Wind Rider (14 page)

XV

I looked down at the forest beneath
us. I could feel its pain, could smell its suffering, blowing in the wind across
my face. The trees were burning.

They’ve set fire to the forest again.

Our people are resilient. They will find a way
to survive, and continue their attack.

I hugged
Yesenia
around
her neck.
How much further, my great friend?

Less than a quarter of one of your human hours,
little one. I would limber up my muscles, if I were you. We are going in as
soon as we get there. The
frujen
are fierce
opponents. You should prepare yourself with your sword.

I nodded and brought my hand down to my blade.

Pull me out. We will do limbering exercises, as
I tell you how to combat the
frujen
. I am glad you
finally remembered me.

Sorry, Carolina.

I pulled out the sword and felt my arms buzz with
energy. High above the ground, the cold wind whipping my face, I began to move
the sword through the air in highly structured movements, like some kind of
strange sword dance. My muscles relaxed and grew warm, becoming more supple and
swift.

Be one with me.

I tried to comply. I let my mind meld with my
hand, with my arm, with the intelligence in my hand. Carolina became my guide,
my second brain. My hand moved faster than I could control it — so I let myself
relax further. Only then could I follow all the movements she was having me
make. I gripped the sword with two hands, and both my arms were swinging
around.

Anders, you will need everything you have
learned with me, everything you have learned in the book of Id and everything
you have learned with
Woltan
to defeat the
frujen
.

If need be, remember you can shoot spells out
the tip of our sword, or from any part of your body, for that matter. Some
wizards have used staffs, or wands, or the tip of their finger, but anything
will do, and an object of power, like our blade, is better than most. Any spell
coming through the sword is enhanced with my power and the strength of the
blade.

I was starting to feel winded, but my arms felt
limber: strong and flexible at the same time. I slowed down the movements until
I was moving the sword so slowly that it seemed stationary to my two eyes, and
only my inner eye could track the difference.

I would like to try a spell.

Carolina’s image popped into view. She nodded at
me.

Don’t do anything that will tire you, though,
or draw attention.

I held out the sword. I concentrated on relaxing
my body, on using the word of power with the minimal amount of energy. I
concentrated on letting that energy flow out through the sword, together with
the word:

Licht
.

A ball of light formed at the end of the sword. I
realized I had not spoken out loud: the word had not been formed with my lips,
but inside me, and had left me through the sword.

I let the ball fade.

Well done. A spell thus formed does not reveal
its secrets to an enemy. Remember that what you learned with the tree mother
will come in handy too. Natural living magic is antithesis to the
frujen
, who have been dead so long that everything living
is alien to them. But they pollute everything they touch, including you air and
your magic. Try not to let them touch your body. Do not let them touch your mind.
If they pollute any of our party, we will have to perform purification rituals…
Some of which are lost …

I felt suddenly something new, and strange.
Yesenia
, beneath me, reached her mind up and joined with
Carolina. We were three as one, now.

Greetings, pixie. It has been a long time since
I have made contact with one of your kind.

Oh really, who was that?

An image flashed into my mind of a small pixie,
flying around the stone mountain.

A second cousin, once removed.
Nuria
. I haven’t seen her in awhile either. And greetings
to you, dragon. It has been a long time since I have seen a dragon, and longer
still since I have seen a dragon with a rider.

History is turning, as you know. We pledged a
thousand years ago to wait for the time of great changes, in which we would
play our part. We dragons keep our promises.

Are you trying to imply something about the
fair folk, dragon?

There have been some of your kind who have not
been the most faithful.

I am not one of those, dragon.

Call me
Yesenia
,
pixie.

And you, fire breather, can call me Carolina,
as Anders does.

You fair folk have too many names.

Enough banter,
Yesenia
.
We will soon see battle. We must be wary, for Anders’ sake. Most of my brethren
have turned their backs on this world, but those who have not prepare for the
final battle, when the dark lord will engage himself.

It is no better amongst us dragons. Most of my
kind have forgotten the world just as they have been forgotten by it.

