Dragon Alliance: Rise Against Shadow (70 page)

A week later, Silvanth woke very early and went down to the stables, taking an early meal of a live steer. This was unusual, for both she and Gallanth preferred their meat slightly cooked when they were at the Weir, but she quickly devoured the lone steer. She usually ate at least twice that, which puzzled Jern,
the master butcher. She then started to pace all around the Weir lake, seemingly very agitated. Annan also got up early and was anxious, even somewhat catty.

“Mkel, you must wake,”
Gallanth said. “Silvanth will fly at any minute, she is in season and ready.” The gold dragon’s voice woke Mkel up from a sound sleep. “I’m getting up now,” Mkel said. “I thought something was amiss, with Annan waking early and in a mood. We’ll meet you in fifteen minutes to go down to the landing.” Mkel got up and walked into his bathroom.

As soon as he was ready and dressed, Mkel directed Annan over to Gallanth, who was waiting on his landing to fly down to the lake. They quickly mounted, and Gallanth pushed off the ledge and glided down to Weir lake, where Silvanth was still pacing. Her eyes were almost glowing and she seemed very agitated. A crowd started to gather, and it was apparent that the female dragon’s emotions were affecting the Weir, especially all the women present.

“Gallanth, are you recovered enough to catch her?” Mkel asked.

“She has not been able to outdistance me yet, my friend,” he quickly answered. The last mating flight they had was over ten years ago, which was before he was married to Annan, and before she was soul bonded with Silvanth. Jennar, the nymph from Draden Forest, had stepped in as a temporary consort for Mkel during that mating flight. It was the only time she ever appeared in the Weir and in front of so many non-elves, for the mere sight of her could cause men to almost go mad.

“I don’t understand these feelings I have, as if I am being washed over by a huge wave,” Annan said to Mkel.

“It’s your dragon, my dear, you are feeling her mating call,” he answered as he helped her dismount Gallanth. Silvanth looked at Gallanth as if to say, go ahead and catch me if you can. With that glance, she spread her brilliant silver wings and took off toward the Weir entrance with a challenge roar. Gallanth quickly walked away from the gathered crowd and with a hurried sprint, jump, and heft of his huge wings was airborne in pursuit of his mate. His answering roar echoed throughout the Weir. Jodem raised his staff and a seeing eye orb emanated from it and darted after the dragons. He then directed a large image to appear over the lake, which showed the dragons in flight.

Silvanth veered hard to the left as she emerged from the Weir and worked to gain speed and altitude. She hugged the Severic River and then kept banking left to fly over the town of Draden. Gallanth streaked out of the Weir in hot pursuit of his mate, but she had the jump on him. While gold dragons are the fastest flyers in the world, silver dragons are better sprinters, capable of getting to their top velocity very quickly. Mkel and Annan were watching the chase on Jodem’s projection as well as seeing it through their dragon’s eyes.

Mkel heard, through Gallanth’s ears, cheers coming from down below in the town as he chased Silvanth. For those who were patriotic and cared about the Weir, this was a momentous occasion, for it meant another dragon would be born in nine months, as long as Gallanth could catch his mate. On rare occasions, a female metallic could outpace her mate, resulting in a strange sense of disappointment. This was one of the very few times that the metallic dragon intellect was dulled. Silvanth darted over the southern part of Draden city and started to round the Weir Mountain. Gallanth was only a mile behind her and slowly gaining.

The hollowed mountain was over three thousand feet tall and at least three to four times that wide at the base. Silvanth was hugging the side of the mountain as she tried her best to gain speed. Gallanth cleared the city and started his hard turn to follow her. She rounded the far side and began to streak over Draden Forest. As Gallanth flew over the forest, the elves below, in an unusual display of emotion, cheered from the tops of the trees and the shore of the Severic as he roared past them. They, above all, knew that every new dragon born into the world brought more magic with it. It was almost a holy occasion for the elves, who respected all of dragonkind and magic itself. They would be celebrating tonight, especially in the forest.

