The Onyx Dragon (27 page)

Her boyfriend managed a spluttering, inhuman growl at this sally. Ah, Dragon emotions, Pip chortled inwardly. Volatile as the suns were bright, and about as safe as whistling up a Cloudlands storm.

Fresh air streamed steadily past the group as they made a small, advancing puddle of light in a passageway cut by some remarkable technology. Pip ran her fingers along the wall. Perfectly smooth. Square edges at floor and ceiling, so this was not an ancient watercourse. Besides, the substrata was granite. Water would not ordinarily cut through solid granite. A slight, dry-musty smell came to her nostrils, and a hint of cinnamon–

Stop!

Pip cried out fractionally before Silver pulled up abruptly, extending his left arm to stop Oyda in her tracks. “Wait. Magic ahead.”

“First entry spell,” Kaiatha muttered, thumbing rapidly through her father’s diary. “Ay. An easy one to warm us up. Arosia and I worked this one out weeks ago. Shall I take this one on to save you for the more exciting work later on, Silver?”

He made a slight bow. “Verily, o mighty Dragoness.”

Kaia spluttered, “Er …”

“That’s you, petal,” said Oyda. “Less catching flies and more action, please.”

As Kaiatha spoke a short incantation, a shimmering light briefly infused a band of stone in the floor just a step ahead of Silver’s feet. The light flared, then faded to nothingness. The Fra’aniorian said, “That’s it.”

“What was it?” Pip asked.

“It’s fondly called a knee-trapper,” said her friend. “The intruder falls in and the stone closes, crushing their knees and trapping them in stone forever. Charming idea, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Um,” Pip gulped.

“Never mind,” said Kaiatha, striding forward. “The next one is poisoned spikes. Then we have the ten-tonne ceiling dropper, then a bottomless pit followed by a trap called the spiked grasshopper, and after that things become really exciting.”

Mercy. She was grateful Kaia and Silver seemed confident about all this nasty Dragonish portal magic. Pip clenched and unclenched her fists. Thank the heavens for friends with skills other than getting into trouble. She watched with increasing appreciation as her companions dealt competently with the various barriers apparently devised by the Order of Onyx with expert draconic help, perhaps their own Shapeshifters. What had driven them to hide their secrets with such paranoia? Was the assassination of Kaiatha’s father connected to his knowledge of this location?

After two hours’ march, the foursome had reached the final barrier, the portal spell deliberately left incomplete in the diary. Here, the tunnel finally rose and widened, becoming a cave hidden behind two successive barriers–firstly, a silver curtain veiling an arched entryway, clearly of magical origin and function. The barrier shimmered slightly as though alive, and was transparent enough to allow a view of a chamber beyond, empty save for a plinth or altar in the precise centre of the floor space. A stone slab denied access to a second chamber, beyond the plinth. Above the doorway, Silver pointed out several runes, which could not be fully read from below.

Oyda mopped her forehead. “Phew. I’m boiling. We must be right beneath the volcano.”

Kaiatha raised her light on her palm, straining to read the runes. “Pip, I need your help. Climb on my shoulders.”

Shortly, Pip rose into the air, but she still could not see clearly. The original chiselling was time-worn, and slightly hidden above a protruding lip of stone where the archway rose toward the ceiling. Carefully, she balanced on her feet and reached up to steady herself against the arch. “Ouch! Islands’ sakes, this rock’s blisteringly hot.”

Silver touched the wall to his right and snatched his fingers away with a hiss. “You’re right.”

Pip said, “Listen to this, ‘Only Pygmies may enter here. Death awaits.’ That’s unambiguous, I’d say.”

Kaiatha put her down again. “Alright, team. Let’s work this out. We’ve a puzzle noted as ‘sliding door’ and we see a small plinth through the barrier in that chamber, which is thirty foot by six by thirteen high, exactly the dimensions noted in the diary. Only Pip can proceed beyond this point. Pip, you need to memorise this entry oath.”

