17
Malea was worried. Even as she scurried up the slope with the other members of the strike team, she looked for Kurt, but she couldn’t find him. Where is he?
Above, the sky began to stir as an unnatural wind picked up from out of nowhere. A shimmer of light shone from over the ridge, and a rumble of sound came from beyond. The dragons were coming.
But where was Kurt?
Malea began to turn, but the Captain caught her by the arm. Malea met the older woman’s eyes and read sorrow and steadfastness in her more experienced gaze. She knew something.
“He went to disable the crossbows that were already armed,” the Captain told her quietly.
“No!” Malea sobbed on an agonized whisper of sound. She tried to break free of the other woman’s hold and run back the way they’d come, but Nariel wasn’t letting her go.
“There’s nothing you can do. He chose this to save the lives of the dragons. And I don’t know what it’s worth, but the virkin went with him.” The Captain shrugged her shoulders.
“They did?” A glimmer of hope formed in Malea’s mind. Surely Arch and Keera wouldn’t let Kurt die, even on so noble a mission?
“Come on. We don’t have much time. The dragons are here, and I suspect flames will commence any moment.” The Captain urged Malea to run farther uphill, and she followed as best she could, already reaching out mentally to her friend, Keera.
It wasn’t something she did often, but Malea had the ability to speak to her virkin friends as silently as they spoke to her.
Dragons too, though she only knew Salveer, Shera, and Shilayla well enough to do so.
It was considered an intimacy among close friends to speak in such a way, so she didn’t do it often.
“Keera? Please tell me Kurt is going to be all right,” she sent to her virkin friend, even as she scrambled up the slope.
“We’ll do our best for him,” Keera promised immediately. Her words were reassuring…in a way. In another, they left room for doubt.
“But you can’t protect him?” Malea shot back, worried.
“Not entirely. We have to keep the mage from striking too,” Keera reminded Malea.
Malea felt immediately chastised, though she knew her friend hadn’t meant it that way.
For such little beings, the virkin were being stretched really thin at the moment.
Malea didn’t know the full extent of their power or if what they were doing was at the edge of their abilities.
It probably was. The fact that they’d try to shield Kurt at all said more about their heart and the friendship they felt for him than anything else.
“I’m sorry. I know you’re doing your best,” Malea said softly, her heart breaking.
She was only just realizing that she loved Kurt. Truly loved him. If he died tonight, her heart would shatter and would probably never recover. Oh, dear Goddess! Protect him!
“We may have another way. Salveer comes. Can’t talk more. Must concentrate,” Keera said, surprising Malea as hope blossomed once more.
Malea left her little friend alone, marveling at how much the small virkin was taking on in this battle. A moment later, dragon wings flew close by overhead, causing a downdraft that knocked most of the strike team down to the ground.
Malea stayed where she’d fallen on her backside in the thin layer of snow, watching as an entire flight of dragons cleared the ridge and began flaming the perimeter of the mining camp. They ringed it in fire so that none could escape.
Harsh, but effective.
But Kurt was in the center of all that fire.
Malea’s heart leapt into her throat as she watched events unfold from afar and prayed as she had never prayed before.
At least a dozen massive ice dragons filled the night with fire and death, and she thought she caught sight of one lone man riding atop one of the smaller ice dragons.
She recognized them both. It was General Brighton and his bonded partner, the young ice dragon, Salveer. They circled far above, watching as the other dragons encircled the camp, then they dove, and Malea clutched at the ground, watching in fear and awe.
Kurt saw the flare of light through the heavy canvas of the tent as the first flames began.
They were far from his location at the moment, but he knew that wouldn’t last. Resigned, he fired the empty crossbows, then set about removing the pins.
He’d just finished when men rushed into the tent, but Kurt was smart enough to dive off the gimbal platform and duck under the tent’s canvas to let him out into the dark night that was coming alive in flame.
Red, yellow and orange raged all around the perimeter of the camp as dragons filled the sky.
Stealthy, mirror-scaled dragons that could hardly be seen.
Curses came from inside the tent as the soldiers realized their machines had been rendered useless, and Kurt did his best to escape in the confusion.
He ran with others, joining the groups of soldiers who were scurrying about, trying to get out of the way of the flames that were coming ever closer.
“Get to the clearing by the mage’s quarters,” Arch ordered in Kurt’s mind.
The virkin sounded tense and tired, but Kurt saw no reason to argue.
He was as trapped inside the circle of flame as the enemy, so whatever he did now would probably not make any difference.
Kurt redirected his path toward the center of the camp where they’d seen the mage disappear into a small building the night before.
The heat from the encircling flames pressed in from all sides, but Kurt moved with a soldier’s calm through the increasingly smoky ruin of the camp.
Ash swirled on the wind. A scream rang out to his left as someone was caught in the fire line, but Kurt didn’t stop.
He had one destination in mind—the mage’s quarters.
The virkin flew above him, silent and swift, gliding low over the tops of burning tents and half-collapsed supply sheds. Arch flew ahead to scout while Keera remained behind, her blue form darting through the smoke like a spirit of vengeance.
