Cursed Bones

chapter 43



“We haven’t much time,” Izzulft said, midflight. “Zuhl will know I’m free and he’ll order the others to fight or flee.”

He landed briefly, carefully depositing Abigail on the floor, but leaving her off-balance just the same, before leaping on top of Nix, his mate, and pinning her head to the ground, exposing the collar to Abigail.

“Quickly,” Izzulft hissed.

In the same moment that Abigail cut Nix’s collar, all four of Ixabrax’s siblings came awake, roaring in unison. Rather than fight, they launched into the sky, one after the other, flying from the aerie into the night.

Izzulft didn’t hesitate, he snatched Abigail up again, ignoring the threat the Thinblade posed to him, or perhaps trusting Abigail to avoid harming him, and launched into the sky toward the nearest of his children attempting to escape.

If felt like time slowed down for Abigail as she watched events unfold, helpless as she was, clutched in a dragon’s claw. Soldiers poured into the aerie from three different entrances while drakini floated into the aerie from above. Izzulft gained with each stroke of his powerful wings, reaching his child just before he reached the opening atop the dome-shaped aerie. With his free foreclaw, Izzulft grabbed his child’s leg and dragged him back into the aerie, bringing him down hard, protecting Abigail, though not gently, while subduing his son and holding his head still so Abigail could cut his collar.

The collar came free easily. She looked up to see soldiers everywhere, then the turmoil was interrupted by Ixabrax, roaring in challenge as he descended into the aerie, savagely attacking the drakini before landing in front of Abigail and Izzulft.

“You have done well, Ixabrax,” Izzulft said, “but we still have family to free.”

“These humans are necessary,” Ixabrax said. “We must preserve them.”

“Agreed,” Izzulft said, turning toward a troop of soldiers fanning out to surround Anatoly, who was already battling three men. The huge dragon belched forth a great cloud of super-cold air that billowed out, engulfing the entire platoon, freezing them solid to a man in moments.

“Gather your human friends and we will make our escape,” Izzulft said, turning back toward another platoon of soldiers and freezing them solid as well. Frozen statues spread out in a battle line, terribly lifelike, terribly still.

Ixabrax moved to surround Abigail with his body and wings while dealing fatal damage with his tail and teeth to any drakini that ventured too close.

“Call your friends to you,” Ixabrax commanded.

Abigail climbed up onto his neck and settled into a space between two of his back bone spikes, drawing an arrow and taking careful aim, letting it fly just a moment after she sat down, killing a soldier circling around behind Anatoly without anyone’s notice.

The big man-at-arms and Magda were squared off against twelve of Zuhl’s palace guard, brutish soldiers, most of them bigger than Anatoly and they were fanning out to surround the two of them.

Magda raised her hand and fired nine light-blue darts formed of magical energy, targeting three of the soldiers that had gotten closest. Each took three to the chest in rapid succession, Magda calmly selecting her targets and unleashing her magic at them, one right after the other. Each collapsed in turn, sputtering blood and groaning in pain.

The remaining men rushed them, raising a terrible battle cry as they charged. Anatoly hurled forward to meet them, stretching out with his axe, and bringing it down on the nearest soldier as quickly as possible, sacrificing balance for first blood. The blade cleaved into the man’s shoulder, driving him to his knees, wounding him seriously but not fatally. Anatoly nearly stumbled, going to one knee, bringing his axe in and then thrusting out into the midsection of the next nearest soldier, stabbing the top spike through his belly and out his back.

Soldiers collapsed in on him from all sides. A battle axe across the right shoulder turned him away from his attacker. A sword thrust into his left side staggered him, knocking the wind out of him despite the protection of his armor. Another sword thrust to the back drove him forward, opening his guard and slightly stunning him. A giant of a man stepped up in front of him with a war hammer held high. All Anatoly could do as the hammer fell was lean into it, take the blow on his dragon-scale helm, and hope to remain conscious.

He was driven to his hands and knees, his axe clattering to the floor beneath him, his head swimming in confusion and pain. The man with the hammer smiled down on him, raising his hammer for a second blow … but then he stopped, the war hammer slipping from his grasp and clattering to the ground behind him as he staggered to his knees, an arrow through the neck. Another fell a moment later with a shaft through the head to the feathers. He’d made the fatal mistake of separating from the group attacking Anatoly just enough for Abigail to feel certain of her shot.