Pip crossed her arms and pursed her lips.

Oyda clipped her fondly over the back of the head. “Stop smirking. It’s impertinent.”

Sipping her water gourd, Kaiatha conferred rapidly with her team. Shortly, she and Silver were probing the barrier with a variety of magical techniques. An hour passed. Two. Pip tried to sit down, but the rock burned her through the seat of her Dragon Rider trousers. At length, she grew impatient.

“Look, have you two tried touching the barrier?”

Kaia waved crossly at the diary. “Look, you need all of this … this part written in my father’s best obsessive double-speak. And left unfinished.”

“Here? Or in there?” She jabbed with her forefinger.

Pip gasped as her finger stuck to the silvery substance. “I didn’t mean to …” She shook her hand. Nothing, save from hurting her cast-in-stone finger. “Oh, no …”

“Pip!” Silver grabbed her waist, Kaiatha her free hand. They heaved.

“Stop! You’re pulling my finger out–mercy, it’s … my hand!”

Kaia shrilled, “The oath!” Pip stared at the strange, silvery substance flowing over her knuckles. It had already reached her wrist. Cool, slick and perturbing.

Oyda slapped her shoulder. “Start talking, you stupid lump of soot!”

As if released to fly, Pip babbled the oath. No change. The silvery coating flowed up over her elbow as if partaking of a leisurely afternoon’s stroll. Still the magic held her fast, unyielding. Had she known a few more Words of Command, she might have been able to counteract this magic. Pip placed her foot against the archway and pulled with all of her might, but she might as well have been welded in place. Her heel touched the silvery surface. Instantly, she was stuck at two points.

Now they were all shouting, Pip rattling through the parts of the spells she had read and the oath, three times, but the cool magic expanded up to her knee and armpit. Oyda tried to push it back, but the stuff simply flowed around or under her hands, ignoring her with suspiciously animate intelligence. Silver attacked the doorway and was repulsed with a sizzle and a loud report, flung across the chamber where he sprawled, shaking his head unhappily. Kaiatha yelled at Pip not to transform. She tried to push at the peculiar magic with her mind, probe it, stop it, change its nature … nothing worked. In seconds, it was creeping up her neck and down beneath her tunic top. That was an Island too far.

Panic ripped through the Pygmy girl. This magic was attacking her! Covering everything, inexorably, sneaking up her chin and tickling her lips and dipping into her mouth and she was screaming and now it closed over her nostrils and reached the top of her thigh, encasing her hips … on the verge of blacking out, Pip gasped a huge breath. Another. She was fine. Not suffocating.

“Mercy, that feels peculiar,” she ventured. “The air’s like ice.”

Kaiatha stared at her, their faces just inches apart. “You’re not hurt? Anywhere?”

“Not so far.”

Silver said, “What–it’s some kind of membrane? That’s impossible.”

With some asperity, Pip retorted, “I’ve struck that word out of my vocabulary. Can we please not use the I-word? What, by all the Islands, is this magic?”

“Look, it’s completely covering every strand of her hair,” said Oyda. “It looks just like the little icicles you get on your nostrils when you fly too high on your Dragon. Come on, Pip. Use your strength or a Word of Command to break free.”

Flexing the fingers of her free hand, Pip said, “Besides not knowing the right Words, I’m not sure that’s wise. We don’t know what this stuff can do. Look, I can see fine. It’s like seeing through a strange silvery film–no disrespect, Silver–but I can
ooooooaaaahhh …
”

Pip’s yell ended in an undignified yelp as the curtain sucked her through the doorway and summarily dumped her on her tailbone on the far side. She stood gingerly. Oyda was leading the chorus of yelling, but Pip could not hear a peep past the silvery screen. She cupped her ear and indicated she was fine with a cheeky little bow that had nothing to do with the fear merrily dicing her innards into stew-sized chunks. Her friends looked very concerned; Silver in particular tried unsuccessfully to hide his distress.

