16

  On a wintery mainland beach, in the firelit darkness:

  Katina feen Tarandahl was the first to spot trouble. That night, she was seated on the stony shore by a roaring driftwood fire, watching the sky. Sparks shot up to join the wavery heavens, but Katie was a half-elf, and a mere fire could not hide the stars, the Seam or the moon from her eyes.

  She sat with her back against a broken, overturned fishing boat, out of the wind. Benny had nursed and then fallen asleep, and now they were once again visible. The babe’s natural magic was effortless camouflage, which he performed instinctively, making both of them blend with their backdrop, from anyone’s perspective. Only motion or sounds would give them away, and Benny was far too young to be reasoned with. She had to keep hold of the child or lose him.

  Her previous nursling, Valerian, had been able to port before he could walk. Just five feet at a time, at first, but soon much further even in sleep. Fortunately, he’d been very fond of his nana and sweets, though sheer mischief drove the rascal to hide from her, then leap out in surprise… Gods keep him safe, wherever he was. She wasn’t sure where he’d got off to, because six months had vanished away somehow, taking Katina from work in the nursery to this barren cold beach.

  She kissed Benny’s forehead, watching him sigh and flex his small fingers. Two mortal women sat by the fire as well, caring for a wee boy they called Bek; a cherub with curly dark hair and soft, wide brown eyes. Mortal children were no trouble at all. Why, her own darling Tam… was gone these long hundred years.

  Katina blinked away stinging tears, looking up at the stars and a thin slice of moon. What happened to mortals after they died, she wondered again? Where were Tam and her Ragnar, now? Val had sworn to find out, but so far…

  Gazing upward, cuddling Benny, Katina saw something blot out part of the Seam and then bisect the moon, swift as an arrow. Small and dark at that distance, the object was moving quite fast and seemed to be headed their way. Her shock alerted Lady Meliara, who was standing watch, nearby.

  Not just a visual. The pair sensed a rank and seething disturbance in the ether, as well. Katina craned her neck, watching stars wink out and then reappear, on a beeline for their windy and narrow beach.

  “Dragon,” whispered Meliara, who was Katina’s full-elven sister. “Katie, get the mortals into one of the sea caves. Not the stairway. If the beast has sensed us poking around in the village, that’s the first place it will strike. Go. Hurry!”

  “Aye, Mil… Melly,” said Katina, rising gracefully. Turning to face Lana and Jillian, she, said, “A dragon comes. Perhaps the same one that destroyed yonder village. We are to conceal ourselves in a cave. Follow, quick and quiet.”

  They had questions, but Katie was too busy rousing Honey, Skipper and Alfea to provide many answers. The dog was healed now, but the mysterious air-sprite had wrenched one of her butterfly wings, and she could no longer fly.

  “Don’t bother about things,” Katie told them, when Jillian tried to pack up her notions and cloth. “Save your lives.”

  That shadowy dragon was very much closer, in just the space of her nervous command. Katina herded them all together and got them moving. The sea caves were some two hundred yards further west, around a bend on the coastline. They’d been too lightly explored by Vikran and Honey, but the best shelter the castaways were likely to get.

  Skipper started to growl as they hurried along the base of that towering cliff. He was part warg, according to… father, Katie supposed she should call him, now… but also supposed to be housetrained.

  “Hush, Skipper,” soothed the nursemaid, shifting Benny to reach down and pat the dog’s head. “There’s a good boy. Honey, give him something to keep him quiet.”

  The girl nodded, wide-eyed. She had trouble moving, so burdened with transferred goods that she walked as though plowing through snowdrifts, but Alfea helped her along.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  “Here y’ go, Boy,” whispered Honey, pulling a strip of dried meat from her over-stuffed faerie pockets. “Dog treat. Stop growling, now. Dragons would eat you up and not even burp, stupid!”

  There was enough light for half-elves and sprites, but the mortals were nearly blind, stumbling on loose stones and clumps of dried seaweed. Katina made and cupped a small, rosy glow, urging,

  “Follow and watch how you go. The tide is returning.”

  The first sea cave was shallow and prone to flooding, to judge by the marks of water and sand that Honey described. The second was deeper, with a high back shelf that opened onto a narrow canyon with paintings and hand-stencils all over its walls. They wouldn’t be trapped there.

