Cormyr

Chapter 22: The Last Dragon

The Year of the Dracorage (1018 DR)

“I hate this,” pouted Crown Prince Azoun, the second of the royal line to bear that name. “We’re sitting here like coneys waiting for the hunter.”

“Your objection is noted,” the young mage Jorunhast said icily, “and duly ignored.”

“You don’t want to be here either,” said the crown prince.

“You are correct,” the wizard replied, his voice verging on a snarl. “But I have to be here to protect you.”

The wizard had no love for this crown prince, and deep in his heart, he hoped that Thanderahast would hang onto life long enough that Jorunhast could be the court wizard of the next King of Cormyr after Azoun. But not this one. Any king but this one. To swear fealty to such an egotistical, pampered, self-centered child! To call him “Sire” and “liege” and “master”! Jorunhast shook his head.

Even the young prince’s voice was shrill, tinny, and irritating to the mage’s ears. Only three years separated the two in age, but the young prince still sounded like a petulant child.

The bickering pair waited on a low, windswept hill outside Suzail. They made an odd pair as they sat astride their light message ponies. The crown prince was whipsaw thin and gangly, the apprentice wizard broad-shouldered and well muscled. An impartial observer would probably have judged that the lean, hungry one was the mage and his larger companion had Obarskyr blood in him.

Behind them, low on the horizon, the smoke from the wreckage of Cormyr’s capital city spiraled up into the warm summer air.

The great rage of dragons had descended on Cormyr without warning and without mercy. Arabel, Dhedluk, Eveningstar, and a score of other settlements had gone up in flames. Small hamlets were reduced to kindling, and the roads would likely once more become haunted, dangerous paths through lawless wilderness.

But it was Suzail that had suffered the worst. Three great dragons, red wyrms of huge dimensions, had descended on the city like eagles among sheep. The docks and the lower wards, built mostly of wood, roared up in flames. Most of the stone buildings weathered the initial blasts, though glass melted and scorched wooden doors caught fire from the heat. Those buildings that still stood, the dragons ripped apart with their claws, seeking the humans cowering within.

Castle Obarskyr sat above the conflagration, separated from the flames by wide gardens now wilted from the heat. Protected by generations of spells, wards, and glamors, it became the rallying point for the city. Here the nobility fled, and here, in the scented chambers of King Arangor, the response was launched.

Three wings of Purple Dragon guardsmen had erupted from the secure doors of the castle. King Arangor, barely fitting into his own armor, led one wing south to the docks, accompanied by Thanderahast. The future King Azoun II led a similar wing of troops to the west, where the smallest of the three dragons was ravaging the warehouses and taverns. The third wing struck north and east, where the noble manors were clustered along the base of the hill. This was the smallest of the groups but contained many of the nobility of the realm-the Crownsilvers and Truesilvers, the Dracohorns and Dauntinghorns, the Bleths and Illances. This group was led by Lord Gerrin Wyvernspur and aided by Thanderahast’s pupil, Jorunhast.

Each of the groups met their dragons and triumphed. The crown prince’s soldiers drove out the dragon to the west. The dragon on the docks was trapped against its own burning work and slain, but at a heavy cost-the king was sent flying from his saddle in the fray and severely injured.

Lord Gerrin’s party found the third red dragon prowling the cobblestoned streets of the noble district like a huge hunting panther, sniffing at cellar stairs to discern which houses had plump aristocracy hiding in the basement. The noble knights struck hard and fast, and Jorunhast barely had time to unleash a few spells before they had run the dragon through.

Jorunhast was standing over the still-cooling body of the red dragon in the wreckage of House Illance when a great shadow passed over his face. He looked up to see only darkness as a great shadow blotted out the sun itself.

A fourth dragon, larger than any they had seen before, descended on Castle Obarskyr.

It had come out of the north, and Lord Gerrin’s party saw it first. The nobles and their retainers could do naught but gawk at the immense size of the creature, as if one of the moons had been pulled down and now hovered over their city. Jorunhast was caught in the spell as well. It was the largest creature the Cormyrean-born mage had ever seen.

All they could do was watch as the monstrous creature banked its mighty wings and settled over Suzail.