When she tried to approach the curtain again, the magic repelled her so powerfully that Pip realised she would be unable to escape without an extraordinary effort. Or, without completing her mission. Simple choice, then, in a place where death awaited.

Pip approached the black granite plinth cautiously, hoping it was not an altar built for Human sacrifice. No’otha had warned her of certain Pygmy tribes which had adopted that barbaric custom. But she eyed a simple block of stone two feet tall with two small, hand-shaped depressions on top. Right. Pip exhaled and placed her hands where they belonged before common sense seized any foothold in her mind. The chamber immediately blazed with rainbows of light, which rippled over her magic-encased body several times.

“Pygmy magic confirmed,” intoned a voice, speaking Ancient Southern with a peculiar, sing-song accent.

She glanced about, but saw no-one or nothing to suggest where the disembodied voice might have emerged from. Suddenly, the plinth cracked and five sizeable silver tubes tumbled out, each as long and thick as her arm. The ends were sealed; Pip could not immediately see how. Nor did she have time to investigate. The curtain flickered and turned opaque.

The voice said, “Take the lore-scrolls, Pygmy warrior. Never surrender their treasure to the enemy. Now, we will show you the words of power. Read quickly. This chamber will self-destruct in
twenty, nineteen, eighteen …
”

Jumping jaguars! Pip gasped as the entire section of wall before her began to develop a reddish glow. What she had thought was solid rock appeared to be some kind of crystal, perhaps Ha’athiorian horiatite, for it appeared similar to the Pygmy necklace Oyda had worn for her wedding. Brilliant runes, precisely etched in Ancient Southern, rapidly scrolled outward from a point directly opposite her nose. Up and down. Sideways. An entire page of words, gleaming like radiant fish swimming in an orange lava lake, which rapidly increased in brightness and heat as the countdown ticked on, unheeding. A second page replaced the first.

… thirteen, twelve …

The wall shone ever brighter, and though she sensed the heat developing, the magic stubbornly kept her body and face cool. Pip read in great chunks, committing each section to memory as page after page, perhaps a dozen in all, flashed by.

… nine, eight …

Now the colour was yellow-white, a dazzling finale to the sections of text, which suddenly began to scroll backward twice as fast as they had appeared. Words leaped off the crystal wall at her in black, sooty clumps of text that expired mid-air in puffs of black dust.

… four, three …

Pip observed with her fullest attention as the Words of Command spontaneously, almost joyfully sprang free to be etched on an eidetic memory. Nothing must be lost.

… two …

Pip gasped as the final words plinked against her nose, but that was because flames burst through the white-hot wall, now, the overheated rock glistening, dripping, sagging! The far door shuddered as it dropped; from the tunnel beyond, Pip heard a booming roar and saw the beginnings of a deep, fiery glow that made her imagine peering down the volcano’s throat.

… one …

Remembering, she reached for the five scroll-tubes. Molten rock sloshed over her back, thick as jungle honey, and now she did feel heat and pain through the magical skin that encased her being, but it protected her enough. Pip fought. Thrashed. Dived for the scrolls and surfaced like a Dragon rising from bathing in a terrace lake, swimming a surge that thrust her irresistibly toward Kaiatha, Silver and Oyda. The barrier was gone, the archway slumping toward the ground, her friends backing up, wide-eyed. Pip opened her mouth, and screamed a newly-acquired Word of Command.

Run!

T
Hey fled the
rising volcano. Pip rode a wave of thin, white-hot molten lava as she chased her friends down the endless tunnel. Oyda was first, her legs fairly flying in the bobbing light of her magical lantern. Kaiatha followed, lean and fleet, then Silver, as quick and lithe as a dragonet in his movements. The threesome ran at superhuman speeds, the speed of their passage creating a strange, whistling sound as they sprinted away from her. Pip struggled to free herself from the viscous rock. She forced the power into herself.

Run!

