Still holding the artifact, Cabe approached the panting beast. "You must listen to me . . . Sssorak. You"re not Tragaro. You"re as much a puppet of his legacy as your new Dragon Masters are of you. You"re a drake!" He studied the coloring closely. The bronze tint of Sssorak"s otherwise green scale was not some residue left by the melting mask. "And right now you work to help destroy what"s left of your own clan as well . . . "
The inhuman eyes stared uncomprehendingly. "Give me my ma.s.ssk, Bedlam . . . "
With a roar, Sssorak, his body still transforming, leapt at the spellcaster.
X.
The change came suddenly, so suddenly that Darkhorse first suspected it a trap.
The tremors ceased without warning, quickly followed by the collapsing of one of the robed figures. The others held their ground, but they moved slowly, almost haphazardly. To the eternal, they looked like nothing less than marionettes whose strings had broken or become entangled.
Yet while Darkhorse took relief from this turn of events, General Majjin saw it only as an opening. He quickly ordered his archers forward again. One managed to get just within range before the shadow steed noticed him.
As the soldier took aim, Darkhorse cried, "No!"
But the archer got the shot off regardless of the warning. Darkhorse was too far away and any spell he contemplated took too long to cast.
The shaft hit its target in the chest. The target, a young, brown-haired woman with sleepy eyes, gasped and crumpled.
"No more!" roared the eternal, filling the view of the nearest archers. Confronted by the sight of a pitch-black stallion ten times the normal size, the hardened fighters broke.
Darkhorse charged toward the general, shrinking back to his preferred dimensions as he neared Majjin. Even then, he made for such an imposing sight that it was all the bearded officer could do to keep his war steed from bolting.
"General! You will cease! Can you not see that they are no longer a threat? Look at them! Now they are the helpless victims you sought to save! Do you still intended to slay them?"
"It could be a trick," muttered Majjin. "They"re wizards! They can"t be trusted-"
"No? Not even as much as a soldier sent to rescue them who instead decides to execute them without first checking?"
Majjin"s countenance reddened from anger, but he finally nodded. Signaling to another officer, he commanded all archers to hold fire.
"Thank you, general." Darkhorse eyed the man close. "Give me a moment and I will attest to their condition."
Without waiting, he whirled about and, to the astonishment of the soldiers, raced up the steep mountainside, heading from one ridge to another.
As he suspected, the threat was most definitely at an end. Several of the young wizards, including the two Cabe had attacked, lay unconscious. The others sat or stood in a daze, most holding their heads or staring blankly.
Just as he had done with the soldiers in the river, Darkhorse seized several of the stunned novices and brought them back down to Majjin. Once those had been delivered, he raced back for more. The speed with which he moved left his charges breathless, but Darkhorse could not think of that. No matter how fast he raced, precious seconds continued to pa.s.s.
Precious seconds in which Cabe might still die.
Sssorak"s claws nearly rent Cabe. The wizard rolled back, the drake"s hot breath almost as deadly as the flames themselves. Sssorak now stood twice as tall as the human and his wings had grown some, but he still looked trapped between forms. He lacked the false armor appearance of a humanoid drake warrior, but the open visage was not that of a man, nor was the body that of a true dragon. It was as if Sssorak did not know what he should be now that he was bereft of Tragaro"s mask.
Although they fought, Cabe still pitied the drake. He well understood the enmity between humans and drakes, the results of centuries of domination by the latter, but Tragaro had done something unforgivable to Sssorak. He had twisted the mesmerized drake so much, Sssorak was willing to slaughter both races in pursuit of his dead master"s dream.
And it seemed nothing could convince the drake otherwise.
"This is not the face you should wear," Cabe insisted. "You are a drake . . . a dragon, Sssorak! Tragaro"s usurped your ident.i.ty! Everything you"ve done in his name goes against your very nature!"
"You will not ssspeak of the ma.s.sster ssso!" Again, Sssorak sought to exhale flame, but again he feared to destroy what remained of the mask. "He taught me the truth, made certain I could carry on without him! The ma.s.sster taught me everything I mussst do!"
That made Cabe"s decision for him. He had failed to reach the drake with talk. Perhaps Sssorak needed more.
"Tragaro is not your master . . . not any more."
With that, the wizard set the mask aflame again.
The spell was a short but intense one, giving Sssorak no time to counter it. Already softened and distorted by the drake"s own fire, the false face had little resistance.
Cabe let the molten ma.s.s drop at his feet. "There is only you now, Sssorak. Only you."
