Dragonlove (55 page)

Instead, the Dragon Elder said, “With all my hearts, I approve.”

Silence rippled from his words. The very air seemed to freeze. Such was the nobility and truth of his demeanour, Sapphurion seemed unassailable. Was this payment for his betrayal of his son? Hualiama sucked in her lip.

“A new magic lives in our Island-World, my Dragon-kin,” Sapphurion added softly. “This is the magic bequeathed us by Amaryllion Fireborn, last of the Ancient Dragons, and I say that this magic is the white-fires which live in Hualiama Dragonfriend–aye, fires clothed in Human flesh.”

Even Ianthine flinched.

“Magic?” Razzior growled. “What is this magic but the taint of the
ruzal
corrupting her flesh, and the miasma of a Human who claims to
love
a Dragon?” He projected an image as he spoke–Hualiama, spinning into Grandion’s paws, crying, ‘My Dragonlove!’ Every Dragon perceived, from her perspective, how she looked at the Tourmaline Dragon in that split second. “Do you condone this perversion too, Sapphurion?”

The Blue Dragon hesitated. Fatally.

The wily Orange Dragon crooked his claw.
TRAITOR!
thundered over the draconic congregation. Hualiama did not at first perceive what had happened. Andarraz the Green Elder had a hundred-fang grip upon Sapphurion’s neck. Ambush! Khaki, boiling acid spurted out of his jaw as the glistening Green added to that appalling bite, the highly corrosive acid and poison that the most powerful Greens were noted for. Sapphurion’s mouth gaped in agony. Tarbazzan and Haaja flung themselves at Sapphurion, now a knot of other Dragons roared in, some to support him and others to attack the enormous Dragon Elder.

As Grandion launched himself into the fray with a panicked bugle, Lia’s gaze flicked to Razzior, taking in the sardonic curve of his lip. Almost lazily, the Orange Dragon accelerated to close with Qualiana, who fought in a thundering frenzy to reach her besieged mate.

Perfidy! She should have guessed. Razzior had turned some of the Dragon Elders against Sapphurion. Perhaps it had not been difficult. Dragon egos were as oversized as their mighty frames.

Swooping at his maximum acceleration, Grandion fired shot after shot of jagged ice spears at Andarraz, peppering his flank as though dozens of crossbow bolts had struck him at once. Gobs of boiling flesh and smoke continued to pour out of Sapphurion’s neck as the feral Green refused to relinquish his bite, despite Qualiana snapping around his ear-canals, her talons apparently buried halfway down his throat. Grandion’s focussed thunderbolt knocked Tarbazzan out of the reckoning. The Brown fell limply toward the ledge beside the Dragons’ Bell. Meantime, the Tourmaline clamped down on Andarraz’s back.

Sapphurion’s plight moved Hualiama’s hearts to grief. Her grief spoke in fury and fire. Nothing in the Island-World could restrain her magic now. Igniting her left hand in lieu of her Nuyallith blade, Lia waded in with a vengeance. She hacked at the Green’s head, severing skull-spikes and carving steaming ruts around his upper skull and muzzle. Suddenly, Razzior pounded Sapphurion with a glob of molten rock at least twenty feet across, careless of friend or foe, jarring both Grandion and Andarraz loose. Lia had a glimpse of holes in Sapphurion’s neck she could have climbed inside with ease, before the Tourmaline spun on a brass dral to assault Razzior. A flurry of gigantic blows staggered even the tough-as-diamonds Orange, before Hualiama added a parting swipe that sheared the final fifth of his left wing clean off.

Razzior screeched,
You’ll pay for that–
Lia did not even know the word he used in Dragonish, but it was clearly a curse.

She whirled her flaming sword about her head, yelling,
Come here and I’ll trim the other wing to match!

More Dragons peeled off the Gi’ishior Dragons’ original Dragonwing, mobbing Sapphurion and Qualiana with champing jaws and flashing fangs. Golden blood spurted from dozens of wounds. The mated pair fought with the fierceness of ten, but the tide was against them until Ianthine threw her might into the fray. Mizuki screamed past Grandion, lining up Haaja with her fearful power of Shivers, that ultra-rare draconic power which vaporised flesh or rock. The front half of the Yellow Dragoness shattered in a spray of blood.

