“The Dragon Prince,” she whispered and she recited a poem that neither had heard before:
“Dance the Seven Sisters in the skies
Raise the mountains laid to rest,
All the stars are now just one;
Between the Scarlet Queen and None.
Upon the wing the black bird flies
To bring the dragons back he must
Before the sun sets and the fire dies,
He rules the Pride, his will be done.”
“What is that, Annaliese?” the Princess asked as Tegan drove the cart on. The mule moved so smoothly that the cart glided along as if on springs.
“The Legend of the Dragon Prince,” she said busy with her plants. She plucked several leaves off a red stemmed plant, crushed them and placed them on the boy’s chest. Poured a vial of sweet scented fluid down his throat and fingered the star stone. “Have you all seven?”
“No, just the three,” Lyndseye returned.
“So, he’s only human during the day if he wears the stone.”
“Can you heal him?”
“I can help. He needs the rest of the spell to make him well and powerful enough to take on the Red Bitch. Corby, trot,” she said and the mule broke into a smooth amble that had them passing the few travelers on the road. The animal seemed to know exactly where to step to avoid jarring the cart and disturbing her patient. He had an unusual gait and turn of speed for such a sorry looking animal. She smiled at the Princess’ worried look. “He’s not really a mule, Princess. He’s a jinn that offered me his services to remain in this realm. He likes humans. He’ll go forever, doesn’t eat or tire and isn’t subject to spooks or spells. Relax. We’ll be in Khafra before nightfall.” She busied herself with the Prince and Linz held his hand.
Chapter 38
Murphy flew over the streaming lines of refugees feeling the strong essence of the Dragon calling him. Just as suddenly, it was gone and he backtracked thinking he had overshot him. He felt nothing, only saw the flash of blue light coming from the woods. He spent hours trying to trace the essence from the boy and gave up when he saw Prince Corwin galloping towards the city.
He landed in front of them, scattering the people into terrified clusters, folded his wings and in two strides was his more human counterpart.
“Prince Corwin,” he said. “The King of Khafra requests your presence in his War Room. Marcus and the Lady Roelle are his guests.” He handed over a Trump with Luke’s picture. “He asks that you come immediately and offered his word that no one in your party will come to harm.”
Corwin thumbed out his pack of Trumps, pulled from it his own copy of Luke’s image and the card activated with the same touch of iciness. “Your Majesty,” he greeted. “There are four of us and horses.”
“Wait then. I’ll head for the courtyard,” Luke’s picture said and when the image expanded to show the palace’s outer courtyard, Corwin reached forward to grasp the king’s hand and the others followed, Murphy by hanging onto the tail of Pire’s mount.
Luke stepped back rapidly, letting go of Corwin’s hand and got out of the way of the horses which milled around in confusion at the rapid method of transportation. Soldiers held their horses’ bridles so that the three could dismount.
Cathorian bowed to the King. “Sire, I fear the news is not good, the witch has found a way over the Sentinels and has brought both armies with her.”
“Jens, stable the horses,” he ordered. “The rest of you, please follow me to the War Room.”
“Marcus and the Lady Roelle?” Corwin demanded and was told that they would meet all of them there. The reunion between Corwin and the teenagers was traumatic, full of tears and protestations of blame from both youngsters who said they would gladly accept punishment for their actions if only the Prince would help track down Raven. It took them only fifteen minutes to bring the others up to speed and Murphy added his aerial reconnaissance of the troop movements.
Luke had thought that the Sentinels would have protected Khafra from invasion except at the point where the mountains broke at the sea by Gates Cove and Tethys allowing them to bottleneck the Queen’s Army with his Navy forces.
“I should tell you, King Luke, that Cathorian has accepted a position in Amber’s army should you release him,” Corwin said with a straight face.
“Hell no!” Luke retorted. “Give Random my finest general? Over my dead body!”
“The General seems to feel his talents aren’t appreciated because he has only one arm,” Corwin added ignoring the General’s attempts to silence him.
“Is this true, Cathorian?”
“Yes, sire. I found myself ignored by other officers and my orders unexecuted because of my association with the Queen Mother,” the General said firmly.
“Do you trust me, Cathorian? To do what is right for Khafra?” The King snapped.
“I do, sire,” he returned swiftly. “Do you trust me to fulfill my oath to you and the throne?”
“Yes, I do,” the king said swiftly.
