The Queen of Death

44

Kandler felt strangely numb as the Phoenix approached the observatory. The idea of meeting with a dragon and perhaps learning more about what he might be able to do to save Esprë thrilled him. At the same time, he feared that the dragon might slaughter them all. The two notions canceled each other out and left him with nothing.

As the ship drew closer, the observatory stood out like a silver spike stabbing from the top of the mountains. The light of the moons shimmered on its glittering surface, and a series of large glowing balls swirled about the place for a moment then froze in place. These luminescent spheres seemed to be made of crystal wrapped in bands of silver. Runes had been cut all the way through these straps of metal, and the light shone through them, spelling out mystic words Kandler knew he would never comprehend.

“There are thirteen spheres,” Zanga said from her perch on the edge of the bridge, “one for each of the moons. These have three bands of metal crossing them, one along each axis.”

“What are the runes?” Esprë said.

They’d gotten close enough that Kandler thought he could almost recognize some of them. Beyond them, the tower loomed larger than ever. It stood at least a hundred feet above the tallest of the mountain peaks, and frost and ice crusted its smooth-carved walls. Kandler wondered how cold it would feel inside, far from the airship’s warming ring of fire.

“Each band has thirteen runes. Those on the first stand for the thirteen moons again. Those on the second represent the thirteen planes of existence. On the third, they depict the thirteen dragonmarks.”

Kandler’s gut flipped. “I thought there were only twelve dragonmarks.” He hoped Zanga could not hear the deception in his voice.

“You forget the Mark of Death,” Zanga said.

The justicar gave his stepdaughter’s shoulder a squeeze and stared up at the tremendous structure. It swept up from the mountains as if part of the toothy peaks and then lanced far out above them. This close, the walls seemed to have been made from gigantic columns of rock drilled from some distant quarry and then dropped here atop the mountain, their inward-sweeping tops tipped toward each other until they almost touched.

The gaps between the columns seemed to have been mortared with pure silver. Spaces showed in these long lines, forming tall, thin windows that glowed with a bluish light. The top of the tower seemed to be open to the air, although it was impossible to tell from the low angle of their approach. The light emanating from the top could have come from a raging bonfire, although it shared the same hue as the illumination that spilled out through the sides of the tower, particularly through the solitary arched entrance.

This gaped like a toothed maw about a quarter of the way down from the tower’s top. A long, stone platform jutted out from the arch, resembling a wide, flat tongue. Monja, who had the airship’s wheel, aimed the craft straight for it.

“Where is the dragon?” Xalt asked. The warforged strained his neck to see through the tower’s entrance. He had stuck close to Esprë since they’d left Seren behind. The thought that the girl had such a protector at her side at all times relieved Kandler. It freed him up to think about more than just standing between her and danger.

“He waits for us inside,” Zanga said. She dropped her shroud over the front of herself again, disappearing underneath it.

“Have you ever been here before?” Sallah asked.

“Once. Right after my mentor passed the shroud to me. It was … sublime. I will not spoil the experience with more words. Soon enough, you will share in it yourself.”

Burch emerged from the ship’s hold with a double armful of crossbows, plus four quivers full of bolts, and some thin rope of elven make. He set them down on the deck with care, and arranged them in a row. Kandler counted four standard crossbows—plus a smaller one that looked like it would be a good fit for Monja—as well as two coils of rope.

When the shifter noticed the others watching him, he winked at them. “Can’t be too careful,” he said.

“Those toys cannot harm Greffykor,” Zanga said. “Your bolts will bounce off his scales.”

“Who said I’d aim for his scales?” Burch said, needling the shrouded woman. “Anyhow, these aren’t for your armored god in there.”

“Then who?”

“Like I said, you can’t be too careful.”

Burch picked up the small crossbow and one of the larger ones. He laid the first at Monja’s feet, along with a quiver of bolts. He gave the second to Xalt, who murmured his thanks as he checked the weapon’s action. Then the shifter handed one coil of rope to Kandler and kept the other for himself.

Burch vaulted back down to the deck and slung his own crossbow and a stuffed quiver over his shoulder. Then he picked up the other one and glanced around, confused.

“What happened to Te’oma?” he asked.

Kandler scanned the ship but saw no sign of the changeling. He cursed softly for not having kept a closer eye on her. Then he peered over at Zanga to see how she would react. Her shroud made her impossible to read.

“I am worried,” Zanga said, her light tone belying her words. “Not for Greffykor’s safety, but for your friend’s.”

“Will this anger the dragon?” Esprë asked.

The shroud rustled as Zanga shook her head. “I am sure he foresaw this as well. We could not surprise such a student of the Prophecy as this.”

“Let’s hope you’re right,” Kandler said as they neared the landing platform.

