Aranya (Shapeshifter Dragons) (37 page)

Ri’arion said, “This
puts some of Fra’anior’s volcanoes to shame.”

“
But not the central caldera, surely?” said Aranya.

“It isn’t this active.”

As Zuziana complained about never having been to Fra’anior and Ri’arion offered her an official visit just as soon as she was no longer considered a wanted criminal, Aranya circled the volcano along the eastern rim. She kept windward of the column of smoke and gases, but the occasional acrid whiff assaulted their nostrils anyway. Something struck her as strange or out of place down there. She was leery of flying closer to investigate. Magic? A … presence? A being which had sensed their approach? Her Dragon sight scanned the bubbling lava lake. Dimly through the drifting veils of clouds, she saw a strange hill in the orange lava, perhaps an upwelling or an enormous bubble. Aranya tilted her wings to catch a thermal and spiralled upward.

“What’s the matter?”
asked Zip.

“A Dragon sense,”
Aranya replied, watching alertly. The hill was obscured by smoke now.

“Danger?”

“I don’t honestly–
that!
”

A
s Aranya banked sharply into a near-vertical climb, her tail pointed at the caldera and her nose to the sky, Zuziana shrieked, “Go, Aranya. Faster!”

Aranya’s hearts thumped in her throat. From below, a monstrous, misshapen head surged up from the caldera,
great sheets and globs of red-hot molten rock sloughing from it, until she saw eyes and jaws emerge from the mass.
Dragon!
It seemed improbable, but the head just kept coming. Zuziana kept shouting in her ear. Aranya did not care. That mouth had to be a hundred feet wide and deep enough to make a snack of five of her. For a terribly long time, they raced toward the heavens, Dragon-Aranya gasping and straining every fibre of her body and the head extending on an impossibly long neck as the mouth gaped open.

“
Magma Dragon! Watch your tail!” Ri’arion bellowed.

She flicked her tail aside as the jaws snapped shut. Molten rock splattered her hindquarters. But the monster sank back, coiling beneath the lava
. Aranya vented a lung-bursting bugle of triumph and relief.

“We did it
,” Zip clapped Aranya’s neck. “Well done, you gorgeous Dragon.”

“So, Ri’arion …
you were saying about flightless Dragons?” said Aranya, twisting her head to keep an eye on the Magma Dragon while she continued to power upward, trying to work out the knots in her much-abused flight muscles. Those last few leagues up to the volcano had been pure torture. Although she had recovered at the speed of a Dragon’s superior cardiovascular system, Aranya still felt the muscular abuse keenly and would do for several days, she suspected. But she could not help smiling as Sapphire played in the wash of her wings, clawing playfully at the sunbeams and the swirling dust motes; chirping away without pause.

The dragonet seemed
unabashed.

Her antics seemed to put the monk at ease, too. “For a man sworn to follow the Path of the Dragon Warrior,” he quipped, “this is all very educational. That
Magma Dragon was coiled beneath the lava like a cobra, ready to strike. How does it even live under molten rock, I ask you? If you hadn’t had that Dragon sense, Aranya …”

“Exactly.
” Aranya willed her hearts to climb back down from the inside of her throat. That was a rather faster start for Immadia Island than she had intended. “Which way? Give me a bearing, o masters of the map.”

“Just a couple
more nose-hairs to the east, petal,” said Zip.

Ri’arion’s smirk suggested he found this very funny indeed. Aranya loftily ignored them both and pointed her nose in the correct direction.

The first hint of a breeze tickled her wing membranes.

Sapphire. Buckle up,
she said.

The dragonet made a ridiculous fuss about settling herself in Zip’s lap, and
only just in time. As Aranya ascended, the wind tugged at the edges of her wings and soon settled in for a steady blast from a few compass points south of southeast, an almost perfect aid to their intended direction of travel. But the Princess of Remoy sniffled and declared that her nose was turning blue. Aranya wondered if she should introduce her friend to the snows of Immadia’s mountains. By the Islands, she was looking forward to feasting her Dragon eyes on those peaks.

