“I thought the Imperial Army had deserted this city,” Urulani yelled more out of frustration than a desire to be heard or answered.
“Find the Aether Well of the city and get me to it,” Braun shouted back. “Once the Well is inverted, it won’t matter if the city is filled with Rhonas warriors or not.”
Kyranish banked left with Marush. A plaza beneath them was strewn with dead elves and slaves of several other races as well, a series of large craters pocking the cobblestones. Marush plunged back among the avatria of the city with Kyranish following only seconds behind.
It wasn’t supposed to happen this way!
“What do you mean it won’t matter?” Urulani asked.
“Once my own Devotions spell is functional and the Well is inverted, the Legions will be robbed of the Aether,” Braun explained, his voice growing hoarse from yelling over the wind. “We’ll have done what Queen Chythal asked. We can leave and the Legions of Rhonas will either stay behind these walls or be forced to walk home.”
“Then where is it?” Urulani demanded of the heavens, her eyes darting between the avatria towers flashing past her in a bewildering array.
“That’s it!” shouted the dwarf, his hand to the neck of Pyrash. The world around them had once again become surreal but the elegant black-and-white marble of the Farlight Palace with its beautiful silver trim was clear to his eyes. “Can you rid us of those pests behind us?”
“For a short time, master dwarf,” Pyrash answered. “They are most persistent.”
“Long enough to get me safely into that subatria garden?” Jugar asked.
“I believe so,” Pyrash chuckled. “So long as you do not care how.”
“I’m not particularly finicky about your methods, beasty, just so long as…”
Pyrash suddenly opened both his wings flat against the wind. The sudden halt in the air pressed Jugar forward, his hand slipping from the dragon’s neck. Desperately, he tried to grip the harness straps ahead of him. They both shuddered to a near complete stop in the air, their momentum and the curve of Pyrash’s leathery wings carrying them slightly upward.
The Iblisi behind them were caught off guard. They flashed past the dragon and wavered in the air. Their concentration had been so completely on following the monstrous creature of the air that they were suddenly disoriented, their course wavering among the avatria forest around them.
Pyrash, on the other hand, knew exactly what to do.
The dragon beat its wings in great arcs reaching through the air, holding its position as it drew in a great draught of air, blending it with the gases belching up through its throat. In an instant, the gases mixed with the dragon’s exhale, igniting into a blue stream of plasma fire shooting from the dragon’s gaping maw. It engulfed one of their pursuers, who fell from the sky trailing smoke from burning robes and screaming in agony.
But this had not been the dragon’s target. Pyrash’s blue flames swung back and forth with the turning of his head, bursting through the shells of several avatria surrounding them. Each flashed into flame and smoke at once, filling the air around them with acrid smoke and heat.
Jugar began to cough and panic. He was used to darkness but this was different—this was a smoke so thick that he could not see. He struggled to reach forward with his hand, to find the dragon’s neck and give him a piece of his considerably upset mind…
The air suddenly cleared, the wind carrying Jugar’s tears from his stinging eyes. Jugar grinned.
There, before them, was the black-and-white tower of the Farlight Palace.
He placed his hand on the dragon’s neck. The world was suddenly bathed in a salmon hue of sunset in the dragon’s other world but the tower remained before them. “No chances, dragon! Take us straight in below the avatria and land in the subatria garden. That’s where the central Aether Well will be found. That’s where I’ve work to do.”
He lifted his hand from the dragon’s neck, reaching for the pocket of his coat. He rested it for a moment on the hard bump beneath the leather then, reassured, gripped the harness once more.
The Heart of the Aer was still with him.
Jugar knew it was one thing to bring down some small Aether Well of an obscure House on the edge of the Rhonas Empire but an entirely different matter to bring down a central Well of an elven city. He would have to demonstrate some delicacy in arranging the collapse of this Well.
Pyrash dove down toward the shadows beneath the avatria of the Farlight Palace.
