A Night of Dragon Wings (34 page)

Elethor darted left and right, dodging the missiles.  Treale flew at his side, whisking around like a bee set to sting.  The clay missiles missed them, and explosions blazed at their backs, blasting them with heat.  The two dragons flew toward twin towers that rose ahead upon a peak; each held a catapult and Tiran soldiers in tan cloaks.

"Treale, burn the left one.  I've got the right!"

He swooped toward the tower.  The Tirans fired arrows.  Elethor roared.  One arrow snapped against his shoulder.  Another thrust into his leg.  He spewed a jet of fire.

The tower top blazed.  Men fell burning and rolled.  The catapult rose in flame.  To his left, Treale blew fire against the other tower, and its men burned and fell like comets to thump against the mountainsides.

Elethor looked back at his army.  Most were still flying toward the fortress.  From a hundred other towers, more missiles flew.  Every second, a blast blazed across the sky, and more dragons and griffins fell dead.

"Attack the catapults!" Elethor shouted.  "Tear them down!"

A flight of griffins—four swooping birds—flew down toward one tower.  A clay missile flew and slammed into one beast.  The griffin burst into blood and gore.  One other griffin shrieked and tumbled, burning.  The remaining two swooped and their talons tore down the catapult.  Arrows pierced them, they crashed upon the tower, and the Tirans leapt onto them with swords.

"Treale, there, the walls!" Elethor said.  "Dive with me."

She snarled and flew toward him.  They swooped together.  Below upon a snaking wall Tirans were firing three more catapults.  Behind them in a ditch, baskets lay stacked with balls of Tiran fire—a hundred or more.

The two dragons blew their fire, drenching the wall.

"Treale, soar!" Elethor shouted.  "With me!"

They began to rise, flying straight up.

White light flooded them.

The sky burned.

Flames licked their feet and Elethor could hear nothing but the ringing, see nothing but white light.  He thought that he had died, that he flew in the afterlife of starlight.

He could see the faces of his family—Orin, his father, and his mother.  They awaited him, clad all in white, and smiled.  They reached out to him.

"Elethor!" they cried.  "Elethor!"

I'm flying to you… I can almost reach you… I…

"Elethor!"

A tail slapped against him.  He looked and saw Treale flying by him.  Ugly welts spread across her tail and back legs.

"Elethor!" she said.  "The fortress—look."

He turned his head and looked down.  He flew so high, he could cover the fortress with his feet.  Dust rose in clouds.  Elethor spun and began to dive, Treale at his side.  When they grew closer, he saw it.

A great hole stretched across the fortress where the Tiran fire had burst.  The opening loomed fifty feet wide, large enough for dragons to fly through.  Inside, Elethor saw burrows and halls where men raced.

"We're going in, Treale," he said.  "Can you fight?  Is it bad?"

She snarled and howled in rage.  "I can fight!  I fight for you, my king."

For the first time, Elethor saw that the rider on her back was gone.  Her saddle was singed black.  When Elethor looked over his shoulder, his stomach plummeted and he wanted to gag.  His own rider still sat upon his saddle—a charred corpse with a gaping skull.

Elethor cursed, tore off the saddle, and let the man fall; they would have to bury their dead later.  He dived.  Treale dived at his side.  They pulled their wings close and curved their flight, racing toward the opening in the mountainside.

"Griffins and dragons!" Elethor roared as he flew.  "Into the mountain!  Into their halls.  Rally here—we enter the darkness."

Thousands of dragons and griffins heard his cry and flew around him.  Clay balls shot toward them.  Blasts flared.  Fire blazed.  Griffins and dragons tore apart.  Elethor roared, shot a stream of fire into the hole, and men inside burned.

He was first to enter.  He dived into the opening and blasted fire in every direction.  Upon staircases, bridges, and crumbling floors, men screamed and burned and fell.  Arrows clattered against his scales.  One slammed into his chest, and Elethor howled and snapped it off.  He blew more fire.

He landed upon a rocky floor.  Around him loomed a cave carved by the blast.  Along the walls, halved hallways and chambers crumbled.  It looked like a great ant hive that a giant had punched.  Men scurried everywhere, firing arrows, and Elethor blew more flames.  Treale and other dragons flew into the cave behind him, and their fire turned the place into an oven.