The nymph Jennar looked up as Gallanth flew overhead. Her radiant beauty shimmered like the crystal pool behind her. Her iridescent blue eyes looked skyward, and she thought of the last mating flight of the two dragons when Gallanth let her stand in as Mkel’s mate. Gallanth would not permit her to continue as his rider’s lover, for he had to marry a woman who could both bear him children and soul bond with Silvanth. As an immortal creature, she could not. She did defy the gold dragon for a time, for Mkel was smitten by her supernatural beauty. Her union with him was intense, even for her, a nymph, the embodiment of nature’s beauty and passion. The mating flight in which she was present in the Weir was the only time she had ever ventured out of the forest and had been in the presence of so many humans. However, she enjoyed the adoration and lust that she inspired in mortal men.

“Well, mighty Gallanth, a good chase to you, but let it be known that I am not done with your rider,” she said out loud, then with a sigh she disappeared into the pool. The griffons and giant eagles that were sunning themselves on the south side of the mountain all took to the air and started to follow the two dragons in a simple gesture of deference.

“Sergeant, why don’t they just mate in the Weir like the land dragons?” a young soldier asked Sergeant Tarbellan.

“Be they a good looking lass or a lady dragon, women love the chase, son. You’ll understand this in time,” the old infantryman told his young charge as he smiled at his own comment.

Back on the Weir landing by the lake, Mkel and Annan had drawn themselves together in a tight embrace; the dragon-inspired passion was overtaking them, and they were almost oblivious to all around them. Mkel began to almost tear off Annan’s dress as they kissed each other deeply. In spite of this personal display, all in attendance barely noticed the couple, for all eyes were locked on the image of the pursuit emanating from Jodem’s staff projected above the lake.

As Silvanth rounded the mountain from the forest side and emerged over the Severic River, she suddenly pulled almost straight up, flying nearly vertical. Gallanth streaked over the Severic and nosed up as well, still gaining on the fleeing silver dragon.

“Catch me if you can, my mate,” Silvanth roared to him.

“You are bragging like a chromatic, my dear,” he chided back as he closed in. She took them almost out of sight from the ground before he finally caught up to her. They locked talons and intertwined tails as they began to spiral back toward the ground, which began the mating process. Mkel could hardly think, in his arousal, as he grabbed his wife in a hard embrace, kissing her neck. Jodem knew that it was time to get them back to their quarters, and with a quick incantation in Draconic, he flash teleported them there. Gallanth and Silvanth continued to plummet at an incredible speed as they mated; the assembled crowd was feeling the effects of the dragon emotions, which was making all anxious and forcing a wanting desire among all assembled.

Mkel threw his wife on their bed, and they quickly disrobed, compelled to imitate their dragons. Gallanth and Silvanth were now only a couple of hundred feet from the ground when, at the last minute and at the termination of climax, they released each other and veered apart. The two large dragons skimmed barely a few feet above the surface of the river before they pulled up, turned back toward each other, and started a slow glide over the training grounds across from the river and back toward the Weir. Mkel and Annan lay beside each other, both breathing heavily. The tension in the crowd at the Weir broke, with the group taking a collective sigh as if they were all coming out from the control of some spell. Dragon emotions can have a dramatic effect on all those that are in close proximity to them; there is always a corresponding spike in births later as a result.

The dragon pair lazily flew back into the Weir. Silvanth went directly back to her ledge, while Gallanth flew to the stables for something to eat. “Congratulations, my friend,” Mkel said to Gallanth out loud from his room. “We will see a dragon egg on the hatching ground in a couple of months and a hatchling shortly after that.”
We will also see a new child of Mkel and Annan at that time as well, my rider,
Gallanth replied. “What do you mean?” Mkel asked.
Annan is now with child. You must remember that Silvanth knows everything about your wife, including the addition of the two new lives now growing within them.

“What does Gallanth say?” Annan asked him.

“You are with child, as is Silvanth,” he answered.

“Why didn’t Silvanth tell me directly?” she wondered.

“She is very tired after the flight and all that has happened the last several weeks and likely didn’t want to interrupt us. You can talk to her later; as of right now, she needs rest. We are going to be parents again. The Creator has blessed us,” Mkel told her as he pulled her close to him. She smiled and put her head on his shoulder. This event sparked a new round of celebrations, not only at the Weir but in the town of Draden itself. The drinking and feasting went on for several more days.

