Legends of the Dragonrealm, Vol. III (97 page)

At the comment, the thing howled. Everyone but Toma was forced to put their hands to their ears until the monster ceased.

The duke silenced his pet with a glare. Had he not known what the creature was capable of, the mage would have felt more sympathetic toward its plight. It craved guidance. It needed
someone
to command it. Unfortunately, that someone had first been the Gold Dragon and now was the renegade.

“How did you find it?” Cabe asked Toma, not so much because he wanted to know but because he was desperately trying to think of some way to defeat the monster before it literally destroyed him with a glance.

To his relief, Toma was willing to explain. After so many years of silently coordinating his various plots, it was not surprising that the renegade might desire to boast of his success to his enemies. “After the death of my sssire in the Northern Wastes, I returned to this cavern. Although I dared not leave signs of my stay in the upper system, I was still able to spend quite some time here recuperating and thinking.” There was a distant look in Toma’s eye. “I know the cavernsss of Kivan Grath better than anyone. I explored their depths asss no one before me or sssince. There are few sssecrets here that I am not privy to.” He pointed at the waiting monstrosity. “Who do you think firssst noted the potential and informed the emperor asss to the possibilitiesss? I am
always
looking ahead, plotting for every circumssstance . . . but then, you know that now, don’t you?”

Kyl moved a step, but Toma’s pet turned and eyed him, causing the young drake to grow still once more. The monster seemed a bit confused by Kyl, Cabe noted. Why that was, he did not know, but it was something definitely worth considering . . . provided that Toma gave him the time to do so.

The duke gave Kyl a mocking smile. “It would be ill-advisssed to move much,
Your Majesty.
Asssk Master Bedlam. He knows what this creature can do. A magical marvel! A fire-breathing dragon in reverssse! Let him fix his baleful eye on you long enough, and suddenly the world will feel like an
inferno.
It will be asss if all the heat of the world isss building up within you and there is nothing you can do to douse those fires. All thisss will happen in but the blink of an eye, too.

“You will burst into flamesss and be consumed from within. A truly novel death, at the very leassst. Our sssire found him to be a very useful tool, much to the
permanent
regrets of the traitorousss kings Bronze and Iron.”

Everyone knew that something had happened to the two Dragon Kings who had sought to usurp control from their counterpart, Gold. What the emperor had done had been a mystery. The only thing that most knew was that there had been little left of either drake lord. The deaths had, for a time, quelled any further notion of rebellion by the surviving monarchs.

“Massster Bedlam!” whispered Ursa in as quiet a voice as possible. “I remember that thing . . . I sssaw it once; heard our sire talk about it. The . . . the creature was blindly obedient to the emperor!”

Blindly obedient?
To the Dragon Emperor? A plan, admittedly thin in substance, came to the warlock. At the very least, it would throw Duke Toma’s plans into chaos . . . hopefully
all
of them, this time.

“The emperor must’ve taken good care of it for it to have survived at all. It must’ve been very loyal to him.”

Toma was visibly amused by the continuing conversation. He was clearly prolonging it only to give his foes desperate hope. In the drake’s eyes, he held all the cards.

Cabe hoped that did not prove to be true.

“Only my sssire had greater control over him than I did . . . and now, only
I
am his massster!”

The monster’s attention strayed to Toma while the renegade spoke, but then the head slowly swung toward Kyl again. It was not simply the young drake who seemed to interest him, though, but also Kyl’s proximity to the throne.

“But if Gold—if the Dragon Emperor were here,” persisted Cabe, “it might not even look at you.”

Toma now only looked annoyed at his comments. Cabe dared not look at Kyl, for fear that the renegade would realize what he was attempting to do. The drake duke folded his arms and stared at the warlock. “I think that this missserable attempt to drag out the last few momentsss of your lives has come to an end, human.” He had eyes for no one other than Cabe. “I think that it isss time to end our long and colorful association, don’t you?”

The renegade turned to the monstrous creature, who seemed to shiver in anticipation.

“Stop!” roared a commanding voice that echoed throughout the caverns. “I, your
emperor
, command it!”

