How to Stop a Witch (26 page)

All heads pivoted toward the castle, where Marvin and Norman Greatheart stepped out onto the lawn. Both looked equally excited about the opportunity to pontificate about their extraordinary dragonslaying skills.

Marvin glanced up at Greg, then over to Tehrer’s face, and must have gleaned from the expression there that nothing interesting was likely to happen soon. He spotted the spirelings trying to tame the wyverns at the east end of the grounds and smiled.

Melvin nudged Lucky, and the boys followed Marvin and Mr. Greatheart across the lawn—or at least they would have, if Norman had been making any noticeable progress. Instead, they followed Marvin, while Norman courageously continued his trek alone, his crackling bones echoing across the yard with every step.

A shriek echoed from the east. Greg looked up just in time to see one of the wyverns break free of the dozen spirelings that fought to hold its restraining chains. With a single bound, the beast spread its wings and took to the air. One lone rider still held fast to a chain behind its neck, digging in with his knees and struggling to control the flight, and Greg had to admit he was doing a remarkable job, at least until the wyvern bucked him loose and swung its head around to swallow him in a single bite.

Apparently there was no such thing as an experienced wyvern rider.

Marvin Greatheart stopped dead in his tracks, looked around the area as if he were just out to enjoy the day, then veered about and returned rather quickly to the castle.

Melvin watched with a look of utter confusion as his brother passed. Lucky tried not to smile.

“Where are you going?” Norman asked as Marvin passed, still just steps from the castle. Marvin didn’t stop. Norman looked ahead to the spirelings and back again. With a scowl he turned around and began the long journey inside.

To the east, the wyvern banked around and swooped low, forcing the other spirelings to dodge out of the way or be flogged by the chains swinging wildly from its neck. It then took to the clouds and disappeared over the Enchanted Forest. Greg was still staring that direction when he spotted a sight that made his body quiver.

“Something huge is flying this way.” He pointed over the forest to the south. “She’s coming. Witch Hazel is coming.”

Greg couldn’t tell
much about the blob in the distance, just that it was large and winged and, worst of all, headed his way. It dipped and climbed as it flew, moving in and out of view below the treetops, and if Greg hadn’t been perched atop a dragon’s shoulders, he’d have stood no chance of seeing it. This was just one more reason he wished he were not perched atop a dragon’s shoulders.

As much as Greg hated that vantage point, he liked his next even less, for just then Tehrer reared up and took to the sky.

“No!” Priscilla jumped out of her chair. “Greg, watch out. Get off of there.”

Greg would have liked nothing more, but he wouldn’t have considered jumping even before Tehrer seized the wind beneath his enormous wings and pulled himself and Greg into the air.

“Nathan, do something,” King Peter ordered. Only without the amulet Greg carried, Nathan had no way of controlling the beast.

Below, the army of spirelings jumped to attention. They growled and waved their axes determinedly, but could do little else from the ground.

In a single leap, a lone spireling landed on the back of one of the two remaining wyverns and used his axe to sever its bindings. With a ferocious cry, the wyvern took to the sky, full of spirit, gnashing at the air. Unfortunately, instead of coming to Greg’s rescue, it chose to sail off to the east and dump its rider over the surrounding farmland.

Mordred and his group of magicians raced to the center of the lawn and formed a large circle that looked barely bigger than a point. Greg heard a screech and focused on the approaching form ahead. At least he would have, if it weren’t soaring toward him so unbelievably fast.

When they’d closed within a mere mile of each other, the two dragons released warning cries that shook the kingdom. And above it all came Hazel’s cackle, amplified by magic. Greg slammed his eyes shut. An instant later he heard a rush of flames and felt a soothing warmth as both dragons unleashed searing jets of fire.

His eyes popped open. Nothing but clear blue sky ahead. Behind, no less than ten miles distant, Ruuan began the slow arc that would bring the dragons together again.

Greg exhaled deeply. Good to know Tehrer’s magic would protect him from the flames, but he had to assume Ruuan’s magic would do the same for Hazel. Perhaps this fly-by had just been a test, or maybe it was part of some bizarre dragon-fighting ritual. Either way, the real battle was sure to start soon, and that’s when Greg feared he could expect to live out the prophecy—or in this case, the prophecy could be expected to outlive him.

