The Black wing

Part One
Chapter 1

The gossamer wings of the tiny nyphids fluttered in silent syncopa shy;tion as they hovered above the sleeping dragon's broad, curved spine. The darkness of the small pit was illuminated by the melon-sized maynus that floated between them, blue lightning streaking within the glassy orb. Kadagan, the younger of the two nyphids, arched one dark, delicately curved eyebrow in surprise at the creature.

"We were right, Toad," he breathed softly to his elder, glancing down the length of the black-scaled dragon beneath him. The beasf s ribs, as wide as the hull of a ship, gently rose and fell. "It «s a dragon. The rumors of their return are true. I thought they were but stories told to children… like me."

"What's that?" Kadagan asked suddenly, tilting his head toward Joad. His luxurious mane of dark hair bounced on his slight shoulders. Listening to Joad's silent conversation, Kadagan's expression grew dark. "Yes, I know we've got to hurry. How dost thou propose we wake it up?"

Shrugging, Joad reached down with his slim index finger and lightly touched the dragon's spine. Like flint on steel, the touch caused blue sparks to zag crazily in the blackness of the stony pit. The dragon's limp body jumped once off the dirt floor, as if struck by a thunderbolt, then settled back down with a loud wumppph. The nyphids winged their way upward to the safety of a ledge, dimmed the maynus globe, and watched with stunned fascination as the dragon awoke.

Khisanth opened one enormous golden eye in confusion. Drawing their first conscious breath in centuries, her lungs nearly exploded in a great, barking cough from the acrid taste of scorched flesh and sulfur. The movement brought her sensitive snout scraping against rough stone. She opened her other eye and looked around.

Where am I? her sleep-fogged brain demanded. Water dripped and echoed hollowly nearby. What did I do to land myself in such an impossibly small cave? she thought, taking rueful note of the damp, stone walls just inches away on all sides. Her last memory came back slowly, murky and distant and dreamlike.

The geetna had brought her mountains of food in a similar chamber. Khisanth's crimson tongue slithered greedily over knifelike teeth as she remembered the way she had gorged. The geetna, a snaggle-toothed matron of the lizardlike bakali race, had encouraged her.

"Eat, eat, Khisanth," she'd said in the odd hisses, growls, and smacks that were the bakali language. Khisanth had always found its timbre oddly soothing, though she had only half heard the ancient one over her own noisy gulping of raw rodents. "It will be many centuries before you feast again."

Where was her old geetna now? The tumble of memories continued.

"I am too old for the Sleep," the bakali had said, "and I would be of little use to our queen when she returns to raise her legions, as she has promised. But you, Khisanth, you are more cunning and perceptive than the other young dragons.

You will see greatness done in her name."

Khisanth had understood little of what her geetna was say shy;ing, until she saw the old bakali's withered, leathery arm, more like a human's than a dragon's, lift high and sprinkle Khisanth's snakelike head with a glittering, silvery sub shy;stance. The dust had tickled her nostrils.

"There, I have done my last magic," the elder bakali had sighed. "Sleep now, as it is ordered, until Takhisis awakens you." Soothed and sated, Khisanth had drifted into slumber.

The black dragon's eyes opened wide now in wonder. The Dark Queen herself had awakened her! The geetna had said it would be so. That must mean Takhisis was raising her legions. But why? Khisanth had been young before the Sleep, had known little of the world beyond the warren. How long had she slept?

Khisanth's stomach rumbled, finally awakened by the memory of her last gorge. The gnawing hunger drove all other thoughts from the black dragon's mind. Her flared nos shy;trils detected the meaty scent of rats. Rats and worms. Some shy;thing nibbled at her tail. She wriggled on her belly to thrash it away, but she discovered again that she could barely move in the confines of the cave. The cavern of her memory was roomy; if, as she suspected, this was that same cave of long ago, she had grown at least four-fold while she slept.

Khisanth felt the persistent nibbling again. The dragon snaked a claw arm along her right side, absently noting the tightly folded, leathery wings on her back. Snatching at the offending rodent, she held it up at eye's height for inspection, taking pleasure in the stunned and terrified gleam in the raf s orbs.

"How long have you been chewing on me?" she asked aloud, surprised by the dark timbre of her own voice.

She tossed the rat into her waiting jaws, eyes closing as her senses delighted in the taste of flesh. But the morsel only whetted her appetite. Blood pounded in her head, and she could think of nothing but gorging.

Still lying, curled, on the cool cave floor, Khisanth rose slowly, carefully, onto her massive elbows and tried to turn

her whole body about. But her new size would allow no shifting in the egg-shaped cave, just long enough and wide enough to contain her. The long, sloping tunnel to the surface was blocked by new, jagged projections of rock, shiny with dripping water. They rose from the floor and ceiling like teeth in an ancient dragon's slathering maw. She would not be leaving by the same route she had arrived.

