The Dragons of Ice and Snow (58 page)

“
It
is, yes.”

The
wizard leaned on his staff, shivering a bit in the cold wind. He had
let the young boy keep his jacket and the chill was starting to seep
in.

He
watched with detached interest as the orbs of light, dozens of them,
bobbed and shivered in the breeze. Funny how magic works, he thought.

“
So
now what?” the paladin asked. “If you stay here much
longer, you are going to catch your death.”

“
Quite
possibly,” Simon agreed. “So, you didn't know any of the
captives?”

With
a dejected sigh, Liliana shook her head.

“
No.
I assume my people were used to create new monsters. Oh my friend.
That the primal white dragon got away is such a travesty of justice.
That monster must not be allowed to live.”

Simon
nodded and stared at the lights again.

“
So,
you want justice? Or revenge?”

“
Both?
Either? Call it what you will, but wiping that creature off the face
of the Earth would be doing all of humanity a favor.”

“
I
agree. I'm glad to know that you're still resolved though. I may need
that.”

“
Really?
Why?”

The
paladin was frowning at Simon's almost detached expression.

“
What
is wrong with you, my friend?”

“
You
know, magic's a funny thing,” he said as he watched a glowing
orb float by in the breeze.

“
Is
it?” Liliana asked, sounding puzzled.

“
It
is. For instance, did you know that I can cast orbs of light just
like these ones? I suspect Tamara and her brother can too. They seem
to be a standard magical light source.”

“
Um,
I see. And is that a funny thing?”

“
In
a way.”

Simon
looked around the mesa. The dragons were beginning to freeze into
grotesque shapes and the bodies of the drakes reminded him of
misshapen bags of garbage for some reason.

“
Aethos
hasn't returned yet. Ah well, I guess he'll turn up sooner or later.”

He
looked straight at Liliana and his dreamy expression was replaced
with one of cold anger.

The
paladin actually took a step back at the sudden change.

She
began to speak but Simon made a motion to stop her.

“
Yes,
magic is funny sometimes,” he said again as he stared at the
crater in the ground. “Did you know that, when I leave a room
and move some distance away, my magical orbs of light vanish? Isn't
that peculiar? It's like they need my presence to keep functioning.
Take that away and they die. Strange, huh?”

Liliana
was still frowning, but then she looked from Simon to the nearest orb
of light and back again.

Her
face blanched and she slowly reached over her shoulder and drew her
two-handed sword from its sheathe.

“
You're
quite right, my friend. It is peculiar.”

“
Yeah,
I thought you'd agree.”

Simon
rattled off a string of words so fast that the paladin couldn't
understand any of them. He motioned for her to move next to him with
one hand, while holding his staff upright with the other.

“
Shield!”
he barked.

Just
in time. The bottom of the crater split open and fell away and a
massive head, scaled and fanged like a dragon's but with human
features, appeared from underground, eyes blazing. With a shrug of
huge shoulders, the rock around it collapsed and the primal white
dragon leapt out of the earth and stood straddling the hole. The mesa
shook with its coming.

It
looked down from its great height, misshapen wings unfurling and
began to laugh.

“
Ah
little wizard,” it said with obvious delight. “I have you
now.”

Simon thought he knew what
the primal dragon looked like after its transformation, having seen
it through Aeris' eyes. The reality was so much worse.

As tall as a four story
building, the creature had morphed into a nightmare. Although he
despised them for what they had done to the Earth and his people, the
wizard acknowledged that dragons had a certain kind of majesty. They
were like icons from old fairy tales with their horned brows and
magnificent wings. They soared through the air as if they were born
to rule the skies. In short, their forms were exactly what they
needed to be. The primal white dragon had mutated into something
grotesque.

It stood on two legs like
a man, but one foot was a twisted ruin and so it stood tilted to one
side. The weathered iron breastplate it wore was rusted and slashed
in places. It fit poorly and hampered the creature's movements.

The face was split in a
wide grin, but half of the fangs had rotted away and brown ichor
dribbled from the corners of its twisted mouth.

However, the wings were
the worst. On a dragon, they stretched out like glorious sails, twice
the width of the body, looking like pictures Simon had seen in old
fantasy books. But the wings jutting from the shoulder-blades of the
primal dragon were stunted remnants of their former glory, so small
and fragile that it was obvious that the creature would never fly
again. It made a mockery of the glory that it must have once had.

As the primal stood
awkwardly, looking down at the wizard and the paladin, a waft of air
from it made them both gag. Liliana clapped a hand over her mouth and
looked a little green. It was the smell. The monster smelled like an
open wound that had begun to rot, a sweet-sour stench that reminded
Simon over over-ripe tomatoes mixed with vinegar. He swallowed
several times to keep from vomiting.

“
So this is the
famous wizard that my people have been so worried about,” the
primal rumbled as it stared at them. It raised a clawed hand and
scratched its armored chest. “This insect. I must admit that I
am...disappointed.”

The pair stepped back a
few paces so they could see that hideous face more clearly.

“
Sorry to
disappoint,” Simon shouted up at it. “You aren't exactly
what I was expecting either, you know.”

The primal stretched out
its arms and looked down at its twisted body. They could see several
running sores in its armpits. Liliana leaned closer to the wizard.

“
What's wrong with
it?” she whispered. “It's like it's rotting or
something.”

