She felt the girl hunker down, heard her rapid breathing at the nape of her neck. Almost at once Neyruu gave several quick beats of her wings, lifting them up too swiftly for Paglar to counter. The big dragon roared and rose, wings thumping, but they flew right over the top of him, beyond his snapping maw. Talasha glanced back, her heart in her mouth for a moment, fearing Paglar would keep on going for the company, for Saska, but no, he arced around and made to follow. The race was on.
She kept her distance, leading him off as she had intended, westward across the lake. When they reached the clouds, a hot rain was falling, and Neyruu ducked lower, plunging down toward the islands, swerving around them. Seals barked and slipped away into the water, disappearing. Birds thrashed and fled in their thousands. On one of the islands, a trio of fishermen stood with nets and spears, their skiff pulled up onto the rocky beach. They dashed for cover as Neyruu passed, and Talasha felt a furnace wind behind her. When she turned the island was aflame, and smoke rose joyously from Palgar’s maw.
“He’s gaining on us,” Cevi squealed.
She was right. The big dragon was faster than before, and Neyruu was tired from her long days circling. Up, she thought. The western banks of the lake were nearing, and the clouds would offer them sanctuary. Neyruu did not heed the command. The storm was no friend to her, the clouds a foe, and she liked to see where she was going. “Up,” Talasha said, tugging the reins for all the good it would do. “We’ll lose him in the clouds. Up, Neyruu!”
The dragon ignored her. Talasha gave out a fitful grunt, but she had to trust that Neyruu knew what she was doing. She glanced back. No more than a hundred metres separated them. Several islands had been lit by Paglar’s passing, she saw, spewing black smoke into the skies. There were cooked birds on the water and a seal was flopping on the banks of one isle, scorched and dying. Ribbons of flame spat out from between her pursuer’s teeth, warped into some maddened grin.
Talasha shuddered. Faster, she urged. Faster. They reached the lakebank, where the trees rose up to clothe its fringe. The forest was a thin green mantle, stretching for a few miles inland only. Beyond it unfolded a wide and open land of grass plains and shallow rock valleys and the occasional spread of hills and highlands. Further off lay the great forest of the Everwood, full of mysteries, and to the northwest the lonely mountain where the moonbears dwelled. Talasha did not mean to go that far. We need only outrun him, she thought. Once we lose him, then…
Neyruu banked so suddenly and sharply that Talasha was thrown forward in the saddle. Her straps strained with a stretch of leather, holding her in place. She felt an impact against her back, a hard strike, as though someone had punched her. It was Cevi. The girl had been thrown forward as well, and knocked out, her head rolling limp on her shoulders, her body swaying left and right.
“Neyruu! What are you doing!”
She had scant time to worry for her handmaid. There was a bigger problem at hand. Palgar was coming right for them, maw widening, flame gushing out in a smoking red river. Talasha raised an arm on instinct to shield herself from the heat, but an instant later it was gone. Neyruu shot up, lifting on the hot air, and then down in a precipitous dive, swinging in behind the bigger dragon. All of a sudden they were giving chase, the hunter becoming the hunted, Paglar’s long tail whipping and fending as Neyruu swerved and snapped down upon it.
“Neyruu! Neyruu! What are you doing!”
She had no control of the dragon. Helpless, she clung to the reins, firming her thighs, tensing her core to fortify her posture. Behind her, Cevi was swinging wildly from side to side in her harness. Paglar turned in sharp movements, left, right, left again, right, diving down and flapping up, trying to wriggle free of his pursuer, but Neyruu was the sleeker flyer. She kept right behind him, nipping at his tail, biting down on it once and twice and thrice as Paglar gave out a fearsome bellow, spewing flame down to the trees.
He’ll burn down the whole forest, Talasha thought. Great swathes of the wood were catching, the fire spreading in a swift inferno. “Neyruu, up, up!” she shouted. The dragon ignored her. She pulled at the reins, kicking out with her heels as though urging on a horse, but that was nothing to such a large beast. She was ten times the size of a horse, with scale armour in place of skin. Her kicks and jerks were soft as kisses to the dragon. “Neyruu! Up! What are you doing! Up!”
The trees ended abruptly, and Paglar went plunging straight down to land upon the sparse sedgy grasslands beyond. His talons tore great chunks of earth from the soil as he twisted about, blood spraying from his bitten tail. The clouds overhead were still spitting their warm rain, and up there Talasha saw lightning, great nets of silvery light spreading, heralds of thunder. But west the sun was still visible, moving beneath the swamp of cloud to set above the hills, gilding their slopes in a warm golden glow.
