clouds sank lower still, hungrily devouring the mountains. They changed color, too, first darkening to near-black then shifting to a sickly green. The wind grew strange-utterly still one moment, then hammering the next-and the gold of lightning flashed in the distance. Thunder muttered in reply.
Gareth’s blade wasn’t out, but his hand strayed to its hilt as he rode up alongside Ilista. Water streamed off his winged helmet as he lifted its visor, and he shouted for her to hear him above the wind.
“The storm will be on us soon, Eflsa! Have to find shelter before it breaks!”
Ilista frowned, glancing up at the anvil-shaped clouds, towering above the mountains like a great wave. The way they boiled and flashed, they almost seemed alive. Her gaze dropped again, to the path ahead. She wanted to go on, yearned to reach the monastery. It was only a few more leagues-surely they could cover that ground before things grew too hard.
Lightning flared close by, making her jump as it struck a wooded outcropping only leagues ahead. Trees became torches, and the stone burst, sending rubble and burning wood pouring down the hill. The thunderclap that followed, a heartbeat later, made the ground tremble beneath them, and set Ilista’s ears ringing. The horses reared and snorted, the Knights struggling to keep them calm.
Hopes of further progress dashed, she nodded to Gareth. “Go.”
A few barked orders later, the party had reined in, and all but two of the Knights were off their horses, clambering up the slopes toward the caves. They climbed around boulders and scrabbled across gravel, grabbing tree trunks to steady themselves as they went. Soon they disappeared, swallowed by the rain and gloom.
A small mace hung from Ilista’s saddle. She hadn’t wanted to carry it, being untrained in arms, but Sir Gareth insisted. Now she thanked him silently as she reached down and pulled the weapon free. She gripped it tightly, heart hammering. Though Gareth was near-his sword finally unsheathed-and the two Knights who held the horses hovered close by as well, she felt horribly helpless beneath the looming thunderheads.
The wind howled. The rain became icy knives. Thunder’s growl rose into a bellow. The Knights did not return.
Worried, Gareth guided his horse to the path’s edge and called out, but the storm smothered his words. The horses were near mad with fear, and the Knights fought to keep them from bolting. Ilista twisted her own reins, repeating a warding prayer over and over as she stared at the thunder-heads. “
Out of nowhere, something appeared in the sky, streaking down out of the seething clouds. Dista gaped as she watched it plummet and saw it glint as lightning flashed nearby. Armor, she thought, but couldn’t find her voice. A heartbeat later, it struck the rocks with a horrible crash and tumbled down the slope to stop on the path.
Ilista’s horse bawled, nearly throwing her. By the time she got it under control again, Gareth was off his steed and sprinting toward the tangled ruin on the ground. Feeling ill, she coaxed her mount forward as the Knight knelt down on the ground, raising his visor to see. He looked up as she came near, his face ashen, and raised a hand to warn her off. It was too late, though-she could already see.
It was Sir Laonis-or had been, once. Now she recognized the young Knight only by the etchings in his armor. The rest was a ruin, battered and ravaged, a few jagged slashes even tearing through his breastplate. His left arm was gone, and the rainwater pooled around him was pink with blood, darkening as she watched.
She swayed in her saddle, wanting to vomit, and Gareth was beside her in an instant, steadying her with a firm hand. When the tide of nausea ebbed, she fought for her voice. “What-what did that to him?”
Gareth shook his head.
“There!” cried one of the other Knights. He stabbed a finger skyward.
They turned to look, squinting against the slashing rain. At first, Ilista saw nothing amid the darkness, but then a flash lit the sky and there was something there, silhouetted against the coruscating clouds: a huge, serpentine shape thirty feet long from its head to the tip of its tail. It flew on broad, leathery wings, its body twisting as it banked high above them. Thick, stone-grey scales covered the rest, pale as death on its underbelly. Long, wickedly curving horns swept back from its head, and its narrow eyes gleamed green. Fangs the length of a man’s hand filled its snarling mouth, and its dangling legs sported talons like scythe blades. At the end of its tail was a wicked, bony barb. Its mouth stretched wide, and a shriek like tearing metal rose above the storm’s din-then, as quickly as it had appeared, it was gone, wheeling and disappearing back into the clouds.