Driven by hunger, Khisanth let loose a horrific, braying wail of frustration that rent the still air. Her mouth was filled with a hot, acidic-tasting liquid that roared past her teeth in a powerful stream, splashing the cave wall before her.

The dragon felt a slow, painful warmth spreading on her right claw arm and looked down, where green, glowing droplets sizzled through the dusty black scales to the flesh beneath. Angry at herself for forgetting her ability to breathe acid, she snatched up a claw full of sand and rubbed it on the wounds. The sizzling stopped, replaced by numbness both there and in her head.

There has to be another way out of here, she told herself stubbornly.

Khisanth's great, golden eyes turned upward for the first time. Expecting a rocky dome, she was surprised to see no ceiling at all. Her cave stretched upward like a chute beyond her field of vision. The air above lightened gradually, giving Khisanth hope for an opening to the surface.

Suddenly, the dragon's sensitive eyes and ears perked up. To her surprise, she both saw and heard movement on a rocky ledge above.

"Is that you, Dark Queen?" Khisanth gulped with a shaky voice. She instantly wished she sounded more reverent and less timorous.

"Thou must be speaking Dragon with that deep voice, because I cannot understand," someone said casually, the words floating down to the dragon's ears. "It is too much to hope thou understands Nyphid. Wouldst thou know the Old Common tongue?"

Khisanth understood the speaker's formal, stilted words, but she had never heard the language called anything but

Common. When had it become old? Craning her heavy head back, Khisanth squinted upward, straining for a view of the voice's owner. A ball of bright white light stabbed her in the eyes. The dragon slammed her leathery lids shut against the pain and tore her gaze away.

"Thou shouldst not look into the maynus globe," said the voice from above, now closer.

When at last the burning light disappeared from her mind's eye, Khisanth opened her lids, searching about with an angry squint for the speaker. Her expression softened slightly to surprise.

Hovering above her just beyond the reach of her claw arm were not one, but two small creatures, sheer wings fluttering like thin crystal between their shoulder blades. Belted green tunics covered their slight frames down to their deeply tanned calves. Poking from their cuffs were slender hands with tapered fingers. Their hair, one's chestnut, the other's silver-gray, seemed to glow around the edges as if lit from behind. Their faces were an even deeper bronze and filled with gentle grace.

Their most remarkable and riveting features, though, were their piercing blue eyes. The color of lightning, thought Khi shy;santh.

"What are you?" she breathed, not quite in awe, but dis shy;tracted by their aura nonetheless. "Pixies?"

The chestnut-haired one scoffed and rolled his blue eyes. "Pixies! Humph. They are pointless and flighty." His chest swelled. "We are nyphids. I am known as Kadagan, and he"- the young one pointed to his elder — "is Joad. Our full designations would be indecipherable to thine ears. Hast thou a title?"

"You mean a name?" the dragon asked, mildly perplexed. When Kadagan nodded, Khisanth became downright con shy;fused. "I'm called Khisanth. Didn't she give you my name?"

Kadagan and Joad exchanged puzzled looks of their own.

"Aren't you agents of the Dark Queen?"

Kadagan's vivid blue eyes clouded over, and he shook his head. "We serve no queen."

'Then who are you?" Khisanth demanded, her voice rising in pitch and intensity at the same time that her eyes flattened into suspicious slits. The feeling of wonder the nyphids had first inspired quickly dissolved into vexation. Even the nyphid's awkward speech was beginning to grate on Khi-santh's nerves.

"As I said, we are nyphids," Kadagan supplied again, oblivious to the dragon's irritation. He looked at the other of his kind, dark head tilted as if listening; Khisanth heard noth shy;ing, though. "Yes, I believe that is the proper way to approach her." He turned his blue eyes on Khisanth. "We woke thee for a business proposition."

Khisanth froze momentarily, then slowly tilted her head back to consider the nyphid. "You woke me? Then the queen had nothing to do with that either?"

"Joad jolted thee awake with his finger," Kadagan offered.

Khisanth closed her eyes and tried to still the anger that was rising with each word the nyphid spoke. She felt choked — by chatter, by questions, by this pit. Nothing was turning out as promised by her geetna. Nothing that had happened since she'd awakened made sense. Except the rat. She under shy;stood gorging. The hunger flared in her stomach, making it difficult to concentrate on anything else.

"Listen," she growled, squinting against the soft light of the glowing globe. "We are both victims of some cosmic case of mistaken identity. You're not who I thought you were, and I'm definitely not interested in any business deal with pixies. Get away from me now, and I'll overlook the trouble you've caused me."

"Nyphids," Kadagan corrected. "And thou shouldst hear our proposition first." His soft features were pulled into a frown. "We would like thee to rescue Dela."

Khisanth shook her head like a dog with a burr in its ear. "Huh?"

