Flight of the Fallen

13 Return of the Dragon

Morning came too quickly for Linsha.

The sun had barely tinted the horizon when the Tarmak guards barged into the prison, shouting and prodding people to their feet. They dropped two large kettles and an armload of rounds of unleavened bread on the ground and departed. The hungry prisoners made an orderly rush for the food. One kettle contained a soup of sorts that might have had a few vegetables or scraps of meat if they were lucky. The other kettle held water, the only water they would have until nightfall. There were no cups or plates or utensils, so the prisoners had to dip their bread into the soup and take turns drinking from the kettle. The first time or two they were given this fare, the frantic men tipped the kettles over and wasted a day’s ration of water. Since then, Sir Remmik had taken control of the prisoners and organized an orderly procession past the food and water so each person received a fair share. Linsha feared at first that he would deprive her of her share in retaliation for her punch. But as petty and obsessive as the Knight Commander could be sometimes, he proved to be ruthlessly fair about the food and water.

Feeling sore in every bone of her body, Linsha took her place in line behind Lanther and claimed her round of bread. It was hard and unappetizing as usual, but if she dipped it in the soup she could force it down her throat. She submerged the bread for a moment in the greasy-looking broth, took a long drink of water from the second kettle, and returned to her place by the wall. For a moment she stared at the pale brown loaf dripping in her hand. Her mind rebelled at the thought of eating it, but her stomach insisted. This was the only food she would get until night, and there was no telling what the Tarmaks would force her to do today. Since her capture, she had been interrogated, hung in the cage several times, beaten, and forced to work with the slave gangs on the destruction of the palace. She had found no chance to escape and no way to get word to the remaining militia at Sinking Wells. She could only hope the survivors were on their guard and would see the danger before it destroyed them.

Daylight gleamed through the bars of the prison doors when the guards returned. For once, no one was chosen to hang in the cage and no one was dragged away for questioning.

“They must have all the answers,” Linsha whispered to Lanther as the prisoners were herded out of the courtyard.

They were taken around to the front of the palace and put to work removing the rock and rubble from the second wall of the throne room that had been pulled down the day before. Centaurs had been brought this morning to pull sledges of rock to the city wall, and they stood, their faces thunderous, waiting for the sledges to be loaded.

One centaur stood out from the rest, not only for his apparent youth and smaller stature but for the color of his light hide. Even the dark stains of sweat and the coating of dust could not hide the yellowish sand color of the buckskin. Linsha saw him and felt a burst of joy. Leonidas! He made no move toward her nor any overt indication that he had seen her, but his face turned her way and one eye dropped in a quick wink of acknowledgment.

A towering Tarmak of minotauran proportions was the overseer that day, and he divided the slaves into several groups. The smallest and the youngest were given baskets and sent to clear out the broken rocks and chunks of mortar that lay piled over the collapsed wall. A second, much smaller group was chosen to sort the stones from the palace walls, and a third group, the largest and strongest of the men, was ordered to the load the rock onto the sledges.

Linsha found herself in the sorters, a group she quickly found out required a certain degree of intelligence. The overseer explained exactly, in excellent Common, how he wanted the rocks sorted. The large quarried stones with no flaws were to be marked with red chalk and sent to the centaurs to be loaded on the sledges. These stones were being used to repair the city wall. Stone blocks of smaller dimensions but good condition were to be marked with yellow chalk and set aside for buildings in the city. Any block that was cracked or badly damaged had to be marked with black and thrown into the treasure room below the stairs. Anyone miss-marking a stone swiftly learned the mistake when the overseer’s lash slashed across his or her back.

Linsha only took two lashes before she began to see exactly what the Tarmaks were looking for. With a careful eye she scrambled barefoot over the heaps of collapsed stone, marking the stones for removal and indicating each one to the slaves in charge of the other groups. She tried very hard to block out her memories of this place and concentrate on her work. These were just stones, cut centuries ago by elven hands. There was nothing left of the great dragon overlord that had resided here. Occasionally she would find a shard of bone, a broken bottle, or a scrap of clothing under the mounds of dust and rock, but these were just bits of trash left by the mercenaries from their time here.

She worked her way to the back of the throne room near the north wall that still remained standing. It was to be brought down the next day. After checking to be sure the overseer had his back to her, she paused for a moment in the shade of the wall and wiped her sweating face. The washing she had been given by the two courtesans was a memory now, erased by six days of sweat, dirt, and hard labor. Her pants and tunic were almost as dirty as the previous ones.

