Ed Greenwood: Death of the Dragon

When the ghazneth showed no sign of rising, Sarmon waved the surviving dragoneers over the edge and shouted, “Do you want him to kill the rest of us? Get him in the box!”

The tower sergeant enlisted the aid of two more dragoneers and shoved the box off the rampart onto the ghazneth’s motionless body, then lowered himself over the edge after it. Sarmon simply stepped off the rampart, relying on the magic of his war wizard’s weathercloak to lower him gently into the insect cloud.

As the wizard descended, Alaphondar’s bony shape appeared on the carnage strewn walkway. The old man was clutching his side with one bloody hand and slapping at his wasp-stung face with the other, shaking his head in confusion as he tried to overcome his teleport afterdaze.

“Sarmon, above you!” Tanalasta yelled. “Alaphondar!”

The princess could not make herself heard above the clamor at the front gate, where a hundred orcs were squealing in agony as they poured through the splintered gates. Despite the rain of death pouring down on them through the gatehouse’s murder holes, the orcs were slowly forcing their way forward, and Tanalasta knew it would not be long before they came pouring across the courtyard. She closed her weathercloak’s magic throat clasp and pictured Sarmon’s face in her mind.

The wizard’s brow rose, and she spoke to him with her thoughts. Alaphondar is on the rampart above you. Get him, and let’s go to Arabel.

Sarmon glanced up, then looked across the bailey and nodded. As soon as we box the ghazneth. Perhaps we can learn of Vangerdahast’s fate.

“Box it?” Tanalasta cried, too astonished to care that her clasp’s magic was gone for the day and Sarmon could no longer hear her. “Have you lost your wits?”

Heart rising into her throat, Tanalasta opened her throat clasp to deactivate the weathercloak’s magic, then pulled her battle bracers from her pocket. She stopped short of slipping the bands onto her wrists. Putting them on would activate their magic, and the last thing she wanted when Xanthon recovered was an aura of magic. Ghazneths absorbed magic the way plants absorbed sunlight, and they could detect dweomer for miles around.

To Tanalasta’s astonishment, the dragoneers were able to do as the war wizard asked, scooping Xanthon into the box and slamming the lid before he recovered. Sarmon stepped over to the box and reached for the iron bolting bar.

A muffled squeaking erupted from the rear corner tower, and the wizard glanced reflexively over his shoulder. That was all the opportunity Xanthon needed. The box lid flew open, slamming Sarmon so hard that he fell and tumbled backward across the courtyard. The ghazneth sat up, his arm flashing up to swat aside the iron sword of an alert dragoneer, then looked across the courtyard toward Tanalasta. Through the swirling cloud of insects, she saw a strange wedge-shaped face and a pair of red, oval eyes, then a dragoneer blocked her view.

The man’s sword slashed down once, then he screamed and clutched at his belly. In the next instant, a dark hand wrapped itself around his neck and gave a sharp twist.

Holding her battle bracers ready, Tanalasta backed toward the corner tower behind her. Though she had not yet spoken with Xanthon Cormaeril face to face, she knew of his hatred for the Obarskyrs and had no doubts about what he would do to her-and her unborn child-if he caught her alive. With Sarmon still lying in a heap where Xanthon had knocked him, she would have to climb up to the rampart and flee to the gatehouse, where there would be no shortage of war wizards ready to teleport her back to Arabel.

As Tanalasta stepped through the door, she was greeted by the same squeaking sound that had distracted Sarmon earlier. Something scratchy brushed past her ankle, and she looked down to see a blanket of rats pouring across the floor beneath her. One stopped to sniff at her leg.

Tanalasta bit back a scream and started up the stairs, then heard a pair of feet whispering across the stony floor behind her. A powerful hand grabbed her by the hair, snapping her head back and jerking her off her feet. She landed flat on her back, still clutching her battle bracers in one hand. When she raised her hand to slip the bands on, she found a beady-eyed rat clinging to the cuff of her cloak. This time she did scream.

A naked black foot swung across her body, pinning her arm to the floor and trapping the bracers in her hand.

“I think not, Princess.”

Above Tanalasta appeared a black, chitinous face that seemed more insect than human. The brow was broad and smooth, the nose long and slender, the mouth lined by a ridge of jagged cartilage. Though Sarmon’s spell had left a fist-sized crater in the side of the thing’s head, the edges of the wound were already closing.

Little clawed feet started to tug at Tanalasta’s weathercloak, and the rats swarmed over her body, gnawing her clothes, hair, and flesh. Xanthon reached out with a spindly arm and slammed the tower door shut, then slipped the heavy lock bar into place as though it were a mere stick.

“Sentries!” Tanalasta yelled. “Down here!”

The ghazneth smiled. “So it is you, Highness.” With his northern accent and dry huskiness, Xanthon sounded so much like Rowen that Tanalasta could have sworn it was her husband talking. The ghazneth chuckled brutally, then said, “I fear your face is so swollen that you are no longer recognizable to your loyal subjects.”

“Swollen as it is, at least it remains human,” Tanalasta said. “Whatever you have made of yourself, it was a poor trade.”

A metallic clamor began to echo down the stairs. Xanthon glanced toward the sound, and the rat swarm poured up the stone steps. The men started to curse and yell, then one screamed and a tremendous crash reverberated down the spiraling passage.

Hoping to take advantage of the distraction, Tanalasta screamed for help, then shot her free hand across her body and slipped a bracer onto her wrist.

Before she could put on the second, Xanthon caught her arm and plucked the bracer from her grasp. “You are too kind, Princess.”

The luster of the metal faded at once, and the gruesome wound in Xanthon’s head healed before Tanalasta’s eyes. He discarded the band and grabbed the other one. As he pulled it off, he gave Tanalasta’s arm a vicious twist. She felt the bone snap, but heard only the briefest crack before her scream drowned out the sound.

A pair of guards stumbled out of the stairwell cursing and trying to kick the rats off their legs. The first lowered his halberd and drove it into Xanthon’s ribs, pushing the ghazneth off Tanalasta and pinning him against the wall. The blade did not penetrate, however, for it was made of steel and only weapons of cold-forged iron could wound a ghazneth.

Xanthon slapped the halberd aside, then grabbed the dragoneer by the back of the helmet and smashed his unarmored forehead into the tower’s stone wall. There was a sickening crack, and the man went limp. Xanthon finished the second soldier with even less trouble, blocking the attack with one arm, then catching the man beneath the chin and simply tearing his jaw off.

Tanalasta’s gorge rose with pain and revulsion. Clutching her broken arm to her chest, she pushed her way through the rat swarm and braced herself against the wall. A series of deep thumps reverberated through the tower as warriors outside began to hammer at the door, but Tanalasta knew better than to think they would break through the thick oak. She thrust her good hand into her cloak, trying desperately to slip her shaking finger into her commander’s ring.

Xanthon ignored the hammering at the door and stepped across the room. He squatted and pulled her hand from her pocket, then plucked the ring from her grasp. The wound in his head was almost completely healed now, and the scalp grew back as he drained the magic from her ring.