Oraxes was lucky it wasn’t the arm with the blade. Otherwise, he would probably have impaled himself. That didn’t make what he had to do any easier. Since he no longer had surprise on his side, his only hope of contending with the priest was to let go of the drakkensteed, twist around, and fight the man more or less face-to-face.
As soon as he turned, he started to topple. When he grabbed the wyrmkeeper, it was as much to anchor himself as to fight him.
The priest’s nose was flattened and streaming blood. He didn’t have the dagger in his hand anymore-he must have dropped it when Oraxes butted him-so he hammered at his captive with both fists. At the same time, he shouted a command in what sounded like Draconic. The drakkensteed started veering back and forth, making it even more difficult for Oraxes to stay on top of it.
Oraxes realized that the wyrmkeeper wasn’t trying to subdue him. The bastard meant to throw him to his death and stood an excellent chance of succeeding. They both knew how to brawl, but the cleric was bigger and stronger and, seated as he was, possessed every other advantage.
Except wizardry. If Oraxes could bring his gift to bear even with the wyrmkeeper mauling him and without a talismanic device to focus his power, he might still have a chance.
Clinging with one hand, struggling to shield himself from his adversary’s bludgeoning fists with the other, he gasped the opening words of an incantation. The acolyte’s eyes widened when he realized what his captive was doing. The man redoubled his efforts to fling or shake Oraxes off the drakkensteed’s back or, failing that, to hurt him sufficiently to make him stumble in the midst of his recitation.
As Oraxes reached the final words of power, the wyrmkeeper grabbed him by the arm he’d been using to block. Oraxes had no way to make the necessary mystical gesture except with the hand he’d been employing to hold on to his foe. He let the cleric go, and now there was nothing except the cleric’s grip keeping him in place.
He could see the realization of that fact dawn in the wyrmkeeper’s face. The man snarled and started to heave him sideways. Oraxes curled his free hand through the necessary pass, thrust it under the priest’s scale- armor chasuble, and grabbed hold of the leather garment beneath.
Force stabbed from his hand just as if he’d cast darts of light, but it passed directly into the wyrmkeeper’s body. The man convulsed, then went limp as a rag doll. Still zigzagging, the drakkensteed made him flop from side to side.
Oraxes was afraid to let go of the corpse, but he had to if he was going to turn back around and try to control the drakkensteed. He did it in one fast, frantic motion, then leaned down over the serpentine neck, so he was lying on the reptile as much as sitting astride it.
He squeezed a fold of skin, giving the command that meant stop what you’re doing. To his relief, the drakkensteed resumed flying in a straight line. Whether or not it understood that one of the humans on its back had just killed the other, it was evidently willing to obey the only rider left.
Oraxes looked around. The sky was somewhat lighter, light enough to reveal the fury and consternation in the faces of the remaining wyrmkeepers. He sneered and started to make a filthy gesture. Then Sphorrid bellowed, “Surrender or we’ll kill Meralaine!”
A jolt of dread obliterated Oraxes’s momentary feeling of satisfaction. But he was sure that if he gave up, he and Meralaine were as good as dead anyway.
“I’m going to fight to the death no matter what!” he shouted back. “If you kill both of us, you won’t have anyone left to question!” At the same time, he made his drakkensteed climb, seeking the advantage of the high air.
It was a sensible tactic to attempt, but he knew he couldn’t afford to let the fight come down to who was the best flyer because it surely wasn’t he. Still a novice when it came to riding griffons, he was bound to prove even clumsier on his current mount. He started another incantation.
Meanwhile, the wyrmkeepers were climbing too. Sphorrid chanted a spell of his own.
Oraxes finished first and shrouded himself and his mount in a haze that ought to make them particularly hard to target in the predawn gloom. It didn’t blur his own vision, but he felt a sudden chill in the air around him as the enchantment sprang into being.
