by Marc Secchia
“Five thousand horsepower,” she said, earning you’re-so-peculiar looks from both Dragon and Outland Human. Zara added, “I don’t suppose the Constructor Dragons built the Beyond to be Artax’s personal play-pen? Or jailhouse?”
“That’s the ancestor of all Dragons you’re disparaging!” Illume howled.
Sanu just shook her head. “You’re weird, Zaranna. A good sort of weird. You being Human is also weird, but not in a good way. How am I supposed to have a chance with Alex, if you’re so … you?”
“I’d stick to Cuddly Kenzo if I were you,” she advised.
The Outland Girl hooted with laughter. “You know, for a Wizard of star-quenching evil, you’re not such a bad person after all, Zaranna.”
Illume just shook his muzzle at the idiocy of Humans.
* * * *
They rested, but Zara could not sleep. How was it that her two big, clumsy feet, or four hooves, kept landing her in hotter and hotter water? Could she not rest a moment without stirring up Abyssal troll-mountains and continent-munching Dragons or the wrath of a nation of supercilious Pegasi? Her life had never been so exciting and that, to borrow Sanu’s blunt expression, was not a good sort of exciting. Saved our lives by a whisker exciting. Heart about to explode with terror exciting. Daily taboo thumping exciting. Oh, and betraying her own family exciting, to cap it all. Maybe she would do better not to go home. Whiz would be more than happy to perform all the indelicate surgical modifications Illume intended to make to her person just as soon as she … did not provoke the Imjuniel.
The Dragonstone subsided palpably.
She eyed Illume the Stars with a decidedly jaundiced air. Feckless lizard. Snarky son of a serpent. Could he not fly them faster through the Dragon-capable Safeways than a two-day journey? He had said the same for his journey to the Obsidian Highlands. Why shouldn’t Amorix be a shorter journey, except that she had no earthly idea in which direction of the compass the Dragonish Beyond lay? Hmm. Hole in the old Geography subject there, Inglewood. Nothing she wasn’t used to. Last time, she had unwittingly folded him through time and space … hmm, again. With extra omens for dessert.
Time for a calculating look. Yes. Yet another question Illume had conveniently not quite managed to answer, ever. Filthy habit.
“Say, magnificent ode to Dragonhood?”
He did not twitch an eyelid. “What do you want, Dreamer?”
“So, I dreamed the other day that I managed to expedite your rapid arrival at Kesuu’s village. Can you shed some light on how that happened, o most noble Illume?”
Ha ha. She could fire a few Arrows of Massive Snarkiness in his direction, too.
The Dragon snarled, “You folded a perfectly unsuspecting Dragon through a scientifically impossible inter-dimensional portal, which you snapped open with your Dreamer magic, and landed me in the Obsidian Highlands, is what happened.”
“Any chance we could do that again?”
His fangs ground together audibly, mangling a reply into a million screaming shreds.
“Pray illuminate, o mighty crystal-based organism?” Drool away, Yolanda! Never mind she had been saving that one up for a few days.
“YES!”
“Really? That’s nice. Why didn’t you mention it before?”
“You didn’t ask. Besides, it requires an infeasible amount of magic. Far in excess of anything a scrawny, adolescent Human Wizard could ever produce.”
If she was Human. If Whiz was right, and she or Illume had managed it before … “Then I’d need the strength of a Dragon, wouldn’t I?” she said.
No word of a lie.
Chapter 29: Families and Fingers
GIVEN SUFFICIENT POWER, a Dragon’s fire could temporarily fold space, or in Illume’s words, rethread the Loom. Time, space, life and magic were different aspects of the Loom. Inextricably intertwined, he warned. Pulling on or snapping one thread could change the entire pattern.
Why did she sense that snapping the Dreamer’s thread was his underlying insinuation?