Dragons and Dragonesses knotted together above the Dragon’s Bell, slowly losing height as the tremendous expenditure of magic and Dragon fire took its inevitable toll. Sapphurion was the first to fall, crash-landing near the base of the Bell, and Qualiana, lifeless, crumpled upon the rock beside her mate. Mizuki became marooned amongst a group of Lost Islands Dragons who were steadily driven off to the west, while Razzior and his expanded force closed in on Grandion and Ianthine.

The Maroon Dragoness looked worse than ever. Razzior in particular had chewed her over, but she flung herself tirelessly against the Orange Dragon, thwarting his repeated attacks on Lia and Grandion. They clashed with their
ruzal
wiles, tearing strips of hide off each other and battling as much mind-to-mind as in the physical realm. Grandion swept a clutch Dragons off the battlefield with his Storm winds, but Andarraz rose again into the scrimmage, unleashing a spray of sticky, rope-like fluid that snarled Grandion’s wings enough to stall the Tourmaline. Razzior roared over her Dragon’s arched back.

Hualiama never saw the blow that knocked her loose.

Her ribs felt as though she had been struck amidships by a runaway Dragonship. Ianthine plucked up the gasping, wheezing Princess, whereupon Razzior pounced on the Maroon Dragoness, clamping his forepaws around her neck as he sought to knock Hualiama out of her paw. Lia responded with a bolt of lightning which burned a small black hole in his snout. Shouting, she repeated the attack, with even less effect.

Razzior laughed, “Having trouble, Dragonfriend?”

“What have you done?”

“Give me the Scroll of Binding, child. This battle is between Dragons.”

“Dragon, obey,” she spluttered.

Razzior only chortled, champing closer beneath Ianthine’s neck. Without warning, he whirled in the air, crushing the Dragoness against the Bell’s metal surface. Another great peal rang out. The impact jarred Lia loose. She tumbled down the near-vertical surface, faster and faster, pursued by both Ianthine and Razzior. The ground rushed upward. She flailed, but found no more fire within herself. She had burned out.

Ianthine’s right wing flapped loosely, obviously snapped. But with a supreme effort, the Maroon Dragoness outpaced the younger Dragon, rescuing Hualiama from a fatal fall a split-second before they struck the ground. Lia landed beside the Dragoness’ nose, feather-soft on a burst of Maroon power. Razzior thundered down, breaking Ianthine’s lower spine with a monstrous kick of his hind feet.

For a second, Ianthine’s fires blazed with a twin-suns fury. Then they become occluded by pain.

She gasped,
Keep the
ruzal
from him, Hualiama.

I will,
she promised.

The eye-fires guttered with appalling slowness, allowing Lia to take in both the expiration of a Dragon’s fire-soul, and the triumphant pose the Orange Dragon struck atop her body.

Ianthine spluttered,
I saved you, didn’t I? Didn’t I, Dragon … friend?

You burned with true-fires, Ianthine,
Hualiama choked out.
May your soul fly to the eternal fires.

The Dragoness was gone. Lia bowed her head.

Razzior stalked her, snarling, “Yield, girl, or I’ll order them to execute your precious Tourmaline.”

* * * *

The image of his girl, so tiny before Razzior’s swirling dark power, shimmered before Grandion as he expended the last of his lightning power on the Dragons surrounding him.

Andarraz’s acid burned his back.
Down, hatchling!

They wanted to capture him? Grandion fought with all of his strength and cunning, but ten Dragons crowded his airspace, forcing him downward with merciless bites at his wings, while Andarraz and four other Dragons piled upon him from above. He was ninety feet long and stronger than any one of their number, but their combined efforts forced him to a bone-crushing landing a hundred feet from Lia’s position. Grandion’s left hind leg buckled upon impact. He had no chance to reflect upon the pain as the Dragons subdued him with the tonnage of their bodies, pinning his wings, tail and upper body beneath a huge pile of Dragonflesh.

Dragons landed all around them. Tens of Dragons. More than he could have imagined. How many had Razzior turned? No, some of these were Dragons who had not joined the battle, waiting to align themselves with the victorious side. Or these Dragons stood against a Dragon and his Human Rider, waiting to see how Razzior dealt with her before making the angle of their flight clear. Grandion knew he had doomed his Rider.

“Yield,” snarled Razzior.

Hualiama turned. He sensed the weight of her regard.

