The Pitchfork of Destiny (2 page)

“How did she die, wolf?”

The wolf tried to wriggle away from the sharp end of the tail, but it followed him like a dancing snake ready to strike. The wolf whimpered and panted in fear. “It was a dragonslayer, or at least that's the story that went through the kingdom. She was hunting in the Southern Valley, near a town called Prosper, and a dragonslayer found her and killed her.”

“
A
dragonslayer?” Volthraxus's voice cracked across the room like a whip. “Only
one
? That isn't possible. She has been known to lay waste to small armies without so much as breaking a claw or scratching a scale. I once personally saw her allow six armored knights to surround her, so she could gut them all without having to stir from her bed. Who is this mythical dragonslayer?”

“Well, it's William Pickett, now King William. He was crowned in recognition of his slaying of the dragon—­I mean, your Magdela.”

“He was, was he? Made king by the blood of my beloved.”

A terrible fire ignited in his breast, something more intense than any flame he had ever breathed.
Vengeance.
The thought echoed in his head. Never before had he wanted to kill more than he did at that moment. He rose, his body bristling with anger, the heat from his rage warming the room like a forge.

“Well, you seem to know what you're about,” said the wolf, which drew back toward the stair, limping slightly from all the battering he'd received. “Seems to me you have an audience with the King. He lives miles away to the north at Castle White. If you left here now, you could get there in no time as the crow . . . er, dragon flies.”

“Perhaps,” said Volthraxus, and he lashed his tail around the wolf, surrounding the creature in its coils. “And yet, the dragonslayer, King William, was able to kill Magdela single-­handedly, and, as I've chronicled, she was considered one of the most ruthless fighters of our kind.” He stared about the room, and his eyes fixed on a tapestry of a dragon, a rather poor rendering of Magdela carrying off a princess from the high tower of a white castle. “Tell me more about this King William. Pray, does he have a queen?”

The wolf paced within his coiled cage, talking and looking for a way out. “Well . . . well, understand the news does not always reach us in the woods by the quickest route, but I have heard that the King is planning on taking a bride soon though I do not know her name.”

Still staring at the tapestry Volthraxus asked, “Do you think she would be at this Castle White, with him? Now?”

Perhaps he had finally grown fatigued at being terrified, or perhaps he heard a change in the tone of the questions, but some of the fear left the wolf's eyes, and a sly grin spread across his muzzle. “I don't know, but,” he said smoothly, “I could find out.”

“Could you now?” asked Volthraxus, pulling his eyes away from the tapestry and fixing them on the beast.

The wolf calmly lay down, crossed one paw atop the other, and cleared his throat. “May I suggest a partnership, O Vengeful One? If you want to”—­he paused and studied his claws before returning his gaze to Volthraxus—­“
avenge
yourself on King William, and I mean
really
avenge yourself, not simply roast and eat him, but to make him suffer, you will need someone who knows the lay of the land, who can help you gather news, and who can help you navigate the kingdom. I can do all that and more.”

Volthraxus blanched at the thought of eating a human—­disgusting. He hoped the wolf wouldn't notice. “And why would you help me?”

The wolf shrugged his bony shoulders. “Partly, because it feels just. This dragonslayer has taken your love from you and profited most obscenely from his crime. Partly because you have not been the only one harmed by the death of your Magdela. Without her as a constant threat, the huntsmen and the guards and the knights of the realm have turned their attention to lesser villains, like me. We have been hounded and harried from our hunting grounds to the point of starvation. I have not had even the scent of a lost child for months now.” His stomach growled at the thought. “And partly because I think the droppings from your table will surpass the spread of my own.”

“I see,” said Volthraxus dryly. “I think you hit nearer the mark with the last point, wolf.”

“I admit it,” said the wolf. He stood and, with a sweep of one paw, gestured at his scrawny body and matted hair. “It would be ridiculous for me to deny that I could use the largesse of a rich patron to get me back to form. I only ask for a fair share for my contribution.”

Volthraxus nodded. He could understand this wolf. “What is your name, wolf?”

“Beo.”