Trying to distract herself from brooding over their narrow escape from the
Magma Dragon, Aranya considered how best to approach her father. He would not be impressed by a showy landing in his castle courtyard. His well-trained troops might just put a crossbow quarrel or three into them before asking any questions. Aranya had watched them at training often enough to know how deadly they were. She imagined throwing her arms around her father. If she knew him at all, the King’s first question would be, ‘How did you get here?’ Would the rumour of her survival have travelled to Immadia as yet, or had the Sylakians cut off all communication with Immadia ahead of the invasion? That would surely alert the wily old fox, King Beran.

Dragon-Aranya
flew still higher, seeking stronger winds. She fixed her attention on the stars coming out as the suns sank away into the death of the day, surveying the familiar constellations of her youth–the Dragon Rampant, the Three Mountains, the Sky-Strider and the Northern Scales of Justice, the constellation which pinpointed true north. Her eyes kept tracking westward, searching for any sign of the Dragonship fleet, even though she knew it was impossible across such a distance. She sensed them out there, somewhere; a scent of danger on the wind, a prickling of her spines that she had come to recognise as a foreboding.

At last, she reached
a height where the wind whistled across the Cloudlands, a Dragons’ Highway beyond anything she had experienced so far.

“
Feel that, Zip,” she cried, spreading her wings. “Immadia, I come!”

A
n amethyst dragon
hurtled through the Island-World’s night, lit by a three-moon conjunction bright enough to hide many of the stars. Aranya flew above two silvery cloudscapes–firstly the thick blanket of the Cloudlands, deceptively solid-seeming from her height, and a second layer much higher up, a gossamer spiderweb spun over the sleeping Islands nestled in that blanket. Her two Riders huddled beneath their cloaks, Sapphire curled in with them.

Around midnight
, Aranya thought she spotted another of the serpent-like Land Dragons, as Ri’arion called them, a name as ancient as the legends that his people told. But it disappeared so quickly she could not be certain. Her eagerness made the night seem endless. She could not wait to sight Immadia. She yearned to know if they were early or late. But she had to pace herself, all the more so because of how much that first leg had hurt her and drained her resources. Aranya’s flight muscles and joints were already complaining. The third major joint of either wing was particularly tender, the joint preceding the final quarter of wing surface which provided her so with so much control, but also received the worst of the wind’s buffeting. She tried to control her healing magic, but it was very difficult. Aranya felt strength drain out of her at once, even as the pain eased.

So, by morning, she was surprised to
spot what she was looking for: the Dragon’s Foot. The Island looked different to how Nak had described it, however. She woke Zuziana and Ri’arion to describe to them what she could see.

“I’d vote for taking us down for a short rest,” said Zip, doubtfully.
She dabbed at a nosebleed she had developed during the night from the altitude. “You said you’re feeling sore. We’ve a full day’s flying ahead of us. The wind seemed to ease during the night as well.”

“It did drop appreciably,” said Aranya. “The timing is about right. But I must say, although it looks like an Island
… well, it isn’t moving.”

Zip
chuckled, “No more Land Dragon surprises?”

“Enough of those,” Aranya agreed.

“A short rest,” said Ri’arion. “I’ll keep watch.”

“Ri’arion
saved three of those eggs,” said Zip. “Is it just me, Aranya, or has your digestion been a little gassy? I keep thinking I smell that volcano.”

The monk chipped in,
“Can’t you do something useful with all that gas, Aranya–apart from stinking out your Riders?”

“I haven’t tried.” Aranya tucked in her wings, losing altitude rapidly on a long
swoop down to the small Island she had spotted below.

“Embarrassed, petal?”
said Zip, as perceptive as always.

“The previously elegant Princess of Immadia finds this a somewhat troublesome topic.”

“You’re Dragon-elegant now,” said Zip.

“Dressed in a hide that outshines a kingdom’s jewels,” added Ri’arion.

“Your eyes rival the stars for beauty,” Zip grinned.

“
The gleam of your fangs drives a thousand ralti sheep in a bleating panic over the hills,” Ri’arion shot back, not to be outdone.

“
While the thunder of your cry makes the mountains shiver down to their roots.”

“And your Dragon magic gave my beloved new life,” said the monk. Over Zip’s startled exclamation, he added, “
Now she glows so beautifully at night she is like a star herself.”

Zuziana folded her arms. “Well, pop goes that
romantic bubble.”

But they were all laughing.

