by Erik Reid
“We don’t have enough to revive these guys from the brink of starvation and still feed ourselves,” I said. “We have a mountain to climb, and even if we win this thing, we’ll be all the way up there without supplies.”
“Even if?” Dani asked. “Kyle, we should go into this expecting the very best.”
“This demon survived how long trapped under a glacier?” I asked, keeping my voice low so I wouldn’t upset Clara or Kaylee. “And then he managed to father a bunch of demonspawn offspring and a legit son with a womb who’s going to make more weird blue babies and try to take over the world.
“We have Oscar, a few noxyweed candies, a kobold who won’t heal anyone, and a simki whose talents include a competitive streak and an uncontrollable berserker’s curse. The odds are ever not in our favor.”
She smiled at me while I talked, like a teacher waiting patiently for a young student to finish saying something absolutely worthless.
“I believe in you, Kyle,” she said, reaching for my arm and rubbing her thumb into my bicep. “I believe in us. No one is going to shake that faith. Not even you.”
“So you believe in me,” I said, “but you don’t believe me.”
“Exactly. I’d have to be crazy to believe every weird thing you say, but I’ve believed every single thing you’ve done.”
“You’re manipulating me,” I said.
“How?”
“Your cute little smile, the warm touch of your fingers, the earnest description of my innate goodness. You’re making it hard to take these rations and walk away from a bunch of useless workers on death’s door.”
“I don’t have to manipulate you into doing the right thing,” she said. “You’ll do it with or without me.”
I took the saddlebag from Dani and handed her the torch. We had two weeks’ worth of rations left thanks to Gretna’s quick thinking. If we fed the hungry like some kind of eighteenth century Catholic missionary, we wouldn’t last more than two days.
“Clara,” I said. “See if you can make these last, would you?”
She ran toward me and took the bag, quickly assessed its contents, and then rushed toward her brothers. Dani kissed me on the cheek.
“Remember this the next time we’re in private,” I said, leaning toward her pointy draykin ear to whisper, “you owe me.”
“No I don’t,” she whispered back. “But I’ll make it up to you anyway.”
I decided not to mention that weird little blood debt business. Technically, she really did owe me, but I wasn’t looking for a soul job. When she finally put her lips someplace other than my cheek, I wanted to know that she wanted it.
Dani, Kaylee, and I munched away at our own ration packs while Clara nursed the boys back to health. Slowly, they climbed to their feet and circled around.
They appeared to want a speech of some kind.
Was I afraid of facing off with a centuries’ old demon who wanted to slice off my arm and keep Oscar for himself? Yup. Did I dread it? Nah, it would be nice to have some closure at the end of this, one way or another.
Was I afraid of giving a speech to a bunch of pubescent kobolds? Of course not. But the thing is, I did dread it — because who the fuck wants to give an impromptu inter-species speech?
“Until today,” I said, “you were hungry. Hungry for someone to care whether you lived or died; hungry for freedom and purpose; hungry for actual food. Or at least ration packs, which are crunchy and bland but technically nutritive.
“That ends now,” I continued. “We’re here to make sure you never go hungry again — as long as we can all build a tunnel together really fast before the ration packs run out. Otherwise, you’re sort of back to where you started.
“But the point is, never be hungry again! Who’s with me?”
They nodded and murmured a bit.
“Your sister stood up to your mom,” I said. “Reminded her that she’s been cruel to her children, but that cruelty is over now. You’re not castaways in your own home. You belong somewhere now.
“Tomorrow, when you’re a little stronger than you are now, we’ll build a tunnel beneath the heart of the highest mountain, and then upward.
“This is important work, and I’m grateful to each of you that works your hardest, but if you need breaks I want you to take them. Our destination is dangerous; the path there shouldn’t be.
“Now eat up. Soon, we ko-boldly go where no man has gone before!”
They seemed a little more content with that, so I decided to end — if not on a high note — on sort of an off-key C-sharp.
