A Dark Tide (Book of One) (26 page)

The group of Darga, almost two dozen of them, changed direction and leapt to another tree branch that ran toward the two who were shooting at them. Another Darga took an arrow in the eye and smashed into the branch, dead, then plummeted to the ground.

"The trick is to keep your breathing perfectly steady and time the shot," Borrican told Storm. "If you let yourself get worked up and change your aim, even the slightest amount, the shot will go wide of your aim."

"I will kill another of these Darga," Storm said and he nocked another long, Kandaran arrow in the large bow and followed one of the lizard men running toward them. He let the arrow fly, and even though the Darga tried to dodge, it caught the creature directly in the throat. Storm turned to Borrican and leaned casually on the end of the bow. "I see how the distance can affect the aim. There is a slight breeze as well."

"Excellent shot," Borrican said as he took aim, using his dragon sight, and let fly with another arrow, then he spotted a familiar looking elf, chasing after the Darga. "It looks like we've been found out. If I am not mistaken, that would be Prince Quenta, coming to berate us for helping him."

The Darga were almost upon them now, and Borrican and Storm leaned their long, heavy bows against the trunk of the tree and drew their swords.

"Let us kill these Darga first," Storm said.

"We might as well," Borrican said with a grin. "Hopefully his elven highness won't mind too much."

"Lexi," Ehlena said, sensing movement far ahead of them. "There is a group of Darga flying toward us."

"Where?" Lexi asked. "I do not see them."

"They are too far away for you to see," Ehlena said. "I can feel them on the wind."

"What should we do?" Lexi asked, not sure how she felt about the creatures. She hated her brother and her mother, and she did not like the way the Darga were such stupid beasts, but she remembered her brief moment with Razak, the Darga that had fathered her, and she was not sure how she felt about the lizard people. She also remembered when they had attacked her in the forest, when she was traveling with Aaron and Tash and the others.

"These Darga are in the service of the dark god who has become one with Calexis," Ehlena said, sensing Lexi's hesitation. "I do not know their purpose, for my ability to hear things on the wind isn't as strong as it was."

"Since Stroma took your essence with the sword," Lexi said.

"Luckily he did not take all of my essence," Ehlena told her. "He did take much of my power, which is slowly returning but is far less than it was."

"Then I have some of your power," Lexi said.

"I suppose you do," Ehlena replied with a tired smile.

"I can give it back to you," Lexi said. "Is there a way to do it? It feels like too much."

"There might be a way," Ehlena told her. "But first, we should decide what to do about the Darga."

"If they fight for my mother, then we must stop them," Lexi said. "All of them."

"There are many such Darga, Lexi," Ehlena replied.

"They have chosen to fight for her, so I will kill them."

"Will you kill them all?"

"If I have to, yes," Lexi said, and she caught sight of a handful of shapes appearing against the sun that shone brightly as it neared the horizon to the west. Lexi glanced over her shoulder. "Can you fly on your own?"

"Yes, I can do that," Ehlena said and she stood upon the edge of Lexi's wing and her form began to shift and waver, becoming the wind itself. "I can even help you move faster if you like."

"I can move fast enough," Lexi said, then she called up the lightning power she had taken from Stroma and she shot forward, toward the Darga.

Ehlena drifted through the air a distance behind her as Lexi curled and spiraled around, fighting the Darga, her powerful jaws crushing them and her claws knocking them from the sky. The last remaining Darga drew a sword and tried to attack her with it, but Lexi took a deep breath and blasted it with a ball of crackling energy that was like a mixture of fire and lightning, and the creature was almost completely incinerated. As the sword fell from its clawed grip, Ehlena appeared and caught the blade, and it was as she expected, another godsword. She turned to Lexi, who hovered in place, flapping her great wings.

"That is like the sword Aaron gave me," Lexi said. "The one I used to take Stroma's power."

"It is," Ehlena said, testing its weight, and executing several strokes she remembered from a time long forgotten, when she had used such a blade. She looked down at the foothills below. "The other Darga each had swords like these. It would be best if such weapons were not left lying around, and they might prove useful."