An instant later, one of his enemies’ drakkensteeds spewed a flare of fire at him, while another spit a puff of what was surely poisonous or corrosive vapor. They evidently had no compunction about striking at one of their own kind if directed to do so. Sphorrid roared the last word of his spell, thrust out his hand, and for an instant the luminous head of a ghostly blue dragon glimmered around the extremity. The illusory wyrm spit a crackling zigzag of lightning that Oraxes assumed to be entirely real.
The flames fell short, and the other two attacks missed, although not by much. So far, so good, but the cloak of blur wouldn’t last much longer. Glaring at Sphorrid, Oraxes started another incantation. Then, on the final word, he wrenched himself around and thrust out his hand at the wyrmkeeper seated behind Meralaine.
He hated doing it. He was terrified of hitting her instead of her keeper or of killing the beast beneath her and making her fall. But he needed her in the fight.
And because she was bending over the neck of her drakkensteed as he had, the shaft of blue-white light that leaped from his fingertips blazed over her and stabbed at her startled captor’s neck. The priest jerked then went limp, his throat and upper torso covered in frost and his heart stopped by a shock of bitter cold.
Or at least Oraxes hoped he’d stopped it. Before he could be sure, his drakkensteed lashed its wings and flung itself sideways. The motion nearly dumped him off its back, and for an instant, he thought that was precisely what the beast had intended. Then, claws poised to catch and rend, another reptile and its acolyte rider plunged through the space his own mount had just vacated.
“Get the girl!” Sphorrid bellowed. The acolyte pulled his drakkensteed out of its dive and wheeled in Meralaine’s direction. Oraxes could tell that he had indeed killed her captor, leaving her in control of his mount. Unfortunately he could tell it primarily by the clumsy, floundering way the beast had begun to fly. When it came to riding a winged creature, Meralaine was even more of a beginner than he was, and she was plainly overcontrolling, confusing, and irritating the reptile.
Sphorrid kept on pursuing Oraxes. He thrust out his hand, and a glowing, transparent red dragon head appeared around it to spew flame. Acting in advance of Oraxes’s tardy prompt-and thank the Queen of Air for it!-his mount just managed to swoop beneath the blast. He replied with a bright, booming thunderbolt, and Sphorrid dodged with a veer to the left. The wretch made it look easy too.
They traded attack after attack, neither quite managing to score. Meanwhile, the other wyrmkeeper maneuvered to get both above and behind Meralaine, who was evidently still struggling to direct her own steed. Oraxes was frantic to go to her aid but knew Sphorrid would kill him if he tried.
Meralaine’s adversary had nearly reached the perfect position from which to attack when, suddenly flying more smoothly, the drakkensteed on which she was sitting wheeled to face it. The priest in the saddle sat up straighter. Oraxes realized Meralaine had reanimated the dead man so he could control their mount.
Their foe still had the advantage of the high air. But Meralaine shouted a word that made him cringe instead of doing anything useful, and at the same instant, the newly made zombie commanded their drakkensteed to use its breath weapon. The plume of poison mist reached just high enough to wash over the head of the living wyrmkeeper’s mount. It flailed and plummeted, and the man on its back screamed as it carried him down.
Perceiving that he had no allies left, Sphorrid turned his steed and fled. It was the wrong move. It kept him from dodging the thunderbolt that Oraxes threw after him. Charred and mangled, the wyrmlord and his mount also fell and broke into pieces when they smashed against the ground.
Oraxes and Meralaine followed them down and made absolutely certain both priests were dead. He took a deep breath and said, “Well. That was interesting.”
Meralaine swiped strands of hair out of her pale, sweaty face. “What’s the plan now?” she asked.
Oraxes tried to think. “We bury the bodies, and act oh so surprised if someone else comes from Luthcheq to ask what happened to the first band of busybodies. We watched them leave for home and have no idea why they never arrived.”
“That might work.” She waved her hand at the two surviving drakkensteeds. “What about these brutes?”
He strained to figure out if they could afford to keep them or set them free or if they needed to kill and hide them too, even though the animals had just helped to save their lives. He couldn’t sort it out.
“By the seven cold and broken stars,” he said, half laughing and half annoyed, “give me a moment, will you?
