The Black wing

Chapter 19

Khisanth stood among the burned and broken bodies.. Her raised and clenched claw was extended toward the smoke-filled sky. Suddenly the dragon felt her bones contract and expand simultaneously, as if she were being squashed and stretched. The pain was excruciating. Khisanth wondered briefly if she hadn't suffered more grievously in the fighting than she'd thought. Craning her neck, the dragon looked down the length of her spine, but saw nothing that should cause such torment.

Is this how it feels to die? Must your soul be torn to incom shy;prehensible bits or compressed into nothing, to leave no trace behind?

Khisanth didn't take a step, or even twitch a muscle, but the world around her shifted, wavered, like summer's heat on pond water. As she peered through the haze, the landscape around her altered dramatically. Battlements, even the mountains, were gone, and the land stretched on forever, empty and flat against an eerily glowing red sky. The sky itself seemed to merge with the sandy ground, leaving no horizon, showing no stars nor moons nor sun. And yet, for all the radiant red, the area seemed as black as shadow.

At least, unlike in the plane of lightning, there was ground here. Khisanth dropped to all fours and stepped warily, half suspecting the ground to drop away beneath her like quick shy;sand. Movement was slow, but there was nothing to walk to, no landmark for which to head. Khisanth scanned the entire area, but still saw nothing.

Until she looked forward again. Misty vapors were slip shy;ping upward from the sand before her and coalescing into vaguely human forms. Blobby, molten flesh ran more than rested on their amorphous frames. They looked like anguished, twisted, mobile, melted candle wax. Only the occasional sug shy;gestion of a face separated one from another.

"What-who are you? Where am I?" she demanded.

Silence.

Suddenly, like an unstoppable, soundless tidal wave, a row of the hideous creatures surged forward. They raised molten claws from the depths of their blobby forms and raked the air before the black dragon.

Khisanth darted backward-into an equally dense row of the silent and bizarre creatures behind her. She saw more than felt claws sinking into her scales from before and behind. Each did little enough damage, but together the growing legions of nameless creatures were beginning to draw blood, and pain.

Like a sickle through tall grass, she swished her tail from side to side, sending the creatures tumbling across the sandy landscape. Some snapped in half like cold and brittle wax, then lay still, but more quickly rose from the sand behind her to replace them. The ones in front of her tore relentlessly at her chest, forelegs, anything they could sink a claw into. Khi shy;santh kicked and lashed out and bucked around wildly like a horse, trying to throw them off. Then she noticed that the

ones that had snapped in half had, like worms, formed into two new, tenacious creatures.

Desperate, she summoned the bile that waited in her stom shy;ach. It surged up her throat and shot out between her jaws in a hot green stream. Khisanth pivoted, aiming her acid down shy;ward, shaking gruesome creatures from her and into the cor shy;rosive acid. The creatures' faces twisted into even greater anguish as they dissolved. Hope flickered in Khisanth's breast. She shook and spewed with a fury, until every last creature was reduced to smoldering gray patches.

To Khisanth's utter shock, the pieces not eaten by acid had begun to reform into many, many more creatures. They seemed angered, even in their silence.

The grotesque beings suddenly darted back from her, though she had made no move, nor spoken a word. Then Khisanth saw the reason.

Rising up behind the last row of creatures, silhouetted against the glowing red sky, were much taller, winged beings. Perhaps half Khisanth's height, they were thin with wiry muscles. They stepped closer, kicking the trembling blobs from their path. These new creatures looked reptilian, with long, prehensile tails-though eight feet tall, they reminded Khisanth strongly of the much smaller stone gar shy;goyles that were poised on the corners and turrets of Shal-imsha Tower, meant by its builders to chase away evil spirits. These were not made of stone, but leathery flesh, like her own underbelly. Six of them were black as night, and two were vivid green.

"Who are you?" Khisanth demanded, repeating her last words to the newcomers. She pointed at the quivering crea shy;tures who had worked so hard to tear her flesh from her bones. "And what are they?"