"I can see where they fell," Lexi said, her eyesight shifting strangely again, now that she was searching the ground for the bodies of the fallen Darga. Ehlena grasped hold of her wing and the two of them began to circle down toward the ground, but Lexi kept blinking, not sure about her vision. "Something is wrong with my eyes."

"What is wrong about them?" Ehlena asked.

"I can see in different colors," she said. "And I can see much farther too."

"That is one of the benefits of being a dragon," Ehlena said. "They are fighters and once, long ago, they were hunters."

"So there isn't anything wrong with me?"

"I do not think so," Ehlena said. "Of course, I am not a dragon, and I don't see through your eyes, so I do not know exactly what it is that is different."

"I guess that's true," Lexi said.

"I believe it is true of every person and every living thing," Ehlena said. "No one sees everything exactly the same."

"I never thought of that," Lexi replied as she landed on the ground next to where one of the Darga had fallen.

Ehlena picked up the sword and realized that she would need more hands if she was to carry the other four weapons that the Darga had carried. She pulled the sword belt the creature wore, a simple leather piece, then she buckled it around her waist and carefully slid the sword beneath it, then she did the same with the other one. Lexi sniffed the air and nodded her head in the direction of the scent of Darga blood.

"There is another one close to here," she said, and she lumbered forward, with Ehlena following along close behind.

After a short while, they managed to collect all six blades and Ehlena's belt was a veritable armory.

"I don't know if I can fly with all these swords," she said. "One or two, maybe."

Lexi shifted to her other form and looked down at the sword at her waist, curiously.

"How is it that when I change, the sword disappears?" she asked.

"I don't exactly know," Ehlena replied, and she looked for an answer in her oldest memories. "I think it has something to do with the metal and the gemstones being akin to your dragon form."

"Oh," Lexi said. "I still don't know much about it. Ashan says that dragons live in the north, where there is a lot of fire."

"That is true," Ehlena said. "The fire is the blood of the earth, stone so hot that it is molten and it bubbles up from deep below the ground. The blood of the earth has metals and the substance of gems within it and, as I understand it, dragons like to swim in it."

"If it is so hot, does it burn?"

"Not dragons," Ehlena said. "It sustains them, like eating and drinking, and I think they quite enjoy the heat."

"I wish I knew more about dragons," Lexi said. "I always wanted to not be a Darga anymore, but then Ashan said the Darga were once dragons, and he said I should be that instead."

"Did Ashan tell you that the dragons were once Ansari?"

"He said that," Lexi told her, remembering what Ashan had told Tash. "And he said Ansari could take dragon form, but that it was very dangerous."

"Yes, it is, unless you are a dragon," Ehlena said.

"I don't understand," Lexi said with a frown.

"Dragons chose to be dragons, and that meant no longer being able to change to whatever they want, like Ansari," Ehlena explained as best she could from her older memories. "Dragons became their own race, separate from the Ansari. They are more powerful in some ways, but they also sacrificed much for that power."

"What did they sacrifice?"

"Madness," Ehlena said.

"Ashan talked about that too, and I don't understand."

"The dragons became mad, in a way. To others, it is a kind of madness, but to dragons it is simply the way they are," Ehlena told her. "I can't really explain it because I am not a dragon, but perhaps you will learn more when we reach the elven forest."

"I have never met an elf," Lexi said. "The Darga do not like them."

"No," Ehlena said. "And I would imagine the elves do not like the Darga very much, since they are attacking their forest. But it is not the elves that can help you understand what it is to be a dragon, it is the dragons who are there, fighting the Darga."

"There are dragons where we are going?"

"Yes," Ehlena said. "One of them is a prince, and a friend to Aaron, and the other is a dragon from the north."

"Are there many dragons in the north?" Lexi asked.

"Yes, there are very many," Ehlena said.

"I would like to go there some day and meet these dragons."

"Perhaps you will," Ehlena said with a smile.

Lexi stared at Ehlena, who she knew was a goddess, but sometimes seemed just like a normal girl, the way she had often wished she could become, and she smiled awkwardly for a moment. Ehlena said nothing, but she was pleased to see such an expression on Lexi's face, and she realized she had never really seen her smile before. It only lasted for a moment, then her look turned serious again.