Tehrer banked hard to his right. Greg’s stomach banked left. After traversing an arc that seemed to cover half the kingdom, the dragon pulled out of his turn. A distant speck, barely visible on the horizon, Ruuan pulled out of his. Suddenly the two dragons were soaring toward each other again, closing the distance like a pair of speeding missiles. Greg barely had time to think. Fortunately Nathan was doing most of his thinking for him.

The castle, Greg. Order Tehrer toward the castle.

Greg heard the sound like a whisper trapped between his eardrums. He shook his head, but again it came, a nagging buzzing inside his skull.

Use the amulet, Greg. Take control.

Again Greg heard Hazel cackle followed by the shriek of dragons and a resounding clash. Launched up and away from his perch between Tehrer’s shoulders, he barely managed to latch onto one of the horns running along Tehrer’s spine. For the first time in his life he truly understood the meaning of the term
death grip
.

The last time Greg fought a battle on Myrth, Queen Gnarla had given him a potion that lent him the strength of ten men. That seemed a weak moment in comparison. His fingers clamped viselike. His biceps clenched. Gradually he drew himself to safety.

And then the dragons were apart again.

As Ruuan and Tehrer circled each other like two boxers, each looking for an opening in the other’s defenses, Greg heard a nearly imperceptible gasp. A tiny speck, nearly lost amidst the brilliant blue of Ruuan’s back, Witch Hazel was just regaining her feet, too. Her black dress fluttered behind her as Ruuan dove first one way then the other. The look on her face suggested she’d been no more prepared for the last impact than Greg had.

Greg!

The sound bounced around inside Greg’s head.

Use the amulet!

Finally he allowed himself to hear the words. He recalled Nathan’s instructions on how to control the dragon.

“Order Tehrer to stay over the castle grounds,” Nathan had said.

“But won’t Witch Hazel attack the castle?” Greg asked.

“She might try, but I have a spell of protection in mind. And Mordred has a spell of his own he’s been working on with the rest of the king’s magicians. You just get Ruuan to follow you to the castle where we can help. But remember, you’ll have to take control. If you don’t, Tehrer will think of nothing more than the fight. And he will lose. He does not know the strength of Hazel’s magic.”

Greg!

A bolt of blue fire shot by above, nearly frying him, and then Ruuan soared past, grazing Tehrer with a claw that was easily two Gregs long. Greg groped for the amulet beneath his tunic and thrust it out nearly hard enough to sever his own head with the chain.

“Fly to the castle!” he screamed, just as Ruuan thrust downward, his jaws wide and eager, his jagged teeth gleaming.

Instead of dodging the attack, Tehrer stiffened at Greg’s command. For an instant Greg relived the sight of Tehrer’s jaws cutting through his boat off Deth’s End, but this time it was Ruuan’s jaws clamping shut, and the vessel Greg was riding was soaring hundreds of feet above the ground.

Tehrer wailed and pulled free with a jerk. Blood sprang from the wound, splashing over Greg’s face with a smell rivaling dragon spit as the most putrid stench imaginable.

What have I done?
Greg’s mind screamed. “Get to the castle,” he shouted, thrusting the amulet out again. “Now, while you still can.”

Again Tehrer resisted.

Ruuan launched a second attack, and Tehrer dodged aside, barely escaping with a nip to his foreleg.

“You’ll die if you don’t,” said Greg.

The two dragons circled again, and this time Greg saw Hazel form a ball of green fire in her palm.

“And you’ll be remembered as the dragon who was defeated by a witch.”

Hazel raised her arm. Her face split into a maniacal grin. Without even stepping into the pitch, she unleashed her flame.

“And no one will be left to tell the world your father wasn’t a coward.”

Tehrer stopped so suddenly, Hazel’s fireball missed by a full thirty feet.

“MY FATHER WAS NO COWARD.”

“And if I survive this, I’ll make sure everyone knows.” Greg thrust out the amulet a third time. “But you have to get back to the castle!”

“OH, ALL RIGHT.”

After one quick blast of fire at Ruuan, Tehrer turned north and retreated at jet speed toward the tiny speck of a castle. Seconds later, Greg spotted Mordred and the rest of the king’s magicians, still joined in a circle, chanting. Kingdom soldiers and spirelings alike were waving their arms and shouting up at him, but Greg couldn’t hear a word. He glanced back to find Ruuan’s jaws gnashing the air just feet behind Tehrer’s tail.

