The Princess's Dragon (17 page)

“That is the reward I demand if I do this for you. Do you accept?”

“Of course! We have no need of the humans; we will see to it that the dragons disperse. Most will not want to remain anywhere near here anyway. I will personally free the human cattle once the queens are dead and see them to safety. Is that agreeable to you?”

Sondra nodded and the red dragon made to leave. “Wait! There is one more thing. I do not know if I will ever see you again. Can you tell me your name?” For some reason, Sondra needed to know the name of the female dragon that nearly claimed Tolmac as her own.

“I am called Rubeliara. And your name, storm?”

“Sondra.”

“Such a strange name for a dragon! But no matter, if you succeed in tomorrow’s battle, the name Sondra will be known forever to the dragons as the hero that freed us.”

Rubeliara hurried off and Sondra settled down to get some much-needed rest. She realized that all odds were against her, and she didn’t stand much of a chance, but for the first time in her life she felt confident that even though she might die tomorrow, she had made the right decision.

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CHAPTER 11

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Sondra didn’t sleep much through the night, her mind sifting through everything she’d learned. She dwelled on Tolmac and the things Rubeliara told her about him to avoid thinking of the coming battle and the death she likely faced as one who had never fought a physical battle a day in her life. So Tolmac was the fi re god of the Pantheon of Six.

She’d always heard of the six gods, of which her own people worshipped two, Morbidon and Vivacel, god of death and goddess of life. Th e elemental gods,

Aquea of water, Terroc of earth, Zephrona of air and apparently Tolmac of fi re, were never really worshipped in her kingdom, though the religious text did mention them in passing. Sondra didn’t remember ever reading the fi re god’s name, though she wasn’t certain she would have suspected the truth if she had.

So what was Tolmac, dragon or god? Was he truly the child of Cindara, the divine dragon he spoke of in his story? Why had he never mentioned it?

Who was this dragon she’d lost her heart to? And most importantly, would she live to see him again?

Despite her noble cause, Sondra didn’t feel at all ready to face the three queens and mortal combat when her pet guard showed up to escort her to the Royal Cavern the following sunbirth. This time, Sondra’s passage through the tunnels was accompanied by much pomp and circumstance. Someone ordered the resident dragons to line up on either side of the passageways as she paraded past in ceremonial solemnity. Guards fell into step before and behind her, and Sondra found the sight somewhat pitiful, like animals playing at being human. Though she supposed that the dragons considered humans as animals 98

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rather than the other way around, for some reason, the queens enjoyed these bizarre displays of power and consequence. The whole experience seemed so different from the way Tolmac behaved that she started to seriously doubt he was a dragon. But no, Rubeliara had told her that the dragons here did behave unnaturally for their race.

Sondra buried her heartache at the thought of Tolmac and followed the procession through the tunnels; her spines standing straight up and out on her neck at the feeling of so many eyes upon her. She felt the brush of other dragon’s minds as they sought to touch her own, curious about her. Out of the corner of her eye she spotted Rubeliara, but the other dragon remained staring straight ahead, making no attempt to communicate with her. Sondra reinforced her mental shields and gulped past the lump of fear forming in her throat as they neared the Royal Cavern.

In what seemed like only half the time it took on the previous cycle, they arrived at the Royal Cavern. Today, the first-tier dragons stood at attention with all four feet firmly planted and their wings, gilded and bejeweled, folded neatly with their heads lifted and watching. They ranged on either side of the queens still lounging on their hoards. Sondra didn’t realize there were so many of the privileged dragons, and she hoped Rubeliara came through with her promised assistance before they ripped her apart. The three queens hissed as she approached, their anticipation of the day’s events obvious as they licked their drooling chops with gray tongues dripping acidic saliva. Sondra readied herself, focusing on reinforcing her shields.

The right queen spoke. “Welcome back ssstranger. It is time to initiate you into the Kin. Are you ready?”

Sondra nodded, glanced out of the corner of her eye at the guards surrounding her, and took a deep breath. Before she had a chance to release her skyfire, a force slammed through her shields with the effectiveness of a battering ram, ripping open her mind and tearing through her thoughts like shredding fabric. The three queens, linked in their element of spirit, gasped as one as they examined her thoughts. They saw her conversation with Rubeliara.