The festivities did not go without some tensions, however. General Daddonan and Colonel Wierangan engaged in a rather heated discussion regarding the defense pact that Gallanth made with Battle Point. They were both at the head table in the Weir tavern the second evening after the mating flight when the subject was breached.

“General, Gallanth and Captain Mkel as well as his combined garrison are already tied to support the Draden Strike Regiment. This unit needs the mobility and power that they bring to the table. They are the regiment’s hammer and anchor,” Wierangan stated.

“Colonel, I understand your need for the dragon and rider as well as his unique garrison with his elven and dwarven allies,” General Daddonan said. “However, as a Weir commander, he is not singularly bound to any one Alliance unit. They traditionally operate independently, and Battle Point has been under significant pressure. Just look at the last two battles we fought at Handsdown. If Gallanth and his Weir mates had not been there, we would have lost the whole village and at least two battalions of legionnaires. The Morgathians are up to something. A whole wing of chromatic dragons and a sorcerer of power with a company of drow conducted a coordinated attack against us, and our land dragons could not have stemmed that tide if we had been without metallic support. Even the nature of the chromatics that Gallanth and Mkel killed, and the presence of a new type of evil dragon, indicates that a dark dawn is on the horizon.”

“General, I do sympathize with you and understand your position,” Wierangan countered, “but as you’ve heard from Captain Mkel’s ranger leader, there is a large gathering of forces in the fire giant lands. Dozens of giant clans, several thousand orcs, grummish, gnolls, and Morgathian infantry, as well as over a dozen chromatics, were seen; there has not been such a gathering of this magnitude since the Great War. Captain Mkel and Gallanth’s garrison company with its land dragon, cavalry, catapult, and sappers, along with their dwarven and elven allies, are a unique force in the Alliance; only Eladran Weir, with their greater numbers of cavalry and centaurs, are as effective.”

“Colonel, I see we will not come to an agreement here,” Daddonan said. “I suggest that we bring the matter to both Generals Becknor and Craigor. Until we can arrange for a meeting with all parties, we should agree that Draden will come to Battle Point’s aid if required, unless the Capital Wing is available or we finally get a dragon or dragons permanently assigned to the city. This will be tough, for bronze dragons will resist coming out there, for we have no major lake, and the river that flows by the city is not deep enough for a bronze. There is no silver or gold currently of age, and a copper or brass would not likely be powerful enough, given recent events. I have heard that there may be something else coming soon, so I don’t think this pact will need to stand long, and General Craigor has tentatively signed off on this already.” Daddonan finished, and Wierangan nodded in agreement.

When Mkel was told of the temporary agreement between the two leaders, he could finally dedicate himself to preparing for the trip to Draconia for the senate gathering and the Honors Day ceremonial games. He did feel a slight bit irritated about being argued over, especially without his or Gallanth’s input.
Maybe I shouldn’t support either one of them,
he thought to himself. Mkel knew he and Gallanth could never turn down an Alliance soldier in need, but this meant that he, his dragon, and the Weir would likely get a great deal busier in the near future, which brought an increased risk to his soldiers.

The trip to Draconia was only a couple days away, and Mkel had to finalize all the preparations. He had his testimony almost ready, in case the issue was brought up before the senate regarding his initiative to give benefits to families of veterans who saw a good deal of fighting then later suffered from wounds of the mind that would not heal and had taken their own lives. He was also proposing a program through the Alliance churches to help prevent such occurrences. Mkel had seen the beginning of this with his father before he died in the Great War and several men throughout the Alliance Army after they retired or left the military. The Enlightened senators were vowing to fight this, of course, stating that those costs could be used for more useful endeavors and claiming there was no proof of this phenomenon. He also wanted to get the Alliance Church of the Three Spirit to start to train their clerics in recognizing those who suffered from this mind wounding and to start helping those veterans.
The Healing Guilds should also be a part of this
, he thought to himself.