soon, Xwarda was lost. And if Pael took Xwarda, it wouldn’t be long before he found a way to use the Wardstone. She was sworn to fight to protect the Wardstone to the end. She couldn’t leave, but she could at least send the thousands of people hiding in the tunnels below, on to Jenkanta, were they would at least have a chance to escape Pael’s wrath.
“Go,” she said to King Jarrek sternly. “The people who win free will need strong men to help them survive.”
“I cannot leave you here unguarded, lady,” he replied simply. “I will not.”
“You’re a chivalrous fool,” she told him. “Call down the order to evacuate the refugees then. Tell them to collapse the tunnels as they go.”
Chapter 58
Before Pael could hit him with another one of those bone jarring crimson pulses, Mikahl rolled, and twisted to his feet. He still had no breath in his lungs, and his head was spinning, but he knew that if he stood still, he was done for. Another hot red blast streaked toward him, and this time, he knocked it away with Ironspike’s blade, but he was still starting to panic. He knew he couldn’t keep this up for very long. His senses were already starting to fade into blackness. He needed air badly.
Pael sent another of his pulses. Mikahl tried to deflect this one with the sword, but his oxygen starved lack of coordination, made the attempt futile. The blast hit him, but it was only a searing graze, not a blunt impact. He was lucky. He would have taken the blow full on, had his body not involuntarily hiccupped, and sucked in a much needed gulp of air.
He couldn’t enjoy his body’s relief, because Pael was already blasting at him again. Twisting out of this missile’s way, Mikahl gulped in another breath, and charged the demon-wizard. Instead of relying on magic, he rode his instinct, and brought on a full-on physical assault with his sword. He slashed, spun, hacked, and thrust, leaving Pael no choice, but to forget his attack, and defend himself. The wizard could hardly keep the wicked steel from his flesh, much less mount an offense.
For several long moments, Pael thought that he might not survive the attack. The blade only had to touch him for his demon essence to be vanquished. Even worse, he could barely see out of his good eye, and it was next to impossible to tell where the bluish-lavender colored blade was coming from next. Only when Mikahl paused, to glance down at the sprawled form of the hawkling, lying limp, amid a pile of broken glass and splintered wood, did the wizard get the chance to make a move.
Pael leapt backwards into the air, and came to a hover just out of Ironspike’s range. He sent a crackling ray of viscous, prismatic energy down onto Mikahl, and showered him with the flesh melting stuff. As if he were standing inside a globe of translucent blue glass, the flow of Pael’s magic broke up into a purple swirl, around the Squire-King, leaving him unharmed.
Mikahl used the brief, unexpected shielding, to touch Talon with the tip of Ironspike’s blade. He listened for, then plucked out of the sword’s magical symphony, the melody of healing, and let it flow into the bird. The surge of the song quickly exhausted itself, but Talon still lay there unmoving. The hawkling was dead, and that simple fact, broke something inside Mikahl. Fighting back tears of rage, he clenched his teeth, and spun on the demon- wizard.
Mikahl sent his own, now white-hot, ray of energy up at Pael. His blast met Pael’s, in a concussive showering spray of sparks, and sizzling smoke. The point of contact between the two powerful channels of destructive force, ground, hissed, and popped, but slowly edged towards Pael, as Mikahl’s rage forced it back. Slowly, ever so slowly, the point of contact kept inching closer to the dark wizard. Pael’s ruined face, twisted into panic, as the radiance illuminated his shredded expression. The power of Shokin inside him so feared the magic of the blade, that the demon flared his might, surging back at Mikahl, like some cornered wildling, fighting for its life.
The energy of the demon’s fear began to pour from Pael, and the brilliant sizzling point of contact came racing back at Mikahl. Mikahl’s rage slowed the coming collision of raw power, but there was no way he could stop it. With gritted teeth, clenched muscles, and his whole body as taut and rigid as a steel bar, he prepared for the agony that Pael’s ray surely brought with it. It was all he could do.
Hyden Hawk opened his eyes in darkness. He was on rocky ground. He reached to his back to feel for the pack that held the Night Shard, and panic shot through him, like the crack of a whip. He didn’t feel it there. It was gone.
He staggered to his feet, and felt a humid, yet cool breeze on his skin. Above the heavy stench of old decay he smelled the earthy fragrance of dense vegetation. Instinctively, he sought out Talon’s vision, but found nothing there. Nothing but more blackness.
His panic multiplied tenfold. He began to search the darkness with outstretched hands. Where was he? What was happening? What had happened to Talon? Finding nothing, but the hard rocky surfaces of the boulders and scree that surrounded him, he began to give in to his suddenly frantic emotion.
Seeing that he was close to stumbling out of one end of her wormhole cavern, Claret spoke to Hyden.
“I am here,” she hissed.
Faint tendrils of flame briefly lit the area in front of the dragon’s great red plated head. A crystalline prism of deep, smoky blue had presented itself in that instant as well. The Night Shard was laying before the dragon’s hunkered down bulk, in a smooth section of floor, which was covered with circular etchings of runes.
“I wants you to trust me, Hyden Hawks,” the dragon hissed softly.
With her words, came the brief glow of the flames that emitted from her cavernous nostrils. Hyden made his way toward her, as she continued to speak.
“I haves no doubts that you intends to release me from the collars.” Her voice was gravelly and ashen. “Never-the-lessss, I will haves it off, before I finish what you have started. You needs my fire to dissolve yon crystal. Removes the collars, and I will do the deed.”
Hyden stopped in his tracks, and forced his fear, and worry for Talon aside. It took him a few minutes to gain his wits back. He cautiously checked his wrist, to make sure that the collar he’d stolen from Shaella was still there, before he spoke.
“I could will you to do it, through the collar.” His voice wasn’t threatening, just matter-of-fact.
“Yesss, Hyden Hawk, you could.” Her voice hissed, and flames licked the air before her. “But if you do, then you’ll never learns whether you cans trust me or not. You’ll never knows my nature. I would value that bond of – What’s the human words? – Friendships, with one such as you.”
“Aye,” Hyden responded, choosing his words carefully. “I would value such a friendship as well. But if you tricked me in this, then I’m dooming my people to the fate of demon kind’s will.”
“It is no easy choice to trust a dragon,” she chuckled, sending bright bursts of flame rolling out ahead of her. “I will hold no ill will towards you, if you choose nots to do so.”
She turned, so that both of her luminous amber eyes came to bear on him. He felt, and smelled the hot, reeking heat of her breath on him.
“It will sadden my fiery heart though, to not be able to call you my friend.”
Hyden thought about Vaegon’s tale of Pratchert, of what Pratchert and the dragon might have spoken of at the Summer’s Day monolith. He wondered what the great Dahg Mahn would do in this situation. He thought of the two young wolves, and how the simple act of saving the mother, had came back to save him in the end. If his god’s gift was to speak, and interact with the animals, then in truth, there really was no choice to make. The feelings he’d felt, when he’d seen the tapestry depicting the collared dragon’s, came back to him. It wasn’t a matter of trust. It was a matter of right and wrong.
“Turn your head, then,” Hyden said.
His decision was made. When she was in position, he had her breathe enough light so that he could see the fastenings on the big, jeweled leather strap. It took some time for Hyden to figure out that opening the clasps was more of a mental exercise, than a physical one. The buckles were linked to his collar magically. It took some effort, and some trial and error, but finally, he bent the clasps to his will. They came loose, and the heavy collar fell to the floor.
