79. The Lion and The Dragon
Chapter 79
The Lion and The Dragon
22 nd Day of the Blood Moon
Firnin Mountains – Winter, Year 3081 After Doom
Rist and the others were about halfway up the mountain by the time the sun had joined the red moon in the sky. The mages of the First Army had set out in the middle of the night, divided into ten groups of ten. Each led a contingent of five hundred soldiers along narrow mountain paths discovered by Taya Tambrel’s scouts the day before. Four of the Chosen had also joined Rist’s contingent.
The mages of the other armies remained with the bulk of the force for the main assault that had begun at daybreak.
It was Garramon’s plan. Taya Tambrel had discovered the main track on the first day, but the path was long and treacherous and the rebels were heavily dug in. With an army of forty thousand and near six hundred Battlemages, the rebel outpost would fall. But a full-frontal assault alone would take heavy casualties. However, if enough mages could find a way inside the mountain while the rebels were focused on the main assault, the rebels would be caught in a pincer and the battle would end swiftly.
It was a plan Rist agreed with. Pincer movements were among the most effective battle stratagems in history and often resulted in a dramatic reduction in the loss of life – at least from the attacking side. Sumara Tuzan’s works spoke of them extensively. Besides, it was the defensive fortification of the mountain that made the assault so costly. If that factor was removed, more men and women would live to see another day – live to see their families again.
A gasp from behind him pulled Rist from his ponderings and he stuck out his hand by instinct. He grabbed hold of Samala’s belt and had to dig his heels into the ground to stop the both of them from tumbling over the cliff edge. Dirt and rocks dropped over the edge, bouncing off the mountainside as they fell.
When he was sure his feet were stable, Rist leaned back to balance Samala’s weight and tugged her away from the ledge.
“Thank you,” she said, a tremble in her voice, her hands shaking before her. “I… my mind was elsewhere.”
“Keep moving,” Magnus called back.
“Don’t look down,” Rist said to Samala. “And if the path gets too narrow, turn your hips towards the mountain to keep your weight balanced. It’s what goats do.”
She looked at him as though he had two heads but thanked him again before he turned and continued on. He didn’t know the woman well. She had seen five or six summers more than he had and had been drafted in from the Circle after the Battle of the Three Sisters. But he’d learned her name – as he had for every mage in the First Army. That was a promise he’d made to himself after Ilnaen, and he’d kept it. Of the nine that climbed with him, he only truly trusted Garramon, Magnus, and Neera, but at least he knew all their names.
“That hand was dangerously close to her arse,” Neera whispered, dropping back to Rist, her eyes narrowing.
Rist knew it was a trap. It was always a trap. And yet, he had no idea how to avoid it. “Would you rather I let her fall?”
“Yes.” Neera said nothing else. She simply turned to look back up the steep narrow path ahead to where Garramon, Magnus, and Yoric led the way, threads of Earth probing at the rock for any concealed entrances or hollow points.
Rist drew a long breath and let it out in a sigh. His father’s words that women were ‘equal parts confusing, irritating, and completely unavoidable’ had made more and more sense the longer Rist had known Neera.
As they climbed, he looked out at the landscape beyond. The army was spread out in columns near the main path. The assault was already underway, but the bulk of the army stood in reserve as the path was only wide enough for five or six to walk abreast.
He had spent most of the night as they’d climbed thinking about the men and women who marched at the head of the army – those who walked the path first. No matter what he or anyone else did, those soldiers would be dead before the next sun. There was no path where that did not happen. They would face the full force of the rebel defences, and they would be cut down, only so that those behind them might push further and in turn be cut down, and so on and so forth.
“Magnus?” Rist whispered.
The man looked back at Rist with a raised eyebrow.
“The soldiers who led the assault.”
“What of them?” Magnus asked.
“Did they know their only purpose was to die?”
“Fuck, lad. Do you ever ask a simple question?” Magnus frowned, then let out a long sigh. “Is this what bounces around in that head of yours when your lips aren’t moving?”
Rist looked down at the ground, then back at the soldiers who walked behind him, careful to keep his voice low. “They’re dead now. The assault would have begun a few hours ago. Surely, they had known their fate before they marched?”
Magnus puffed out his cheeks then ran his hand down his face, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Aye. They are, The Saviour’s light upon them.”