Aranya landed neatly, folding her wings and absorbing the shock with her thighs. The travellers found themselves on a barren, rocky plain, utterly devoid of plant or animal life. Ri’arion unpacked the remaining eggs for Aranya and bade her eat and rest. Then he set himself to ‘test’ their Island, declaring that he did not feel comfortable in his bones.

The Dragon
’s muzzle had hardly touched the ground before she slept.

Two
hours later, Ri’arion startled them both with a shout, “Mount up! Go, Aranya!”

She felt the ground lurch. Instantly awake, she hardly waited for Zuziana and Ri’arion to find their seats before launching herself sky
ward. Their Island was moving westward. It was sinking away into the Cloudlands.

“I think I woke it up,” said Ri’arion.

Zip turned around to glare at him. “You did what?”

“Mercy,” said the monk. “I did what I thought was a harmless bit of magic.”

Aranya left them to squabble as she climbed into the morning sky. Actually, she reminded herself, the Island had been far too early. The Northern nights were short in this season, only eight hours to the day’s nineteen. She should have remembered to take that into account. It left perhaps sixteen hours of daylight. Could they reach Immadia before dark? Would they be in time?

Two
hours later, as they entered the Dragons’ Highway again, Aranya had one answer at least. She saw another Island ahead, one shaped unmistakably like a Dragon’s clawed foot, three toes to the fore and two to the rear. She groaned as she reported this to her Riders.

“Great,” said Zip, rustling the map about. “That knocks off another stretch of this lovely blank
Sea of Nothingness–Sea of whatever the monk said. Twenty hours to go, Aranya.”

“When we pass the Island,” the Dragon retorted.

As they passed over the Dragon’s Foot, two and a half hours later, Aranya calculated carefully in her mind. They should reach Immadia Island at dawn on the morrow, if Nak’s directions were accurate.

She scanned the skies one more time for Dragonships.
Immadia’s tale would be told in smoke and fire, or blessed silence.

* * * *

The winds picked up again during the afternoon, so much so that Aranya struggled to use her tail for steerage, as Nak had taught her. She rested periodically on the wing, and chuckled at the sight of Zuziana with a small wad of cloth stuck up her nostril to stop another nosebleed. Zip refused to fly any lower. Instead, she offered to kick Aranya if the Dragon flew so much as a foot lower. Aranya laughed dutifully, knowing her friend was only trying to cheer her up.

Despair gnawed at her heart.

That night was a bleak time for her, a place of dark thoughts and fears, of a loneliness born in being the one who had to keep flying when her Riders were able to sleep. She could not remember the last time she had enjoyed a decent stretch of sleep. The night’s starlit majesty seemed cold; the wind a capricious master; the bone-deep pain a constant reminder that even the efforts of a Dragon would surely not be enough. Seeing the patchy cloud-cover developing several thousand feet below her, Aranya hatched a plan for landing. But dark thoughts kept intruding.

Zuziana awoke in the early
hours and stayed awake thereafter. Perhaps she was as excited and apprehensive as her Dragon–Aranya did not know, but she was grateful even just for quiet companionship.

False dawn brightened the sky
. With it, the jagged peaks of Immadia assaulted the horizon’s featureless expanse. Home! She wanted to weep, or sing for joy. Aranya waited for Princess Zuziana to notice, content for a few moments just to drink in the sight. Secretly, she searched with her Dragon sight for what she feared most: the smoke of burning buildings, or the oblong balloons of many Dragonships, detectable by a Dragon even at this distance.

Immadia lay serene.

Aranya’s eyes scanned the far horizons, but she saw nothing of the expected invasion fleet. She drove on faster and faster, her wing beat rate increasing unconsciously as hope swelled in her breast. That was what alerted Zip.

“Oh, Aranya! It’s … are those
Immadia’s mountains?” She kicked Aranya’s shoulders for emphasis as she added, “You’re a rotten friend. You never told me Immadia was so beautiful.”

“Sorry.” But Aranya was delighted at Zip’s response.

“Well?”

“
Well, what–oh. No Dragonships, no smoke, no–”

“Could they be hiding, Aranya? Behind the mountains?”

“Maybe.” Aranya frowned. “But they don’t know we’re coming, so why hide? Garthion and his Hammers must expect to arrive in force, overwhelm my father’s defences in a matter of hours and put the Island to the sword.”