“Very well, Beo, my name is Volthraxus, and between us we have an accord. If you serve me well, you will be rewarded beyond the imaginings of your kind. If you fail me”—­ his voice dropped ominously low—­“then I will mete out on you and your kin such punishment as will make future generations howl in fear.”

Beo, shivering now, nodded.

“Excellent,” said Volthraxus, uncoiling his tail from around the wolf. “Your first duty is to point me to the place where Magdela died. I feel the need to make an appearance.”

“O Menacing One, may I humbly advise less haste,” said Beo, as Volthraxus began to turn toward the open balcony. “It takes time to do revenge properly, and if we raise the alarm now, before we are prepared—­”

Volthraxus swiveled back and felt his golden eyes kindle into molten flame with his anger. Beo drew back beneath the force of that awful gaze. “I am not a fool, Beo. I will let you scout the castle before I attack, but we go now. I am roused to a rare anger, and my blood boils as it has not in many lifetimes of men. Right now I would do untold destruction in the cause of my despair, and there is nothing that can stand before me.”

He did not add the question that was at the back of his mind.
How long can it sustain me?

Beo lowered himself to his forepaws in a bow. “I am yours to command, Volthraxus, Avenging One.”

“That will do,” replied Volthraxus. “Which way is Prosper?”

“Northwest.”

Volthraxus snatched the wolf up in his talon again and turned in the direction of the unsuspecting town, spreading his wings to catch the wind. Magdela would be avenged, and William Pickett would suffer for what he had done.

G
wendolyn was in the kitchen garden, carefully weaving a green tendril of wild rose through an arched trellis Montague had built for her and wondering when he would return from the market, when she saw the dragon. At first it was just a black speck against the orange of the evening sky, and she mistook it for a crow, but then it began to descend lower and lower in wide, looping circles. Now there was no mistaking the sharp shape of those wings or the long, sinuous tail that flowed behind it.

Gwendolyn froze.

The dragon drew nearer and nearer, and it became obvious from the ever-­narrowing spiral of its descent that it was not coming for Prosper but for the farm. It had something, perhaps an animal, clasped in one of its massive talons.

It is Magdela returned,
she thought, and shook her head at her own foolishness. After all, she had seen Magdela's bodiless head lying bloody on Prosper's green. It was the first sight that greeted her on waking from the fairy's spell. A more frightening possibility came to mind.
It is the fairy. She has found a way around Will's proscription and has come for revenge. She will take me away again, and I will be lost forever.

The memories of her waking nightmare, for so many happy months locked away in a remote corner of her mind, sprang forth anew. The shadows under the trellis seemed to stretch unnaturally toward her. Gwendolyn began to shake uncontrollably, her eyes fixed on her coming doom, a scream trapped in her throat.

But then the dragon did something strange. It stopped about a hundred feet above the ground and hovered there, its silver-­gray wings beating against the now-­blood-­red sky, and she could see that it was looking at the flower-­covered mound out in the field where Magdela was buried. Gwendolyn could also see that this dragon had horns issuing in two sinister curves from the top of its head.

This is a male dragon,
she thought.

“He is silver like starlight and has a long tail that can flow like water,” she mouthed thoughtfully, remembering Magdela's description from so many years ago.

The dragon loosed an earsplitting roar that shook the ground beneath her feet. Then, spitting fire, he rose, and like an arrow loosed from a bowstring, launched himself to the north.

Gwendolyn stood there, unmoving, watching the dragon's flight until the frantic sound of the bells of Prosper brought her mind back from old memories. She felt a stabbing pain and noticed that she had closed her hand around the rose vine and that it had pierced her forefinger. A brilliant drop of crimson arose from the wound. She stared at it a moment, still lost in the past.

She heard the sound of running footsteps, and Montague was beside her. “Gwendolyn, are you okay?” he asked breathlessly. His arms were about her. “I came as soon as I saw it—­but you are hurt,” he added, cupping her hand in his.

“It is nothing.” Her voice sounded distant and hollow.

“Did the beast do anything? Did it try to harm you?” He asked this as though her response would answer for him whether he needed to go after the creature, and she knew he was being earnest and loved him all the more for how ridiculous the sentiment was.