The new arrival was three times the size of the great elder wyrms they had previously fought. Its once ebony scales were purple and gray with age. As it beat its wings, the rushing winds extinguished some flames in the lower city, fanned others, and caused many damaged buildings to collapse. It landed on the castle, and the west wing collapsed beneath its prodigious weight.

The purple dragon, the true Purple Dragon of Cormyr, had returned.

Lord Gerrin, strongest and most noble of the knights, was the first to recover, shouting out a curse as he began to run up the hillside. Jorunhast and the others, wounded and tired, followed more slowly. Elsewhere, the sorely wounded king and the crown prince were also rallying their troops and climbing the low hill to the place where the dragon that was too large to be true was destroying the Obarskyr family home.

Jorunhast stumbled after Lord Gerrin, trying to shake the image of the beast in flight, blotting out the sun itself, from his mind. The dragon was immense to the point of being overwhelming. The mage wracked his brain for a proper spell to use against a beast so huge, but all he could come up with was a name. Thauglor. Thauglor, the Black Doom.

The Purple Dragon continued its slow, leisurely destruction of the castle’s western wing. Ancient stonework crumbled under its weight, and the slate roof shrieked and crashed inward. Jorunhast was relieved. Most of the noble refugees were in the east wing. The west wing contained the guest quarters, the scriptorium, and the library…

And Thanderahast’s spell-chambers, filled with all manner of dangerous devices and explosive magic. Jorunhast forced himself into a panting run, catching up with powerful Lord Wyvernspur halfway up the hill. Behind them trailed the armored knights, struggling in their heavy armor. The young mage opened his mouth to warn the Wyvernspur lord.

They were too late. The dragon crushed something better left uncrushed, probably in the wizard’s chamber of alchemy itself. There was a fierce white flash and a roar, and the ground beneath them rolled and surged.

Their boots had already left the ground behind. The two men tumbled end over end, blown halfway down the hill by the force of the explosion. The brightness of the flash was later reported to have been seen in Arabel, a brief, flickering star on the horizon.

By the time Jorunhast had recovered his wits, the dragon was gone and the rest of the castle was in flames. The great purple dragon, the Black Doom of myths and legends, was a large blot flying north and west, still huge even at a distance. The refugees who had sought the safety of the Obarskyr fortress now spilled out the doors and windows, seeking to escape the flames that raged unchecked within.

Jorunhast and Lord Gerrin reached the front of the castle, and the Wyvernspur noble started shouting orders, telling the screaming courtiers to clear the area and make for the noble houses. Jorunhast remembered feeling at the time that Gerrin Wyvernspur embodied all that was noble in Cormyr. He was strong, brave, and utterly fearless, not an overweight relic of the past like the king or a wastrel like Arangor’s only son.

Jorunhast heard screams from above. In an upper chamber window, one of the younger ladies-in-waiting was sobbing for help. The wooden frame of the window had already been touched by flames, and smoke poured out from behind her.

Jorunhast worked a minor magic then, one of the few spells he still had. He cleared his mind of the smoke and the noise swirling around him and muttered a few ancient words. Then slowly, carefully, he began to walk up the wall.

He reached the open window less than a minute later. The lady-in-waiting was red-eyed from the smoke and in a trembling panic, ready to jump. She wrapped her arms tightly around the mage’s neck and held on with all her strength, practically throttling him in the process. Jorunhast gasped calming words and slowly brought her down to the earth.

By the time the pair of them had reached firm ground, the other knights and nobles had reached the summit as well, and they were beating back the flames with tapestries, cloaks, and whatever came to hand. Gerrin had organized a bucket brigade down to the lake named after the first Azoun, and Thanderahast was working a spell of weather summoning, calling thick, rain-bearing clouds to Suzail to help battle the blazes that raged at the castle and across the city.

Upon reaching the ground, the young maiden refused to release her tight grip and pledged eternal love and loyalty to her brave rescuer. Jorunhast accepted the praise-and kisses-warmly, then lifted his head to see the crown prince staring at him icily.

It was then that the broad-shouldered wizard suddenly remembered the young lady was one Azoun himself had been courting.

