Wings of Fire (The Legend of Hooper's Dragons Book 7)

by GARY DARBY

  My blade rips through the Elementis and for an instant, the creature arches its back and bellows in pain and anger. It whips around and slices its flaming sword downward. Backhanded, I catch his fiery edge on Galondraig. Like a blacksmith’s hammer pounding on a piece of red-hot metal, shards of fire explode through the air.

  Scamper ducks away from the fiery fountain and takes refuge under the golden’s skull sheath while I protect my head by flinging up one arm. Embers bounce off my Meile armor to be swept away by the wind.

  We sweep past the Elementis and the golden swings us upward in a tight arc as I glance over my shoulder at the beast. Where my sword slashed there’s a large slit in the creature’s back but even as I watch, the gash is filled in by fire until it’s completely gone.

  I see a sapphire streak by and Cara unleashes an arrow right into the thing’s scarlet eye. For an instant, there’s a tiny hole where the arrow hit, but then it too is gone.

  Regal Wind descends and from his mouth erupts a titanic river of dragon fire that wholly envelops the Elementis and the fire beast disappears under Regal’s onslaught.

  Then Regal Wind’s fire dies out and my eyes go wide. The Elementis is still standing, utterly unhurt by Regal’s blast. It opens its mouth and roars at Regal and Alonya as if daring them to do it again.

  I swallow and look around. The company is in a full brawl with the Blackguards and Fire Hounds. Where they can, from atop our dragons, the dwarves use their axes to carve into the fiendish horde. The Blackguards’ fiery whips crack and zing through the air, trying to wrap their coils around one of my comrades. The Fire Hounds spew so many fire streamers into the air trying to catch us it’s as if the company rides under a waterfall of fire.

  Our archers’ bows thrum and arrows split the air bringing down both Blackguards and Fire Hounds but not enough. I shake my head to myself. “Golden Wind, they’re too many and we’re too few.”

  My eyes find the Elementis who stands on the cusp of the fire bridge, his arms held skyward, his mouth open in a roar, exulting in our inability to hurt him. “And it seems that we can’t kill that thing.”

  “Maybe,” the golden answers, swinging her head around to peer at me with one eye, “it’s not the Elementis we should be trying to destroy.”

  I blink at her several times before my I suck in a breath. “You’re right! Let’s go!”

  Golden Wind spurts forward until we’re winging beside Bold Wind who’s harassing the Elementis, keeping his attention away from the company. “Phigby!” I shout. “I have an idea!”

  “I’m listening!” he calls.

  “Take the company with you,” I direct, “and head toward the shaft. Make it look like you’re trying to escape—get the Elementis and his scum to follow you.”

  Phigby’s eyes grow a bit wide as he says, “I hope your idea is a good one, because if it’s not, we’ll be caught between the roof and these fiends with no room to maneuver.”

  “I know, but this is the best chance we have!”

  He gives me a firm nod and turns Bold Wind away. I follow and one by one, we collect the company with Phigby giving his orders followed by me gesturing toward Pim. “You’re with me.”

  Before we turn away, I give Cara a brief smile which she returns and then we’re off in separate directions, the company winging upward, while Pim and I plunge downward on our dragons.

  As I suspected, once the company bolted toward the shaft, the Elementis, with his flaming bridge extending even higher, followed.

  I call over to Pim, “You and your lance ready?”

  “Ready,” she answers, her face and voice stern, “let’s do this.”

  We sweep closer to the cauldron’s searing surface as I keep an eye on our companions high above. “Not yet,” I yell, “we don’t want to give that creature any idea of what we’re doing.”

  “Don’t wait too long,” she answers, “or the company will be boxed in with no place to go.”

  “I know,” I reply, and wipe sweat away from my eyes so that I can see better.

  The company is almost to the top, with the Elementis and his braying horde close behind. “Get ready!” I call and raise Galondraig high.

  “Now!”

  Golden Wind and Sparkle explode forward, their wings a blur in the cavern’s hot, wavy air. Pim readies her lance, while I reach up to push Galondraig higher with both hands.

  Faster and faster the golden and Sparkle fly, keeping themselves abreast of each other. We get closer and closer until I yell, “Scamper, get down!”