Too much magic. Blackness spotted her vision before she managed to collect herself. Pip kicked forward with a shout of rage and a belly brimful of blazing energy. She thrashed the lava into foam with her limbs, slowly emerging from the surging wave of rock filling the tunnel as if it sought to drag her back into an unwelcome, deadly embrace. Magma sloughed off her body as she battled and fumed and won, her feet splashing short-lived footprints in burning yellow puddles before she accelerated onto cool, solid ground. She raced off as though shot from a Pygmy bow.

Rock blurred to either side of her.

Seemingly a moment later, Pip found herself at the base of the stairs, chasing after the sounds of her friends. On and on, lungs rasping for air, realising at some level that driving her body this way could only end in grief. She searched her newfound knowledge but could find no immediate answer to how to reverse a Word of Command. Once spoken, never unspoken? She launched herself upward in huge bounds, seven steps at a time, catching up to Silver with ease now, as the passageway’s confines forced him to slow.

Not far behind, a series of deep explosions reverberated through the earth and rock.

Pip and Silver broke out almost simultaneously into the passageway carved by Cinti, and collapsed. Wheezing. Coughing. Gasping as though they were half-dying; Oyda and Kaiatha were the same. Shimmerith had her paw upon Kaiatha, easing her pain, but she quickly moved to help the others.

Shimmerith called,
No time to rest. Hurry, we must fly. Hide this place. Pip, did you–

I have it all,
she replied. Or so she hoped. Time would tell.

Easy, Silver. Breathe deep,
said the Sapphire Dragoness. But Pip detected nuances of alarm in her voice.

Shimmerith, what’s the matter?
She tottered toward the cave’s entrance.

Before the Dragoness could speak, Cinti called from outside the cave,
Shimmerith, get them out, now!

The volcano, of course. Pip accepted being snaffled up into Cinti’s paw, while Shimmerith gathered the other three into her grasp. The Dragonesses launched out into space. Pip wriggled about, searching for a decent view between Cinti’s gnarled knuckles. Well, the Ape Steps were no longer hidden, that was for certain. A clear line of mini-volcanoes linked the two Islands, while above … she cried out softly, involuntarily. Night-Reds. Dozens of Dragon Assassins hovered over the Cloudlands out there, watching her home Island intently.

Bile rose in her throat. Her neck twizzled; Pip noticed that the Dragons guarded not only horizontal space, but vertical as well. A dome of the Marshal’s forces arched over her Island. A Dragon every few thousand feet. There were no bolt-holes, not this time.

We’re shielding so they can’t detect us,
Shimmerith said.
But you’re right. They’ve tracked us to this Island, and we don’t know how.

Hunagu? Chymasion–

Cinti replied,
Returned safely, little one. Do not fear. The Night-Reds came upon us while you were below. We thought at first it was just another search, so we hid ourselves with all our draconic cunning, but by my wings, we were not cunning enough. Somehow they have spied us out, and we are trapped behind this blockade.

Pip scanned the late afternoon skies.
There’s hundreds, Cinti.

Were we betrayed, shell-mother?
Silver asked.

Her answer was a deep, smoky growl.

But you succeeded, little one?
Shimmerith repeated, anxiously.

I have the knowledge, but I need to … assimilate it, I guess? I don’t understand all of the runes. Master Balthion might have been able to help if we had him here; also, Arosia studied Ancient Southern writing.

The Dragonesses stuck close to the cliffs, flying upward with cautious wing-strokes, not wanting to disturb any bush or dust or boulder in passing. Fire thundered out of the tunnel they had just departed, the final chisel-mark on the gravestone for that secret tunnel, as the Island saying went. The Night-Reds responded instantly. A dozen Dragons rocketed downward toward the source of the disturbance; as if acting with one mind, Cinti and Shimmerith sideslipped away with great guile, soft-winged, barely disturbing air particles in passing, it seemed.

They ghosted up beneath the great overhanging canopy and plunged into the safety of the jungle’s deep coolness.

