Offspring (The Sword of the Dragon) (7 page)

“I want all of these buildings checked. Caritha, Rose’el, and Laura”—Ilfedo pointed to a street leading north—“look in that direction.”

Caritha reached into her skirt, through a fold in the outer garment, and drew out her rusted sword. The blade glowed with a faint light. She held the weapon in one hand, acknowledged Ilfedo’s order with a slow nod, and walked up the north street.

Following close behind, Laura drew her sword as well.

Rose’el shook her head, muttering something like, “Here we go again,” and followed. She drew her sword, its rust screeching against the sheath.

“What about us?” Levena’s eyes searched his face.

Beside her, Evela stood with her hands clasped over her bosom. “Give him time to think. He has dealt with these creatures before … surely he knows best what to do now.”

“I
have
dealt with these creatures before.” Ilfedo reached to his side, slipping his hand over the cool pommel of the sword of the dragon. For a moment he considered leaving the remaining two sisters to watch the main street. But he could hear the crackling of fire in several nearby buildings, their wooden walls feeding the blaze. He’d feel better if he kept his wife’s kin in sight.

“Come with me.” He forced a smile as he spoke, but it was a weak smile, one borne of necessity and not from his heart. That part of him still ached, trying to cope with the loss of his dearest love.

Casting aside his inner grief, he set off toward the southern end of town. At each building he expected to see a pair of white snake eyes peering around the stone foundation. If he found one of those foul creatures, he would channel his grief into his sword arm … and heaven help the serpent that dared stand in his way.

The buildings burned around him as he made his cautious way through the streets. Most of the buildings were single-story structures; some rose a couple floors higher than that. In places, the cobblestones had been stained red with blood not yet dried. But nowhere did he see any bodies.

Turning into a side street leading to the southeastern corner of town, he climbed a pile of rubble, stones mixed with wood. He stood on the rubble and gazed around. Behind him Levena and Evela murmured, “Take care, brother.”

Few of the buildings remained intact. Gaping holes had been punched through most—holes large enough for a horse to walk through. Telltale bits of black leathern snake skin ringed each gap and mixed with the rubble. He crouched and extracted a black scale from under a stone.

As he turned it over in his hand, rage built within him. The rough snake skin scraped over his palm. Curling his fingers into a fist, he crunched the scale, paying no heed to the pain it caused as it bit into his hand.

Not bothering to warn the two women with him, he dropped the snake’s scale and bolted into the nearest hole. Smoke stung his eyes, roiling around him. Rubble crunched under his feet; flames spread up the stairway and over the floors, threatening to burn him. But he pressed on through the building, past a table broken in half and chairs burning around it. He trampled a burning pair of curtains on his way out the back of that house. The alley led to another serpent-sized hole. He wound through that building and the next and the next.

He stumbled over an anvil in a smaller building, its long roof now smashed by some creature. Picking himself up, he gritted his teeth and skirted the blacksmith’s forge. The forge itself appeared undamaged, but the rubble had fallen into the blazing fire. A wall of flames spread from the forge, churned along the wood walls, splashing against what remained of the splintered ceiling.

With a burst of speed, he ran through the flames, reaching the other end of the blacksmith’s shop unscathed. The thick wall of wood had also been smashed through by something that had left three-foot-long strands of black-scaled skin hanging across the opening. The strands flapped back and forth as the fire within the building sent waves of heat against them.

Parting the strands of snake skin with his hands, he darted through the wall. He stepped out of the shop into the six-foot-long bed of a wagon. But one of the wheels was missing and the other was ringed with flames, leaving its bed angled sharply toward the street.

He slid down and landed on the street. With cobblestones once again under his feet, he stood in front of a large, four-story building. No fire burned along its walls, no smoke rose from the shakes covering its roof. Unlike the surrounding homes and businesses, it appeared relatively untouched, except that where a set of double doors had marked the entrance before, there was now a hole higher than his head and broader than a rowboat. The double doors lay splintered into large pieces on the stone steps leading up to the building.

“Ilfedo, what’s wrong,” a timid female voice said from behind him.

Without looking at her, Ilfedo took off his bearskin coat, dropped it onto the ground. “Stay here, my sister,” he said, firming his mouth in grim determination.

“But … you are not going in …
alone
?” Evela’s voice rose to a high pitch, and he heard her take an uncertain step forward.

“No!” He turned and set his hand on her shoulder. Behind her Levena rushed to catch up with them.

Evela bit her lower lip, her eyes wide with fear.

The path of ruin led here, to this building. Whatever waited within … he would face alone.

“Do not fear.” He would risk no life except his own on this venture into the jaws of death. “I must do this alone.” He let go of her shoulder and resolutely faced the hole in the building. The morning sunlight streamed from behind him through the billowing clouds of smoke but did not illuminate the building’s interior. The fires heated the air so that it felt as warm as a clammy summer day.

Up the steps he went. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Not only was the air extra warm, but knowing what he was hunting brought to mind his close encounter with death that first time he’d faced the Sea Serpents.

His fingers inadvertently reached under his loose shirt to his right shoulder. He ran his fingertips over the parallel scars embedded there. A reminder of just how close the Sea Serpent had come to killing him the last time he’d faced its kind.

While waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness of the building’s interior, he stood still in the deathly silent room, trying not to make a sound even though the dust begged him to sneeze.

At last his eyes adjusted to the dimness. A carved wood pillar twisted from the floor to the ceiling a dozen feet above his head, supporting an impressive arch upholding the story above. Three portraits hung on the dark, stained walls. Judging by the fine apparel and aristocratic poise of the subjects, he guessed they were the town’s mayor and other political leaders.