"Do you want me to give you back your power?" Lexi asked.

"You really would do that?" Ehlena asked.

"Will it make it harder for me to fight?"

"I don't think so," Ehlena said. "You said you felt like you had too much power, right?"

"I drank too much water once, when I was captured in the desert, and I felt like I was going to burst," Lexi told her. "It is like that."

"Then it might be a good things for both of us," Ehlena said. "I am slowly regaining my power, but this will make things easier."

"Will it hurt?" Lexi asked, seeming very young, all of a sudden.

"I will have to cut you," Ehlena said. "But it will only be a small cut."

"All right," Lexi said, and she closed her eyes. "Do it."

Ehlena shook her head as she drew one of the godswords from her belt, then she took Lexi by the hand. Lexi opened one of her eyes and looked at Ehlena.

"Hold out your hand, Lexi," she said.

Ehlena stepped back and touched the edge of the sword to Lexi's open palm. A drop of blue tinged blood dropped from the blade to the ground and Ehlena felt energy begin to flow through the sword. It was how she remembered it from long ago, the memories of a different life, in a different age and she felt the power fill her up inside and she could now hear the world whispering through the trees, over the mountains and the streams, across the seas and through the skies. Ehlena's eyes fluttered open and she pulled the sword away, breaking the flow of power. Lexi looked at her, with a questioning expression on her face.

"Did it work?" she asked.

"How do you feel?" Ehlena asked.

"A little better, I think," Lexi said. "I don't feel like you took much."

"You have Stroma's power, Lexi," Ehlena told her. "Even though, in this age, he was weaker than he once was, he was still very powerful."

"Was Stroma the strongest god?" Lexi asked.

"The strongest?" Ehlena smiled. "That depends on what you mean by strength, but we can talk of such things on the way."

Lexi shifted form and she lowered her wing for Ehlena, who climbed up onto her shoulder, with the godswords weighing heavily on her belt.

"You will have to change back, once we reach the elven forest," Ehlena said. "The elves are a little sensitive about outsiders, especially dragons." She shifted her thin, white dress to a similarly white outfit of cloth and leather armor. The belt around her waist shifted to match, though the swords remained naked blades, and an elven mask appeared over her face. Lexi turned and looked at her.

"Is that what elves look like?" she asked.

"When they are at war, yes," Ehlena told her.

"I will try to make the same," Lexi said. She might not be able to change what she looked like when she was out of her dragon form, but at least she could change her clothes and blend in a little. And while the blue color of her skin, the permanent effect of the poison from her time in the fighting circles was something she knew she could not hide, Lexi liked that she could wear a mask.

*****

Thousands of dead soldiers marched through the narrow gorges that led up toward the giant limbed trees of the elven forest, while archers picked their way precariously across the ridges above them, keeping a watchful eye for the enemy. The Darga and the special captains had already gone ahead, bounding over the dangerous area without any trouble, while the regular forces had to plod their way on foot. The soldiers did not care, for most of them had become increasingly mindless as their bodies continued to rot, their remaining thoughts on marching where they were told and killing the enemy. Few of them noticed when the archers above them fell down upon them, and they remained oblivious when the roots of the trees that ran through the rocks and earth above them, began to move and shift, causing the rocks to break and the earth fall. The dead soldiers continued their march until they were completely buried. A Maramyrian scout, who was one of the ensorceled but not one of the dead, ran back to the command tent and found Berant returning from his survey of the troops.

"Lord General!" he yelled as he approached. "The grey forces we sent through the gaps have been killed by the enemy."

Berant stared at the man. "How?" he asked, even though he already suspected the likely cause. "We had archers positioned to protect them. What happened to them?"

"Killed, sir, by enemy archers, then the elves used magic of some kind on the tree roots and made the ground fall atop our soldiers. They are completely buried."

"That is unfortunate," Berant commented, even though he had expected such a thing might occur, for he was well aware of the elven ability to manipulate trees. "What does the ground look like now?"

"The ground?"