"Noooo!" The drake dropped to the ground, crawling over to and scratching at the melted remains. His breathing turned ragged as he sought vainly to save what little still resembled the original artifact. "Tragaro . . . Tragaro . . . "
Stepping back from the pitiful sight, Cabe contemplated his next move. The fight appeared to be out of Sssorak, but the question remained as to what to do with the drake. Return him to his own kind, whom Tragaro had trained him to despise? Bring him to the Manor, the Bedlams" home, and try to fit him into the human/drake settlement within it?
As he pondered the possibilities, he sensed the arrival of another.
"Cabe! I came as soon as possible! Are you all right? Is the danger past?"
He smiled wearily at Darkhorse, grateful for the eternal"s presence. "I"m all right. It"s-"
"You murdered him!"
The startled wizard turned to find Sssorak standing over the puddle of bronze. Atop his not-quite-human, not-quite-draconic visage he had slapped the bent eye holes and partial mouth-all that remained of the mask. His flesh sizzled where the hot metal touched and a few streaks of burning bronze dripped down his face, but the wild-eyed drake did not seem to notice.
"You murdered the ma.s.sster!"
Sssorak inhaled, his chest swelling grotesquely.
Both Cabe and Darkhorse reacted instinctively, striking-as they had done so often in the past-in tandem. A bolt of wicked blue lightning from the wizard struck Sssorak full in the mouth, shutting it in mid-exhalation. A tentacle from Darkhorse tightened around the chest.
Trapped, the flames reversed, seeking an outlet but finding none.
Sssorak swelled up like a water sack.
Darkhorse enveloped Cabe, creating for him a safe, secure coc.o.o.n.
The drake exploded.
Within the safety of the coc.o.o.n, Cabe grimaced, furious with his own weakness. He sensed every agony suffered by the shadowy stallion as the furious forces of the dying drake washed over the chamber.
Yet, as quickly as it had begun, it ended. Darkhorse peeled away slowly, reforming, rather unsteadily, his favored shape.
The torches had been destroyed, but bits of dragon flame illuminated the chamber, revealing the carnage. Of the ancient throne and the columns, only shattered bits remained. The rotting corpse of the other dragon had been nearly reduced to blackened bone. The stench of burnt and decaying flesh forced Cabe to cover his nose with a cloth.
Of Sssorak, there was no trace. Only a few fragments of bronze left any indication of his past presence and only one of those was still recognizable as part of the mask.
The twisted bit of smile gleamed dully in the light of the dying flames.
"And so it ends," declared Darkhorse, snorting. "So much for new Dragon Masters! Imagine! A drake, of all things! He must have have been mad! I knew it was not Tragaro! I knew he was dead all along!"
"Yes, Darkhorse, you were right."
They had returned to Gordag-Ai, returned to the court of King Edrik. The young monarch had taken the ensorcelled students into his house and promised that they would be cared for until they could be sent to their respective homelands. Any who wished to study with his own wizards could, of course, remain. The king was happy to provide them with whatever they needed.
Edrik was young, but not stupid.
However, one of Sssorak"s puppets had already chosen to leave. Hala had not even come back with the group, instead riding south, toward Zuu. She had other family there, she had said, who would welcome her.
Cabe had noted Majjin speaking with her earlier. Whether or not the general had actually encouraged her departure, he did not seem disappointed with the choice. It meant a likely end to the king"s infatuation with her and nothing would please Majjin more. The situation bothered Cabe and he made a note to check on Hala as soon as possible. She had been no more guilty than the rest and did not deserve such treatment, but as he could prove nothing, Cabe had to let it stand as it was for the time being.
He and Darkhorse now left laden with gifts from the king for the entire Bedlam clan. The eternal was in fine spirits; not a creature of material things, Edrik"s grat.i.tude had been his present and Darkhorse savored it. More than anything, he enjoyed the friendship of others, possibly because there was no other being like him in all the land.
"At least this was a situation nipped well in the bud! Who knows what would have happened if he had been able to make true use of the Twin"s ascension! True, there were some deaths-and I mourn Den"s most of all-but if things had continued on, the entire western half of the continent might have been thrown into chaos and war within only a few days! We were fortunate!"
"Yes, fortunate."
The shadow steed mistook his mood. "We could not save everyone, Cabe! Den, the soldiers, and those other young spellcasters who perished in the name of this false Tragaro have all been avenged, at least! All the wrongs have been righted!"
The wizard nodded and from there on pretended his mood was lighter, but for the rest of the journey, he thought of the one victim who could never be avenged.
Sssorak. The drake had lived for over two hundred years as the twisted, hate-blinded p.a.w.n of a man obsessed beyond reason-a dead man. Tragaro had nearly created a worse threat than the drakes he had so hated and in the process he had tortured his servant well beyond the point of madness, a crime Cabe could not forgive, whatever Sssorak"s race.