Then I sat down at the tunnel’s edge and closed my eyes. Exhaustion had finally caught up with me.
Clara sat next to me and laid her head on my shoulder. “Thank you for everything today.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
“Yes, you do,” she said.
“You mean letting you win the cart race? I didn’t think you’d notice.”
“Nuh-uh!” Kaylee said, snuggling up on my other side. She claimed the opposite shoulder and nuzzled against my arm. “We won fair and square.”
“Suuuure,” I said.
“We did!”
“I know, I know.” I pulled both girls closer and looked up at Dani. She had just arranged our remaining ration packs into neat stacks.
“Dani,” I said. “You want in on this? It’s been a long day.”
“I sleep face-down,” Dani said, “on account of this tail. Draykin tails have more muscle to them than most other races.”
“I have a lap available.”
“That you do,” she said, widening her smile and approaching me. “I think I can curl up here.”
She lay between my legs and rested her cheek against my inner thigh, stretching her body out behind her and letting her tail lay flat. The gentle rise and fall of Clara’s breathing signaled the onset of sleep, and the rest of us quickly gave into the same need.
CHAPTER 28
That night, for the second time in Silura, I dreamt.
“She’s made so little use of a good sword,” Gretna said.
The captain of the draykin guard stood with her hands on her hips, wrinkling a long, tight dress that wrapped her body in a pleasant teal. The dress’s collar swooped low enough on her chest to show an inch of cleavage, the same as her old armor had revealed. An insignia of a fist with a crown on its knuckles was stitched over her heart.
Her blonde hair was still styled in a severe bun atop her head, but a few long curls hung free, trailing down the sides of her face and adding some extra femininity to the former soldier’s appearance.
“Dani’s not used to combat yet,” I said. When I took a step forward, my foot sank into sand. It was all around, a flat stretch of fine powder beneath a starry night sky. No moon, no mountains on the horizon, just sand.
“She never will be,” Gretna replied. “Too much of a dreamer. I like the girl, but combat requires tapping into something primal and ancient. That draykin doesn’t have enough dragon in her. I can’t blame her. Our people have forgotten where we come from, what we are. That’s why we’re here.”
“In Silura’s largest sandbox?”
“In the Rundune Desert. I’ve learned a lot since I left you all at Kaylee’s enclave. There are secrets buried here that won’t stay hidden forever. I need to bring Queen Zolocki’s heir here, before the sins of our past catch up to our future.”
“So this tight dress and fancy new hair style — it’s not your ‘bury Kyle in the desert’ outfit? You did seem pretty keen on putting Oscar under the dunes.”
“As a guard, that was always an option,” Gretna said. “I’ve retired from the guard now. This is my wardmaster’s uniform. I stand ready to watch over the princess, as soon as she hatches.”
“If she hatches,” I said. “There’s every chance we’ll lose this thing.”
Gretna’s back stiffened. Her arms slipped off her hips and fell straight by her sides. “The only losers are the on
es that quit before they win.”
“Proverb?” I asked.
“I know how much you love those,” she said. “I find them a little contrived, but simpler minds really seem to enjoy them.”
“Your point?”
“He was afraid of you once. I saw that myself. Remind him to stay that way and you’ll save that princess just fine.”
“He has an army now,” I said. “And home field advantage.”
“You have a team of devoted women and a growing bond with Oscar. Do not underestimate yourself. You are a powerful man. For a non-draykin.”
“Thanks, Dream Gretna,” I said. “You’re pretty cool, even if you are my own subconscious giving me a pep talk.”
“Is that what you think I am?” she asked. “A dream? I made a hard bargain to get this close to Silura again. I won’t have you diminish that sacrifice.”
My footing faltered again and I stepped backward, treading sand that started shifting of its own accord. The stars blinked out all at once and the sky lightened to a pale yellow while I struggled to keep my balance.
“Go,” Gretna said, pointing toward the distance. She stood perfectly still on the small dune that supported her. “It’s the morning of your final day. Make it count.”