Carefully the wizard disengaged himself from the young woman, but the damage had already been done. The crown prince was not as handsome, as tall, or as well mannered as the apprentice mage. Jorunhast could feel the burning royal jealousy. Indeed, had not young Azoun driven off a dragon, only to find the wizard had been declared a hero thanks to some bit of parlor magic?

That was three days ago. Since then, the citizens of Suzail had buried their dead, put out their fires, and picked through the remains of the city for survivors and salvage. A full half of the buildings in the city had been destroyed, and a third of the population killed. A quarter of the castle was shapeless ruins, and most of the rest was smoke-gutted and scorched. Yet some god or other had been smiling on the Obarskyrs, it seemed. The throne room had survived, as had the Shrine of the Four Swords and the great treasures of the kingdom. The heart of Cormyr had survived the flames, but just barely.

Arangor, whom Jorunhast thought had grown fat and lazy in his long, peaceful rule, lost no time in regaining order. Outriders and heralds were posted to all the major towns and villages for reports to determine the extent of the dragons’ depredations. Most of the noble knights, led by Lord Huntsilver, rode north to Arabel, where a pair of green dragons had emptied the city.

Then the word had come from the marshalling grounds near Jester’s Green, once known as Soldier’s Green. The Purple Dragon, Thauglor, had been spotted in the King’s Forest, apparently licking its wounds from the explosion at the castle. It had not flown off into the mountains for a long slumber as it had apparently done many times before. It had remained within striking distance and might, when it recovered, strike at Suzail again.

A council of war was held in the king’s quarters. Despite the efforts of the best surviving priests of the city, Arangor was unable to walk more than a few paces without great pain. Pillows were tucked in on all sides of his throne, and a heavy blanket was spread across his legs. He accentuated every statement with a low moan.

A weak king, thought Jorunhast. His mentor’s words of loyalty to the crown rebuked him for such thoughts. Thanderahast had to have served forty kings in his time. Were they all as mewling and sad as this one?

“That Purple Dragon is behind all of this,” said the king, planted firmly among his pillows. “Thauglor is leading this attack.”

Lord Gerrin Wyvernspur shook his lean head, “No. Dragons don’t think in terms of leaders and attacks, They are much more independent.”

“How do you know what dragons think?” asked the king sharply.

Gerrin looked at the Royal Wizard for support. Thanderahast put in, “Lord Gerrin means that what our sages know of dragons states that they swear fealty in matters of recognizing territory, but they do not band together in organized attacks. I think whatever roused these dragons to attack Cormyr also brought Thauglor back as well. He is not leading the attacks, but he is benefiting from them.”

The wounded king put his head in his hands. “Why now? Why did he suddenly appear now?” The unspoken words in his anguished query were “during my rule.”

Thanderahast shrugged. “No one knows why there are Flights of Dragons, and this one is as bad as any previously recorded. As far as Thauglor the Black is concerned, he has been sighted before.”

“Before,” repeated Arangor bitterly. “Out in the wilderness, far from any city and any king. And each time his appearance has marked a weakness in the crown and the nation. What are the people saying now that the Purple Dragon has attacked the castle itself?”

“What matters now,” said Thanderahast calmly, “is what we are going to do.”

The decision that followed had brought them both to this wind-whipped hilltop: Jorunhast, armed with one of his mentor’s wands, and the young crown prince, lightly armored. They sat in the saddles of their spindly-legged ponies, waiting for the dragon to arrive. The elder wizard had set out with Lord Gerrin to flush the dragon out.

“I don’t like it,” said Azoun.

“You’ve said that before,” said the wizard-in-training. “Why didn’t you say such things when it was proposed?”

“And have everyone think me a coward?” protested the crown prince.

“Best to speak up and be thought a coward than to fail in action and be proved one,” said Jorunhast calmly.

The slender young prince looked hard at the mage. Loudly he said, “And I don’t particularly like you either.”

“I don’t believe they make you a court wizard based on popularity,” said the mage, turning in his saddle to face the younger man. “It’s sort of like kings that way.”

“Ah, but I am popular,” the prince replied, smiling tightly.

