Remli shrugged, “He might. I would. But I’d be willing to bet he thinks he can control or convert them. That’s why he hasn’t just ridden in and killed them already. He’s obviously got a plan for them, so if Lageena somehow tricked them into getting close to Merglan and they got caught, I bet he’s going to hold onto them for awhile.”
Nadir nodded thinking over Remli’s theory.
“At the very least, I’ll want to leave a few people here with the Lumbapi. We’ll need to know where to strike when we return,” Remli said.
“I’ll stay,” Maylox offered.
“No,” Remli commanded, shaking his head. “You’re needed with me.”
“You didn’t want me with you when you came here, but now you need me to join you when you’re leaving?” she asked. “You’ve guaranteed me a position in the dwarf army; let me start here with this mission. I won’t let you down.”
Remli swelled with pride, “Well, no one will ever accuse you of not being like your old man.”
Maylox chuckled.
Remli nodded, “Yes, I need to let you go, don’t I? If this is what you truly desire, then you can stay.”
“I’ll task Natalia with staying, even though she would regardless. Solomon will follow the Lumbapi, as he did before, so that leaves us with some allies here among the Lumbapi.”
“Very well,” Remli said. “I’ll order my dwarfs to the ships. ‘Tuck tail and sail’ as I used to say to those Rollo Islanders.”
Nadir grinned, chuckling at the slight. He found Natalia resting against a tree, eyeing the Lumbapi soldiers. Kneeling next to her, Nadir handed her a small pouch.
“What’s this?” she asked, taking it.
“Keep it on you at all times for communication,” he said as she opened the pouch.
“Your father’s communication mirrors,” she said, sounding confused.
“Our people need convincing to stay in this fight. I need to lead them to make the right choice,” he paused, shaking his head. “I should be staying to help you seek out Anders and Ivan, but I can’t. The council will usurp my reign if I don’t follow our army home. That’s why you need to stay and keep me updated. Follow the Lumbapi and keep me in the loop. I’ll return with the full strength of the elven army and the dwarf army.”
Nadir rose to his feet once Natalia had nodded. “Serve me well, Natalia. Our rider’s fate may very well depend on it.” As Nadir walked back to the ships, he hoped Anders, Zahara and Ivan would be waiting for them at the Everlight Kingdom.
Chapter 50
Anders
Anders awoke with a gasp, his eyes peering into the vast emptiness before him. The darkness encased him as he lay on his back, his body damp with feverish sweat. Rising to a seated position, he winced with pain. His muscles taut with days’ of overuse; he also felt a burning sensation across his back. Groaning, he attempted to control his rapid breathing and slow his heart rate while trying to make sense of the darkness. Confusion hung over him like an early morning fog, blanketing his memory.
Where are we? Where’s Zahara? he questioned, the thoughts making his head feel pressed as if a vice squeezed on his brain.
Fighting physical fatigue, Anders again squinted into the darkness, hoping to discern even the outline of something that would give him an idea of where he was and whether Zahara was still with him. Twisting to expand his search, he felt the skin on his back crack and then a wet trickle from the crack. It stung. He gritted his teeth to fight off the pain. He didn’t want to risk crying out in this strange place for fear Merglan and Killdoor might still be after him. As he tried to settle back into a more comfortable posture, Anders recalled a fleeting glimpse of a dragon; the brilliant red of the dragon shining against an opal sky. The image seemed like something from a dream, but stood out so clearly that Anders knew it to be real. The fog clouding his memory broke in patches, bringing to mind a glimpse of their hasty escape. Ivan had been locked with Merglan in a mental struggle when Anders had broken free from Merglan’s grip. He recalled diving toward Ivan on Zahara’s back and somehow summoning the will to transport them. Then a bright flash.
As his mind continued to clear, Anders grew nearly frantic to find them, so he opened his mind, attempting to search for Ivan and Zahara’s presence. Calling upon his mental power, Anders was hit by a tidal wave of pain that again robbed him of his focus. Grunting, he put his fingers to his temples and applied pressure. He closed his link and retreated within, quickly giving up on using magic to locate his companions. He would have to rely on his other senses to find them.
Reaching straight ahead, Anders felt into the empty black space. Slowly moving out to his sides, he was careful to avoid further cracking the burning patch of skin on his back. Feeling nothing but open to either side, he began to panic. A fear of complete loneliness and isolation crept into his thoughts and he felt his pulse increase. Attempting to control his emotions, he tried to push through the worry and focus on where they might have been transported.
He closed his eyes to gain some self-control and saw a bright flash. Suddenly he recalled sliding across the stone floor with Zahara and grabbing Ivan as they skidded past. He could almost feel the release of the tainted energy from Lazuran, his empowered sword, as he sent it from his body. The sphere of light grew around them, ever so briefly turning Merglan’s own energy against him to allow for their escape. Visualizing the enclosing sphere gave Anders a sense of safety, allowing him to calm down for a moment. Then he remembered a hand shooting into the white orb, gripping Ivan and yanking him out of sight an instant before they were transported. The heartache he’d felt in this fog was now explained. He planted his hands at his sides, clutching at the wool blanket beneath him.