Magda completed her spell, brandishing a longsword of blue-white magical energy and charging into the fray. She circled just behind the nearest soldier attacking Anatoly and stabbed him through the heart, drawing the attention of the man Anatoly had first wounded. Holding the wounded man’s eyes, she casually circled another soldier and killed him with one stroke of her conjured sword.

A soldier grabbed Anatoly, ignoring the commotion taking place in the background, and pulled his head back, exposing his face to two soldiers standing before him. Anatoly came up on his knees, bringing a knife up in each hand, stabbing under each man’s breastplate into the soft flesh of their lower bellies. Both men shrieked in sudden agony, spasming backward and collapsing to the ground in writhing pain.

The man behind him raised a knife but fell with an arrow through the skull. Anatoly staggered to his feet, war axe in hand, and scanned the battleground. Magda killed the last of the men confronting them with a well-placed trust to the heart. Seeing the enemy dispatched, she let go of her blade and it fell to the ground, vanishing before it hit.

Abigail beckoned to them.

The aerie was now home to a confused, mostly aerial battle with the drakini trying to attack the soft membranes between the bone struts on the dragons’ wings. Unfortunately for the drakini, the dragons were very good at killing them when they got anywhere close. All four dragons stood, back to back, in the center of the aerie and fought the drakini and any soldiers that were fool enough to charge into a dragons’ lair.

Anatoly was wounded, Abigail could tell from his gait, but he was still alert and deadly. A drakini made a run at them, attempting to latch on to Anatoly with its hind claws and carry him into the air. Anatoly kept walking like he didn’t notice the impending attack until the last moment, when he ducked under its feet, flipped his axe up and hooked it over the drakini’s wing, dragging it to the ground and stabbing it in the back of the head with a dagger before retrieving his axe from the corpse.

Another drakini dropped straight down on top of Abigail, crushing her into Ixabrax’s back spikes and cutting through her armor where his talons dug into her shoulders. She felt the warmth of her own blood soaking into her undershirt as the drakini launched into the air, dragging her with it. The pain was so sudden, so unexpected, that Abigail didn’t fully comprehend what was happening until she was a good twenty feet in the air. She dropped her bow, a magical gift that had served her so well for so long—it was useless in this moment.

She drew the Thinblade. Even grasping for it in a moment of desperation, when she couldn’t get a good hold on the hilt, the Sword of Kings still felt like it was made for her hand. The drakini’s legs came free of the rest of its body just below the knees.

Abigail fell.

She hit the ground hard, breaking her left leg with a loud snap, sending a jolt of pain so intense that she forgot to breathe. Anatoly hobbled up, scooping up her bow along the way, kneeling next to her, looking into her eyes and nodding.

“She’s hurt, help me get her onto the dragon.”

Magda took his instruction without question or debate, stabilizing Abigail while Anatoly maneuvered her onto Ixabrax’s neck.

The remaining drakini were fleeing the aerie in the face of the four furious dragons. Ixabrax launched into the night sky with a roar and his family followed him. He flew low and steady toward the crevasse, landing near the edge and letting Anatoly and Magda go to work on Abigail while waiting for the rest of his family to arrive.

Alexander appeared, standing over his sister while Anatoly fashioned a splint.

“You all right?” he asked.

“Been better,” Abigail said through gritted teeth. Then she passed out, overwhelmed by pain when Anatoly set the bone and fastened the splint in place. He worked quickly and efficiently, with a mixture of great care and emotional detachment.

With her leg set, Magda broke some pungent flower buds open under Abigail’s nose and roused her from her pain-induced unconsciousness. She woke stunned from the pain, but managed to accept it and take it into her, mastering the hold it had over her and regaining some control over her body.

Magda cast what limited healing magic she had over the leg, but it was a small remedy next to the kind of magic contained in a healing draught. Next, Magda cast a spell that numbed the pain, not removing it exactly, just making it feel like it was far away and unimportant. Abigail began to relax and clear her head.

Once his family had landed, Ixabrax introduced them to Alexander and Abigail.