After all, Jugar reasoned, he wanted to live to see the terrible results.
Ethis pulled his dragon skyward. The smoke and haze filling the city was making it difficult for him to see. He had managed to drive one of the Iblisi into the wall of an avatria, crushing the elf. Somehow he had managed to lose the remaining three Iblisi agents for the time being.
Wanrah had been injured by a pair of the bolts from the Iblisi Matei staffs. There were slight tears in the membranes of both her wings; nothing that wouldn’t heal with time. But Wanrah could still fly, and so Ethis continued to seek Jugar and Pyrash, peering at the city below them.
“There you are!” he breathed.
He could see the blue-and-purple markings of Pyrash climbing up through the center of the city from the west side. Streaks of lightning flashed behind the dragon from his own set of pursuers.
Wanrah saw them, too, diving painfully down to help protect his fellow dragon.
Marush and Kyranish wheeled around an enormous coliseum in tandem, Marush cutting to the left as Kyranish turned sharply to the right. Their paths crossed over the coliseum, giving the Iblisi behind them a moment’s hesitation over which of the dragons they should follow. Kyranish then banked hard left again, diving down over the crowded street below and toward a plaza featuring a series of columns. The citizens below were mad with fear. Urulani wondered how they might be comforted. This was not their fight—not their war—but they were caught up in it nevertheless. They would be the ones who would suffer the most and suddenly the raider captain felt compassion for them.
“On the left!” Braun shouted into her ear. “That’s the Palace! That’s where I’ll find the Well!”
“What do you want me to do?” Urulani called back.
“Land me on the subatria wall,” Braun grinned. “I’ll make my way into the garden from there. Once the Well is inverted, come back and get me.”
“But Drakis,” Urulani said. “I can’t see where he’s gone!”
“Put me on that wall!” Braun urged. “Once the Well is inverted, then the battle’s won and we can all go home!”
Is that not what Mala said to me? Urulani thought with a chill.
But she answered with a nod, her hand to the dragon’s neck. In moments the dragon altered course slightly to the left and the black-and-white marble structure quickly grew large before them. Kyranish opened her wings, slowing as she approached the wall, the long talons of her hind legs reaching for the stonework. Kyranish’s grip shattered the marble but the masonry held. Braun slid down the foreleg of the dragon, landing hard atop the wall. His legs gave way and the mage fell on his back.
In that instant, a brilliant shaft cut through the dragon’s wing. Kyranish howled, her outrage matched by her pain.
“Go!” Braun shouted, waving Urulani away. “Go now!”
The dragon did not wait for Urulani’s answer. Kyranish spread her wings, pushing them both straight up into the sky, desperately clawing at the air for altitude.
But the Iblisi had anticipated this. They circled around the dragon, their Matei staffs flaring, bolts of blinding magic piercing the dragon as it fought to regain the air. Urulani held on as it climbed higher into the sky, its tormentors climbing with it, their bolts carving holes in the dragon’s wings and perforating her scales and hide. Kyranish thrashed desperately looking for an avenue of escape, but the Iblisi wheeled around her on all sides and there was nowhere for the dragon to go but higher. Flight is a predatory response in dragons for they inst
inctively know that there is safety for them in the clouds.
Kyranish saw the sun as she climbed upward among the burning avatria of Tjarlas. Then her membranes shredded from her own desperate beating of her wings and, now high above the towers of Tjarlas, she fell from the sky for the last time.
And Urulani, still in her harness, fell with her.
CHAPTER 30
Collapse
URULANI FELT KYRANISH SHUDDER beneath her. Flaring bolts of light lanced the air from every direction. Then, with a terrible roar, the dragon rolled backward in the air and plunged toward the city below.
“Kyranish!” Urulani screamed in outrage, the wind howling in her ears. She pressed her hand against the dragon’s neck but nothing changed; she was not transported to that otherworld of the dragons and, in that moment, she knew the dragon she had known was no more. Tears welled up in her dark eyes, pushed back across the smooth, night-black of her skin before being whisked away with the rushing wind of their fall. She could see the towers of the avatria below her now as onrushing spears threatening to impale them. “Kyranish! Wake up!”