“With the ladies, I’m sure,” snapped the wizard. “Ah-some of them, at any rate.” He allowed himself a small smile and ignored the fuming prince.

“If I’d been there I would have rescued-” Azoun began, but the rumbling cut him short. The sound seemed to rise out of the ground itself, and both young men could feel it through their saddles as well as hear it. It was a roar that seemed to envelop their world, coming from the east. Both men looked to that direction, where a small dot blossomed on the horizon.

It was on top of them in an instant. In fact, there were two airborne figures, one pursuing the other. In the lead was Thanderahast, mounted on a wyvern’s back. The wyvern was a smaller kin of dragons, lacking forelegs, and this one was marked with orange and red striations. Of Lord Gerrin, who had accompanied the mage into the woods that morning, there was no sign.

Behind the wyvern and mage came the dragon. Jorunhast clearly saw it approach, and it still looked huge. Its ancient scales reflected in the morning sun in shades of lavender and lilac, belying the powerful muscles that lay beneath them. It beat the air heavily and steadily, as opposed to the wyvern’s quick, panicked wing thrashings. The Purple Dragon was gaining. Magical energy danced from the old wizard’s fingertips, and the bolts of power he hurled ricocheted off the dragon’s ancient scales.

Prey and predator were over their heads in a heartbeat, the windy wake of their passing carving furrows in the tall grass. The wyvern banked sharply after it passed over them, and the great flying behemoth banked in pursuit. Its large size took it into a larger turn, and its massive wings nearly scraped the ground as it swung about to follow its smaller prey.

It was even bigger than Jorunhast remembered. Now, without the city around him, without the protection of walls and redoubts and buildings, it dominated the young wizard’s vision. He suddenly felt very small and exposed and alone on that bare hilltop.

Something cold and clammy settled in Jorunhast’s stomach and clung there tightly.

The dragon passed over them again, and the wizard was aware that the young prince was shouting something at him.

“The wand!” he bellowed, his smooth, beardless face almost apoplectic. “Use the damnable wand!”

The wyvern-mounted mage banked again, and the Purple Dragon followed, this time pulling out of its turn almost directly behind its quarry. The two young men on the hill saw the monstrous creature’s throat bunch and swell. Azoun was shouting again, and Jorunhast was fumbling frantically with the wand.

The dragon breathed a huge gout of acid-and the wyvern and mage evaporated. Jorunbast thought he saw his mentor move his arms in sudden spellcasting before the heavy, scintillating spittle struck, then both wyvern and wizard were lost to view, swallowed in the flow of the dragon’s breath. After the acid gout had passed, the great purple dragon was the only thing in the sky.

Jorunhast screamed a magical word of old Netheril and felt the wand glow and pulse in his hand. A bolt of flame burst from its tip and lanced upward. Jorunhast did not aim it, but the dragon was so huge he could not help but strike it. The lance of flame raked along the orchid-hued belly plates of the beast.

The great monster screamed.

The Purple Dragon convulsed and pulled itself into another tight, air-shattering turn. Fighting for calm, Jorunhast readied his next spell.

Beside him, Azoun shouted after the great beast’s retreating form, “Hail, old lizard! Think you can defeat the true rulers of Cormyr?”

The lad’s voice cracked, and Jorunhast would have sworn that the wind blew the remains of his words away, but the dragon apparently heard them well enough. It responded with a great roar.

Jorunhast muttered the last phrase of a new spell and slapped the withers of both ponies. The pair sprang forward as if released from a starting gate, their powerful legs enhanced by the magic. The ponies ran as they had never run before, sped by Jorunhast’s hastening spell.

The dragon surged through the air behind them, but the pair slowly began to increase the distance between them and their pursuer. Jorunhast looked back.

All he could see was the dragon’s open jaws-a huge, fang-toothed mouth surrounded by ancient wattles of flesh. He turned around again and bent low to spur on his mount, urging it to even greater speed.

Then he heard laughter and looked to his right to see the crown prince smiling in the racing wind. Had the dolt lost his mind?