Even Toma could not help but turn.

Cabe thanked the Dragon of the Depths and whatever else might be watching out for Kyl and the others. The heir had picked up on what the warlock had been hinting at . . . picked up on it and taken it further than Cabe could have believed possible.

Kyl no longer stood near the throne. Instead, impossible as it was to believe, there loomed before them a dragon as had not been seen in years. To Cabe, it was as if time itself had stepped backward, resurrecting for all to see the glory of the Dragon Emperors in the form of the drake lord Gold.

He had confronted the emperor only in the final moments, when that glory had been, in great part, tarnished by madness. Kyl, on the other hand, was a sleek, gleaming leviathan, the epitome of glory and command.

For several seconds, even Toma was speechless. He gaped at the dazzling sight, then recalled himself. Hissing loudly, the duke whirled to his pet beast and pointed at the sun-drenched form atop the dais.
“Slay him!”

In response, the monster emitted a mournful howl. Duke Toma stepped back as if slapped. The creature took a few tentative steps toward Kyl, then paused to glance at the renegade.

It remembers the Dragon Emperor as its guardian!
It did not matter that this was not the same dragon. Kyl was similar enough in form that even Cabe had had to look twice to see the differences. Toma’s pet had evidently sensed the kinship from the beginning. Moreover, to it, the throne represented the emperor, the one who had given it a place. The beast was understandably torn in its loyalties. Kyl had solidified that impression by taking on the form of his sire.

The heir had done something more than simply copy the appearance of his father. Cabe doubted that Kyl had ever so completely changed form before. What everyone saw now was the form that the drake, had he not been influenced by human presence, would have certainly worn when he had reached adulthood. What stood before them was truly Kyl,
emperor
of the drake race.

It was a realization that did not sit well with Toma.

“What are you waiting for, you misssguided monstrosssity? That isss not the one who gave you purpose! That isss an enemy of hisss in disguise!
I
am the only one you can trussst here!”

The beast wavered, again unleashing its mournful howl.

“How horrible!” whispered Valea. Cabe glanced at her, thinking that she meant the misshapen drake, but his daughter’s eyes were fixed on Kyl. It occurred to him then that Valea had never considered the heir’s other form. Not truthfully. She had no doubt realized that as one of the drake race Kyl had another form, but imagining it and
seeing
it were two entirely different things. Kyl was a handsome dragon, but he was still a
dragon
and not the exotic young man the witch had grown up knowing. It mattered not that she had seen Ursa change, either. Ursa was not Kyl.

“You will obey
me,
” roared the heir to Toma’s pet. “Obey me and I will protect you.”

That was all the monster evidently needed to hear, for it started to trot toward the dais much the way a small, lost animal that has finally found its mother might have.

No one betrayed Duke Toma. Grath had learned that, much to his misfortune. The renegade evidently intended Kyl to learn that, too, for the warlock barely had time to act as he saw Toma pull the deadly blade from his belt and stretch his arm back in order to throw it at the heir, who was preoccupied with guiding the monster to him.

As quick as Cabe was, Ursa was even quicker. She leapt toward the turned Toma, already shifting her form. Yet, if the female drake had hoped to catch the renegade off guard, she had not counted on Toma’s propensity for survival. Somehow, the drake always had some response ready, even if circumstances warranted it to be a swift one.

Toma barely succeeded in maintaining a hold on his blade. There was, much to Cabe’s relief, no time for the duke to turn the knife directly on the attacking drake, but he was still able to bring down the hard handle on the side of her head. As she had not yet completely altered her form, her head lacked the scaly armor and thick skull of a dragon. More importantly, the spark that flew off when blade met skull was clear proof that the dark knife was ensorcelled on many levels.

Ursa struck the floor already unconscious. All vestiges of her change dwindled away, leaving her in the human form she had always so much preferred.

“Ssstupid,
ussseless
female!” sneered Toma.

Unable to act before without possibly harming the brave drake, Cabe attacked the moment Ursa was out of his line of sight. The spell was not an intricate one; the warlock’s only intention was to permanently part Toma from his blade. The weapon was the key to much of the renegade’s work, including, Cabe suspected, the spell that surrounded the cavern.

