Master of Dragons Page 16

  Caradryel clambered back to his feet, brushing the soil from his robes. Just as he had done before, he aimed to find the balance – not craven, not arrogant, not supine, not threatening.

  ‘Imladrik knows you will march on the city. He knows your people demand vengeance and knows you are sworn to deliver it. All he asks is that, for the sake of your old friendship, you speak to him once before giving the final order. He will meet you, under flag of truce. He requests nothing more – no assurances, no treaties – just the chance to speak.’

  Morgrim’s grey eyes flickered, for the first time, with less than certainty.

  ‘That’s all?’ he asked.

  Caradryel risked a nod. ‘If he has any further tidings, he has not shared them with me.’

  Morgrim shook his head and turned away. ‘This army is drawn from all the holds,’ he muttered. ‘There is no dam capable of holding it back now.’ He snapped his gaze back to Caradryel. ‘It is too late. It cannot be stopped.’

  Caradryel met his glare evenly. ‘He told me you would say that, and so told me to reply thus: The runes never lie, but nor do they compel. Nothing is fated.’

  That held Morgrim’s attention. The dwarf pondered the words for what seemed like an age.

  Caradryel watched him, saying nothing. He had heard it said that dawi minds were slow, like those of simpletons or children, but he saw the lie in that immediately. Morgrim was no fool, and if his thoughts worked with more deliberation than an elf’s then perhaps that was to his credit. Caledor had a quick tongue and a ready wit, but it had not made him a wise king.

  Finally Morgrim’s face lifted again.

  ‘The march continues,’ he announced. ‘I swore an oath to bring this army to Tor Alessi and I will not break it.’

  He drew close to Caradryel again, the familiar breath-stink of meat and ale wafting over him.

  ‘But I will think on your words,’ Morgrim said, making it sound more like a threat. ‘By the time you smell sea-salt, you will know my answer to them.’

  Final preparations had been made. The great hawkships of the fleet put to sea again, packed with ballistae and Sea Guard units to keep the supply routes open. The last repairs were made to the city’s battlements and bulwarks. Standards bearing the runes of war – Charoi, Ceyl, Minaith, Urithair – were slung from every parapet and balcony, rippling down the pale stone in a riot of blues, reds and emeralds. Tor Alessi’s many walls stood proudly against the desolation of the land about them, rising up like spars of dirty bone from the scorched and scoured earth below.

  They will drown in their own blood, observed Draukhain, wheeling high above the tallest of the towers. The city is impregnable.

  Imladrik gazed down at the sprawling fortress below, not sharing the dragon’s assessment. To be sure, the defences were awe-inspiring – taller, thicker and more heavily manned than at any time since the city’s foundation – but he’d seen what the dwarfs could do when their blood was raging.

  Our strength is not in the walls, he sang. I hope, though, that they will prove enough of a deterrent.

  Draukhain laughed, pulling hard round and swinging over the sea. The long, maundering coasts extended far into the north, their smooth strands broken by rocky dune country.

  So restrained, the drake mocked. You really are not much sport.

  The sun blazed strongly, making the sea sparkle and lifting the worst of the gloom from the nearby forest. Imladrik turned his head to the east, watching curls of mist rise from the brooding treeline. It looked like the woodland had somehow contracted, pulling together like an inhalation before the storm.

  Just on the edge of sensation, he almost felt something, like a faint whiff of burning, or the distance-muffled sound of iron boots crashing through rotten wood.

  Consumed by it, he missed Liandra’s approach, coming out of the sun-glare some hundred feet above him, riding the high airs with her habitual carefree abandon. He only sensed her at the last minute, just as she swung alongside him, her red steed trailing a long line of hot smoke behind her.

  ‘My lord!’ cried Liandra, saluting him. Her copper hair buffeted out behind her, her robes tugging at her body in the wind.

  He saw her then just as he remembered her – a creature of fire, a spirit of the raw heavens, unbound and vivacious. It was as if the past had suddenly come alive before him, his memories crystallising out of empty skies.