Jorunhast turned in his saddle again. They had gained more distance, and now the dragon was gaining altitude behind them. Jorunhast pointed the wand and shouted the eldritch words again. The wand pulsed, and a lance of flame streamed over the great creature’s head. The dragon dodged it easily but came down lower now, only slightly higher off the ground than the two riders ahead.

Jorunhast and Azoun plowed forward up a shallow wash. On either side rose grass-swept slopes topped with brush. At the far end of the wash, the ground climbed to a small hillock.

Both young men dug spurs into their mounts, and the message ponies once more increased their speed, topping the end of the wash with a few dozen strides. They reined and wheeled in place, and the young Azoun raised his arm, sword in hand.

The dragon was coming in low and fast, nearly touching the grass beneath it, gliding with its wings outstretched, grazing the soft hills on both sides. Azoun dropped his arm in a short, chopping motion.

The brush lining the ridges on either side dropped away, and two lines of Cormyrean archers unleashed steel-tipped volleys against the great beast.

Had they aimed at the creature’s scaled body, their shots could have done little more than annoy the beast. Instead, they shot for the wings, riddling the tough membrane with a myriad of holes. A few shafts caught at lucky angles and tore great gouges in the wing surfaces.

The dragon was coming in too low to recover as the air beneath its wings suddenly streamed through the holes. It tried to land on its massive haunches, but it was moving too fast and sprawled forward as it landed, its head and long serpentine neck plowing a furrow along the base of the sod-covered wash. There was a sound like a ship’s mast being rent in twain, and Jorunhast knew it had to be one of the dragon’s massive wings doubling under it.

They had knocked the creature out of the sky. The soldiers on either side of the wash threw down their bows and snatched out their swords. They lowered their helms over their faces and, with a single shout, spilled down from both rises to where the wounded dragon thrashed.

Azoun dismounted and pulled out his own blade. The mage nearly fell from his mount trying to stop him.

“Those are my men,” said the crown prince angrily. “I should fight with them!”

“And further risk the loss of the heir to the throne?” Jorunhast dismounted and put a firm hand on the young man’s shoulders. “I think not. Let them wear the beast down. By then Thanderahast and a real warrior, Lord Gerrin, will be-Oof!”

The crown prince moved more swiftly than the wizard had thought possible, elbowing him sharply in the gut. Jorunhast felt the air rush from his body as he fell to his knees, gasping helplessly. By the time the world stopped spinning around him, the young royal warrior was halfway to the battle.

The soldiers swarmed over the great dragon like ants, and with about the same effectiveness. They hacked at the great beast’s scales, and occasionally an armsman would loosen one sufficiently to strike at the meat beneath. For Thauglor, it was akin to being stung to death by gnats.

The great beast had its own bag of tricks. The one good wing swept a half-dozen attackers into dazed and bruised ruin. Its tail smashed another two. Its claws gutted a pair of warriors where they stood. And its huge jaws ran bloody as its head snaked out again and again to snuff out the life of another Cormyrean soldier.

And the only heir to the throne of Cormyr was charging into that maelstrom of death.

Jorunhast looked around. If Lord Gerrin was coming, he was taking his damned time about it. Thanderahast was wounded or dead. The mage raised the wand but saw that the crown prince was in the way. The insufferable, irritating, impulsive crown prince. A lance of flame would burn through him and into the dragon itself. Perhaps Cormyr would be a better place without him.

Jorunhast paused for a long moment, then cursed and ran down the hill after the prince. Even with all these warriors rushing about, you’d think less work would be needed to get a clear shot at something as large as the dragon. And as he ran, the mage swore to himself that, even under torture, he would never admit he was running to Azoun’s rescue.

The young prince reached the dragon and struck. His blade bit deep. The sword, supposedly crafted long ago by Amedahast herself, parted a scale as if it were jelly and slid into the creature’s haunch, striking to the bone.

It was as if the dragon had been struck by lightning. It heaved itself from the ground, shuddering, and tried to roll away from the attack, crushing a half-dozen soldiers and almost snatching the blade from Azoun’s hands.