The Phoenix slowed as she approached the platform. It had been built to accommodate dragons, not airships, and it showed no mooring lines or gangplanks.

“Just slip in over the platform,” Kandler told Monja. “We’ll take a ladder down.”

The halfling smiled. “I’ll try not to set the place on fire.”

Kandler patted her on the back. “We’ll be back as soon as we can.”

He strode over to the starboard rail and unfurled a rope ladder over it. Then he slipped down it to the platform below.

The long expanse of stone seemed as solid as the mountain peak over which it hung. Kandler put his hand on his sword but did not draw it. He reminded himself that he was here to talk, even if they were meeting with a dragon.

Sallah came down after Kandler, then Esprë, Xalt, and Zanga. With a quick wave to Monja, who had to keep her hand on the ship’s wheel, Burch brought up the rear. Each of them—with the exception of Burch and Zanga—shivered in the cold. Away from the airship’s ring of fire, the chill of the heights began to work its way into their bones.

“Shouldn’t we knock?” Sallah said as she crept toward the brightly lit opening.

From here, Kandler could see one large room inside the tower. It seemed to occupy the entire floor—which sprawled as far across as an open field—and the ceiling was too high above to see through the arched entry. A wide hole gaped in the far side of the floor, no railing around it.

Strange apparatuses, most of which stood taller than a human, lined the walls of the room, some atop carved tables or ornate cabinets large enough to hide a wagon inside. Kandler couldn’t guess as to their purposes, but he could see that they had been built for a dragon to use. Even if he knew what to do with the things, he wasn’t sure he could get them to activate or move.

Some were made of gleaming metals of every color. Others had been formed from polished woods that curled in such intricate and delicate shapes that it seemed they might still be living. Tinted glass, shaped like cubes, cylinders, or bells covered many of the pieces, and although Kandler could see through the material he doubted that even one of Burch’s explosive shockbolts—which had all been used up long ago—would have cracked them.

In one glass-fronted cabinet stood a miniature city, complete with walls and towers built from tiny bricks. It reminded Kandler of a section of Sharn, the Brelish metropolis he’d once called home. When he peered closer at it, he saw that it crawled with pinkish, finger-sized worms rather than people, inching along blindly through their land and lives.

Lightning flashed along the edges of a blue-metal cone that rose into a bronze cloud that shimmering and shifted with the raw energy that coursed along its surface. Sparks rising from it floated through the air to the devices on either side of it. These sucked the glowing specks into coils and nets of translucent tubing through which they pulsed with a staccato beat.

Sparkling steam spun leafy green wheels and billowed from a pair of glassy chimneys set in the far wall. Shapes twisted in the artificial clouds as they spilled forth, forming full-color visions of fantastic, winged creatures with scaly skins and stretched bat-wings. As the images fell and faded, the pulsating gas cascaded down and flowed out across the floor, lending a diffuse glow to the polished stone there, as it edged its way toward the landing platform.

As Kandler and the others walked closer to the entrance, he had to shade his eyes against the intense light. It seemed like every corner of the place glowed of its own accord, making the place brighter now, even at night, than during the height of day.

The light became more intense as a gigantic crystal ball hove into view near the north wall to their left as they came in through the open portal. The massive crystal, which stood taller than a house—or even a fortress, seemed to glow with an inner light. A mixture of strange images swam within its depths. Some of these seemed to pull Kandler in, while others made him want to flee.

When Kandler reached the tower’s threshold, he stopped. The others filed up next to him and stood alongside him at the edge. The justicar wouldn’t have been surprised to find that every one of them had stopped breathing, stunned into breathlessness.

“Shall we?” Zanga said, her face seeming to glow nearly as much as the crystal globe. With that, she strode into the room.

Kandler waited for a moment. When nothing happened, he breathed a sigh of relief. Then he took Esprë in one hand and Sallah in the other and crossed into the dragon’s tower. Burch and Xalt came in right behind them.

Kandler pulled back his head and looked straight up to see the night sky above. The top of the tower lay open to the cold night beyond. The light from the tower nearly drowned out the sight of the stars hanging there in the cold distance.

“Maybe he’s not home?” Esprë said, hope rising in her voice.

Then a titanic shape moved from behind the crystal ball and shuffled toward the empty middle of the room on long-taloned feet. It held its wings close to its body to keep them out of the way. Its silvery scales clinked together as it moved, sounding something like the chimes of an entire army of chain-mailed soldiers marching off to war.

“Call me Greffykor,” the dragon said, in a voice that seemed to rumble right through Kandler’s chest, so that he felt it more than he heard it. It peeled back its armored lips, revealing uncountable rows of long, sharp teeth spread in an approximation of a smile. “Enter my home.”