Dragonlinks

by Paul Collins

  Brother Clevarian considered this and finally looked up and smiled. ‘Forgive me,’ he said more gently. ‘It is hard to be civil after such a trial. Can we meet in the morning, when I am better rested?’

  ‘Two hours past sunrise?’ asked Jelindel.

  ‘Done. Where are you staying? I shall come past with the morning patrol.’

  ‘We’re at an inn near the town gates, the Green Bull –’

  There was a loud blast and a gust of air rushed past Jelindel. The body of the daemon and all its spilled blood had been sponged out of existence.

  ‘That always happens just after they’re killed,’ explained Brother Clevarian.

  Chapter

  13

  We’re in the service of a Mage Auditor,’ Zimak cried gleefully when he and Jelindel arrived back at the inn.

  Daretor was eating his dinner, and looked up quizzically.

  ‘He means me,’ Jelindel explained. ‘The people here were expecting help from their capital for a very strange and dangerous problem.’

  ‘Hey, Daretor, stand to attention when you’re talking to the Mage Auditor.’

  ‘Shut up, Zimak. What is this problem, Jaelin? Is it related to the link?’

  ‘There are large, powerful and probably sentient beings appearing in this valley. Zimak had a brush with one, and was lucky to escape with just cuts and bruises.’

  ‘What’s sentient?’ asked Zimak.

  ‘Something you’re not,’ replied Jelindel coldly. ‘The chief monk in the local temple is a senior Adept, but no more than a nine. He can speak binding words just strong enough to slow the daemons down so that the town militia can kill them, but …’

  ‘But?’

  ‘He’s old, and he’s looking terrible. If he falls sick or dies this place will become famous for a lot more than heavy mists and fat cattle.’

  ‘You can speak those binding words, too,’ Daretor pointed out to Jelindel. ‘You ensnared that dog in the village when we were fighting the last linkrider.’

  ‘True, but that nearly cost me my life. Trying to speak binding words without a degree of training is like trying to trim your toenails with a sword while blindfolded. It’s difficult, dangerous and not very reliable.’

  Daretor was clearly disappointed. The addition of binding words to their armoury would have been very helpful.

  ‘Well then, what is the source of these daemons?’ he asked.

  ‘There seems to be a rent in the fabric between paraworlds somewhere nearby, apart from the presence of the dragonlink and its rider. The only problem is that such a rent should have stood out like a beacon pyre on eclipse night when I checked the area from the paraplane.’

  ‘It may be opening and closing like a gate,’ Daretor suggested.

  ‘No, gates between paraworlds do not work like that; they should glow with the potential to create an opening.’

  ‘What of the dragonlink? Have you seen a suspicious glow or heard of any such thing?’

  ‘We just may have a problem there,’ Zimak cut in. ‘A warrior called, ah –’

  ‘Holgar Drusen,’ said Jelindel.

  ‘That’s him. Well, he saved us from the daemon with some very impressive pikework, but got his hand slashed through his gauntlet so that blood was dripping out. Even so, he would not remove his glove for a healer to treat him.’

  ‘So there might be more than a wound beneath his gauntlet?’

  ‘I’m sure of it. He was strong, but unusually skilled in pikework for a back-mountains blacksmith.’

  ‘So what do we do about the dragonlink?’ Jelindel asked. ‘He is using his skills in defence of the town whenever the daemons attack. How can we demand that he give us the link?’

  ‘He does not deserve skills gained dishonourably from the talents of others,’ shouted Daretor, slamming his fist down on the table, then standing up.

  The taproom suddenly went silent, although nobody there could follow their Skeltian language.

  ‘I only meant –’

  ‘I know what it is like to have a decade’s skills and training sponged away. I despise anyone who would use a dragonlink to gain the skills of another. If he will not give it up I’ll fight him for it.’

  ‘But the blacksmith’s pike skills may be his own!’ Jelindel shouted back. ‘Like you, he might have been tricked into wearing the dragonlink and now he can’t afford to give it up.’

  While both were standing up she barely reached Daretor’s chin, but her words hit with considerable force. Daretor flopped back onto the bench.

