Dragons of a New Age

21 Sapphire Schemes

The blue spawn stood on a ridge above Khellendros’s underground lair. Its stubby tail twitched, miniature bolts of lightning danced between its clawed fingers, and its head slowly turned to take in the barren expanse.

Sand spread away from it in all directions. It was fine, white sand, not the coarse brown grains that covered the ground a few months ago. The white sand contrasted sharply with the color of the spawn, and with the Blue. Rich sapphire against glistening white.

A pale, cloudless blue sky reached overhead, and the sun hung suspended in the center of it, white-hot and merciless heat. Blessed heat, the spawn thought. Like its creator, it reveled in the blazing warmth.

Khellendros had been sculpting his land, as the other dragon overlords had been doing. But he didn’t create any mountains or lakes or coax plants to grow in such great profusion. And he didn’t make the desert much bigger than it was before. He left the terrain largely as it was—he had little inclination to significantly alter the physical features of the Northern Wastes. The dragon liked his home the way it was. He had simply changed the color and texture of the sand.

Khellendros believed the white grains stored the heat better. He loved to feel the intense warmth beneath the pads of his massive feet or beneath his belly when he stretched out in the middle of the day—the hottest time in the desert—as he was stretching out now. The warmth permeated every scale, soaked into his thick muscles, and massaged the ridge that ran along his back.

The white sand held the water better when he unleashed a storm to wet his hide and soak his domain. The dragon needed to be cooled off on occasion, if only because when the water dissipated and the heat returned he could more appreciate it, bask in it anew.

Ah, this glorious heat!

The dragon rumbled, purring like a cat, and the spawn turned to glance at him. Khellendros stared at his sapphire creation, and, as usual, found that he was staring at a miniature doppleganger of himself.

“Master? You wish something of me?”

“No,” Khellendros growled, as he continued to stare. He cocked his head. “I wish to sleep. Wake me if you spy trespassers.”

The blue spawn turned its head, and the dragon saw the scene shift away from himself and to the south. Khellendros was still getting used to this ability to see what any designated spawn saw—to see, hear, and feel. This spawn, and the others below in his lair, were extensions of himself. He closed his eyes and thought of the hot sand, and as he did so his senses pulled away from the blue spawn.

“Two-legged trespassers,” the dragon softly added.

The spawn had previously—and needlessly—woken him when a wild camel plodded by. Trespassers, to the young, mentally-childish creation, seemed to mean anything that wasn’t itself or Khellendros. The dragon knew the spawn would learn. The creature had the capacity for genius. Khellendros simply had to fill its mind and give it direction.

The blue spawn continued to survey its master’s domain. It glanced at each cactus, every patch of scrub grass, ignored the large scorpions that skittered about, and paid little attention to the thin, brown snakes that worked their way across the land, leaving curved shapes behind them. The spawn knew when its master awoke, he would erase the S-shaped designs and restore the desert to blankness once again. It watched the air shimmer, the currents of heat rising from the master’s bed of white. And it watched the tiny, two-legged trespasser approach. Khellendros was not allowed to sleep long.

“Master?”

The dragon rumbled. He irately rose on his haunches and looked past the spawn. Another camel? A giant scorpion perhaps? Maybe a small sandstorm? For an instant the dragon wondered if he had made an error in designating this blue spawn a sentry before it had been thoroughly educated. The dragon had been promised other sentries, suitable guards so that his spawn could remain a secret while he taught them. But the huldrefolk’s promise of sentries remained unfulfilled, and Khellendros was constantly being awakened from his needed sleep.

The dragon’s misgivings were quickly set aside. “I am pleased with you, blue spawn,” he said. “You are serving me well.”

The diminutive gray-skinned man, who a moment before was only a speck on the horizon, strode persistently forward, apparently unbothered by the heat.

“Fissure,” Khellendros hissed. He opened his maw, just enough so his tongue could edge out.

Away from the shadows of his lair and the black skies of Nightlund, the dark huldrefolk’s features were revealed in all their blandness. Though Fissure had no ears, Khellendros could see small holes in the sides of his smooth, hairless head. In their earlier meetings, the dragon had thought the huldrefolk’s eyes had no pupils. But now the sun exposed small black pupils set into deep violet eyes. And the weird eyes returned Khellendros’s stare.

“Could you make the sand any color you wanted?” Fissure asked.

