Redemption

Chapter Twenty Shadow Play

Dhamon felt himself spiralling down into a suffocating darkness.

The heat centered in his chest spread all over his body and threatened to consume him.

“Mal?” Dhamon called out.

There was no answer—only the darkness and the swirling sounds and the great heat.

No part of him was spared. Daggers of fire jabbed into him from every direction. He felt pulled apart, stretched on a torturer’s rack. His arms and legs were being torn from his torso, even as they were burning up with pain.

Dhamon gasped, sucking in as much air as his searing lungs would permit, trying to shut out some part of the acute pain and see… something…anything.

All he could detect was a break in the darkness that was jet black.

“What? Mal? Are you there, Mal?”

A throaty growl was the only reply.

“Strong!” Dhamon heard himself say aloud. “I am strong, Nura Bint-Drax!” The words followed the beating rhythm of his heart. “Nothing is stronger than me, you damn snake! I’ll stop your magic!” But her spell was already done.

The pain and fever deepened, so extreme Dhamon expected—hoped—to perish before he could draw another breath. He screamed. His scream became a roar, then trailed off when the heat started to abate.

He screamed again just to be sure he was still alive, then stole a deep breath and found the will to resist a little longer.

“The heat,” he whispered. “It was cleansing me!” The heat was chasing all the weakness from his once-human body, leaving only power and force. “I will live, Nura Bint-Drax! And I will keep a promise I made to Ragh. I will see you dead.”

His body was still changing, growing larger perhaps. He thrust a hand in front of his face but saw nothing except the darkness. He heard a popping sound and felt his chest broadening and swelling, but this time he felt no pain. Where was the pain and heat?

He didn’t actually feel anything now, he realized with a start. An unwilling participant, he waited as he sensed his body double in size, then double again.

“Fiona!” Somewhere in the darkness Maldred was calling to the Solamnic Knight.

So Maldred was still here. Why was he calling Fiona? Was she here, too? Dhamon wondered. How did she get here, so far below the earth? The darkness was finally receding. The depths of the cave come into focus. He could see himself.

My eyes, Dhamon heard a voice inside his head say. You are seeing with my eyes now, Dhamon Grimwulf, but soon you will see and sense nothing ever again.

The shadow dragon’s consciousness was thoroughly embedded in his mind—two beings sharing one body.

What vile magic could take away someone’s soul? he thought.

“Ragh! Fiona! Hurry!” Again he heard Maldred’s voice.

So the draconian and Fiona were here, somehow had managed to follow him. Had they gotten Riki and the baby away from the hobgoblins? Was his child safe? He tried to call out to them, but he couldn’t work his voice. He wasn’t even able to open his mouth.

“Fiona!” Maldred’s voice echoed and echoed.

It didn’t matter if they were here, Dhamon thought. They should leave. Maldred should tell them to flee while there was still time for them to save themselves. Again he tried to shout to them, warn them to run. He centered his thoughts on opening his great mouth and shouting for them to run away as fast as they possibly could.

What about the dragonfear? Dhamon wondered. They should be running away. The aura of dragonfear exuded by the shadow dragon should be repulsing them. But it wasn’t, nor, come to think of it, had the dragonfear been present when he entered the chamber. In fact, he realized, he’d felt not even a twinge. Had the shadow dragon become so weak it couldn’t generate its magic? Had it thrown everything into its spell to control Dhamon?

“That’s Dhamon? Is that really Dhamon?” This was the draconian’s familiar hoarse whisper. “By the first eggs! He’s not turning into a spawn. He’s turning into a dragon!”

All of a sudden Dhamon knew that was true. He could sense his size—legs as thick as ancient, sturdy oaks, claws massive, talons long and deadly. The nubs on his shoulderblades were gone, replaced by wings that were tucked close to his sides, unable to stretch very far because Nura’s magical barrier was still in place. His neck was long and serpentine, his head wide and his eyes large—now they saw everything with great clarity.

The shadow dragon turned its head, and Dhamon saw Maldred, fists still pounding against the invisible wall. Fiona slashed against it with her accursed sword, crying out something… something about being cheated? She screamed her ire, and this time Dhamon heard her clearly through the rumbling cavern and his forcefully beating heart.

“Damn you, dragon!” Fiona cried shrilly. “It’s my destiny to kill Dhamon Grimwulf! Me! I want to make him pay for Rig! To pay for all of them!”

“Ragh! Help me with the barrier!” Maldred shouted as he pounded.

Curiously, Ragh did nothing. Instead he spoke so softly to the ogre-mage that Dhamon couldn’t hear what was said—despite his dragon-sharp hearing. The ground was rumbling too loudly, Fiona was shouting wildly and Nura Bint-Drax was talking too, speaking more of her arcane words. Another spell!