“
No idea,” he
murmured. “Maybe whatever the magic did to it went bad
somehow.”

“
Yes, I am different
now, am I not?” it boomed out, sounding almost pensive. “But
oh, I am so much stronger now than I was in my old form. I can use
magic now, just like you puny humans.”

It threw back its head and
roared with laughter.

“
Do you not see,
little wizard, what the dark ones have done for me? This gift? I
still have all of my strengths, but now I have yours as well. Here,
allow me to show you.”

The primal raised a hand
straight up over its head. Simon heard it chant something that he
didn't recognize and then the monster flung down its arm and pointed
a finger straight at him.

Without hesitation, he
grabbed Liliana's arm and pulled her.

“
Come on!”

He turned and ran toward
the large boulders on the western side of the mesa. Above him, a
crackle of electricity made his body tingle and then a bolt of
lightning slammed into the ground just outside of his shield, sending
both of the humans tumbling end over end.

Simon pushed himself
groggily to his feet and turned to look up at the primal. Liliana
pushed herself up and stood next to him. The shield was holding, for
now.

“
You see?” the
beast said, sounding delighted with itself. “I can summon
lightning now, just like you. And fireballs. And many other things. I
can even create a stable portal, which even you cannot do, insect.”

“
Sounds like its got
confidence issues,” the paladin muttered.

“
Yeah. Weird, isn't
it? Something that old and that powerful is trying to prove it's
better than me. Why does it even care?”

The primal took one
enormous step forward, shaking the ground beneath it, and looked
around at the bodies of the dragons and drakes.

“
I see you and your
puny forces have defeated some of my followers. No matter. I am about
to do the same to you.”

“
What are you
talking about?” Simon yelled.

It shrugged its heavy
shoulders.

“
The tunneling worms
that call themselves dwarves. Their capital city is about to fall.
You may have destroyed a handful of dragons here today, but there are
hundreds of my altered servants who are even now attacking the
dwarves in a relentless horde. When some of mine fall, they are
simply replaced, but there are no replacements for the fallen worms.
They are doomed. Now, does your victory here today still taste as
sweet?”

Its yellow eyes blazed and
its broken-toothed grin widened.

“
I don't think
you'll be getting any more replacements, monster,” Simon
shouted, his voice thick with anger. He pointed at the mass of broken
eggs. “Your eggs are destroyed. Now when a white dragon falls,
another will not hatch. Whatever happens to me, your kind is
finished.”

The primal turned to look
across the plateau and saw the mess that Malcolm and Aiden had left
in their wake. Hundreds of shattered egg shells littered the ground
and were being scattered by the wind.

“
What have you
done?” it growled. The useless limp wings on its back fluttered
and flapped, as if trying to lift the creature off the ground. It
spun around and raised its arms over its head.

“
What have you
done!” it bellowed and the huge arms swung down, its hands
balled into massive fists.

Liliana leaped in one
direction and Simon jumped in another. The primal's fists slammed
into the ground and actually lifted the wizard off of his feet. He
managed to roll as he landed and then skittered to the left and
ducked down behind a boulder. He hoped that the paladin was able to
find cover as well.

There was a long moment of
silence and then the primal began speaking as if talking to itself.

“
But what does it
matter? I have plenty of servants left. Yes, like me. Stronger, more
clever. And once this wizard is no more, there will no longer be a
threat. I will not need to replace any more dragons. Yes, of course.
Doesn't matter.”

Simon listened to the
primal's internal debate and something began to dawn on him. The
dragon was insane.

Whatever magic had twisted
it, changed it into the misshapen beast it had become, must have also
altered its brain. The thought was frightening. It meant that the
dragon was now totally unpredictable. He couldn't trick it the way
he'd tricked the other primals. He had no way to know how it would
react.

I'm flying blind, he
thought. So what do I do now?

“
Come out, little
wizard. There is nowhere to run,” the primal rumbled mockingly.
“Face me, magic-user to magic-user and at least die like a man
and not like a worm.”

Simon didn't answer. He
was thinking fast. His shield would fall in a moment and he'd have to
recast it. Would the primal sense that? Probably. Maybe he could
divert it somehow.

“
Oh, so the little
paladin chooses to face me instead,” the dragon said, sounding
delighted. “I see now which of you is more brave.”

Simone gasped. Liliana!
No!

“
You killed my
people, monster,” he heard her shout somewhere to his right.

The wizard crept around
the boulder and peeked out to see what was going on.

The paladin was standing
on the far side of the primal, her sword held firmly in both hands.
There was a shimmer in the air around her and Simon wondered if it
had something to do with her powers. He knew very little about the
holy warriors.

The hulking primal had
turned and was watching her, its hands on its hips. Its back was
facing Simon.

“
You turned them
into atrocities against nature. And for that, you are going to pay.”

“
Against nature?”

The primal rubbed its jaw
reflectively.

“
Nature is what I
will it to be, human. You should be thanking me. I took your little
friends and made them part of something greater. Why, they couldn't
be happier now! Imagine, part human and part dragon. A rebirth! I
would like to offer you the same gift, but I am afraid that you would
be too hard to tame, would you not?”

Simon watched Liliana's
face darken and felt his stomach twist.

It's baiting you, he
thought frantically. Don't let it.