Khellendros raised a scaly eyebrow and growled. His tongue ran across his bottom lip. The huldrefolk would be an insignificant speck in the dragon’s massive belly, but the thought of swallowing the impudent faerie gave him some satisfaction.

“Could you make it green or blue or purple? After all, I can make myself any color I choose.”

“You came here to bother me about sand?” Khellendros slid forward, noiselessly.

“Actually, I came here to bother you about colors.”

Khellendros snarled and the sky rumbled. Fissure looked up and noticed a cloud overhead, where none had been a heartbeat before.

“One color in particular,” the huldrefolk continued.

The rumbling grew louder, and suddenly the light blue sky was darkening, becoming instantly overcast. Fissure thought he saw a flicker of lightning amid the gathering multitude of clouds. He certainly saw lightning crackle around the dragon’s teeth.

“Gray,” he continued unperturbed and unworried. “The Gray to be specific.”

The rumbling lessened, though the sky remained ominous. The huldrefolk reached a reed-thin finger to his chin. “Interested?”

The rumbling stopped. Fissure padded forward, slipping by the spawn, which bared its razor teeth at the small man. He stopped about a dozen feet in front of Khellendros.

“I’ve been doing some research—about magic. It seems that tapping magic stored in items can augment any dragon or human’s magic.”

Khellendros drew his eyes into thin slits. “I knew that,” he hissed. “That is why I first sought the magic held in the tower in Palanthas.”

“Ah, but the humans do not know what I know, that certain old, magical baubles: swords, scepters,—the nature of the thing really doesn’t matter—can release more force than others.”

“Go on,” the dragon coaxed.

“Things from the Age of Dreams,” Fissure said.

“That was a long time ago,” Khellendros snarled. “Before the gods began truly meddling in the affairs of Krynn.”

“Yes, before the Time of Light, before Reorx was tricked into forging a stone that he left on the moon of Lunitari. While Reorx wasn’t looking, the gods of magic, who had been banished from Krynn filled the stone with their very beings. These scheming gods tricked a Chosen of Reorx, into stealing the stone. The Chosen—accidentally perhaps—dropped the stone onto Krynn. And with that one act, magic reentered the world.”

“I know all of that, faerie.” Khellendros said with irritation. “But magic from the Age of Dreams—”

“Magical baubles from that age are not nearly so plentiful as the baubles that were created since, fashioned after the gods of magic started dabbling and spreading their trinkets around. Those ancient things are more powerful than all the baubles created since.”

“Perhaps they could be used to reopen the portals,” the dragon mused.

“That is my point. I think it is worth trying in any event. Now all that remains is to find one or more of those moldy baubles,” Fissure continued, “which I suspect might take a considerable amount of time. Months, maybe years.”

“Time matters little to me,” Khellendros said. Only Kitiara matters, he added to himself, and her spirit is timeless while it floats in The Gray. “You will search for this magic.” It was an order, not a request.

“Of course,” the huldrefolk replied. “I want access to The Gray as much as you do. But first, I have a gift for you.”

“The sentries you promised?”

Fissure nodded and gestured toward the sky. He opened his mouth, revealing a row of small, pointed teeth, and whistled shrilly.

At first Khellendros saw nothing, just the dark clouds he had summoned into existence minutes ago. Then his keen eyes picked out twin shadows amid the gray billows, shadows shaped like dragons, though not as large. The shapes dropped through the clouds, and—drawing their wings near to their bodies—plummeted toward the desert floor.

The creatures were dark brown and only partially-scaly, with wingspans of nearly fifty feet. The heads of the two looked as if they had been snatched from twin giant lizards, but they were filled with triple rows of long teeth, and curving fangs that edged over their lower lips. Their wings were batlike and leathery, not at all as enormous as a dragon’s. And also unlike a dragon, they possessed no front legs. Their three-clawed hind feet opened as they landed, and their whiplike tails thrashed wildly, stirring up sand. The dragon spied a knot of cartilage near the end of each of their tails, from which protruded needlelike barbs that glistened with moist venom.

The larger of the two creatures opened its maw wide and emitted a loud hiss, a noise that sounded like a newly forged blade being thrust in cooling water. The other lowered its head and released a deep-throated growl that sounded more like the snarl of a great crocodile.

“Wyverns,” the dragon observed.

“From Nightlund,” Fissure added proudly, puffing out his small, gray chest. “They like the forests the best, where there’s plenty of shade. But I finally persuaded them to come here. And I... enhanced them.”