She must be working to keep up her invisible barrier, Dhamon guessed, working to keep his companions from breaking through and saving him and fighting the shadow dragon.

If Nura was so intent on her spell, that meant the shadow dragon’s magic was not yet final, that the monster did not yet have full control over Dhamon’s dragon body.

And if you don’t have full control, I might yet be able to stop you, Dhamon thought. My companions and I will stop you.

It is far too late for that, Dhamon Grimwulf, the shadow dragon mentally taunted him. My enchantment is finished. I own this body now. I should have never sent you after Sable. I should have kept you close. I didn’t need Sable’s death energy after all. I just needed the magic from all of these wondrously enchanted items… and your inner magic. I needed you. Nura was right all along, Maldred too. You are the one I will live through.

You lie, dragon. Your spell isn’t done, but your puppet Nura is trying to buy you the little time you need to finish it, Dhamon raged. All those weeks he’d thought the shadow dragon was turning him into a simple spawn or abomination—baiting him, threatening the ultimate transformation if he didn’t kill Sable, promising a cure if he did, throwing in a threat to Riki and Varek and Dhamon’s child for good measure.

All those weeks he was slowly being turned into a vessel for the dragon’s essence, for a dragon crafted by the god Chaos.

“No!” Dhamon shouted, startling everyone by the roar that erupted from his dragon’s mouth. “I will not let you win!”

He tried to say other words, but the shadow dragon came into his mind like a storm and overwhelmed his consciousness. In Dhamon’s shrinking mind’s eye he saw the image of Chaos pluck his god-shadow from the cavern floor in the Abyss and give it life and the form of a dragon. He saw it all again: the newly birthed dragon—the shadow dragon—slaying Knights of Takhisis and Solamnic Knights. The shadow dragon fighting and killing blue dragons and drinking in their energy.

As I killed all of them, I will kill your spirit. I will fly again in my new, perfect form, the shadow dragon hissed in Dhamon’s mind. I will banish your very soul.

Dhamon felt his awareness slipping away, his life’s blood spilling away. The dragon was winning.

Everything around him dimmed—Nura’s continued incantation, Fiona’s shouts. He heard what sounded like thunder, perhaps the beating of the dragon-body’s massive heart invading his body, then he heard nothing. He sensed a blackness, welcoming and frightening. His end beckoned, and he felt himself gradually drawn toward it.

“You did it!” Ragh shouted. “You did it, ogre! The barrier’s down!”

At Ragh’s suggestion Maldred had grabbed some of the carved magical figurines in the pouch and lobbed them against the enchanted barrier. The explosion was small but enough to shatter Nura’s spell, as well as collapse part of the cavern’s ceiling.

Fiona rushed forward, dodging falling rocks.

“In the name of Vinus Solamnus!” she cried. “For the memory of my Rig!”

Ragh hesitated, eyes shifting from the Dhamon-dragon to the husk of the shadow dragon. Maldred was staring at Dhamon.

“By my father,” the ogre-mage said in a low voice. “By all that’s sacred. Just look at him, Ragh. Look at what he’s become.”

Dhamon in dragon form was not quite like any other dragon that had ever been seen on Krynn. His scales were black mirrors, reflecting the cavern and everyone in it. His scales were mostly shimmering silver. In a few places the scales were glossy.

The dragon-Dhamon was an impressive creature, not so large as the shadow dragon, yet far more elegant-looking. It was as if a great artist had sculpted the creature, stealing the best traits from Krynn’s various dragons and creating a unique composite.

The shadow dragon had borrowed the shadowy black horns from a young Red he slew in the purge.

The magnificent wings were from first Blue he killed in the Abyss. The claws were copied from a white dragon, webbed and deadly as a well-worked blade.

“Beautiful,” Ragh admitted, staring wide-eyed at the Dhamon-dragon now. “He—it’s a beautiful creature, to be sure. Incredible.”

“Beautiful or not, it will die,” Fiona hissed. She had edged close and now raised her sword and continued inching toward the dragon. The dragon was moving sluggishly. The spell was still working its last vestiges of magic. “Now is the time to strike! While the beautiful beast is still vulnerable.”

“Nooooo!” Nura howled. The naga had been watching with pride, awestruck by the final transformation, but now she belatedly roused herself to action. “You’ll not scratch my master’s new body! You’ll not hurt him, you wretched woman!”

Nura raced toward Fiona, changing as she went, becoming taller, her legs melding together to form her hideous snake-body, stretching twenty feet from the top of her head to her tail. Her coppery hair fanned away to form a hood.

