A Sword for a Dragon (50 page)

“The enemy always uses life for its magic,” said Kesepton. “It destroys life to obtain power. That’s what they taught me, and I have seen that it is true.”

Hollein Kesepton did his utmost not to think about Lagdalen, about she who he cared more for than for his own life. He did not think in terms of revenge, he simply prayed that she was still alive and that they had not hurt her. Revenge would come later.

They went on and crossed over a wide bridge, massively built, and found themselves in the outskirts of what had once been a huge city . Once it had been a mighty place, now it was a virtual ruin.

The walls had long since vanished, torn down and taken away to build other things in the surrounding region. Buildings had decayed and fallen in. Other places had burned down. Bushes and small trees grew throughout this section, even in the center of what had once been streets.

This part of the ancient city was empty of people and had been for a long time. They went on through long dead streets and then quite suddenly they heard the sound of metal-shod horses riding through the streets somewhere not too far ahead.

With remarkable speed, the dragons slid into the ruined houses and hid themselves. Kesepton watched them and felt a shiver run down his spine at the sight of such predatory skill. He remembered that in the wild, dragons ate whatever they might catch, including men.

Along what had once been a main avenue passed a troop of cavalry in the black uniform of Sephis. Some of the horses reacted to the faint smell of dragon with whinnies and nervous movements. The cavalrymen took no notice, however, and trotted on without investigation.

Now they emerged from their hiding places. The dragons moved with a stealth that continued to surprise Kesepton.

At one point they waited behind a long ruined wall while Relkin went forward to scout alone.

“What happened here?” whispered Swane, gesturing to the ruins. “This looks like it’s been this way for a long time.”

“When they threw down the old Sephis, they threw down the city as well. That was long ago.”

“A dead city, dedicated to more death, may the Mother preserve us!” muttered Mono.

Relkin returned and described the next stretch of their journey. Kesepton went over it carefully and then sent them forward. They went on, moving quietly through the ruins.

Eventually they began to see more activity. In the central regions of the city, some of the buildings had been repaired. The great Temple to Sephis was a circular block seven stories tall that still dominated the city, although much of it was in ruins, too. It had been converted to a temple of Auros and so had received a certain minimum of care over the decades.

Close to the center, the streets bore a traffic of carts and wagons. Groups of soldiers in the black uniform of Sephis were also visible. Then they saw a party of imps, a dozen strong. They wore a costume that was new to Bazil and Relkin, with black leggings, knee-high boots, and a leather cape fringed in white around the neck and shoulders.

“Imps of the Doom in Axoxo, ruler of the White Bones Mountains,” said Kesepton.

“We saw imps driving the slaves on the enemy’s war machines. But they did not have that white neck on their capes,” said Relkin.

“They came from the deep Hazog, with the enemy engineers. This war was something the enemy had planned for a long time.”

They slid closer to the heart of the city.

“The dragons will hide here while we scout forward,” said Kesepton.

Kesepton and the dragonboys pushed on, and the dragons withdrew into the ruins of what once had been a large brewery. The great vats had been torn down, but there were still fermentation pits half full of rubble from the roof. The dragons hid in these pits.

“We sit, they go, what happens if they don’t come back?” said the Purple Green.

“There is a saying, ‘When we come to that horse, we will eat it,’ ”said Bazil.

“You have a saying for everything, leatherback dragon.”

“Bazil is smart,” said Vlok.

“Smarter than Vlok, that’s for sure,” said old Chektor. Vlok growled but did not challenge big Chektor.

“What is this thing we go to kill?” said the Purple Green. “I have heard things but I do not understand.”

Chektor looked at Bazil.

“Why do you look at me?”

“Are you not friends with the Great Witch Lessis? So you know these things.”

“Boy told me things; that is all I know.”

“So?”

“So it is a demon, something not from this world.”

“What does this mean?” said the Purple Green.

“There are many worlds, this is all I know, and this thing comes from one far from ours.”

“Are there dragons in the world from which this thing comes?”