Izzulft stepped forward. “I speak for my family. I will hear what you wish to say.”

“My name is Alexander Reishi. I am at war with Zuhl, and he’s using your family against my soldiers. Help me free your remaining children so he can never use dragons against us again.”

“Motives that I understand,” Izzulft said, regarding Alexander intently. “Bargain struck. What is your plan?”

“I’ll tell you where they are, you hold them down, and Abigail cuts their collars.”

“Simple, direct, and effective,” Izzulft said. “I like it. Proceed.”

Alexander vanished for a minute or so and then reappeared. “All three just launched from the aerie and they’re headed this way, backed up by a hundred drakini or more. All three dragons have riders … one of them looks like Zuhl.”

“I’m not ready to fight yet,” Abigail said. “My leg is broken. I can’t even stand.”

“No, but you could ride,” Alexander said. “Tie on to Ixabrax’s neck and he’ll get you close enough to cut the collar while Izzulft holds the dragon down and everyone else watches your back. Go from one to the next, taking the rider first, then freeing the dragon.”

Abigail grimaced in pain, nodding nonetheless.

“I know it hurts, Abby. I wish there was another way.”

“Me too,” she said, turning to Anatoly. “Help me tie on to Ixabrax. If we’re going to do this, I need Magda riding another dragon to attack the enemy riders.”

“I will allow it,” Nix said.

Magda bowed formally with the utmost respect to Ixabrax’s mother.

“You will ride my youngest, Human,” Izzulft said to Anatoly. “This battle is liable to stretch out across leagues … we wouldn’t want to misplace you.”

Anatoly grumbled to himself but held his tongue.

Abigail was relieved that the agony of getting mounted atop Ixabrax was finally over, that her pain had subsided into a low throb, but she knew it wouldn’t last. The battle would be an exercise in agony. Flight required using your arms and legs to remain stable in your saddle … more so when you didn’t have a saddle.

Abigail closed her eyes and focused on her breathing while she waited for the enemy to draw near. Magda mounted, as did Anatoly, riding Ixabrax’s youngest brother, Khazad. At the sound of the enemy’s approach floating on the cold night air, all three quaffed dragon draught, the last of their supply. Coldness flowed into Abigail’s veins.

The enemy crested a rise and formed up for an attack run. All four dragons leapt into the air, scattering in different directions. Abigail gasped in pain, willing her mind to focus on the fight and not on her injury, but was still distracted by the pulsating agony in her broken leg. Zuhl’s trio of young dragons remained in formation, targeting Izzulft. The elder dragon roared in defiance and gained altitude, easily outpacing his children.

Nix carried Magda into the sky, following her mate in a wide orbit, waiting for a chance to strike. Her youngest son, Khazad flew at her wing, carrying Anatoly. Ixabrax waited off to the side, orbiting in wider circles.

Spells from the three riders fell short. Izzulft tipped over and fell into a dive, gaining terrible speed and closing the distance to the dragon on the right of the formation in seconds. He crashed into his daughter and grappled her wings tight against her chest, falling with her while his tail snaked around and cut the man riding her in half.

As they plummeted to the ground, Ixabrax altered course to glide toward the spot where Izzulft intended to land. “Be ready, I’ll get you as close as possible.”

Abigail slipped her hand through the thong on the Thinblade. Izzulft continued to fall with the other two dragons in tight dives behind him. Ixabrax altered course to intercept one of his sisters.

All Abigail could do was hold on and endure the pain, waiting to cut a collar while dragons battled around her. She started laughing at the insanity of it all.

Nix made a run at the lagging dragon that was chasing Izzulft to the ground, breathing frost in a great cloud, icing the wings of her daughter and collapsing the shield of the priest riding her. Magda waited until they had passed before unleashing her spell, a dozen shards of magical force, one after the next, leapt from her hand, streaking to the target and hitting the priest in the back with unerring precision. He slumped forward against the dragon’s neck.

Izzulft broke their fall at the last moment, sparing his daughter a crushing death but dropping her hard enough to stun her, while remaining aloft and banking sharply toward the dragon still diving toward him. Zuhl loosed his spell. An orb of amber, tinted with blackness, shot toward Izzulft, transforming into a wide circular net at the last moment and collapsing around him, midair. Izzulft lost strength and folded his wings, falling nearly a hundred feet to the ground.

