The Rage (5 page)

Firvimdol had his rapier halfway out of the scabbard, and he shoved it, scraping, back inside.

“I would have killed her for you.”

“I know,” Speaker said. “But with luck, no one sensed my spell contorting space, and I thought it better to silence her without leaving a corpse behind. This way, folk may well assume she simply ran away. Come along, we’re almost there.”

They sneaked onward. The black blade drifted along before them for a few seconds then faded out of existence.

After another minute, they came upon several domes, each possessed of a chimney fuming smoke and a doorway high and broad enough to pass the largest wagon in or out. Inside those openings, saddles, their girths longer than any horse required, dangled from the high ceilings, suspended by ropes and pulleys. From their presence, another trespasser might have concluded that the complex was a sort of stable, but Gorstag, who realized precisely where Speaker had led him, knew that wasn’t really so. For the occupants of the domes were no mere beasts of burden. They were personages, dignitaries of the realm no less than the knights and paladins they deigned to carry on their backs.

They were also likely to attack Speaker, Firvimdol, and their ilk as soon as they recognized them for what they were. Gorstag couldn’t imagine what the wizard hoped to accomplish there. Surely even a madman would have better sense than to attack all of the Queen’s Bronzes at the same time and on their home ground.

The intruders slipped through one of the doorways. The corridor on the other side curved, following the outer edge of the dome partway around, no doubt to protect the inhabitant’s privacy. At the end of the arc, gold and silver coins littered the floor, and the inconstant light of a fire gilded the wall.

The fire’s heat warmed the air in the passage. His heart hammering, Gorstag had to concede that Speaker had kept his promise. He’d gotten his henchmen in out of the cold. The only catch was that death by freezing seemed a kinder fate than the one that likely awaited them instead.

“You lads keep watch here,” Speaker said, “while I conduct my business.”

He ambled on to the far end of the hall, and something came to meet him. Gorstag couldn’t see the creature itself. The inner wail of the passage blocked his view. But the fire abruptly cast the gigantic shadow of a horned reptilian head with a jagged ruff and a long, flexible neck with a finlike protrusion on the dorsal side. A musky scent tinged the air. Gorstag clenched himself against his fear. Firvimdol actually whimpered, and fearful the cultist would bolt, the spy gripped his shoulder to steady him.

“Quelsandas,” Speaker said.

“You,” the creature’s voice rumbled, deeper than any human’s, yet it possessed a sibilant quality as well. “The lurker from my dreams.”

“Dreams I sent, to prepare you for this parley.”

“Why would you wish such a thing? Do you chase your own death? I’m a bronze!”

Speaker shrugged and replied, “Metal, color, gem. Once it didn’t matter, and in a new guise, that time is coming around again.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Of course you do. You feel change nibbling away at everything you are. But you can endure. I’ll help you if you earn it.”

“Why must I earn it when others need not?” Quelsandas said.

“You may imagine, to make up for all the trouble your kind has given me in the past, but that’s not really it. I have an important venture underway in Impiltur. Most likely, the

lords will never learn of it. But if they should. I need an agent in place to stymie any attempt they make to interfere.” “Why choose me?”

“Because I’ve looked into your soul, and I know you’re different than the others.”

The shadow reared and curled, cocking its head backward like a serpent poising itself to strike.

“You think me cowardly?” asked the dragon. “Or disloyal?” “Merely sensible. Sensible enough to want to survive as something better than a beast.”

“Who are you?” Quelsandas said. “Show me your true face.”

“You’ve already determined who I am,” Speaker replied. “However, if you wish it….”

The mage waved his hand and his features shriveled.

23 & 24 Hammer, the Year of Rogue Dragons

In Dorn’s estimation, the Flooded Forest had proved to be a particularly unpleasant swamp, a place of dead trees, spotted toadstools, grimy drifts of snow, sluggish channels of murky water, and boggy, treacherous earth, all of it stinking of decay. Unfortunately, it was where the dragon menacing wayfarers in the vicinity of Ylraphon made its lair, and so the hunters had to seek it there.

That simple truth failed to keep Will from complaining as they slogged along tracking their quarry as best one could track a flying creature.

Swiping at a fat, buzzing fly that evidently thrived on winter’s chill, the halfling said, We could be lounging on the quarterdeck of a nice galley, munching grapes, drinking beer, and listening to a comely maiden sing sweet songs, but no, not us. We’re too manly for such soft work. We live to flounder through filthy, freezing, bug-ridden quicksand bogs—”

“Enough,” Pavel said. “At first it was amusing to hear you gripe and grouse with never a clue as to why the rest of us decided as we did. But it’s become annoying, so listen up: Kara lied to us. She said it was bandits armed with swords and spears who hurt her. The truth is, her wounds were claw marks, with some singes and blisters thrown in.”