Yet it is worse among the Fair Folk. Some of
the fair folk now form alliances with the dark lord’s demons.

Try your best to convince more of the necessity
of our fight. We have not waited a thousand years to lose this battle, nor to
lose the war. We need all the help we can get.

Yesenia
sniffed in front
of us. I could smell the smoke, through my nose and through hers.

We come to battle now. All three of us should
keep our minds blended. We can act faster, and our defense will be all the
greater. Put up your shields, Anders. And let them be strong.

I imagined a hard shell around me. The necessary
words flowed forth from my blood and my mind together, words I had been born
with that were inscribed too in the book of Id. The words flowed from my mind
and my blood to my hand, and out my sword, and formed a shimmering barrier around
me. It would let nothing in, but allow us to send out spells and
dragonfire
.

Around me, the other riders made shields. Dragons
were casting spells for the riders who knew no magic. Soon, I thought, all
riders will be mages.
You dragons have so much to teach us.

Yesenia
spat fire.
First
we will teach you our art of battle. Prepare to attack! We will sweep by the
attackers on the outside on the way to the
frujen
,
then fly inside the wall to confront them there. From there we will send them
back to their hell.
Riderless
.

Around us I heard sonic blasts and smelled
sulphur
as the dragons dived as one.

XVI

The sky had turned a dark red, the
color of dried blood. Foul magic that I did not even want to understand.
Something was sucking away all the light and life around us. Something evil and
old and rotten from the inside out. Something we could not hope to kill,
because it was already dead. My stomach turned, and then something snapped.

I forgot my disgust for killing. I forgot my love
for life. Surging up in my blood came battle lust. I was so entwined with the
consciousness of Carolina and
Yesenia
that I could
not tell if these were my thoughts or theirs.

Into the melee we flew.

Below us a team of giant trolls were arming a
giant hammer to hit the wall. One of the dragons beside me let out a sonic roar
and the hammer split asunder, blasting the trolls away on both sides. There
were ladders up the wall. I set off a volley of spells.
Liessen
!
Zuruck
.
Zerbrechen
!
Several
ladders fell down, several flew back, and several broke into bits. One ladder
in the middle remained.
Yesenia
let out a roar of
fire and I added a word.
Brennen
.
The
ladder and its kobolds burst into flame.

Up and over the wall, Anders, we need you now!
The sky is black with them. We have torches and fires set, but still they
freeze us and pollute our city with their taint.

It was
Jona
.

And my parents?

They are safe for the moment. But you must
hurry.

I could feel the distress of all the people inside
the city. There was still life and hope here, but there was fear too. And fear
was growing while hope and life were being sucked out. Above us the sky grew
steadily darker. What the people needed here, I realized, was new hope.

WE COME.

Yesenia
sailed up over
the wall, and her brothers and sisters flew beside and behind and over her.

We flew into the darkness.

I spoke words of power.
Lebensfreude
!
Licht
!
Hoffnung
!
From
the edge of my drawn sword light pierced the darkness, like a beacon. Into the
death and despair and darkness we rode, Carolina,
Yesenia
and I, bringing hope and love of life and light again to the forgotten city.

We were not alone. Beside me in the darkness shone
forth
Woltan’s
blade, and Kara’s sword, and the staff
of
Arboris
was a great beacon in the artificial
night. The dragons shone like suns with light that was both magical and
natural: natural living light to combat this chemical darkness of death.

In front of me rose a ghoulish rider on a
frujen
, undead riding the undead, and he hissed a word
through yellow dried and dead lips:
Herr.
Without a further word I smote
him with my sword, and the sword cut through the ghoul like butter, and through
the
frujen
like smoke, and the ghoul fell apart, and
the
frujen
,
riderless
,
vanished.

Yesenia
spat fire at
another rider, and it burst into red flames.
They do not want to be here,
and take their own leave. They fear dragons above all else. Destroy the undead
riders and we will be rid of their demon steeds.

But there were too many of them. The foul dark
air, even with our blazing swords and the fire of the dragons, grew colder and
colder. I clenched my teeth to keep them from chattering as I swung my sword
and spat out from it a word of power.
Zuruck
!