When the flames died, they revealed a chamber full of charred Tiran corpses.  Elethor flapped his wings, grabbed onto the opening of a corridor, and shifted into human form.  He ran into the shadows to find more Tirans firing arrows.  He raised his shield, and the arrows peppered it.  Men shouted and raced toward him, swinging swords.

Treale leaped at his side, her own sword blazing.  Elethor raised his blade and snarled.  Behind them, more of their warriors—soldiers from both Requiem and Osanna—raised their swords.

They had entered the mountain.  The search for Solina began.

 
 
MORI

The skies above Irys, ancient capital of Tiranor, swirled with blood, fire, and endless beasts of scale, feather, and rot.

Everywhere Mori looked she saw them.  Salvanae streamed around her like banners in a storm, shooting lighting from their mouths.  Griffins shrieked and swooped, talons outstretched, to tear down buildings.  Dragons blew fire across streets and forts.  Upon their backs, the soldiers of Osanna shot a rain of arrows that clattered against streets, rooftops, and the armor of Tiran soldiers.

The warriors of the enemy were not idle.  Nephilim filled the sky like murders of undead crows.  Phoenixes blazed and shrieked and crashed into dragons, burning them down.  Wyverns beat their leathern wings and spewed their acid; the foul liquid tore into bodies and rained blood upon the city below.

Mori had seen the fall of Nova Vita, but she had never seen such slaughter, tens of thousands falling together, and a city of a million souls—twenty times the size of Nova Vita at its largest—burning and crumbling.  As she flew between the beasts, her heart pounded, her eyes stung, and she could barely breathe.

"Bayrin!" she shouted.  "Come with me.  We're going to the palace.  I know the way."

She winced, snarled, and pulled her wings close to her body.  She dived, skirted around a soaring wyvern, and arced over a nephil.  She dared not breathe fire—not yet.  She needed to save her flames.

"Mori!" Bayrin shouted behind her.  "Bloody stars, Mori, you know, we are part of a phalanx, and—damn it!

The green dragon cursed, swerved around a phoenix, and barely dodged two swooping nephilim.  Mori spared him only a glance.  She kept flying, dodging the creatures, seeking the palace between the flames.

"Princess Mori!" cried the rider on her back, a young man of Osanna.  "Mori, wyvern on your tail!"

"Shoot the rider!" Mori replied.  "Keep your arrows flying!"

Crossbow bolts whizzed around her.  Upon her back, she heard her rider respond with arrows.  Mori kept flying, rising and falling between the combatants.  Behind her, she heard Bayrin cry for their phalanx—a group of one hundred dragons and salvanae—to follow.  Mori could not even spare them a glance.  She had to find the place.  She—

There!  Among flames and smoke ahead spread a cobbled square, an expanse large enough for armies to muster upon.  Mori knew this place.  Here was the Square of the Sun, a sprawling disk of stone in the south of the city.

This is where she whipped me.
  Mori clenched her jaw and swallowed.  Her eyes burned and she could barely breathe. 
This is where she chained me for the crowds to see.  This is where I screamed and bled.

Pain pounded through Mori.  She could feel those whips upon her back again, tearing her skin, tearing her mind; she had never imagined pain could blaze so powerfully, shake and claim and twist her insides until she could not bear it.  She could feel the chains around her wrists again.  She could see the cruel jailor and feel his rough fingers forcing her jaw open.  Mori screamed.  She dived down, blasted fire at two nephilim who rose toward her, and skimmed along a street.  She roared her flames, and men and women fell dead before her.  Mori screamed and flew through the stone canyon.

Queen's Archway rose ahead.  Roaring, Mori flew under it, her claws grabbing soldiers like an eagle grabbing prey.  Past the archway, she soared high above the Square of the Sun, soldiers still screaming in her claws.  She tossed the men down, knocking them against their comrades below, and bathed the square with fire.

The Palace of Phoebus rose before her from flame.  A great staircase led from the square below to the palace gates.  The Faceless Guardians flanked the ivory doors, statues that rose taller than dragons.

That is the place.  That is where she hurt me.

Mori roared and wept.  She flew toward the palace.  Arrows fired all around her.  Two shot through her wings.  Another pierced her shoulder.  On her back, her rider screamed and fell silent.  Mori kept flying, howling, rage and pain tearing through her.

She flew up the stairs, clawing men apart, and soared up the palace walls.  She bathed those walls and towers with fire.