Will snorted and said, As if you could tell the difference.”

“He’s right,” Raryn said. The dwarf was wearing all his armor and carrying much of his gear, including a number of magical implements supplied by the company’s business partners among the wizards of Thentia. Indeed, he bore such an arsenal—harpoon with coiled rope attached, bow, quiver, fighting knife, and ice-axe that the small hunter was nearly lost behind the weapons. Still, he moved with the lithe, surefooted tread of a born ranger. “I noticed, too.”

“That wasn’t the only strange thing,” Pavel said. “Why wouldn’t she give her surname, and why would anyone travel these lands alone in Deepwinter, particularly with a fortune in jewels in her purse? Why was she plainly so afraid someone would attack her again?”

“Well,” said the hanging, “I don’t know, but say she is a shady character. Her treasure would still spend like anybody else’s. By the Mother’s smile, we’ve even worked for Zhents a time or two, when they had a beastie that needed killing.”

“At least then,” Raryn said, “we knew what we were getting into. We have no idea what kind of trouble hides in Kara’s cloak.”

But we could have made a bundle finding out,” said Will. “Maybe we still can.”

“No,” said Dorn.

“Aren’t you even—”

“No.”

That pretty much quashed any further conversation for several hours thereafter, and Dorn was just as glad. Hunters didn’t catch their quarry by chattering their way through the wild. That was how they became prey in their turn.

Perhaps an hour before dusk, as Dorn was considering halting to make camp, they came upon another open space sufficiently large for an enormous flying beast to light. At the edge of the clearing stood a willow with a section of its bark charred away and the wound still bubbling and steaming. Slimy gray-green scales littered the ground beneath it.

“It set down to scratch,” whispered Raryn, “and recently.”

“Did it take flight again?” asked Dorn.

The ranger studied the marks on the ground then said, “No. It scuttled off that way.”

He pointed with the barbed head of his harpoon.

“We could be close,” said Will, “so I guess I’d better stroll ahead and take a look.”

He pulled off his calfskin glove, wet a finger, and held it up to ascertain which way the breeze was blowing. If at all possible, he wanted to approach their quarry from downwind.

After the halfling vanished into the undergrowth, his companions had nothing to do but watch and wait. The passing minutes gnawed at Dorn’s nerves.

Finally Will came scurrying back.

“It’s there,” he said. “Just a bowshot from where we’re standing. I mean, if all the trees weren’t in the way.” “What’s it doing?” asked Dorn.

“That’s the strange part. Muttering to itself like a cranky old granny.”

“What’s it saying?” Pavel asked.

“Since when do I speak Draconic? That’s you, or so you claim. Do you want to sneak up and have a listen?”

As long as it didn’t seem to be casting spells,” said Dorn, “it doesn’t matter what it’s grumbling about. It’s on the ground and within reach. Let’s get ready.”

They shrugged off their packs. They didn’t want their gear weighing them down in combat. They drank the elixirs intended to protect them from the acidic secretion slathering the dragon’s hide. Then it was time for Pavel, brandishing his sun-shaped pendant, to work magic.

From past experience, Dorn knew the first prayer was a blessing to brace and invigorate the four of them. It cleansed the fleshly part of him of the aches and heaviness of fatigue even as it cleared and sharpened his mind. The second invocation engendered no such sensations, but in some subtle fashion he didn’t pretend to understand would make it more difficult for the wyrm to strike them.

The third spell was for Dorn alone. The world fell silent as Pavel shrouded him in stillness. In theory, the rest of his comrades might have benefited from the same treatment. But Will was too vain of his thief-craft to admit the magic might be of use to him, and neither Pavel nor Raryn wanted to dispense with their voices and thus their ability to recite incantations. The latter possessed his own store of cantrips, wilderness lore handed down from ranger to ranger, not as formidable or versatile as the cleric’s divinely granted powers, but useful enough in certain situations.

After that, they were ready. Dorn nodded, signaling it was time to go.

They crept in single file, Will in the lead, Raryn second, Dorn third, and Pavel, currently the noisiest as well as the least adept with mundane weapons, bringing up the rear. Each kept several yards back from the hunter in front of him. Even if a dragon had no breath weapon—and if they were right about its species, the one they were stalking didn’t—it was good tactics not to bunch up. That way, the creature couldn’t rear up and fling itself down on the whole hunting party, pinning and crushing everyone with a single hop.