“
Gareth shook his head. “No, Your Grace-the dragons are gone from the world, as the legends say. That was a wyvern.”
Ilista had heard tales of wyverns. They were kin to the long-vanished dragons, but were smaller and much more stupid, though every bit as cruel as the wyrms that had once filled Krynn’s skies. They possessed no fiery breath, nor did they use magic as true dragons did, but they were still deadly. The barb on the creature’s tail was a stinger filled with venom that could kill in moments. They fed on anything they could find-Gareth’s goats and lizards leaped to Ilista’s mind-and while they were usually too vicious to hunt in packs, they sometimes gathered in swarms.
The Knights cried out again, and sure enough, a second wyvern swooped out of the clouds. This one’s scales glistened black, but other than that it resembled its brother in every way. There was something odd about it, though, Ilista noticed- something in the way it moved. It struggled rather than soared, moving slowly, jerkily.
“Huma’s silver arm,” Sir Gareth swore. “It’s carrying something.”
Lightning blazed, and they saw it: another young Knight clasped in its claws, arms and legs dangling. As they looked on, the monster’s tail shot down, driving its stinger into the man’s body. Then it pulled up, opening its talons and letting the remains plunge earthward like a giantling’s discarded toy. The body smacked into a cliff face, then rolled down in a tumult of stones and broken bones until it stopped, tangled in a mass of Hangman’s Snare.
High above, the black wyvern screeched, tucked in its wings, and dove.
Ilista watched in sickened fascination as it plunged straight toward her, its mouth a forest of fangs, its eyes blazing orange. Her mace fell, unnoticed, from her grasp. Beside her Gareth raised his sword high, shouting and slamming his visor shut. He brought the flat of his blade down hard on her horse’s rump.
The mare leaped forward at once, plunging down the path with Ilista clinging to the reins. Glancing back, she saw Gareth dashing toward his stallion, sword flashing in his hand. The wyvern was too fast, though, and he had to throw himself on the ground, rolling over and over as its talons clutched at the air, missing him. Instead, it snatched up his steed and lifted it off the ground, beating its wings furiously as it fought to rise.
The horses were all wailing with terror, but Gareth’s screamed loudest of all, struggling mightily as the black-scaled monster bore it away. Its stinger drove into the horse’s flesh once, twice, three times, then the animal gave one last thrash and sagged, twitching. Gareth struggled to his feet, stunned and glaring as the wyvern let his steed drop, then he raced to the other horses and leaped astride one. Above, the wyvern banked and disappeared back into the storm as Ilista reined in again.
There was shouting now from the hillside. Several men were scrambling down the slope-the Knights, or what remained of them, five now instead often. Sir Jurabin limped behind the rest, his right leg ripped bloody, scowling against the pain as he stumbled and nearly fell.
Another cry sounded from above, and Jurabin turned toward a third wyvern-this one the color of rust-as it bore down on him. A lesser man would have fled from such a sight, but Jurabin was a Solamnic Knight and trained to meet an honorable death. Bracing himself, he brandished his blade and faced down the beast. Ilista, Gareth, and his fellows could only watch as the monster swooped in.
It hit him hard, claws furrowing his armor, spattering blood across the stones. Somehow, though, the brave Knight didn’t drop his sword, even as it lifted him off his feet; instead he stabbed wildly, the beast’s scales turning away his blade once… twice…
The third mad thrust drove home, as Jurabin buried his blade into the flesh beneath its wing. The wyvern’s triumphant cry became a shriek of pain, and it wavered, sinking as the Knight managed to twist the sword, working it deeper. Finally, it stung him and let him go-and his sword snapped, leaving two feet of steel lodged in its flesh.
Jurabin was dead before he hit the ground. The wyvern, however, had a moment of struggle before it plummeted as well, crunching down atop a broad, flat boulder. The surviving Knights cheered at its death, but Sir Gareth shouted them down, waving his sword at the sky. Dista looked up, and her mouth went dry. Five more wyverns circled overhead.