Mounted up once more after a couple of hours’ rest, the two Human girls clung to Illume’s back as he accelerated down the Safeway, flapping his injured wing with care. He still felt no pain, but that did not preclude damage, Zaranna realised, wishing she had Doctor Martinez’s expertise in the area of … well, physiology and anatomy. Of Dragons? Right. At Illume’s low request she gathered her butterflies, the whimsical carmine-and-yellow expression of Equinox’s fearsome natural magic, and funnelled them into the Blue Dragon. He literally swelled with power. Would he try to turn on her in this moment? Yet the Imjuniel’s command held firm. Summoning his fires, the Dragon sucked in an enormous inhalation before spraying the air ahead of them with Dragon fire of a kind Zaranna had only seen once before – the time Rhenduror must have done the same for her, or had it been her own fire, that brought her to Equinox?
His fire was iridescent streamers of cool, beautiful flame shaped into a flowering-outward circular portal, fiercely redolent of that beautiful, tangy smell of Dragon magic. Jasmine, spices and sulphur. A soul-thrill to a Dreamer.
The butterflies raged past them, drawn into the maw of that portal just as they were, and through the shifting veils of power, washing over a new land – not the ubiquitous blue underground tunnels, but an unspoiled mountain wilderness of surpassing beauty, a place of dizzying heights and multi-tiered waterfalls and rivers, and then the Dragon’s wings flared and brought them to a landing atop a mile-high waterfall, just beside the place from which a distinctly pink plume of water leaped into the gorge below. From the sun, she judged the time to be mid-afternoon.
“Amorix,” the Dragon announced, rather grandly.
She patted his shoulder. “Good work, my friend. Good work.”
Sanu said, “Friend and foe. Which way?”
No gazing about in delight for her, wondering at the variegated colours of the waterfalls or pausing to suck in a great lungful of moist, delicately fragrant air, the scents of lily and frangipani and rose rolled up into a heady bouquet. River Horse territory.
She listened with half an ear as Illume replied, “Back along this river you will find a trail leading to a secret tunnel through the mountains. Follow that up to a quintet of small pink lakes. From there, you must strike directly south for five miles before you will come to a cunningly hidden pass. Even we Dragon don’t know exactly what lies down that pass, or how to enter it, but we believe that False Amorix lies there, a Vale long concealed by foul Earthen Fire magic wielded by our Human Wizards – in this case, the Wizard of Spring.”
“The Equine-kind lie within the Vale, of course. Again south of here, a mere four miles along this gorge, you will find the first Splash of River Horses – that’s the equivalent of a village. As for friends, I don’t believe you two taboo-breakers will find any beneath the skies of Equinox. But that is your chosen fate.”
“May we request a paw down, Illume?” asked Zaranna.
“I don’t see why I should bother,” said the old Dragon, ramrod-stiff.
“Don’t mind me,” said Sanu, sliding down his shoulder before taking the sixteen-foot drop to the ground with her usual catlike ease. Zaranna knew she would likely as not break an ankle if she attempted any acrobatics.
Rather than jump off the equivalent of the house roof, she walked down Illume’s long back, past the diminishing row of spine-spikes, to his haunches. There she slipped gingerly down the muscular curve of his upper thigh, onto his knee, then his foot. From the foot-arch it was still a respectable jump to the ground. The Hulking Mound of Scaly Muscle turned a grave look upon her.
“Time to prove your alleged integrity, Wizard.”
Cue an hour of torture. In that beautiful spot, with a view of lavender cliffs and slopes, nineteen waterfalls and rivers, ample vegetation and vertiginous drops into the spiderweb of gorges below, Zaranna exerted every ounce of her stubbornness, guile, magic and impatience to try to remove the Imjuniel from her finger, but the Dragonstone was having none of that
. Period.
Sanu made helpful wisecracks from the sidelines. “Try biting the ring, Zaranna.” “Is that actual sweat pearling your majestic brow?” “Say, are you the Wizard of Obfuscation, and the Mistress of All Feebleness?”
The ring stung, twisted, pricked and throbbed, and if she persisted, bathed her in rivers of agony. Twice Zara made herself pass out briefly, and once the ring struck back so hard, she bit through the side of her tongue and thought she’d had another seizure; every muscle in her body went rigid and the scream that wrenched out of her throat was worse than Rhenduror’s torture at its peak.
Finally, the Outland girl must have been moved to sympathy. “Zaranna, stop. Look, you’re killing yourself. Your hair looks like a Pegasus that’s flown backward through a storm, and your face is covered in tears, saliva and green snot.”
Zara stared at her, panting heavily. “Sanu!”
