Chris Wraight - Master of Dragons

One by one the druchii crept out onto the ledge, going warily. Latharek hung back, hugging the near wall, looking sickened by the precipitous drop.

‘Behold its chamber!’ cried Drutheira, sweeping her staff-tip around her and throwing light up the walls.

Huge pilasters loomed up over them, each one carved with immense runes of containment. Sevekai could sense the magic bleeding from them like a physical smell, sulphurous and metallic.

As soon as he saw the runes, Kaitar turned on Drutheira. ‘Dhar,’ he snarled, reaching for his blade.

Drutheira smiled wickedly. ‘What did you expect?’

Kaitar sniffed. It was an odd gesture — like a dog hunting the scent of its prey. His eyes suddenly widened. ‘No. Do not do this.’

Drutheira shrugged. ‘A little late, I fear.’

Her staff exploded with power, sending crackling lines of energy lashing out against the pilasters. The aethyr-force slammed into the runes, shattering them. A rumble like thunder welled up from the chasm depths, sending loose rubble clattering down the sides of the shaft.

Sevekai staggered, nearly losing his footing. Kaitar’s head snapped around. He looked terrified.

‘What do you fear, Kaitar?’ asked Drutheira, her violet eyes glittering with mirth. ‘No druchii fears Dhar.’

Kaitar’s face changed into something bestial. ‘Fool!’ he slurred. ‘You cannot control it!’

‘You have no idea what I can control,’ said Drutheira imperiously.

Kaitar went for her, lunging out with his blade. Latharek was closest. He tried to block Kaitar, ducking low to shoulder him off the ledge. Kaitar lashed around, grabbing Latharek and hurling him away. Off-balance, Latharek tumbled clear over the chasm edge, screaming as he plummeted.

Drutheira fled along the ledge, hurrying around to the far side of the chasm, her staff still blazing. More runes shattered, sending fragments spilling into the vault. The stone walls trembled again, rocked by something huge and muffled from far below.

‘You cannot stop this!’ cried Drutheira.

Kaitar went after her. Malchior attempted to seize him but Kaitar twisted away from his grip. Hreth darted at him next, blade in hand. For a moment Sevekai thought Hreth got a dagger to stick, but Kaitar somehow angled away at the last moment. They grappled on the edge of the ledge, blows flying furiously, before Kaitar punched his dagger into Hreth’s stomach and wrenched it free with a flourish.

Something terrible had happened to Kaitar — his eyes gleamed with unnatural light, his limbs moved with ferocious speed. He was demented, raving, slavering with fear and fury. Whatever Drutheira was doing had made him crazy.

Sevekai went for him, dagger in each hand. Kaitar parried with his blade, desperate to get past and go after Drutheira. In the flurry of jabs Sevekai managed to wound him, stabbing a dagger-point deep into his arm before pulling sharply away.

It should have stopped him. It should have severed tendons, sliced muscle. Kaitar merely grunted and rushed at him faster. Sevekai got his blade to block just as Verigoth came at Kaitar from behind, dropping a throttle-cord over his neck and yanking it tight.

Kaitar’s eyes bulged and his cheeks went purple. Verigoth dragged him back from the brink and for a moment Sevekai thought he’d pinned him. Then Kaitar’s hands flew over his shoulders and grabbed Verigoth by his armour. With a ferocious lurch, Kaitar doubled over and hurled Verigoth headfirst into the chasm.

That was impossible. That was madness . Verigoth was strong — the strongest of them all — and he’d been thrown overhead like a child.

By then Drutheira had reached the far side and begun destroying more runes. Kaitar’s gaze switched back and forth: Ashniel and Malchior blocked him from the left, Sevekai and the wounded Hreth from the right. He looked like a trapped animal.

Sevekai twirled his daggers in his hands and advanced again. Kaitar let slip a strangled growl and crouched down against the stone.

Then he leapt.

If any doubt remained that Kaitar was more than mortal, the leap quashed it. Sevekai could only watch as Kaitar flew high into the air, his limbs cartwheeling, propelled by some unnatural strength far out over the drop. He flew straight at Drutheira, his eyes blazing with anger, his arms outstretched to grasp her. She watched him come with a playful smile on her pale lips.

‘Impressive,’ she murmured.

But just as Kaitar reached midway, a column of fire thundered up from the depths, spearing out of the gloom and engulfing him in a gale of flame. He screamed — a horrific, otherworldly sound that rang round the chamber.

Sevekai dropped to his knees. The heat was incredible, pressing against his face like a vice. After the long trek in the dark, the sudden brilliance made his eyes sting.

Drutheira revelled in it. Her robes flapped about her.

‘ This is the weapon!’ she crowed. ‘ This is the weapon!’

Sevekai had no idea what she was talking about. He shrank back from the heat and the noise, just as all the others did.

An instant later the fires gusted out and something vast and dark surged up out of the chasm, rising on a tide of ruin, wreathed in oily smoke. With a twist and snap of immense jaws it ended Kaitar’s wretched screaming. A hard bang echoed around the vault, like a steel hammer falling on an anvil. Cracks shot across the walls and rubble rained down from above.

The creature kept rising, buoyed by an updraft as hot as a forge. Vast wings stretched out, bat-skin black and pierced with chains. Ophidian flesh snaked and coiled on itself in the flickering gloom.

‘You know me, creature!’ cried Drutheira. ‘You know what I am. Listen to me! The druchii have returned. Listen! We have come to reclaim what is ours.’

Sevekai looked on, unable to do anything but cower. A solid mass of curled, distorted black flesh loomed high up over them, hovering across the face of the chasm. Its hide glistened in the witch-light, reflecting from a thousand tight-woven scales. Ragged wings brushed against the shaft’s wall. He saw spines, curved teeth crowded along a jagged jawline and talons the length of an elf’s body. Gold chains, some broken, hung from an armoured torso, and iron runes had been branded and hammered into its flesh.

A dragon. A black dragon. One of Malekith’s own creations, as warped and ruined as anything to emerge from his embittered mind.

‘Your will is broken!’ shouted Drutheira, speaking in the tone of command she used when spellcasting. ‘Your mind is enslaved. You are ours , creature.’

The beast hissed at her, and flickers of blood-red flame danced across the void.

‘Do not resist!’ warned the sorceress. ‘You belong to the druchii. We never forget. We never release.’

That brought a sudden gush of flame and a roar that made the whole shaft shiver. Flames kept coming after that, guttering and snorting, breaking the murky darkness with a dull glow of crimson.

‘Serve me!’ commanded Drutheira, raising her staff fearlessly. ‘Serve me! ’

The beast screamed back, but it did not attack. If it had chosen to it could have wiped her out just as it had consumed Kaitar. Its jaws opened and closed, revealing a long, lolling tongue the colour of burned iron. Its eyes — slits of silver — flashed furiously.

Sevekai saw the truth then: the powerful magicks that had cracked and twisted the creature’s mind still held. It would not attack. It writhed, snorted and flailed, but its fires stayed subdued.

Drutheira smiled savagely. ‘You know who your masters are. You sense us. You smell us.’

It screamed at her again, and echoes rang around the vault. Drutheira pointed the staff directly at it. ‘The wards are broken. When I call, you answer.’