Authors: Mark Acres

DW01 Dragonspawn (27 page)

BOOK: DW01 Dragonspawn

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Bagsby’s eyes fluttered open.

“We leave now or we die here,” Shulana told him. The thief staggered to his feet. He was extremely dizzy but able to stand.

“Get to the rope,” Shulana ordered.

The last thing Bagsby remembered was holding the rope in his hand, gazing back in confusion at the wooden crate, while the sounds of clanking armor and confused shouts drifted through the door.

“And then, after I had reduced us in size, George helped me carry you down the rope. We were so small the guards never noticed us in the dark,” Shulana explained.

Bagsby raised his head and winced with the pain.

“I’m surprised we carried it off,” he said, grinning broadly.

“Who was that guy who appeared in the tower window while we was runnin’ across the field?” George asked. “’E ‘ad the ugliest face I ever saw!”

“Valdaimon,” Shulana answered. “What you saw,” she said to Bagsby, “was his body re-forming as his soul returned to it.”

“Why didn’t he just blast us with a fireball or something?” Bagsby wondered out loud. “He must have been able to see us, despite our size.”

“He could not cast spells,” Shulana answered softly. “The blessed water damaged him. His right arm was gone, and from what George said, I think his eyes and mouth may be injured as well. No human mage can cast spells without gestures and the careful forming of the words of power.”

“Then he’s powerless!” Bagsby said, thirst for vengeance again rising in his breast.

“No!” Shulana said. “Only until he finds a way to heal his dead flesh or, more than likely, take on a new body.”

“A new body?” George said, incredulous.

“The undead, such as Valdaimon, need to preserve only a portion of their original body to maintain their existence.”

“You think he knows who we are?” George asked.

“Certainly,” Bagsby responded with a grimace.

“Well, then, we’re in for it someday,” George said cheerfully.

Bagsby gazed around at their woodland campsite. In the near distance he could hear the sound of flowing water and the splashes of a large animal.

“There’s water nearby?” he asked.

“Aye,” George said. “And fat Marta’s about ‘er bath. I think I’ll go and join ‘er. If I’m goin’ to die by some undead thingie’s ‘and, I want a bit of sport before I go!” George winked at Bagsby, then got up and disappeared into the bushes.

“It’s the River Rigel,” Shulana explained. “We’ve been on the run from Heilesheim troops for two days. We have to stay in the woods. The only natural route led here, to the river.”

Bagsby looked at the large sacks that lay by a nearby tree.

“The Golden Eggs of Parona?”

“Yes,” Shulana answered.

“So, now you kill me, eh?” Bagsby said, trying his most charming grin.

“Only if you keep me from doing what I must do.”

“And what is that?”

“I must destroy them.”

Bagsby stood, shakily. He walked over to the large sacks and opened first one, then the other. “Why,” he asked, “would you want to destroy these?”

“You don’t know what they truly are,” Shulana said simply.

“And I’ll not let them be destroyed until I know their secret,” Bagsby stated flatly.

“Then I must kill you,” Shulana answered. “For their secret I cannot reveal, even to you. It is a secret known only by Elrond, myself, and some on the Elven Council.”

Bagsby leaned back, resting his weight against the two large treasures. “Go ahead.”

Shulana’s eyes met his in a level gaze. “You know I cannot,” she said.

“Nor can you tell me the secret?”

“No.”

Bagsby opened his arms and drew Shulana to him. “Then I must learn it for myself,” he said. “It may be that there is one other who knows it. There is a man with the desert tribes who knows wondrous things from ancient times.”

Bagsby basked in the warmth of Shulana’s body pressed against his own. Only then did he notice with some surprise that there was also great warmth radiating from the Golden Eggs of Parona, and a strange vibration, almost like a series of blows, coming from inside them—as the magical words spoken five thousand years before drifted through the web of time and came together to work their speaker’s will.