He peered into the gloom toward the middle of the room. Uncoiling beside an enormous stone fireplace against the back wall were six forty-foot serpents. Their eyes were closed, else he would have seen their whites. Their bloated bodies undulated in an unnatural way devoid of rhythm. Bumps appeared as if from inside. Ilfedo knew, beyond a doubt, that some of the townspeople were suffering a frightening death, drowning in the snakes’ bellies.

He reached down to the sword at his side. This day, he would spill their blue blood over the place of their feast! “Rise, you devils! And let us have at it!”

The serpents roused, their wedge-shaped heads lazily rising from their tangled mass. Their white eyes startled open, fixing him with haunted gazes. Their tails twitched as they attempted to move their burdened bodies.

Ilfedo reached to his side and grasped the two-handed grip of the sword of the dragon. He drew it from its scabbard as easily as if it had been oiled and with both hands held the blade, pointing it toward the ceiling. The flames within the shiny metal spread out, twisting to entwine it.

The flames spread from the sword, up his arms and over his body. His muscles grew taut and his shoulders squared with extra strength. As quickly as the flames covered him, they now receded, returning into the blade but leaving him adorned with armor of white light. Indeed, flames danced inside the armor that replaced his former clothing as if telling of a realm beyond his reach. He stepped into the heart of the room, his armor flexing with his movements with such ease that he could have forgotten it was there.

His awareness of the room around him, around the armor, deepened as if it were an extension of his senses. The sword and his armor lit every dark corner.

The serpents locked their eyes on him. Their forked tongues twisted out from between their fangs.

Before they could advance or retreat, Ilfedo fell upon them. He thrust his flaming blade into three of the serpents’ brains and slit the next one across its throat. The sword in his hand cut through the snakes as if they had been made of cheese.

As Ilfedo raised his sword to strike the remaining Sea Serpents, they regurgitated their prey. Coughing and choking on their own bile and that of the serpents, a dozen men, women and children sprawled across the floor. Some got up on their hands and knees to escape the filthiness around them.

A few victims remained prostrate in the puddles of brightly colored liquids that reeked like rotting animal corpses. Ilfedo clenched his jaws, breathing rapidly. His fists wrung the handle of his sword even as his eyes looked away from the survivors and burned into the serpents.

Rid of their burdens, the remaining serpents snapped their jaws at one another, untangling from one another and sliding across the floor, to face him with their ghost-white eyes.

“Come, you vermin!” Ilfedo yelled as he started forward, swinging his sword wide. “Face me! Fight! I would have it no other way!”

The serpents drew back their heads out of his reach. Their mouths hissed open, their fangs shining white, drops of venom forming on the tips.

In that moment, as the creatures rose in all their hideous strength, Ilfedo wished the flames burning in the sword of the dragon would reach out, burn into the creatures. An impossible feat, but somehow it now seemed viable.

As the serpents prepared to strike, he took a couple steps backward and pointed the blade’s tip directly at the creatures’ white eyes. Flames emerged from the weapon, forming a torrent of twisting yellow and red tongues that gathered strength and threw themselves through the air.

Ilfedo felt his will merge with the sword as if he were in its blade. He gathered the sword’s power as if from an unfathomably deep well and threw it—threw himself, his strength, his wrath—against his opponents. His mind felt connected not only with his body but with the sword as well, enabling him to step to the side as one of the serpents avoided the shooting flames and snapped at him.

The other serpent fell, smoke curling off its head.

When the last serpent attacked him again, its fangs scraped across his shoulder guard but did not pierce his armor. The scraping of the fangs across his shoulder guard sounded like music to his ears. He held onto the sword with one hand and dug his armored fist into the serpent’s eye with the other.

A scream tore from the serpent’s throat, a sound halfway between an elephant’s roar and a Nuvitor’s cry. It pulled away from him, shaking its head, trying to reacquire its target with its uninjured eye.

Again gripping his sword with both hands, Ilfedo approached the creature and swung. The blade cut through the serpent’s scales and burst its veins. Blue blood painted the walls, spraying the survivors. The blood struck his armor and steamed off it, leaving it as clean as when the dragon first gave it to him.

Around him the survivors stood to their feet. They gazed upon him with eyes wide and mouths agape.

“Who are you,
warrior
?” one man asked. The others gathered around Ilfedo while a few lingered to look at the bodies of those who had been less fortunate.

“I am no one of consequence.” Ilfedo sheathed his sword. The living fire retreated off his body, returning to the sword. He tried to walk toward the door, wishing to get away from the admiring gazes directed his way.

“Wait!” one man said. He stood in Ilfedo’s way and swallowed hard. “It’s you again. Isn’t it?”

“It’s who?” the bearded man asked. “For the sake of all that is just, man, who is this?”

“Ilfedo! Ilfedo Mathaliah, the Sea Serpent slayer! I saw you.” The man pointed at Ilfedo. “I saw you at The Wooden Mug … it was
you
.”

Suddenly five figures filed into the room, brandishing glowing orange-red blades. The sisters, led by Caritha, faced the group.

Their sudden appearance imposed confusion on the survivors, enough confusion to let Ilfedo walk toward the doors unhindered. But before leaving he turned to the survivors with the sisters flanking him on both sides.

“Our land cannot continue in this way without falling prey to the world around it,” he said. “Something must be done and, if no one else will strengthen us, then I will.”

Uncomfortable nods followed his words as the bedraggled townspeople looked from the sisters to him and back. But the man who had first addressed him stepped forward, his face solemn. “Your reputation precedes you, Ilfedo. By killing the Sea Serpents you proved yourself brave and cunning. And in not asking much of the people whose lives you saved, you proved yourself wise.” He dropped to the floor on one knee, head bowed. “Ages ago, as you know, our people followed a Lord, a warrior superior to all and envied by none. It is time for us to do the same and follow you as Lord Warrior.”