Ragh simultaneously leaped into action. Dhamon can take care of himself against Fiona, he thought, but the naga is dangerous.

The draconian shot at the snake-woman.

At that very moment, the dead body of the shadow dragon gave a twitch.

Maldred noted it and stopped the incantation he had begun. He had to take a second look because he was so astonished—he had thought the shadow dragon dead.

“Ragh! Fiona!” Maldred boomed. “The shadow dragon controls both forms! We’ve got two dragons to deal with here, not one!”

The ogre-mage halted the one spell and thrust his fingers into his pouch, closing on the last figurine he had left. He ran forward, hurling the carving. Maldred had aimed it at the shadow dragon, but his aim was off. It struck the cave wall, sending chunks of rock flying and a piece of the ceiling crashing down. The vibrations threw Maldred to the ground.

In the haze of debris Maldred thought he’d actually struck his target, but then the dust and rocks settled, and the shadow dragon moved again, more noticeably this time.

The sleek, new dragon tried to move, but was still sluggish. It seemed the shadow dragon could not effectively power both bodies at the same time.

Dhamon opened his mouth and roared his rage.

The shadow dragon howled in return.

“Kill the shadow dragon! The shadow dragon!” Maldred shouted as he pushed himself to his feet. “Kill it and we might break the spell. We might save Dhamon!” He picked up the glaive, and madly charged toward the dragon to whom he owed his own debt of revenge.

The cavern rocked from all the energy—from Maldred’s enchanted carvings, the shadow dragon’s and Nura’s spells, and the release of magic from the treasure horde.

The noise and constant quakes finally proved too much for Nura Bint-Drax. She spun one way, then the next, as if tortured by her choices. She whirled against unseen foes, stretched toward the shadow dragon, considered an enchantment, then dismissed it while thinking of another.

In her moment of indecision, Ragh’s fingers closed around the hood of her snake-throat.

“Dhamon thinks I should know and hate you, snake-woman,” the draconian spat. “Well, I do hate you, but I don’t want to know something so foul as you.” He squeezed, wrapping his legs against the sides of her snake body and holding on. “I just want you dead.”

Yards away Fiona stood suddenly frozen, her own indecision mirroring her divided soul. Her Knight’s honor bound her to attack the shadow dragon, but she desperately wanted to pursue her revenge against Dhamon.

“Where have you gone, Dhamon Grimwulf?” she screamed. “Where is my revenge?” A tear streaked her dust-covered face. “How do I know who I should fight?”

A part of her recognized the sparkle in the dragon’s eyes, the sparkle of his dark, mysterious gaze. It was the same sparkle she’d noticed in the baby she held in her arms hours ago. Rig’s eyes had been dark, too. Oh, how she missed the mariner.

“I will never have my own child,” she said, lowering her sword slightly. “I will never have….”

In that instant, Dhamon finally moved, creeping forward. He still felt as though his soul was plunging toward the darkness, but he fought against oblivion with the few ounces of humanity left in him.

I can’t let you win, he told the shadow dragon. Not just for Riki and his child’s sake, but for Fiona and Ragh and Maldred, and for the countless others who had fallen and would fall to this reborn shadow dragon in the centuries it would roam the face of Krynn. Perhaps this is my sole chance at redemption, Dhamon thought, sending his thoughts to the shadow dragon. To stop you from walking the face of this world.

The shadow dragon fought back mentally, his strength divided between two forms.

In Dhamon’s mind two dragons fought—one mirror-black scales and supple lines, the other a large, gray beast, sluggish and depleted, but nevertheless formidable.

The old one lashed out with a great taloned claw, slashing at the new dragon. “Surrender,” the old one hissed. “You’ve no choice. And you only anger me by resisting.”

The new dragon roared a word that sounded like “Never,” a word that echoed in the confines of Dhamon’s mind. The new dragon reached out with a claw, too, batting away the old creature, not hurting the shadow dragon, but keeping it at bay.

As Dhamon shook off his thick dazedness, his goal became increasingly clear.

You took on too much, Dhamon told the shadow dragon bitterly.

I will best your spirit, the shadow dragon returned. Then I will best your companions.

In Dhamon’s mind the old dragon dove toward the mirrored one, both claws outstretched, mouth opened wide, showing rows of jagged, shadowy teeth. A serpentine tongue snaked out, whipping the air, then lashing at the snout of the new dragon.

Dhamon recoiled from the image in his mind. You’ve no more magical items, dragon, he cursed vehemently. There’s nothing to power your dying spell.

But I do, the shadow dragon instantly returned. There’s magic in the wingless sivak, and more in the ogre-mage. The naga, too. Their deaths will release the energy I need.