As he drew nearer to the quarry, Dorn’s eyes started to water and sting. It hardly inspired confidence in the efficacy of the potion he’d just consumed. He wondered if old Firefingers had brewed up a weak batch.

Then he caught his first glimpse of the wyrm, hunkered down among the trees. As expected, it was one of the bog-dwelling creatures called ooze drakes. Smeared with a vile-looking whitish slime, its dull green body was lanky and serpentine, and even the idiots who claimed to consider other breeds of dragon beautiful would have found nothing fair or graceful in its proportions. Its claws were gray, and Dorn knew that when he saw them, its fangs would be the same. As usual, the sight of the thing gave him a pang of dread, out he reminded himself why he hated them, and he was all right.

The ooze drake jerked, and a stone rebounded from its flank, leaving a bloody pock behind. It seemed miraculous that such a small missile could penetrate the creature’s scales. But Will was a master of the warsling, knew the spots where the dragon’s hide was thinnest, and had hurled an enchanted missile. All in all, it was sufficient to give the beast a sting.

The creature whirled in the direction of its attacker. Pale yellow eyes blazing, it opened its jaws, roaring, surely, though Dorn couldn’t hear it. Another stone caught it on the end of its snout, and it charged.

Dorn drew back his composite longbow and sent an arrow streaking through the trees. He too knew where to aim, and the shaft plunged deep into the base of the dragon’s neck. It stumbled, then, its sweeping tail obliterating a stand of blue-spotted mushrooms, lurched around in the archer’s direction. Will immediately hit it in the shoulder with another stone.

The ooze drake spread its batlike wings. If it took to the air that might give it a crucial advantage, even against foes who took care to remain beneath the sheltering trees. Or if it was feeling timid, it could simply soar away and leave its attackers behind. It was Raryn’s job to keep that from happening. He scrambled out from behind a stand of brush and threw his harpoon. Trailing rope behind it, the lance drove into the wyrm’s belly.

Most dragons were at least as intelligent as men. This one clearly had the wit to surmise that the white-bearded dwarf had knotted the other end of the line to a tree. Perhaps it even realized the harpoon was barbed, and that if it simply yanked it out, it risked giving itself a far more serious wound than

it had taken hitherto. In any case, it made the right move. Twisting its neck, it reached to bite the rope.

If Dorn was lucky, he could prevent that, but not by sniping away with his bow. He gripped his bastard sword and charged out into the open. Had it been possible, he would have shouted a war cry to attract the ooze drake’s attention

Not that he needed to. The reptile could hardly miss such a hulk of a man, body half made of iron and long, straight blade in hand sprinting to engage it. And it obviously realized that if it simply ignored him, he was likely to drive the sword into its eye while it chewed at the rope, because it swung around and pounced.

Dorn sprang aside, just avoiding the scaly foot and talons that would otherwise have eviscerated him and smashed his mangled body to the ground. He cut at its foreleg out scarcely nicked it. The creature spun around to face him.

When Dorn had nightmares, they were about dragons, and conducted in utter silence as it was, the duel that commenced had something of the same eerie quality. Certainly, seen up close, the ooze drake was nightmare incarnate. Its gnashing, slate-colored teeth were like swords, while the citrine, slit-pupiled eyes shone with demonic rage. Its body, long as a tree and big as a house, coiled and struck with appalling speed. So far, its wounds weren’t slowing it at all.

Dorn fought as he generally did, the almost indestructible iron portion of his body forward to parry, or when unavoidable, bear an enemy’s attacks; the soft, human half behind. The ooze drake caught his metal arm in its fangs, bore down, realized it couldn’t bite through, and settled for whipping him up and down. The action slammed him to the ground. Instantly the reptile raked at him. He thrust, and the point of his sword drove into the flesh between two of the creature’s claws. The wyrm snatched its foot back, away from the pain, and for an instant, the pressure of its jaws slackened. Fortunately, Dorn’s artificial limbs had sensation of a sort, though it wasn’t like a normal human sense of touch. His master had seen no reason to make a tool meant purely for killing susceptible to pain. The half-golem felt the loosening and wrenched his fist free. The knuckle spikes caught on one of the drake’s lower fangs and ripped it from the gum. He heaved himself to his feet, and the reptile lunged at him once more.