WarMage- Unrestrained

by Martha Carr

  Leander raised his head and screeched again before he drove his tail against the metal wall beside him. Raven surged into action and stepped toward him, both arms outstretched. “Hey, it’s okay. Woah, woah, woah. Everything’s all right, Leander. Take a breath.”

  Snorting again, he swiveled his head toward her on his long neck, his yellow eyes huge with fear and concern. He paced against the far wall of the pen, and Raven moved quickly.

  “Come here. It’s okay.”

  His head reared away when she approached him but he stopped pacing. The scales at the top of his chest and shoulder quivered when she touched them, his wings still outstretched. Finally, a low rumble rose in his throat and he settled. A forepaw stamped the upturned earth twice more, then he turned away from her and snorted a hot burst of steam and a little smoke into the night sky.

  “There you go. See? Everything’s okay—”

  “Everything is not okay, Raven.” The dragon’s next rumble sounded much more like a warning growl. “Something’s very wrong. I felt you, and then I felt…wrongness.”

  Well, yeah, I was nervous about the dance, too. That went away quickly though. “Wrongness from me? Because I’m having a good time tonight, Leander. I promise. It’s a little weird, but I’m safe. I didn’t mean to worry to you.”

  “I’m not talking about you.”

  Shit. I should’ve made a Plan B. “Okay. Can you tell me any more than simply ‘wrongness?’ I want to help you find this…whatever’s going on. Let’s talk it through—”

  “Someone’s coming.” Leander raised his head again and his forelegs lifted off the ground a little as he tried to see over the wall of the pen.

  Raven heard the pounding of hooves galloping down the road toward the school. She patted his shoulder again and nodded. “I’ll be right back. I’ll go see who it is.”

  He snorted but didn’t try to stop her.

  She slipped through the gate again and left it cracked slightly to save time.

  “I have a message for Headmaster Flynn!” The shout came from the front of the school. “I need to speak to the headmaster!”

  No one can hear him over all the music and dancing.

  “Hey!” Raven waved her arms and darted across the field. With a grunt of frustration, she hiked up the bottom of her dress again in one hand and waved with the other. “Over here!”

  The small form of the rider atop the horse turned toward her, then he dug his heels into his mount’s sides and raced across the grass. They met halfway across the field, and she caught her breath as the horse reared and she saw the rider.

  “It’s you.” She looked at the hostler boy she’d met in Brighton the day after orientation. “Quinn, right?”

  “Yeah, hey.” The boy ran a hand through his hair and dropped the reins from one hand to give his horse’s neck a reassuring pat. “Raven Alby.”

  “You have a good memory. I see you don’t have any water to throw on me this time.” Her smile faded when he glanced across the field with a worried frown.

  “Not tonight. I came with a message, Raven.” His horse stamped a few times, and he reined the animal in and glanced quickly at the empty courtyard of Fowler Academy. “Jamie MacMillan sent me to warn the school. There’s trouble at the wall.”

  “What? What kind of trouble?”

  Quinn shook his head. “Just trouble. I don’t know anything else. Where is everyone?”

  “Behind the school on the other side. I’ll get Headmaster Flynn. He’ll want to hear it from you.”

  Behind her, Leander uttered another piercing screech. Quinn’s horse snorted and backed away a few steps, but the boy had enough control of his mount to stop it. He leaned down and offered Raven his hand. “This is faster.”

  “Yep.” She hiked the long dress up again as he slipped his foot out of the stirrup. Her boot slid into it instead, and he hauled her up as she swung her other leg over the horse to sit behind him in the saddle.

  The boy clicked his tongue and turned the horse toward the back of the school. They surged into a gallop across the grass and veered around the buildings until they reached the other side and the lights, music, and laughter of the spring gala.

  “Stop right here,” Raven said and slid out of the saddle again when he complied. She nodded toward the dance as Quinn looked with wide eyes from her to the party. “I’ll be right back. He’ll want to talk to you and I think that should be private.”

