“Two more,” Armagon called over the thundering sound of the wings below them. Three other dragons peeled off formation, these he didn’t know. He drew his sword. No other attacker would be saved from the battle. Their arrangement had only included the four he pointed out.
DraKar nodded, seeing the identifying marker on the dragons. He sent a deadly bolt of magic into one of the three unmarked dragons speeding toward them. The green dragon twisted in agony as the crackle of power wreathed her in purple and black lightning, and she fell from the sky in silence, the single spell enough to kill her.
Armagon flew off to meet the other two, leaving DraKar to handle his illusions for the last two their pact included. The two red dragons had continued their path toward him even after the green fell to her death. His smaller size allowed him to maneuver around their massive bulks with ease.
The smaller of the two reds breathed fire as he came within range, but he drew his wings in, letting himself fall through the air and below the gout of flame. Armagon snapped his wings open again and flew up to the one who had tried to attack him. His sword punctured the dragon’s wing on the downward stroke, and he ripped a long tear through it. Once above the dragon who was trying to roll in the sky to face him, Armagon dove toward the joint where the wing joined the body. He caught hold of the thick membrane with his claws and let himself be carried through the roll with the dragon. He sliced deeply into the tendons, and even the bone gave way to the hell-forged blade.
The red screamed as his wing failed and the roll turned into a spiral as he fell. Armagon kicked free of the falling dragon and aimed himself at the other red circling above; who was warily searching for the dark sarpand who’d felled his fellow. A line of lighting ripped through the air and Armagon struggled to dodge the magical strike from the remaining red. A searing pain ripped along his back as his armor was heated from the near miss.
With a hiss, Armagon forced himself to keep flying, as he darted toward his magically active attacker. He needed to get in close to make it more difficult for the dragon to strike him with a spell or his breath weapon, but it also meant getting within range of the claws that were as long as he was tall.
Armagon had been trained to fight dragons and had fought more than he had bothered to count. He could dance with this one, slice at sensitive areas, gouge out eyes, tear through wings, but he needed to meet up with DraKar again. Banking into the shadow the dragon cast, Armagon disappeared from its sight. He let the shadows fall away as he slammed his sword up through the dragon’s lower jaw. He clung to the hilt as the dragon gurgled and tried to lurch away. Pushing the blade back to the dragon’s throat he let the gush of blood spill over him and finally lunged away as the massive creature struggled to breathe and not fall from the sky. The red’s desperate efforts only lasted another choking breath before it careened out of the air.
Blood dripped from Armagon’s body as he flew back to DraKar, the warm sticky fluid whipped off the end of his wings with each flap. He resisted the urge to lick it away as it fell from his muzzle.
DraKar gave him a sardonic look before clearing the gore with a minor spell. Then he carefully crafted an illusion of him and Armagon, while simultaneously enveloping their true selves in an invisibility spell. The illusions went to battle the four grounded dragons, while they flew away from the battle, toward the River Styx.
***
Sahra shifted from foot to foot on the ocher sands near the river. Her fingers tapped a quick staccato on the handle of a dagger at her waist as she scanned the skies with her green eyes. There was no sign of Armagon and DraKar. Only dragons.
The boat behind her scrapped against the sands as the river tried to dislodge it.
“Your masters are late.”
Sahra tried to ignore the robed skeleton behind her in the boat. Charon was a creature of the Hells but beyond even the archdevils’ influences. He freely traveled the river and chose who he would help and who he would abandon. Some said he was one of the first demons ever made, one of the Shadow Dreamt. If that was true, he was the only Shadow Dreamt she’d ever heard of that wasn’t a mindless thing seeking only destruction.
“They’ll be here.” She tried to keep her voice firm, confident, without giving offense. She wouldn’t fail Armagon and DraKar. Without them she’d be completely lost to the Hells. She deserved it. She’d made the deals, done the damning deeds. Sacrificed people to gain power, luxury, and then killed herself when she’d run low on both.
