Dragons Lost (3 page)

I'm sorry, Father,
Mother,
he thought, looking behind him at the village. He saw Derin
gasping, shielding baby Eliana within his embrace. He saw villagers flee. And
he saw Mercy leap onto her firedrake and soar, and soon all the beasts were
flying, and their dragonfire streamed toward him.

Cade flew higher,
dodging the flames. Tears burned in his eyes. He had never flown in daylight
before, never flown in the open for anyone to see.

Today he flew faster
than ever, heading north toward the mountains, leaving his village behind. He
cried out, a torn howl of fear and pain.

Behind him, Mercy
shouted from her saddle, and the dozen firedrakes flew in pursuit.

 
 
MERCY

A weredragon.

Mercy shook with rage,
leaned forward in the saddle, and sneered.

A living weredragon.

The foul creature flew
ahead, streaming across the sky, a golden dragon. But he was no true dragon.
Mercy had seen his true form—a pathetic, sniveling little peasant boy.
Infected. Cursed. Impure.

"Faster, Pyre!" Mercy
shouted, digging her spurs into the firedrake she rode. "Faster, damn you!"

Scales in all the
colors of flame covered her firedrake, this true dragon, a dragon whose human
form had been yanked out. Mercy had cut off two of the scales, leaving room for
her spurs to dig into the soft flesh beneath. Now, as Mercy drove in the steel
spikes, the beast howled and beat its wings mightily. Streams of smoke blasted
from its nostrils, and its saliva dripped toward the fields below. Eleven other
firedrakes flew around Mercy, paladins in white armor atop them. The paladins'
hair—the pure white hair that grew from only the right side of their heads—billowed
like banners.

"We hunt a weredragon,
brothers!" Mercy cried and laughed. "A true, living weredragon!"

She had heard tales of
weredragons living in the Commonwealth, still infected—those who had escaped
purification as babes. Mercy had hunted several herself, slain them with her
own lance. This was a great hunt, a great moment of triumph for her god. She
licked her teeth as they flew in pursuit. The golden dragon—this Cade Baker—was
fast, streaming across the sky just as fast as her firedrakes. But she had
trained her firedrakes for stamina, for long flights across the great distances
of the Commonwealth. The weredragon ahead would have only flown at night, in
secret, probably never more than a mile or two. He would soon tire.

"And then I will break
you, Cade," Mercy whispered, her sneer growing into a grin. She imagined how
she'd bring him to the capital, how she'd chain him upon the palace balcony,
displaying him to the multitudes. She would break him then. She would shatter
his bones with a hammer, and she would whip his flesh, and finally when he
begged her for death, she would mount her firedrake and burn him with
dragonfire. She would laugh as he screamed.

"You cannot escape us,
Cade!" she shouted into the wind. "You cannot escape your death." She dug her
spurs into her firedrake again. "Blow your fire, Pyre!"

The great multicolored
reptile blasted out a jet of flame. Around Mercy, the eleven other firedrakes
shot forth their inferno. The dozen fiery streams blasted forward, crackling
and spinning. Cade flew just out of range; the last flickers of fire singed his
tail, only spurring him onward. Mercy laughed to hear his yelp of pain.

"You will hurt far more
before I'm done with you," she said into the wind, her teeth clenched, her grin
so wide it hurt her cheeks.

Along with her rage,
her pain drove down into her belly, a metal rod forever inside her. The
weredragons—those men and women with the disease so many were born with, the
disease her Temple cured—had caused nothing but misery. Thousands of years ago,
they had formed a kingdom for their kind, a kingdom that had suffered through endless
wars, genocides, and tyrannies. They had given their kingdom a name, a name
forbidden now, a name Mercy dared not utter, not even think of. And for that
name, millions had died.

Throughout history, the
weredragons had attracted the wrath of demons, of griffins, of phoenixes.
Throughout history, endless wars had been fought for that magic of reptiles.

Until the Cured Temple.

A hundred years ago,
Mercy's great-grandmother, a pious woman, had heard the words of the Spirit,
the wise god, creator of all. The priestess had raised the Cured Temple, a
small but ancient religion, to dominion. It was a religion to cure all
weredragons, to remove the illness that had brought so much death. The first
High Priestess had begun to cleanse the land of dragon magic. She had burned
all scrolls and books bearing the kingdom's old name, had outlawed uttering
that name, and had called her new realm the Commonwealth—a realm for the cured.
A realm without weredragons.