The dragon cocked his head. “Explain.”

“Wyverns cannot normally talk,” the huldrefolk stated. “But these can, courtesy of me. It was no small effort on my part, mind you. Lots of time, energy—nothing but the best for you. They can warn you of intruders, alert you to things going on in the desert, or they can travel wherever you choose to send them. And when they come back, they can report what they saw. I give them to you as a gesture of my good faith—a gift, a token of my friendship. They will loyally follow your instructions.”

Khellendros narrowed his eyes. He doubted Fissure had any faith—good or ill, but he accepted the wyverns. The new sentries would allow him to keep the majority of his spawn below ground, and to use only a carefully chosen few as scouts. He could devote more time to tutoring his scaly offspring.

“Aren’t you touched?” Fissure asked.

The dragon rumbled. “I am satisfied.”

“Do now what?” the largest wyvern asked. Its big black eyes blinked, and its nose quivered. It shifted its weight back and forth on its feet, never keeping one claw on the steamy sand for too long.

“Don’t know do now what,” the other answered, as it began to shift like its brother. It blew at its feet in a futile effort to cool them. “Ask do now what.”

The pair looked to Khellendros as they continued their odd dance.

“Do now what?” they queried, practically in unison. “They’re not especially bright, are they?”

Fissure dug his smooth foot into the sand. “They possess some amount of intelligence... just not a lot of it.”

The sky grew darker and a bolt of lightning raced to the ground behind the dragon’s lair. Sand erupted over the dragon, the surprised wyverns, and the nervous huldrefolk.

“But I bet they’ll get smarter. And I’ll enhance a few more sentries for you just in case they don’t,” Fissure quickly offered.

“See that you do,” Khellendros replied. “Ones with more intelligence.”

“I’ll see to that right now.”

“No.”

“No?”

“Not yet.” The Blue edged forward, sliding over the sand like a snake. When he was inches from the huldrefolk, he said, “I need to create more blue spawn.”

“More? Why? I thought you had dozens.”

“I need to create an army, for protection and as a show of force. And to create an army, I shall need people. Bodies to corrupt and mold.”

“Oh.” The huldrefolk swallowed hard.

“Humans, preferably.”

Fissure relaxed, if only a little. “Any kind of humans? Short? Tall? Fat? Men or women?”

The dragon ignored his questions. “First, you will travel to the hills south of the Plains of Solamnia. There are ogres there, my allies. I usually have brutes handle the actual extractions, but it is time I get use from other beholden followers. Find them, and direct the ogres to collect some people.”

The faerie relaxed. “So I don’t have to gather them myself. That’s good. Well, where should I tell the ogres to get these... uhm, people?”

“There is a large city nearby. Palanthas, the humans call it. The ogres can take people entering and leaving that city, people passing through, those laden with burdens and who look like travelers or strangers.”

“I don’t understand.”

“The residents of Palanthas will not care so much about the fate of strangers. They will be less likely to pursue, to search for the missing, and I will have less chance of being discovered. I prefer not to have fingers pointed at me yet. Contact the Knights of Takhisis in Palanthas. They have been most helpful in administering my realm. They can quietly aid the ogres in their mission and the brutes will receive the captured humans. If anything should go awry, blame will be placed on the ogres. They are expendable.

“My brutes have been raiding barbarian villages to the northeast of the city. But they haven’t been bringing enough humans. And there are not many villages left to plunder.

“All right,” Fissure answered. “I’ll tell the ogres. And I’ll meet with the Dark Knights. You can trust me.”

“That task finished, you will attend to creating better sentries.”

“Of course. Ones with more intelligence.”

The dragon nodded. “You will deal with these matters quickly. Then you will start searching for this ancient magic you mentioned.”

“From the Age of Dreams.”

“Yes.”

The huldrefolk drew his lips into a thin line, bowed his head, and melted into the desert floor. A small pile of sand materialized where his feet had stood a moment ago. The pile shimmered, then moved away from the dragon like a mole burrowing through a garden. It headed toward the southwest, in the direction of the hills.

“Do now what?” the large wyvern asked again.

“Do nothing?” the other posed a related question.

“Follow me,” Khellendros rumbled.

“Good. Here hot.”

“Hot too much,” the smaller added. “Follow you colder?”

The dragon snarled as he guided the wyverns into his underground lair. The spawn took a last look at the horizon, and the mounting storm, then also disappeared into the cavern.