BOOK II OF III: The Reign of the Sultan (37 page)

The following morning, after the army and the
giants had unassembled camp and breakfasts were eaten and drunk,
they continued to travel northeast along the river.

By noon, for the first time since having
entered the Galgaa Jungle, thick rain clouds now covered the entire
skies and a steady rain poured down not only all day, but for most
of the night. Everyone was quite joyous, especially Cheo, about
this fortuitous turn of events!

Despite the fact that everyone was completely
exhausted, drenched, and muddy by the end of this day, they did not
camp or stop at all through this night either.

After all, Humonus had briefed to everyone,
during their hour-long break, that a night like this would be a
perfect night for the gnomes to attack, and it’d be better to ride
until morning and then make camp … no one disagreed.

It was only shortly after sunrise the
following morning that Humonus ordered the beyond-exhausted troops
to make camp—they did, and once camp was set, all but Humonus,
Cheo, and the guards immediately passed out.

During the dried-jerky breakfast that
commenced in the command tent, the only time that Humonus spoke at
all was when he informed Cheo, “I’m going to scout around on
Leshava for a couple of hours this morning, before I come back and
pass out…until we ride tonight.”

Cheo, while disgustedly and tiredly
continuing to chew on a piece of jerky in his mouth, simply cocked
his head from side to side, indicating the affirmative. He had to
drink it down with a few swigs of water, before waving farewell to
his friend, getting up, climbing into bed, and passing out.

Humonus, on the other hand, stood up, exited
the command tent, and headed to the temporary animal stables. Once
there, he assisted Darius with the final preparations. Thankfully,
both hawk and hawk-master were not tired, as they had ridden on a
topless wagon and slept.

Once the two were strapped in, he launched
Leshava straight up into the air with Darius riding passenger.

An hour later, and now forty miles to the
southeast flying at an altitude of two thousand feet, he continued
to cautiously steer the hawk around the smoky, stinky, and
poisonous clouds that rose from the areas where there once had been
beautifully lush plants and trees.

Minimally, that smoke enshrouded half the
skies … typically it was seven-eighths of the way filled with
smoke!

Nearly thirty-five minutes later, filled with
tons of loop-da-loops, Humonus just happened to glance to the
front-left of the hawk, which was to the east.

Spanning from the north to the south—in
between dozens of smoke-rising clouds—millions and millions of dead
tree stumps lined the landscape. However, there wasn’t an ounce of
smoke strangely rising up from that area, in which his deductive
mind approximated to be thirty to forty miles away!

Only a split-second later, Humonus had
already begun to veer the hawk that direction.

Approximately twenty minutes and twenty miles
closer, he saw that these dead tree stumps spanned across at least
three horizons…

About twenty minutes later with the same
amount of distance being passed, Humonus could only now tell—with
shock—that these tree stumps were actually moving about, resembling
tiny black ants. Looking back over his shoulder at Darius, Humonus
ordered, “Scope.”

“Yes, sir,” Darius said, just before his
right hand reached to the right, opened up the rear-right
saddlebag, pulled out an unadorned black scope, and extended it out
in front for Humonus to take.

Once Humonus had the scope in his right hand
and put it up to his eye—he observed that these were not black ants
at all, but millions upon millions of dark gnomes engaged in some
chaotic type of combat training!!

After handing the scope to Darius, who not
only took it but put it up to his own eye, Humonus informed,
“Darius—it seems that we have finally located the enemy army. Let’s
get back and report our findings as soon as possible.”

Without waiting for a reply, Humonus had
already begun to pull the reins hard to the right, in order to get
the hawk to pull a U-turn and go back to his army’s encampment.

“Yes, sir,” Darius replied only a moment
later, while holding tight onto the scope as he hadn’t enough time
to put it away.

Out of the very corner of Humonus’s left eye
halfway through the turn, he unexpectedly saw a much larger black
speck leap off the ground from in the very middle of all the
gnomes!