Her back still to him, Gwendolyn shook her head. “No, Montague, he had no interest in me.”

“He?”

“Of course, he was her love—­Magdela's—­or he should have been. He has finally come back for her, but he is too late.” Gwendolyn turned herself in Montague's arms and buried her face against his chest, so he would not see the tears in her eyes as she began to cry.

 

CHAPTER 1

UP IN FLAMES

O
nce upon a time in the Kingdom of Royaume, a land of fairy tale that had been recent witness to no less than three verifiable happily ever afters, on a hill of green stood a shining castle of white where lived the young bachelor, King William. By all accounts, he was a good king. He was wise but not haughty, generous but not frivolous, and even if he was a bit prone to odd turns of phrase better suited to an alehouse than a throne room, he seemed to earnestly wish the best for his ­people. Indeed, the only real complaint to be raised against him (and this came solely from the lords and ladies of the realm) was that perhaps he was a bit too fair in his judgments, failing quite often to give his peers their proper due in disputes against the less-­landed classes.

His reputation for fairness was only one of the reasons that King William had become a popular subject of toasts in taverns throughout the land; another was his romance with Lady Rapunzel.
*
Their love affair was the talk of the high and the low, and the recent announcement of their upcoming nuptials had set the kingdom atwitter with anticipation.

Lady Rapunzel had, in the space of less than a year, gone from being a lunatic social outcast to the most admired woman in Royaume. Ladies everywhere had begun to copy her style, and her short hair had become all the rage with the more fashionable set.

All in all, as a new spring approached, most of the ­people of Royaume could not remember a time of such peace and tranquility. And, if there were rumors in the South of a dragon's being spotted above the skies of Prosper, most ­people dismissed them as a hoax, just another attempt by the increasingly inventive Prosper town council to increase tourism. So, on a beautiful night in the middle of March, beneath a moonlit sky bejeweled by a thousand twinkling stars, the kingdom slept soundly in the surety that King William, Lord Protector and Dragonslayer, watched over them.

Of course, things might have been different had those soundly sleeping ­people known that on a mountainside several miles to the west, the Gray Terror, the Killing Wind, Volthraxus, the Great Dragon of the North, was watching and plotting and waiting, but mostly waiting.

V
olthraxus gazed down from his mountain perch at the castle, which, even with his preternatural eyesight, was at this distance little more than a ghostly spot of reflected moonlight glowing among the foothills below. He sighed. While he had fully intended to attack the castle when he left Magdela's tower, the journey had been too long, and his white-­hot rage had faded on the flight. Somewhere between there and here he had come to the conclusion that the wolf had been right. He needed information. What if he attacked while the King and his love were at a hunting lodge or touring the kingdom? He might never live the humiliation down. So, he had stopped and given Beo clear instructions to learn all he could and return.

Now here he sat.

Waiting.

In his younger days, he never would have diverted to this hillside or sent the wolf to spy on his enemy. He would have flown straight to the castle, flaming and raging, torn this upstart king to pieces and burnt his kingdom to the ground. It would have been glorious, but then again battles were terribly messy and painful. He still had scars from the lance and arrow wounds he'd received during the misadventures of his youth, and the idea of getting poked at by dozens of metal-­bound lunks held no appeal for him.

I sound like an old Wyrm,
he thought.
I'm only seven hundred and still in fair shape.

At this, he craned his neck around to examine his armored sides and the rippling muscles of his taloned limbs.

Well, obviously I still have it,
he reassured himself silently.
I'm just being strategic. The plan is sound, and the beautiful symmetry of its revenge will be far more satisfying on an intellectual and spiritual level than would merely killing a bunch of random ­people. And, the satisfaction will be all the greater for having taken some time to come to ripeness.

The thought of stealing the dragonslayer's love away as he had stolen Magdela away did carry a certain amount of retributive justice. Forcing his love's killer to feel the agony of loss and the keen sting of dashed hopes that Volthraxus had been made to suffer also seemed quite appealing. And yet he felt empty.