His sudden awareness of the blanket knocked him from the horror of leaving Ivan behind. How did this wool blanket come to be underneath him? He carried two in his saddlebag, but now he could clearly recall the moment of transport. The sight of his mentor and friend being ripped from his life as the energy from casting the transport spell took its toll on him. Following the flash came the red dragon, approaching, then darkness.
Fighting through the memory of the hand ripping Ivan away, Anders returned to his search. He knew he didn’t arrive wherever this was alone. And the sight of the red dragon confused him all the more. Was he back in the Everlight Kingdom? The sensation of not knowing where he was or whether anyone else was nearby sent him further into a state of panic. Shuffling ninety degrees, Anders sought to feel at the space behind him. He swept his hand freely to the side expecting to feel open air when the side of his hand slapped into something hard. Shaking his hand, Anders whimpered a solemn, “Ouch!”
He reached, slower and more gently this time. The feeling of dragon scales was unmistakable, even in the dark. Anders knew Zahara slept at his head as she so often did when they were traveling. Turning onto his hip, Anders fought through the physical pain searing in his back and gently stroked the dragon. Despite his heartache for Ivan, he felt great relief and a sense of wholeness at knowing he hadn’t left entirely alone. Zahara was here with him. Now he just needed to figure out where ‘here’ was.
Did Zahara set me on this wool blanket? Has she made sure that we were safe before choosing to sleep here? And what of that red dragon?
Anders abruptly stopped petting Zahara. Doubt entered his mind when he heard the deep rumbling exhale of a dragon; a dragon that wasn’t Zahara.
Clamping his hand over his mouth, Anders stilled his breathing and remained motionless. The deep grumbling of the unknown dragon drew fear Anders thought he’d escaped. Quivering, he breathed unsteadily into his cupped hands as he tried to decide what to do. He again tried to open his mental link with Zahara, but the pain was too excruciating. Because of his fatigue, his magic proved inaccessible.
Deciding he had to move, Anders weighted his palms and shifted silently in the darkness. As he pressed down and bent to pull his legs up under him, he felt the tight patch of skin on his back crack open again. Biting down to avoid crying out, Anders flexed every muscle in his body. Moving silently though carefully, he rested momentarily on hands and knees. Slowly, he lifted his right hand and began to crawl. As he moved off of the wool blanket, he paused, feeling the ground beneath him. His hands touched bare grass, damp with early morning dew. The grass suggested that he wasn’t in the dense forest of the Everlight Kingdom. So where then? He continued crawling, knees on the grass dampening his riding pants.
Clear of the blanket and the dragon, Anders rose to his feet. His stiff muscles urged him to lie back down and the throbbing pain in his back nearly forced him to, but the fear regarding their current situation kept him moving.
How did I come to be in this predicament? Anders asked himself. And why is it so dark?
On his third step, Anders’ foot landed on an unfamiliar surface. He tried to stop, but his momentum carried him forward. In his attempt to hop around the object, he wound up stepping even farther into the uneven mass. Metal clanged as he weighted his feet onto a loose bulge. The pile he stepped into shifted and sent him toppling to the ground. Unable to help himself, Anders cried out as he landed on his back. If the clattering of the metal wasn’t enough to wake the dragon, his screaming did the job.
The sleeping dragon went on alert, scales clicking as it leapt to all fours. Spraying the air above with fire, the dragon illuminated their surroundings. Anders quickly assessed his whereabouts. He was sprawled in the pile of Zahara’s saddle and his riding armor. Zahara was to his left, her head perked up in alarm as a red dragon expelled another arch of fire overhead. The wool blanket he woke up on was spread out in the grass next to him and a ring of rocks marked a campfire that obviously had been burning earlier in the night. Across the fire ring, close to where Anders had been sleeping, he saw a girl with brown hair rise onto her elbows, a look of shock on her half-asleep face. The dragon’s fire extinguished and Anders’ world plunged back into darkness. All thoughts of his pain vanished as he recognized the girl in the fleeting light. He tried to untangle himself from the saddle’s many straps and get out of the pile.
Awkwardly moving to his feet, he spoke into the void, “Maija, is that you?” Now that the darkness had returned, he wasn’t sure if it was Maija. He waited for a response.
“Anders?” Maija’s voice floated across to him, soothing his fear. “What’s wrong?”
“Maija!?” Anders said, more loudly and in disbelief. “It’s you, but how?”
“Yes, it’s me. Hold on, don’t move. I’ll come to you,” she said, her voice moving closer as she spoke.
