“Where is it?” he asked, speaking slowly as he tried to catch his breath.
Ethmira walked to the exact center of the glade, turned and pointed at the ground.
“Right here. I can feel the veil, like thin strands of webbing, overlapping here. The worlds are close together, meshed and intertwined.”
“How long will it take you to open a portal?” he asked. “And how long can you hold it open?”
“Hold it open?” she replied quizzically. “Why would I want to do that?”
“Because,” Simon said, “I want you on the far side of it when the primal arrives. I need him to follow me through and I'd rather you weren't between the dragon and the portal. If you open it now and stand behind it, how long can you hold it open?”
She shook her head.
“Not long. It takes its energy directly from me, you see. And it's an enormous drain on my strength. At a guess I'd say, perhaps, two minutes.”
“Oh damn. So how long to open it?”
“A minute, no more.”
Simon looked at Liliana, who looked almost fresh after their run, even in full armor. He reminded himself that the paladin healed herself automatically, giving her a huge advantage over most other humans, himself included.
“Liliana, have you heard any sounds of pursuit?”
She shook her head. She was staring off into space, obviously straining to hear any suspicious noises.
“Nothing since that first cry and that was perhaps thirty minutes ago. Maybe the damned thing lost the trail? Or it decided to attack the others in the cave instead?”
“Oh God, I hope not,” Simon muttered. “Okay, look. If and when the primal arrives, we'll need to give Ethmira the time to open the portal, so we might have to distract the beast. Can you do that?”
The paladin snorted and slipped her shield off of her back. The plain wooden buckler suddenly began to glow with a clear silvery sheen and, when she drew her sword, it matched the shield's intense light.
“Of course I can. I've been waiting for this moment,” she said with an unpleasant smile.
Simon looked at her dubiously and wondered if her lust for vengeance would override her common sense.
“Easy,” he said. “We just need to keep the beast away from Ethmira long enough to allow her to open the portal.”
“And then?” the elf asked. “You really haven't said what you intend to do after you pass through the doorway.”
“As I told you, it's crazy, and a bit complicated. I'm kind of improvising as I go.”
“You're improvising?” Ethmira said, aghast. “Are you joking? Simon, you're luring that monster back into your own world! You can't just...make it up as you go!”
“Well, it's worked for me so far,” he replied with a shrug.
“You are joking about that, aren't you?” Liliana asked as she stared at him.
“Which part?”
Whatever the paladin was going to say was cut off as a ear-splitting roar tore through the still air. A deafening crashing shook the ground and the three companions turned as one to look back the way they had come.
The bright sunlight of the glade made it impossible to see into the shadowy reaches of the forest, but then they all knew what the sounds meant.
“It's coming,” Simon said as he and the paladin backed away from the edge of the clearing.
“Oh really?” Liliana said sarcastically. “Thank you for the update.”
“Ethmira? Start opening the portal!” the wizard said urgently.
“I am, Simon,” the elf replied tersely. “Just keep that thing off of me for a minute.”
“I intend to,” the paladin growled.
And then the forest gave way to the immense head of the primal brown dragon.
Almost long as a lesser dragon in length, the scaled head of the dragon was grotesque. Brown, slimy scales covered it, each a yard across or more. They were cracked and twisted, looking like split, dried mud and almost the same color. The yellow eyes, slit like a cat's, were as large as Simon's body. They blazed with evil intent and the grizzled maw, dripping black liquid that smoked and ate away at the growth on the ground beneath it, was filled with rows of greenish fangs, some broken, others black or missing entirely.
The monster breathed and Simon covered his nose and mouth as the foul breath, stinking like rotten eggs, rolled over him. His stomach rebelled and he turned away and retched, dry-heaving because his stomach was empty.
Liliana seemed detached and unaffected by the primal. She reached out a mailed hand and steadied the wizard until he got his stomach under control.
“You okay?” she asked, keeping her eyes on the dragon.
“Yeah, good. Thanks.”
Simon watched the primal as well, but turned his head slightly.
“How are you doing?” he murmured, hoping that Ethmira could hear him over the loud breathing of the dragon.
“Almost there,” came her quiet response.
“So,” the voice of the primal echoed around the glade and made Simon stagger back a step.
“So,” the creature repeated. “I have found the killers.”
The head rose up and up again until they were craning their necks back just to keep it in view.
Branches snapped off and fell thickly around the dragon, leaves and twigs fluttered to the ground. The monstrous body was still hidden in the forest and Simon couldn't understand how the primal had managed to force its enormous bulk through the ancient trees.
“Hmm, an elf and two humans. A strange combination.”
The head tilted down and this globules of tarry acid continued to dribble from its mouth. Somehow the yellow eyes caught Simon's gaze and seemed to burn into his soul.
“Before I crush you like the insects you are, tell me how you killed one of mine. If you do, perhaps I shall make your ends quick and painless.”
It threw that insanely huge head back and let out a bellow of laughter that sent even more branches and leaves raining down on them.
“But probably not.”
The dragon dropped its head down so quickly that the leaves and debris in the clearing flew up in all directions as it created a massive displacement of air. And suddenly the primal's face was at ground-level, its chin almost resting on the grass. The eyes were still twenty feet above them.