They saw that she was a storm dragon. They dug deeper and saw Tolmac, emitting chittering sounds of excitement at the revelation. Then they traveled deeper into her memories and saw … Sondra, the human princess. The queens roared in rage and Sondra struggled to fight them, to release her skyfire, to move. But her struggles yielded nothing and she remained pinned in place 100

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while the queens decided what to do with the information they’d uncovered in her mind.

Her heart broke, her hope faded as she realized that she’d failed. She’d failed herself, Rubeliara and the chicks, the humans of Fomoral, and Tolmac.

Now she would die and everyone she’d failed would suffer for it. The queens started barking orders and the guards shifted. Sondra prepared herself for the sting of death, determined to ask Morbidon about the fire god when he came for her.

The guards moved to surround her, with the combined minds of the queens still raping her memories, rifling through her childhood hopes and dreams, her memories of the wizard—which they also found interesting—and life at court. Sondra suddenly felt a strange presence wrapping her in warmth and love. Suddenly part of her mind felt free as a gentle maternal presence pushed aside the queens as effortlessly as moving aside a curtain. The presence shielded her mind, burying it back away behind impenetrable shields that blazed with a white light.

The queens gasped in shock as they were pushed out of her mind and Sondra felt one claw reaching for and unsheathing the forgotten sword belted at her waist. She turned on the guard to her right, and the sword buried itself through the only vulnerable part of his body, the throat ring, where his neck and head met and the scales didn’t completely overlap. He suffocated on his own flame, bursting apart and falling to the ground. The sword continued to move, imbued with a divine power and a life of its own, unerringly finding the weaknesses of every opponent that came against Sondra. She aimed it at the queens and, obeying the maternal presence guiding her, directed her skyfire down the blade. It fired off the blade of the sword, amplified by magic from an ancient and alien divinity. It slammed into the central queen, sparking off of her and linking into the two others. They screamed in agony as the skyfire burned through their scales and into their flesh, melting down to the bone.

Behind her, Sondra heard the sounds of chaotic combat as a small army of young and strong dragons charged the guards and first-tier dragons, distracting them from the battle in the center of the room. Suddenly, everyone fought for their lives, and those dragons not directly controlled by the queens joined in the fray, attacking guards standing next to them with feral abandon.

Sondra remained focused on the queens. They struggled against her skyfire as she sent wave after wave of it against their writhing forms. The

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stench of scorched flesh polluted the air and their screams rent the chaotic din, bursting out over the battling dragons, until as a one, they died on a final cry of agony, melted into three pools of blood and gore that dripped over the golden hoards.

The battle didn’t proceed as Rubeliara had promised, however. Many of the dragons controlled by the queens did stop fighting when the queens died; free of their compulsions, they fled through the tunnels, eager to escape the aftermath. But others, the guards included, continued to fight, and several came after Sondra. She backed away, shaking with exhaustion from the vast expenditure of magic.

Rubeliara shouted in her head, and she looked up to where the dragon stood indicating a side tunnel. She followed the red dragon blindly, racing through the tunnel as fast as she could move on shaky legs. They passed several caverns, all occupied by struggling dragons, bursting flames, stone walls rising out of nothing to crush guards, and starving dragons ripping into the dead.

Sondra shuddered and turned away, struggling to keep up with Rubeliara.

“Where are the babies?” she thought to the other dragon.

“They are safe and well-guarded. None will harm them ever again.” The other dragon passed the dining hall and raced through the kitchens, Sondra on her heals, studiously ignoring the abattoir where humans, dragons, and animals alike met their end to feed a sick society.

Rubeliara stopped in another room filled with cages. Contained within were several types of herbivores, small carnivores, and in one cage at the back, a group of ten terrified humans that screamed at the sight of the two dragons racing into the small cavern.

“Here are the cattle, free them quickly. I will need your help moving them outside to the surface. We will let them go there and hope they have enough sense to escape on their own.”