She sighed. It was barely noon and she was already very tired. Her back ached and stung where the lash had cut her skin. A headache was building behind her eyes. She stretched her arms and shoulders then twisted her head to stretch her neck.

Something odd caught her eye. Something so out of place and so unexpected that she nearly lost her balance trying to twist around to see it. Just beyond the ruin of the throne room, on the remains of an ancient foundation, sat a cat. An orange-striped tomcat. He did not move or blink or twitch his tail. He merely sat and stared at her. Linsha’s eyes widened. Her heart raced. It couldn’t be.

She heard a heavy step behind her, and the cat whisked out of sight. A Tarmak guard grabbed her arm and swung her around. He raised a club over his head to strike her, but she spat a word at him and raised the chalk up so he could see it in her hand. She pointed angrily at the stones she had already marked.

The guard dropped his club, bemused that the woman had used one of the better-known Tarmak swear words at him. He laughed and shoved her out of the shade to a place where he could see her better, then he took her place in the shelter of the wall.

Linsha risked a quick glance back at the place where the cat had been, but he was gone. There was no sign of him anywhere. A fleeting smile lifted her lips, and her hand slid to the two scales tucked carefully under her shirt. She gave them a grateful rub for good luck. She knew that cat. She would know him anywhere, in any street, in any city or farm. That cat meant Crucible had returned, and with him some hope. While it was true she had told Varia not to ask him to come, and it was also true she worried deeply for his safety, she was immeasurably glad to see him. She kept the image of the cat in her mind for the rest of the day like a secret gift and told no one. The dragon would make his move when he was ready, and until then she would have to be patient and bide her time.

The red star was rising in the east when the Tarmaks finally sent the slaves back to their quarters for the night. Linsha, Lanther, and their group were herded together and taken back to their prison in the old storehouse. Linsha wondered again why she and the others were kept separate from the rest of the slaves. Maybe it was just a lack of room, or maybe the Tarmaks had kept them apart for interrogation. That onerous pastime seemed to be over, so maybe the Tarmaks would soon move them to the bigger slave pens. Linsha hoped so. She had caught glimpses of the big slave pens to the east of the palace in the old stables and knew it would be easier to escape from those than this old stone prison.

“Why do you look like you just swallowed the cream?” Lanther said, leaning over her shoulder. He looked hot, sweaty, tired, and very irritable.

His words startled her so much she flinched and stared at him in surprise. “What did you say?” she exclaimed.

“You look like a cat that just drank the cream,” he said softly. “You aren’t exactly grinning, but you radiate pleasure. What has happened?”

She made certain none of the other prisoners or guards were close enough to hear, then she whispered, “Crucible is back.”

“What?” he hissed. “How do you know?”

“I saw him this morning.”

Lanther’s eyebrows rose to his hairline, but he made no other remark. Neither of them said another word until they were back in the prison and the meager supper had been doled out under Sir Remmik’s stern eye. As soon as she picked up her bread and drank her water, Linsha hurried to a place near the door where she could see out into the court. Lanther sat with her.

“Your eyes must be better than mine,” he said irritably. “I didn’t see a bronze dragon sneaking around the premises.” He held up his bread and waved it like a fan. The bread was still so hard it did not even wobble.

“He was in his cat shape,” Linsha murmured. “He was watching us.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t just an orange cat? There are a few cats around this city.”

She shook her head. “I know this cat.”

“Well, it would be nice if he would assume his dragon shape and come blow the doors off this place. I’ve just about had enough. Look at this!” He flapped his bread at her. “Disgusting. Why can’t they give us some decent food?” Lanther flipped the bread at the bars of the door.

His aim was so precise that Linsha chuckled to see it pass cleanly between the bars and out of the cell.

But as luck would have it, a Tarmak guard walked by the door at the precise instant the flat bread flew between the bars. It struck his leg with a splatting noise and fell to bits over his sandalled foot. The guard growled something harsh in his own language and glared through the bars of the door. The first person he saw was Linsha, a smile still on her face. Furious, he unbolted the door, charged inside, and wrenched her upright. She was so astounded to be accosted like this that she did not react fast enough. Her bread fell from her hands.