Lemures-mindless spirits. They can't answer. Khisanth looked around, startled. The voice had spoken inside her head. She spotted a red reptilian creature staring closely at her and decided it was the one that had answered her telepathically.

"We're abishai, sentries on the Abyssal plane," it said, its tone very low-pitched and slow, like stone would sound if it could talk.

"The Abyss?" Khisanth squealed, a sound she'd never heard from her own throat.

Without answering, the creatures snapped into formation, boxing Khisanth in with two abishai on each side of the dragon, save for the front. She began to walk forward, feeling a strange tug at her thoughts. Dimly she realized she must be under a spell, to respond without complaint or contest. Only after the spell faded was she able to resist.

Khisanth dug in her heels. The black and green creatures stopped in their tracks. Even eight creatures, large by any other standards, could not hope to budge a dragon who did not wish to move.

The red abishai extended its tail toward her and revealed the small stinger at its tip. "Poison," it said. The creature looked around anxiously, as if something would emerge and slay it for communicating with the dragon. Nothing did.

The warning was enough for Khisanth. For now. They started forward again.

The sentries stopped marching abruptly, though their des shy;tination looked not a whit different from their departure point-dark red, glowing sky, like a fire the size of the world burned in the distance. The shifting sand made it difficult to tell up from down. "Wait."

The small battalion of abishai disappeared into the dark red sky as mysteriously as they had arrived.

Khisanth detested mystery of any sort. Where did they go? Did their absence mean the lemures would return? The thought of those brainless creatures clawing at her relent shy;lessly made her feel more trapped than the escort of abishai had. Every nerve tingled at the tips of her scales.

But the lemures did not return. Nor did anyone-or any shy;thing-else. She waited. And waited. Khisanth thought it nearly possible that an entire cycle of seasons could have passed while she waited, for what, she didn't know.

Then, to Khisanth's utter amazement, a wall of fire shot up out of the sand like a geyser. Through it stepped a creature

she would have mistaken for another abishai, if it hadn't cor shy;rected her thoughts.

"Cornugons are the Abyss's greater baatezu," it said in a sepulchral tone. "The distinctions between them and lesser baatezu like abishai are obvious."

Looking more closely, Khisanth began to notice subtle dif shy;ferences-the flesh-covered horns, the slightly more human-looking face, deeply slanted eyes, and protruding tusks instead of rows of equally jagged teeth, like the abishai. And this one gripped a large barbed whip in its talons; the abishai were armed only with claws.

"I am instructed to take you to your meeting." The cornu-gon nodded its horned head once toward the wall of flame.

"Meeting? With whom? Why was I brought to the Abyss?"

The cornugon simply stood, looking toward the blazing wall.

Khisanth felt something pulling at the corners of her confi shy;dence, until she noticed the beginnings of a most unfamiliar sensation-fear. Most oddly, she was developing an irra shy;tional fear of staying where she was. Not that a trip to the Abyss shouldn't inspire terror, she told herself. Still, fear was totally alien to Khisanth's nature. There was no new reason for it to rise at that moment.

Except if it were magically inspired. Dragons were natu shy;rally resistant to magic. The cornugon's magic must be pow shy;erful indeed for a fear spell to affect her so. The dragon felt another unfamiliar twinge of fear.

Before Khisanth could step toward it, the fire wall came to her. She felt its flames tickle and lick at her hide, but the fire didn't burn, wasn't even very warm. The white-orange flame slipped down her back and over her tail and left her standing in a place that looked exactly the same. The sky and sand glowed red as before.

Yet, it felt very different. The cornugon was gone, but Khi shy;santh had the distinct and unshakable impression that she wasn't alone. Cutting through the strange dimness of the bar shy;ren landscape was the long, spiny back of a dragon. Huge, and very close, but very dim.

"Who are you?" Khisanth began, but the momentary relief she felt at the sight of something familiar was knocked away, along with her breath. The area seemed to grow darker, though it was more a darkness of the mind, since the sky's faint redness didn't change. Struggling to breathe, Khisanth could see the dragon's long, unusually thick neck start to swing around to the left.