He had been on these windswept heights for what seemed an eternity now, watching the wolf come and go with nothing new to report, and he was growing impatient. It was a barren piece of rock, and he hated it. No matter what he did, he could never seem to get warm.

As if on cue, a night wind began to whip its way across the face of the mountain, and, bored and cold, Volthraxus retreated back through a copse of dark green fir trees to the cave he had appropriated from a none-­too-­happy family of bears.

“And who's been eating
my
fish?” he said in a fair mimic of the question the largest of the bears had asked just before discovering the dragon asleep in his den.

Officious freaks,
he thought as he used his long tail to sweep aside the bony remains of his last meal, adding as he curled himself up for sleep, “I should have eaten them to make a point, but the big one really was too muscly, the middle one too fatty, and the little one not worth the effort. Besides, bear is stringy. They are all tooth and claw, and the fur gets stuck in my teeth.”

He hadn't had much of an appetite lately anyway. Three days, and all he'd had were a dozen or so cows, the odd sheep or two, five or six deer, two elk, and a very ill-­fated flock of geese. There was no hunger in him. He hadn't even touched the deer he had caught earlier that afternoon, and he usually appreciated good venison. All he could think about was Magdela, his poor Magdela, lying cold and alone in that farmer's field. He had hoped that this revenge business would give him some measure of satisfaction, or failing that, at least distract him from her death, but it wasn't working out to be as therapeutically destructive as he had imagined.

I will waste away at this rate.

He tried to work up an appetite by imagining the dragonslayer's lifeless body dangling, mangled and bloody in his claws, while the lamentations of his beloved hung in the air. Nothing. He just could not work up the energy to
do
anything. It was hopeless.

Face it,
he thought in a sudden burst of self-­loathing,
you just don't have the necessary bestial rage and demoniac ambition to attempt a real massacre anymore. You are old and weak.

“And possibly sick,” he added aloud in an attempt to provide an explanation that was less existential in nature.

He coughed, and a little cloud of noxious gray smoke came out.
Gray smoke, hadn't his mother told him something about that?
He tried to remember the advice she'd given him on smoke color, but it had been several hundred years ago, and all he could recall was, “Black smoke your fire's stoked, White smoke your fire's choked.”
Or was it the other way around? And what does gray smoke mean?

He was in the middle of repeating the expression aloud in different ways to see which sounded more correct when he heard the soft, rhythmic fall of padded feet along the path outside the cave. Beo was back and trying to sneak. Volthraxus smiled. It amused him that the wolf thought he could spy on a dragon. Volthraxus calmed his body and steadied his breathing. He then closed his eyes and waited, watching the mouth of the cave through the thin membrane of his outer eyelids.

A few moments later, the bright red and orange silhouette created by Beo's body heat appeared in the opening. He came on tentatively, darting from shadow to shadow, making his way toward the slain deer. Volthraxus could hear the slimy smack as the wolf licked his drooling muzzle greedily with his long tongue. The dragon recalled that kind of hunger fondly and sighed at the memory. The wolf froze, a hindquarter of deer clenched between his teeth.

“Good evening, Beo,” Volthraxus said, eyes still closed. “Hungry?”

The wolf, tail between his legs, backed into a dark corner and spit the hunk of meat to the floor between his feet. Panting nervously, he said, “Very hungry, Your Awful Eminence. I see that the hunting was good today.”

Volthraxus opened his eyes and grimaced in disgust. Now able to see the wolf in living color, he was reminded again of the creature's terrible eating habits. The wolf's muzzle and face were covered in a gory mixture of fresh blood and innards, and a string of tendon had caught in his teeth and hung limply out of his mouth.

“Still not hungry, O Avenging One?” the wolf asked, licking enthusiastically at the foul mixture on his face.

“Becoming less so with every moment,” Volthraxus said with disdain and some jealously.
God, I remember days of rending that would put this little dog to shame.

Beo glanced anxiously down at the mangled hunk of meat at his feet. “Do you mind if I . . .”

“Yes, yes, just take it outside. Watching you eat nauseates me.”

“Of course, Most Fastidious One,” the wolf said with a bow that he completed by grasping the bloody haunch in his mouth.

