***
Tallin, now on watch, could hear men’s voices in the distance. “Duskeye! Wake up! Soldiers!” said Tallin, communicating telepathically. The dragon awoke with a snort. It was not yet dawn.
“Where are they?” asked the dragon.
“I cannot see them with my eyes, but I can sense them. They are at the very edge of my cloaking spell. There is a mage with them, but I sense that he is inexperienced. He knows that there is magic here, but he cannot identify its origin.”
“What shall we do? Do you want to attack? I shall make short work of them,” snorted Duskeye, licking his lips.
“No, it’s too risky,” said Tallin. “We could kill them all, but if the emperor is awaiting a message from these fools, then killing them could be dangerous. I will scale back the cloaking spell and create a circle of protection around us. Hopefully they will come our way and we can hear what they say.” Tallin withdrew his spell. As he did so, Tallin’s dragon stone glowed on his chest with a ruddy red light. Tallin’s dragon stone was implanted in his chest, visible just above his sternum.
A few minutes later, about ten soldiers came into view. They were all on horseback, except for a blundering mage, who travelled on a fat black pony. Both the mage and his horse were obese. The mage trailed behind the soldiers, mumbling to himself.
“I told you, I don’t feel good about this,” said the mage. “We should leave this area. It’s not safe here. We’re being watched.”
“By Golka! What a skillful magician! How did we ever get so lucky? Now someone is spying on us?” snickered one of the soldiers. “You couldn’t even lead our horses to water yesterday!”
“I’m serious!” sputtered the mage, who was sweating profusely. He wiped his greasy brow with his sleeve. “There is something here, I’m sure of it.”
“You’re sure?” asked the captain, but he wasn’t laughing. He was angry. “Pangran, tell me honestly—is there a more useless mage in the entire kingdom? Can you do anything worthwhile? Anything at all?”
“Hey Captain—I can think of one thing—he sure knows how to eat! Him and his bloody fat pony!” All the soldiers laughed and Pangran, the mage, bowed his head with shame. He was obviously a frequent target for the soldier’s mockeries, and he suffered this indignity in silence.
Pangran didn’t protest any more, but his eyes kept darting back and forth. The mage grew more nervous with each passing moment.
“That mage is ridiculous, but he still knows something is wrong,” said Duskeye. “He can feel magic here, but he’s too embarrassed to say anything else. What a fool.”
“It’s nice to know that the emperor’s mages have grown fat and lazy,” whispered Tallin. “We are lucky that they don’t have a necromancer with them.” Tallin was grateful that there wasn’t a necromancer in the group because they would have been forced to run or fight. They wouldn’t have had a choice.
“Agreed… although I wouldn’t mind testing my skills against one of those filthy deadrats.”
Tallin didn’t respond. Duskeye was always itching for a fight while Tallin was the cautious one. More than anything, Duskeye enjoyed the hunt. For all their intelligence, dragons were still wild animals. Tallin had kept them safe all these years, and most of their close scrapes occurred because Duskeye let his guard down.
One of the soldiers kicked his foot against a tree. “Captain, why are we traipsing all over the countryside? To find a teenage boy? The emperor has hundreds of men looking for him, and none of us even knows what he looks like.”
“Just do as you’re told. We don’t get paid to question the emperor’s orders. Our job is to find any boy that fits the description, and test him for mageborn skills. It’s why we’re stuck with Pangran,” said the captain, jerking his thumb in the direction of the mage. “Although I don’t know if he can even do that.”
The mage found this particular comment offensive, and he raised his chin and sniffed loudly, “I resent that statement! I am perfectly capable of testing a mageborn child!”
Some of the men laughed, but Pangran wasn’t letting the subject go. “I’ve had enough of your harassment! You would do well to show me some respect!” the mage yelled, and his hands started to glow.
“Aye, look at ‘im! What are you going to do, ‘eh? Throw a firecracker at us? Shut up, you slobbering fool, before I punch your face in!” said one of the men, and now all the other soldiers joined in, laughing and snickering.
“Do you think that you could cast a spell and make yourself disappear? That would make everyone happy,” said another. This caused an eruption of laughter that lasted several minutes.
Pangran’s face turned red. His anxiety and the soldiers’ constant ribbing had finally taken its toll. His right hand glowed, and a small ball of flame formed in his palm. “This is the last time you will disrespect me! Hringr-Incêndio!” he yelled.
