The Ruin (7 page)

As he dodged a potentially bone-shattering flick of Brimstone’s tail, Taegan struggled not to panic. He and his friends had stood against chromatic dragons, a dracolich, a sunwyrm, demons, and plenty of other formidable foes. Surely they could defeat the linnorn, too.

But no matter how he tried, he couldn’t make himself believe it. Some other night, perhaps, but not then, when they were already spent and luck was running against them.

Unless…

He turned to Pavel and cried, “You have to hold Brimstone back by yourself!” He looked up at Jivex and Kara. “Flee! Get as far away as you can.” He beat his wings and leaped closer to Dorn, Will, and Raryn, who, though still shaking, was struggling back to his feet. “Keep shooting! Hurt the thing!”

“What do you think we’ve been trying to do?” snapped Will, spinning his warsling. “Treat it to a sausage and a jack of ale?”

“Make the Hermit focus on you so Kara and Jivex can get clear,” Taegan continued.

Dorn loosed an arrow. “What’s the plan?”

“Just, trust me.” Taegan rattled off one of the few spells he hadn’t already expended.

The world flickered and leaped around him and he was flying above and behind the Hermit’s colossal head with its writhing hair-like cilia and encrustations of fungus. The reptile’s neck was like a twisting highway beneath him.

Back on the ground, tiny with distance, Pavel, his mystical abilities apparently utterly exhausted, battled Brimstone with his mace alone. Hornblade drawn, Will scrambled to help him. Dorn and Raryn kept shooting at the Hermit and had likewise taken up Taegan’s cry, bellowing for Kara and Jivex to get away.

The dragons were trying, but the corpse tearer wouldn’t allow it. Ignoring the barrage of arrows, it pressed Jivex and Kara so hard they couldn’t escape. Neither could turn tail without inviting a rear attack.

Taegan had hoped to put his own stratagem to the test before the Hermit even realized he was hovering nearby, but plainly, it wasn’t possible. Kara and Jivex wouldn’t break away unless he helped Dorn and Raryn distract the corpse tearer. He furled his wings and dived, hurtling at the Linnorn’s eye.

Up close, the Hermit smelled foul, not with the rotten stink of a dracolich, but a stale, musty reek suggestive of inconceivable age. From instant to instant, its eye looked like black emptiness or a plate of obsidian large as a tabletop, depending

on how the moonlight struck it. A few arrows jutted from the dark surface, moisture seeping from around the tips. Taegan’s sword made similar wounds, narrow punctures and cuts that only oozed fluid instead of gushing it.

Still, he succeeded in capturing the Hermit’s attention. The dark, enormous head at the end of the flexible neck jerked away, then straight back at him, jaws spreading wide to engulf him. He lashed his wings and flung himself clear an instant before the stained fangs clashed together.

The Hermit struck at him again, and then a third time. He dodged, swerving, each time only narrowly avoiding the prodigious teeth. Occasionally he had a chance to strike back. Rilitar’s slender blade pricked and sliced the reptile’s snout. and came away black with slime.

Gigantic claws slashed down, catching him by surprise and only missing by an inch. The Hermit’s tail whipped around at him, and he swooped beneath it. In so doing, he caught a glimpse of Kara and Jivex past the linnorn’s body. They’d fled as directed, but the faerie dragon was starting to wheel back around.

“Go!” Taegan shouted.

The Hermit lunged at him, cutting off his view, then pressing him so fiercely he had no opportunity for another look. He couldn’t tell if his friend had heeded him or not.

The corpse tearer snarled an incantation, and Taegan felt a pang of ache and dullness shoot through him. His magical augmentations to his innate capacities disappeared, stripped away by the Hermit’s counterspell. The reptile followed up by spewing a blast of its smoky breath, but with a beat of his pinions, Taegan jerked himself clear. The vapor’s stink churned his guts and set him shuddering even so. The linnorn lifted its talons to shred him before he could recover, but then it faltered. Perhaps Dorn or Raryn had given it a particularly painful wound.

Regaining control of his limbs, Taegan thrust, dodged, and continued to evade. His heart hammered, and he panted. Were Kara and Jivex far enough away? Since he didn’t

see them and couldn’t divert his attention from the Hermit to look about, he’d simply have to assume so, for Sune knew, he couldn’t continue this way much longer.

He whispered an incantation, meanwhile continuing to defend with as much agility and vigor as before, for that was a bladesinger’s art. His swordsman’s magic was far more limited than the average wizard’s store of charms, but he could conjure and fence simultaneously.

