Dragon Ultimate (34 page)

Lessis's former companions crouched together, grim-faced. The day was ending in glory far off in the west as the sunset glittered off the distant River Oon. Beruyn was keeping watch at the head of the gulley. Their horses were muzzled and tethered nearby. Mellicent and Ward stood behind Mirk. Lagdalen and Giles faced him.

"She said we were to head north until we were sure we had not been pursued and then to turn east until we saw Mount Ulmo. From there we could go south and find the middle Argo towns."

"Right," said Giles, wrapping his arms around himself against the wind that wasn't there. "Let's go then."

Mirk and the others were silent for a moment, as if they were solemnly considering this thought.

"There is no chance of recovering the Lady?"

"I don't know," said Lagdalen, struggling to keep her voice level. "You understand who our foe really is?"

"Oh yes," muttered Giles. "I know who he is. I feel him burning in my mind. His power glows there like a dark sun. Oh yes, I know him."

"Then you can find him for us?" said Mirk. Mellicent nodded his big head at this. Ward's face was without expression, perfectly blank.

"Find him? You want to find him? He took her! Lessis the Great, just like that. And you want to find him?"

"He has powers, this ancient wight, but if he lives and breathes in flesh then he can be killed. The Lady bade me kill him once, but I was just a little too slow. I will not fail a second time."

Lagdalen put a hand on Giles's shoulder. "We must try to save her. You can find her."

"If she still lives. He may have put her to death already."

"He may have, but then again he may have wished to torment her beforehand. The Lady said that it was his cruelty that would be his weakness."

Of course, Lagdalen thought to herself, if the Dominator had not killed the Lady right away, then he was taking a serious risk, because keeping Lessis around was sure to be dangerous for him.

"You can't be serious." Giles still could not believe them.

There was no reply for a moment. Then Ward spoke for the first and only time.

"He is still in the camp."

"This is madness," Giles exclaimed. "What can we hope to do to a being like him. He is a colossus. He will rule this world and squeeze it until the pips squeak."

Mirk turned to Giles with eyes of stone.

"No. If a man lives, he can be killed. Killing is not so difficult. Getting close is difficult."

Mirk leaned closer. "You can sense him, you can guide us to him."

"By the Hand, I don't think that's a very good plan."

"You will not have to risk yourself. Just show us where he is."

Giles caught the grim certainty in Mirk's voice and wondered for the first time. Could it be possible? Mirk had a matchless reputation as a killer. But the Lord Who Burned Men, he was surely beyond the knife and the sword thrust, the poisoned arrow or the hidden syringe of curare.

Lagdalen spoke as if she read his thoughts. "He is not a man, not a wizard, nor a magician. He is an elemental of the greatest kind, and his power is indeed enormous. But the Lady says he can be slain. A knife is just as deadly to his flesh as it is to ours."

And if Giles didn't want to help them, what was the likelihood that Mirk would force him to with the threat of violence? Inside he cringed with fear; that burning power, that ferocious strength, that terrible keen eye, were all familiar to him just in the pursuit they'd made with the witch. To get even closer?

Giles's face sagged into gloom. "You really want me to take you right to him?"

After a moment Lagdalen smiled at him. "Yes."

Away to the south, beyond the River Argo, the setting sun was also a spur to the rearguard force fighting at the Angle. The battered Legions had passed through sometime before. The head of the retreating column was already on the Swampfish Bridge. They had held their lines well, but the enemy was outflanking them on both sides with parties of Baguti who had been goaded into the most maniacal fighting.

The 109th, still paired with the 145th, pulled off the rampart during the lull and began the march down the military road in the dark. To guide them, the road had white spots painted on the center stones, and these were visible stretching away into the murk in a straight line.

They had fought well and repulsed two severe assaults without casualty, though Vaunce, the crullo, had taken a knock from an ogre's hammer. Vaunce was on a wagon, being hauled by a few lucky oxen that had not been left for the trolls.

The dragons were hungry; there'd been little to eat that day. The dragonboys were bunched between Alsebra and Jumble, and though they were elated at coming through without casualties in their own unit, the story of the 44th Kadein was discussed somberly among them. Most of them were too tired to talk much. They concentrated on saving all their energy for marching.

Behind them on the Angle fortifications they had left mounds of dead imps and trolls, with even an ogre or two scattered among them. But they knew the enemy would not be stopped. Though they had killed more than their fair share, still the enemy had hundreds more trolls, dozens of ogres, and thousands upon thousands of imps, who would be on their heels very shortly.

They pushed the pace, and huge dragon bodies swayed down the road in two-legged motion, forcing dragonboys to jog to keep up. Archers formed the rear guard, moving back in ten-yard increments and stopping to take aim.

They kept the Baguti horsemen back, but bands of Baguti would pursue on foot and attempt to close on the archers. Then the rearguard spearmen would step forward and take on the Baguti. This was hard fighting, but the rear guard did the job and held back the immediate attack.

Now the Padmasan horde came on through the Angle and parties of imps, reeking of the black drink, were driven forward. The rear guard's duties became more onerous, the retreat more hurried.

Men just ahead of the rear guard eventually found themselves involved in the fighting. There was a bottleneck at Viper Swamp, and this soon turned into a battleground as the enemy came up in greater numbers and turned the rear guard into a desperate rabble. With some effort a line was formed and held, but then trolls came up and the line was broken and many men died before a few dragons were able to get back through Viper Swamp and stem the trolls.

The rear guard rallied then, and the archers took a toll of the oncoming enemy horde.

At the bridge over the Swampfish the battle was renewed when fresh forces of Baguti rode out of the dark or crawled up from the swamp, slathered in grease. For a while the road to the fort was cut off by a Baguti force that dismounted and built a barricade.