  The little ball of fur jumps onto the golden’s skull sheath and hides. Pim takes aim with her lance and I grip Galondraig as tight as I can.

  Then, just before we flash under the fire bridge’s arch, Pim’s lance bursts into a beam of pure force. Galondraig’s hue changes from a bright green to a dark emerald. Pim’s shaft of light joins Galondraig as we slice through the fire bridge on which the Elementis and his horde stand.

  There’s a loud sizzling that fills the ears as we rip and cut through the brimstone. Black smoke bursts outward where our combined power slashes through the bridge. Sparkle and Golden Wind never slow and then we’re through and out. I glance back and for a moment, nothing happens.

  Then, the bridge splits apart just where we sliced through and a moment later, begins to crumble. Large pieces of brimstone fall into the bubbling liquid and then, to my delight, the whole thing starts to drop.

  Blackguards and Fire Hounds topple off the bridge, flailing and spinning helplessly as they plunge into the churning maelstrom. “Like gnats into a blazing fire,” I grin.

  “What a lovely sight.”

  The last remaining span of the fire bridge drops away from under the Fire Elementis. For a moment, he seems to hang as if the heated air were holding him up. Then, with a thundering bellow that shakes the air, he drops, hits the molten rock and instantly is swallowed up.

  “I’m not sure that hurt him,” I growl, “but at least we got rid of him.”

  I wave to Pim and motion upward. Together, Golden Wind and Sparkle climb upward until we’re met by the company. “Well done, Hooper, Pim!” Amil calls with a broad smile.

  “Yes,” Phigby calls, “but we’re not out of this yet. Look there,” he points and I peer below.

  The cauldron is more than churning, it’s raging—throwing towering pinnacles of brimstone and flames high into the air. Even as I watch, the seething sea grows even more furious as enormous fingers of molten rock climb into the sky as if they were reaching out to try and wrap themselves around us.

  The air grows even hotter and more oppressive. Taking in a deep breath, Amil calls out, “Now I know what the fire eater at the circus feels like!”

  I grimace, cough, and wrinkle my nose at the noxious fumes that fill my lungs. Wheezing, I yell, “Let’s get out of here!”

  “Vay?!” Alonya demands pointing upward.

  “No choice!” Phigby bellows. “This mountain is about to blow!”

  The golden surges upward, the company right behind. We sweep into the shaft and again, the gale blasts us. The golden strains to lift us higher and we barely creep forward. Then, I have an idea. Over my shoulder, I shout, “Regal Wind, get up here! Block the wind!”

  The company opens a wide hole for Regal and the giant purple climbs past us. The golden and the other dragons slide in behind him as he beats his powerful wings. Slowly, we rise, but one look down at the swelling cauldron tells me we’re out of time. “We’re not going to make it!” I shout.

  “Perhaps,” the golden answers, “it is time to fight fire with fire.”

  “Huh?” I think for a moment and then nod. “Oh, I get it.”

  I whip Galondraig out. “Get me up there.”

  The golden swings out around Regal and I can feel her straining as she lifts us even with the massive purple. I raise my blade high and call out, Vald Hitta Sasi Ein! Power to this One!

  Galondraig’s sheen fills the shaft with a brilliant emerald glow, and then
I hear a howling below that fills the cavern and a gale hits us from behind. It blasts into Vay’s tempest and for a moment, we’re tossed and turned from being pummeled on both sides.

  I struggle to hold onto Galondraig and still maintain my seat on Golden Wind who’s doing her best to keep us on an even keel through the terrible buffeting. She rocks one way and the other, her wings continually shifting and adjusting, but even with her efforts we’re almost slammed into the grotto wall.

  One look behind tells me that my comrades aren’t doing any better. “We’re caught between two windstorms!” I call out.

  “Hooper!” the golden answers. “It’s your will against Vay’s! Would you have our friends fall to her tempest or carried to safety by yours?”

  I grit my teeth, close my eyes, and grip Galondraig as tight as I can. I concentrate on the winds swirling, blasting around us. I grab onto a thought and hold it. In my mind I picture my storm as a giant battering ram, an armored fist in my hand.