He hit hard.

Rolling to a stop on the glacier, the elder dragon groaned but didn’t try to get back up. Zuhl pressed the attack, crash-landing on top of Izzulft and dismounting with a collar in hand, while Izzulft’s daughter held him down. The moment Zuhl’s foot touched the ground, Izzulft thrust into the air, carrying his daughter with him. He flew in an arc that brought them down near Ixabrax, landing on top of his daughter and holding her head down to expose the collar.

Ixabrax extended his head and neck close to his struggling sister, so Abigail could reach out with the Thinblade. She clenched her teeth in pain but managed to cut the collar cleanly and quickly. A moment later, Ixabrax’s sister stopped struggling and Izzulft let her up. When Ixabrax launched into the air again, Abigail gasped in agony, fighting to remain conscious.

All at once the cacophony of battle was interrupted by the roar of a hundred drakini pouring over the nearest ridge. They split evenly between the now five free dragons and fanned out to attack en masse. One of the two remaining collared dragons circled in protection of Zuhl, while he removed the corpse in the saddle of the other and fastened himself in. A few moments later, he was airborne again with the second dragon riding his right wing.

Abigail felt sudden, stabbing pain with each thrust as Ixabrax struggled to gain altitude and distance from the twenty drakini pursuing him. Once he leveled off and started to glide in a wide circle, Abigail managed to wrest her focus from the insistent claim of such intense pain. She scanned the enemy below, all of them struggling to reach such a height, a few coming close, but none succeeding.

Calmly, Abigail nocked an arrow and took aim. The arrow sailed out and down, rapidly gaining speed, but falling well short. She adjusted her aim and fired again, this time scoring a direct hit in the back of a drakini circling below. It tried to glide to the ground but lost control, crashing in a jumble of broken bones.

Izzulft flew straight at the twenty drakini targeting him, crashing into several, claw, fang, and tail thrashing about in a whirl, dead drakini spinning off of him as he passed through their formation and spread his wings to gain altitude for another attack. The wave of drakini, now half their original number, turned to meet the dragon’s next charge.

Magda, riding Nix, was working to get an angle on Zuhl and the remaining two dragons under his control. Anatoly, riding Khazad, was floating along behind her, attacking any drakini that got too close. Ixabrax adjusted his course to be as close to his collared siblings as possible should he need to deliver Abigail and the Thinblade.

Zuhl banked sharply, turning into Magda and unleashing an ice spike six feet long and a foot wide and moving fast enough to cut a man in two. Magda stretched out, reaching past Nix’s neck, and projected a force wall below them. It manifested as an opaque, grey pane of energy and it only lasted for a few seconds, but the ice spike exploded into vapor on impact.

Nix breathed a cloud of frost at Zuhl, but his shield pulsed red and the frost blew past him as steam. She banked up and to the left, circling away from Zuhl, gaining altitude. Zuhl broke away to the right and circled around on Izzulft, who was nearly finished slaughtering all twenty of the drakini that had attacked him. Zuhl got around behind him and cast another paralysis net, the amber orb expanding into a fine mesh that started to settle over Izzulft’s wings. This time he lifted his wings straight up and fell, escaping from under the net and avoiding the paralyzing effect of its touch.

Breaking his fall perilously close to the ground, Izzulft landed hard, crouching low for just a moment before thrusting into the air again. He gained altitude quickly, closing on Zuhl with each stroke. Zuhl cast an ice spike, Izzulft ducked and the six-foot-long shard of ice ricocheted off his back, shattering into pieces. He renewed his pursuit, clawing his way through the air toward his daughter and the mage that had enslaved them for so long.

Floating overhead on Nix, Magda loosed her spell. She knew it wouldn’t penetrate Zuhl’s shield, but that wasn’t her purpose—she meant to distract him just long enough for Izzulft to close the distance. A dozen shards of magical force slammed into Zuhl’s shield, one after the next. It wasn’t a complicated spell, but it was quick and effective, two qualities that Magda favored for combat spells.