DraKar found her, a new soul in the Hells, not yet morphed into a demon. Not yet fully claimed by Mammon. He held out his hand to her, the palm marred by a long scar across it.
“You can come and serve me and Armagon for the rest of your existence, or I leave you here for the ruler of this plane and his dogs. Decide quickly, I have little time.”
She grasped his hand desperately, trying to hold onto her sense of self, and retain something of her soul. He carried her away, like a child, and took her to his tower.
The magic he used bound her soul to him. Again, she had to agree to the communion, bargaining her autonomy for his protection. Much like an archdevil claiming a fallen soul as a demon, she now belonged to DraKar. But, oddly, he never used it to control her. If he told her to do something she never felt the influence of his will to obey, like she would have if Mammon had claimed her soul.
At first, he ignored her and left her to wander his tower, although some doors were locked to her. She’d see him in his study or in the lower levels, soaking in the boiling water of the pit, trying to heal and slough off scars and regrow scales. If she asked him what he wanted her to do he either ignored her, or handed her a book or a broom. It wasn’t until Armagon gained an interest in her that she felt like something more than DraKar’s experiment to keep a damned soul safe from Mammon.
Armagon trained her in weapons and stealth. When she’d become competent enough, he introduced her to Khain. The alchemical man taught her of the assassin’s guild, and she rose in the ranks, until she realized Armagon had been grooming her to be his second in command. She hadn’t really believed it until she’d overheard the brothers arguing in the tower’s study. They rarely argued.
“I didn’t bind Sahra to me to be your servant,” DraKar snarled.
“I don’t force her to do anything. She needs something to occupy her time,” Armagon said. “And that is exactly what you told her she was: a servant.”
Sahra stopped before crossing the partially open door and peered through the crack between it and the wall. Her stomach dropped as she saw them facing off against each other. No weapons were drawn, but DraKar’s wings were flared and his tail was lashing back and forth. Armagon stood several steps away, to a casual observer he would have appeared calm, but Sahra had spent enough time with him to notice the twitch in his wings, the jump of muscle along his jaw as he clenched his teeth.
“Not like this.” DraKar gave a sharp wave of his hand. “Not something that sends her into harm’s way. I took her in. I meant to protect her.”
“You can’t protect everyone.” There was more meaning in the phrase than was spoken.
DraKar rocked back, his wings lowered. “I couldn’t leave you behind.”
“Which time DraKar?” Armagon took a step forward. “When you found me staked in that noble’s garden, starved and stunted? When you stayed by me in the years after? When you cut your palm and made the pact beside me when we first came here?”
DraKar’s wings drooped further, touching the floor, his shoulders slumped. “Does she know what you’ll be asking of her?” His head bowed, and he wouldn’t look Armagon in the eye.
“I’ll explain every mission to her satisfaction.”
DraKar’s voice dropped lower, barely more than a rumble of air from his chest. “I’ll want to hear it from her.”
Sahra pushed her way into the room, ignoring the startled grab for weapons from the two. “I’m more than some pet. I don’t want to be kept in this tower for ages just to be underfoot.
I can do more. I owe you both more.”
DraKar turned from them both. “I never should have bargained for your soul.”
Sahra looked nervously to Armagon, trying to judge his mood on her interruption. There was nothing for her to see, just the calm surface of a teacher waiting for his student to make a decision. She turned back to DraKar, stared at his bowed back and slumping wings. “What happens to you?” She paused, licked her lips, and swallowed so her voice wouldn’t catch. “What happens to you if something destroys me?”
“Nothing, child.”
“And me?” Every muscle in her back felt locked. Her spiritual flesh as tense as it would have been in life. “If something happens to you, what happens to me?”
“The binding breaks and you become an enslaved demon to the archdevil, as you would have been.”
Sahra’s mouth set in a resolute frown. “Then I should be the one protecting you.”