Near the dais, Toma’s monster had turned back at the sounds of struggle. Now the creature wanted to join its former master, but repeated commands by Kyl were so far keeping it in check. It continued to howl, frustrated by the two conflicting loyalties.

Cabe did not strike at the blade itself, suspecting that among the powers that Toma had imbued it with was some sort of shield. Grath had been able to hold it a short time, but that was because he had simply been trying to halt its flight, not affect the weapon itself. Instead of the blade, the warlock chose to strike at the renegade. Granted, Toma was probably also protected, but what Cabe planned was not exactly a direct attack.

Without warning, the duke’s hand opened wide. The drake’s expression was indication enough that he had not
wanted
to open his hand, especially as that meant he no longer had a grip on the knife. Toma tried to seize the falling weapon with his other hand, but it was too late.

The blade struck the cavern floor point first and bounced a foot or two away. Cabe noted no change in the conditions around them, despite Duke Toma having no direct control of his toy. Of course, he had not had any such control when Grath had attempted
his
spell.
The blade’s tied to him. It has to be destroyed to be stopped.

That was something easier said than done, especially with the renegade now turning his attention to his old adversary. The drake stretched forth one hand toward the knife while the other he balled into a fist and pointed in Cabe’s direction.

As the knife rose from the floor, the warlock felt his shield buckle under an unseen but incredible force all around him. Cabe strengthened the shield, but doing so drew his concentration from seizing the blade. He watched with frustration as it neared Toma’s open hand.

Then
another
hand thrust upward from the floor and snared the knife by the handle. Ursa, not so unconscious as Duke Toma had supposed, reversed the blade so that it pointed toward its master. At the same time, she tried to plunge the weapon into the belly of Toma.

There was no doubt that it would have sunk deep, armor or no, but the renegade drake was swifter than Ursa had evidently hoped. Although taken unaware by her sudden revival, Toma recovered quickly. This close, he did not have time to protect himself with a spell, not against such a powerful device as his own magical blade, but he could still move. Toma’s hand came down on the female drake’s own, forcing the blade lower and to the side. Ursa gasped in obvious pain as the duke squeezed.

The knife missed his stomach, but Ursa was evidently stronger than he had supposed. Stronger
and
swifter.

A hissing cry burst from the renegade as his own dagger plunged almost halfway into his thigh. Armorlike skin failed to slow the sorcerous weapon.

Pulling away, the knife still in his thigh, Duke Toma cursed. The knife and the wound glowed a peculiar green. Fueled by his pain, he struck Ursa as she tried to rise and finish what she had begun. It was quite clear from the angle at which the female drake fell that this time there would be no trick.

From the dais, the dragon Kyl turned to the monster and roared, “Kill him!”

The creature remained where it was, looking confused and almost panic-stricken. It could no more destroy Toma than it could the one it believed was the previous emperor. Distraught, the beast looked up to the ceiling and renewed its howling.

The ceiling shook. A rain of tiny and not-so-tiny fragments buffeted everyone. Even Toma paused in his pain to cover himself as one particularly large chunk of rock fell within a few feet of him.

Cabe tried for what seemed the thousandth time to focus on Toma, but again something prevented him from unleashing a new spell. The something this time proved to be Kyl, who, realizing that there would be no victory through his new pet, charged toward the wounded renegade.

Toma looked up to see several tons of dragon converging on him. He did not seem panicked, however, but rather
furious.
Foregoing the removal of the enchanted blade, which still glowed, the duke faced his awesome foe and clenched his fists. Kyl was already almost upon him, frustrating the warlock’s attempt. Only a powerful spell could take down Toma, but such a powerful spell would likely include the heir as well.
So much power and I stand around like a dithering fool!

There was, however, one thing he could do. That was pull Ursa away from the vicinity of Toma and Kyl. With a glance, he raised the still form of the female drake and brought it swiftly toward himself. At the same time, he whispered, “Valea! Take hold of Ursa the moment she’s near enough. Bring her to the gateway. You have to find some way to open it and summon Darkhorse.”