War of Dragons (54 page)

John sighed inwardly.
What about the rest of your troop? Shouldn't you be with them?
The Browns and Blues were now almost out of sight.

No, not really. They’ll do fine now they have the upper hand and they're not my proper unit anyway. I'm the only survivor from my original unit. Let's just say we had a very bad day yesterday. So what do you say, Gold? Do we have an agreement?

John didn't like the sound of this; this Brown Dragon sounded far too relaxed about having lost his unit.
A temporary agreement. My mission is still to get to Furnace. But I guess I can help you out on the way.

Excellent, well, follow me then. I'll show you where the next battle is likely to be. I'm Wami, by the way. What's your name? I can't just keep calling you Gold.

John. Let's see what sort of pace you can maintain, Wami.

Wami set off quickly, following more or less the same route John would have taken had he turned Wami's request down. John would have flown higher, but the pace was acceptable, so he didn't complain.

Wami was a talkative fellow and although John didn't say much in reply, that didn't seem to put Wami off and he rattled off story after story. He was the youngest in a family of five brothers and seemed to have a habit of getting into unfortunate situations, as he put it. He was the veteran of many small conflicts with the Blues, although, as he explained it, they generally had a very low casualty rate on both sides. The Browns were too fast for the Blues to catch, and the Blues were too good at defending against their attacks, so both sides would usually retreat. This conflict was different though, due to the sheer scale of the war, which had already sucked in most of the adult population of his country. Losses had been heavy on both sides. As far as Wami knew, after the initial advances by the Browns, it had settled into a stalemate, with neither side making any significant advances. The Blues had the trump card though, with the huge population they had at their disposal. If they were to divert some of their forces from the front with the Reds, they could crush the Browns easily. Upon reflection, John wondered why they hadn't done so already.

John let him talk uninterrupted for a while before enquiring where he was taking them. Wami explained that there was another settlement near the border that they weren't too far from and its location made it an ideal target. He thought that it was highly likely that a skirmish would be going on over there and probably would be every day till either the settlement was lost or the Blues were pushed back.

I'd hate to live here, but someone has to,
Wami told him.
The border just follows you. If you move away from it, the Blues just expand the area they claim. So someone has to live in these horrible holes. It's the same with any border.

Not with your borders with us,
John replied.
We've given no reason to fear us trying to move your border.

True,
Wami admitted.
Never really understood that one, or why you're helping everyone now, to be honest. Still, don't get me wrong, I'm very glad to have you here. Wouldn't mind a few more of you, truth be told.

Wami's eyes lit up as he caught sight of something up ahead. He picked up speed, clearly impatient to see what it was.

Ah, look, as I thought, there's another battle over there. That's right by the settlement I was talking about. They'll attack this place every day till they destroy it or until the wars over. It's the same with every one of these border settlements at the moment. Watch how these lot fight; these battles can last for most of the day when they're like this, with neither side really getting an advantage. Hopefully we can change that.

Sure enough, up ahead, a cautiously conducted battle was being fought, much more even balanced than the one they had come from, but was still very bloody and the fields below were strewn with the corpses of the fallen warriors. There were probably three hundred combatants on each side and the death toll showed that both sides were determined not to give up. However, at the moment, neither side seemed to be willing to engage the other. They flew as two huge flocks, circling each other warily, like two chess players trying to determine each other's next move.

Stay high,
John commanded as Wami began to drift down towards the battle.
Fly higher still, up with me. They'll look up every now and then, but rarely this high. We'll probably be able to get right above them without them noticing us.

Wami climbed after John till he complained that he was finding it hard to breathe. John levelled off before studying the combatants below.

Attack the rear,
John instructed him.
They won't expect it and it may distract them long enough for your lot to gain an advantage. Take the southern side. I'll attack on the other side.

We're going to start a dive from up here?
Wami asked doubtfully.
Will you be able to control the dive at that speed? If you misjudge it or they change direction suddenly, you'll hit one of them head on and kill yourself.

Watch,
John told him.
Feel free to start slowly if you prefer.
He pulled his wings close to his body and dropped away from Wami, making tiny corrections as he rapidly descended towards the fight. He watched the two groups circling each other as he approached, still unnoticed by both groups. John noticed a gap on one side, large enough for him to slot through the pack. He was approaching quickly now and would have little time to adjust if one of them moved unexpectedly, just as Wami had pointed out, but John was supremely confident in his reactions and didn't slow his descent at all. Just as approached the dragons he fired a short volley of fireballs at them; the small balls of flame travelling only slightly faster than he did, before bursting apart as they hit the heads of two of the Blue Dragons. He passed through the gap very quickly, a gold blur flashing past their eyes, slashing at the trailing edge of the wings of three of the Dragons as he passed through. As soon as he was clear of the pack of Blue Dragons he threw his wings wide open, pulling out of the dive abruptly. A chorus of shrill shrieks sounded above him; several hundred pairs of angry eyes glared down at him as he circled low below them. They must have been sorely tempted to break away from their positions and dive after him, their murderous gazes focused on him, but they were disciplined enough to stay in formation. The three dragons he had targeted were plunging to the ground beneath him, the sound of their fatal landings barely audible from this height. John looked up in time to see Wami dive past the group on the other side. He had been more cautious than John, beginning his dive from a lower height, but still passed the Blue Dragons at great speed and yet he managed to control his flight enough to clip one of their number and John saw a single Blue Dragon dropping slowly away from the group, its left wing damaged. Whether the injured Blue Dragon had enough use of the wing to survive the fall they would never know, as Wami flew after it to finish it off, striking at its unprotected neck from above as it struggled to control its descent.

