The Dragons of Ash and Smoke (Tales from the New Earth Book 5) (4 page)

“
Even
small elementals like your servants, friends, whatever, are very hard
to kill,” Stanis said grudgingly. “I wouldn't worry too
much about them. Now, as for the survivors of the town, that is a
much more interesting tale.”

Simon finished the last of
the fruit and sipped some tea, listening attentively.

“
They
stayed here with us for a month or so. Opheilla and our other clerics
healed their wounds and we gave them some time to get over the shock
of losing a second town. Also they needed the chance to grieve for
their leader, Clara.”

He looked at Simon
sympathetically and the wizard nodded silently in appreciation.

“
Afterward,
they began to debate their next move. Where to go to begin a new
settlement and all that. And that is when I got a brilliant idea.”

Opheilla snorted and
rolled her eyes.

“
It
wasn't your brilliant idea, Stanis; it was theirs.”

“
Well,
maybe so, but I did implement it after all, so I can lay claim to
some of its success, can't I?”

“
Sorry,
but what idea?” Simon asked, interrupting the beginnings of an
argument.

“
Well,
your people mentioned some mages living in a city called London,”
Stanis said, keeping a wary eye on the cleric. “I assume you
know them?”

“
Yes,
of course. A brother and sister team; Sebastian and Tamara.”

“
Aye,
that's them. The guardsman, Malcolm, also said that he'd heard tell
of another group living in the small continent that humans used to
call Australia. So, since none of your people can cast a Gate spell,
I decided to seek out these humans and ask for their advice on where
the, let's call them refugees, could resettle.”

“
That
was a marvelous idea, Stanis!” Simon told him, surprised and
pleased.

“
See,
I told you,” the dwarf said to Opheilla, who gave him an
irritated look of disgust.

“
So
I took Malcolm and the paladin, Liliana, with me in one of our
smaller drilling machines and we traveled to both locations. It took
a while to locate each group; apparently they moved around fairly
often, which I think is wise. But we spoke to both of them
eventually.”

“
Happily,
it turns out that those mages can actually cast the Gate spell,”
Opheilla cut in with a smile.

Stanis nodded, looking
pleased.

“
Saved
me chugging around the world, constantly ferrying your friends, sir
wizard,” he said jokingly.

“
But
where is everyone now?” Simon asked a little impatiently. “I'm
guessing none of them are still here or someone would have turned up
to say hello by now.”

“
Aye,
that's true,” Stanis agreed. “Now this is the interesting
part of the story. The red dragons have stepped up their campaign to
eradicate humankind and somehow, and this is quite troubling, they
have increased their numbers.”

Simon finished his tea and
Opheilla took his tray from him and set it down next to the bed. He
thanked her absently, focusing on Stanis.

“
Increased
their numbers? But I was told that that was impossible,” Simon
protested. “There are a limited number of eggs and once they
are all hatched, that is that.”

“
That
is true, my friend,” the dwarf told him gravely. “But
someone,” and he looked at the wizard keenly, “killed off
four of the five primal dragons. And now, according to certain signs
passed to Opheilla in dreams from the gods, I fear that the primal
red dragon has gathered up all of the remaining eggs from his fellow
primals and made them his own. And he has hatched them; all of them.”

“
Oh
my God,” Simon muttered in horror.

“
Yes.
I daresay that there may now be as many red dragons darkening the
skies over the Earth as there were once when all of the other types
of dragons were combined.”

“
So
we've just traded one problem for another,” the wizard said
helplessly. “Which means that killing the primals achieved
nothing.”

“
Not
nothing,” Stanis told him firmly. “You slowed down their
goal of wiping out the mortal races, including ours, for which we are
forever grateful. And you put some fear into those beasties. Never a
bad thing. But unfortunately, the red dragons are probably the most
powerful of all of their kind. And now there are a hell of a lot more
of the damned things out there.”

“
So
what you're saying is that this is all my fault,” Simon said as
he rubbed his eyes wearily. “All of our losses, all of the
battles we've been through and we're back to square one.”

“
Hardly
that,” Opheilla told him with a pat on the arm. “Red
dragons have their weaknesses. They hate the cold, for one thing. And
they have only the one basic attack: fire. Plus they are notoriously
ill-tempered. They hate us, yes, but they also hate each other and
only work together with great reluctance. Which means that you will
rarely see a dragon attack of more than a few of them at a time.”

“
Small
favors,” Stanis said a bit sourly. “But let me finish up
my tale. After hearing about the attack on the new town, the mages in
London and the Changlings in Australia decided that safety in numbers
made the most sense.”

“
Did
they?” Simon looked at him in surprise, shaken out of his
depression. “That's great.”

“
Aye,
I tend to agree. And since the people in Australia had seen a surge
in dragon attacks, it is rather warm there and red dragons love the
heat, they decided to move north to join up with everyone else.”

“
So
where did they all go?”

The dwarf chuckled and
Opheilla smiled as well.

“
I
think you'll appreciate their choice, sir wizard. The sibling mages
found a place in what used to be northern England; very defensible
and hardly touched in the original dragon attack. It is big enough to
house ten times the numbers of humans living there now, it has good
fields for growing crops in season and half the year it is covered
with snow, making it a place that the red dragons tend to avoid.”

Simon shook his head with
a frown.

“
What
about wight attacks in the winter? That's what sent my friends south
in the first place.”