  ‘My lady,’ he responded, immediately wincing as he remembered how he and Yethanial played at such exchanges. ‘I did not know you were aloft.’

  Liandra laughed. She was close enough now for him to see her face light up in amusement – the narrowing of her eyes, the wrinkling of her freckled skin.

  ‘No,’ she replied. ‘I don’t suppose you did. You’ve been busy since you got here, lord. Too busy to speak to me, it seems, or to know very much of what I am doing – no doubt you’ve had weightier matters on your mind.’

  The familiar insolence – he’d missed it.

  ‘I have been busy,’ he admitted, giving Draukhain his head and speeding further up the coastline. Vranesh struggled to match the pace and was soon spitting sparks of effort from her flame-red maw. ‘As you should have been too.’

  ‘Oh, my duties have been many. I have thousands of spears under my command, all waiting for orders to march. They have been waiting a long time.’

  ‘I know,’ said Imladrik. He was not blind to their frustration. ‘And if I have my way they will be waiting longer still.’

  Do you really think you can halt it? Liandra sang, her voice appearing in his mind as suddenly and as clearly as Draukhain’s did.

  That stung him. It was an intrusion, an unwelcome reminder of how they’d once conversed.

  ‘You always wanted to fight them, Liandra,’ he responded aloud, pushing Draukhain harder. The wind raced against him, making his crimson cloak ripple. ‘You wanted it even before Kor Vanaeth.’

  ‘No,’ she replied, shaking her head vigorously. ‘I did not. I came with you to the mountains and tried to understand them. Remember this – they started the killing.’

  Imladrik let slip a weary laugh. ‘Oh, they started it. Then that makes everything clear.’

  You make it sound as if our races are equals, she sang. You make it sound as if they could actually hurt us, if we had a mind to prevent it.

  Draukhain swung round again, enjoying the speed and exchange. He seemed to be goading his younger counterpart a little, daring her to match his mastery of the air. Imladrik let him.

  ‘You are all the same,’ said Imladrik wearily. ‘You, Salendor, my brother: you think we are bound to destroy them. You are all wrong.’

  Are we? Or is it you, my lord, who is afraid?

  Imladrik spun around, hauling Draukhain back on himself in mid-air, rearing up in the sky like a charger on the battlefield.

  ‘Afraid?’ he asked, incredulous.

  Liandra laughed again. ‘Of battle? You know I do not mean that.’ She was struggling to keep Vranesh on a counter-trajectory to match Draukhain’s dazzling change of angles. You are fearful of what would happen if you unleashed yourself, if you allowed yourself – for one moment – to let slip the shackles she has placed on you and became what you know you should be.

  Only then did Draukhain’s flight dip from perfection. Imladrik’s mind flickered, momentarily, out of focus.

  What do you mean? he sang, inflecting the harmony with warning.

  That you are a dragon rider, lord. You always have been. You have fire in your blood but you will not light the kindling. As Liandra spoke her eyes glittered, as if she was both thrilled and appalled by what she was saying. You think you love her – you have persuaded yourself you do – but you are wrong. She has tamed you.

  Imladrik rose in the saddle, angling his staff towards her, feeling a hot wash of anger building behind his eyes.

 
‘Foreswear those words!’ he cried, feeling Draukhain respond instantly. The dragon’s vast wings fanned the air into a whirl of ashes and flame-flickers. Raw aethyr-fire rippled along his staff-length, crackling angrily.

  Liandra glared back at him, her face twisted in both delight and fear.

  ‘I take back nothing, lord!’ she shouted across the gap between steeds. ‘The truth needs to be told!’

  Imladrik spurred Draukhain towards Vranesh, and for a moment, just a moment, he teetered on the edge of attack. He could already see the outcome – the tangled clash of talons, laced with the quick burn of actinic magic. He had a splintered image of himself, wreathed in anger and lightning-crowned majesty, cleaving the air apart and casting the Sun Dragon down and into the sea.

  At the last moment he pulled away. Draukhain turned, pulling out of the encounter and swinging back out seawards, and he caught a glimpse of Liandra’s defiant, terrified face staring right at him.