He turned his head that direction, and
observed that the speck was not only gaining altitude, yet was
flying directly toward them…

Realizing that this speck must be the dragon,
even without having used the scope to identify for sure, Humonus
lowered the reins so that the hawk would begin to descend, and at
the same time, they could pick up a whole lot more speed!

Only a second later, Darius—who was looking
through the scope—gulped out, “Sir—it’s the dragon! Oh my God!
Let’s get the hell out of here!”

Humonus mumbled, “Doing the best I can… I
promise you that…”

Perhaps ten minutes later, Humonus finally
dared to look back, grimly noticing that the dragon had
miraculously quartered the distance. It was then that he realized
that they wouldn’t make it back to their own army … not even
close!

While pulling the reins hard to the left in
order to another U-turn, he informed, “It looks like we’re going to
have to fight this beast alone—it’s flying much faster than we
are.”

By this time, the hawk now faced directly
toward the dragon, and so Humonus relaxed his grip on the reins and
allowed his mount to fly straight ahead.

With fear etched onto Darius’s face as well
in his voice, he asked, “Fight it? Alone? Are you freaking
crazy?”

Humonus breathed out, “Maybe…”

“You’re kidding me, sir! Please tell me you
are…right??” Darius asked with utter terror in his voice.

“Nope, no kidding,” Humonus said evenly, just
before he turned his head around so he could look directly into
Darius’s eyes.

Once so, his voice sounded as solid as steel
as he stated, “Darius, you really need to settle down and control
your fears, and not just for yourself as I am frightened
too…okay?

Without waiting for an answer, he added,
“After all, Darius, your main mission is to ensure that Leshava
stays alive and well—I shall do the actual battling with the
dragon. So please, while you calm yourself down, undo the rear
strap holding the lance in place, hold onto your end of the lance
until I’m ready to mount it, and, thank you.”

“Yes, sir,” Darius gulped, while trying to
tame down his fears and undo the rear strap.

At the same time that Humonus undid the
saddle’s front strap that held the fifteen-foot-long steel lance,
Darius undid the rear strap and then held his end of the lance.

Humonus said, “Okay…pass up that lance now,
carefully.”

It was then that Darius apologized, “Yes sir,
and by the way sir, I apologize for two reasons. One, I’m sorry for
letting my fears take a hold of me. Two, I’m sorry for not having a
weapon—though I don’t know how to fight at all, as I am just a hawk
master.”

By this time, the lance’s handle securely
rested within the circular wooden post that extended out the side
of the saddle.

With his left hand, Humonus first gripped the
wood handle of the lance, and then said, “No problem. I’m a highly
skilled warrior who knows how to use weapons of any type, including
lances. Hopefully I’m good enough to kill this…
thing
!” He
had grumbled aloud his final word.

About five minutes later, both he and Darius
could both see the whites of the hatred-filled eyes as the
monstrous dragon continued to zoom directly toward them at an
uncanny speed, especially for something so freaking huge! It was
perhaps a quarter of a mile away now.

In Darius’s unspoken opinion, it seemed that
both Humonus and this dragon were playing the popular gambling game
that was held monthly in a large arena back in his home city—a game
called “chicken.”

In this dangerous-and-deadly game that had
only two contestants, each contestant rides upon a horse-drawn
chariot moving at full-throttle toward the other contestant; that
is, until one of the contestants chickens out by pulling his or her
reins sharply to the right or the left, in order to avoid the
impact.

From the dozen-or-so times Darius had
witnessed the games, he oftentimes more-than-not discovered horses,
chariots, and contestants brutally smashing into each other, and
both contestants getting majorly injured if not killed in the huge
pileup. In fact, the only real winners to this game, in his
opinion, were the hundreds of viewers doing the betting and
cheering—they could even bet that a collision would occur in the
next round, in which they called that round “a draw.” In Darius’s
case, however, he never had good luck in most of his predictions,
and as he didn’t like to lose hard-earned pay, it was but a rare
occasion that he ever went.