For a moment, Talasha Taan was captivated by the wild beauty of it all. The sun and the lightning and the clouds, the colours, the two dragons doing their death duel, brother fighting sister. Through the distant clouds, shafts of light were showering down, and a great rainbow had formed, curving across the plains, magnificent in its multicoloured radiance.
The roar from Paglar’s maw only added to the moment, an echoing bellow that seemed to match the thunder above him, mixing with it, overlapping. It was a challenge for her to land and face him, but Neyruu was no fool. With a hiss of her own, she shot right over him, circling as he turned and scrambled, firing lances of flame to the skies. Neyruu ducked them, jerking out of the way, turning her body to protect Talasha and Cevi on her back. Then suddenly Talasha felt the deep heat inside her, the furnace fires boiling in Neyruu’s chest, and the dragon turned, flying over Paglar, dousing him in a great torrent of flame and smoke, a thick black smoke that spread and billowed, enshrouding him and blinding him.
Then she plunged, right down atop him, reaching out with her taloned feet, raking and clawing at him like a crazed crow defending her young. Talasha coughed and covered her mouth and her nose. The smoke stung her eyes. She could see nothing but black. But she could hear plenty; the ripping of scales, the rending of flesh, the roaring of Paglar as he thrashed beneath them.
Then as abruptly as Neyruu had descended she beat her wings and up she went, firing herself out of the shroud, and not a moment too soon. Paglar’s mighty jaws snapped after her, reaching up on a long thick neck, crunching down on fume and air. Neyruu was gone, rising, circling. Paglar bellowed and beat his wings in a frenzy, dispersing the smoke. It spread and weakened and grew thin, turning from black to charcoal to a light flint grey. Talasha could see the cuts and gouges on the dragon’s back and neck, but they were superficial, and only enraged him further.
You’ll never kill him, she thought.
She sensed Neyruu knew that too. She was circling her foe, keeping a wide berth, trying to recover some strength. Was it anger that drove her? Vengeance for those three deep gouges Paglar had torn down her flank? No, she is only trying to protect us, Talasha was starting to realise. If they fled the dragon now, he would only find them later. He will not stop, she knew. Not until one of us is dead.
Neyruu turned, Paglar roared, and the battle resumed in earnest. Talasha was a passenger, an observer, and Cevi no more than dead weight on her back. It would be different with Kin’rar, she knew. He had been a born rider, in tune with Neyruu’s every thought and feeling, their connection as strong as steel. The Fireborn dragonriders went through years of training with their steeds, learning attack patterns, forging together a style of combat that suited them. Like the Bladeborn with their fighting forms, the dragonriders too had their preferences. But I am no dragonrider, Talasha thought. I am no Kin’rar Kroll.
So she could do nothing but cling on and hope, raising her hand against the sudden burst of flame and smoke, coughing as it rushed down into her lungs, blistering and burning. Before long they were fighting upon a field of fire, pitted and scarred, and Talasha’s stomach was starting to lurch. She wretched and gagged, the motion too much, too fierce and fast and frenzied, heaving up clots of bile. Breathing became difficult, the air was choked and black. She shut her eyes and tucked her chin and prayed to some formless god for it to end.
Then suddenly there was a fierce impact, shuddering hard against Neyruu’s side, and the dragon tumbled across the field. She landed with a crunch of scales and horns, raking ruts in the earth as she ground to a stop. Talasha breathed hard, hanging sideward in the saddle, opening her eyes. She could see Paglar lumbering forward in a burning rage, feel the ground shaken by his tread. His tail was lashing behind him. That tail. It must have hit her.
“Up, Neyruu,!” Talasha screamed. “Up! Up!” The dragon staggered to stand, unsteady. A storm of flame was brewing in Paglar’s maw. “Up! Up!”
The torrent of fire came gushing. Neyruu gave a weary beat of her wings, and half running, half flying, she fled. The flames receded behind them, but Paglar was setting into a charge, thumping his wings to follow. Talasha could feel Neyruu’s exhaustion, her fear and her pain, but her instinct to survive was stronger. She took flight, wings working hard at the grey, smoky air, ascending, as fast as she could, up toward the clouds.
Paglar was close, matching her wing-beat for wing-beat. He is not tiring, Talasha thought, in fear. This is it. He’ll catch us eventually. Cevi was still swaying in the saddle, oblivious, and perhaps that was for the best. The fear of death was always worse than the dying itself, it was said.