For a hundred years,
Mercy's elders had worked to make this dream a reality, to finally rid the
world of the last weredragon. The Spirit taught that when the last weredragon
fell, the ancient King's Column—a relic of marble in the capital—would fall
too. The world would be cured. The ancient disease would be cleansed away. The
Spirit himself would descend to the earth, ushering in an era of peace and
holiness.

The Falling,
Mercy thought, sucking in breath. The day the column would fall. The day all
adherents of the Cured Temple craved.

Perhaps Cade himself was
the last weredragon. Perhaps she, Lady Mercy Deus, would be the one to bring
about the Falling.

She spurred her
firedrake again, racing across forests and hills. The parti-colored beast blew
fire again, and Cade kept flying, but she saw him wobbling in the sky. He was
weakening. He would not be able to keep flying for much longer.

Mercy tightened her
grip around her lance's shaft.

Yes, she craved the
Falling. She craved the holiness that would come from cleansing the world. But
even more, she craved revenge.

"The weredragons killed
him, killed my—"

Pain bolted through Mercy.
No, she would not summon that memory now, the memory of a day of fire, of
screams, of loss. A day of a soul torn from her.

"Weredragons are
murderers," she whispered, and her eyes stung with tears. "And now I will
murder you, Cade. Slowly. Savoring every drop of your blood."

Cade dipped lower in
the sky. Smoke streamed from his nostrils in two trails. He was slowing down.
The firedrakes, meanwhile, only flew faster at the sight. The great beasts
tossed back their heads and screeched, the sounds beautiful—the sounds of
ripping flesh and snapping bones.

"Burn him!" Mercy
shouted.

The firedrakes blasted
out their flames.

The inferno shot toward
Cade and washed across him.

The golden dragon
screamed.

It was a human scream,
the cry of a boy, pained, beautiful. Mercy grinned and licked her lips to hear
it. Scales heated, expanded, and cracked across Cade, but still he flew.

"We take him alive!"
Mercy shouted. She rose in her stirrups and raised her lance. "Barely alive."

She aimed the lance,
prepared to thrust it into Cade's wing to cripple him, then drag him back to
the capital in chains.

Before her, Cade turned
in the sky.

"What's the damn fool
doing?" she growled.

With a roar, the golden
dragon came charging toward the dozen firedrakes.

"He's taking us head
on!" said Sir Castus, a tall man who flew a firedrake at Mercy's right side.

She stared in
disbelief. "Burn him!"

Beneath her, her
firedrake thrummed, its scales of many colors clattering, as it blasted out
flames. Its eleven comrades blew fire too. The jets coalesced into a single
strand, an inferno like a dying sun, a great pillar—wider than a city boulevard—that
streamed toward the charging gold dragon.

Instants before Cade
could hit the fire, he soared higher, dodging the flames. The gold dragon rose
toward the sun, then spun and swooped.

His dragonfire rained
down.

Mercy screamed and
raised her shield.

Cade's inferno rained
upon her.

The dragonfire
blazed across her shield, and Mercy screamed. Tongues of fire reached around
the metal disk to lick her armor. Her firedrake shrieked, the flames cascading
across its scales.

"You'll be the one to burn,
Mercy!" the golden dragon roared. An instant later, Cade's claws came slamming
down.

Mercy gnashed her teeth
as she raised her shield. The dragon claws clattered against it. Mercy swung
her sword blindly, trying to hit Cade. He dodged the blade, grabbed her shield
in his claws, and yanked it free from her grip.

For an instant, Mercy
stared up into the roaring jaws of the golden dragon, and she saw her death.

For that instant,
terror, all-consuming, filled her.

Cade plunged down,
prepared to snap his jaws around her.

Mercy growled, rose in
her stirrups, and thrust up her sword.

The blade drove into
Cade's palate, piercing him, and blood showered. The dragon screamed and beat
his wings, rising higher in the sky.

"Burn him, Pyre!" Mercy
shouted.

Her firedrake reared
beneath her and blasted flames upward. The other firedrakes joined in. One of
the beasts slammed into Cade, knocking the golden dragon aside. Another firedrake
thrust its claws, tearing at Cade's scales.

