The Legend of Vanx Malic: Book 02 - Dragon Isle (11 page)

“Will they be all right there?” Trevin asked as he started back up the steep, narrow ledge behind the Zythian. The “they” he was referring to was Yandi and Darbon. The seaman had volunteered to stay behind and watch over the injured boy.

Darbon had tried to keep up at first. It was a noble effort, but the blow to his head affected his balance to the point where he was a danger to himself and the others. Yandi had been happy to stay with him in the small crevice they chose. Zeezle and Trevin piled up brush and scree in front of the hiding hole before leaving.

Trevin hoped that Zeezle didn’t go the way of Sir Earlin and Vanx. Without the Zythian, he might not ever find Darbon or the skittish seaman ever again.

He reminded himself that Darbon and Yandi could wait until daylight and easily kick away the pile that concealed them. They could make their own way back down to the rowboat. Still, the idea of them being buried, as if they were dead, was unsettling.

Trevin tried to push away the growing sensations of doubt that were taking root in his guts. The thought of not succeeding here, of losing Gallarael because he failed to attain the dragon’s blood, was unbearable. Already it had cost his friend and the prince’s man their lives. He suspected that, even if he succeeded, he might not ever recover from the guilt. This endeavor was exacting a price from his soul that he might not be able to repay. He couldn’t give up hope, though. To do so, as Vanx had put it in telling the story of Sir Earlin’s gruesome death, would cheapen the sacrifice of those who had chosen to come on this quest. The hope for success and the desire to justify the deaths of the others began to take over. Then all thoughts were wiped away as a damp, musty stench hit him full in the face.

By the time Trevin realized what was going on around him, Zeezle was urging him into a crouch. They were at the top of a ridge now. The moon wasn’t quite above them yet, but it was a bright, silvery disk that eclipsed most of the stars in the darkened sky. The sounds of insects and night creatures filled the air, and the occasional low, throaty bellow of some larger animal cut through the cacophony every now and again.

Below them opened a valley. It was long and narrow, but like no valley Trevin had ever seen before. It was rotten, dark, and corrupt, right out of some spooky bard’s tale. To the right, and near the valley’s end, the huge black maw of a cavern could be seen. Four-hundred paces out from the opening there was nothing but what looked to be dark, thorny bushes growing in the blackened soil. The few thin and twisted trees that reached up looked like grasping skeletal hands. Further out, in a vast field of haystack-sized piles of dung, clumps of trees, all stunted and mangled, formed into a foreboding forest that made the Wildwood’s tangle of growth seem like a flower garden.

At the edge of this infected tree line a dragon squatted with its long, snaking tail curled up over its body like a scorpion. The beast was huge, easily the size of Prince Russet’s ship. Its head was held up high, as if it were howling at Aur. With a grunting growl it squeezed out a giant pile of foul muck from it arse.

“Is that Pyra?” Trevin asked in an almost inaudible whisper.

“Pyra is red, and she could bite that dragon in half,” Zeezle returned. “Now be still and quiet or we will end up in the next shit pile.”

Trevin strained his eyes to try to determine the color of the dragon’s scales. They were green, he decided, or maybe a deep shade of blue. It was hard to say because Aur’s light had bathed the valley in a monochrome-tinted hue that made depth and color hard for his meager human eyes to determine.

Trevin tried to imagine a dragon big enough to bite that one in half and only managed to unnerve himself further. The stench of the place had roiled his stomach and he could taste a foul presence inside his mouth. It was disgusting.

The dragon finally finished defecating, and then after scratching at the earth like a haughty cat, it made two leaping strides that carried it into the air. Its wingspan was so vast and its huge, bulky body so wide that at one point it completely eclipsed the light of the moon. After it was gone, Trevin found that he had been holding his breath for way too long.

“Come,” Zeezle whispered and took Trevin by the sleeve, pulling him out of his awe-inspired trance. “We have a steep descent ahead of…” The Zythian froze as a deep, hissing roar came from the cavern mouth below them.

Trevin caught the subtle change in the blackness of the opening, a slight orange flicker, as if a procession of torches was marching somewhere deep in its belly.

“Move,” Zeezle hissed and yanked Trevin in the direction he was already scrabbling.

Trevin followed, moving swiftly on all fours just as the Zythian was. Zeezle led them to a ledge where they could lie flat and peer out over the valley below through the cracks and washouts cut into the rocky surface.

“It’s her,” Zeezle whispered excitedly. “Be very quiet, she can…” His words were cut off again, this time by another, closer hiss. The orange glow that accompanied the bone-chilling sound was bright enough to throw the shadow of the lip back over them for a heartbeat or two. Trevin had to fight his instinct to get up and flee to the far side of the ridge.

“She can hear a mouse’s heartbeat and smell a fish’s fart,” Zeezle said with a wide-eyed, almost manic-looking grin on his face. “We all fear dragons and giants and trolls. Those beasts, however, fear Pyra.” He glanced down at the valley and put a finger to his lips. “The bitch is coming out, so be perfectly still. Hopefully she will pay us no heed.”

The only problem Trevin found with being perfectly still was the fact that he was trembling all over. He could smell the fear on himself, which was amazing considering the foul aroma of the valley below. He just knew Pyra would smell it, too. He hoped the stench of this place would mask his presence, but if she could hear a mouse’s heartbeat then his heart would sound like a pounding drum to her.

Another gout of flame erupted from the cavern mouth, accompanied by an earth-shaking roar. He saw her then, just her head, but it was enough to make him glad he relieved himself earlier, for if he hadn’t he would have soiled his britches.