  ‘Aye, like me he might have been tricked,’ Daretor reluctantly admitted. ‘So what do we do if his fighting skills are needed here and we can’t take the dragonlink? We can’t stay forever. There are at least three more links to find after this.’

  Jelindel turned away from him, arms folded high over her breasts, as always trying to hide their increasing size. She noticed that the rest of the taproom was silent, and everyone was watching them.

  ‘It’s all right; we had a small misunderstanding over who will pay for the lodgings,’ she said quickly in Baltor -ian. The atmosphere of the place relaxed at once.

  She turned back to Daretor and Zimak. ‘I shall go to our room and lie down. Please see that I am not disturbed while I scan the town again from the paraplane.’

  Safely in the woodroom, and with the sound from the nearby taproom dim in her ears, Jelindel again floated in the blackness laced with the glows and sparkles of healing enchantments and guard spells.

  From the paraplane the magical aspects of the town looked little different by night than by day, but this time Jelindel was not on horseback, and she could concentrate better. Space was different in the paraplane, being related to strength of spells and their domains rather than physical distance between the doors and houses guarded by the spells.

  The dragonlink was still there, a subtle carbuncle in the fabric of the blackness. From what she could deduce, it was moving. The effect was as if the entire town’s guard spells were rearranging themselves to keep the link at the focus of several domains.

  Jelindel was about to return her senses to herself when the dragonlink’s domain suddenly blazed with light. A red glow now gleamed and moved amid the golden glows of the guard spells, quenching some in its wake. It was another daemon, Jelindel decided as her heart began racing, yet according to the monks they never came so close together. Whatever the explanation, the blazing red light had originated right at the dragonlink.

  Jelindel heard a mighty crash somewhere in her own world, followed by the sound of men shouting. She immediately focused on the solidity of the mailshirt and returned to herself as fast as she could.

  She sat up too quickly, reeled, then sat down heavily on the rough frame bed as the sound of splintering wood, shouting and screams of pain continued from the taproom. Another daemon, and it was here!

  Picking up a woodsman’s hatchet she opened the door to be confronted by a broad red back and thick tail. Without even thinking she stepped through the doorway and chopped backhand up at the daemon’s head. The hatchet stuck fast, and its tail lashed out to fling her back into the woodroom.

  Daretor moved in on the daemon, chopping at its arms as it clawed at its own head. It waddled backwards into the woodroom, saliva dripping from its jaws and leaving smoking spots on the floorboards.

  Jelindel picked up a branch from the kindling rack and stood ready, but Daretor pushed her to one side. Zimak entered the fray next, half-sword in hand. He and Daretor bracketed the daemon, which was staggering by now from the wound to its head. Whenever Zimak cut at it from behind, Daretor followed up with a cut to its throat as it turned.

  As before, the daemon began to weaken as it lost blood, and by the time the militia had arrived it was lying dead.

  The body was impressive, even in death. Jelindel noted that it had a broad forehead and braided topknot of black hair-like fibres. What she had taken to be scales were really some type of tough fabric with glossy, overlapping plat
es, and there was a buckle of reflective red material on the belt at its waist. Even the massive claws on the outer fingers of its hands were inlaid with small, gleaming gems and threads of gold.

  ‘This is no warrior daemon,’ she said to Daretor. ‘I would guess that it’s a female, of perhaps my own age.’

  ‘You’re mad,’ retorted Zimak. ‘Why, it killed two men out in the taproom. It slashed them open like sacks of wheat.’

  ‘Let him finish,’ said Daretor.

  ‘Were Zimak to be dropped into a room of armed, intelligent rabbits, he too might fight and kill most fearsomely, wringing necks and crushing bodies under foot until overwhelmed. I don’t think these are invaders at all. I think there is a hole between our paraworlds through which they are falling either by accident or design.’

  ‘But you said anything like that would be plainly visible when you go into that trance and do whatever you do,’ Daretor said slowly, trying to get the reasoning correct. ‘You said you saw nothing.’

  ‘The first time, yes. Just now I saw a disturbance beside the dragonlink when this, ah, young lady came through. The link has some great and unusual powers stored within it, and perhaps the walls between the paraworlds are weaker here than elsewhere. Our own dragonlinks may begin to do the same thing if we stay.’