  “Yeah, okay.” He swallowed and remained where she left him with the horse.

  She scanned the faces on and around the dancefloor. Fortunately, Headmaster Flynn stood on this side of the gathering beside a stack of flowering hay bales, talking to Professor Worley and grinning with a drink in his hand. She hurried toward him, the long black dress bunched in both hands.

  “Excuse me, Headmaster Flynn?”

  He turned toward her and Professor Worley stepped back so she could join them. Both men grinned at her, but their cheerful expressions vanished quickly. “What is it, Miss Alby?”

  “A messenger came from the wall.” She turned partially to nod at the nervous-looking Quinn. “He’s looking for you and said something about trouble at the wall.”

  The headmaster set his cup down on the hay bale and strode swiftly toward the messenger. He reached Quinn in seconds. Professor Worley and Raven watched them as the rest of the students and staff at Fowler Academy danced and enjoyed themselves, completely oblivious.

  “Do you know what’s happening, Raven?” Worley muttered and leaned toward her while his gaze remained focused on the headmaster.

  “Quinn didn’t tell me anything else. I only know we can’t ignore it.” She looked at him and frowned. “Leander felt it too. Something’s wrong.”

  Flynn nodded at Quinn. “Thank you, young man. I suggest you head back now. We’ll need a messenger with a clear head and a swift horse if anything else comes up.”

  “Headmaster.” The boy darted another hasty glance at Raven before he turned his mount and pushed it into a run toward the road to Brighton’s town center.

  The headmaster moved briskly toward Raven and Professor Worley, his normally calm features contorted in a grim frown. “Miss Alby, I appreciate your foresight in bringing the rider to my attention and not the entire school’s.”

  “What now?”

  “We wait and hope we’re prepared for whatever trouble arises.” He cast her a sideways glance and said nothing else.

  Another earsplitting screech erupted from Leander across the field, and Raven turned. “Whatever it is, I don’t know if Leander can wait. He feels it too. Shouldn’t we do something? Send someone out to look or at least—”

  “No, Miss Alby. If we hear word again of some other—”

  The dragon’s next warning shriek ended in a thunderous roar. The musicians playing with Professor Fellows wavered a little at the sound but managed to pick their rhythm up again.

  “I have to go to him, Headmaster. If he knows something else, anything…he needs me.” She didn’t wait for an answer but raced toward the pen, the dress hitched unglamorously once again. It’s definitely not made for running.

  “Raven, wait!” Headmaster Flynn lurched after her and moved swiftly around the back of the school.

  She ignored him. Leander’s all that matters. If he doesn’t calm soon, we might have a bigger problem. She had reached the far end of the school’s buildings when a massive, earth-shattering crack hurt her ears. Two more of the same followed quickly and echoed into an ominous rumble. She stopped in surprise and glanced at the ground, which trembled beneath her feet.

  The music cut off abruptly. All the laughter and conversation and dancing froze, and the silence made the last massive crack and rumble in the distance even louder.

  Leander roared and thumped against the pen. Someone has to find out what’s going on.

  Raven jerked the dagger from her boot and sliced a long slit in the side of Elizabeth’s fancy black dress. She stowed the blade and sprinted across
the field.

  “Raven Alby!” Headmaster Flynn continued his approach, his eyes wide. He slowed on the grass and shook his head. She’s not wrong. I would have done the same if it were Asher in that pen. “Use your head, girl,” he muttered and stared at the young mage who raced across the grass while the ripped dress whipped around her legs.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Raven pushed herself as fast as she could go toward Leander’s enclosure. The dragon uttered another shrill, screeching cry.

  “Leander!”

  The unlocked gate burst open when he shoved it aside with his head and the red dragon stormed out of the pen and into the field. His wings stretched wide as he turned and headed toward her.

  When they reached each other, he turned and lowered himself to the ground enough for her to leap onto the thickest part of his tail. Her boots held steady against his scales like she knew they would, and she ran up her dragon’s back to the place at the base of his neck. His wings cut through the air as she sat astride, squeezed with her thighs, and leaned forward against him as he launched them skyward.