Ten minutes later, amidst the cool, loam-scented gloom, the two Dragonesses and their cargo joined up with the others–No’otha and his warriors, and the Academy Dragons and Riders. Emblazon immediately set the tone by accusing Cinti of outright betrayal. Nak questioned Silver’s motives. Kaiatha worried about Durithion, left on the other Island with the tribe, while Chymasion unhappily tried to play the peacemaker and found himself lambasted from all directions for his trouble. Silver snapped into his Dragon-form, the better to growl at Nak and anyone else who dared to express their suspicions.

Finally, Pip had to act. She transformed, and pounced into the midst of the Dragons, shouting,
Stinking jungle blossoms! Stop it!

To a beast, they stared at her, momentarily forgetting their various quarrels.

“I think I know who has betrayed our presence here,” said Pip. “Me.” And she explained the dreams she had been having of Zardon, most recently as she walked the jungle ways, and the power of their Dragon-Rider oath-magic.

Silver ground his fangs together in palpable rage. Dragon-jealousy seethed in his hearts. But to her shock, it was Shimmerith who rounded on her. “You bury your secrets well, Pygmy Dragoness!” she spat. “Silver told me how you hide crucial information from us all; I did not believe it, until now. This is foul, undraconic misconduct!”

“We might better have invited the Marshal’s Assassins to cuddle up to us,” Nak snorted, mimicking his Dragoness’ fury. “Does he see through your eyes too, Pip?”

She hung her head. “I don’t know. I didn’t think about that.”

Nak yelled, “You don’t know? Islands’ sakes, you look so cute standing there mincing your paws, what do you expect–one cutesy flutter of your pretty Pygmy eyes and all is forgiven? You of all people should understand this is not a game played by children! These are real people, real lives–”

Arosia gripped Nak’s shoulder, spinning him around. “Now, just a moment–”

The Rider shoved her, making her stumble and fall. “Unhand me, child! We should never have brought all these feckless hatchlings along on such an important mission.”

Chymasion was growling up a storm; appearing to take her cue from her Dragon, Arosia stood and threw her right knee squarely into Nak’s vitals. Pip would have laughed if the situation had not been so fraught. Nak folded up like a snapped twig. Immediately, Shimmerith swung a paw at Arosia, only for her shell-son to deflect the blow, and then Emblazon shouldered between them, stoically letting Shimmerith pummel his flank until she met his blazing gaze. Whatever she saw there, the Dragoness backed off like a spitting, furious cat.

Perhaps the companions had never understood the stresses underlying their venture, Pip thought. Perhaps Dragon emotions overtook their Riders, too!

At Emblazon’s gruff, “Simmer down!” the Dragons backed off.

Then, the Amber bowed his great muzzle. “Let me express my sorrow at my lack of sound leadership. All I cared for was this Dragon’s pride, when I should have acknowledged each member of our group and the unique, valuable contributions each of you have made.”

Shimmerith made a soft bugle of shock.

“Ay, my beautiful fire-heart,” he said. “I did not draw upon our unique strengths and abilities, nor did I understand any of your inner fires in any sufficient measure.” His nobility and vulnerability held them all rapt. Pip rapidly translated for the Pygmies, before Emblazon continued, “My leadership has failed you. Jyoss and Tazzaral have passed on. I grieve. Duri lies gravely wounded. My fires weep! I will do better, that I promise.

“Please accept my–” the word choked in his throat, but emerged at last, “–apologies.”

Pip knew what that cost a proud Dragon. Suddenly there was a clamour of approval, promises to work together and not against each other, apologies from Nak, Pip and Arosia, and the shining love in Shimmerith’s gaze as she considered her mate as if for the first time, never more magnificent. The Amber Dragon rapidly organised them, modifying his commands at several suggestions from Nak. Healing for the exhausted quartet. Checking the precious scrolls, if they could. Nak and Shimmerith to put their heads together to formulate an escape plan. Pip rapidly related their adventure beneath the volcano, and then they were out of time.