  Brother Clevarian pushed past the crowd with the blacksmith behind him. They looked down at the body in astonishment; then, as before, the body vanished with a loud bang and a gust of wind.

  ‘You – you killed it?’ Clevarian asked, astonished.

  ‘These are not the worst daemons that we have encountered and killed,’ said Jelindel. ‘We shall teach your militiamen how to fight them more easily, then we shall set to work and close the gate between the paraworlds that is letting them through.’

  ‘Gate? Paraworlds?’ spluttered Brother Clevarian. ‘Heresy! These are the damned from the very depths of hell, not from worlds such as ours.’

  ‘No, you don’t understand; we need to find a glowing link –’

  ‘Yes! I understand only too well. You three are devil worshippers, come to allow more of them into our world.’

  ‘What?’ Jelindel spluttered incredulously. ‘We just killed one.’

  ‘Pah! A sham fight. You’re in league with them!’ he screamed, shaking his staff and tracing holy symbols in the air.

  Holgar Drusen glared at them, his eyes hostile and fearful beneath his bushy eyebrows. He turned and followed when Brother Clevarian abruptly left.

  ‘What was all that about?’ asked Zimak.

  ‘It sounded as though someone doesn’t like competition,’ ventured Daretor.

  ‘And I think that another daemon will not be long in arriving,’ concluded Jelindel. ‘That dragonlink apparently does more than store impressive pikework.’

  ‘Drusen the blacksmith?’ said Zimak. ‘But he fights the things.’

  ‘And makes himself into quite a hero by doing so,’ said Daretor. ‘Why does he never take off his gloves, even if his hands bleed? Aye, he is the linkrider we must overcome to acquire this dragonlink.’

  ‘I apologise, Daretor,’ said Jelindel. ‘I fear you were right about him and I was wrong. Yet exposing him and getting the dragonlink will be easier said than done. He seems to be the most popular man in this town, apart from Brother Clevarian.’

  ‘As I said, nobody likes competition, especially if it’s superior. My guess is that Drusen can conjure the daemons at will, and as Jaelin says, yet another will be here very soon. Get ready, Zimak, we should barricade the place this time.’

  ‘No. No, you should flee,’ said Jelindel. ‘Head for the town gates and out into the fields.’

  ‘The fields?’ gasped Zimak. ‘At night? Not in any way known! The mist blocks out most of the moonlight. It’s as black as Black Quell’s ar–’

  ‘Take a torch!’ shouted Jelindel, fists clenched and stamping her foot.

  ‘The daemon will surely follow the light.’ He stared incredulously at Jelindel’s apparent stupidity. ‘And I’ll be holding it.’

  ‘All magic knows defeat in distance, Zimak. I warrant that the daemon can only go a half-mile from the linkrider if he is to maintain control. I’m gambling that the linkrider is controlling the daemons, forcing them to attack us. The linkrider will be forced to leave the town to keep the daemon after you.’

  ‘So you’re gambling, and my life is the stake,’ cried Zimak in disbelief.

  ‘Shush, Zimak. I think I know what Jaelin’s getting at. The linkrider will have to follow us out of the town if he wants to control the daemon. Once clear of the town by, say, two miles, we can turn and fight the thing.’

  ‘But who will engage the linkrider?’

  ‘Me,’ said Jelindel.

  ‘Jaelin fight the blacksmith?’ cried Zimak. ‘Don’t make me laugh. He can’t even fight his way out of a smoke haze, let alone stop that pike-master –’

  Something outside bellowed. It was a deep, resonant challenge that echoed along the fog-shrouded streets of the town.

  ‘It’s here already,’ gasped Zimak. ‘Now, Jaelin, you stay with Daretor and I’ll – Jaelin!’

  But Jelindel was not there. She had slipped out through a window in the woodroom.

  The torches in the streets were burning low by this time of night. Although Reculemoon was high, it was difficult to see more than outlines amid the swirls of mist. Jelindel made for the town gates, which were closed for the night. A lamp burned wanly in the gatehouse on the wall.

  Jelindel slipped something round and soft from her pouch. It was the size of a small lemon, about the same weight, and it trailed a short length of string. It had been a gift from Zimak back when they first struck their deal of sharing knowledge.