  Drawing it back, I slam it upward and suddenly we’re all jolted forward but not far enough. I close my eyes, bring my battering ram of a fist back and then punch it into Vay’s windstorm.

  Again, we slide upward, even farther this time. I glance up and see a faint light, like a small, glowing eye that stares down at us. Then I realize, it’s the shaft’s opening at the mountain’s top that’s rimmed by crimson light.

  I settle in deeper into the golden’s neck saddle, clench my jaws tight, and in my mind I see an enormous emerald fist, just waiting to punch something, preferably Vay’s face. I strain with all my might and then yell out, “Ahhhhhh, now!” as I thrust Galondraig upward with all the strength I have left.

  The fist flashes forward and slams into Vay’s wind barrier—and then we’re free, shooting straight up out of the shaft into the night air. For a moment, I exult that we’re out of the cavern then Cara shouts, “Hooper! Above us!”

  My head jerks up to see a dark horde of Wilders descending, bows pulled taut and arrowheads aimed right at us.

  Before I can yell, Phigby bellows, “Below us! The mountain’s erupting!”

  I whip my head over the golden’s side and with full eyes peer down. The shaft is filled with seething, frothing molten rock that’s blasting upward.

  We’re caught in a death trap between the erupting cauldron below and rampaging, bloodthirsty Wilders above.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  “This way!” Phigby yells and Bold Wind dives down the mountain’s shadowy, snow-packed side. Golden Wind and I are the last to spin away and follow with the Wilders charging close behind.

  In an instant, the Wilders realize their colossal misjudgment.

  With a roar that would do justice to a thousand bellowing Regal Winds, the mountain erupts. The Wilders are caught in a titanic blast of heated gas, fire, and molten rock. One glance over my shoulder is enough to turn my face grim as the luckless Wilders are swallowed in a cloud blacker than Night’s Curtain.

  With every wingbeat, the golden gains speed until we’re even with the company. Phigby dives us down and then in a swooping arc we soar skyward before we level off and come to a hover halfway to the mountain ring.

  Below us, the landscape boils and churns as the smaller mountains within the circle of peaks spew out their own blasts of gas and flames, along with cinders and bits of molten rock. Smoke lifts, whirls, and stirs in the air, hiding a good portion of the dark landscape.

  I glance toward the giant peak whose top is now hidden by a veil that shrouds not just its highest point but races down the mountainside. The blackness mushrooms upward, lightning sears its insides while cherry-red boulders arc up and out.

  The cloud rises higher until it hits Vay’s Sheath of Shadows. Seemingly unable to climb higher, the roiling, churning smoke begins to spread outward adding to Vay’s dark creation.

  “Please tell me,” I implore of Phigby who stares at the roaring, growling mountain as it belches more smoke and orange-red molten rock, “that Vay was inside that and we killed her.”

  “Yes, please,” Amil adds, his voice, like mine full of pleading.

  Phigby doesn’t answer; instead, his eyes are narrow and intense as he leans far out over Bold Wind’s scarlet neck scales to peer toward the mountain.

  That he doesn’t answer sends a little shiver down my neck. “If Vay was in the mountain, she has to be dead!” Cara calls over. “No one could live through that!”

  I start to answer her but just as I do, I see Phigby stiffen, his mouth sagging open just a bit. I swing around and look toward the thundering mountain. My eyes pop wide and I jerk back. “No!”

  Coming out of the roiling, churning clouds, as if she were climbing a set of black stairs is Vay. Her thin lips are drawn back in a savage snarl, and her eyes gleam with hate and fury. In one hand she grasps her scepter with its glowing red globe, an evil scarlet eye that she holds upright at her side.

  Do you think that just because you destroyed my portal with your puny efforts that you will stop me? Never! she rages. I am more powerful than you can imagine, and my armies will march across all Erdron!

  She whips her staff up and points it straight at me. But you’ve crossed swords with me once too many times, Hooper Menvoran, and that goes for the rest of you. For what you’ve done, your just reward is death!

  Vay’s face is scrunched together in a horrid scowl as she lowers her staff just a bit to level it at Golden Wind. As for you, traitor, my patience has worn thin. Come to me as your creator, or your demise will be exceptionally long and painful, but I promise you that in the end, I will kill you—after you beg me for many, many days to end your miserable existence.