Talons lashed at him. He dived below the stroke and articulated the final word of his spell. Power prickled across his skin and momentarily turned the drifting fog a ghostly blue, but otherwise, nothing seemed to happen.

He hadn’t known precisely what to expect, but he’d hoped for something. Perhaps the linnorn would hesitate, or leave itself vulnerable in some way. Instead, it simply kept on attacking, and, he suspected, there truly was no hope. For him, anyway. If he could keep the creature busy for a little longer, maybe one or two of his friends could escape.

He evaded raking talons, cut the Hermit’s haunch, and the reptile growled words of power. Taegan’s body stiffened into absolute rigidity. Unable to flap his wings, he plummeted.

He had little doubt the fall would kill him, but the Hermit evidently wanted to make sure. It plunged after him like a hawk swooping to catch a pigeon in its claws.

But it didn’t use its talons to pierce him, nor its grip, painfully tight though it was, to crush him. Instead, leveling out of its descent, it recited another spell that gave him back the use of his body. Not that he could use it for much at the moment.

“What did you do to me?” the Hermit snarled, its voice a rasping, discordant rumble like a scrape of blades and distant thunder muddled together. It spoke Elvish with an accent Taegan had never heard before. “I feel it squirming in my mind!”

“Ah,” Taegan wheezed. With the enormous digits clamping his torso, he could scarcely draw sufficient breath to speak. “That would be the Rage. Phourkyn One-Eye taught

me a spell to crumble any wyrm’s defenses instantaneously. I must compliment you. Most dragons, experiencing frenzy all of a sudden, go berserk. They certainly aren’t capable of conducting a civilized conversation.”

“I’m no dragon. My kind and theirs diverged eons ago.” “Apparently,” said Taegan, “not quite far enough for comfort’s sake.”

“Lift the curse!”

“A wise request, for, left to fester, it will obliterate your reason. I haven’t actually mastered the charm for dampening it, but fortunately, Lady Karasendrieth—the song dragon— has. Once you agree to conduct yourself in a more hospitable manner, I’m sure she’ll be delighted to oblige you.”

The Hermit glared. “I don’t succumb to threats. I’ll slaughter you all, raise you as my lifeless slaves, and command the song dragon to cleanse me of this taint.”

“That would be ill-advised. Who can say with absolute certainty that an undead Kara would still recall the spell, or be able to cast it if she did? Even if it all worked out as you hoped, it wouldn’t save you for long. The Rage is waxing ever stronger. It would swallow you eventually in any case. My friends and I are exploring all the dreariest corners of the northlands to prevent such a calamity from befalling dragons—and dragonkind—everywhere. Thus, it truly is in your best interests to welcome us as the benefactors we are. You could make a start by easing the pressure on my ribs.”

The Hermit didn’t release Taegan so much as toss him away like a piece of trash. Still, a couple wing beats turned his graceless tumble into directed flight, and he soared up in front of the linnorn’s huge, dark mask, oily with slime and with its seething tendrils, sickening to behold.

“Shall we join the others?” the bladesinger asked.

Kara had no idea why Taegan, Dorn, and the others had exhorted her and Jivex to flee. Perhaps they simply hoped

that if the seekers split up, someone could escape, and they thought the dragons, with their wings and magical abilities, had the best chance.

If so, that might be logical, but she couldn’t abandon Dorn or any of her friends. It wasn’t in her. But perhaps she’d succeeded in making the Hermit believe she was forsaking the field, and then had some slim hope of taking the creature from behind. Her wounds throbbing, chest aching with the effort. to produce still more breath weapon, she wheeled. Jivex, his mirror-bright scales stained with a coating of his own blood, did the same.

When they turned, though, they saw things had changed.

Still floating dozens of feet above the ground, the Hermit clutched Taegan in its talons. It wasn’t hurting him, though, nor was it casting any more spells or spitting additional blasts of its noxious breath. It seemed to be palavering with its captive.

That left Dorn, Pavel, Will, and Raryn free to deal with Brimstone, who, shrouded in sulphurous smoke, continued to attack. Bloody and reeling from the punishment they’d already taken, the hunters fended off the vampire as best they could.

“Brimstone’s the greater threat now,” Kara said. “We have to deal with him.”

“Don’t worry,” Jivex said. “He’s no match for me.”