  “The wall!” she shouted, her chest heaving from the run and the wind that caught her throat.

  “I know.”

  That was all they had to say before Leander turned to the south and the source of the awful sound they’d heard all the way out there on the school grounds. They flew directly over Brighton now without care for who saw the young mage and her dragon familiar overhead. As they soared over fields and ranches, she leaned down to get a better look at the Alby ranch on their right. Something about her grandfather’s house felt off. I can’t tell what it is from up here.

  As if reading her mind, the dragon descended and made another sweep, close enough for the moonlight to offer some illumination. She squinted at her home and finally saw the thin lines of upturned dirt that snaked across the field, stopped at her cabin, and turned toward the wall again. This is bad.

  Leander pumped his wings faster, climbing high to get a better view.

  “There it is,” Raven shouted and pointed at the high stone wall that encompassed the entire kingdom to keep them safe. “Oh, no…”

  A huge hole gaped in the barrier from the ground to the top and massive chunks of stone and rubble spilled into the kingdom like a trail. Whatever broke through came from the other side.

  Leander banked and turned left, following the angle of the fallen rubble.

  Where are the guards?

  The earth rumbled as mage and dragon wheeled in a wide arc. “Leander, do you see anything?”

  “The ground is moving.”

  “What?” She leaned down on his other side and saw it. Thick trails of earth were dislodged by an unseen force that moved directly below the surface at an incredible speed. That has to be the Swarm. Nothing else moves like that. We need to get ahead of it.

  Feeling her intention, Leander stretched his neck and sliced forward to gain speed against the upturned ruts that sliced across fields, past stables and barns, and moved around houses. “They aren’t stopping. Grandpa said the Swarm acts on mindless hunger. This isn’t…why are they avoiding everything?”

  They headed toward Brighton’s town center again while the trails pushed forward below them. A bell tolled at the center of town, followed by shouts to raise the alarm and the clash of armor and weapons being drawn. The soldiers looked incredibly small from where Leander and Raven glided across the town, but they gathered quickly and efficiently at the south end of town where the road snaked toward the outer ranches and the breach in the wall beyond.

  They don’t know.

  Raven glanced over her shoulder when they passed Brighton, and Leander responded perfectly. He banked sharply to the left and brought them down toward the fountain in the center of town. Shouts of alarm and fear greeted them as he descended gently and beat his powerful wings to keep them off the ground. Dust, grass, and leaves kicked up along the cobblestones, but the soldiers stood their ground and stared at the dragon and his rider.

  “They already broke through the wall!” Raven shouted and pointed in the other direction. In that moment, she knew where the Swarm was headed. “We passed over them. The Swarm is on the way to the school. Fowler Academy!”

  A decorated general with bushy gray eyebrows stepped forward from the ranks of wide-eyed soldiers. “That’s a big claim to make, girl.”

  “Maybe from someone else.” Raven clenched her fists. They have to believe me. “But I’m a mage on a dragon making this claim, and I saw them myself. The Swarm’s back, they’re headed to the school, and we’ll need all the help we can get. This is what Brighton’s best have trained for, right?”

  The general narrowed his eyes. “Does Headmaster Flynn know?”

  “He will as soon as we get back.” None of the soldiers moved, and the general stared at her. Leander uttered a low growl, which startled Brighton’s military into action. “Trust me. We need your help. And if this isn’t enough to convince you, think about what’ll happen if you don’t come. This is happening now!”

  Without waiting for a reply to her challenge, the dragon turned swiftly and launched skyward. The general yelled orders she couldn’t hear over the wind that rushed past her face. I wish we had more time to explain. Here’s hoping Brighton’s army really is ready for anything.

  They hurtled through the sky again and soon caught up with the dark streaks that plowed across the earth toward Fowler Academy. Leander descended a little lower and sniffed the air.