Lanther and the other men leaped to their feet. The guard shouted at them and swung Linsha toward the door. Although she was trained in several martial defense arts, she did not have the chance to use them on the tall Tarmak. She lost her balance in the impetuous of his swing, fell forward, and cracked her head on the heavy wooden frame. Pain exploded into sparks that danced in her eyes, and her muscles turned to jelly. When Lanther tried to intervene, the Tarmak slammed a fist into his jaw and knocked him senseless into the wall.

Other Tarmaks ran to the guard’s aid. Linsha struggled, but the blue-skinned warriors hauled her out of the prison cell and dragged her to the metal cage.

“Sit in here and laugh,” the guard ordered. He pushed her inside and locked the door.

Linsha felt the cage being hauled into the air. The angry guard slammed a shield into the side of cage in spite, then the Tarmaks left her gently swinging at the end of a rope. She sagged against the bars while her head threatened to explode. A number of well-chosen words in several languages told the Tarmaks exactly what she thought of them and where they could put their swords, but the warriors ignored her and went back to their posts.

After a while Linsha wriggled her arm up high enough to touch her forehead. A large lump and a sticky rivulet down the side of her face confirmed her suspicions. She would have a bangup of a bruise the next morning. Blasted Tarmaks. She hadn’t even been able to eat her dinner. She was hungry and thirsty and tired and thoroughly annoyed, and she had a headache reminiscent of a dwarf spirits hangover. Now she was hung out like a bird in a cage, and there was nothing she could do about it except try to conserve her strength until the guards decided to let her out.

Taking a deep breath, she relaxed and stared upward. The night was fully dark by this time and the stars shone bright in a flawless sky. There would probably be frost tonight, she thought unhappily—and she was without her cloak.

The hours dragged by. She tried to sleep and found that sleep was impossible, for she was too cold and cramped in the metal box. When she sought to relieve her boredom and frustration by singing bawdy tavern songs at the top of her lungs, both the prisoners and the guards yelled at her. The threat of arrows being loosed at her finally convinced her to be quiet.

Shortly after midnight, new guards came out to take the place of the old, and for a brief moment Linsha hoped they would release her. But none of them looked her way or made any move toward the cage. She watched them stride around the yard and along the walls until they were all in their places, then the ruins fell quiet again, and she had to resign herself to enduring the cage until dawn. Surely they would free her at sunrise to work with the rest of the prisoners.

Late into the night, a waning crescent moon slowly lifted its horns above the line of hills to the east. Linsha watched it wearily. She was too uncomfortable to sleep and too tired to think. Her entire mind and body felt numb from cold and exhaustion. She was so distracted by the moon and her own misery that she did not see the small, dark shape slink noiselessly along a wall toward her.

Somewhere out in the ruins, the hunting cry of an owl cut through the frosty night.

Linsha suddenly grew alert.

Linsha.

Her name rang in her head, sent by a worried and powerful mind. If she’d had any space to move, she would have jumped out of her skin. Shaking, she jerked her head down and saw the cat standing close to the posts that held the cage upright.

Linsha. One moment and I will have you free.

A bright glow suffused the small cat. Golden, shimmering light covered its body and hid it from view in a ball of dazzling power that rapidly expanded outward like a small nova into a brilliant haze that glimmered with sparks of orange, yellow, and white. Within the haze, a shape began to form with a long neck and nebulous wings of fire.

In that instant between light and shape, Linsha heard shouts and the unmistakable snap of a large crossbow. The dragon within the cloud of light screamed in pain and surprise.

Linsha’s voice rose to join the cry with her own scream of terror and denial. “No!”

The golden light vanished, leaving Linsha Winking in the dark. She could not see well, but she could hear the dragon thrashing on the ground, and she heard the unmistakable voice of the Akkad-Ur coming from somewhere close by. She twisted her head and spotted several black silhouettes on the roofline of the storehouse.

“Be still, dragon!” thundered the Tarmak general. “Be still or both you and the woman shall die.”

A sudden understanding glowed in Linsha’s mind like the light of the dragon’s power. They had been waiting for him. Damn! She berated herself. How could she not have seen it? She had said herself she thought the Tarmaks wanted the dragon to return. Having listened to the Akkad-Ur discuss Crucible and Varia, how could she not have guessed what they would do? She was not out here as punishment, she was hanging here as bait. Somehow the Tarmaks had known the dragon had returned, or perhaps they just calculated the number of days it would take for one small owl to fly to Sanction and one large dragon to fly back. Whatever they knew, they had put her in the cage in plain view and waited for Crucible to come. Would they have hung her out for the next seven days? Maybe so. And maybe she would have seen through this in another night or two. But it was Crucible’s bad luck that he came this night.