"Dela. My betrothed, the daughter of Joad. The last female of our race. She-" The nyphid's voice caught in his throat. "She was captured by humans, and-"

"That's all very interesting to you, I'm sure," cut in Khisanth. "But as you might have noticed, I'm having diffi shy;culties of my own." She looked up, considering the climb before her. The nyphids' glowing globe allowed her to see farther into the gloom, but she still could not detect any opening.

The nyphid followed her gaze, then took quick stock of her size. "How didst thou come to be in such a tight spot?" he asked artlessly. Without waiting for an answer, he added, "Joad and I could assist-"

Khisanth cut him off with a raw, vicious chuckle. "You can't retrieve this pixie friend of yours from some humans, but you think you can help me climb out of this pit?" Laugh shy;ing humorlessly, the dragon dipped her head to look for toe shy;holds in the base of the rocky walls.

"We would not have awakened thee if we could not help thee from this pit."

"You'd be better off not to mention waking me!" growled Khisanth. Blood boiled at her temples, and she flexed her foreclaws. "There is only one thing of interest to me at this moment: getting out of this hole so I can gorge." Khisanth's leathery lips pulled back in a threatening sneer. "In fact, if I could reach either of you now, I would eat you. You'd scarcely be a mouthful," she said archly, "but if you don't cease your chatter, get away from me, and take that blasted, blinding ball with you, I'd settle for a snack."

The nyphids fluttered up and away from the angry dragon, drawing the maynus globe with them. "Yes, she is most excitable and stubborn," said the dark-haired one to his com shy;panion. "Fare-thee-well, then," he called. With a silent flut shy;tering of wings, the pair rose together through the still air, beyond Khisanth's sight. "Call and we will assist thee."

"Never!" she growled, her own throaty, guttural word nearly deafening in the confines of the cave. Instead of their departure calming her, it made Khisanth livid. She was a member of the most powerful race that ever lived, and she couldn't get away as easily as two puny pixies-nyphids. Whatever! She would die before she called for their help, as if they had any to give!

She would claw her way to the top, if she had to. Rage born of desperation made the dragon lash out wildly, wings straining upward, rocks tearing at the tough leather webbing. Her claws raked uselessly at the walls, the dirt-and-sand floor, until her own dark blood ran freely from countless cuts and abrasions.

The smell of the blood jolted Khisanth's rumbling stom shy;ach. She licked her bleeding cuticles, savoring the meaty taste. It calmed her nerves.

Think. Turn your energies from rage to survival, Khisanth told herself. If you continue as you are, you'll surely die.

Taking the smallest outcroppings of rock into her talons, the young dragon pulled herself up with her short forearms. But her appendages, grown during centuries of sleep, were as atrophied and undisciplined as the flabby, humanlike arms of her old bakali nursemaid. More often than not, her grip faltered, and she caught short her fall by digging her hind feet into the walls. She progressed by sheer force of will, two steps taken for every one secured.

Khisanth had no concept of time. Having slept under shy;ground for most of her life, she was unaware that the dim light from above waxed and waned in a regular cycle. Moments were measured in steps taken, brief rests stolen, feedings missed. She could have been dragging herself upward for as little or as much time as she'd slept, for all she knew or cared.

The dragon fed herself on the blood that oozed from her wounds; it slaked her hunger somewhat, though it gave her no energy. She bled mightily from a host of large wounds and broad scratches. Every part of her huge, unfamiliar body ached. Her massive head felt heavy, yet strangely light and dizzy at the same time.

Stopping to rest for a moment on a large, jutting rock ledge, Khisanth allowed herself to look up at last. The light from above was noticeably brighter. She could scarcely believe it. The opening had to be near, perhaps not even as far as the length of her own body, a mere thirty feet.

If only I were a bit closer, she thought blearily, I could stand on my haunches and pull myself up. But she knew there wasn't enough strength in her claw arms for that. If only I could eat. Or sleep…. Her lids-her whole cumber shy;some body-felt heavy and lifeless. Just a few moments of rest, she thought, and I'll be able to make it.

Khisanth struggled to curl her bulk up on the narrow ledge. Pressing her neck and spine into the stone wall, she tried to settle on her right side, but her long, heavy tail slipped over the edge. Its great weight dragged her down, hind feet scrabbling futilely. Suspended for a moment in midair, Khisanth flapped instinctively. She heard a snap in one of her wings as it caught on the walls.

She fell, plummeting, spiraling head over tail, every part of her scraping and slamming into the rough stone walls. In her descent, she became aware of a regular pulse of light, dim at first, then bright and hot like blue-veined lightning. Takhi-sis's evil realm would be filled with fire and lightning, the dragon thought distantly. Perhaps the Dark Queen has sum shy;moned me, and I am on my way to her side.

Khisanth could barely keep her enormous, golden eyes open. She struggled against unconsciousness, wanting to wit shy;ness her first journey into the Abyss, the plane where the evil goddess made her domain. Yet the dragon lost the battle, even as she felt the strange surge of energy pulse through her body.