“But… why?” It was something Rist couldn’t quite wrap his head around.
“A sense of honour,” he suggested, though his eyes betrayed him. “Or more likely wilful ignorance. War is death. There is no escaping it.”
“But why not wait? If we cut them off, eventually they will need food and supplies. We could take the outpost without any losses.” Even as Rist spoke, his mind travelled back to what he had seen in the camps outside Berona, of the sick and the injured and the hungry, and of how cruel and hopeless it had all felt. And there he was, suggesting they do the same, or worse, to the souls within that mountain.
“Time,” Magnus answered. “We have no idea what kind of stores they have in there, and we don’t have weeks or months to wait. The emperor wants this place dealt with so we can focus on the Uraks and the elves. So, we do what must be done.”
“But what?—”
“Quiet,” Garramon snapped in a hushed whisper.
“What is it?” As Magnus spoke, Rist heard something: the sound of dirt grinding beneath feet, of gently rustling leaves.
He barely had the time to take a breath before an arrow punched into Yoric’s eye and the man went tumbling down the cliffside. Shouts erupted behind him, more bodies falling.
Neera threw herself across Rist and shrouded them both in threads of Air, creating a physical ward around them.
Rist glanced to the side, only to see an arrow ricochet off her ward and lodge itself into Samala’s neck. The woman already had two in her leg and one in her chest, but her eyes rolled with the last one, and she collapsed, blood spilling from her open mouth. His heart raced as he stared into her dead, white eyes.
One of the other mages, Dremaine, was huddled behind a rock, an arrow jutting from just below his kneecap, soldiers both dead and alive all around him. And Rist thought he could see Yanda’s body, along with a few others, tangled in the gnarled roots of a tree that grew from the mountainside over the cliff edge. The rest of the mages had raised their shields of Air in time to avoid injury. But they had lost scores of soldiers.
“Bastards,” Magnus growled, threads of Air swirling around him. “Well, they know we’re here now, and it looks like this path definitely leads somewhere. Find cover and engage!”
The man spun on his heels and launched streaks of lightning towards a cliff edge that twisted about the one upon which they stood. The rocks exploded in a cloud of dust, and three rebels fell from the ledge, the path they had stood on collapsing with them.
Rist pulled Neera down to the closest patch of boulders and opened himself to the Spark.
“Where are they?” Kalder, a mage who had been with the army since Rist had first met Magnus, shouted from some fifty feet down the path, back pressed to a tree.
“A score on the higher ledge to the right,” Magnus answered. “More to the left, hiding in that bush. And a few more too, I’d guess. Rist, Neera, dragon’s maw on the upper ledge. Keep them down. Hopefully cook them for dinner. Kalder, Lakrin. You do the same to those in the bush. Garramon and I will pick off whoever escapes. The rest of you, keep your heads down!”
“What about me?” Dremaine called out from behind his rock, his fingers pressing down around the arrow in his knee.
“Oh, Dremaine, you’re alive? Great. Keep us from being killed, would you? On my mark. Three, two, one. Mark!”
Rist pulled threads of Fire and Air into his body, weaving them together as he rose from behind the rock. Neera followed him, her threads intertwining with his. He unleashed the threads, and a pillar of fire roared upwards to the ledge. Screams sounded, and blazing bodies plummeted into the open chasm below, bouncing off the cliffside as they fell. One body was impaled on a jagged peak, the rock bursting through his spine.
Rist stared down at the body, watching as the muscles and tendons snapped from the pressure and it ripped in half, both pieces tumbling out of sight. He did that. He killed that man, just as he had those people in Berona. And how many more would he kill before this day was over… in the name of what?
“Rist!” Neera grabbed his hand and squeezed. “I need you.”
Rist snapped his focus back, realising his threads of Fire and Air had all but faded and the surviving rebel soldiers were nocking arrows and loosing.
He plucked another thread of Air from his mind just in time to redirect a hail of arrows meant for Neera and himself. This time he made certain to send them down the mountainside, unable to stop himself glancing at Samala’s lifeless body, the arrow jutting from her neck.
Threads of Earth and Spirit whipped past Rist’s face, and a chorus of screams filled the air as Garramon ripped the rock out from under the rebels’ feet and sent them all into Heraya’s embrace.