Gods above, what had they done to him? What sort of crossbow did they have that was large enough to wound a dragon?

She locked her fingers around the bars and shook the cage in a rage, angry at her own stupidity and terrified for his safety. He was still writhing in pain on the ground. She was able to see he was trying to reach something between his shoulder blades at the base of his neck. His eyes glowed with a fiery edge of scarlet, and his nostrils blew jets of steam in the cold night air. His talons scraped sparks from the stone nagging.

“I said be still, Crucible!” the Akkad-Ur shouted. “There are arrows aimed at your lady and at your neck. If you wish both of you to die, continue with this struggle.”

The sound of his name seemed to reach through his frantic struggles, for he stopped snapping at his back and crouched, his tail lashing across the yard. His large head lifted to spot his tormentors.

Inside the storehouse, the prisoners crowded up to the doors and stared horrified at the bronze. None of the Tarmak guards were visible.

Linsha froze in place and forced herself to be calm. She could not do anything to help Crucible.

“Do not try to sear us with your breath,” the Tarmak went on in a reasonable tone of voice. “You cannot reach all of us, and by the time you shot one beam, the lady knight would be dead.”

“Crucible, don’t listen,” Linsha pleaded. “Just go. Get away! Shapeshift, if you can, and go!”

“That would not be wise,” said the Akkad-Ur. “If he tries to shapeshift now, the barb in his back will kill him.”

Crucible chose to ignore him. Clamping his wings tight to his sides, he peered into Linsha’s cage.

“I smell blood,” he said. “Are you hurt?”

Linsha felt her heart contract. He was in pain and trapped by a dangerous enemy, yet his first question was for her. More than anything she wanted to reach through the bars to touch him, but she could barely move her arms from her body. Her eyes ached with unshed tears.

“Crucible,” she said. “Why did you come?”

An arrow ricocheted off the cage with a jarring clang. Crucible’s head snapped up, and a thunderous growl rumbled from his throat. He shrugged his shoulders and squirmed again with pain.

“What is this weapon you have used against me?” he roared at the Tarmaks. “What have you done?”

“It is very simple,” Linsha heard the Akkad-Ur shout from the roof. “We are planning a campaign to complete our conquest of the brass dragon’s realm. We no longer have our mercenaries or the blue dragon to help us. What we do have is you. Metallics, I am told, are much more reasonable than chromatics.”

Linsha felt her mouth fall open. She hadn’t expected anything like this.

“I will not help you!” Crucible roared. “You slaughtered my friends. You killed a great dragon. You destroyed this city.”

“And I will kill this friend if you do not obey me.”

“I’ll take my chances, Crucible,” Linsha implored. “Get out of here!”

“If he leaves, he will die as well,” the Akkad-Ur warned.

Torches flared on the roof, illuminating the Akkad-Ur in his golden mask. Behind him stood three guards. One held a large crossbow, and the others carried a long, slim, black lance with a barbed tip and a heavy cowl for the hand. Linsha saw the lance and gasped. A tremor ran through her.

“You see we did retrieve the Abyssal Lance that you so helpfully left behind. However, we have changed it somewhat. In case you can’t tell from where you are, the lance is now about ten inches shorter.” He took the crossbow from his guard and held it high so both Crucible and Linsha could see it had been fired. “The bolt that is now lodged between your shoulders is a barbed dart crafted from this lance. Think about that.

You knew the evil spells that were imbued in this wood. It will kill whatever it penetrates. Fortunately for you, the dart is a smaller piece. It does not work as quickly as the larger lance. Unless I say—”

He spat a word in his own tongue and pointed to the dragon. Crucible screamed a frantic sound of agony and rage. Twisting and curving his sinuous neck, he tried desperately to snatch the bolt that burned into his neck. He scratched at it with a hind leg and stretched his forelegs around to reach it, but it was placed in such a way that nothing he tried could pull it free. His wings flapped loose and whipped the air around him in agitation. Dust rose up in a thick, choking cloud.

