Omensent: Rise of the Shadow Dragons (53 page)

Susa managed to tear herself free of the cultist
's grips, and jumped down from the platform, dashing away as fast as her tiny little legs would carry her, but she wasn't fast enough. Tara suddenly appeared from behind the altar in pursuit. The young child tried valiantly to avoid capture, but the scar faced woman was too quick, and managed to seize the girl by her hair. She screamed in pain and horror as Tara began to drag her back towards the altar, ignoring the raging torrent of debris which swirled around the ruins chaotically.

Damion was just preparing to act, when an arrow suddenly appeared from the chaos, burying itself deep into Tara's shoulder, causing her to drop the slave girl, who ran for her life, disappearing into the safety of the marshes. He turned to see Raven retreating from the swirling debris,
her bow grasped tightly in her hand. She quickly vanished from sight, presumably to search for the frightened young slave girl.

He looked back towards the altar and watched as Tara slowly rea
ched back and wrenched the arrow free from her shoulder, then tossed it away negligently, and turned to gaze at him with hate filled eyes.

"Do you think you have won?" She suddenly
screamed. "Do you think we care about that child?" She began to laugh insanely, still ignoring the swirling pandemonium around her. "She was only meant as bait to insure you followed me here to your doom!"

Damion stared at her in shock as her body suddenly began to elongate and darken, stretching to impossible
proportions as her skin continued to darken, until finally, an enormous shadow dragon stood before him, staring down at him with contempt. The other cultists also began to transform, until every single robed figure had revealed themselves to be shadow serpents, then almost as one, they turned to face him, their eyes bright with triumph.

"I guess I've located the brood
!" He muttered to himself.

"I knew you would never suspect what we had planned for you!" The huge shadow dragon rumbled at him in amusement. "Now
you shall die, and we will use that sword to carry out our revenge on the scarlet wyrms!"

"So
that's what all of this is about?" He asked in a conversational tone. "You want the Dragon Sword so you can take your revenge on the scarlet dragons?"

"
It was because of them we were banished from this world, driven deep beneath the surface to sleep forever, until
you
released us from our slumber! Now we will use that sword to imprison and enslave our enemies, and repay them for what they did to us!"

"And where is your brood mother?" He asked
, scanning the mass of serpents for a shadow dragon with only a single wing, as Tempest had described. "Was she too frightened to face me?"

The dragon snarled. "The mother fears nothing! And once she possesses that sword, revenge will be ours!"

He stared out at the dozens of shadow dragons, and an eerie calmness overtook him. He had set off from Sevria months before with the sole purpose of locating the brood and wiping their evil from the world, and now the brood stood before him, quivering with eagerness as they readied themselves for battle.

"Well
, if you want this sword, you're just going to have to come through me to get it!" With that, he released the power of the Dragon Sword once more, causing the swirling debris to suddenly began raining down upon the beasts with bone crushing force.

The shadow dragons went wild, launching themselves forward to attack, only to be beaten back by the churning barrage. There were dozens of shrieks of agony as the crashing debris ripped through many of the shadow dragons' membranous wings, and crushed their bones, leaving many of them crippled and injured horribly.
A number of the beasts tried to launch themselves into the air, but the swirling torrent prevented any flight, and they were forced back to the ground with their brethren.

With shriek
s of fury, several of the shadow dragons suddenly charged forward, ignoring the jagged chunks of granite that continued to slam into their enormous bodies as they shoved one another aside to be the first to attack. Several of the beasts began belching fire as they advanced, engulfing the foundation on which he stood fearlessly, momentarily obscuring his vision, but he ignored the flames, confident in the fact that he was impervious to the heat, and continued to focus his magic on the swirling torrent of debris.

A huge block of limestone suddenly sailed through the flames, narrowly missing his head.
He stumbled back, losing his balance, and releasing his hold on the flying debris, which came crashing down upon the raging brood, crushing several of the monstrous beasts under tons of granite blocks.

He dove to safety as one of the shadow dragons, the beast which had disguised itself as
Tara, lunged forward, its razor sharp talons slashing the air. He rolled to his feet and sent a sizzling bolt of energy streaking from his fingertips. It struck the great beast full in the face and exploded, hurling it backwards where it slammed into several others. It scrambled back to its feet, screaming in insane fury, then lashed out again, reducing the granite foundation on which he had been standing to rubble. His exposed flesh was pelted with sharp jagged debris, opening a large gash over one of his eyes.

Damion fell back as he tried to wipe away the blood, which had began to pour down into his eye, partially obscuring his vision. The shadow dragon tried to take advantage
of his injury and pressed the attack, but he was prepared for this and instantly dropped to the ground, avoiding its raking claws, and lashed out with a powerful blow.

The scream that the be
ast released was deafening. The burning sword carved into the dragon's wrist, just above the forepaw, slicing through scale, skin, and bone effortlessly, severing it completely from the attacking beast. It stumbled back, staring at the stump at the end of its wrist, which was pumping enormous amounts of blood across the plaza. It shrieked again in agony, then tried to launch itself into the air, flapping its ragged and torn wings desperately, but Damion rolled to his feet and rushed forward, dashing up the fleeing beast's whipping tail, the Dragon Sword still blazing. The sword sizzled as it sliced through the membranous flesh and ropey tendons of the dragon's great sail-like wings, crippling the fleeing beast, and causing it to crash back to the ground. He jumped clear as it began to thrash about insanely in a desperate attempt to regain its footing with only three legs.