Then the shadow dragon began to retreat back into his old body.

“There is time to vanquish your spirit later, Dhamon Grimwulf,” the shadow dragon hissed. “First I must collect more of the necessary essence—starting with your friends.”

So you don’t have enough power yet to wipe out my humanity, Dhamon said. There must be something about me that is too difficult to overcome. What?

Why was the shadow dragon having so much trouble? Dhamon wondered. Could it be he carried a touch of Fiona’s madness, bequeathed to Dhamon by the Chaos wight who had invaded his mind? The shadow dragon might not be able to cope with that unexpected fragment of madness lodged within the body he had been nurturing for his own ends.

Yes, that madness is the final barrier, the shadow dragon admitted. But with more magic, I will defeat the madness. After your friends are dead, their energy will be mine. When they are gone, I will come again. And then you will be destroyed.

Maldred slashed with his claws at the bloated shadow dragon. He’d used magic to sharpen his claws, and now he began to slice through the dragon’s scales and draw shadow-dark blood. “Killing this dragon is the key!” he cried exultantly. “I’m sure of it!”

The draconian struggled with the naga, his clawed fingers tightening around her neck. The Solamnic Knight was slowly backing away from Ragh and Dhamon, watching as though mesmerized as the shadow dragon came alive and raised a claw and batted Maldred away as though he was but a cornhusk doll. The shadow dragon spread forward, dull yellow eyes locked on Ragh, its jaws opening.

“Rig is dead,” Fiona murmured dully to herself. “Shaon and Raph and Jasper. All dead. Soon Ragh will be dead. And Maldred too. Everyone dead.”

The shadow dragon hardly bothered to glance at the Solamnic Knight, as it closed on the draconian and the naga, its lips drawn back in a feral smile, showing its teeth.

The beast didn’t even care about her, she thought. First it would finish Maldred. Then Ragh. Finally she would be the only one left alive… the only one… alone.

Fiona rushed forward, sword gleaming in the magical light that still swirled around the chamber. She brushed by Ragh and closed on the shadow dragon, swept her sword hard and wide, and bit into a thick, scaly plate on the dragon’s stomach.

The shadow dragon wheeled on her, astonished to have been attacked by a lone human. His eyes narrowed on the magic weapon.

“Your sword,” the shadow dragon cried. “I will have it now.”

“Fiona!” Maldred shouted.

“I’ll have the magic in your sword,” the dragon repeated, “and I’ll have you.”

Fiona spat at the beast and pulled back, swinging her sword forward into the dragon’s outstretched claw, digging into dragon flesh and causing a spurt of black blood.

“Come and get me, dragon!” she yelled.

“Fiona, get back!” Maldred shouted again. He had come up behind the dragon, where he touched his thumbs together and hurriedly tried a spell. His hands took on a faint green glow, and he stood and pointed his fingers like weapons at the shadow dragon.

Ragh finished his strangling of the naga and dropped her to the ground. He stumbled over her serpent-body, spun and shot for the shadow dragon.

At that moment, with the shadow dragon distracted by so many foes, Dhamon felt a surge of power.

In his mind’s eye the mirrored dragon had been chasing the evil dragon. Now the mirrored one breathed a black cloud that streamed toward the other.

Fiona thrust upward. Her enchanted blade dug deep into the staggered shadow dragon.

He had sacrificed too much energy to power the transference spell. He had used up all but the last of the god-magic that had birthed him in the Abyss.

Again Fiona thrust her sword, unknowingly buying Dhamon precious seconds to increase his mental battle and release his breath weapon. Buying Maldred time to enforce his spell. Buying Ragh time to close on the weary old dragon with his talons.

“Come and get me, dragon!” Fiona yelled again.

The mirrored dragon breathed again in Dhamon’s mind—and suddenly that black breath materialized in the chamber beneath the mountains. The black, poisonous cloud raced away from Dhamon’s maw to engulf the shadow dragon’s head.

In the wink of an eye, the shadow dragon was finally purged from Dhamon’s mind, and in that instant, Dhamon shook off all of his sluggishness.

The shadow dragon slammed a claw down on Fiona. He swung his head about, watching Maldred balefully. The ogre’s spell sent globes of green fire at the creature.

Maldred with his green fire, Ragh with his mighty claws, Dhamon with his breath weapon. The three united to attack the beast.

It finally fell.

As Fiona had fallen.

When they looked around, the naga had disappeared without a trace. Ragh had thought the frightful creature was dead, but Nura must have slithered off during the final battle—the demise of her beloved master. They didn’t have the energy or the heart to follow after the child-snake-woman who had ensnared them all in her mad scheming.