  The earth beneath them erupted in a spray of dirt, pebbles, and grass only a few yards in front of them. It churned into a swirling whirlpool and from its center shot two thick, undulating tentacles with deadly pincers that snapped together at the ends. Two more dark appendages sprouted from the ruptured soil, and the earth bucked as something dark-green and nightmarish pushed itself from below.

  A Skiffling.

  There wasn’t enough time to think, but neither of them needed it. Leander unleashed a massive ball of flame as they rushed toward one of the Swarm’s eyeless, mindless monsters.

  “Sequantur flamma!” Raven extended both hands and felt her spell tug on the dragon’s fire. She jerked it down and launched the flaming fireball the size of her grandfather’s cabin into the churning earth and the flailing tendrils. One whipped toward the dragon before the creature ignited with an agonized screech.

  Leander darted sideways and turned ninety degrees to avoid the snapping pincers. She cried out and squeezed her thighs against his back with so much force that they shook as she flattened herself against the back of his neck. When they leveled off, she turned to look over her shoulder at the burning, flipping tentacles that gradually lost their strength before they flopped motionless for everyone who came after to see.

  If that doesn’t convince them, nothing will.

  The red dragon’s wings cut through the sky as he pushed himself to go faster. The other thick trails of tunneling Swarm nightmares swerved around the flaming Skiffling but didn’t stop or slow down. More earth exploded behind them in a wide arc, and from the massive hole in the ground, hundreds of giant, glistening Swarm beetles surged to the surface. Their clicks and squeaks as they scuttled away from the piles of upturned soil sent a shiver down her spine.

  We have to warn the school.

  The cold, whipping air made it almost impossible to catch her breath when her dragon rocketed forward with a renewed burst of speed. She blinked more tears away and stared in awe as the ground rushed past them. “Is this as fast as you can go?”

  “Almost. I think.” His words were hard to hear and she tucked her face against her shoulder to take another breath.

  The headlong flight took them over the countryside and finally, the grounds of Fowler Academy. Headmaster Flynn stood in the center of the field in front of the barn with Professors Worley, Fellows, Gilliam, and Dameron. The dragon pulled up, beat his wings quickly to stop short, and lowered quickly to the ground.

  “My word,” Professor Gilliam
muttered.

  Headmaster Flynn stared pointedly at the lack of saddle and harness on the red dragon’s back, his lips pressed firmly together. “What did you see?”

  “It’s the Swarm.” Raven leapt from Leander’s back before he’d completely lowered himself. He straightened and stepped away from the professors with a snort. “We saw them, Headmaster. They broke through the wall and ignored everything else. And they’re headed directly toward the school.”

  “Impossible!” Dameron shouted, shook his fists, and glared at Leander. “The Swarm is gone. Eradicated. The Great War ended such a vile mass of—”

  “Thank you, Professor Dameron.” Flynn’s voice cracked sharply to silence the man. “Miss Alby, I need you to tell me exactly what you saw.”

  “We don’t have time for that, Headmaster—”

  “We have time to get it right.” He nodded firmly at her. “What did you see?”

  “A hole in the wall and moving streaks under the ground—like drawing a line in the dirt but from below instead. But they’re above ground now. A Skiffling with all the tentacles. Green…arms, I think.”

  “A barbequed Skiffling, now,” Leander added and stamped a little behind her as he lowered his head.

  The professors stared at him.

  “And hundreds of beetles. They’re awful.” Raven grimaced quickly and shook her head. “Each of them was the size of a horse. And they’re coming here, I’m telling you.”

  “Why would they do that? Even if the Swarm did still exist in part, they have no way to tell a ranch from a magical school.” Professor Dameron shook his head. “These are fantasies. You spend too much time with your head in the clouds, Miss Alby.”

  “Brighton’s army doesn’t seem to think so.” Her nostrils flared and she turned to Headmaster Flynn. “They rang the alarm bell and are headed this way right now. They know what’s coming.” I hope.

  “Headmaster?” Professor Fellows turned toward Flynn and raised his chin. “It’s your call.”

  “You can’t seriously be considering this,” Dameron retorted acidly.