“By the roar, how should I know?”

“Well, you know a lot about these things.”

“I am not a witch! I am a fighting dragon.” Bazil’s voice had gotten loud.

“Shh,” said Chektor. “Someone comes.”

They hushed. Tails flexed with small swords and maces, just in case.

But it was only Relkin.

“Dragonboy!” hissed Chektor.

“They always take their time.”

“What is situation?” said Baz.

“I think we have a route, follow me.”

“Wait,” said Bazil. “You either have a route or you do not. What do you mean ‘think’ you have route?”

“We have a route. You’ll just have to jump a little to get started.”

They moved through empty streets to a ruined aqueduct that had once conducted fresh water from upstream of the city to the homes of the wealthy.

Through this structure they were able to cross a wide avenue, right in front of a constant enemy presence with many guards, and not be seen.

They clambered down from the aqueduct in a neighborhood of long-since-ruined mansions. Palm trees towered above them. They tiptoed through gardens that had long since become small forests and at length emerged outside a huge building, seven stories tall and one hundred meters long completely surrounded now by scaffolding. Repairs were underway at the Temple of Sephis.

Kesepton appeared out of the shadows.

“We’ve found a door that’s big enough for dragons. It’s guarded, but lightly. The enemy does not expect an attack. This is the center of its power.”

“We give them a surprise,” said Bazil.

“By the roar, we’ll do that and more,” growled the Purple Green.

“Once we go beyond that door, then we will be in unknown territory,” continued Kesepton, “but you understand that. We will have to strike at once, as swiftly and as terribly as we can. We can only rescue Lagdalen and the witch if we destroy the dark power here. Surprise is our only tactic. Beyond that, it will be up to us.”

“If it can be killed,” muttered the Purple Green, “we will kill it.”

“It will be no easy task, my great friend. This is not a being from our world. It comes from a hotter, heavier place. The witch told me. ‘Gammadion’ she called it, ‘Malacostraca,’ she said it was.”

“Can steel cut this thing?” said Bazil.

“Yes, I think so.”

Baz held up Ecator’s gleaming blade. “Then we will kill it.”

They were all agreed. In the dark, Captain Kesepton slid across the street and hugged the wall of the Temple. The dragonboys followed. They moved quickly along the wall toward the door where a pair of guards kept a desultory watch. They expected no trouble. Who in his right mind would wish to enter the house of Sephis? They had long since been dulled by the effect of the controlling spell on their brains.

When they were still twenty feet away, Swane and Mono knelt and fired their bows. They could not miss. Both guards suddenly coughed and staggered as arrows struck them in the throat and face.

Kesepton was upon them in the next moment. He finished the first with a downstroke and then thrust home into the second’s heart.

They pushed open the door, peered inside, and then signaled to the dragons, who crossed the street one at a time, and slid through the portal.

They were inside the great Temple of Sephis and still undetected.

It was dark just inside the door, but light came from the end of a long corridor just ahead.

They found that the passage opened onto a large hallway, lit by lamps along the walls. A dozen or more guards stood in front of a great set of double doors.

Kesepton turned and clasped hands with each of them, even the great Purple Green.

From here on, they would go forward only by right of the sword.

The Queen of Mice relaxed her muscles and slowed her breathing. She murmured a series of subtle declensions and formed a powerful volume that she released like a long drawn-out sigh.

Slowly the wheels of consciousness spun to a halt in her mind, and she transcended to an astral plane. This was not the subworld of chaos, and it required no power to stay or to travel here, it was a subtle realm, a refraction of the higher worlds such as Ryetelth.

To her mind’s eye, she appeared to float through a field of semitransparent blue bubbles, billions on billions of them, each surface reflecting a billion others. She concentrated. The bubbles came to an end, cut off in a cliff wall of phase perception, and now she seemed to float through a clear ether, uniformly lit by the mental energies of living beings all around her. In some ways it was as if she floated in a field of stars, a great galaxy perhaps.