A line of green power ran out from my blade and
cut through the
frujen
and their undead riders. I had
acted without thinking, trying to send the massing dark forces around me back
away from me, but many of them vanished, and the others became faint and
indistinct.
You’ve sent them back to their plane, Anders!

But more
frujen
fell in
to fill the patch of light that I had created.
We must act together, and
send a great patch of them back. Somewhere there is a rift where they are
entering, and we must seal it too.

I felt
Woltan
and Elias,
fleetingly on the edge of my mind.
We will find the rift, Anders. You and
Kara and Ulrike and the rest must send them back.

But they were closing in on us from all sides.
Don’t
let them touch you.
I remembered what
Yesenia
and
Carolina had told me, and thought my shield was solid.

But then a Rider swooped down on me, pushed at my
shield and stuck his dead arm through.

Your magic protects you against the living,
rider. Feel the kiss of the dead.

Its shriveled head pushed through my magical
shield, its dry yellow lips pursed.
Zuruck
!
I screamed with my sword, and the sword cleaved head and arm from body as
the rest of the rider and steed became transparent and then vanished.

But it had taken longer for the spell to work this
time, and around me the dark air grew even colder.
They are becoming
resistant, or we are weakening.

Carolina moved my blade for me, knocking new
frujen
away.
They are growing stronger. The colder it
gets, the more the sun is blocked out, the stronger they become. The more that
come through, the more they can block out the sun and freeze us all. Our only
hope is that
Woltan
and Elias close the barrier.
Jona
is with them, helping from the ground, but she is
weak.

I spoke another spell. I dug down deep in myself,
felt the energy of the forest around the forgotten city, of the trees and shrubs
within.
Sonnenlicht
!
Lebenslust
!
I swung my sword around, and the spell burst forth from it, life and light
and sunshine and heat, and
dragonfire
burst from
Yesenia’s
mouth as she turned as well. I felt the freezing
despair melt around me, felt the undead riders shield their eyes and the
frujen
turn away, blinded.

Carolina spoke to us then.
To Elias and
Jona
and
Woltan
now,
Yesenia
. They cannot fight off the attackers and close the
rift at the same time. They must be defended.

With blazing sunlight and burning
dragonfire
, we clove our way through the mass of
frujen
.
Herr
, their minds whispered at me. But they
drew back or were burned away or cloven asunder as we moved forward. Still it
was slow going.
Yesenia
could barely fly, for fear of
touching one of the foul things.

I twisted around in my harness. One of the
frujen
was about to bite at her tail.
Zuruck
!
The
frujen
was blasted back and faded into
nothingness.

We could not go on this way.

We were surrounded, and no further to helping
Woltan
and Elias than we had been five minutes ago.

There had to be some way to protect us all, to
make my shield meaningful. It needed to be hot, and bright, and burn away cold
dead attackers. Finally, it hit me.

Sonne
!
I
spoke the word of power through my whole body, through
Yesenia
and through my sword, willing the spell to be all around us, in a circle: and
we were surrounded by a globe of burning natural light and heat.

Quick, now,
Yesenia
,
I do not know how long I can keep this spell up!

Forward she flew, through the attackers, and they
burned away or shrank from our approach. I reached around for more energy and
felt energy from the trees and the sun itself flow into me and out around me,
burning the black swarm away. I pulled more from the sun, and felt a connection
form. A burning band of solar energy reached up from my magical sun to the real
sun far above, burning through the
frujen
grouped
above us.

The energy flowed through me and I was sweating
now. The chill that had frozen me to my bones was gone. I pulled more energy
and made the sun bigger, greater. Moving out, warming my friends and burning
away or driving away my enemies. A growing ball of natural fire, so bright it
was blinding, shone from all around me and my steed.