But the dragon did not respond, twisting lifelessly in the air. They began to roll and tumble, slowing in their fall, the world starting to spin madly about them.
She realized she was not alone.
Two dragons were falling out of the sky.
Urulani saw Marush plunging downward next to her. She thought at first that the Iblisi had killed him as well but then realized that the other dragon’s wings were pulled in against its body rather than flailing in the wind. She glimpsed Drakis, still on the back of Marush, looking at her, yelling and gesturing at her wildly.
“Jump!” he seemed to shout.
Jump? she thought. Jump to where? But the ground was coming closer by the moment and there was no time for questions. She reached down and desperately yanked against the leather straps securing her to the harness. Too long to undo.
She pulled out the dagger at her waist.
They were already falling between the avatria towers.
She pulled at the securing straps with her left hand but her grip slipped along the leather. She wrapped the hand around it then pulled them both tight, the dagger sawing at the harness.
The small plaza below with a fountain and a number of subatria shops around it grew larger by the moment.
The straps gave way to the sharp blade. Urulani had been pushing against the harness with her feet to keep the leather straps taut. Their sudden release caught her off guard and she was flung from the back of Kyranish, suddenly falling freely through the air.
She closed her eyes.
Talons wrapped around her.
She heard the sickening sound of a terrible crash and collapse. The pretty little plaza was certainly no more and, most likely, many of its surrounding buildings had shattered beneath the crushing mass of the dead dragon.
Urulani realized in that moment that she was still alive.
She opened her eyes and regretted it.
The street of the elven city rushed past her with sickening speed. The talons around her body were a little too firm in their grip, making it difficult for her to breathe but she had no intention of asking the dragon to loosen its hold on her. They were flying far too low and too fast for comfort or safety. A tower on a corner shop building rushed in her direction. Urulani instinctively held her arms in front of her face to shield herself from the deadly collision but the dragon suddenly moved her sideways with a jolt, swinging her around the structure as they flew past it. The floating avatria of the central city were now everywhere above them. Marush twisted his course down several streets before finding a large open plaza.
The dragon, still flying at tremendous speed, pulled up over the screaming, panicky elves of the plaza, roaring into the sky. Straight up the dragon rushed, vaulting once more above the avatria towers. Their upward speed slowed until the dragon came nearly to a stop in the air, its wings extending. Urulani felt as though she were floating in the air, neither going up nor down in that moment as Marush reached up, bringing the Sky Mistress toward Drakis.
He grabbed for her with both his arms, taking hold of her hands just as the dragon released her at the top of their flight.
Drakis pulled Urulani toward him, swinging her around behind him.
“Hold on!” Drakis bellowed to her.
The dragon once more pulled in his wings, craning his great neck downward
Urulani wrapped her arms around Drakis’ waist in a viselike grip. Below them, she could see the Iblisi already rushing up toward them.
The dragon plunged downward, wings tight. They were once again headed into the thicket of avatria towers below.
“They know how to stop us!” Drakis yelled over the rising gale around them. “Is Braun at the Well?”
“Yes!” Urulani nodded.
“Then I hope he hurries!” Drakis shouted as Marush dove directly through the onrushing Iblisi and sped once more among the twisting chasms between the avatria of Tjarlas.
Ethis could see Jugar on Pyrash below him. The dragon was weaving between the avatria in the central city with three of the Iblisi closing at his heels.
Ethis urged Wanrah downward. The dragon dove in from behind, barreling through the Iblisi. The elves scattered among the towers in their surprise. One of them, to Ethis’ satisfaction, misjudged his turn and smashed directly into an avatria.
Ethis knew that the dwarf had to maintain contact with the dragon in order to give him any instructions. Ethis reached down with his own hand and touched his dragon’s neck.