  The dragons spun apart, wings beating and tails writhing. Draukhain quickly took up the dominant position, his shadow falling over the smaller Vranesh and turning her vivid red scales into a dull, dried-blood colour.

  Is this what you intended? Imladrik sang, controlling his mighty steed with some difficulty. To make me angry? You would risk that, knowing what it means?

  Liandra’s resolve dissolved then – she was like a child who’d pulled at the tail of a cat and now had to contend with the claws.

  ‘Something had to stir you!’ she cried aloud. ‘You are dead! You treat me with contempt, like some lordly conquest which now means nothing to you – a toy, thrown aside now that you have taken up loftier things.’

  ‘I never dishonoured you,’ said Imladrik.

  Then Liandra laughed for a third time, and the sound was bitter. ‘No, you did not. I do not believe a day has passed when you have not kept your honour, my lord.’

  Imladrik said nothing. The words cut him deeply, especially coming from her. He knew what they all wanted of him, and he also knew what she wanted of him – the two things were much the same. Just as he had done years ago, he felt the tug of desire, the pull towards oblivion. The dragon responded to it, growling like a blast furnace lighting up.

  It would be so easy. He could give in this time, forgetting about windswept Tor Vael, forgetting about Ulthuan and its survival. The two of them could do what they had resisted before and take the fight to the enemy together. They could sweep east at the head of Caledor’s armies, burning a furrow through the forest until the flames licked the very ramparts of Karaz-a-Karak.

  He saw Draukhain and Vranesh flying in dreadful unison, the Master and Mistress of Dragons searing through the air like vengeful gods, cracking open the halls of the dwarfs and exposing the deeps within. He could cut loose at last, unlocking the cage that kept his true nature sealed behind layers of control. He could unfurl, giving into the second soul that whispered within him and finally, just for once, forget duty and embrace pleasure.

  He felt the words form in his mind, ready for the song that would seal things.

  I long for it. I long to bring ruin on them, with you by my side. I would wage war until the end of the world with you, caring for nothing but death and splendour.

  In the end, though, it was Liandra that turned away, as if suddenly afraid of what she might goad him into doing. Vranesh’s head dipped, and the two of them started to circle back down, gliding through the twisting air currents.

  ‘But you are right, of course,’ she said bleakly. ‘You are always right.’

  Imladrik followed her. The fury ebbed from him, but only slowly.

  You deserved better than silence, he sang.

  That halted her. Vranesh slid round, angling so that Liandra could look back up at him. She gave him a proud look.

  ‘I did.’

  ‘And do not think, even for a moment, that I had forgotten.’ Imladrik came down to her level, easing Draukhain’s bulk alongside the slender Vranesh. ‘We are all the children of Aenarion, Liandra. That is our downfall. We have only ever been defeated by ourselves.’

  Tor Alessi was by then barely visible, a speck of white stonework on the long shore. They could have been alone, the two of them, lost in an edgeless sky.

  ‘Do you not think it would be easier for me to give Salendor what he wishes?’ Imladrik asked softly. ‘I know what it would bring – victories, to begin with. For a time we would hurt them. Our thirst for vengeance would be slaked, and we would revel in it.’

  Draukhain was circling Vranesh now, turning in a wide falconer’s arc as Imladrik kept speaking.

  ‘But then the long grind would begin. Athel Maraya would burn. Athel Toralien, Sith Rionnasc, Oeragor – they would all burn. We would throw our finest into those flames and they would wither. Even the dragons would grow sick of it as the years wore on; they would no longer heed our songs, leaving us alone against an empire of mindless fury.’

  Liandra listened warily, as if he was spinning some deception around her.

  ‘And who would gain from this?’ asked Imladrik. ‘You know whose hand was behind the war – the same that grasps the sceptre in Naggaroth. I will not see that happen. I will not let our desire for vengeance give him what he desires.’

  She never looked away. Her expression never changed: sceptical, bruised, disappointed.

  ‘You sell us short,’ she said.

  ‘That is your judgement,’ said Imladrik.

  ‘Then I must warn you, lord,’ said Liandra, nudging Vranesh closer. ‘You are wrong. This course leads to ruin. We must strike now before they gather more strength.’