The captain’s eyes widened, and he jumped up to stop the mage, but it was too late. Pangran’s flabby arm reached back, and he threw the fireball at the men. His aim was poor, and the men scattered. The fireball flew towards the oak tree where Tallin and Duskeye were hiding. Rather than striking the tree, the fireball dissipated in a shimmer. Tallin’s heart skipped a beat.
“What the—look out! It’s a protection spell!” the captain barked.
Tallin’s spell stopped the fireball easily, but now they were exposed. “Here we go,” he said. Duskeye smiled widely, his forked tongue moving under his teeth. There was going to be a fight after all!
The fat mage turned white, raising his hands to create a bubble around them, but it was too late. Duskeye and Tallin tore aside the branches, and Duskeye roared. It was so loud that the ground shook. Tallin drew his sword—a short falchion with a leather-wrapped hilt.
“Aieeeeeee! It’s a dragon rider! Run—run for your lives!” screamed the panicked mage as he jumped on his pony and turned tail into the forest.
The horses scattered, and the men shouted in alarm. Most of them were young, and they had never seen a dragon. Duskeye’s massive jaw opened and white fire came out, burning two of the men where they stood.
“Feel our wrath, dragonkillers!” yelled Tallin. He struck one man with a paralyzing spell, and he collapsed onto the ground in convulsions. Another soldier surprised him from behind, swinging a broadsword. Tallin didn’t have time to deflect, and the sword grazed his right shoulder. Tallin winced, grabbing his injured arm. Duskeye felt Tallin’s pain through the dragon stone, and swung his tail, striking the soldier’s torso. The man flew high into the air and struck a tree. He crumpled to the ground, unconscious.
Two more soldiers attacked Tallin from the front, driving him back into the tree. Both soldiers aimed for his injured arm. Tallin blocked the blows with his sword, ducked his head, and swung to the left, while grabbing a dagger from his wristband. Tallin spun on the ball of his foot, throwing the dagger deep into the eye of the first soldier. The man fell backwards, screaming.
“Duskeye! Your right side!” said Tallin. Duskeye’s right eye was blind, and the soldiers struck his leg. Duskeye breathed fire again, but the soldiers stepped back. None of them were hit by the flames the second time.
Tallin jumped high into the air and swung downward with his blade, hitting another soldier in the neck. A fountain of blood erupted from the wound, and the man fell. Another soldier engaged him from the right, and Tallin deflected the blow, but lost his balance. He fell and rolled back, jumping up to defend himself against more assailants. Tallin held his own, but these men were well-trained. Eventually, he would be overpowered. Tallin reached out and communicated with his dragon, “Duskeye—there are too many of them, and these are experienced fighters. I can’t concentrate well enough to overpower them all! I need you to fly us out of here!”
Duskeye swung his tail furiously, but he had already sustained several cuts. He couldn’t see well enough to safeguard his right side. Duskeye nodded, and Tallin scrambled up on his dragon’s back. The soldiers c
ontinued to attack, and they hit Duskeye’s injured leg again and again. Even though the dragon’s scales offered some protection, blood flowed from the wounds. Duskeye kicked off, and flew up into the air about twenty feet. “Stop,” ordered Tallin. “That’s far enough.”
“Nagl-meizi!” cried Tallin. At first, nothing happened. Then, tiny pebbles swirled up from the ground, glowing white. The soldiers looked on, bewildered. Tallin began to rotate his wrists furiously, and the pebbles also began to spin. They looked like miniature hurricanes, glowing and spinning up with dust.
“Ow!” cried one of the soldiers as a pebble hit him. Then he screamed, “The rocks are burning hot! They’re burrowing into my skin!”
Tallin kept spinning his wrists, faster and faster, and the little hurricanes spun hotter and faster as well. The men didn’t even have a chance to run. The heated rocks shredded their armor and clothing—and sizzled through their skin. “Augggh! Augggh! They’re burning my chest!” The screams of the soldiers echoed through the forest. The men jerked and scratched at their clothing, but it was no use. Within seconds, all of them had collapsed.
“Is that all of them?” asked Tallin, breathing heavily.
“I believe so. The only one missing is that fat mage.”
Duskeye settled back down onto the ground, and Tallin exhaled deeply. The spell had drained him, and he still had to heal Duskeye’s wounds. Tallin paused for a moment to gather his strength, and he touched Duskeye’s wounded leg, healing the cuts.
“Thank you, my friend. Now… let’s go find that mage,” said Duskeye. “I will find him.”
