Dragon Strike (Age of Fire #4)

The Copper decided he much preferred having AuRon as an ally. He seemed to have the knack of making friends who didn’t demand blood or gold or rank in exchange for their service.

Some of the Queen’s servants took their own lives rather than surrender. The Copper found a heap of corpses, male, female, even children, lying peacefully beneath a statue of the Queen.

The sight depressed him.

Dragons, at least, had more sense. They accepted a new Tyr and got on with their lives.

Time, indeed, for dragons to get back to the purpose of living.

They found the crystal in a blue-domed chamber, high in the mountain. Careful star-charts were etched above. He picked out patterns both familiar and unfamiliar. AuRon wondered if the stars bore some purpose related to the crystal or if they’d preceded its installation. There was an even smaller passage, too cramped for any but a human, that led up to a tiny platform with a good view of the sky.

AuRon guessed the crystal chamber lay just behind the forehead where the eyebrows met, or perhaps just above.

He sent for his brother. The Copper might be interested in this if he could squeeze up the stairs.

HeBellereth made it, well dusted with scrapes and scraps from the stair-passage walls, along with a slender young Firemaid named Yefkoa who had distinguished herself with fast flying.

“I was afraid I would have to go for oil to work him through,” she said.

“I wanted to see the source of so much misery.”

So they stared, the four dragons, at the Red Queen’s seat of power.

She’d set an impressive throne against it, built a comfortable seat and arm and footrest. Instead of facing outward, the throne-chair faced toward the crystal, so that one might peer deep into it. The throne itself was built on some sort of mount that allowed it to rotate around the crystal.

“So careful, with each and every step,” Naf said. “Until she found this. Then she thought she could see everything.”

“She saw how weak her enemies were,” the Copper said. “More, she knew how to exploit faults, primarily greed. The greatest stone gives way if you tap it in the right crack. It is a strange thing. It almost seems to be—to be looking at me.” Did the stone dislike him? What did a piece of crystal care who its owner was? “I can’t help but feel it doesn’t like me.”

“Perhaps you’re just seeing your conscience in the reflection,” AuRon said.

“Don’t speak to the Tyr that way!” HeBellereth snapped. “He saved your thin little hide, you know.”

“And helped himself to a new Uphold. One worth all the rest put together, I expect,” AuRon said. “My profound admiration, Tyr RuGaard. You’ve won a gamble for the ages.”

“What shall we do with this trophy?” HeBellereth asked.

“Perhaps we should smash it,” AuRon said.

The Copper tapped it with a sii. “Go ahead. Try.”

“Perhaps some dwarves could do it,” HeBellereth said.

“I know a man who would enjoy spending some time with it. Or perhaps the Anklenes.”

“It could be dangerous,” AuRon said.

“I thought NooMoahk lived with it for years,” the Copper said. “And you, and our sister, spent some time in its presence. It is only fair that I take my turn to see what mysteries it holds.”

“It seems to me there’s danger in it,” AuRon said. “Anklamere used it, the Red Queen. Were they who used it corrupt, or did the power within it corrupt them?”

“In the end, it seems it did them more harm than good. They were defeated despite its power,” HeBellereth said.

AuRon looked at the crystal. He’d lived with it for years. Yet it seemed different. Not in general shape. It still had a heavier end and a curve to it, an upright kidney, but he could have sworn it had grown.

Perhaps it was just a trick of the light in this chamber. “I am not convinced she is dead,” AuRon said. “The Red Queen may turn up again.”

The Copper gave orders for a guard to be placed at the entrance to the stairs.

Then he slept, more or less comfortably, on some hay in the stables at the side of the palace. And still dragons disturbed him, flying in to report a barge sunk or some cattle pinned in a box canyon. If only so many of his dragons weren’t illiterates, he would hang up a sign outside that said “Decide for Yourself.” Parl would do. It was a good vigorous language that allowed you to make your point with a minimum of words.

He woke to a glorious dawn. Maybe this was why the Ghioz made their capital here, for the views of the sun coming up as clouds raced around the end of the mountains from southwest to northeast in furrows like the fresh-plowed fields he’d seen while flying.