A gust of air from wings broke Sahra from her revelry. The invisibility spell faded from Armagon and DraKar as they landed in front of her. She let out a breath she didn’t need at the sight of them unharmed.
She fell back to an acerbic tone to hide her relief. “I was getting impatient.”
“Khain is rubbing off on you,” Armagon complained and climbed into the boat.
“You did well choosing the dragons,” DraKar said and lifted her, needlessly, in after Armagon. He gave the bow a shove and leaped in without touching the deadly waters.
Sahra kept her back to him, keeping a small smile hidden from him. It was a minor compliment for all the work she and Khain had done. They had been the ones who carried out the orders to summon the ambassador and kill him. They had orchestrated the deceit that Mammon had ordered it.
Without the attack from Tiamet, without the dragons taking most of Mammon’s attention and magic, Armagon and DraKar wouldn’t have been able to reach the river undetected. Charon’s arrival would have been known.
Though nothing could hamper Mammon’s awareness as their feet left the Third plane and stepped onto Charon’s boat. His infuriated roar at being defied again echoed from the battlefield.
Chapter 4
309 Br. winter
“Ancient oral histories hint that the species were divided when the Dark and Light fought for the Mortal realm. The darklings and the chromatic dragons were crafted by the Dark, and the Light empowered the other mortals and metallic dragons to combat them.”
-Scroll fragment in the library of the free-state Fenex
M adger wondered at the softness of the cloth her clothes were made of. She had never worn anything so fine before. “How much?” It had taken two days for the tailor to make a set of clothes for her after Kharick had brought back the first fitting. The measurements had all been guess work. The tailor promised to have more available later.
Gerran waved her question off with a shrug. “Don’t worry about that. I just don’t know why you insist they all be black.”
Madger suppressed a sigh, she had said it before, but Gerran just didn’t seem to understand. “Exile. Must follow Traditions.” Exile had been the easiest word for her to say, and it seemed to match what she meant.
Gerran shook his head, but let the matter drop, it wasn’t worth a disagreement with the giantess. If she was an exile from her people, why bother with following their traditions?
“Now that you’re getting stronger, I think we should work on your magic training. I’ve never seen someone with as much raw potential power as you. You’re lucky you didn’t accidentally kill someone, or yourself, with it yet. Is magic common in your people? I’ve never seen a mountain giant mage before.”
Madger shook her head. “Not common. Freak.” She looked at Gerran with a hint of hope. “But want training…”
Gerran nodded. “And in return, you’ll work for me. I train you for as long as you want and as long as I have the knowledge to share. You help out around here, and work with Kharick.”
“Hmm,” Madger said and nodded. “Fair.” She wasn’t sure if it was a truly fair deal, having never negotiated before, but she didn’t feel uneasy with the arrangement.
Gerran clapped his hands and pushed himself up from the chair. “I have something for you.” He opened a drawer at his workbench. “You can read the Merchant language?”
Madger hesitated, but it was obvious she had learned the language somehow. “Yes.”
“Excellent,” Gerran said as he found the slim green book. He presented the book to Madger with a large smile, exposing his crooked, aged teeth. “It isn’t the best book for beginning your training, but it’s the only thing I have at the moment.”
Madger took the cloth covered book reverently. Her boney hands caressed the cover as she rotated it, examining the binding. The book was small in her hands, but she didn’t notice. All she knew was Gerran had just presented her with a book and wanted her to read it. She blinked back tears and looked at the old man.
“Thank you.” No man had given her a book before.
Gerran tilted his head at her reaction, but shrugged his narrow shoulders. “No need to thank me, little rabbit.”
“Why, little rabbit?”
“Because you aren’t little. Because, you might have been scared. I was hoping it might comfort you when you woke.”
Madger smiled, sat on the floor in front of him, and opened her book.
The next morning Kharick thumped a basket in front of Madger. “Here, lass. If you’re gonna be eaten’ so much, ya need to help carry it home.”