Only moments seemed to pass before Humonus
pointed at his target and steadied the lance … only dozens of feet
separated the two contestants at this point.

Just at the last possible second before
contact, Humonus tugged hard twice to the left on the reins, back
to back, which caused Leshava to immediately roll to the left, and
those two forces to miss each other by mere inches!

A split-second later, the lance contacted,
punctured, and ripped through the dragon’s right wing, but only a
second after contact, the wooden base of the lance suddenly cracked
completely off, just before the handle was ripped out of Humonus’s
right hand!

Out of the corner of his right eye, Humonus
saw that the dragon had no choice but start slowly circling its way
down to the ground—thankfully with the lance still stuck in its
right wing.

Humonus’s right hand drew out his sword,
while his left hand pulled the reins down and to the left … until
Leshava was flying about a hundred feet directly over the
dragon.

Once so, he yanked twice down on the reins,
back to back, which yanking caused the hawk’s wings to collapse,
and for the three of them to plummet straight down toward the
dragon!

Less than five seconds later, upon drawing
close to striking range of the dragon’s neck, Humonus pulled up on
the reins, so that the hawk would level out in altitude—she
did.

Humonus, once in that range two seconds
later, swung his sword with all of his might! Right away it bounced
off the thick armor on the dragon’s neck, which didn’t surprise the
man. What did surprise him was the fact that the dragon had
unexpectedly flipped around in midair, and was now clutching
tightly around his torso with its front-right paw! Even worse, one
of those claws had ruptured through his body armor and into his
abdominal flesh … he couldn’t help but scream out in horrific
pain!

Because Humonus was strapped into the saddle,
all four—dragon, two humans, and hawk—began to plummet for the
ground! They were currently a little over eight hundred feet in the
air.

Through the pain, he realized that everyone
aboard would die if he didn’t immediately do something about it,
and so he did!

Instantly he located and released the
quick-release straps holding him into the saddle … he and the hawk
were now separated.

Within the next two seconds, Leshava had
already recommenced to level out in altitude, even though her reins
were still wildly flapping around in the wind. Meanwhile, Darius
continued to desperately reach out and grab them, so that he could
regain control over the hawk’s flight!

As for Humonus and the dragon, they continued
to plummet straight for the ground!

Only five seconds later, the dragon
unexpectedly flipped back around in midair yet again and spread out
her wings as best she could, in order to slowly descend! Once on
the ground, it was her fullest intentions to yank the lance out of
her wing, heal up, and then eat this “most-troublesome human” that
was still in her clutches.

Although everything seemed hopeless for
Humonus, his fighting spirit never gave up—with the tip of his
sword, he began to try and pry the sharp blade between two of the
scales, in order to pierce the dragon’s flesh and do some
damage!

The dragon, upon feeling the very first ounce
of sharp pain caused by the sword, became quite irritated with this
pest-like human, and so she purposefully released her grip!

In turn, Humonus’s body instantly plummeted
five hundred feet through the sky and toward the earth—the very
second before making impact with the ground, he instinctively
relaxed every muscle in his body!

When the dragon—now at an altitude of four
hundred feet—threw her head back and saw the human bounce off the
ground and fly ten feet back up into the air, she began to laugh
menacingly. Not only did her forked tongue dart in and out like a
hissing snake, yet thousands of jaggedly sharp teeth instantly
became revealed like a shark’s maw!

Still, it took her nearly a minute before she
able to finally land on the ground, due to her broken wing with the
lance still stuck through it, perhaps two thousand feet away from
the unmoving human. Once there, she next began to use both of her
front paws, in order to carefully yank out the lance.

Upon removal, about thirty seconds later, her
wing began to heal itself, magically—two seconds later, it was once
again “undamaged and unscarred!”

In the very next moment, she cast her fuming
gaze to the human who still hadn’t moved a single inch, ever since
having landed on the ground the second time. She was just about to
stomp her way over to this human and eat him, but she heard a deep,
masculine voice inside her head call out,
Hail, Your Unholy
Greatness!