The horrendous wound on its forth limb
was still gushing huge amounts of blood, and was beginning to effect the rampaging beast. Its thrashing began to grow weaker, and its movements became sluggish, but it still wasn't ready to give up its attack. It whirled around dazedly, slamming its tail into one of its brethren with bone crushing force, crushing the side of its head, then lunged forward, its massive jaws agape.

Damion almost laughed as he easily side stepped the desperate lunge, then drove the flaming Dragon Sword directly into the shadow dragon's neck and ripped it downward, severing the beast's windpipe, and ripping open a massive wound in its scaled throat.

The shadow dragon that had once disguised itself as the slaver Tara, screamed  a gurgling scream of anguish and reared back onto its hind legs, grasping feebly at the fatal wound, then collapsed twitching to the moss covered ground.

He scrambled away from the massive corpse breathing heavily, then turned to face the remaining shadow dragons, many of whom were already move in for the attack. "
This is going to take a while." He muttered to himself, preparing to meet their attack with brute force. "I guess I had better get started." He let out a roar of defiance, then charged forward, the blazing Dragon Sword held aloft.

Chapter 18

"It must be their reinforcements." Sly said in a tired voice, watching the new army of dragonspawn as they continued to pour from the forest and gather in the clearing on the far side of the trade road. "I had hoped that they hadn't been holding any in reserve, but that was too much to hope for, I guess."

"This new force seems to be led by yet another shadowspawn." Damarius pointed to a
shadowspawn at the head of the new army. He squinted in an effort to get a better look. "It appears to have already suffered an injury!"

Sly peered down at the creature and was surprised to see it was indeed missing part of one arm. "You're right! It looks as though it has already seen some battle!"

They watched as the force continued to grow, then at a gesture from the one armed shadowspawn, the force suddenly charged forward towards the first mass of dragonspawn, obviously ready to join their fellows in the attack.

"Here they come!" The little man bellowed in warning.

The new force of dragonspawn merged with the first, then to everyone's surprise, began attacking their fellow dragonspawn, ripping into the already injured and demoralized beasts with a brutal efficiency.

"They're killing their own force!"
The old wizard said in a baffled voice. "Why in the world would they do that?"

"Who cares
?" Sly declared, watching as the dragonspawn continued to slaughter one another. "There will be less of them for us to deal with!"

The fresh army of dragonspawn
reduced the few remaining creatures with surprising ease, then after only a few moments of mingling around, they slowly began to retreat from the wall and move back across the open clearing. They gathered around the one armed shadowspawn momentarily, then turned and began to disappear back into the surrounding forest where they came, leaving the shadowspawn to stand alone in the center of the pasture.

"What just happened?" Sly asked, still expecting the dragonspawn to come boiling back out of the forest. "Why would they slaughter their own force, then retreat? That makes no sense!"

"It looks as though that shadowspawn ordered them to be killed," Damarius murmured, scratching his cheek absently. "then sent the rest of the spawn back to where they came from!"

"Why would it do that?"

The old wizard shrugged. "I'm not sure," He gestured to the crippled beast, who had raised its good arm and began waving it back and forth, obviously trying to get their attention. "but I'm guessing it wants to tell us!"

After several minutes of discussion, both Sly and Damarius decided to go out and meet with the creature, which continued to wait patiently in the center of t
he clearing. They were forced to wait while several of the town blacksmiths made some rudimentary repairs to the outer gate, then, once it had been raised high enough to allow them to pass, they rode out to meet the crippled beast, carefully weaving their way through the mass of charred corpses.

The shadowspawn
did not react as they approached, but merely watched them with unreadable eyes.

"Do you speak the common tongue?" Damarius asked as they reined in their horses a few feet away.

"I do." It replied in a hissing voice.

"Why have you come here?"

"Massster sssent me to watch over hisss home."

"Who is your master?" Sly asked, his face confused. "And why would he have you destroy your own kind
?"

"Massster isss the
dragon man." The shadowspawn answered, rubbing its crippled arm unconsciously.

"Dragon
man?" The little man suddenly snapped his fingers. "Damion! He was the one who sent you?"

The creature nodded its head once. "Massster
ssspared me, and I pledged my life to him. He accepted, and declared my name to be SSSlither."

"And he had you gather other dragonspawn to help protect Sevria?"

Slither nodded once more. "Massster wissshesss hisss home to be protected. He sssent me to insssure it remainsss untouched."

"Where was Damion when you last saw him?" Damarius asked curiously.

"In the landsss to the north." It answered. "Massster plansss to face the Mother. He plansss to dessstroy the Mother."

"The
brood mother?"

The shadowspawn nodded yet again. "The Mother ssseeksss to dessstroy Massster, and isss awaiting hisss arrival in the landsss of the ssserpent people."