For a while, the only sound Rist could hear was the crashing of rocks as they cascaded down. A tense silence followed, broken only by the flames that crackled on nearby trees and bushes.
“Count?” Magnus called out.
A momentary silence was followed by Kalder’s voice. “Six mages still breathing. Dremaine took an arrow to the neck. At least eighty soldiers dead.”
“Fuck.” Magnus tugged at the strap of his helmet. “These bastards are smarter than we gave them credit for.” He drew a long breath, exhaling sharply. “All right. Rist, Neera, eyes open. Anything moves, kill it. After that racket, any element of surprise is well and truly gone. Don’t fuck around. Bring the mountain down over them if you have to. The rest of you, prepare wards. Move out!”
They’d not been walking long when horns bellowed from the plains below, signalling the second phase of the assault.
“Pick up the pace, you sack of arse-licking donkeys,” Magnus roared, raising a hand in the air. “I’ll not have it said that we sucked each other’s toes on the side of this fucking mountain while the rest of those bastards won all the glory.”
“Sucked each other’s toes?” Rist asked, sweat slicking his forehead, his helmet sliding as he tried to keep pace with Magnus.
“Don’t question it, lad. It was the first thing that came to my mind.” He twisted his head around and glared at Garramon, raising a finger. “Don’t say a fucking word.”
Rist fell into a rhythm, each step drumming up his legs, his muscles burning under the weight of his armour. Had he done this a year ago, he’d probably have keeled over long before the sun rose, his stomach emptied in the dirt. But he was stronger now, harder. All those steps Garramon had made him climb had been for a reason after all.
Out of the corner of his eye, Rist spotted something drifting between the clouds. He watched for a few moments, wondering if it had been a trick of the mind, but then he saw it again – like a shadow, barely visible. He stopped.
“What is it, lad?” Magnus called.
Rist tilted his head to the side, following the shape as it twisted in the sea of white above.
“Rist?” Garramon stepped into Rist’s periphery.
“Dragon,” Rist answered.
“What? Where?” The man followed his line of sight. “Are you sure?”
Rist pointed towards a gap in the clouds, judging the creature’s trajectory. A moment later, something flashed across the sliver of blue sky before vanishing again.
“I think you might…” Garramon dropped his sentence short when a dragon covered in blue scales broke through the bottom of the cloud bank and roared before sweeping back upwards into the cover of the sky.
“I thought you said we wouldn’t have the Dragonguard for this assault?” Magnus asked. Fear was not something Rist associated with Magnus. Fear, shame, nor the ability to say no to whiskey. But there was fear in his voice in that moment.
“We don’t.” Garramon stared up at the sky, his eyes narrowing. “Eltoar and the others are watching over Elkenrim and Merchant’s Reach.”
“Seleraine has blue scales,” Magnus posed.
“She doesn’t have red wings.”
“Elves?”
Garramon shook his head. “I don’t know. But it matters little.”
As though responding to Garramon’s words, the blue dragon burst through the clouds again, but this time it was followed by a second. A third creature followed, smaller than the others, its scales as pale as the clouds.
Murmurs spread through the soldiers and mages as the dragons wheeled around each other, soaring across the sky towards the columns of the Lorian armies below. Those murmurs soon became gasps when the creatures plummeted. Gasps turned to utter silence as two of the dragons dropped low and unleashed rivers of dragonfire down over the men and women on the plains below. The third swooped and tore bloody paths through the columns before lifting into the air once more.
Not a word was spoken as they all stood and watched, helpless. Streaks of lightning tore upwards, shards of stone and spears of ice. In pockets, dragonfire washed over massive wards like water breaking over spheres of glass. Rist could feel the power of it all thrumming in the air. But the dragons were too fast, and the Draleid on their backs sliced through the Lorian threads with Spirit, fire pouring from their hands.
The smallest dragon soared from right to left and carved a path of fire through an entire column of soldiers.
There was something surreal about watching the devastation from so far away and yet seeing it so clearly. From above, with the wind whistling in his ears, everything seemed almost… calm. It was as though time moved more slowly. But even though he couldn’t see the men and women thrashing about and burning, throwing themselves into the dirt, the skin peeling from their bones, he could still see it in his mind. His memories flashed back to the Battle of the Three Sisters. He could hear the screams of those around him as they were burned alive, see the incandescent light of the dragonfire as it raked through the army like the blade of a god.