Up we flew into the center of the black swarm,
burning them away. I pulled more, and the sun expanded, until we were a great
burning globe of fire, in the middle of the sky – burning away the unnatural
frozen night that the
frujen
had created. Slowly the
unnaturally dark cold sky brightened into a natural hot summer day. We fell
upon the remaining enemies, as we made for Elias and
Woltan
,
who had flown high up in the air to find the rift.

And they had found it, and were flying in front of
it, shielding themselves too from the
frujen
who were
still moving through it. They had closed it half-way, and the
frujen
were struggling now to get out.

We flew closer to the gateway, and our heat came
with us, our sun met the cold that rushed through the gateway. I pushed and
pulled with the heat of the sun above us and pushed it toward the gateway. A
funnel of liquid fire ran from my hand and
Yesenia’s
mouth, meeting in the cut in the air through which a
frujen
was emerging, a rider on its back. The
frujen
was
covered with flames.

The
frujen
pulled back,
and disappeared.

Now, Elias,
Woltan
!
We can’t hold them much longer.

Together then. One Two Three.

SCHLIESSEN.

The rift got instantly smaller but refused to
close … the poison remained in the air, the shrinking hole was a wound that
would not heal, with cold fetid air escaping through it. I pulled from the
grass beneath us, from the trees, from the tree people who fought far below,
and from the city itself. To the poison and infection I sent healing green
energy.
Schliessen
.
The cut in the sky
narrowed until it was no more than a red scar. But still it would not heal, and
I knew any moment the wound would, could reopen and let out more pollution. I
needed one last spell.
Heilen
.
With the
last word, the red cut in the sky, from which so much death and destruction had
been birthed into this world in such a short time was healed.

The rift was closed.

Below, the battle raged. Around me, the remaining
frujen
regrouped. One of them, I noticed, was bigger than
the others. And atop it was not a dead man, but a human rider.

How could I have ignored his presence? It must
have been cloaked by all the death and cold around me, all the other
frujen
and their dead riders.

Gerard
.

He did not look happy. Covered in leather, almost
unrecognizable, he held his staff high.

Nacht
!

I did not hear the word; I saw it in his aura.

I pulled more energy in, and diverted it towards
Gerard.
Tag!

I did not even have to look at Gerard to know his
spell had been thwarted. I could feel his rage.

Carolina impinged on my consciousness than.
Careful,
Anders. You may think you have surpassed him, but you haven’t. He is more evil
and dangerous than he appears. Watch out.
 
Maybe I should have listened to her. But
around us the second sun burned on. I felt like some kind of deity, on top of a
dragon in the middle of it, feeling all the energy course through me. Perhaps
Carolina was right, but it felt glorious. Surrounded by this second sun fed by
the energy of the sun high above me, I felt invulnerable, filled with the
energy that coursed through me as my dragon beat its wings high up in the air.

Somewhere nearby, someone very close to me
screamed.

I felt and heard it over the sound of the battle.
It ran up and down my spine, as cold as the dead
frujen
and their riders gathered above the forgotten city.

Karsten
.

A great mass of the
frujen
were attacking my friend from behind, grabbing him with their foul stinking
hands. Before we could react, they pulled him off his mount. Octavia swung
around – I could feel her confusion, afraid as she was to spit fire for fear of
burning him. Elias spun towards them, flying into the mass,
Esmerelda
burning them away. But then he too was engulfed. Elias, too…I could feel his
pain; the poison was deep within him, burning at him, cold icy death taint. And
my friend
Karsten
would bake no more bread.

Gerard laughed. Later I would remember the
screams, and that laugh.

An alien dragon intelligence touched my mind then.
It was
Esmerelda
, contacting me directly.
I must
bring Elias down, Anders, he cannot stay on
dragonback
.
I will come back to fight without him.

After the shock I felt at last a rage well up in
me that knew no bound. From Octavia too came a wailing scream. The last barrier
between my blood and brain broke down then, the last barrier between my sword
and the pixie within, between my blood and Octavia and
Yesenia
beneath me – we all became one in rage. I reached up and grabbed at the sun and
sent it smashing down at Gerard, and I watched him burn: there was a look of
panic on his face, but then with a twist of his staff he was gone.