Zuhl looked up for just a moment before returning his full attention to Izzulft. As the elder dragon closed the gap, Zuhl removed a ring he was wearing and held it out toward Izzulft. Holding the dragon’s eyes, he pronounced an ancient word and tossed the ring into the air. It vanished in a flare of total blackness. A moment later the two remaining collars flared the same black, and the dragons’ heads came free in midair, two of Izzulft’s children dead in an instant and plunging to the ground.

Zuhl leapt free of his saddle and fell toward the ground, slowing to a manageable speed and landing lightly. All of the dragons howled in fury and pain—two of their family were dead. The man responsible stood in open defiance below them. All eyes fell on him.

He stood in the snow, his white battle armor and long flowing snow-fox cloak blending into the surroundings. He didn’t run or hide or flinch when the dragons roared. He stood his ground and began preparing a spell, while the remaining twenty or so drakini flocked to him, surrounding him in a complete cordon.

Khazad flew over him, breathing a cloud of frigid air as he passed. Anatoly watched as some of the drakini were forced to the ground, their wings iced up, but Zuhl was unfazed, his shield completely absorbing the cold of the attack and countering it with heat while he focused on the words of his spell. An arrow bounced off his shield a moment later. Abigail cursed.

Magda cast a small blue orb at him. It hit his shield, depleting it in a few seconds, leaving Zuhl completely vulnerable, but still, he focused on the words of his spell.

Abigail loosed another arrow. She was a long way away but her aim was true, she knew she had him the moment the shaft left the bow. She held her breath while the arrow sailed through the air in a graceful arc, counting her heartbeats until it hit.

Zuhl looked up, spreading his arms wide, an orb of utter blackness materializing above him. A moment later it pulsed, sending out a rapidly expanding shell of darkness. When the darkness passed over each dragon, a black tether linked them from their chest to the orb floating over Zuhl’s head. Ixabrax was the only one spared, too far away for the spell to reach him.

Zuhl pronounced the final word loudly and defiantly. Abigail’s arrow buried in his chest to the feathers only the briefest moment later. Magda’s light-lance was next, burning a hole through the simulacrum where his heart was supposed to be. Zuhl slumped to the ground, dead.

In the span of the following three seconds, all of the darkness contained within the orb floating over Zuhl’s head drained into the four dragons. Each became stiff almost instantly, frozen in place, the pure blackness of Zuhl’s magic running its course. All four fell from the sky, their wings becoming so brittle that they shattered and broke off during the fall. Each hit the ground, exploding into a pile of blackened remains.

Anatoly hit hard, falling from Khazad and winding up nearly buried in the broken, desiccated remains of the murdered dragon. Magda leapt free of Nix and landed lightly in the snow nearby, watching in horror as all four dragons crashed to the ground and shattered into mounds of broken black, leaving terrible stains in the snow where they fell.

Ixabrax howled in a low wail, a death knell that carried on the wind for miles. Abigail felt such desperate sorrow in his cry. The pain of his loss was palpable, emanating from him in waves and all but overwhelming. She didn’t say anything, choosing instead to cry silently. And not just for Ixabrax’s loss, but for the guilt she felt for her part in it.

In retrospect, she should have known, she chided herself. Of course Zuhl would have a contingency plan, of course he would never allow the dragons he’d controlled for so long to roam free.

Ixabrax landed amid the lifeless ash of his family, falling silent and still. Abigail held her breath. Magda was moving toward Anatoly, but otherwise, the place was as still as a tomb.

“What have I done?” Ixabrax said. “My whole family … dead.”

“You didn’t do this. Zuhl did,” Abigail said.

Quicker than a cat, Ixabrax reached around, snatched her off his back and tossed her into the snow. Pain exploded from her leg. She gasped, tried to scream but couldn’t. She rolled to a stop and lay still, gathering her wits and struggling to focus her mind on the angry dragon instead of on her broken leg.

“Listen well, Human,” Ixabrax said. “Our business is done. You have failed to deliver my family and so my obligations to you end here. Do not seek me out again.” His anger melted into sadness as if he’d forgotten Abigail’s very existence and all that was left surrounding him were the remains of his family. With a howl of anguish, Ixabrax launched into the sky, turning north, away from Zuhl, away from his past … and away from humanity.