“
Oh,
the wights won't be having much luck attacking this place, I assure
you,” Stanis said with a bark of laughter.

“
Why
not?”

“
Because,
my friend,” the cleric interjected. “It is a castle.
Ancient, built strong from the bones of the Earth. It sits atop a
tall hill with walls forty feet high. There is only one route into or
out of it and, thanks to some tutelage from our own magic-users, your
mage friends have warded it from top to bottom. There is nowhere else
in the world that could be more secure.”

“
A
castle?”

Simon stared at them in
amazement and the two dwarves both chuckled at his expression.

“
Yes,
we thought that a wizard who lives in a tower would appreciate that,”
Stanis said with a toothy grin. “And, in memory of their lost
town, the people have agreed to call it Nottinghill Castle. Rather
fitting, don't you think?”

“
That's
just...wow, that's amazing. A castle,” he said to himself,
trying to picture it. “So how many people are living there
now?”

Opheilla glanced at
Stanis, who motioned for her to answer.

“
To
be honest, we're not quite sure. There were about twenty from the
destroyed town and a dozen from London.”

“
Plus
a couple of dozen from Australia, right?” Stanis asked her.

“
Yes,
that sounds about right. So, close to sixty, I'd say.”

“
Sixty.
Whoa. So my friends have tripled their population. That's terrific.”

“
And
better still, the group now includes four mages and a cleric, so
magical defenses are available in case of attack.”

“
Don't
forget those two warriors, Malcolm and Aiden,” Stanis added.
“I've rarely known two such skilled fighters. They are training
others and doing a fine job. Plus the paladin, Liliana. A formidable
woman.”

Simon nodded and ran his
fingers through his hair thoughtfully, pushing it off of his
forehead. Then he caught himself and tugged at his hair with both
hands.

“
Hey,
my hair grew back!” he exclaimed, absurdly pleased for some
reason.

Opheilla smiled at his
delight, while Stanis chortled.

“
Well,
just because you were unconscious for six months, it didn't stop your
body from doing its business,” she told him. “I don't
wish to sound immodest, but we dwarven clerics have perfected methods
of keeping our patients fed and fit even in deep coma. You are
actually physically stronger now than you were before you were struck
down.”

“
Yeah,
I noticed that I'm not as skinny as I was before I ended up,”
Simon waved at the room, “here. Um, I don't want to sound vain,
but do you happen to have a mirror? I'd like to take a look at
myself; curiosity and all that.”

The dwarves exchanged a
quick glance and, after a moment's hesitation, the cleric nodded once
at Stanis, who turned and left the room.

“
That
was a rather ominous expression you had there. Am I so ugly now?'

Simon had asked the
question jokingly and was met with a solemn look by the cleric.

“
I
have no way to judge the attractiveness of humans, sir wizard. Would
you say that you were handsome before,” she tapped the scars on
his arm, “this?”

“
Handsome?”

Simon thought about it a
moment.

“
Well,
I know I was better looking than I had been before I Changed. Part of
that was just being young, I suppose. I guess the mismatched eyes
were at least interesting.” He shrugged. “I've never been
too caught up with looks. Personally, I've always been attracted to
people by their personalities rather than their physical beauty.”

“
A
healthy attitude,” Opheilla said. “I approve. But even
so, I must warn you that the young man you were used to seeing in a
mirror has been altered significantly. You should prepare yourself
for a bit of a shock.”

He nodded and then
swallowed nervously. If a dwarf who had no point of reference thought
that he was ugly, just how bad was it?

Stanis returned with a
hand mirror. It was made of silver and gold, intricately formed and
gleaming in the torchlight. He hesitated and then offered it to
Simon.

The wizard took a deep
breath, closed his eyes tightly and then raised the mirror and looked
into it.

The face looking out at
him was virtually that of a stranger. His blue and brown eyes were
the same, but that was about it.

He tried to be clinical as
he examined himself. He guessed that the fire that had engulfed him
had basically burned his face off, or most of it. He was actually
surprised that he still had his sight.

“
We
had to rebuild your features as we healed you,” Opheilla told
him carefully. “Your friends Virginia and Malcolm gave me their
opinions as the work progressed, but since I had never met you, I
could only use their advice in a general way. I pray the results are
acceptable.”

Simon had been prepared
for some hideous visage, scarred and twisted like a monster. But what
he saw was nothing of the sort. Instead, he saw a young man with his
own wide eyes, but with some things just a bit off. His nose was
smaller and narrower. His lips with thinner, his forehead higher.
There were several thick scars like ropes criss-crossing his face,
across his nose, and one that ran diagonally from above his right
eye, over his lips and down to the left side of his chin, but he
barely noticed them.

He smiled at the stranger
in the mirror and the reflection smiled back. And that was when he
really saw the difference from his old face. The scarring twisted his
grin into a snarl, a leer of such rage that he gasped and stared at
himself with wide eyes.

When the smile
disappeared, he was looking at an innocent face again. It was beyond
creepy.

“
So
what do you think, laddie?” Stanis asked him diffidently. “How
did we do?”

“
How
did I do, you mean,” the cleric said firmly. “Any errors
are mine, Simon.”

“
I...I
don't know what to say,” the wizard replied, watching himself
as he spoke. He was relieved to see that his snarl didn't appear as
he was speaking, only when he smiled.