“I shall have to punish you, you see. Others of your kind must not believe that they can rebel against us. Against me. I have wiped out your 'elders' and now the only thing to threaten my servants is...you!”
Those egg-yellow eyes, flumey and jelly-like, widened as if in surprise.
“Imagine,” the primal boomed, making Simon wince. “Three of you killed a dragon! What weapon did you use? What magic? I know that elf,” it snorted contemptuously, “has no spells, but humans? Yes, humans have magic again, don't you? What did you do? And how are you even here, in this realm, hmm? Tell me. You know you want to.”
That voice was almost mesmerizing. Simon had the sudden urge to tell the primal everything. Why not? They weren't going to beat it anyway, were they? It was hopeless. The thing was larger than the biggest jumbo jet ever built. They had no chance.
He opened his mouth to answer and then staggered to the side as Liliana gave him a sharp shake that almost knocked him off of his feet.
“It's using its voice on you, Simon!” she snapped angrily. “Pay attention! That's part of their power, their voices.”
The wizard shook his head, trying to clear the fuzz that seemed to be packed between his ears. Then he glared at the dragon, embarrassed that he'd let down his guard.
“Oh, a wise one,” the dragon said, tilting its head slightly. “What are you, I wonder? Cleric? No, no. Not a cleric. A paladin! Yes. A holy warrior.”
A deep-throated chuckle escaped its twisted maw.
“You chose the wrong side, paladin. If you had followed the gods of Chaos, your powers would have been unimaginable. But now? Now you shall die in a nameless forest on a conquered world. No glory
, no songs of your deeds, nothing to mark that you were ever here at all.”
“Ready,” Ethmira said from behind them.
“I'm not the one that's going to die, monster,” Liliana yelled angrily.
The dragon's thin lips pulled back to expose its twisted fangs.
“I admire your spirit. And what about your companion? The robed one. Surely a magic-user of some sort. Come now, speak up while you can, little human.”
Simon felt sweat trickle down inside his robe and could almost feel the elf straining to hold the portal open. Strangely, the primal didn't seem aware that she'd opened a conduit to the Earth.
“You primals claim to be the strongest and smartest of your kind,” he shouted, knowing his young voice was squeaking weakly.
“Of course we are,” the dragon rumbled. “And I, I am the strongest of all of my siblings. Even the red dragon cannot claim to be mightier, though he tries. Fool.”
“Then how is it, oh wise one, that you don't even recognize the wizard that killed your brothers?” Simon said, trying to give his voice a sarcastic twist.
This is, he thought fleetingly, the craziest thing I've ever done.
The primal's cat-like eyes narrowed and he pushed his snout forward, his gaze almost as blinding as headlights.
He sniffed loudly causing the robe to swirl around Simon's ankles.
Then that hideous head reared up high again and the dragon bellowed in fury.
“Now I know you!” it screamed, acid spraying in all directions.
Simon hastily stepped back and rattled off his shield spell. It snapped into place just in time to block the acidic rain, which ran off the translucent barrier in all directions.
He looked over his shoulder in a panic, afraid that Ethmira had been caught in that corrosive shower. But no, she had retreated to the far side of the glade. Her arms were raised and he could see the distortion in the air where the portal flickered and wavered.
“Time's running out,” she shouted at him and he nodded his understanding.
“You dare to come here, to my domain!” the primal screamed with insane wrath. It dropped its massive head and spread its jaws.
“Now you die!”
“Simon, get through the portal!” Liliana shouted at him. Around her, a nimbus of white, like and yet unlike his own shield, had protected her from the dragon's acid breath.
“I'll keep it off of you until you are clear!”
She turned her head and glared at the dragon, which was ignoring her completely as it sucked in a huge lungful of air.
“I may not be remembered, monster,” she screamed as she began to run right at the dragon. “But neither will you!”
And then she launched her body in a leap that Simon would not have believed was humanly possible.
She cleared those gaping jaws, landed on top of the primal's snout and plunged her glowing sword into one of its blazing eyes.
The bellow of pain from the dragon was so loud that Simon was knocked off of his feet. He rolled over several times and then looked up in disbelief.
The dragon had reared back again and its head was so high that the wizard could not even see Liliana any more. He pushed himself to his feet and gaped upward as the dragon's head whipped from side to side, trying to dislodge the paladin and the sword that was buried deep in its eye socket.
“Simon, get through the portal!” Ethmira shouted at him. “I can't hold it much longer.”
“What about Liliana? I can't just leave her!” he yelled back at her.
“Damn you, wizard! Do you want to dishonor her sacrifice? Get through the portal and ready your trap. The dragon will be hot on your heels. Now move!”
Simon stared at her and then looked up, torn by his loyalty. Then with a cry of frustration and grief, he ran as fast as he could toward the portal, locked eyes with Ethmira for a fleeting second and then dove through.
There was a moment of complete darkness and then he tumbling through low brush and grass. He stopped rolling face down, tears of frustration streaking his dirty cheeks.
With a huge effort, he heaved himself to his feet and looked around.