  The shutters of the gatehouse were open on all sides, and two sentries were looking back into the town. Jelindel lit the string from a streetlamp’s flame and it spluttered and caught, burning as a brilliant point of light at the end. She watched it progress for several heartbeats, then flung it into the open side window.

  At first nothing happened, then there were shouts of alarm as the guards burst out of the door, gasping and wheezing at the stench from Jelindel’s stink-pot as they clattered down the stairs.

  Jelindel slipped up the stairs as they staggered away into the mist. Taking a deep breath she entered the guardhouse, scooped up the smoking stink-pot and tossed it out the window. Next she barred the door, unlatched the windlass and began winding the gate up while her eyes streamed tears from the remaining stench.

  She was barely in time. A torch appeared in the distance, accompanied by a deep bellowing from the night’s third daemon. Jelindel continued to wind. She heard scrabbling at the gate as Daretor and Zimak squeezed beneath it.

  ‘We’re outside!’ Zimak called, then the windlass suddenly became a lot easier to turn as the daemon pushed up the heavy gate to squeeze its bulk underneath. Jelindel released the windlass and the gears whirred shrilly for a moment as the gate dropped. It boomed down onto the cobblestones.

  The clatter of heavy boots approached from within the town as the militia arrived. Jelindel watched the torches glowing through the mist, then heard fists and weapons pounding on the gate.

  ‘Legions of reeking dead bodies drove us from the guardhouse,’ someone cried. ‘They raised the gate.’

  ‘So our visitors have escaped,’ Jelindel heard the blacksmith saying. ‘We’re best rid of them.’

  ‘No, we must be after them now!’ insisted Brother Clevarian.

  ‘They’re outside, praise be to fortune! The town is safe for the night,’ someone else retorted.

  ‘We must go after them!’ Brother Clevarian shouted back. ‘Raise the gate.’

  Brother Clevarian! Jelindel gasped softly with surprise. It couldn’t be. His fingers and even his toes were all in plain sight. He wore no link, yet …

  Jelindel lowered herself down the town wall by a rope through the outer window and stole quickly across the mist-shrouded fields. Behind he
r the gate was slowly raised again, and soon the torches of the cautious pursuing militiamen shone as dim globes of light through the darkened mist.

  The baying of dogs mingled with the distant bellowing of the daemon; then there was the rumble of the gate being lowered again.

  ‘Forgive me, Daretor, but this is the only way,’ whispered Jelindel as she slipped the free dragonlink onto her finger.

  It took precious moments to get the feel of the thing’s powers, but her practice at moving her senses between paraplanes came to her aid. Through the eyes of a huge four-horned bull she watched the militia approaching. Brother Clevarian would be at the centre, but all that was about to change. She extended her control, and the bull suddenly charged its bramblefang fence, ignoring the thorns that ripped at its hide as it crashed through. It charged straight for the militiamen.

  The men and dogs scattered, and now Jelindel seized control of one of the dogs and sniffed for the temple incense that was on Brother Clevarian’s robes. Within moments the dog ran down the monk, leaping upon him even as he spat a word of binding to ensnare it. Jelindel now sent another dog after him from behind, and this one knocked him down and ripped at the leather cowl that covered his head.

  Orange light blazed out of the link that he wore in his ear as the leather came away, but blue coils burst from his lips to entrap the second dog. Brother Clevarian began shrieking for help.

  Jelindel seized control of the bull again and drove it back at the regrouping militia. Now the monk made a fatal mistake. He spoke a word of binding to stop the bull, a word that was at the limit of his life-force. The bull crashed to the ground, its front legs ensnared, but Brother Clevarian also fell to his knees with exhaustion.

  Jelindel crept up to him now, guided by the glow of the link that was leaking through the fingers of the hand that was over his ear. Taking the link from her own finger and dropping it into her pouch, she crouched, crept closer, then spoke a word. Her aim was off, but she still ensnared the old monk’s legs.

  Surprise was on Jelindel’s side. She sent the monk sprawling and the link again blazed out like an annular eclipse of the sun. Weakened, she staggered over, reached out for the link and ripped it from his ear.