The 109th formed up and charged the barricade. The Purple Green tore the flimsy thing apart and Alsebra cleared the Baguti off the rest of it with vigorous blows of the dragonsword. The others ripped what was left off the road and drove the remaining Baguti into the swamp. Relkin and Bazil hardly got into this fight. For once they were in the rear party. Jumble, however, was forward, and he went down into the bog a few paces to thrash a group of Baguti who were struggling with their horses in a mire.

The Purple Green roared back onto the road after chasing away more Baguti, and the others turned back soon after. Bazil had never left the road, and he and old Chektor were the only ones not covered in mud. The others, dragons and dragonboys, looked at them with envious eyes.

"Very clean pair of dragons," boomed the Purple Green.

"Compared to you, perhaps," said Bazil, tired, hungry, and bruised after all the fighting of the past few days.

"It is good that the old veterans stay out of the mud. Leave that to us young ones," said green Hexarion, with the usual green lack of tact.

Bazil gave him a withering stare. "You be lucky green dragon if you live to our age, this dragon know that for sure!"

There was a whistle, and someone called, "Cuzo!" out of the dark. The Dragon Leader ordered them back on the road at the double. The enemy pursuit had not lost its impetus. They were still in a footrace to the fort.

The road became a chain of white dots stretching into the distance ahead. They set to hard marching, moving at that ground-devouring pace that the Legions of Argonath had perfected.

The 109th were well accustomed to this, even on an empty stomach. They swung along in two-legged stance, bodies leaning forward, balanced by tails, with dragonsword slung over their heavy shoulders. Marching was something that Legion units did better than any unit the Padmasans had ever organized. After the first mile or so, nine-foot-tall trolls were not able to march at much over three miles an hour. Ogres were even slower. Once they'd distanced the trolls and imps they found the Baguti suddenly more hesitant in following up.

Thus Urmin's army was able to leave the Padmasan horde behind by marching at the double through the darkness from the Angle, across the Swampfish Bridge and on to the flank of the volcano. There were two more bridges, a short wooden one at the Little Mountain Stream and a larger one built partially of stone over the Mountain Stream. The fort was just above the stream, within bowshot of the bridge.

Soon the steady tramp of Legions took them up to the bridge over the Little Mountain Stream. There was no fighting at this bridge. The Baguti probed, but they were still nerving themselves to attack when Urmin pulled off the rear guard and withdrew to the last bridge, the big one over Big Mountain Stream, just below the fort. This bridge was fortified, part of the fort's outer line of fortifications.

The 109th, the 145th, and two companies of Legion troops marched up that final stretch of road together with a defiant chorus or two of the Kenor song. They'd fought a huge battle. They'd been forced to retreat, but in their hearts they knew they were not beaten. Their spirits were high.

Not everyone was in good spirits, however. By then, Relkin had discovered that Jumble wasn't with them. He gave Cuzo the bad news at the bridge. With a curse, Cuzo called a halt. A party was sent back to look for the young leatherback, but there was no sign of him. No one reported seeing him at the Little Mountain Stream bridge either. Relkin was devastated.

To lose a dragon was the ultimate blow to a dragonboy. Relkin had not forged the deep bonds of long-term familiarity, it was not like losing Bazil, but still the loss horrified him.

"I just didn't see him go. I don't know where it happened," Relkin explained again and again, as if that would help make the guilt go away.

Alsebra tried to help. "This dragon remember Jumble step down into the swamp at the first bridge," she said.

That turned out to be the last time any of them remembered seeing the young leatherback from Seant.

"Must have got caught in the bogs," said Swane.

This thought did not help Relkin's peace of mind that much. A lone dragon in broken terrain or forest was in danger when fighting men or imps. They could easily get in behind the dragon and spear him or cut his hamstrings.

The 109th formed up again and resumed the march up slope to the fort. Rescue parties were already working back down the road, but the enemy was coming on in the rear, and that meant there was little hope for Jumble unless he could somehow get out on his own.

Behind them General Urmin rode down to the bridge to meet Kesepton. Because of their previous service together, because Urmin recognized the vast experience that Hollein Kesepton carried, he turned to him for a sounding board, as someone whose opinions he could trust. They rode out of earshot from the troops, just across the bridge.

"So, Kesepton, we marched them into the ground. But what now? They will try to keep us under siege, then send a huge raiding party up the Argo. We can't allow that."

"Well, sir, both Legions are intact Casualties during the retreat were not terrible. About forty men all told, split between the Red Rose and ourselves."

"Plus a dragon, damn it. And we've lost so many. Can't afford to lose any more."

"We have parties out there searching for him, but I admit it looks bleak for Jumble."

"Bad business to lose dragons when we're so heavily outnumbered, and they have ogres, too."

Urmin pulled out a silver flask and took a sip of brandy. He passed the flask to Hollein, who also took a generous sip.

"This army fought well; we bloodied them. Maybe we haven't won a victory, but we haven't been defeated either."

"Sir, I have this crazy idea."

Urmin cocked an eye. "My grandfather's brandy can have that effect, young man."

"Yes, sir, and maybe that's part of it, but still, I think we have an opportunity coming up."

Urmin's eyes suddenly popped wide open. "You mean?"

"Counterattack. And soon."

Urmin saw the chance at once. "Yes! We have the time to recuperate, get a hot meal into everyone and even a few hours' rest. By then the trolls will be up and the enemy will be in position right outside the fort. That's when we hit them, just bang the doors open and charge them. Put the dragons in front, men behind to exploit the confusion."

"You have it, sir."