“We need to move.” Garramon’s voice pulled Rist from his memories. “We need to get inside the mountain.”
“What about them?” Rist hadn’t intended for his voice to sound as sharp as it did, but neither did he apologise for it.
“There’s nothing we can do for them up here.”
“They’re just dying down there, Garramon. We can’t leave them.”
Garramon grabbed Rist’s shoulder. “The fighting would be long over by the time we got down. The Battlemages will hold the dragons off while the army gets inside the mountain. The rock is their best shield. Taya knows what she’s doing.”
“You need to have faith, lad,” Magnus said. “Sometimes faith is the only armour we have.” He motioned Rist on. “The Saviour will watch over them.”
“I’ve never seen a god watch over anyone,” Rist said, turning his gaze back to the battle below. He’d intended for the words to stay within the boundaries of his own mind, but his lips had stolen them.
Magnus’s eyes sharpened for a moment, but he just nodded and turned. “Keep moving. We help them down there by killing everything inside. Go.”
Coren pressed her back against the rock, arrows clattering off the mountainside above. Threads of each elemental strand swirled in the air around her as the Lorian mages laid siege to Tarhelm’s main gates.
She drew a breath, then slipped an arrow from the bucket at her side and nocked it. She shifted to look over the ledge, found a black cloak, and loosed. The man dropped like a sack of stones. Coren repeated the motion, scanning the swell of bodies below, following the threads of the Spark to their sources.
For every arrow that found its mark, another ten were plucked from the air or set ablaze by threads of Fire. The main path from the gates to the plains below was inked with black Lorian leather, their number stretching outwards to the sea of tents beyond. The bodies had piled so high the Lorians had started to toss them back down the mountain just to find space to move.
At first she had wondered why they’d sent so many to simply die while beating themselves uselessly against the gates. Then she’d seen the shoddy, patched armour and the weary faces and understood they’d sent the auxiliaries first, those drawn from the refugees and citizens of Berona. The mages hadn’t even arrived until a few thousand had been sent to Heraya’s embrace.
A tremor swept through the rock, and Coren dropped back down behind the ledge, the vibrations sweeping through her. She could feel the power of the Spark pulsing in the air as the Lorian mages smashed threads of Air into the gates below and tried to crumble the rock with threads of Earth, all while the battering ram smashed at the wood unceasingly.
The only thing stopping the gates from caving in at the Spark’s touch was Farwen and the ten mages who stood with her on the other side slicing through Lorian threads. And the only reason they stood a chance at all was because the Lorians were keeping most of their Battlemages in reserve – something Coren was well aware of. It had been clear for centuries how much higher the Lorians valued the life of a mage over that of the common people.
The power of the Spark pulsed below, and threads of Earth pushed into the ledge upon which Coren and the others stood. She opened herself to the Spark and fortified the ground with Earth while Tahro, one of the three other mages not holding the gates, sliced at the Lorian threads.
Another pulse of the Spark sent a tingle down Coren’s spine, and arcs of lightning smashed through the ledge to her left.
A handful of rebels who had been hunkered behind the ledge were torn to pieces, shards of rock slicing through flesh and crushing limbs, while others were ripped apart by the lightning, the smell of burning flesh filling the air.
“We can’t hold them here forever!” Varik shouted, scuttling over to Coren on all fours, pausing only briefly at the sight of a torso severed across the chest, the heart hanging from the open cavity, blood pumping.
Streams of blood flowed through the matted dirt on Varik’s face. Almost three hundred souls were spread about the ledges that overlooked the main path, raining death from above. There had been over five hundred when they had begun.
“No,” Coren answered. “But as long as Farwen can hold the gates together, we will do what we must. Understood?”
Varik gave a sharp nod and his lips moved, but the sound was drowned out by a monstrous roar.
Every hair on Coren’s body stood on end, and she twisted, leveraging the rock behind her and staring up at the sky.
“He came.” The tone in Varik’s voice was equal parts relief and awe.
It can’t be .
The awe within Coren however was not that Calen Bryer had answered her call, but that the dragon she saw above was not white. She knew Varthear instantly. The dragon’s soulkin, Ilmirín, had been a close friend of Coren’s master. And it had broken Coren’s heart to watch Varthear sit about Alura’s eyrie, the light gone from her eyes.
