Draconis' Bane (41 page)

Tristan’s jaw
dropped. “A
dragon
helped form the group that would slay
dragons!?” He shouted.

Ben waved off the
question. “You must understand, young Prince, Henjis only wanted
the mantel of Dragon King so he could safeguard his brethren!” He
explained.

“Instead he gave them
the tools to hunt down and kill all of the dragons!” Tristan
yelled.

“And he very likely
paid for that mistake with his life.” Ben yelled. “His daughter now
commands the
Bane
and it’s by her hand that you are here as
you are.” He continued.

“We’re wasting time.”
Tristan answered, his irritation rising inside him like a disturbed
serpent ready to strike. He walked back over the study area calling
Eurydice.

“Listen to this.” She
answered him in rush, interrupting him. “Atacamite is the only gem,
crystal or magical item known to be able to funnel energy from
another life source. If used properly all of the targets energy can
be funneled into the gem and focused to another.” She blurted
out.

“Wait a second. All
of the dragon power is being funneled out of all of the remaining
dragons and into someone else?” William asked in surprise.

“Not exactly.” Ben
replied as he walked over to them. “Danica Rhodes can’t tap into
that power, only the creator of the gem can do that, and the irony
is that it’s draining him of his power as well.”

“Henjis.” Tristan
said gritting his teeth.

“Precisely.” Ben
agreed. “So instead, the gem just keeps growing and growing as it
draws away the last of the Dragon Magic on our world.” The old man
explained. “Soon the land will start to revert back to its original
state, the climate will change and I very much doubt mankind will
survive.”

Tristan turned to
Euri and asked. “How do we destroy this gem?”

Eurydice flipped the
pages, panicking. “It….it doesn’t say.” She replied looking up at
him in shock.

~

“Damned fool.” Rhodes
cursed, picking her way through the rubble.

A short distance away
Rossi’s arm twitched from underneath a pile of large stones. Danica
smiled sadistically at the bloody arm. The hand grasped weakly at
the stones around it as Antonius tried to pull himself out of the
rubble of the collapsed ceiling. That last spell had brought down
the rest of the ceiling. Rossi had been in the middle of casting
another spell and couldn’t keep his defenses up as three pillars
collapsed around him and a large chunk of ceiling came crashing
down on him.

Using her arts, she
pulled pieces of rock off of him so that she could finish the job.
When she’d moved the third rock she heard mumbling and barely had
her defenses gathered around her as a shock wave threw her
backwards. Danica landed painfully twenty feet away as all the air
exploded from her lungs.

She forced herself to
draw in breath, bringing tears to her eyes from the effort. Her
robe was in tatters around her, the hood ripped off by a barely
dodged spell and holes scattered haphazardly all over her robes
from weaknesses in her defenses. Rhodes reflexes saved her as she
summoned her defenses again as a ball of fire erupted around her.
On one knee she focused her will and fought against the oppressive
heat.

The spell lifted
leaving her skin reddened and irritated and her robe was a
smoldering ruin. She focused her will again and summoned all of her
remaining power directing it at Antonius Rossi. An angry green
fireball erupted from her hands and quickly crossed the rubble
between them.

Rossi waved his arms
in a circle focusing his power, when he shot his hands forward a
weak barely coherent dome leaped up around him. The ball of green
flame struck the barrier as he struggled to keep the defense up.
Sweat began to pour down his forehead and angry red pustules formed
along his arms and face.

He began to scream as
he focused his rage and anger into strengthening the defense. The
green flame vanished leaving his face black and scared, his arms
and robes smoldered as he breathed deeply, gasping to draw in
enough breath to fill his lungs. Then his eyes widened as his legs
slackened with weakness underneath him.

Dropping to his knees
he raised his hand slowly to his chest. A black jeweled dagger hilt
jutted out from his torn robe. He looked up at Danica Rhodes, whose
arm was at the end of her throw. Relief was clearly evident in her
striking features. Rossi began to sway back and forth as he slowly
pulled the dagger out of his chest with a grunt. It fell from his
limp hand as he looked up at Rhodes.

