The Last Dragon: Book One

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Kendra had walked a few paces into the room but pulled to a stop long before reaching the proffered chair an insolent young Lord Kent indicated. He appeared the same high-born, overbearing boy Elizabeth had walked with in the gardens, and the same I’d placed a wet spot at his groin to rid her of his presence.

Her eyes roamed the room and rested on a closed door. The three of them avoided looking at it. She smiled back at them, but spoke to me, “Damon pull your sword and kill whoever is lurking behind that door, should he or they emerge. Then run outside to protect yourself. My dragon is about to do to this building what it did to the city of Mercia.”

My sword was in my hand. I was only a few steps away. Lord Kent and the mage stood to object. “Sit or die,” I barked, my sword ready to speak for me.

They sat.

She said to them, “Do you know me?”

“The servant who spies for Princess Elizabeth,” Lord Kent said with a curl of his lip. “A homeless orphan.”

Princess Anna said, “I believe you served me tea once, but perhaps not. I do not keep track of palace servants.”

The mage looked worried.

My sister paced as they spoke and pulled to a stop near the door we’d entered. She said softly, “I am all of those things.” Her focus was on the mage. “I am also the one who ordered a mage trying to sail to Kondor today grabbed by my dragon and flown into the sky. Then dropped. He twisted and turned, and I could swear I heard his screams for the longest time as he fell to his death.”

“You’re her,” the mage said, his voice hushed.

“Who?” Lord Kent bellowed.

The eyes of the mage never left Kendra, but he answered, “The Dragon Queen.”

“This is all her fault?” Lord Kent asked, confused. “A servant?”

The building shook as if a boulder had rolled down a hill and struck it, or a dragon had landed on the roof, none too gently. My guess was the dragon. The closed door the three had avoided looking at still drew my attention. Sword still in hand I crabbed sideways closer. Now they watched me instead of Kendra, which told me something important was beyond the door.

Kendra realized I was up to a game of my own and kept the dragon quiet, although we heard hundreds of running feet in the street outside and screams as people fled the area. I placed a hand on the door latch and yanked. The door flew open, and a single huge soldier wearing a burgundy breastplate bolted out, already lifting his heavy broadsword as he ran at me. It took both hands to raise the sword that was longer than he was tall, and it weighed as much as a large child.

Mine was already in hand, and as I’d argued with Elizabeth about, reflexes slashed the blade across his breastplate, doing him no harm at all. However, on my return swing, I adjusted the height to below his waist, which was unprotected by the breastplate. He wore stiff leather leg protectors for his thighs, but as his arms were raising his sword, his bare lower abdomen was exposed. I cut across it, so deeply I felt my blade strike bone.

My third slash was higher and removed his left hand at the wrist. It fell to the floor with a solid-sounding thump. The unbelieving eyes of the massive soldier watched his own hand roll across the floor after his foot kicked it. He fell. He was not dead, but from the amount of blood, he soon would be.

But it was not him that concerned me. Still in the small room was another man. “Come out,” I ordered.

He hesitantly did.

Kendra drew in a deep breath of recognition.

I didn’t know what to do. The man who strolled regally out of the room and callously stepped over the fallen man was a man we knew well. It was the king. He was healthy. It was Elizabeth’s father.

Then it wasn’t.

“Stop it,” Kendra screamed at the mage. “He’s drawing essence from the dragon!”

The building shook again. The dragon roared as if in response to Kendra.

The man who had looked like our king for a time was still similar, the same nose, hair, and height, but how I had confused them was beyond me—unless it was magic. I’d met, talked, and performed tasks for the real king a hundred times. No, a thousand. This was not him, but a cousin? Perhaps. However, it had not been a trick of the light or my mind. The man had been the king.

The mage smiled at me, unworried and confident.

Lord Kent said, “How would both of you like to be elevated to become royals? Live on a par like me? The image of our king standing before you will have that power to grant, and more. Perhaps you wish to be an earl? Or duke? Duchess for your sister?”

Princess Anna said in an earnest, convincing way, “Together, we who are in this room today can rule Dire. Imagine what your lives can become with our help.”

“And we won’t have to wait half a lifetime to do those things, either,” Lord Kent said with a grin that continued to grow as he believed the bait he fished with couldn’t be resisted.

The man who had briefly appeared as our king said with a wave of his arm, “Name your titles, and I’ll make it so as soon as I rule Dire.”

Kendra said coldly, pulling me away from the conversation, “Damon, is there a back door?”

“There must be one for the people to reach the outhouses.”

Puzzlement crossed Princess Anna’s face. Lord Kent’s smile slipped.

Kendra said to me, “Go out back. Stand well away from the building. Kill anyone who leaves by that door, and none will enter.”

When I didn’t move fast enough, she screamed, “Damon!”

My feet carried me at a sprint, dodging chairs and tables as I ran. The door crashed open as my shoulder struck it, and I turned, ready to defend it as she told me, but without any idea of what was happening. A timber lay in the dirt for walking on after the rains, and I propped it against the door so it wouldn’t open. The dragon sat on the roof and eyed me as I did what she asked. From the ground, I couldn’t see her folded wings, and from down on the ground, she resembled a huge, hungry frog.

“Hey, girl, remember me?”

She didn’t seem to. Then she reared up and screamed as she brought her forefeet down on the roof, splintering wood and caving in a section. Someone inside pounded on the door I’d barred, but the dragon tore aside a section of roof and disappeared inside the building, like a rat scurrying down a hole. There were more screams and cries, but none lasted more than a few seconds. The side-wall of the building crashed outward, then the entire building fell into a pile of rubble, the dragon standing in the middle.

I couldn’t see Kendra through the rubble and dust cloud. I raced forward. But she was safely on the street out front, waving to attract my attention. I pulled to a stop. The dragon stood taller and reared up on two hind feet again, bringing the front two down hard enough to pulverize the wood beneath them—as well as anything else under them. She used her mouth to tear apart boards and throw them to either side.

She nudged a pile away and snatched a pale blue mouthful, which was a dead Lord Kent and tossed him to join the other rubble she had discarded. Then she found the body of the mage. She shook her head back and forth violently, like a dog with a rabbit, and tossed it. The dragon returned to the patch of blue that had been Lord Kent and placed her right foot on it and shifted her weight until it flattened.

The dragon found the yellow that had been Princess Anna. I turned aside and allowed myself to spew sour vomit instead of watching. When I looked back again, the dragon lifted what was left of her limp body and threw it aside, too. The dragon roared in victory, and I covered my ears. It turned to Kendra, and my heart stopped as I thought it might attack her next, but it spread its wings and pumped them slowly a few times, almost hovering over the destroyed building, before flying higher and away.