Tehrer dipped and whirled and let out a wail that buzzed Greg’s spine. The two dragons clashed together in battle, shaking the walls of the castle below, or maybe it was just that Greg’s eyes were shaking too badly to see. He nearly fainted when a head the size of a truck opened its jaws and sank its fangs between the scales in Tehrer’s neck, just feet from the previous wound.

With a shriek, Tehrer whipped around and sank his teeth into Ruuan’s head, just behind the ridges above Ruuan’s enormous eyes. For one hysterical moment, Greg remembered a picture he had once seen of two snakes swallowing each other by their tails. Maybe the two dragons would swallow each other, and this whole problem would go away. Then he looked at the ground so far below. This seemed a bad time to be left to his own fate.

The two dragons remained locked that way for only a moment. Then Ruuan released his grip and shook free, and they were apart again just as quickly as they’d joined.

Tehrer shot off to the south, toward the Enchanted Forest. He banked upward at the edge of the lawn so abruptly, Greg felt his own body would have pierced Tehrer like a cannon shot if not for the impervious scales lining the dragon’s back.

“I told you to go toward the castle,” Greg shouted.

To the north, Ruuan shot upward too, and when Greg saw an eerie fog seeping between the trees of the surrounding forest, he realized the magicians gathered below must somehow be preventing the dragons from flying outside the boundaries of the castle grounds. But to what end?

Below, the kingdom soldiers raised their bows and released their arrows, an impressive sight that might have been effective if Ruuan had been soaring at half the height. Instead, the arrows fell short of their target and dropped harmlessly to the ground.

To the east, the spireling warriors organized into dozens of groups. Perhaps they thought to surround the enemy, but what possible threat could they pose from so far below?

Another shriek caused Greg to spin. Ruuan was circling again. Greg looked for any sign of recognition in the dragon’s eye, some glimmer of hope that Ruuan remembered the friendship, or at least tolerance, he held for Greg. But Ruuan’s eye burned with nothing but rage, and Greg turned away rather than dwell on the sight too long.

His gaze moved from bad to worse. Hazel had regained her composure and stood just like Greg remembered her, not the frail old woman who once greeted him at the door of her shack at the center of the Shrieking Scrub, but as she’d been later, when she thought he’d betrayed her, with her back defiantly straight, her body youthful and full of power. She’d been terrifying then, but nothing like now. In one hand she held the Amulet of Tehrer. In the other, a ball of emerald green fire.

This is it,
Greg realized. This was when the prophecy would be fulfilled. He had but one instant to live.

With deadly accuracy, Hazel released the fire. It soared toward him, picked up speed as it flew . . .

Had it not occurred to Greg that he had yet to save the kingdom, he might not have dodged out of the way in time. Instead, he ducked and rolled, and the flames rocketed off into the woods. He was still staring that direction when the barbs of Ruuan’s tail crossed his vision and met Tehrer’s back with a crash.

Tehrer jerked hard to the left, sending Greg sprawling in spite of the dragon’s magic. Escape to the south was impossible. The eerie fog at the edge of the lawn forced Tehrer to cut left again before the woods and race to the east. Ruuan chased hard on his tail, and Greg watched as Hazel, shouting words lost behind the rush of air, opened her palm and formed another fireball.

Again Hazel unleashed her magic, too fast for Greg to duck. Fortunately Tehrer banked north, out of the line of fire, and then west again.

Unable to fly far in any one direction, the dragons were forced to continually cut and weave to stay above the castle grounds. Perhaps that’s what Mordred planned when he organized his spell. With Ruuan never able to fly too long in any one direction, Hazel had little chance to aim her throws.

Wait, this was Mordred. More likely he was just keeping the battle nearby so he wouldn’t miss the moment when Greg got himself killed.

Greg’s eyes watered from the rushing air, but he could still make out activity on the castle lawn. To his dismay, the splinter groups of spireling warriors seemed to be shrinking.

Only then did he realize the groups were growing smaller because they were also rising taller. The thousands of spirelings were climbing on top of one another, quickly forming living pillars that rose high into the air. Within seconds, dozens of blurry stacks rose up all across the yard, barely a dragon’s width apart, providing obstacles to slow the dragons’ flight.