“Bitch.” He muttered
in scarcely a whisper as his eyes rolled up into his head and he
fell backwards.

~

“Great.” Tristan
fumed.

“Not only do I have
to kill the evil child of an overly ambitious dragon, I’ve got to
somehow figure out how to fix what they’re destroying.” He mused
darkly.

“More or less.” Ben
answered with a smirk.

Tristan groaned, Euri
laughed and William brooded. After the initial shock of the
monumental task in front of them, the three of them had begun
trying to decide the best way to proceed. Euri and William favored
bold direct action tough Tristan wished to be slightly less obvious
about their attack, no matter how he personally felt slighted.

The attempt on his
life still irritated him and he longed for revenge. Every time he
imagined driving his sword into the chest of the bastard who had
cast the nightmare spell on him a nagging voice in the back of his
mind would sing;
Revenge is a dish best served cold.
So
again he attempted as best he could to control his temper, despite
his more animalistic desires.

Eventually it was
decided that they could, at the very least, discuss this problem as
they mounted the stairs. Even the old man couldn’t offer them much
in the way of information regarding the stairs. Where they came
out, how many of them there were, or even if the staircase was
still intact. Not wishing to stand still any longer, Tristan led
his sister and cousin up the stairs while the old man vanished once
again.

Hours later the
endless debate ended abruptly as they approached the hole where the
light from outside poured through. The stairs ran just below the
opening. It was an enormous hole, easily thirty feet in
circumference. It was perfectly constructed and ran from inside the
cliff to the outside. Along the chasm were three smaller holes,
presumably to keep rain water from pouring into the lair.

Tristan wasn’t
inclined to investigate the entrance further. He felt a strong pull
upwards and had long ago decided to trust his instincts over his
failed memories. William and Eurydice kept pushing their point of
view on Tristan as they continued to climb the stairs.

“They can’t have much
of an army left; they lost so many in Sutten.” William said.

“Those were all Terum
soldiers cousin.” Tristan scolded.

“They’ve lost three
commanders already, how many men could they have left after that?”
Euri implored. “You never saw what I did Tristan, their leader has
a bad temper and every time you blunted their progress, the leader
would kill someone.” She explained.

“I’m not convinced.”
Tristan asserted. “Fear is a powerful emotion, if they control
their forces through fear then they’ve always done so and yet they
still managed to conceive all of those plans.” Tristan replied.

Still, his cousin and
sister continued to push the issue as they drew closer to the top
of the stairs. The hair on the back of Tristan’s neck began to rise
as they closed in on the surface. Every few minutes an explosion
would cause the dust from the top of the next flight of stairs to
fall on their heads. A rather large explosion caused more than a
few rocks to come tumbling down the chasm.

Two powerful
magicians tossed around energy at each other as children would toss
sticks and rocks. Tristan could feel the heat of battle and began
to run up the stairs, William and Eurydice weren’t far behind.

The young Prince
stepped off of the staircase and ran down a short tunnel that had
been carved out of the bedrock. Eventually, that tunnel faded from
solid rock to brick and mortar. Finally the three of them stood in
front of a large solid oak door, reinforced with iron bands.
Tristan heard a loud crash and whipped his head around; the cave
behind them was collapsing from the last blast which was still
ringing in their ears. He and William threw their shoulders into
the door, pushing with all of their might. Slowly, almost
imperceptibly, it began to inch open.

The rusted hinges
gave way and the door fell forward with a loud crash. A group of
mercenaries standing nearby watching the magical display looked
over to see the three of them standing where the door had once
been, dust settling around them. William and Tristan drew swords
readying themselves for a fight.

Eurydice stepped out
in front of them, twirled her staff over her head and brought it
down driving the end into the rocky ground at their feet. At first
Tristan thought she’d gone mad, but moments later a strong gust of
wind burst from her staff and knocked all of the mercenaries
backwards. Some of them flew far enough to clear the cliff side,
their screaming growing distant as they fell to their deaths.