  Imladrik nodded. ‘I know your view, though it changes nothing.’

  ‘So what, then, of us?’

  Imladrik felt his stomach twist. The burn of desire was still there – for another life, one that he had only glimpsed in brief intense snatches. Above it all, though, hovered Yethanial’s calm presence, the one who had sustained him, the one his true soul cleaved to when away from the heady madness of the dragon.

  ‘That moment has gone, feleth-amina,’ he said, forcing the words out. ‘We have both taken vows.’

  Liandra looked at him for a little longer, her face flushed. He couldn’t decipher her expression – it could have been anger, or maybe humiliation, or simply disbelief. They hung there for a while longer, their steeds’ wings making the air thrum, before her expression finally hardened again.

  ‘You may have done, my lord,’ she said. ‘For myself, I vow nothing.’

  Then Vranesh arched, twisted, and shot down towards the sea. She went quickly, like a falling stone, plunging down towards the sparkling waters.

  Imladrik watched her go, motionless in the air, letting Draukhain hold position and giving him no orders.

  For a long time he said nothing at all. The wind pulled at his hair. He felt wretched, more wretched than he could remember being – even the brisk push of the salty air felt stale and old.

  I like her, sang Draukhain eventually. I always did – she has a heart after our own. Are you sure you are right in this, kalamn-talaen?

  Imladrik’s eyes remained locked on the diminishing figure of the flame-red dragon as she spiralled out over the ocean.

  No, great one, he sang bleakly. I am not sure about anything.

  ‘Draw!’

  Thoriol bent into the pull, using his whole body to lever the arrow on to the string. Alongside him on the battlements his company did likewise; alongside them a hundred other companies the same. With a ripple of steel points, the battalions of an entire wall-section pulled their bowstrings tight, angling the heavy yew shafts and holding position.

  Thoriol felt his muscles tremble as the tension bit. He’d become far more proficient than he had been, but the effort of using the longbow was considerable and he was less comfortable with it than his companions. They could work a longbow for an ho
ur and register little fatigue, whereas he was struggling after several flights.

  He gritted his teeth, desperate not to lose face. Loeth stood beside him, calm as ever.

  ‘Release!’

  The order was a relief – Thoriol loosed his arrow with the others, watching as the dense hail of darts soared up into the sky and arced down to the plain beyond.

  The sight was a stirring one. Their wall-section was nearly fifty feet above the level of the plain, facing due east. The arrows clustered together in a thick cloud, whistling through the air before jabbing down into the sodden earth far below. The range was impressive – over a hundred and fifty yards, with each dart falling within a wide band. Thousands of arrows already stood at angles in the mud, the results of many previous volleys.

  ‘Draw!’

  If Thoriol had counted correctly, this should be the last one. He’d already reached for his arrow in the rack before him and had it ready. He grasped the string with three fingers, feeling the single-feather fletch brush against his knuckle. The nock slid up against the silken string, and he pulled it tight using his bodyweight as a counterbalance.

  At such ranges the aim was not as important as the timing. The task was to fill the air with a thick cloud of arrows, all hammering earthwards in a single block. The defenders of Tor Alessi knew from experience that dwarf armour was extremely tough and so single shots were rarely effective. The only thing that troubled units clad in steel plate was a veritable flood of darts, clogging the air and rattling down against them in a dense cloud. At such concentrations there was every chance of hitting an exposed joint or sliding through a narrow eye-slit, and, even if the majority of arrows wouldn’t register a kill, the flight as a whole would badly hamper any advancing formation.

  ‘Release!’

  Thoriol let fly, watching with satisfaction as his arrow soared upwards with the others. The air thickened with shafts again before they swooped down in unison, tracing a steep arch towards the plain below.

  It was a sight to gladden the heart of any true son of Ulthuan. When the final assault came it would be even grander – thousands of archers arranged across the entire stretch of parapets, raining steel-tipped ruin on the advancing host. To that would be added the shuddering flights of ballista bolts and the arcane snarl of magecraft.