“Joking – well, about some of it. Look. I’m going to keep my word, at least.”
“Uh … how?”
Illume had been watching all of this with aloof disinterest. If he was impressed at her attempts to kill herself, he did not show it in the slightest. But now, the massive Blue Dragon cracked a grin. “How shall we make the wicked Autumn Wizard suffer even more, Human girl? What do you propose?”
“Well …” Sanu cracked her knuckles meaningfully.
Zaranna groaned and flopped back on the thick bluegrass beside a foot-wide flow of water. “Do your worst, o past-tense friend.”
“Advice for a budding Wizard. Don’t try insults. You’re no good at them.”
“So what do you – urk!”
“Strangulation,” was the last word she heard.
* * * *
Zaranna’s eyes fluttered. “Alex?”
“Hey, dreamy girl. Are you … Zars?”
His voice seemed to echo down a long, long tunnel. The darkness sucked her back in with malevolent glee.
* * * *
She woke back in Equinox to the sensation of Sanu pinching her cheeks with cheerful inattention to any gentleness whatsoever. Zaranna flapped an arm at her, the left, which twinged in the elbow where it had been so badly broken.
“Didn’t work,” the girl said succinctly.
“What –”
“Stuck to your finger like a wart.”
“Sanu, give me your – oh, mercy!” She clutched her poor, abused left hand. Turning all the power she had inward, all that she could summon, she tried to slip the ring loose. Butterflies. Raging magic. Shrinking her finger. Desperation made her strong, but not strong enough.
I will not depart such a notable vassal.
The thought formed lucidly in her mind. Zara gasped. “What?”
You have power. I have more. I was created of a Wizard’s soul and Earthen Fires, created to devour and control magic. You are mine, young Wizard, without hope or defence. And you will do as I bid.
Zaranna screamed!
Sanu’s hand slapped over her mouth. “Ancestors, why not just tell the Hooded Wizard’s army where we are? Wave a flag. Do a –”
“No. Be still,” said Illume. One dark eye turned upon the stricken girl. Sympathy? “You look as if you saw your own grave, Dreamer. What has terrified you so?”
“The Dragonstone!” She screamed again as pain bit deep, little runnels of blood leaking out from beneath the stone’s clawed feet now. “I – aiee!”
The pain bit so hard she collapsed on the ground, sobbing. Then she thrust out her hand, just the forefinger outstretched. “Alright. I give up. Dragon, I command you neither to touch this stone, nor my person.”
But she looked desperately at Sanu as she spoke.
The girl’s eyes flew wide.
Zaranna squeezed her eyes shut. “Oh, pleee …”
Cool metal touched the webbing between her left forefinger and its neighbour. She felt a sharp pressure; her hand jerked. Snick. Then her right hand shot over, tore loose a flap of skin and flung the remains several feet away from her.
Her finger lay there. Disconnected. “Dear God. It’s done.”
Sanu dropped her dagger. “Ancestors, Zaranna, you made me promise … I couldn’t bear it. Your pain.”
“Grateful,” Zara gasped.
Illume’s peaceful magic washed over her, soothing her pain. Breathless with wonder, he said, “Dreamer, did you just –”
“Take it. I don’t want to be your Mistress or a freaking Wizard or anything else! I hate it, Illume. Don’t you understand? Hate it! If that’s what it means to be an Autumn Wizard –” she pointed at the forlorn scrap of Human flesh, still wearing the stone, sobbing with fury and grief “– then I want no part of it. Don’t touch it, Sanu. I-I-Illume, that’s yours. This is what promises mean to me.”
She held up her ruined hand. Three fingers and a thumb, and a glaring gap where the forefinger should have been, the wounded flesh already closing over with the help of the Dragon’s healing magic.
He said, “My first heart sings, my second is riven by grief.”
White mists gathered in the corners of her vision. Zaranna had the impression of fading into a tunnel. She began to say, “Illume, when you speak to the Dragon Clans about Humans, and think about the plight of these about to be overrun by the Hooded …”
She fainted. Softly.
* * * *
She came to on the couch in the lounge to find Whiz leaning over her, red-faced. Shouting at Alex, who appeared to have her head pillowed on his lap.