He was standing on a flat plain with scrub brush, small trees and grasses blowing in the wind. On the horizon he could see the flicker and whitecaps of the ocean crashing on the shore.
I must be back in Florida, he thought vaguely. He turned in a circle and saw with relief that the new town was nowhere to be seen. At least they wouldn't be in the line of fire.
The portal was easy to see, like a wall of water rippling uneasily. It grew and shrank, grew and shrank and he could tell that it wouldn't last much longer.
What happens if it fails before the primal comes through, he thought frantically. Worse still, what if the dragon doesn't follow me at all?
He couldn't think about that. Simon turned and ran as fast as he could away from the portal, his breath coming in loud gasps and his head swimming with fatigue.
When he'd run perhaps a hundred yards, he whirled around, blinked sweat out of his eyes and stared at the ground in front of him. He opened his mouth to speak and then with a roar of earth-shaking rage, the primal brown dragon stepped out of nothingness and stood there, glaring down at him with one good eye. The other was a ruined mass of running puss and green blood.
“I have you now,” it rumbled and stepped toward him.
Chapter 30
Simon stared up at the enormous beast. Without the forest to shelter its body, the creature was so huge that he couldn't quite comprehend it.
It blotted out the sky and, as it spread it massive wings, a foul stench blowing from it as they unfurled, the wizard felt a sense of despair.
How the hell could I ever believe that this behemoth could be defeated, he wondered hopelessly. It was like a confrontation between a man and an ant. He wondered that the dragon had even bothered to follow him. It couldn't possibly conceive of him as a threat.
He looked up at the snarling, glaring visage and at its ruined eye and saw it hesitate before striking.
Maybe it did think he was a danger, a small voice of wonder said from deep inside of him. After all, he'd killed three of the dragon's siblings. Not all alone, of course, but he was involved in all three defeats. Was it possible that the primal brown was just a tiny bit frightened?
A gigantic clawed foot slammed down on the ground and sent shudders across the plain, creating its own earthquake. Fifty feet above him, the dragon shook its head, gore and acidic goop flying everywhere.
“Your puny attempt to surprise me has failed, as you can see,” the dragon rumbled. “Your little paladin wasted her life for nothing.”
A hissing laugh as shrill as a train whistle assaulted Simon's ears but he barely heard it.
Liliana? Dead?
A cold block of ice formed in his guts as he pictured his friend giving her life just to let him escape; just to give him an extra minute in his futile attempt to destroy the primal brown dragon.
Don't let her sacrifice be in vain, you fool, that little voice snapped at him. Get on with it.
Simon looked up bleakly and matched the dragon's one-eyed glare with his own.
“Not exactly for nothing, you bastard!” he shouted up at it. “You're blind on one side now. How does that feel?”
The dragon's head dropped down until it was just above ground level and it narrowed its good eye at the wizard.
“You fool. What do you truly know of my kind? This wound is simply a nuisance. It will heal in time and then I shall see as well as ever. Do you really think that pain inconveniences a being as ancient as I? Bah. You know nothing.”
“I know a few things,” Simon yelled. “I know that your arrogance will be your undoing, just as it was for the other primals.”
A deep rumble in the dragon's chest made the wizard back up hurriedly. He chanted quickly and cast his Shield spell again. It had collapsed when he'd leaped through the portal.
But the dragon wasn't attacking; it was laughing. The soun
d shook the ground under Simon's feet.
“Arrogance? Yes, we are arrogant, but then we deserve to be, do we not? You are an idiot, little wizard. Do you truly think that I mourn the deaths of my siblings?”
The dragon chuckled and acid sprayed from its mouth, splattering the small bushes and grasses and leaving smoking, decaying pools behind.
“Now that they are gone, this world shall be divided between my brother, the primal red, and myself. We will ravage it, drench it in blood and claim it for our own. I shall take great pleasure in hunting down the remnants of your annoying race. Their death throes shall be exquisite. And when we have cleansed this planet of all of you and those little rat people, the dwarves, the gods of Chaos will come forth and plunge all into darkness.”
It closed its lone eye and almost seemed to smile in contemplation of the future.
The wizard backed away further, pushing away his fury and concentrating on what he had to do. This was his chance, while the primal was lost in its wicked dreams.
“Kassus, it is time,” he said quietly, watching the ground under the dragon's massive paws. “Come forth and bring your brethren.”
In the distance, a rumbling began. It sped toward Simon's location, first as a mere hint of sound, then as a vibration that the wizard felt through his shoes. Finally the ground began to heave in earnest.
The dragon, shaken out of its reverie, opened its eye and glared around, snorting in confusion.
“What is this?” it cried, spittle dribbling from its jaws. “What is happening?”
Its eye blazed as it looked down at Simon.
“What are you trying to do, human? There is no trick, no magic of yours that can harm me!”
“You're right, there isn't,” the wizard yelled up at it. He shrugged innocently. “Earthquake maybe?”
The primal spread its enormous wings as the shaking continued. The ground was actually rolling now, as if it had turned into a kind of liquid; waves undulating across the plain like combers on the ocean.
Simon fell to his knees, hanging on desperately to his staff, and rattled off a spell.
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