But Talasha was sensing her doom. They could try to get back to the company, as Cevi had pled, and let the Whaleheart and the sellswords swarm Paglar with their swords, but something told her they wouldn’t make it that far. Neyruu was depleted, or near enough that made no matter, and their only hope now was the storm. And Neyruu had realised that too.
Weary, battle-beaten, she pressed skyward as steeply as she could, thumping hard through pillars of smoke rising up from the woods beneath them. A great conflagration was engulfing the Green Cloak, a ring of fire spreading to girdle the lake. Where Agarath’s minions go, fire follows, the princess thought numbly. She could hear the Fire God laughing in the skies, and the twisted forms of tar-black clouds seemed to gather to form his face, lit from below by the flames. It was the face of doom, and into it Neyruu flew, right up through the fiery maw of the god, punching through cloud and fume and rain.
They were not alone. Paglar gave chase, the smog swirling about him, and with each flash of silver lightning, each deafening peal of thunder, he drew closer.
Talasha twisted her neck to look back. It should not have been this way, came a bitter, angry thought. Paglar’s jaws snapped down so close they bit through the tip of Neyruu’s tail. The dragon screeched, and propelled herself onward, but it won her only yards. Talasha felt her pain. The flash of it, searing, where her tail might be, a phantom blaze that rippled through her, and there were tears in her eyes, she realised, tears of horror and hate streaming down her cheeks.
It should not have been this way. He was meant to rise benevolent.
But that had never been true, Saska Varin had told her. The wise masters had all been lied to. Pullio the Wise, Quarl the Blind, the Skylady of Loriath. All had prophesied the second coming of the Father and the Founder, rising from his tomb to bring the world to balance, but that balance did not require his strength, it only required his death. For millennia Rasal manipulators had worked toward that end, with their whispers and their spells and their potions, all guided by the foresight of Thala. It was they who seeded the prophesies into the minds of Pullio and Quarl and Misha. They who lurked in the shadows, corrupting their dreams with their magic. No good godsfearing Agarathi would resurrect Eldur only to see him slain, so they had twisted the truth, this lie of his benevolence, and in that form, the prophecy had spread.
Talasha had been part of that prophesy, that lie. I was the first to find him in the depths of the mountain, she thought. I was there the day he awoke at the Nest, my heart bursting with hope to see him open his eyes and end the war once and for all. But no sooner had that red gaze awakened than Talasha’s hope had turned to fear, as she watched her cousin die, saw Ulrik Marak swatted aside, stood in horror as Eldur summoned the dragons to his will, enslaved by the Soul of Agarath. Tethian had died that night, and Kin’rar too, and Mirella only days later, and how many others since? And now I’m to follow, at last, she thought. To join my brother in his Eternal Flame.
The tears were rolling down her cheeks. She could feel the hot breath of Paglar behind them, feel the force of his power as he thrashed through the skies. Blood sprayed out from the tip of Neyruu’s tail. She was starting to slow. Paglar snapped down hard, a crashing of a thousand teeth, but Neyruu swerved to the side, and he missed. Another snap, another jerk, another savage bite and Paglar only ate air. A thrumming sound filled the air, of satisfaction, Talasha thought, as Paglar closed on his prey. She dared to look back at him, at his massive smoke-grey maw, right there, saw the burning hate in his eyes, but there was joy within them too, as he savoured the thrill of the kill.
It was then that Cevi stirred awake, into that smoking, fiery hell.
She lifted her head and opened her eyes, blinking, looking around in confusion and fear as it dawned on her what was happening. Just don’t look back, Talasha thought. When the girl did, she screamed.
Talasha reached behind her to take her hand, twisting in the saddle. “Look at me, Cevi,” she told her. “Look at me.” The girl looked at her, her eyes bulging in horror. Tears crawled from her eyes, drawing thin lines down her sooty cheeks. “It’s OK, Cevi. Just look at me, that’s it. Keep your eyes on me, my sweet.”
Paglar’s jaws were opening wide. Talasha saw the flame boiling within, ready to pour upon them. She squeezed Cevi’s hand as tight as she could. “It’s going to be all right,” she called to the girl. “Just keep your eyes on me. It will be quick, I promise. There’s not going to be any pain…”
A light reflected in Cevi’s eyes, golden as the dawn.
It brightened, spreading through the clouds, casting away gloom and fume and smoke. There was a great flash of golden lightning, strands stretching and reaching across the world like a net, and the thunder that followed sounded strange.
Like an eagle, screeching, Talasha thought dimly…though godly, otherworldly, divine.