They dived. Jivex created blazes of dazzling light immediately in front of Brimstone’s crimson eyes and blares of deafening noise by his ears. Pained, startled, the smoke drake thrashed, and failed to notice Kara’s hurtling descent. Commencing a battle anthem at the last second, when it was too late for the reptile on the ground to dodge, she slammed down on top of him, dug her claws into his flanks and her fangs into his neck, wrapped her tail around him, and covered him with her wings, pinning him in place.

Weapons raised, the hunters rushed forward. But before anyone could strike a blow, Brimstone’s body dissolved into

smoke and embers. Kara fell through the cloud, which surged sideways as if a gale were blowing it. It coalesced back into solidity several yards away. Kara saw that Brimstone had a crooked leg and wing, and numerous rips in his mottled hide.

Still avid to make the kill, the others swarmed after him. “Wait!” Brimstone snarled. “When I attacked you, I was acting under coercion, but now the linnorn has released me from its control.”

Dorn’s only response was a sweep of his iron talons. Brimstone leaped backward, and the strike missed.

“The Hermit has been casting priestly magic,” the smoke drake said, “and divines of a certain stripe can command the undead. You know it’s so, Pavel Shemov! Tell your comrades!”

Pavel looked as if he would have liked nothing better than to ignore Brimstone’s plea and keep attacking. Still, he said, “Wait! It’s as he claims. The hermit may well have forced him to turn against us. Though it’s the fundamental corruption inside him that makes it possible.”

“But we knew he was a vampire when we agreed to work with him,” panted Will, “so I guess there’s no point complaining about it now.”

Scowling, Dorn lowered his blade. “I don’t trust you,” he said to Brimstone, “but I suppose I do trust the strength of your hatred of Sammaster.”

The smoke drake sneered. “Like recognizes like.”

“It’s nice to see everyone getting along,” Taegan said. “Guests should behave with decorum in front of their host.”

Kara looked up. Black pinions half furled, the avariel came gliding down to earth with the gigantic, wingless linnorn drifting behind him.

With no spells left in his head, Pavel used his physician’s skills to tend everyone’s wounds as best he could, and they

all drank their supply of healing elixirs dry. Otherwise, they would have been in no condition to attend to what the Hermit had to say.

At that, slumped around the crackling, smoky fire Dorn had built, they remained a weary and battered lot, each with his bruises, blisters, and swaths of bloody bandages on display. Only Brimstone, whose vampiric body shed wounds with unnatural speed, looked little the worse for the recent ordeal.

As if he’d discerned the tenor of Pavel’s thoughts, Will whispered, “If the Hermit decides to break its promise to the maestro, I imagine we’ll all wind up in its belly about a second and a half later.”

“Should that occur,” Pavel said, “I can only hope you’ll sicken a corpse tearer as much as you’ve always nauseated me.” Thanks to the sting of his burns and abrasions, he hadn’t yet managed to get comfortable. He tried leaning back on his elbows, and it helped a little.

“I gave you time to drink your draughts and apply your ointments,” the Hermit said. The greasy, lichen-spotted bulk of the creature loomed over everyone else, even Brimstone, and radiated not merely dislike but utter loathing, like an emperor forced to treat with beings made of dung. “Now ask your questions.”

“As you wish,” said Kara, in human form once more, “As we’ve already said, we seek a remedy for the Rage.” She proceeded to explain with a succinct storyteller’s clarity what plague Sammaster had unleashed on dragonkind, how they knew about it, and how they hoped to cure it. “So you see, you must aid us, if only for your own sake. Perhaps frenzy never touched you before, but it has now, and will never let you go, because Sammaster somehow altered the enchantment.”

“We suspect,” Pavel said, “he sought you out in the course of his explorations, though he may not have proffered his true name, or worn his true face, and you gave him information that advanced his schemes.”

The Hermit crouched silent and motionless for what

seemed a long while, only the fine cilia spouting from its scales squirming sluggishly, like sated grubs in decaying meat.

At last it said, “A wizard did come, some years ago.”

“Why would you help him?” asked Will. “Because he’s a lich, and you’re partial to the undead?”

A cup of brandy cradled in his hand, managing a certain elegance even when half sitting, half lying on the ground, Taegan grinned. “No. Ghouls and phantoms are the Linnorn’s slaves, not its friends. Sammaster had to compel cooperation, just as we did, and the shame of capitulation is the reason our new acquaintance is reluctant to discuss the incident. Isn’t that right, Lord Hermit?”