I turned to walk, sinking deep into the sand with each step as I left the captain of the guard — no, the royal wardmaster — behind.
“Oh, and one more thing,” she called out. “Don’t let the queen name that poor kiddo ‘Smaug.’ Family name or not, it’s hideous.”
I turned back and laughed. “I’ll see what I can do.”
***
I yawned myself awake. The girls were all busy helping the kobold kids tunnel through the solid rock beneath the foothills to the northern mountains.
Together, they formed an efficient line of kobold workers, with a pair in the lead hammering and pickaxing at the rock wall ahead, and a relay of kobolds behind them taking newly-broken rocks and passing them backward, removing the debris as the first pair kept chopping away.
When that first pair got tired, they fell back, letting the next pair of workers pick up where they left off. The girls and I pitched in where we could, piling stone and clearing the path ahead. This was the kobolds’ show though, and I was happy to let them do their thing.
The day was long, and all of our muscles ached from the repetitive work. We only broke to crack open our next pack of rations and scarf them down, though those breaks were more frequent than I had hoped for. By nighttime — at least I assumed it was nighttime — we ran through all but a handful of ration packs.
“I underestimated how much kobolds eat when they’re working nonstop,” I said. “We don’t have another day of this. We have a continental breakfast at most, no omelet station.”
“We’ve tunneled what, ten miles in just one day?” Dani said. “That’s great progress, but if we have to turn around we should do it now, before we get much further from the mine carts.”
“No need,” Clara said. “We’re getting close.” She touched her hand to the rock ceiling above us and closed her eyes. “The weight of the mountain overhead increases the further we go. When it starts to trend down again, we’ll know we’ve just passed the peak.”
And so we dug onward, inch by inch and rock by rock until our team of diggers came to a halt.
“Master Kyle,” said a boy. It was Franco, the scrawny teenager Clara had rushed to when we first arrived. His mop of black hair fell to the same side as his crooked red nose.
“Please,” I said. “Just ‘Master’ is fine.”
“Of course,” he said. “Master—”
“I was kidding,” I said. “It’s a thing I do. Call me Kyle.”
“Ky—” The boy looked distressed and confused. “Taker,” he said. “Our tunnel has reached the heart of the mountain, but there’s a problem.”
“Great,” I said. “Tell me when you’ve solved it and I’ll be very proud of you.”
“We cannot dig upward,” he said. “The rock is heavy but hollow, and we worry the tunnel will collapse.”
Clara pushed her way forward. “It is a risk we must take.”
“We could all die,” the boy said.
“You would be dead already, Franco,” Clara said. “The Goddess would not send me where I could not go. Please dig.”
The boy looked at his brothers. They shrugged and shook their heads. None moved to lift their tools.
“Kyle,” Clara said. “You are their taker. Will you advise them that a tunnel collapse is a small risk compared to the fate of the realms?”
“This isn’t a suicide mission,” I said.
She opened her mouth to reply, but shut it again. Instead, she picked up a hammer and tapped the ceiling with it, closing her eyes and tilting her long kobold ear upward. The small tapping sounds she elicited meant nothing to me, but she occasionally flinched or frowned. Finally, however, she smiled.
“We can dig here,” she said. “The tunnel may collapse, but it will not spread far.”
She held her hammer out, but none of her brothers took it from her. With a deep breath, she lifted the tool as high as she could and thrust it toward the ceiling. When it hit the rock, it rebounded, twisting in her hand and bending her body backward to avoid letting the dense iron hammerhead land against her skull.
“Clara,” I said.
She pulled the tool away. “The way up lies here. I am not wrong.”
“I never said you were. Now drop the hammer and get back, all of you.”
Everyone gave me the space I asked for, and then I balled my fist and aimed for the ceiling. With a jump and an uppercut-style punch toward the rocks overhead, I slammed Oscar’s fist into the stone.