The dragon’s cavernous nostrils, at the end of her snout, were the size of gate portals; gray smoke, tinted orange by the light of her flames, trailed up from them like orange-gold ribbons. Huge eyes, glowing like backlit amber moons, blinked into view. The sharp, vertical slits splitting them were as long as a man’s height. Pyra’s horns curved back from gnarled, plated brows like windblown ivory palm trees.

Zeezle hadn’t exaggerated in the least. She could have snapped the other dragon in half with ease.

It was a terrifying, awesome sight, watching her slither out of her hole. Her bulky body seemed too large for the opening, but with her foreclaws she pulled and shimmied her way out anyway. Stone broke away and vegetation was uprooted or crushed as she came. With most of her tail still snaking down the cavern, she stretched her big head up into the sky and spread her wings. She let loose a blast of flames as tall as a castle tower along with a painfully ear-piercing roar.

She was announcing her presence to any and every living thing within a dozen miles of the island, Trevin decided. A few seconds later he slipped into blackness because, again, he had forgotten to breathe.

“Shhh.” Zeezle covered Trevin’s mouth and pressed down roughly. In a voice so quiet that Trevin wasn’t sure he really heard it, the Zythian said, “She is still down there.”

Trevin blinked the cobwebs from his brain and peered down through a crack at the valley below. She was there sniffing and romping around at the far end of the valley, crushing whole trees for no apparent reason as if they were merely blades of grass. It was then that Trevin realized the field of low, thorny growth close to the cavern opening and around the many dung piles wasn’t plant growth at all, at least not live growth. It was the trunks and branches of those twisted skeleton trees after being crushed beneath Pyra’s huge claws. At the moment she was smashing down the small glade near where the other wyrm’s recently laid pile sat.

Trevin felt his mind clear, and he noted that Aur was directly overhead. He had passed out for a good while. He took a deep breath and immediately regretted it. The putrid smell from below coated his lungs with oily film and he started to retch. He tried his best to keep from it, but his body wouldn’t cooperate. His guts clenched and he curled into a fetal ball making a loud, repetitive heaving sound that cut over the crunching of limbs like a struck bell.

He saw Zeezle grimace and then stiffen, and knew that Pyra had heard him too, but still he couldn’t stop heaving.

In one bounding motion the dragon was on their side of the valley. With another, her huge body was clinging to the rocky valley slope a dozen yards below them like some massive garden lizard on a trellis. Trevin looked up from his fetal ball to see the moon disappear, only to be replaced by two glowing eyes. He smelled hot steel and brimstone and felt as if he were lying far too close to a raging hearth fire.

Zeezle was frozen in shock, his wild Zythian eyes glowing only a few shades lighter than the dragon’s. He was mouthing something, probably a prayer, and when Trevin saw the Zythian’s silvery hair begin fluttering out toward Pyra’s nostrils he realized she was drawing in a breath. He couldn’t make himself stop convulsing, even though he knew they were about to be roasted. The fear was totally debilitating.

Old Master Wiggins

was dancing at the fair.

He did a flip, but then he slipped,

upon his homemade hair.

– a Parydon street ditty

V
anx woke to two male voices speaking but couldn’t quite understand what they were saying. After listening to a few exchanges, he figured out that the language being spoken was a mixture of old Zythian and some other that was foreign to his ears. He was sore, aching in places he didn’t even know he had. He wanted more than anything to stretch himself out and work his joints, but he knew better. He didn’t move, but lay perfectly still, trying to piece together what they were talking about.

“Ootlin, un secran shant’ve slumbered un mannish,” one voice, a deep authoritative growl, spoke.

“Inna sterin mannish,” the younger-sounding voice responded.

“Mannish behim,” the first voice barked.

“Inna pears wellin.”

Vanx decided there were only two of them. If there were more, they had to have been standing perfectly still for a good while. He hadn’t heard the telltale boot scuff or so much as a sigh or sniffle, only the two male voices conversing about what he believed to be his heritage.

A sudden whimpering wiggle against his body caused him to jerk in reflex. Something was nestled up close to him.

“Livin, livin behim,” the younger voice called out in startled warning.

“Inna, Ootlin, don timbed goaf,” the other voice barked an uneasy laugh. “Certain livin be him, uncertain mannish be him.”

There was no more need for subterfuge, Vanx decided, as he took in the soft warmth that was snuggled beside him. It was a pup, barely weaned, all black and white and scared, with liquid eyes that looked up at him. Vanx couldn’t pay much attention to it at the moment, though, as the others were now standing right there discussing his mannishness as if he were a chunk of ham hanging in the meat market.

“Who are…?” Vanx rolled over and asked in his best old Zythian. His words caught in his throat when he saw what he was speaking to.

They were short folk with the wide, stocky build of the dwarven races; only these stout little men had green, glowing eyes and pointed ears like the legendary Welves of old. What was more surprising was their milky skin and snow-white hair and beards. A long streak of gravy, or maybe old blood, stained the whiskers of the older one. The younger of them stepped back and raised the gnarled root staff he was holding into a defensive position.

The other one smiled, or maybe snarled. Vanx wasn’t sure because, when his beard parted, all he saw were blue lips and a row of sharp animal teeth. In his hand, the older man-like creature held a shiny staff that was topped with an ornamental box. Vanx saw tiny curls of smoke rolling up through the seams of what was probably a closed shutter. The expression on the old creature’s face relaxed and he chuckled. Then he cautiously extended a hand down to help Vanx to his feet.