Zip said stoutly, “Well, we’ll show him
.” But Aranya heard a note of horror enter her voice. A large spark leaped from Zuziana’s left hand into Ri’arion’s great sword, strapped to the saddle just behind her. “Roaring rajals,” said Zip. “Did I do that? So, what’s the plan, o most noble of Amethyst Dragons?”

“There’s only one of me, so that I guess makes me the most noble,” Aranya agreed. “Well, I’m going to fly right overhead, using those clouds over the city for cover,
before diving down from the mountain side. I’ll aim to land on my mother’s tower as fast as I can. We duck behind the battlements to avoid the war catapults and crossbows and hopefully a soldier will appear to accept our surrender. I’ll show you how to surrender Immadian style–given as I’ve had practice.”

“Smart,” said Ri’arion, who had evidently not been as asleep as he looked. “At this speed, we should be over the city just around dawn. Zip, you need to get Aranya’s clothes ready.”

“And be ready to catch our saddlebags when I transform,” said Aranya.

The rising suns flung slowly-changing oranges and pinks across the snows of Immadia’s jagged peaks, as though a painter were working on a master
piece but remained undecided as to the precise shade to use for the mountains. Soon, direct sunlight blazed off the highest peaks, so dazzlingly bright that Aranya had to shade her eyes with her secondary membranes in order to look directly at them. She realised her plan was even better than she had thought. Coming out of that dazzle, they would be well hidden.

Aranya ducked behind the clouds, accelerating on the descent
until the wind whistled across her flanks and her Riders put up their arms to protect their eyes. Aranya folded her wings, laughing as her stomach lurched toward her throat. Ri’arion made a gurgle of dismay.

“We have to beat the crossbows
,” she shouted, blinking as cloud engulfed them.

For a few moments, grey masked the world. It took all of Aranya’s courage not to pull out of her vertical dive, to trust her instincts in
the knowledge that they would appear a few thousand feet above Immadia’s castle, exactly on the trajectory she desired, to wait for the battlements to appear and the inevitable alarm cries of the warriors which should follow.

The world blinked into focus again, hurtling toward her, the castle’s towers looming sharply as Aranya adjusted with her tail, refusing to brake until the very last moment, waiting and waiting for the soldiers who would be looking outward for Dragonships, not
heavenward for a Dragon, and finally the thin cry of a soldier sighting them, a rash of panicked shouts coming to her hearing, but still there was no sound from the war crossbows. Aranya knew that every second was vital. She zoned her vision in on the tower. She saw the face of a young soldier there, turning, blanching with terror as he caught sight of a Dragon on a collision course with him. All she had time to think was, ‘When did Father post a guard on Izariela’s Tower?’ A violet Immadian flag waved bravely on the flagpole above the young soldier’s head. Aranya flared her wings, braking with care, judging the moment as she bled the speed ahead of her final braking manoeuvre. Crossbow winches squealed. Officers bellowed their orders. It was going to be very tight.

W
arning gongs crashed out over the city.

Aranya’s stomach plunged toward her paws as she
extended her wings fully. Her muscles shrieked with the strain. She swept in toward Izariela’s Tower, snarling at the young soldier, “Get clear, idiot.” Her shoulder thumped him aside. Aranya crashed down four-pawed on the tower’s stone, her tail crushing the battlement behind her. A breath later, she transformed. Ri’arion managed to land on his feet; catlike. Zuziana thumped down on her saddle with a startled yelp, which was echoed by the poor Immadian soldier, who fumbled his sword, dropped it, kicked it toward them and stood there like a flummoxed ralti sheep as three Humans gazed at him. Saddle bags and Dragon tack landed all around them.

“Heads down
,” Aranya shouted. A quarrel swished through the air above them.

“Nice landing,” Zip congratulated Aranya.
“Clothes?”

“That would be wonderful,” said Aranya, appreciating how her friend held up a cloak to shield her as she quickly pulled on her undergarments.

“Who are you?” quavered the soldier.

Metal
scraped on stone as Ri’arion picked up the sword. Reversing the blade, he held it out hilt-first to the startled young man and said, “Take your sword, soldier. Accept our surrender.”

As Aranya had instructed, Ri’arion knelt
. He put his head to the stone with his hands outstretched in the posture of surrender. Not without a mumble of complaint, Zuziana joined him, speaking softly to Sapphire to calm her. Aranya pulled the cloak over her head and shoulders and joined her friends.