The ceiling indented from the impact, but not by much. A hairline crack opened up, sending a powdery dust down into my face.
“Again,” I said, striking the ceiling a second time. The crack barely grew. I readied myself for another strike.
“What will this make me, Three Punch Man? That has no pizzazz.” I tried again, forcing another dusting of powdered rock to rain down and splitting that thin fracture wider along the ceiling’s surface, but failing to break through.
“Come on, you dumb rock,” I said. “Don’t you know who you’re dealing with here? I’m Kyle the fucking Vanquisher. I will vanquish you, my sedimentary enemy!”
Suddenly, a shelf of rock above our heads began to split apart, first bowing in the center along that hairline crack, then crumbling at the seams as smaller fault lines snaked in every direction. The kobolds clamored back and Clara snatched my wrist to pull me out of harm’s way.
Piles of rock skittered from the ceiling and spilled onto the path we had just dug, then the mountainous shelf overhead collapsed entirely, emitting a deafening crash of rock against rock.
The fissure tearing across the ceiling widened, releasing a gale of icy wind that sank quickly from the high altitude above, blowing a chill gust that swept away the stagnant warmth of the mountain’s underground tunnel. It was invigorating, that onrush of cold. It was the outside coming in, the warm air of safety peeling away and leaving us bare, and cold, and small.
A jagged crevasse gaped across the ceiling now, shaped like the perfect half-moon of Kaylee’s simki ears, or the smirking crack in the grasslands above that led to Momma Jumbo’s entry tunnel.
From my perspective though, it arced downward, like a deeply worried frown.
As the dust settled, I climbed the mound of broken mountain that lay beneath that opening and peered upward. The night sky came into view, pocked with distant stars. We had tapped into a vent in the mountain, with a clear view to the peak a mile up.
“This must have been a volcano once,” I said, marveling at the chimney-like cylinder of open space.
Clara climbed up next to me. She wrapped a long stretch of rope against her thigh with a pickax handle trapped beneath. “This is it,” she said, tightening a knot to keep her mining tool flush with her upper leg. “Dest
iny awaits.”
“We should camp here,” I said. “It’s late, and we’re all tired.”
Clara leaned her chin on my shoulder and tilted her head toward the sky. “Thank you,” she said in a low voice. “I can’t imagine what would have become of me if I never met you. I’d have died as I always lived, quiet and lost and alone. You changed that.
“I wish we had more time.”
“We have hours before first light,” I said. “Come with me. It’s been a long and boring day. Because we’ve been boring a hole nonstop, which gets very uninteresting, very fast. A little rest will do us good.”
“The wicked will not rest,” Clara said. “And so neither can I. You should lead your givens far away from here, Kyle. Guide and protect them. Give my brothers a good life full of joy and purpose — just don’t ascend the mountain. I care about you all too much to drag you into the dangers ahead. It’s my destiny to face A’zarkin, not yours.”
She kissed me on the cheek, then leapt at the ceiling, gripping the rock with her nimble kobold fingers and bringing her feet up beside her. She perched for a moment like Spiderman on the underside of an overpass, then climbed out of sight, hands and feet ascending the inner walls of the mountain’s central crevasse without a hint of hesitation or struggle.
I opened my mouth to yell after her, but we couldn’t afford to send echoes rumbling toward the peak of our enemy’s snow-capped stronghold. They’d find us quickly that way. They’d find Clara too.
“Are we racing to the top?” Kaylee asked, bounding up beside me and jumping toward the rocky ceiling the way Clara had. Her feet weren’t accustomed to gripping smooth stone, nor were her fingers. She landed back on the floor and brushed herself off, puzzled.
“Clara left without us,” I said. The world got quiet around me. My eyes stung and my eardrums throbbed, drowning in the sound of my own heartbeat. “We have to stop her. She’s going to face him alone.”
“I can’t fly that high,” Dani said. “It will take ages to climb, assuming our arms and legs don’t give out halfway up.”