shaking themselves out of their stupor and turning on their adversaries.
But that was wrong. Right now, Magikas were not our problem, and nor were archers, or even Ifrits. The fire was stealing innocent lives. The fire that I set, that I ordered. I hadn’t known – hadn’t realized – what I was doing, but every choking, screaming, dying soul below us was my fault.
Shuddering with horror. I laid my hands on Raolcan’s scales, forcing my thoughts from incoherent panic to a plan. We needed water. The lake!
I didn’t even need to clearly think of what I was planning before the entire mass of dragons was wheeling from the city and back toward the mountain. We dove toward the lake at full speed, the cool night air washing over us, so pe
aceful and different from the fires in the city below. Raolcan opened his mouth as wide as it would go. On either side of me, I saw dragons doing the same, taking huge, gulping mouthfuls of water and spinning in the air to turn back on the city.
Would a hundred mouthfuls help? Two hundred? Three hundred? Would that even dent the infernos raging beneath us?
Between the pounding of my terrified heart and the desperate speed of my beloved dragon, I felt completely turned around as we shot toward the city. Something was on the horizon where the road led to Vanika – a dark moving mass. I prayed it wasn’t Ifrits, but there was no time to plan for them or even worry.
We swept over the creeping line of fire, each dragon spitting water down on the licking flames and arcing back into the air to fill their mouths again. Steam rose up into the air and in the hellish orange light the city flickered and melted light into dark and shadow into brilliance.
I had a horrible feeling that the city was me. It was shadow that thought it was light. It was smoke that thought it was clarity. I was trying hard not to imagine the fates of those already lost, trying desperately not to think of how few would be saved by the Dragon Riders in the city. If I stopped for a moment and thought of those children with Hubic racing toward them...
I was in a steady rhythm of dive, scoop, ascend, swoop, spit, ascend. Over and over and over until my mind grew numb with it.
Chapter Thirteen
We can leave them to this pattern now.
It felt like we’d been doing it for hours.
At most, it’s been twenty minutes.
We flew toward the city again, my mind spinning with a brew of guilt mixed with terrible despair.
Your despair helps no one. Shake out of it!
It was all my fault. My plan. My execution.
Your responsibility now to save who you can.
Dragon School: Dragon Piper Page 5