No, Sssorak could never be avenged . . . but perhaps now, so the wizard hoped, he could be at peace at last.
A Wolf in the Fold
Suffer not the children . . .
I.
The cavern glittered, its walls encrusted with a mult.i.tude of crystals of varying proportion. The flames from the two torches set in niches on opposites ends of the chamber were all that were needed to create the dazzling light that filled his surroundings.
He fidgeted, but not because the constantly-shifting illumination bothered his wide, feline eyes. No, the young, brown-furred figure fidgeted for a far better reason-to try to escape the black ropes which bound him from head to foot.
Although only a small child, the captive tried his best to hide his deep fear. His father and his mother were the bravest people he knew and he tried to emulate them, but it was so, so difficult. They knew everything, could defeat any enemy.
But they were back home and he . . . he had no idea where he was, save that it was a place worthy of any nightmare.
As if to accentuate that thought, a fearsome figure suddenly filled his gaze. Immediately he ceased his fidgeting.
The monster stared down at his him with narrow, red orbs. It had a long, slim snout that ended in a tiny but toothy mouth. The snout constantly shifted up and down, as if the behemoth sought to absorb every scent.
A scaled arm as thick as the child"s torso reached forward to test the bonds with heavy claws designed for digging through mountains of rock and earth. The monster shook him as it tested the ropes.
"The ropes will hold," said a toneless, seemingly disinterested voice.
The beast turned to its right, giving the captive a glimpse of the layered armor that covered its backside. Embedded between the various plates were yet more crystals, their purpose unknown. They gave the monster a yet more surreal appearance.
It unleashed a shrill, hooting sound in response to the distant speaker. The beast"s peculiar voice echoed through the ma.s.sive cavern.
"He is unlikely to free himself," answered the voice to what apparently had been a question from the creature. "He lacks yet his father"s frustrating tenacity to survive, not to mention his mother"s grace."
The creature the child had seen twice before, but the speaker was a new thing. His eyes could not help but be drawn to the voice-human if not containing a touch of humanity.
The gargantuan watch dog shuffled aside as the other drew near. To the captive"s momentary relief, the newcomer was indeed human, although of an unnerving appearance.
Beneath a shocking head of utter white hair-hair that clearly had not turned so pale due to age-could be found a plain visage utterly devoid of identifying feature or emotion. In truth, the human"s countenance might have seemed a dead one if not for the scathing hatred boiling over in the eyes.
Under a tattered but serviceable traveling cloak could be seen clear evidence of armor and arms. As the figure approached, the tell-tale squeak of metal followed, reminding Darot of his father"s soldiers.
From within the cloak, an arm sh.e.l.led in midnight black stretched forth. Unlike the monstrous giant, though, the human reached for the straps binding his prisoner"s mouth tight.
The cloak slipped back as the arm moved, revealing the other limb.
Darot"s feline eyes widened further. What he could see of that arm revealed a twisted, withered appendage, one long dead. Armor hid most of the effect, but near the shoulder and the hand, the horror lay unveiled. The arm looked as if something had burned it away, leaving but a mockery behind.
The cloaked human noticed his eyes. The good hand swiftly retreated-the better to push aside the garment and give the child a good look at the travesty.
"A pretty sight," Darot"s captor remarked with the same unsettling lack of interest. He might as well have been commenting on some insect he had found wandering near his foot.
His scaled companion hooted loudly.
The icy-haired man did not look at the beast. "The Quel, he thinks it"s dangerous to keep you breathing. He"s for skinning you and wearing your fur for a trophy."
If he hoped to put more fear in the heart of the child, he readily succeeded. Despite wanting so desperately to be like his father, Darot sniffed and tears dripped down his cheeks.
His plight did nothing to touch the cold heart of the soldier. "I, on the other hand, want to keep you alive long enough for you to see your d.a.m.ned parents flayed and made into a new cloak for me."
The constantly-shifting glitter only added to the human"s horrific aspect as he leaned closer. Even the animalistic Quel was preferable to the evil that young Darot could sense in the man.
"By now, the note is delivered, the stage is set. Your father will come running, knowing it to be a trap . . . but still he will come running." He straightened, absently touching the twisted limb with the good. "And I will pay him back a hundredfold for this and other indignities."
From the same shadowed entrance through which the human had emerged came a second towering Quel. This one hooted in a slightly deeper tone, clearly relating something of importance.
The cloaked figure nodded, then said to the beast, "The tunnel"s ready, then?"
The second Quel responded with a different, higher note.
"Then have the others to keep an eye on the master of Legar. He likely will not stir himself from his seclusion . . . but we must be certain of no interference."