So much to do. Crippled griffaran who had survived their plunge, wounded dragons and men—he gave orders that the dragon-rider wounded were to have as much dragonblood as they could stand. If nothing else it would ease their passage into death. The citadel fortress might make a good place to house them, for now.

Already men were arriving from Ghioz, answering warnings that they should mark the roof of house and barn, warehouse and temple, with white linen or paint if they wished to avoid destruction.

Most of the Ghioz Empire would fall to pieces, he expected. Just as well. AuRon had already planned to set that human friend of his up as king in Dar—no, Dairuss, it was called. It would be well to have an armed body of men, as long as they remembered to whom they owed their liberty.

He didn’t have anything like the dragons to manage all this. He’d have to see about taking the best and the brightest of the thralls from the Lavadome and setting them up here to act as go-betweens for the dragons and their new domain. The Anklenes had thralls who could read and write in several tongues. He would have positions for even CoTathanagar’s endless stream of relatives now. But there must be dragons to serve and protect them, Drakwatch and Firemaids to keep order.

NiVom had done an admirable job of spreading the word. He would probably make a good governor of the Ghioz Uphold, come to think of it.

He expected that he and Nilrasha would spend much time traveling between Hypatia, Ghioz, and the Lavadome. He’d have to find a nice cave somewhere—there looked to be some fine ground where those spearlike rocks stuck up toward the sky, about the right distance from each—and set up a small refuge cave, where just he and Nilrasha and a few thralls could take their ease from the travels.

What a world of possibilities awaited them.

That lithe little Firemaid he’d met the previous year arrived and collapsed almost on top of him.

“My Tyr,” she gasped, “your Queen needs you. Nilrasha was hurt in battle in Hypatia, and Ayafeeia asks that you attend her.”

Hypatia?

“What is she doing in Hypatia?” he asked, angering. “How did she come there?”

“She led the Firemaids in battle, my Tyr.”

The Copper swung his wing, and . . . It wasn’t this little flash of green’s fault.

Oh, Nilrasha. What have you done now? Once she had an idea in her head it was like digging out an obstinate dwarf.

“I’ll come at once. You look worn-out, ummm—”

“Yefkoa, my Tyr.”

“Of course. The one who begged an escape from a mating.”

She glanced around at some of the Aerial Host, who cast admiring glances her way. “A mating to fat old SoRolatan, my Tyr, and he already mated.”

He called HeBellereth over. “I must fly to Hypatia.”

“Eat first, my Tyr. I believe it is a long way.”

“Over a day’s hard flight,” Yefkoa panted. “For me.”

“That means three days for me,” the Copper said. “Consult with NiVom on matters here. You two were good friends when we were in the Drakwatch together. It should not be too difficult to remember old times and forget the recent past. Consult, I said. You’re in charge, not he.”

“Yes, my Tyr.” HeBellereth studied his sii.

“HeBellereth, suppose NiVom asserted an old claim to the Tyrship.”

“In that case, white dragons will be even rarer, Tyr,” HeBellereth said. “I’ve little patience for renegades.”

The Copper relaxed. A little. “He may turn out to be no more a villain than that DharSii.”

“How long will you stay in Hypatia?” HeBellereth asked. “The Lavadome has no ruler while you and the Queen are away.”

He looked at Yefkoa. The dragonelle looked away, stricken.

“Long enough to burn my dead mate, I expect.”

It was a long, exhausting flight, lengthened by having to go to ground and wait out a thunderstorm. He was tempted to test his artificial wing-joint against the winds, but the griffaran guard practically dragged him to earth, where they knitted him a shelter out of pine branches laced by the effort of their beaks.

He arrived at Hypat thin and hungry, but would take no food until he learned the fate of his mate.

“She still breathes, my brother,” Ayafeeia said, as she led him up the hill toward a ruined temple with a great piece of canvas stretched between the broken columns.

“The remaining Directors of Hypatia are more willing to hear your words now, Tyr.”