Roars sounded behind her.  The dragons of her phalanx descended upon the palace, howling and blowing flames.  Their tails lashed at towers.  Their claws tore at walls.  Nephilim flew to face them.  Mori roared and shot flames at the beasts.  One nephil grabbed her leg, and she clubbed it with her tail, tearing the beast off.

She flew higher, shooting up in a straight line.  Before her rose the Tower of Akartum, the tallest spire in Tiranor, perhaps in the world; it scratched the sky, looming above the city like a great needle of stone and platinum.  Archers lined its top, and arrows flew, and Mori roared her fire until the archers burned and fell.  She circled the tower, tears in her eyes.  The city spread burning below her.

I screamed.  I hurt.  I cried.  I will always scream, Solina.  Always.  Every night I will scream in my dreams, and every night I will feel those whips again, and I will destroy this place.  I will crush these stones that held me.

She slammed her tail against the tower, again and again.  She screamed.  Stones cracked.  Mori howled and barreled into the tower, claws lashing, teeth biting, eyes weeping.  Bricks rolled.

Always.  Always, Solina.  Always you will hurt me.  But know this—know that I'm the one who crushed your glory.

The Tower of Akartum cracked.  With one more swipe of her tail, Mori sent it crashing down.

The great pillar of stone slammed into the palace.  The roofs below collapsed.  Walls fell.  The lesser towers crumbled.  Dust rose in clouds, and the dragons howled and soared.

The Palace of Phoebus, Solina's ancestral home, fell below them into a ruin of flame and dust and blood.

Mori rose higher, tears in her eyes, until she flew so high the cold air spun her head and she could barely see the streets below.  When she looked over her shoulder, she saw her rider dead, pierced with a dozen arrows.  Below across the city, fires burned and thousands of warriors flew and killed and died.

 
 
ELETHOR

They charged down the hall, a thousand warriors swinging blades, trampling corpses beneath them.  The soldiers of Requiem charged with longswords, clad in breastplates bearing the Draco stars.  The soldiers of Osanna fought at their side, bull horns engraved upon their armor, their one-handed swords lighter but fast as striking asps.

"Get to the staircase!" Elethor cried, sword drenched in blood.  He swung that blade with both hands, cleaving the armor of a Tiran warrior.  "Take those stairs!"   

This place had once been a banquet hall, Elethor thought; faded murals of feasts covered the walls, featuring the Ancients dining on roasted ducks, bowls of pomegranates, and peacocks still bright with feathers.  This had been a place of life; today death filled the hall.

Dozens of Tiran soldiers stood between Elethor and the staircase leading deeper into the fortress.  They wore armor so pale it was nearly white, the breastplates sporting the Golden Sun of Tiranor.  Their sabres swung, spraying blood in arcs, the pommels shaped as sunbursts.  Their visors swooped like beaks.

Columns rose every few feet, supporting a low ceiling.  Torches crackled.  Along the walls, archways led into deeper shadows; more soldiers fought there.  There was no room here for dragons or nephilim; here was a war of blade and armor, of hacking forward every foot through blood and entrails and corpses.

"Elethor!" Treale shouted at his side, her sword clanging against Tiran sabres.  "What's up those stairs?"

Elethor took a sword's blow to the breastplate and cursed.  He swung Ferus down, severing the Tiran arm that had attacked him.  With another swing, he slew the man.

"I don't know!" he shouted back.  "But we've got to move deeper.  Let us fill every corridor, chamber, and staircase in this place."

He had no map of the palace.  He did not know where Solina hid. 
We will fill this mountain like water spilled into an ant hive,
he thought. 
Wherever you lurk, we will find you.

Finally, with a sword swing that clove a man's helmet, Elethor reached the stairway across the banquet hall.  He shouted orders, and his forces split into five phalanxes.  Each phalanx—a hundred soldiers strong—dashed into another hallway or chamber, leaving the banquet hall littered with corpses.  Elethor ran up the staircase, leading his own phalanx, a hundred warriors of both Requiem and Osanna.

You cannot hide, Solina,
he thought as he raced upstairs. 
We will bang down every door and overturn every brick until we find you.

Tirans raced down toward him.  Blades swung and men fell dead, and Elethor kept climbing.  Treale fought at his side, eyes narrowed and lips tightened; the staircase was only wide enough for two to fight abreast.  Their hundred warriors ran behind them, awaiting their turn to fight.