Sondra moved to the cage, using her claw to smash open the lock. The humans kept screaming and huddled in the corner of the cage. The dirty and ragged men formed a wall around the three females, one of whom Sondra noticed in horror was barely more than a child. The men screamed at the dragons, cursing them, and Sondra didn’t even attempt to communicate with them, fearing she didn’t have the time to convince them she meant them no harm. Instead she scooped up three in one claw and two in the other and moved away awkwardly on her hind legs. The humans struggled, bit, and kicked, and 102

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Sondra felt proud of them for fighting to what they believed to be the bitter end. Their attacks hurt her not at all.

Rubeliara grabbed up the remaining five humans, including the young girl who passed out from fright, and turned toward another tunnel. They proceeded down it, meeting few dragons on the way. Arriving at an intersection, they took the left-hand passage, which soon found them at the entrance to one of the many caves that dotted the cliff face.

Rubeliara didn’t bother to speak, but simply jumped out of the cave; she spread her extensive wingspan and lifted herself up into the sunlight, her passage trailed by human screams. Sondra glanced around her at the dragons pouring from the caverns, many engaging in aerial battles with the guards and few first-tier dragons that enjoyed their privileged life and didn’t appreciate its end. Already dragon corpses littered the rocky shore below, and as Sondra jumped from the cave ledge and spread her wings she breathed a grateful sigh of relief at her freedom.

The humans she clutched weighed more than anticipated, and she found her flight to the top of the cliffs extremely difficult. Fortunately, the men and woman had enough sense to remain still, uncertain of their future but unwilling to plummet to the shore below. Even they realized something catastrophic was happening to the Dragon Cliffs. They didn’t wait around to find out what when Sondra finally crested the top of the cliff and collapsed, exhausted, next to Rubeliara, who had already deposited her charges. Sondra’s humans raced off without a backward glance, each fearing what new game the evil dragons planned to play with them.

Rubeliara turned to her and started to say something when a dragon struck her, knocking her off the cliff. The red dragon plummeted to the shore below, barely spreading her wings in time to slow her fall. She landed heavily, and the impact stunned her.

Before Sondra now stood a guard dragon, none other than the female guard that had first met her when she arrived in this cursed land. The other dragon grinned horribly, her teeth filthy and bloodstained by the many kills she’d claimed in this battle. Even without the gray taint of the queens’ control, her aura still looked sick and diseased, ragged black tears moving within a bilious brownish-tan.

“I knew you were trouble the moment you entered our territory. But you

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have done me a favor. The queens are dead and the city is in chaos. This is the perfect time for the guards, led by me, of course, to take control.”

“Why? Why would you want to live like this? Why not fly to distant lands and make your own lair?”

“Fool! Why be the master of myself when I can become the master of many? With the power of a dragon army I will be akin to a god. I will not waste time with demanding petty tributes and playing twisted games with the creatures of this world. My army will destroy everything in its path and I will make this world the domain of dragons only, where the only other creatures will be our cattle.”

“But that is not natural for a dragon; why would you want to live in a manner so against your nature?”

“What would you know about dragons, human?” The guard grinned evilly.

“Oh, yes, I know the truth. The queens were so outraged by what they saw that they let images slip to those standing nearest to them. I saw it all. It will give me the greatest pleasure to crush you for daring to pretend to be a member of the most powerful race.” The guard snarled and leapt at Sondra. She met the charge of the much larger female and shrieked in pain at the impact.

Unable to find the strength to summon up more skyfire, Sondra relied on her physical agility and teeth and claws to tear at the other dragon. They grappled on the ground, the larger and heavier guard gaining an advantage despite the many fights she’d already won that day. She tore at Sondra, sending glittering violet-blue scales flying and leaving behind welts and trails of blood on Sondra’s flank. Sondra tried to draw her sword again but the guard batted her claw away, slicing the leather of the scabbard belt and sending the sword careening to the dirt as she pinned Sondra and snapped at her neck, seeking her vulnerable throat ring. Sondra’s wings crushed beneath her as she brought her hind legs up and ripped at the guard’s stomach, her claws skittering off the heavy scales that protected the other dragon. The guard dragon simply laughed and bit her wing tip, snapping the bones and tearing through the membrane as Sondra screamed in agony.