He began to slink away, but was stopped as Volthraxus whipped his tail out to block the cave opening. Beo sat back on his haunches and again dropped the meat with a wet
thunk
. “Was there something else, Your Unpredictableness?”

“Yes, there is
something
else. Tell me what you have learned. I grow tired of feeding you and getting nothing of value in return. You have become fat enough that I think you might well be worthy of
my
table if you do not soon provide me with the means of exacting my revenge upon this dragon-­slaying king.”

“I do have news, O Beneficent One, but sneaking through Castle White is not easy, and I have not eaten for days. I thought if I could have just a bite to refresh myself—­”

Volthraxus wrapped his tail around the wolf's body and, coiling it inward, began to tighten his hold. “Tell me what you know. Now!” His voice snapped like a whip.

“As you wish, Your Impatientness.”

“And stop with the titles,” Volthraxus roared. “Some of those weren't even proper words.”

“Again, your wish is my command, Grammatically Correct . . . I mean . . . Volthraxus.”

“Good.”

Volthraxus unwrapped his tail from around the wolf, and Beo visibly relaxed, lying on the floor, both paws positioned possessively on either side of the haunch of deer. “Do you wish to hear the good news or the bad news first?”

Volthraxus glared at the wolf, who responded by crouching lower to the ground in supplication. “No games, Beo, I wish to hear all the news.”

“Yes, I understand. It is just an expression meant to prepare you for bad—­”

“I do not have any desire to banter with you,” Volthraxus managed to put enough anger in his belly so that a trickle of steam escaped his nostrils. “Tell me all you know, or your life is forfeit. My patience is at an end.”

Eyes rolling with fear, Beo began to tell his story in a rapid-­fire fashion. “The King and his betrothed are both in the castle preparing for the upcoming wedding. However”—­and here the wolf paused and gave a meaningful glance—­“as I warned, visiting Prosper was not advisable. Tales have been spreading through the realm that a dragon had been seen in the skies over the South Valley.”

“It was necessary,” Volthraxus said, then asked nonchalantly, “What is the reaction among the ­people?” Oddly, he realized, he was hoping for the worst—­total bedlam.

“Most believe it to be just village hysteria,” Beo began, but at an angry snarl from Volthraxus, quickly added, “but a growing number clamor for King William to seek you out and slay you.”

“I see,” said Volthraxus sourly, not fooled by the wolf's hasty improvisation. “Well, if he did seek me out, it would make things easier.”

The sight of me in all my glory didn't cause a kingdom-­wide panic? Of course, they were used to Magdela, and she always was more bloodthirsty.
Nevertheless, it was annoying. He absentmindedly began to scratch the outline of Castle White in the stone of the cave floor with one of his claws, adding flames here and there for ghastly artistic effect.

Warming to the topic, Beo began to speak at great length about all the preparations the King was making at the castle in case the rumors proved true. “The King sent a
large
contingent of troops south to investigate,
and
he doubled the standing guard on the castle . . .”

That he was being “handled” by a creature no better than a common dog only added insult to Volthraxus's feeling of injury, so he paid little attention as Beo continued to add ever more elaborately to the King's defenses against him.

“ . . . and I have heard rumors that he has made a plea for dragon hunters or even someone called the Dracomancer to attend him.”

Volthraxus held up a taloned claw. “The Dracomancer?”

“Y—­yes.”

“I know this Dracomancer. I questioned him about Magdela and the fairy at one point. He is a vain and foolish man. If he is the best advisor the King can manage, then my victory is assured, and if this is all the news you can gather, your use to me may well be at an end.”

“There is one more thing . . .”

Volthraxus looked up from his drawing and fixed his attention on the wolf. “Well?”

Beo squirmed. “I . . . I may have discovered where Lady Rapunzel is staying in the castle, but . . .”

Volthraxus was on his feet. “Tell me. I go tonight.”

“This is what I was afraid of, Volthraxus.” the wolf whined. “Do not be so hasty. With a double guard, there will be dozens of archers on the walls. On a clear, moonlit night like tonight, they will see you coming. We should only attack at the new moon. There is no need to—­”