Douglas Niles - The Dragons

The tutor’s words moved the silver dragon, but already Patersmith had moved on to Aurican, the last of his hatchlings to say farewell.

“We owe you much, our teacher,” murmured the gold dragon. Aurican had picked up a diamond from the nest, clutching it in his foreclaw as he gently nuzzled the sage’s beard. Darlantan hung his head low, but couldn’t help listening to the exchange.

“Hold your gems, my golden one. Share them well, for those stones may become the proof of your life, even the hope of the world. And your songs, too, are ballads that will endure.”

“I would like you to carry this on your journey,” Aurican said softly. He extended a golden forepaw, in the clasp of which he held a bright diamond. When he pulled his claws away, the stone floated in the air. “It is all the magic I have been able to work.”

Patersmith took the stone, blinking back the moisture of his emotion. “Hold your faith, my golden one. You may find the means of greater power yet. I only regret that I shall not be here to share in your triumph.”

Finally Patersmith laid himself upon a bier of fine stones in the rear of the sacred cave. He settled back peacefully, clasping his hands over his chest while his eyelids drooped shut. With a deep, shuddering sigh, he went to sleep. Then, as the thirteen dragons watched with breath held in check, the frail and weathered body slowly faded from sight until it had completely disappeared.

3493 PC

The ogres gathered in a mighty throng around their mistress, shouting, roaring, and cheering in a monstrous din. The stomping of their feet shook the ground as greatly as did the rumbles of the nearby volcanoes. Accolades and battle cries rang through the night in a rising tide of martial thunder. Hulking Blacktusk, the battle chieftain who was descended directly from Ironfist himself, led the hailing of their mistress’s name, of her power and her might.

Crematia coiled in their midst, her crimson neck and head rising high into the air. The dragon’s serpentine tail snaked through the legs of a massive bull ogre, and a dozen more of the brutes, clad in armor of stiffened leather studded with bronze spikes, stood arrayed in a stance of honor around her. They were armed with swords and held these weapons high, allowing the red dragon to temper the keen edges with a great explosion of her flaming breath.

Beyond the elite bodyguards were thousands more of the burly tusked warriors. Great knobbed clubs waved through the air like a sea of grass flowing back and forth in the currents of the wind. Numerous chieftains were bedecked in feathers and ornaments of gold. Instead of crude clubs, many of these leaders brandished long swords or axes with blades of jagged-edged bronze. They all thronged forward, praising their leader, sharing in the glory of her presence while they displayed their bravery and devotion.

“You are brave, my ogres!” crowed the red dragon, and a roaring chorus of approbation rose from the gathered throng. “And soon you shall vent your courage against the legions of our Dark Lady’s enemies!”

The shouts rose to a thunderous crescendo, resounding from the high stone walls of the barren valley. Crematia allowed her leathery eyelids to droop lazily as she swept her gaze over the frenzied, noisy mob. Ogre skin was slicked with sweat, and tiny eyes gleamed furiously from many a flat-skulled face. She saw the spittle dripping from tusks, heard the pure hatred in so many of those lusty shouts.

In the center of the throng, a huge fire blazed upward, spilling a wash of bright light through the deep canyon. The black, smoky skies of the Khalkists glowered overhead as a pile of whole pine trunks crackled and flared with greedy flames. Fiery tendrils roared eagerly upward, as if they would challenge the sun with their heat and brightness.

As encouraging to Crematia as the frenzy of her own tribe was the fact that similar gatherings were occurring in other valleys throughout the Khalkist Range. The dragon clans of blue, black, white, and green had each claimed realms in the mountains and foothills. Her cousins were more numerous, of course, a dozen or more of each color to her solitary crimson presence. Yet still she was acknowledged as their lord, for she alone had received the blessing of the Dark Lady herself.

So it was only appropriate that none of those other ogre bands was quite so large, nor were any of their dragon masters her equal in size, sorcery, or savagery. It pleased her to know this legion was but the vanguard of a mighty force that in time would sweep across Ansalon and spread the yoke of the Dark Queen’s rule to all corners of the world.

And at last that time had come.

“Blacktusk,” she growled in a rumbling purr. Her word settled the roaring and pulled the attention of the massive bull ogre to the red serpent coiled on the high rock.

“I am your slave, mistress!” cried that brute, whose maw was distinguished by a single, upward-jutting fang, an ivory tusk dark and discolored enough to have given the mighty chieftain his name.

“Tell me what the scouts have reported,” demanded Crematia.

“The elves of the woodlands have spread throughout the forestlands of Ansalon,” growled the hulking brute. “While we have been busy slaughtering and enslaving the humans on the plains, their long-lived allies have been establishing strong footholds to the south.”

“Are they dangerous?”

“My crimson lady, barely two moons ago an entire war party, commanded by my own brother, Fire-eye, was destroyed by ice magic as it circled the southern mountain. From this we have learned that the elves possess the power of sorcery, the power the humans have told us has been lost for ages.”

“I know this tale,” Crematia said slowly. Her hooded eyes narrowed still further as she considered the disturbing implications. “Yet the skill of your Painmasters is sufficient to insure that your human slaves are not lying, is it not?”

“Aye, mistress. My torturers possess exquisite abilities. I believe these humans spoke the truth as they knew it, up until the time their tongues were ripped from their mouths. They believe that magic is gone from Krynn.”

“So if the elves possess magic, they have kept it secret from their allies?”

“Well… we know that the alliance between humans and elves is tenuous at best. Would it not be natural for such a mighty truth to remain concealed from the short-lived, irresponsible men?”

“That is one possibility,” the red dragon agreed.

Privately, she placed more credence in another theory. After all, she and her chromatic kin-dragons had been granted magic in the Abyss by the Queen of Darkness herself. Crematia was fairly certain that the elves had not, in fact, discovered a way to bring magic back to Krynn on their own. She knew it was far more likely that the icy attack had a different origin, and it was one the nature of which her ogres did not as yet need to know.

“Do you have prisoners?”

Blacktusk nodded. “Bring out the elves!” he roared.

Immediately strapping ogres rolled away a rock that had been placed to block the mouth of a small cave. A hulking warrior seized a chain and pulled forth a trio of golden-haired figures-elven warriors, unarmed but still clad in their supple chain mail. The tallest of these stepped before the others, who were obviously younger and very frightened. But the leader crossed his arms over his chest and glared defiantly up at the dragon.

“Shall I show mercy?” Crematia brayed the question so it could be heard by her entire gathered horde.

“Mercy is weakness!” The cry came back as a resounding chant, echoing from the mountain walls, thundering through the valley. “And weakness is death!”