DRAGONS! SHOW YOURSELVES!
An enormous, magic-magnified bellow reached even to the base of the Crescent Island giants.

“It’s Zardon,” said Pip.

“Not the Marshal?” Oyda asked.

“Well, how can she know that?” asked Silver. “Yet Eridoon Island moves slowly. I doubt the Marshal will be here yet, unless he moved the Island in secret.”

“Why wouldn’t he just fly here?” Pip asked.

Silver replied, “My father flies little, and does not often take his Dragon form. Perhaps it is the strain of levitating the Island.”

“Perhaps he fears he’ll be eaten by the Shadow Dragon,” Chymasion suggested slyly.

“Ay!” Oyda and Shimmerith agreed fervently.

“We have to negotiate,” Cinti interjected, clenching her paws in a clear indication that she would rather be negotiating with the Marshal’s entrails wrapped around her talons.

Emblazon said, “The noble Dragoness is correct. Nak and I will go speak to him. The rest of you, stay hidden beneath the canopy but remain close enough to shield and protect us.”

“Nak cannot presently contemplate standing,” Nak whispered, from his prone position between Shimmerith’s paws. “Nak’s manhood has been forever blighted–woe to us, o Oyda, how this mighty exemplar of manly virility hath fallen!”

Oyda whispered to Shimmerith, “Will you tell him, or shall I?”

The Sapphire Dragoness’s eye-fires softened toward a rich peach. “Go ahead, petal.”

Pip and several others chuckled at her use of one of Oyda’s pet phrases. Yet suddenly, there was another feeling in the air, a bashfulness Pip had never seen in her friend as the petite Dragon Rider turned to her new husband. “Congratulations.”

He blinked. “Um … for being so irresistibly attractive? Or because I am maimed for life?”

Pip knew. She sensed it in the Balance, in the way Oyda held her head, her eyes resting tenderly upon the man she loved. She caught her breath. Oh, by the white-fires of life itself … what fragile beauty was this, a pair of the tiniest of buds?

Oyda smiled, “I’m pregnant, and you’re going to be a father. Congratulations.”

True to form, Nak gasped and pretended to faint.

When the general babble had subsided slightly, Pip added, “Nak, you’re going to be a father of twin girls.”

He pretended to faint a second time and thumped his head on a stone. “Ouch!” he rubbed the offending spot. Never had a man smiled more broadly than he.

* * * *

Selecting a great bare bough that arched out of the Island’s canopy, Pip and Emblazon poked their muzzles out into the radiant afternoon suns-light. They stood in a sea of verdant green. Creeper-covered mounds of trees alternated with those free of clinging vine-parasites, spreading a full mile around them in every direction, and further along the Island’s splayed isthmuses. Ordinarily, thousands of birds would have been diving into and out of the foliage, munching flying insects or playing with each other or singing at the top of their lungs in salute of the coming nightfall. But the presence of the Dragons had scared them into hiding. Pip ignored that response in her own breast. She was Dragonkind, only outnumbered a mere five hundred to two.

Above, the form of a lone male Night-Red Dragon detached itself from the hovering throng to wing steadily, unhurriedly down to them. Pip knew his manner for a ploy. Impress upon the victims-to-be their helpless state.

Zardon’s eye-fires blazed balefully as he approached stiffly, his great age evident in every wing-stroke, yet Pip thought him noble, not sad. Brought low, ay, and changed by the Marshal’s Dragon-bending magic, but this was Zardon. Her rescuer. A beast she knew to be torn within, yet could she acknowledge it? Would this Dragonwing not fall upon him, and tear him limb from limb?

Closer and closer he flew, until the hoary old-timer faced them from a mere hundred yards distant, and every sinew in Emblazon’s body thrummed with audible tension, at least to Pip’s imagination. Zardon’s left forepaw was curled beneath him as if he were injured, or did he hold something concealed from view?