Chapter 15 Face-Off #2
The wind whistled past his ears. He heard the whump of wings flapping as fell past Raziel into the void.
He’d been so upset and emotional overall about what was to happen that he hadn’t had a chance to fear flying like this.
The ground was far below him. His arms and legs were stretched wide.
The wind was pushing his skin back from his lips and causing him to have to squint.
Gotta fly. Gotta fly. Gotta slow the hell down! Caden repeated to himself, trying to remember how he had flown up the mountain, but now there were no handy ledges or even, God forbid, Jasper Hawes to catch him.
He actually started flapping his arms as if they were wings.
He knew this was madness. He looked up towards where Raziel was flying away.
The Black Dragon Spirit did not even look back.
Raziel expected him to fly. Caden looked back down towards the fastly approaching earth. He started flapping again.
Fly. Fly. Fly. Fly. FLY!
And he started to slow and slow and slow until he was stationary. Levitating about 100-feet above the lip of the crater. Caden breathed in and out slowly. He’d made it. Well, he wasn’t falling anymore. That was something. Now he just had to get down. Maybe if he simply thought about it.
There was a roar.
It was so loud that the sound seemed to penetrate his bones.
Caden’s head snapped towards Raziel and the Behemoth.
Raziel had not made the sound. The Behemoth had.
And it had roared like that because Raziel had snuck up on it and struck.
One of its massive gray-green wings was now ragged and broken.
Part of it was in Raziel’s back claws. The Behemoth was earth-bound because of that.
Time for me to be earth-bound too. Now! Caden realized and started plummeting again.
But it was a controlled plummet. He swooped low and skimmed along the ground.
The joy of flying overcame his fear for a moment and he was able to just love the freedom of movement.
But he used it to follow the plan. He found a spot on the edge of the crater behind two large boulders.
He got behind them, levitating a few feet off the ground, so that he could peer over the top.
Lightning balls erupted from the Behemoth.
They burst when they reached several hundred feet above its heads.
The lightning formed a dome of electricity over the Behemoth.
Raziel soared above it. He sent a ball of fire, massive and glowing, but the moment it hit the sizzling electricity it broke apart, splattering magma that followed the curve of the dome.
Raziel didn’t stop though. It changed its strategy and hit the dome in one location with a steady stream of fire.
The dome began to crackle and thin there.
But this meant Raziel had to stay in one place.
And while Raziel’s blasts couldn’t get through the dome, the Behemoth’s could get out.
Water spouts turned into tornadoes by gusts of air rose up through the electricity dome.
Even as Raziel dodged four of them, one of them caught the tip of Raziel’s left wing.
That was enough to capture the Black Dragon Spirit though and Raziel let out a cry as its wing was wrenched in the opposite direction of its body.
Caden’s fingertips dug into the stone as he clenched his teeth as he watched it.
He wanted to scream out. But no, that would not do any good.
Raziel is strong. Raziel is brave. Raziel will kick the Behemoth’s ass.
Raziel managed to get out of the water tornado, but the one wing was clearly injured and the Black Dragon Spirit was gliding in a spiral that was going nearer and nearer to the electric dome that the Behemoth kept up with the electric bursts.
Raziel flapped harder to soar higher, but it was clearly not able to keep to that higher height.
Instead, Raziel would start to spiral back down again before it struggled up once more.
It blasted fire at the dome, but it was unable to stay in one place to weaken it enough.
And the Behemoth could keep strengthening it because the one head’s only duty was to keep that dome up.
The Behemoth doesn’t want Raziel getting anywhere near it! If it hadn’t turned at that last moment, I think Raziel would have had its main head and not its wing during that first pass. Dammit!
Caden searched for the forlorn white head. Was Iolaire responding to any of this? Did Iolaire know it was Raziel fighting to free it? But the electricity dome obscured his view and he could see nothing.
He closed his eyes again and fiercely felt for Iolaire this time.
The light from the fireworks show that the two Dragons were giving off was the only thing he saw behind his eyelids though.
He dug his fingernails into the stone again.
He was not giving up. The connection was still there!
Raziel told him it was! If it wasn’t then Iolaire was truly gone.
But no, no, NO! That could not be! He would not let it be!
Iolaire? Iolaire, can you hear me? It’s Caden, he felt immediately stupid for saying that.
Iolaire would know him anywhere. But maybe just saying both their names could somehow breach through the control that the Behemoth had over Iolaire.
C’mon, baby, c’mon, Iolaire. Listen to me. Listen to my voice.
He thought he heard the softest twitter.
IOLAIRE?! Caden’s voice grew louder and his body tensed.
There was a soft twitter as if Iolaire didn’t believe it was really hearing Caden, but just imagining him.
Iolaire, it’s me! Caden cried. It’s me! I’m here! We’re here to save you! You’ve got to fight! You’ve got to--
There was another terrible roar. Caden’s eyelids flew open.
A geyser of acid burst through the top of the dome like some kind of apocalyptic fountain.
Raziel was struggling to get higher from the dome at this point, but that left wing was ripped and wasn’t working right.
So when the acid rose, Raziel avoided the first geyser and the second, but then wind turned the acid into a tornado just like the water had.
This time it was the right wing that was hit.
The acid ate through the delicate webbing and Raziel let out another roar.
NO! Caden cried.
He reached for Raziel as if he could truly catch the Dragon.
His lips parted in horror. Raziel was falling.
No, not falling. Its wings curled against its back almost uselessly as Raziel didn’t try to fly away, but headed down, like a rocket, towards the dome.
Fire bloomed in front of Raziel, weakening the dome, as it crashed right through it.
There was an explosion that had Caden lifting up his right forearm to shield his eyes.
He shut his eyelids tightly, but the light still managed to seep in around the edges.
When he dared to lower his arm and open his eyelids, there were still black spots floating there, eliminating part of the scene before him. He strained to see Raziel. He expected to see the Black Dragon Spirit grappling with the Behemoth, but that was not what he saw.
Raziel lay crumpled on the ground. Broken black wings. Still tail. Massive head with eyes closed.
Caden’s mouth opened to let out a scream, but nothing came out.
The Behemoth rose up behind Raziel’s still form.
Its heads were all staring down at the prone figure of the great Black Dragon Spirit.
The Behemoth poked Raziel with one of its huge foreclaws.
The largest head, the Behemoth itself, tilted to the side.
And Caden swore it smiled.
All of the heads reared back then, all except the white one and the ruby one.
They were both limp. Caden felt his soul wanting to separate from the body he didn’t have.
Fire crackled in one mouth. Acid bubbled in another.
Electricity sizzled in a third. Pure, seething light burned in a fourth. And on and on it went.
Not even Raziel could take the force of all of that.
The other Dragons are not here to distract the Behemoth, to take the blows. That’s how this worked last time. The Dragons were all needed together. Now, Raziel needs that distraction. Right now.
Caden didn’t think. He simply rose up into the air and flew straight towards the Behemoth. He was so small and insignificant that the Behemoth didn’t even notice him. Not until Caden spoke.
“Hey, Behemoth, you bastard,” Caden hissed. “Pick on someone your own size. Pick on me.”