They buried Fiona deep inside the dragon’s cave, near where she’d valiantly made her last stand.

Near her head, Maldred used his magic to turn the rock wall into liquid—for several moments—then he rammed her prized long sword into the stone. The once-enchanted sword would forever mark her honorable fate.

Maldred spread the enchantment over the earth and broken stones, sealing the spot into a smooth sheet of rock.

“I hope she’s found Rig again,” the draconian said when Maldred was finished. “I hope that if there is something beyond this world, a place where spirits go when their bodies are done… I hope she’s there with Rig. That together they’re at peace.”

Dhamon didn’t say anything. He closed his great dragon eyes and silently grieved—for Fiona and Rig, for Shaon and Raph and Jasper. For all the lives he’d touched and befouled. Minutes later, in eerie silence, he slipped from the chamber, taking the widest passage that climbed to the surface. Maldred and Ragh followed him.

They didn’t speak until they emerged in the foothills. The sun was setting, painting the dry ground with a warm glow and setting Dhamon’s scales aglow as if they were molten metal. Dhamon lay down, talons stretched to the horizon, wings tucked in close.

Ragh cautiously climbed up first, settling himself at the base of Dhamon’s neck between two wicked-looking spines. Maldred waited, watching the sun sink lower, the glow start to fade. Then he perched himself behind Ragh, grasping one of Dhamon’s spines and clenching his legs tight as the dragon spread his wings and effortlessly vaulted into the sky.

Flying came instinctively to him, and Dhamon wondered if it was seeded in him by the dragon-magic, or whether it was partly because of the years he flew on the back of the blue dragon Gale. The wind rushed above and beneath his wings, played across his head and caressed his back. He felt he should be troubled by his ruined humanity, but the power of this new form, the sensation of flying, kept his morose thoughts at bay.

Perhaps there was something wonderful and fated about becoming a dragon. Dhamon found himself enjoying the sensation of flying so high above the earth.

“Where are we going?” Ragh had to shout to be heard above the wind.

Dhamon’s answer was to bank far to the south, to the edge of the mountain range. The sky was starting to grow dark by the time he landed, nodding for Maldred to get off.

The ogre-mage did so with some reluctance.

“I will miss you, Dhamon,” Maldred said. “I will hope that fate sees to bring us together again, and I will hope that in the intervening time you find a way to forgive me.”

Dhamon waited until the ogre-mage stepped away before spreading his wings. His legs propelled him skyward once more, and as he rose higher his neck craned back for a last glance at his onetime friend.

The blue-skinned giant was gone. In his stead was again the bronze-hued man with a handsome, angular face and close-cropped, tawny hair. That was the old form that Dhamon knew and the one that seemed to suit Maldred the best.

“You’re not dropping me off on some lonely peak,” Ragh grumbled. Softer, but not so soft that Dhamon couldn’t hear, he added, “Besides I’ve nowhere to go.”

Their course took them slightly west now, then toward Haltigoth. Stars were winking into view by the time they landed. The draconian slipped from Dhamon’s back, and Dhamon called upon a spell that came to him unbidden from mysterious depths.

Within the span of a few moments, the dragon that was Dhamon Grimwulf appeared to fold in upon himself, shrinking, then becoming flat, like a pool of oil. The oil glided silently to the draconian, attached itself, and moved with him as his shadow. Ragh hurried to the nearby village, skirted the stable, and passed beyond the closed merchant stalls. There was a small, stone building with a thatch roof. Dhamon’s keen senses led them there.

Ragh crept toward a window at the back.

Riki and her husband sat at a wooden table. Riki cradled an infant—a boy with mysterious, dark eyes and wheat-blond hair. A boy, Dhamon decided, that he would check in on again over time to make sure his way in this world was safe and profitable.

“Seen enough?” Ragh whispered after several minutes. The draconian did not want to risk discovery.

Aye, the shadow answered. I have seen well and enough.

They left the village, flying again and cutting a course against a cold, fall wind. Dhamon headed north, where a dragon named Gale held sway. He wanted to see his old battle partner and see Gale’s surprise. In the miles that stretched between Throt and Gale’s lair perhaps he would figure out how to explain what had happened to him.

“What then?” Ragh asked. “After Gale?”

Dhamon wasn’t certain. Perhaps they might journey to the Dragon Isles, certainly to somewhere he’d never been before. This new body, a new life, demanded new surroundings.

“They named the boy Evran,” Ragh told him. “Riki said it was an old family name she wanted to honor. Sounds nice. For a human name.”

Dhamon inwardly smiled. Evran was his middle name. Few but Riki knew that. The child did indeed favor him in some way.