But this Varthear was all fury and power, her vermillion wings like streaks of blood against the clouds. This was the Varthear of old. Most astonishing of all though: she was here. She had left the Eyrie. Coren hadn’t thought that possible.
The dragon lifted into the clouds once more before re-emerging only a few moments later. This time, Varthear was not alone.
And once more, Coren had more questions than answers. The clouds swirled around Avandeer’s body as she dropped in the open sky above Varthear. Barely a few seconds later, a smaller dragon, white as the winter snow, streaked from the cloud cover, wings folded.
The white dragon unfurled a massive pair of black-veined wings and swooped forwards, its roar rippling across the sky.
“The white dragon!” a voice called out from somewhere on the ledge. “The Warden!”
More voices answered. “The Warden of Varyn! He’s come!”
A cheer rose, steel clattering against rock. And as the cheers rose, the dragons dove. Avandeer and Valerys plummeted before unfurling their wings as a pair and raining fire down upon the Lorian army that waited in the plains below.
A rumble sounded in the back of her mind, a deep powerful thing that once more set her hairs on end. It was equal parts pride, joy, and rage.
Not yet . Coren drew a deep breath, settling herself. Not yet.
A roar of defiance echoed.
Horns bellowed from the Lorian forces below. It didn’t take much for Coren to know what they meant: break through at all costs. The mountain would be the Lorians’ only safe haven now.
She opened herself to the Spark and pulled in threads of Fire, Spirit, and Air. She roared, “Tahro, Makri, Ulyira – Eldingstír!”
Coren focused her threads forwards, feeling those of the other mages join hers. She was the conduit. With a breath, she let go, watching as the threads of Air crashed into the Lorian forces below, lifting soldiers from their feet, shattering legs, sending shards of broken stone slicing through the flesh as easily as steel.
The Lorian Battlemages were not used to facing others who could wield the Spark. In their eyes, there was nothing that could stand against them. The Circle taught them to kill, to destroy, and to crush everything in their path – and it taught them that such was their birthright.
But the Circle never taught them to face a Draleid, and a lion was not the predator when a dragon spread its wings.
Aldryn roared in the back of Coren’s mind, defiant and furious. She pushed their power into the threads of Fire and Spirit, and arcs of chain lightning streaked from her hands and ripped the Lorian ranks to pieces.
As the other mages joined their threads to hers and the Spark wrought death and destruction below, a sharp, high-pitched horn shrieked from within the mountain, and her heart sank. Around her, faces paled.
The Lorians had found a way inside.
Coren looked out at the Lorian army that stretched down the mountain path and out to the plains, streaks of fire carving through the battlefield below. She turned back to the passage behind her, drew a short breath, then exhaled sharply. “Varik!”
The man loosed an arrow, then pressed himself to the rock beside Coren. He knew what she was going to say. There were no choices here. It didn’t matter how long they held the gates if the Lorians got in behind them. They would be butchered. “Go,” Varik said, his voice sombre. “We’ll hold them here as long as we can.”
“No. We go together. Farwen can hold the gates for a while longer. We need to secure whatever breach they have made and burn them from our home.”
Varik smiled and rested a hand on Coren’s shoulder. “It has been the greatest honour of my life standing beside you and Farwen in this war.” He squeezed. “We will give you as much time as we can. Go. You’ll owe me more than one bottle of rum after this.”
Coren grasped Varik’s forearm. “Give them fire and fury.”
Varik nodded. “Wouldn’t dream of anything else. Now go. If the gates fall, we’ll collapse the rock and retreat to the sally port. Hopefully that Draleid clears the way.”
Coren turned and sprinted towards the passage in the rock, calling out to Tahro as she did. He was young, and they’d found him before the empire could. His connection to the Spark was strong. He could hold them back for a time.
As she descended into the mountain and the rock swallowed her, she listened to the beating of her heart and pulled Aldryn’s mind to hers.
It is time, my heart. Come.
She could feel the dirt sliding around Aldryn’s talons, the rock scraping beneath. With a mighty roar, the great dragon lifted himself from the mountain eyrie that had been his fortress of solitude for so long. The time had finally come, and he would greet it with the fury of all he had lost.