Linsha’s fingers tightened around the bars. A gut-wrenching terror exploded in her mind, dissolving her will and sucking away her strength. If the cage had not held her upright, she would have collapsed, groveling and shrieking on the ground. Although she had never felt Crucible use the powerful sense of awe and fear that dragons could exude, she had enough experience with dragonfear to recognize it.

Massive and paralyzing, the dragonfear rolled outward from the dragon and swept over those nearby. The prisoners in the cell fell to the ground, overcome by the fear, and the guards nearest the dragon dropped their weapons and clutched their heads. Upon the roof, only the Akkad-Ur remained on his feet. He shook in every limb, but he looked over the wall at the dragon and choked out an order.

Linsha heard his voice and forced herself to look up. What was the Akkad-Ur doing to Crucible? How could one small bolt cause such pain? Then out of the shadowed corners of the ruin, she saw tall figures moving toward the writhing bronze. Terror for him rose up within her and overcame the dragonfear. Her voice burst out in a frantic scream—“Crucible! Behind you!”

Mad with pain, he barely heard her. His reactions were dazed, confused, and too slow. He forced his body around to face this new danger. His tail caught one of the warriors and slammed the Tarmak into the storehouse wall, but three others reached his side.

Linsha saw torchlight flash on sword blades in the swirling dust, then Crucible roared again. His head dropped into the curtain of dust and his teeth snapped loudly in the dark, but the Tarmaks dashed away from him, and as they fled his wrath, the Akkad-Ur shouted another command over the uproar.

Abruptly Crucible fell still. The dragonfear faded around him, but Linsha stared in growing panic at the big bronze. It was difficult to see him in the dark and the clouds of dust.

“Crucible?” she called.

There was a rustling noise, a stamp of heavy feet, and a vicious string of words in the ancient tongue of the dragons. No one needed a translation. Linsha stared hard at the dark shape before her, and as the dust began to settle, she saw the dragon more clearly. Thank the absent gods he was still alive.

He crouched between her cage and the prison, his head raised to glare at the Tarmaks on the roof. His wings were partially open, but they looked wrong. Linsha bit back a cry. She realized the torchlight from the prison door was still burning despite the uproar in the yard, and its light gleamed through places in Crucible’s wings that should not show light. The Tarmaks with the swords had not tried to kill, only to maim. Their heavy two-handed blades had sliced through the leathery vanes of his wings, crippling him again and trapping him on the ground. Crucible would not be returning to Sanction any time soon.

“Now, perhaps you understand,” the Akkad-Ur said into the heavy silence. “You cannot fly. If you leave, even on foot, I will torture this woman to death and leave you with the bolt embedded in your neck. In a few days, maybe a week, it will work its way into your body, pierce your heart, and kill you. There is nothing that can remove it. However, if you stay, if you obey my commands and serve this army, I will keep the bolt in its place, allowing you to live, and I will not harm the woman. It is your choice.”

Linsha shivered in a cold that bit deeper than the night’s frost. “Go, Crucible!” she whispered. “Go. Surely there are mages who can help you. Go north and find my father.”

“I will not leave you,” the dragon hissed. “I had hoped to return to Sanction, but our destiny seems to lie here in the south. We will see it through together.”

“It is done then,” said the Akkad-Ur. “Remember, dragon. I have but to speak one word and the bolt will begin to bore into your back. One word and this woman is dead. You will go to my tent and wait for me there.”

Linsha watched Crucible leave the yard. Conflicting emotions swirled around her like the winds of a cyclone—relief that he was still alive, worry that he could still be hurt, fear that the Tarmaks would use him against the people of the plains, but the worst was the guilt. Guilt, like a huge ache, settled into her mind. He had come back because of her, and now he was enslaved because of her. His rationalization of destiny might keep him satisfied for a few days, but in time he would come to resent her, perhaps hate her, for her part in his capture. And what about Lord Bight? The lord governor would not be happy that Sanction’s guardian was now trapped in Missing City. What would Lord Bight do now?

She heard footsteps approach her, and she looked down to see the Akkad-Ur standing by the foot of the suspended cage. “Thusly our plans fall into place. Do not do anything to jeopardize his well-being. You have seen what I can do to him.”

Linsha said nothing. She could think of nothing to say.

When the Tarmak turned on his heel and left, she pressed her aching head back against the cage and let the tears fall.

If only Crucible had stayed in Sanction…