“Uh, Nonno?”
“How could you?” he yelled.
Alex began, “Now, Whiz –”
“You shut up. First you knock my granddaughter out – just look at this bruise – then you help her steal the Imjuniel? What’s the matter with you?” She had never seen her grandfather so upset. “Where’s the stone now? Tell me! Back in Equinox? If so, you’re in terrible danger.”
“In Equinox, Whiz,” Zara said.
“You have to bring it back.”
“That’s going to be a little tricky.”
“Tricky how?”
“Gramps, you do know how Dragonstones were made, don’t you?”
“How tricky, exactly?”
“From Earthen Fires and a Wizard’s soul. I spoke to that stone. It exists to –”
He shouted, “I don’t give a rotten fig how it was made. Where’s the stone? What have you done with my stone, you ridiculous, irresponsible child?”
“I gave it to Illume.”
“You what?” Whiz seized her sleepshirt, half-dragging Zara off the couch before Alex could stop him. Zara saw Christi and Yolanda looking on. His face had turned a dangerous shade of purple. “Tell me this is a sick lie. That you haven’t ruined everything … the centuries …”
“I couldn’t get the stone off, Gramps. It has a mind of its own.” Peering down at herself, she saw blood pooled on her sleepshirt. “I couldn’t take it off, so I had Sanu cut my finger off. Like this.”
“No!” Yolanda shrieked.
Whiz stared at her as though his eyes, bulging out of their sockets, had suddenly become glued in place. Then he clutched his throat. His eyes rolled up and he toppled, smashing into the glasses on the coffee table.
For a moment, no-one breathed.
Then Yols wailed, “You killed him! You killed him!”
“No,” said the Doctor, grabbing her arm. “Go fetch my medical bag from the hallway. Run!”
Yolanda fled.
Christi snapped at Alex, “Help me get him down. On the carpet, easy does it.” Alex was already moving, checking Whiz’s throat with a calm Zaranna felt in no measure at all. “Oh yes, you’re a paramedic, right?”
“Yes,” he said. “Haemorrhage on the arm here. Applying pressure.”
Poor Alex. His eyes. Shocked to the core.
Zaranna looked on as the medics lowered Whiz to the floor and set about treating him. She heard the Doctor say that Whiz had not had seizures for many years. Just too great a shock. After a few minutes, she had Ale
x telephoning for an ambulance while she moved over to Zaranna to check her hand.
“How long have you had this wound?”
“Since ten minutes and a million light years … uh, not long. Oh, Doctor, will Whiz be Ok?”
“Fine, honey, and this time I am certain. I don’t think we’re looking at a seizure, just a severe shock. Look, he’s already coming around. A few stitches in that arm and a few in his forehead, and he’ll be even more handsome than ever. I should sterilise your hand, but it looks like the wound is days old. Fresh blood, old wound. Yols, go help your sister get cleaned up.”
Alex stopped her by clasping her good hand. “You really … Zaranna?”
“Yes, Alex.” She smiled wanly at him. “The stone was evil in a way I don’t really understand. It held the corrupted soul of a Wizard. It was more powerful than me and told me that I belonged to it; I couldn’t get the vile thing off my finger. It fought and hurt me and … I had to do it. I promised. For there to be any chance at all of peace with the Dragons –”
“You betrayed your entire race.”
Zaranna turned at the sound of Whiz’s voice, flushing. “I righted an ancient wrong, a deed you clearly lacked the courage to –”
“Shrivelling little fool,” sneered Whiz. “I know you. Tell me, what bargain did you strike with the Dragons for this keystone of Wizardly power? Tell me you gained something. A grain of sand? A leaf from a Vale?”
She could not speak; just shook her head mutely.
“Whiz, the ambulance is here,” said the Doctor. “We can talk later. I’ll come with you.”
Her grandfather hissed, “Congratulations, Zaranna. You just bargained away our only chance to make something of our return to Equinox. You must be the most naïve person on this planet to trust a Dragon. No wonder your sister calls you Beauty – because you were born with the brains God gave a cockroach. How this family could have whelped such an idiot is beyond me.”
Alex barked, “Shut your yapping, you senile old fool. Come, Zaranna. You don’t need to listen to this.”