Nearby she sensed an enormous presence, a darkness that was devouring the lights. The thing in its dark pit. Nearby was another powerful presence, a light so bright and hard it was violet in hue, tinged with black. The horned master that had surprised her in Ourdh.

And all around her were human minds, white and yellow points in great numbers. But none of these were what she sought. That lay closer in more humble circumstances. She focused on the most immediate surroundings, on a smaller scale. And here there was a great number of tiny lights, small golden glimmers in the darkness, the minds of mice and insects.

And among these tiny minds, she found a nest of paper wasps built in a crack in the wall of the temple. It was close by, and thus useful for her purpose.

Ribela focused on the queen of the nest, a small ferocious personality. The paper wasp queen was much concerned with food, egg laying, and the numbers of her daughters that were functional at that moment. Some were missing. There were birds nesting elsewhere on the wall. It was interfering with the food supply, and there were many hungry grubs to feed. The wasp queen became agitated as Ribela made contact. The wasp bit her daughters and sisters and buzzed her wings angrily. She could not understand what was happening nor control her reaction. She buzzed madly, abdomen twitching, jaws working, for several seconds, and then quite suddenly all this activity ceased as Ribela set in place a calming spell.

It was not the easiest spell to cast. The insect mind is a terrifying place of absolutes. But at length, Ribela was done and she withdrew. The wasp queen went about her business, but now prepared for what was coming.

Ribela rested, falling back into her body, collapsed into a deep sleep. When she awoke, an hour later, Lagdalen was already awake.

“I have spoken to the guards, my lady. I pleaded with them to release me.”

“Good, then we can proceed.”

Ribela set herself to rise into the astral mode once more. It was more difficult than before, an hour to sleep was insufficient at her age for this trick. In fact, she was approaching exhaustion. But there were no mice on hand to provide energy for the mightier magic involving the astral plane on the subworld of chaos. She found it hard to simply relax and not drift back into sleep. It was a difficult trick, but at length her tired old head achieved the necessary state.

Close by, outside the door, stood two guards. They knew that Lagdalen was within and they had heard her soft voice, pleading with them. Ribela now had to raise a killing lust within one of them.

Ribela had done without lust on her own part for centuries. It took a great effort for her to recall the mechanisms, the impulses of human nature. Slowly she formed the spell and wove into it the picture of the beautiful young woman in the cell with her glossy hair and firm body.

The guard she had chosen quickly became aroused. The other was virtually asleep, leaning on his spear. The enemy did not expect any trouble from a couple of women locked up in a cell.

The guard fidgeted for a few minutes, but the thoughts of the lush body of the young maiden in the cell would not leave him. Suddenly he broke. He drew his sword and slew his colleague with a thrust from the side. The man died without a sound.

The guard lowered him to the ground and opened the door with the big key from his belt.

Lagdalen put her hand over her mouth and cowered back against the wall. She had removed her leggings.

The man looked down at the witch, who feigned unconsciousness, then he strode across the cell, grasped the girl, and began to pull apart her clothing. Lagdalen went limp, Ribela had told her not to move at this point.

The man was on top of her, clumsily trying to rape her. Lagdalen resisted him but only passively, without striking a blow, gritting her teeth against his hot breath and his beard where it scratched against her while his hands invaded her.

There was a sudden loud buzzing in the ceiling of the cell. An angry horde of black and yellow wasps had flown in through the narrow ventilation slit set high on the wall. The queen had sensed the attack and had considered it a direct threat to her nest. The wasps dropped on the guard and began to sting him wherever they could reach. With loud oaths and cries, the man pushed himself to his feet and slapped vigorously at the swarm that swung angrily around him.

He didn’t notice Lagdalen getting to her feet. She struck with her right foot, and he doubled over with a gasp, clutching his abdomen. A wasp stung her, but she remembered Ribela’s warnings and did her utmost not to move. Several wasps landed briefly on her arms and face, but they did not sting. They returned to stinging the poor guard, who had gone down on his knees, still groaning from her kick to the belly.