Madger raised an eyebrow at him. His accent made it difficult to fully understand what he was saying. She’d rarely heard the Merchant language spoken outside of the few times the men were teaching it to each other, and the occasional mountain man who would stop at their cave to trade. Only her brother had practiced it with her when he taught her to read it. “Get food?”
“Aye, lass.” Kharick grinned at her, and his brown eyes glinted with amusement.
It seemed a fair request, she hadn’t sat so long since she’d taken ill three winters ago. She pulled on her shoes, the leather was stiff from the river and stained dark from her clan’s blood. If she hadn’t known what the stains were, it could pass for mud. She grimaced and tried to ignore it. She picked up the basket and stood, careful to stay hunched over in Gerran’s little house. The basket was small for her so she picked up another from the corner. “Now we go.”
Kharick chuckled and opened the door. Madger ducked lower but made it through the six-foot opening. Outside the house, the few people in the street startled back from her and whispered about Gerran’s giant, before hurrying on. It seemed word had spread that he had found a mountain giant and brought her back.
The town was built up around a spring fed communal fountain. It was a gathering point for people to gossip when they fetched their water. Around the fountain, a wide circular cobblestone plaza stretched out and at the edge, dozens of merchants had set up wooden booths with colorful tarps to keep out the weather.
The citizens all stopped and stared, pointed and gossiped as Kharick led her past them. No one yelled at her though, and she accepted their mutterings as wariness. She had been a short freak among her people, now she was a tall freak here. At least there was another mage, and he was willing to teach her how to control her magic.
The sky was overcast and occasionally a small tuft of snow drifted down from it. Madger shuddered, the soft black cotton of her clothing was nice, but it didn’t offer any warmth.
“Cold, lass?”
“Yes.”
“We’ll stop at Varik’s cloak shop and get one made for you. Likely cost double, but we just got you fixed up from the river. Can’t have you going back to being sick again.”
“Should have worn…” She searched for the proper word for her brother’s poncho. It wasn’t opened in the front like cloaks.
“That poncho is near ruined, sorry to say, lass.”
“Poncho,” Madger repeated. It felt like her tongue would tri
p over the word.
They stopped at a stall with potatoes, onions, some cabbages, and squash that were still ripe. Kharick filled one basket and handed the wide-eyed woman some coins. Madger recognized the coins from the small stack her father had kept for buying things from the lowlands, or passing to mountain men when a trade couldn’t be agreed on. She picked up the laden basket and did her best to ignore the plump woman as they walked away.
The outer circle of the town, beyond the booths, was where the permanent wooden buildings for the more affluent merchants had been built. The butcher was their next stop, and Madger hit her head on the lintel of the door as they entered. She wasn’t used to ducking her eight-foot height under six-foot doorways.
“Earth’s bones,” she cursed in her native tongue.
“What’s that, lass?” Kharick asked, turning to her. His thick eyebrows drew down, almost hiding his eyes.
She sighed and repeated the phrase in the common dialect. Kharick laughed at her, and the butcher stood mutely with a cleaver in hand. She had to stay slightly hunched over in the butcher’s shop, but it was better than standing out in the cold weather.
“This is Madger,” Kharick explained, as he had with the woman before. “Gerran has taken her in. She be working for him too.”
“Oh.”
“Madger this be Bauren.”
She offered a little wave, but didn’t move anymore, afraid to hit her head or disturb some of the displayed smoked meats.
Kharick made a selection of ham, sausages, and a thick cut of cow. Bauren wrapped up what he wanted and Kharick placed it in the other basket. The stocky dwarf waved Madger away when she reached for the laden basket. “I got this one, lass.”
They left the little shop and traveled to the east around the merchant's circle. They passed a variety of stores Madger didn’t fully understand, but when she asked, Kharick explained each one.
“This is where folks get their shoes made.” He pointed to a sign with a boot on it. “And the apothecary.”
The Titan's Tome (The Mortal Balance Book 1) Page 5