The Queen of Death

58

The dragon queen smashed the horned crests that ran along the top of her head into the crystal again. She had already forced a half-dozen spiderweb-patterned sets of cracks into the opposite surface of the crystal in the same way. This time, though, Sallah heard something larger give, and she looked up to see that a good chunk of the crystal had caved away. The shard toppled from the top of the crystal and shattered on the stone floor near the crimson dragon’s feet.

“We can’t hide back here much longer,” Xalt said. He had stopped screaming, but his voice still held a histrionic edge.

“We don’t have anywhere else to go!” Sallah said. She peered around the crystal and spotted Esprë and Te’oma talking near the hole.

The knight’s heart sank. If Esprë had come up from the lower level by herself—without Kandler or Burch—then something horrible had to be wrong. Te’oma had disappeared before they’d reached the observatory. What could she be doing with the girl now?

Although Burch had vouched for Te’oma, Sallah shared Kandler’s distrust of the changeling. If not for her, they would be safe in Flamekeep now, with Esprë in the caring hands of the Voice of the Flame.

The dragon smashed into the crystal. Once more, a piece that could have crushed Sallah dead cascaded to the floor.

Xalt screamed.

Sallah turned on him and snarled. “When did you lose your nerve?”

Xalt froze. “Is this not the right way to act in such a situation? I was taking my cues from you.”

If Sallah had thought for a moment that the warforged was mocking her, she’d have considered separating his head from his shoulders and then toting around his skull as a warning to others who might be tempted to try it. As it was, she knew he meant her no disrespect. The dragon had rattled her, and she’d let it show.

She hadn’t acted so cowardly in the battle with Nithkorrh, but she hadn’t faced the great beast directly in that fight. Now, come face to snout with an enraged dragon the size of a cathedral, she’d given in to fear and taken to cowering behind cover like some common mercenary. If her father could see her now, he would turn away from her and hang his head in shame, she knew.

This had to end.

The dragon queen smacked her head into the crystal again, and another boulder-sized piece of it came away. The beast roared in triumph, so loud that Sallah wondered if her ears might bleed. Only half of the crystal remained now. It would disappear entirely with just a few more blows.

Sallah peeked around the crystal again and saw Esprë and Te’oma wrestling with each other. The girl’s hands glowed in a telltale shade of black.

The knight turned back and grabbed Xalt by the shoulder.

She pointed behind him. “I need you to run as fast as you can in that direction.”

“Of course,” Xalt said. “I will lead the way.”

Sallah started to say something, but yet another crystal-cracking strike from the dragon cut her off.

“Go!” she yelled at the warforged. She spun him about and slapped him on the back. “Go!”

Xalt took off as ordered and did not look back. Sallah spun on her heel and chased around the other side of the crystal instead.

The dragon queen reared up for another attack and froze in mid-strike. Her head snapped to her right, her eyes following Xalt’s progress as he dashed away, oblivious to the fact that Sallah had not followed him.

Then she roared and started after him.

For a creature so large and powerful, the dragon queen moved with surprising grace. She lowered her head to the ground and prowled forward, every stride of her gigantic legs pulling her forward faster than the warforged could run. She would be on him before he could find another place to hide.

The dragon queen’s tongue slithered across her slavering lips as she closed in on the hapless Xalt.

As the dragon turned, Sallah raced around behind her. There, still stuck in the dragon’s tail, hung the knight’s blazing sword. Black-baked blood caked the blade, and the tip of it had been broken off at the point where it had stuck out of the dragon’s scales. The hilt still jabbed up out of the dragon queen’s flesh, though, and Sallah charged straight for it.

While the dragon moved fast, it took a moment for her tail to catch up, and Sallah leaped atop the end of it. This part of the tail was nearly severed from the rest. The dragon’s thrashing attempts to dislodge the sword had only made matters worse, and Sallah doubted the creature could even feel her back here on the deadened flesh.

Somewhere up ahead, Xalt screamed again. Sallah hated that she hadn’t been able to explain her plan to the warforged. He probably thought that she’d abandoned him for her own gain, perhaps plotting to slink away while the dragon queen tore him to pieces.

It added up to just one more reason why she could not fail.

Sallah pulled herself up the dragging tail, hand over hand, until she could reach her sword’s gleaming hilt. As she went, she looked up the Vermillion crest that ran up the dragon queen’s back, right from the tip of her tail to where it split at the base of her neck and thrust along either side of the crown of her skull. It felt like looking up a mountain.

Just as she put her hand out for what was left of her sword, the dragon came to a halt and reared up on her haunches. The sudden movement threatened to throw the knight from her seat. She knew, though, that the change meant that the dragon meant to strike. If the knight did not act soon, the beast would destroy Xalt with a single, crushing blow.

Sallah snapped out her hand and closed it around her sword’s hilt. As she did, she let her body fall backward. The weight of her armored form pried the weapon free.

As the blazing sword left the dragon’s tail, it cut through the flesh there again. The dragon queen stiffened, then threw back her head and howled.

Sallah let her momentum roll her off the dragon’s tail and somersaulted to her feet. She stood there, her broken sword in hand, still defiantly blazing away, and shouted out a prayer.

“Silver Flame, guide my way!” she cried as the dragon turned to face her.

The dragon queen’s head spun about on her sinuous neck first, her gaze darting back and forth until it landed on Sallah and her sword-shard. The creature’s eyes narrowed, the reptilian slits in the great yellow orbs constricting until they seemed like vertical lines.

The dragon’s tail cocked back, and Sallah tensed, ready to move. When the tail whipped around, she leaped into the air. The dragon queen, though, had anticipated this, and the tail came up and knocked the woman’s legs from beneath her.

The blow sent Sallah clanging to the floor. Despite that, she kept her grip on her sword.

By the time Sallah had scrambled back to her feet, the dragon queen had spun her entire body around, bringing the whole of her fearsome visage to bear on the knight.

Sallah felt a tremor pass through her body, but she suppressed it. If these were to be her last moments in this world, she refused to spend them afraid. She held her broken sword before her, interposing its silvery light between herself and the dragon.

The flickering blaze echoed in Sallah’s own soul and set it afire. She felt the heat of it burn in her eyes in her determination to deport herself as she had always been meant to be: a Knight of the Silver Flame.

“Come, queen of dragons,” Sallah said. “Let us bring this to an end.”

The monstrous creature peered down at the knight as if she’d come across some curious insect crawling across her path, something that bore closer inspection before she crushed it. A low growl escaped from her mouth. It sounded like rolling thunder.

Sallah assumed a warrior’s stance. From here, she could not reach the dragon’s snout or neck. The creature had been hurt once already, and the wound had made it cautious.

Sallah considered charging the beast, her sword held high. One look at the dragon’s maw told her all she needed to know about how well that would succeed. The creature could swallow her whole then use her blade to pick her teeth.

“Wait!” a voice said behind her.

Sallah snapped her head around to see Esprë walking up behind her, an unfamiliar look painted on her face.

The moment Sallah took her eyes from the dragon queen’s, she knew she had made a mistake. She heard the rush of air as the creature’s head darted forward. She had time to say a single word before the slab-like snout smashed into her in an attempt to snuff out her light forever.

“Run!” Sallah said to Esprë.

The instant before the dragon’s attack knocked her senseless, though, she recognized the look in the young elf’s eyes. She would do anything but run.