But the scion of the Obarskyrs would not let up. He tore the blade free and cut another long, shallow wound along the dragon’s belly. It gave out a great scream and spat a huge gout of acid. Men screamed where the acid struck, but the dragon had little time to enjoy their deaths. Its serpentine neck snapped around, and its jaws closed on the small form of the crown prince.

Jorunhast shouted, but then he saw that Azoun had avoided the fanglike maw of the beast and was hanging by the loose wattles at the corner of the creature’s mouth. The dragon shook its head like a dog trying to dislodge a tick, but the young monarch held fast. The wizard saw a white flash of clenched teeth as he stared at Azoun’s blurred form.

Wildly, Jorunhast tore his gaze away and looked about. Half of the soldiers were dead, and there was still no sign of the elders. Where had they gone? The mage was close enough to use the wand of flame, but it might bounce back off the dragon’s scales to consume him as well. And if he missed and cooked a certain crown prince

The wizard ran to the gaping wound along the dragon’s belly, now seeping thick, deep purplish blood. He glanced up to see the young prince still clinging to the hide beside the dragon’s mouth. As he watched, Azoun drove his blade deep into the wyrm’s eye. Dark, gold-flecked fluid sprayed out.

Jorunhast hastily bent his head away from the bloody rain he knew would come and shoved the thin wand into the open wound and shouted the command word. The wand pulsed, and a jet of flame shot deep into the creature’s body.

The dragon spasmed, its body arching and flexing from the agony of the ravaging fire inside and the blade in its eye. A huge clawed paw swept Jorunhast off his feet. He lost his grip on the wand, and his last sight was of Azoun driving his blade deep into Thauglor’s reptilian brain with both bands.

Blackness overwhelmed the young mage when he struck the ground. It seemed to last for only a moment, but when he picked himself up, the dragon was sprawled dead on the floor of the wash. Priests moved among the fallen soldiers. A priestess of Lathander put her hand on Jorunhast’s shoulder, but he shrugged it off and stumbled back toward the dragon’s flank, where Gerrin and Thanderahast stood talking to Azoun.

Lord Wyvernspur was badly burned, the left side of his face and entire body raw and bleeding beneath the slimy ointments of the priests. Thanderahast was similarly burned and anointed, and in addition sported purplish ridges rising along the side of his head, bruises from some sudden impact.

Azoun seemed unharmed by his adventure. Jorunhast wondered at the luck of children, fools, and royalty.

“You are back with us, lad,” said the elder mage. “We could not return as soon as we’d hoped, but I see the pair of you were capable of handling things.”

“It was a good plan,” said the young mage, still lightheaded. He blinked hard in the sunlight, then added, “I lost your wand, I’m afraid.”

Thanderahast chuckled. “A small loss, easily forgiven. Azoun told me of your bravery in charging the dragon and in waiting for the right moment to strike with the wand. We were worried you had panicked.”

Jorunhast stared at the younger man. Hadn’t he told them the mage had frozen up when the dragon first attacked? That he had tried to stop Azoun from entering the battle?

Azoun cocked his head and said, “It’s good to see you back standing up. Want some help looking for that wand?”

Jorunhast gaped at the young prince for a moment, and then, slowly, nodded.

Gerrin and Thanderahast flagged down the priestess of Lathander for information about the wounded, leaving Azoun and Jorunhast alone. The two young men paced off to the trampled area near the dragon’s body. They made vague sweeps in the splayed grass with the sides of their feet, looking for little and finding less.

At length, Jorunhast said, “I only charged in after you because you were going to get yourself killed.”

“I know,” said the slender man. “And they probably think something like that, but they never have to know. Despite it all, you did pretty well today.”

Words burned in Jorunhast’s throat like the black dragon’s bile. Finally he spat them out. “So did you.” And then he added, “Sire.”

Azoun flashed a wide smile. “Mind you, I don’t trust you, and I still don’t like you. But with the beating old Thanderahast has taken, it’s likely you’ll be my wizard when my time comes. So I might as well get used to you.”

The young wizard sighed. “And I to you. But do me one favor, my lord: No more charging into combat.”

“Only when you’re behind me with your magic,” said the future king. “Only when you’re behind me.”

The young prince strode away, leaving Jorunhast to think that Azoun’s voice was not so tinny after all.