Now what?
Wami called as he drew near to John, blood still dripping from the claws on his right foreleg.
They know we're here now so we can't do that again.

Attack again of course,
John replied before flying straight up towards the group. The Blue Dragons were watching him, tracking his movements through the air, and although he was faster than them they flew in a tight, highly organised pack and made it hard for him to find an approach. He flew in a circle around them, briefly passing between them and the Brown Dragons before dropping behind the group of Blue Dragons and approaching their rear. They could turn their heads around fully to watch him, but couldn't turn to face him without breaking away from the rest of the group. John began making a series of feints, flying daringly close to them. Even flying away from him they were far from defenceless, and he was greeted by a storm of fireballs. But his actions unnerved them and a small group of about twenty dragons at the back split off from the main group to pursue him. They flew at him aggressively, allowing him to lure them away from the main group. Wami, who had drawn level with the combatants again, followed quickly behind them, getting dangerously close and narrowly avoiding a vicious swipe from one of the dragons at the rear of the group. John took advantage of the distraction and changed direction suddenly, attacking instead of fleeing. He shot a series of fireballs at their heads to temporarily blind them as he neared, then slashed at them with outstretched claws as he flew past. It was a dangerous move and the Blue Dragons swiped at him with their own claws as he flew close by, but John was too agile for them and dodged the attack, and as he passed two dragons dropped away from the group, one stunned by a knock to the head and the other bleeding profusely from a neck wound.

Two down,
Wami called.
Nice work, John. You're not just fast, are you? You can really change direction pretty quickly as well.

I guess so,
John replied.
I need to with these Blues. They're too used to fighting your lot to be beaten by speed alone. Hey, it looks like help is on the way.

A group of about thirty Browns had broken from their main group to attack the smaller group of Blues. The disciplined, cautious approach the two sides were taking was slowly breaking down.

Try to keep their attention on us,
John instructed Wami. He needn't have bothered, as just as the Blues heard the warnings from their comrades and turned to face the charging Browns, Wami took advantage of the distraction and flew at the group. He drew close to the group of Blue Dragons and slashed at the wings of one of them at the back of the group. It turned and tried to strike back at him with its claws, but found that it couldn't control its flight any more and spun away from the group. Wami was playing a dangerous game and only narrowly evaded the retaliatory strike of his victim's neighbour in the pack, but he had successfully distracted the group, allowing John to attack them from the other side just before the group of Brown Dragons met them mid-air. The two groups briefly merged in a cloud of snapping teeth and flailing claws, but the Blue Dragons had been distracted at just the wrong moment, and uncoordinated and confused were easy prey for the larger group of Browns. The fight was swift and bloody, lasting just a few seconds; and after the two groups separated there were only eight of the Blues remaining, flying desperately hard to rejoin their main group. They had all fallen some way while fighting, and were at least a hundred metres below the two main groups of dragons.

The rest of the Blues had been watching from above and screamed in rage at their comrade's demise. The group split into two large groups, with one flying towards the small group of Brown Dragons that had just slaughtered their comrades and the other staying to engage the remaining Browns, which they were blocking and preventing from reaching the rest of their number. The battle was becoming more and more chaotic.

Go for this group coming towards us, John,
Wami urged, flying towards them himself.
You'll need to distract them. They outnumber these Brown Dragons five to one. They won't stand a chance.

John had already seen the risk and was ascending quickly to get above the Blue Dragons. No dragon was comfortable entering a battle from below and this was particularly true of the Blue Dragons. They were flying on the level to stay above the Browns, ready to dive at them when they were near enough, so by rising above them and charging at them John would throw them off their attack. They saw him fly above him and screamed at him hatefully, but maintained their advance on the Brown Dragons, reluctant to let their quarry escape. The Browns might be able to outfly them if they fled, but the Blues had a considerable height advantage and would pick up speed when they began diving so it was far from certain. Wami seemed determined to demonstrate his reckless nature and was flying straight at the Blues, actually looking like he was going to attack them from below.

Wami, what are you doing? You'll get yourself killed!

Giving you an opportunity,
Wami replied calmly.
They'll find this hard to resist.

He turned just short of the group and flew parallel to their group, a body's length distance from them and flying in the opposite direction to them. A quick dive from one of the dragons was all that it would take to reach him. Four of them took the bait and broke from the group and dived after Wami, who turned to dive himself, just staying out of their reach. John dived after them himself, dropping past the group and slashing at a dragon who was too distracted by Wami's antics. John may have been slower than average for a Golden Dragon on the straight, but his diving was unsurpassed. Wami was barely managing to stay ahead of the four pursuing dragons, but John closed the gap with ease and slashed at the wings of each of the four from behind as he passed them, each blow sending the victim careering off course.

Thanks, John, much appreciated,
Wami said gratefully as he pulled out of the dive.
Another four down, eh?

More than that,
John replied grimly.
Look above us.

The battle was now raging fiercely. All of the groups of dragons had thrown their caution to the wind and were fighting much more recklessly. Dragons were dropping out of the sky above them at an alarming pace. John flew back up towards the conflict, which had descended into utter chaos with the death toll mounting rapidly. The fighters had broken down into many small groups fighting, with the result that no one was able to watch their backs. He had to act quickly, or just as many of the Browns would perish as the Blues, if not more; this style of fighting played more to their strengths than to the Browns, unable to make use of their greater speed.