  Katina waved her charges inside, just as something big and fast blotted the stars overhead and behind. A blast of reeking, bitter-cold air tore the breath from Katina’s lungs as winged darkness shot past.

  Skipper barked furiously, lunging and snapping, starting to grow. Honey pulled the black-and-white mutt back by his collar, digging her heels and her extra mass in. The dragon paid no attention, banking around the headland to strike Meliara, Vikran and young Brother Arnulf.

  It attacked the fire, which no one had thought to put out. Great, shattering bolts of dark ice blasted the logs apart and splintered that wrecked wooden fishing boat. Vikran conjured a shield spell, defending himself, Melly and Villem from the wyrm’s first attack. Ice splintered to shards on his barrier, driving the cleric backward with transmitted force, denting and shrinking that flickering magical ward.

  “Uhn…” Vikran grunted, stumbling.

  Villem braced the grey-haired cleric with muscle and divine manna, adding his own strength to his old friend’s.

  “Steady, Priest,” said the paladin, searching the night sky for a target. “Help is coming. The others have heard.”

  He wielded a glowing spear and an ancient sea-elven sword named Flood, but the dragon had already swooped off. Out to sea or over the cliff, or else…

  Shhh-KRACK!

  “There is no help, puppet of Oberyn!” snarled the dragon. “There is only meat in my larder!”

  A tremendous impact shook the cliff just beyond them, collapsing the stairway. Great chunks of rock split away from the cliff face to crash on the beach far below. Villem and Meliara dragged Vikran away from a landslide of stone, keeping the half-elf uncrushed.

  Meliara summoned power from land, sea and sky.

  “Be made visible,” murmured the beautiful elf, inscribing a sigil in midair.

  All at once, that hurtling drake was outlined in silvery fire, looking like an eclipsed sun. The wind of its passage knocked them off of their feet, whipping their hair and cloaks into a swirling wild tangle. The stench of meat too long in cold storage made their noses burn and their eyes water. That wasn’t a dragon’s usual smell, not even a white one.

  “You will not kill me! Not you, nor anyone else! I am a GOD!”

  Alyanara rose in the air from the cliff’s shattered top, crying spells of abjuration and command.

  “Be careful, Mamma,” whispered Meliara, getting back to her feet. Next, adding a hasty twist to her sigil, she made the dragon’s corona of light searing hot.

  “Fire is nothing! You are nothing! I am eternal!”

  The monster twisted and writhed, then swept back around, hunting its tormentor. Melly summoned her bow and quiver, then began firing arrows into that roaring, dragon-shaped void.

  Villem cast holy light on her arrowheads, making them glimmer like moon-tears. Melly kissed him, then took aim again, drew and fired. Two of her shots struck the dragon, one at mid-chest, the other piercing a wing.

  The wounded drake’s roar shook the ground and flattened the ocean, but the canny thing wouldn’t land. It doubled back through the air instead, scraping the cliff with the claws of its damaged wing. The high-pitched squeal and shower of stone-chips made Melly clutch at her head, but they were succeeding. They’d wounded it.

  Lerendar and Keldaran rose into the air to back Alyanara. Sister Constant and Brother Humble made a glowing path through the sky using nothing but faith in Lord Oberyn’s power. Melly would have joined them, only… Alive. There was life. She was pregnant, and using magic would snuff out that barely-formed little one.

  Vikran placed a warm hand on her shoulder.

  “Take from me,” he offered.

  Melly nodded, reaching up to press the cleric’s thin, knobby hand.

  Life… How had she missed it before, that precious, wee little sparkle deep inside? All at once she was crying, wild with joy and fierce with the need to end this fight quickly.

  Beside her, Villem cast smite evil, wrapping an arm around Melly’s waist. Her paladin husband shone like the dawn, strong as a mountain and good clean through. Raising Flood, Villem sighted between Lerendar and Alyanara, murmuring,

  “Elixir of Life!”

  The sword hummed aloud, projecting a stream of glowing blue water that the dragon swerved and looped to avoid.

  “Thought so,” growled Villem. “Undead. It’s undead!” he told them all, raising his voice to be heard by the others. “Normal fire and mere wounds cannot destroy it!”

  “I shall live FOREVER!” howled the white dragon. It shot past them at stooping attack speed, jetting ice, raking the beach with its spiked tail.

  Melly pushed Villem out of the way, using all of the power she had and Vikran’s as well. Then there was only the dark and the cold and a terrible silence.