The Princess dropped
to one knee briefly as a few of braver mercenaries got up and
approached them carefully. Tristan pulled Eurydice behind him and
then stepped forward with his cousin. The first of the mercenaries
broke into a full run and leapt into the air, bringing his sword
crashing down on Tristan. The Prince sidestepped the attack,
reversed his grip on his sword and drove the blade down to the hilt
through the mercenaries’ back.

William laughed,
preparing to take on the next mercenary. Tristan pulled his sword
free as the mercenary fell forwards. Tristan shook his shield off
of his back and raised his sword, ready for the next attack.
Another mercenary approached slowly, his spear and shield at the
ready as Tristan prepared himself.

The mercenary shouted
as he thrust his spear forward. Tristan sidestepped the clumsy
thrust and chopped down with his sword, slicing the spear tip off
and splintering what was left of the staff. The mercenary cursed,
tossing it aside and drew his sword. He kicked Tristan’s’ shield,
pushing the young Prince backwards to make room to swing his long
sword.

Tristan leaped
forward, blocking the strike with his sword and using his shield to
bash the man in the face. When the Prince pulled his shield back he
could appreciate the damage he’d inflicted. The man’s nose guard
was bent off to the side and his nose was little more than a
squashed tomato on his face.

The mercenary
snarled, revealing a few missing teeth and a bloody mouth as his
rage took over and he began to hack and slash at Tristan’s shield.
All pretense of swordsmanship was lost as the mercenary raged at
the Prince. Finally, having enough of this ridiculous display,
Tristan used his sword to turn aside another blind slash and used
the bottom edge of his shield on the mercenaries’ throat.

He heard a satisfying
crack as he broke his opponents’ windpipe. The mercenary dropped to
his knees and began uselessly grasping at his throat. Tristan spun
in spot and lopped the man’s head off rather than let him
suffocate. Instinct took over and Tristan lifted his shield up
behind his neck to block a blow from another man he’d seen out of
the corner of his eye.

The man’s spear
skidded along the surface of Tristan’s shield. A hook, cleverly
fashioned at the base of the spear point, pulled Tristan off
balance as the man pulled back on the Princes’ shield. Tristan
brought his sword over as his shield as it was pulled away from him
and jabbed the man through the neck with his blade. The dying
mercenary dragged Tristan’s sword out of his grip as he fell
backwards.

Off to his left
William was being over-run by three mercenaries. Tristan put his
toe under the fallen spear. He kicked it up into his waiting hand
and threw it with all of his strength. The spear took the first man
in the neck and as he fell sideways it slammed into another
mercenaries shoulder. The hook that had pulled Tristan’s shield
pulled the second mans arm off at the shoulder joint as it was
wrenched out by the dying mans fall.

William quickly
dispatched the last mercenary slicing open his gut and then kicking
him back into the armless man screaming on the ground. Tristan
picked up his shield, pulled his sword out of the dead mercenary’s
neck and walked over to William. The Prince reversed the sword in
his hand and stabbed the screaming armless man through the chest as
he walked past.

Euri was still trying
to catch her breath from the spell she cast as the cousins walked
towards her, sheathing their blades. Off in the distance a hot wave
of air rose as a robed woman flew into view briefly and then
disappeared. Tristan grabbed a hold of Euri’s hand and pulled the
young woman up and held her arm over his shoulder.

“Ready little
sister?” He smirked.

“Getting there.” She
gasped between deep steadying breaths.

William approached
and added his shoulder to the task, holding her staff for her in
his free hand. The three of them walked towards the sorcerers’
battle, looking for a safe place to observe.

An enormous ball of
fire erupted near them and crossed the distance to a woman just
getting back on her feet. Tristan watched in fascination as she
erected a defense at the last possible moment. He could see that
her robe was smoldering in places beneath the shield of light, her
skin itself began to blister. Finally the ball of fire dissipated.
The hairs on Tristan’s neck rose again, and the young Prince knew a
spell of terrible magnitude was being conjured. The male magician,
cradling his obviously injured arm, erected a force-field around
himself by waving in a circle with his good arm.