  Thrusting her scepter up, she screams to the heavens, I will kill them all! Do you hear me!? They will die!

  Slowly, she starts to whirl her crimson staff over her head. Faster and faster it goes and as she does, the crimson orb begins to suck in the black, searing smoke and air. The globe becomes a blood-red streak, absorbing more and more of the seething clouds.

  Then, she thrusts her arms straight out at her sides and with her voice seeming to echo off the clouds, cries out, Nigrum Draco Surrecturus!

  From her scepter blasts a stream of ebony smoke that blossoms upward, adding to the churning black that covers the sky. The darker-than-night cloud churns and swirls before slowly taking shape.

  “Phigby,” I rasp, “what is that?”

  “A drake made from the clouds,” he answers, “but a cloud dragon alone is not what we should fear.” He points down. “That is what we should fear.”

  I stare at where he’s pointing and stiffen. Climbing through the boiling clouds, as if pulled upward by Vay’s power is the Fire Elementis. Only, he’s much bigger than before and his flames and fire rise even higher. In one hand he holds a giant sword whose flames hiss and sizzle as if they sear the sky.

  The thing rises until he’s at Vay’s height and then the gigantic cloud dragon flaps forward in slow, lazy beats until it’s under the fire creature.

  Slowly, the Elementis lowers itself until he’s sitting in the smoke dragon’s neck saddle. There, he thrusts both arms high and from him fire streams outward and downward until it covers the dragon. The Elementis crashes his hands together and the dragon erupts in scorching flames that dance across its body.

  From the beast’s mouth spews a thunderous river of dragon breath that it whips back and forth as if it would scorch the sky. The flames lick at the churning clouds basking them in fire and shadows.

  “A Fire Dragon!” Phigby yells. “It has endless dragon fire! Get away!”

  The company scatters, with Bold Wind, Wind Song, and the golden diving away together. I glance behind to find that the Fire Dragon is chasing the three of us. My eyes snap up to the Elementis whose grin is an evil leer and his burning eyes shine with the hungry gleam of revenge.

  “Phigby!” I shout. “How do we kill that thing?!”

  “Call up a storm, Hooper!” Cara calls. “A full gale and a cloudbu
rst should do the trick.”

  “No!” Phigby shouts. “Wind will only make it grow larger.”

  “Then just rain!” Cara yells back.

  “Do you think a few sprinkles will douse that thing?” Phigby retorts. “You could empty the heavens on it and it would still blaze hotter than molten rock.”

  “Then what?!” I spit out.

  Phigby doesn’t answer, just glances back over his shoulder, the wind catching his wild, flapping beard so that it streams over his shoulder like a galloping horse’s tail.

  After a moment, he turns back to us and I can see his face suddenly become old and weary. “Gather up the company,” he commands, “and keep Vay occupied the best that you can. I will deal with this one.”

  “Alone!? Phigby, you—” I start but he stops me, saying, “Lad, I have neither the disposition nor time to argue with you, now do it before these creatures bring us all down.”

  Just for a moment, I feel a stubbornness rise, or perhaps, it was a protective sense that urged me not to leave Phigby’s side. But I recognize his voice of determination and understand that whatever he’s going to do, he has to do it his way and alone.

  I take in a deep breath, let it out, push aside my feelings and nod. Just before I have Golden Wind turn away, Phigby calls out, “Hooper! Remember lad, when it comes time, do what you must and don’t look back!”

  Our eyes meet for an instant. His soften just a little and he gives me a smile. Then, the golden and Wind Song sweep away in one direction as Bold Wind arcs away in the opposite direction. I’m not sure what Phigby is planning but if he thinks the Fire Dragon will follow him, he’s wrong.

  “It’s still behind us!” Cara shouts.

  “I know! I’ve got eyes too!”

  The golden and Wind Song weave through the sky, trying to throw off the Fire Dragon but it stays right with us, gaining a little with each wing stroke. As I glance back, my eyes widen as I watch the thing’s wingbeats. On each downstroke the flames flare higher just like when you use a hand bellow to make a hearth fire hotter.