Grandion wondered if her eye-fires still held that softness he had once observed, an expression reserved for her Dragon. Exhaustion spread through his body, but he would not give up. No, this Dragon would fight until he spilled the last drop of his fire-soul …

“I yield for his sake,” she said. His muzzle slumped against the ground. “But I will die rather than give you what you want, Razzior.”

The Orange was all arrogance now.
“What do I want? Justice. You are the Scroll of Binding. You and your knowledge are the greatest danger ever to threaten the Dragonkind. Sapphurion was a blind fool. I will restore the rule of draconic law and the strong paw of justice. No Dragon will ever submit to a Human again!”

Snarls hailed his words.

“Dragons! This Human is the daughter of Azziala, leader of the Dragon-Haters. She came to Grandion, shell-son of Sapphurion, and seduced him with promises of
ruzal
. She rode Dragonback.” His voice throbbed with outrage, making the tall metal bell sing in response. Over the rising thunder of the watching Dragons, Razzior roared, “Now she twists other Dragons to her ways. But I say we are the masters of the air! Lords of every Island! Never will a Dragon be shackled. Our task is clear. We must immolate these Dragon-Haters with our fire, starting with this one right here! Who will speak for this Human?”

* * * *

Sapphurion groaned, “I will … speak.”

As if unchained, Hualiama rushed to the Blue Dragon. “Sapphurion. Mercy …”

The great eyes darkened as his fires receded. Then, the Blue Elder appeared to rally. By his suffering, he commanded their attention. “No Dragon can know peace … while his fires … yet burn! Dragon-kin, I know this hatchling. I raised her in my roost for three years. I fed her from my own paw. There is no fire in her but the fire of Amaryllion Fireborn, the fire-gift of an Ancient Dragon!”

Hualiama bowed, weeping as the great Dragon struggled to speak his last words. “Sapphurion …”

“Warring among ourselves, we grow weak. For the future of the Dragonkind, for the sake of our shell-sons and shell-daughters, let us bind lasting peace between Dragons and Humans!”

He remembered! Long ago, Lia had begged the Dragon Elder to bind his purpose to peace; she had risked all to prevent open war between the Dragons and Humans of Fra’anior Cluster. That stage seemed tiny in comparison, now. Azziala had fallen, but Razzior and Shinzen still vied for the ultimate power.

I have third-heart-loved her as my own hatchling!
Sapphurion roared, spitting his words between gouts of blood pouring from his muzzle and neck.
Truly she is named the Dragonfriend. Witness how I pass my soul-fires to my beloved shell-son, Grandion. For he is worthy! And my only blindness was not to love his fires from the first.

With that, the great Dragon heaved one final time to his paws. A whisper-storm of fire rushed over Hualiama and poured into Grandion. Sapphurion collapsed. The rasp of his breathing slowed.

Thou my soul’s fires, my guiding star,
she heard Grandion whisper.

Sapphurion lay silent.

Razzior pounced! With his paw, he swatted Hualiama aside. “Away from this noble Dragon, beast!”

“What?” Lia groaned as her injured arm struck the Dragon’s Bell. She stumbled to her knees, too enervated to stand. “I–”

“I’ll be the first to celebrate this Dragon’s passing into the eternal fires! I will raise my Dragonsong the loudest and the longest in praise of Sapphurion’s noble deeds,” declared Razzior. Fire leaked from his nostrils to accentuate his words. Very slowly, playing his role to the hilt, he raised his fore-talon to point at the Princess of Fra’anior. “But first, we must execute this liar.”

“I’m no liar!” she shouted. “You twist Dragons to your bidding.”

The Orange sneered, “Her secret gift is even deadlier than the power of these Dragon-Haters!”

“What gift?”

Across from her, Grandion’s muzzle poked out from beneath a pile of Dragon bodies. She saw his fire. If she could hold Razzior’s wrath for a moment longer, might he recover? What strength could oppose Razzior now? He had these Dragons eating out of his paw. She read it in their mood, in the slow, sinuous approach of Andarraz and Tarbazzan, of the Dragons slinking around her, even up the mountainside to gain a view. Razzior’s long, lava-coloured body smoked with the force of his passion; that passion was what drew the Dragons to him, fire to fire. Honeyed words, they would say on Fra’anior. Words to turn Dragons feral with rage.