The avatria somehow became enormous trees towering into the sky. Perhaps the dragons are more comfortable among thickets than cities, he thought.
“Jugar!” he called out.
The dwarf turned around in surprise. “Well, you’re a fine sight on a dark day!”
“I’ll give you a very dark day if you ever leave me behind like that again,” Ethis shouted back.
“Sorry, lad! I was just a wee bit too enthusiastic. It shall not happen again, I assure you,” Jugar smiled. “Let’s find the others and leave.”
“Leave?” Ethis said, just as both dragons banked out of the central cluster of floating towers. They were on the north side of the city again. The Sak’tok River glistened in the morning light beyond the city wall. Below them, the elven Legions still manned the defenses. Beyond, the Army of the Prophet was in trouble, with a number of Centurai appearing behind their lines. “What do you mean leave?”
“The job’s good as done,” Jugar beamed. “Any minute now the whole thing should come crashing down and we’ll have our victory.”
“I’m surprised you have that much faith in Braun,” Ethis admitted. “I’d have thought you would have demanded to be at the Well with him.”
“With him?” Jugar scoffed. “He doesn’t even know where the Well is! Besides, the job’s already done.”
“That cannot be. Braun’s at the Well now,” Ethis said. “I just saw Urulani land him there not three minutes ago. Hey, where are you going?”
Jugar had pulled Pyrash around, making a hard turn back in toward the city.
“He’s done it again!” Ethis groused, turning his own dragon back in pursuit.
The garden was hot.
Braun wiped the sweat from his forehead as he moved across the floor of what had been a subatria garden. The plants were charred, some of them still burning and the ground was warm under the soles of his boots. The inverted dome that formed the bottom of the Farlight Palace hung over his head but the surface of it was charred and blistered. The walls surrounding the remains of the garden were most curious as there were a number of places along the wall where the soot outlined the shapes of humans or, perhaps, elves. They were like inverted shadows: patches where shapes had somehow shielded the wall from heat and flame. There was debris beneath each of these strange shapes outlined on the wall but Braun was not keen on investigating too closely.
Besides, he told himself, he
could ask his questions later. There was important work to be done.
He turned toward the Aether Well and gasped.
The Aether Well was not a single monolith of crystal but three spaced around a central altar. More than that, Braun had never seen Aether Well crystals of such size before. Each was nearly thirty feet tall, extending upward from the garden into a hole in the center of the avatria overhead.
Something is wrong, Braun realized.
The color of the Aether Well crystals was a strange green that pulsed upward from the ground, forming brilliant green trails along jagged fracture lines. Aether spilled out from these lines, radiating in irregular flashes from the fissures. Between the three crystals, the Aether collided, twisting and writhing. As Braun watched, more fissures began to appear in the Well crystals, each spilling more of its power over the ruined garden.
They’re cracked. Broken. Braun thought. I’ve got to fix them.
Braun hurried to the center of the garden, moving his feet quickly over the heated ground.
Perhaps that is what happened to the elves here, the mage thought as he rushed toward the altar between the crystals. All I need to do is mend the cracks, make the crystals stable again. Then I can maintain the Devotions at the same time I flip the Well from the altar.
Braun reached his hands out for the altar. He could feel more Aether running through it than he had ever before believed possible.
Braun smiled as he touched the altar.
All I have to do is…
The Tjarlas Governor’s Well vanished in a flash of heat, power, and madness.
Braun simply ceased to exist, entirely consumed by the power he had unwittingly released.
The avatria of the Farlight Palace with its beautiful black-and-white marble exterior and its intricate silver trim vanished too, pulverized by the upward blast and flashing into a ball of purple flame as its structure and contents were instantly consumed by the supernatural heat and power. All this fueled the conflagration as its disintegrated mass was added to the explosion. Fingers of smoke and fire drove into the sky even as a dome of light and compressed air rushed outward.
Blood of the Emperor Page 24