“Yes.” Tallin replied. He mounted Duskeye and they took flight, flying low, just above the trees. All dragons can perceive magical energy, and Duskeye concentrated, using his senses to find the escaped mage.
“I’ll bet he’s trying to generate a cloaking spell right now,” said Tallin.
“A lot of good that will do him! I could find this human just based on his awful smell. He’s a sweaty, pungent one.”
Tallin chuckled. They kept searching, and eventually they found the mage and his pony, cowered underneath some thick brambles. Tallin dismounted and pulled Pangran out of the brambles by his collar. Duskeye grabbed the pony in his jaws and cracked its neck with a loud snap. Then he tore it apart and ate it in a few gulps.
The mage screamed while Duskeye devoured the pony. “Delicious! Horses aren’t usually my preference, but this one was fantastic; marbled with fat.” The dragon burped, satisfied. Then he sat back on his haunches to watch his rider interrogate the terrified mage.
Tallin hated the emperor’s mages. To him, they were all traitors. He shook the fat mage violently by the neck. “You! Tell me what you are doing here, and I might let you live.”
“I can’t! I-I can’t! The emperor will kill me!” he whimpered.
“The emperor isn’t here, and all your men are dead. You should be more worried about what I’m going to do to you. Talk now, or my dragon will roast you alive… slowly.”
The mage gulped, “I—I don’t know much. The emperor is sending men all over the countryside, trying to find some mageborn boy. His name is Ellis, or Elias —something like that.”
Tallin shook him again. “What else?!”
“V-Vosper is using his own necromancers to find the boy. He rarely lets any of them leave Morholt, so that means that this mission is very important to the emperor.”
“I see,” said Tallin. “Anything else?”
“I don’t know anything more than that. I don’t even know why Vosper is looking for him—our orders are just to bring him back alive. Any mageborn that fits the description must be delivered to the capital. That’s all I know, I swear! By Golka, please let me go!” pleaded the mage, clasping his hands. Tallin released his collar and the mage fell to his knees, coughing.
“Get up, you fool. Die like a man,” said Tallin gravely.
“What? B-but you promised! You said you would let me live!”
“I never promised you anything. You deserve to die. You are a coward and a traitor. Those soldiers never had a chance, but you didn’t even try to protect them. I know that you will betray us to the emperor the first chance you get. Be thankful that I am giving you a painless death. It is more than you deserve.”
“No—no—please, don’t! I won’t say anything, I swear!” he pleaded, but it was already too late. Duskeye’s clawed hand shot out, and severed the man’s spine. His back arched, and he made a gurgling noise. The mage was dead before his face hit the ground. Tallin resisted the urge to kick him.
“This mage was a weak-minded fool. Is this the type of spellcaster that the empire is producing?”
“Perhaps. The emperor can’t really afford to have powerful spellcasters in Morholt. What if they rose against him? Just having necromancers is risky enough.”
“True. Who knows what Vosper intends to do? It’s impossible to know his motivations. Duskeye, we have to cover the evidence. Burn this part of the forest,” said Tallin. “I will call a messenger and send word to Mitca. He must be warned. Things are accelerating faster than I expected.” Tallin whistled for a messenger. He thought about scrying a message back to Sela, but decided against it. He needed to conserve his strength, and scrying a message at such a long distance would drain his already depleted reserves.
A few minutes later, a huge black crow landed on Tallin’s shoulder. Tallin reached up and gently touched its head with his thumb.
“How are you this evening, old friend?”
The bird cawed loudly in reply. Tallin smiled. He loved these intelligent scavengers. When he first became a dragon rider, bird-language was one of the things that fascinated him the most. He spent hours listening to their intricate songs and playful chatter.
Tallin pulled out a snippet of parchment from his pocket and scorched a magical message into the paper.
“Warning: the emperor knows about the boy. He is sending out necromancers. We are crossing into Darkmouth Forest in three day’s time. We go to the Elder Willow.” The parchment smoked as the runes appeared and then vanished. He rolled the parchment into a little scroll, and attached it to the crow’s foot. He whispered his instructions to the crow, who squawked a response in primitive bird language.
As an afterthought, Tallin reached down and plucked out the dead mage’s eyes, offering them to the crow. The bird swallowed the eyes greedily and took flight. The crow would reach the death sands in three days, maybe four.
Tallin looked over his shoulder, feeling the heat from the spreading flames. Duskeye was magnificent. A river of white flame poured from his mouth, burning everything in its path. The fire spread, and soon the entire forest was burning, destroying evidence of the dead soldiers and their cowardly mage with it.
***