The golden dragon cried
out and plunged down in the sky.

As Cade tumbled down by
her, Mercy leaned sideways in her saddle and thrust her lance. The blade
cracked one of Cade's scales and drove into the flesh. Blood spurted.

The golden dragon cried
out and lost his magic.

Cade plunged down in
human form, a boy again.

Mercy grinned.

"Grab him, Pyre!"

The firedrake swooped,
claws extended. As Cade fell toward the distant forest, Mercy rode her
firedrake down in pursuit, prepared to grab Cade and bloody him a few more
times before chaining him up.

The land below—rocky
mountains covered in pines—raced up toward them. Pyre's claws stretched out
like an owl reaching for a mouse.

The firedrake's claws grazed
the tumbling boy.

Before the claws could grab
him, Cade became a dragon again.

Mercy screamed. As Cade
shifted, he ballooned in size. The golden dragon slammed against Pyre, knocking
the firedrake back. Mercy nearly tumbled from the saddle.

Cade's fire blasted
skyward, hit Pyre's belly, and exploded in a great fountain. Smoke blinded
Mercy. She grabbed the saddle's horn, pulling herself back into position.
Flames burned at her boots. She screamed and thrust her lance blindly, and her
firedrake swayed, and for a moment Mercy didn't know up from down. The other firedrakes
streamed around her.

When Mercy finally
righted herself, she stared around, sneering and panting.

"Where is he?" she
shouted.

Cade was gone.

Mercy rose in her
stirrups, staring from side to side. "Where's the boy?"

The other paladins
seemed just as confused. They too stared from side to side, seeking Cade.

The golden
dragon was gone.

"He must have fallen,"
said Sir Castus, streaming across the sky to her right. He pointed his lance
down toward the mountains. "Probably dead between the pines."

Mercy growled. No. No!
She would not let him die. She would kill him herself in the capital for the
multitudes to see, for her mother—the High Priestess herself—to smell the
blood.

"Then find him!" she
cried. "Down into the forest. Uproot every tree if you must! Bring him to me
alive, or bring me his corpse!"

The firedrakes swooped.
The wind roared, and the mountainsides rushed up toward them. With a shower of
shattering branches, the firedrakes crashed through the pine canopy and landed
on the rocky slopes. Mercy leaped from her saddle and gazed around, seeking
him. Nothing. No sign of him. She saw only trees, boulders, a rocky stream.

Mercy trembled with
rage. How could he have vanished? He had flown right beneath her! Her firedrake
had burned him! How had he disappeared in the blink of an eye?

The other paladins
dismounted. They gathered around her.

"He's probably just
dead on a rock somewhere," said Sir Lancino, a gruff man with a cleft chin. He
snorted. "I say we return home. The weredragon won't bother us no—"

Mercy stepped toward
the paladin and thrust her sword into his neck.

The man gasped and
gurgled. Blood filled his mouth. He twitched, held upright upon her blade.

Mercy leaned in closer,
sneering. "We will not rest until the weredragon is found."

The other paladins
stared, silent. Mercy tugged the blade free. Sir Lancino gave a last gasp, then
fell down dead. Mercy spat on his body.

Good riddance,
she thought. The man had been a fool, and she had hated that ridiculous chin of
his.

She turned toward the
other paladins and raised her dripping blade. "Now fan out and find him! Find
the weredragon, or I'll slay you all. Go!"

The paladins nodded.
Leaving their firedrakes, they began to race between the trees, seeking Cade.

Mercy marched through
the forest, sword raised, the hot blood sticky on her fingers.

Cade had hurt
her. He had escaped her. He would scream with the pain of ten thousand tortured
men.

 
 
CADE

Cade lay on the forest floor,
bleeding, head spinning, not sure if he was alive or dead. Smoke and flame rose
above him, raining ash. He could see nothing but the inferno.

"Where is he?" rose the
shriek. "Find the boy! Find him!"

Mercy's voice—no longer
fair but twisted with cruelty, dripping bloodlust and rage.

Cade tried to move. He
lifted one arm and grimaced with pain. Welts rose across his skin—burns from
his own dragonfire, the blaze he'd blown when still in dragon form. His memory
slipped in and out of his mind. He had become human again. He had fallen,
crashing through his own fire, hidden within the blaze. He had landed here, bruised
and burnt. He was dying. He—