Like a tightly coiled spring, the neck unwound, and five heads completed the turn, snaking and writhing and hissing softly. Khisanth dropped to her knees in reverence and awe. She cringed before one of the three creators of the world.

In the Dark Queen's present form, the name She of Many Faces seemed most appropriate. Each head represented a type of evil dragon: white, black, green, blue, and red. The colors ran the length of each neck and into the forepart of the dragon's body. They blended into three strips of gray, blue-green, and purple over her back and hindquarters, and merged into a muddy brown tail.

Takhisis's black head slithered closer to the trembling black dragon, hissing softly. You have displeased me greatly,

Khisanth.

Takhisis's lips didn't move, but Khisanth heard the queen's even, almost sensuous voice directly in her head.

"Then I am dead," said the black dragon.

Not yet. Five sets of dragon eyes all bore into Khisanth's, their message unmistakable.

It is my belief that you are yet useful to me, especially now that you have slain three of the only five black dragons worthy of being in my service.

"Worthy!" cried Khisanth. "But you don't under-"

Silence! the Dark Queen's voice cut in sharply. You are clever enough to know that everything happens with my knowl shy;edge, if not consent.

Khisanth, for once, was struck speechless.

Of course I knew of their betrayal with the knights. Black drag shy;ons are the greediest and most solitary of the evil dragons and must be watched accordingly. The tongue of Takhisis's black head darted out, as if to acknowledge and accept the evaluation of its brethren.

"They betrayed you and exposed your entire Black Wing to decimation. Why didn't you strike them dead?"

They were much more useful to me alive. I would have appealed to their greed, offered them more than the knights-their very lives-and turned their betrayal to my advantage. They would have feared my eternal wrath forever after.

Takhisis paused. Her blue head hissed wordlessly. As it was, you helped them destroy the wing.

Khisanth found her voice. "I saved the wing!"

Only vanity would make you view the devastation at Shalimsha as a victory, the same vanity that has made you refuse to take a rider….

"But you don't-" Khisanth stopped the thought.

/ know of the betrayals that have forged your personality-and your pride. You have gleaned less from them than you should.

The five heads swayed to an unheard cadence. You need consider only this one example: If you had taken a rider after your arrival at the wing, you would have secured the rightful position of second dragon. You gave inferior dragons like Khoal power over you. Had you been their superior, they could not have betrayed me.

"Maldeev could have made me second dragon without a rider!"

It was not his rule to break, the voice cut in sternly. / deter shy;mined the policy regarding riders. Maldeev is simply an agent whose function is to enforce my edicts. Again, only vanity would make you think yourself worthy of his risking a god's retribution.

You are right about one thing, though, the voice said in a slightly conciliatory tone. Humans are an inferior race. That is the crux of the whole, upcoming war. They currently control all of Krynn. Until I can return in physical form-which I am using them to help me accomplish-they are necessary annoyances. Like lemures.

That last comment, spoken with a hint of amusement, reas shy;sured Khisanth that she was not beyond redemption. "I thought I was honoring my queen. Must I take a rider?"

Only if you do not wish to repeat your mistakes and risk my wrath a second time.

"Humans are so easily swayed by emotion. How will I find one who is both worthy and true?"

You will live to do much greatness in my name, Khisanth, but trust no one. What you seek is a human worthy of your talents. Look in unexpected places. You will know him when the time comes.

The Dark Queen's five heads began to turn away. There is much work and little time to rebuild the Black Wing. Commit my words to memory, Khisanth, for I fear a second meeting would not go as well for you.

"Thank-" was all the humbled black dragon could squeeze out before the majesty of the Queen of Darkness faded into the barren landscape.

Just as abruptly and with scarcely a puff of smoke, Khi shy;santh left the Abyss. She landed squarely in a scene nearly as bleak as the Infernal Realms. Around her, in the scant light of dusk, soldiers with battle-blackened faces picked through the charred wreckage of Shalimsha Tower.