Kurt ducked under a charred crossbeam and emerged into a small, mostly untouched clearing at the center of the encampment.
A small building stood at its heart that was barely more than a glorified shack, but it had been reinforced, protected, and made important.
It was the mage’s domain, and the mage himself was standing in the open, wild-eyed and screaming.
“They’re mine! My blades! My brilliance!” the man shrieked at the sky, arms raised in a desperate clawing gesture as a trio of ice dragons roared overhead.
Blue-white flame licked the perimeter, and the mage flinched, then turned in circles, grasping at the air like it owed him an explanation.
Sparks caught in his greasy hair and burned out.
His robes were stained with soot and sweat.
He looked like a man unraveling—not from fear of death, but from the humiliation of watching his plans fall apart.
“I called them! Why won’t they come?” he raged. “Balreal promised me time! He swore. He swore!”
Nobody was listening to the man come apart, except Kurt. Everyone else was looking for ways out of the fire. Some were fleeing into the mine, but that wouldn’t save them. They’d just be sitting ducks in there when the fire came for them.
The mage spun on a passing soldier—one of the few still running through the chaos—and grabbed him by the tunic. “Fetch me an amplifier stone! A focus! Something! My power’s gone dead! I can’t—”
The soldier shoved him off and kept running.
Kurt kept to the shadows, watching with narrow eyes. The virkins’ suppression was clearly working. Whatever magic the mage usually wielded was silent now. He couldn’t do anything to save himself.
“Fools! You’re all fools!” the mage roared, staggering forward until he fell to his knees in the dirt. He clutched his own head, clawing at his scalp. “You’ve ruined it! You’ve all ruined it! They’ll take the glory from me! I was supposed to be the one to destroy the dragons!”
A dark shape passed overhead, casting a long shadow. Another dragon—just a bit smaller than the rest. Kurt didn’t need to see the rider to know. It was Salveer, and General Brighton was on his back.
Kurt rose from his crouch, stepping forward slowly as the mage knelt in the dirt and screamed at the heavens. He didn’t need to fight the mage. He just needed to let him watch everything he built turn to ash.
The air shifted and was suddenly a bit colder, somehow sharper, and charged with raw power.
Kurt turned instinctively, his heart pounding as the dragon’s shadow descended through the smoke and ash-choked sky.
Wings outstretched, claws gleaming like frozen steel, Salveer came back into view, his crystalline scales catching the firelight, making him shine red and gold as his entire body reflected what was happening around him.
Wind howled as the dragon swept low, circling once, then folding his wings in a controlled dive that shook the very earth.
He landed in the clearing with a thunderous crack, snow and cinders blasting outward in a storm of force.
The ground trembled beneath Kurt’s boots as the dragon’s weight settled, talons gouging furrows in the scorched earth.
Perched astride his back, battle-armored and commanding as ever, General Samnir Brighton rose to his full height, his hand on the hilt of his sword, his eyes locked on the pitiful figure of the mage crumpled before the dragon.
Still on his knees, still screaming—though now it was incoherent, panicked gibberish. He clawed at the ground, then tried to rise and run, but stumbled and fell again in the soot and debris.
“Kurt!” the General’s voice cut through the chaos like a blade. “Get up here. Now!”
Kurt sprinted forward without hesitation, vaulting over the scorched remains of a supply crate and reaching the dragon’s side in seconds.
Salveer crouched slightly, lowering one powerful foreleg to form a natural stair.
Kurt scrambled up, gripping the rough saddle straps behind the General as Salveer’s body coiled like a spring.
The mage screamed one last time as he looked up and saw the eyes of the ice dragon fixed on him.
“No! Wait! I can still— I have knowledge! You need me!”
“It’s not up to me,” the General replied in a somber tone. “Your crimes against the dragons have sealed your fate.”
Salveer’s head reared back, his nostrils glowing with inner fire as power built in his throat. The air grew momentarily cold, then cracked with pressure as brilliant blue-tinged flame erupted in a focused, devastating blast of heat. The mage didn’t even have time to scream.
Fire engulfed him. It was a heat so intense it killed almost instantly. The scream that might have come died without being voiced, and the mage’s body vanished in the blaze, reduced to ash, regret, and nothing more.
Salveer held the flame a moment longer, just to be sure. Then he exhaled, the fire dying down, smoke curling around them like ghostly fog. Silence fell, and Kurt tightened his grip, his chest rising with a heavy breath.
The General glanced back at him, grim but satisfied. “Justice,” he said, his voice barely audible above the crackle of dying flame.
Kurt nodded, his gaze fixed on the scorched circle below. “And vengeance.”
Salveer lifted off in a single powerful surge, wings beating the smoke aside as they rose into the night—leaving behind nothing but ruin, and the end of a very dark chapter.
Then, the crates began to explode. One after another, they blew up in a shattering of diamond fragments, wood splinters, and deadly metal shrapnel.