“Then, I am your General, My Liege,” he dropped to his knee before his King.
“I’ll knight you later Cathorian, or make you a Baron. If we survive this war,” Luke said. He laid out a map of the kingdom and all of them contributed their observations to the layout of the Army as he devised a plan of action.
The War Room was a large chamber deep in the center of the palace, well protected by heavy walls and barricaded fortress gates spelled with strong rune stones to ward off both battering rams and destruct spells. Its magic went deep into the bedrock of the land, anchoring the palace against all but a world disaster.
The room itself was pillared with a hundred white columns that held a vaulted ceiling depicting scenes out of Khafra’s past and showed dragons of every size and color supporting the pillars of the world.
The floors were made of green travertine and shot with white veins that shimmered with the magic of the wards. There were no windows but an oculus allowed light to enter and spread out, illuminating the tables and workstations of the officers and generals who strategized. Boards hung from the walls with messages and maps, communications came in via message globes that wizard readers translated. It was a hive of activity yet it was not crowded.
“Inform the citizens to seek shelter within the city in the tunnels and the arena. Both are spelled to protect them,” Cathorian announced and a junior officer scurried to obey. “I need updates on where the Red Queen’s Army is. Send a message globe to Tethys’s Prime Minister, ask what his situation is.”
“Aye, General,” a captain saluted and ran to do his bidding. The room was instantly abuzz with conversation as Luke leaned over the largest board with Corwin at his side. They studied the miniature troops and warships aligned on the table.
A glow appeared in the center of the green felt right above the amber square that denoted the city of Topaz. Brilliant blue light that they could not stare at because it blinded them.
“What is it?” Whispered nearly everyone until it became a bird, ethereal, and beautiful as it hovered above the map.
“King Luke. Your Majesty, I beseech you, I am Caldor’s Crown Prince. I beg your aid. We are where this sign will lead you on the marshes with a wounded companion. I ask you to honor the age-old treaties my great-great-grandfather made with the house of Khafra. Yours, Princess Lyndseye Caldor.”
“Murphy, can you follow it back?”
“Yes. Will you come with me, my Lord Corwin?” The gargoyle asked.
“Luke, can you use your Trump again?” Corwin turned to the King.
“Yes. Go. If she’s that close to Tethys, Jasra can sense her. She’s an important figure in this war, our rallying cry for the Eastern kingdom.”
Murphy opened his wings, grabbed told hold of Corwin’s belt and flew out of the oculus without breaking a ward; the magic simply parted around him as he followed the bird into the sky.
*****
Gates Cove had fallen to Jasra’s power, her c
ity gates lay shattered and her port was in ruins. Large merchant ships lay burning at their moorings while the city’s formidable Navy was at the bottom of the harbor. Her spells were a hundred times more powerful than they had been and Ryan’s soldiers took out hundreds with their weapons he called pistols from incredible distances and with firepower that pierced through blood and bone. It killed with such a small hole that it frightened the city soldiers.
She ordered the city leaders to surrender or face her Dragon Fire. They mocked her, told her to blow her best against their warded gates and when the magicked steel and wood went up in flames, capitulated too late to save the central city. A hundred thousand died in the first hour as fires ravaged the interior.
She saved the Government Palace for last to rob the Treasury and the Relics, increasing her power with their talismans. When she and her consort entered the last stronghold of the Council and the Prime Minister, it was to force the last living member to concede defeat as he begged for the lives of not only his family but that of the citizenry.
“Bring me your relics and your gold,” she ordered and he unlocked the vaults to give her access. As a reward for his swift compliance, she let her Thrid guards enjoy his children, his wife and last, the Prime Minister himself. He died, bent over screaming as the Thrid poison ate his insides. “We’ll rest here,” she decided. “In the morning, we’ll start for Topaz.” Her soldiers scoured the palace and secured it, killing all those they found, leaving only a few servants to carry on with the running of the building. All the upper officers were imprisoned in the dungeon and held for the torturers. Her armies’ ranks had swollen with each successive win, no one wanted to be on the losing side and from the power she now exhibited, no one had any doubt that she would annihilate her son, King Luke.
The tingling that started on her palms made her scratch idly at them until it became an obsession that her consort noticed and handed her a tube of medicine from one of the many pockets on his uniform. “Here, Jazz. It’s anti-itch cream. You must have touched something like poison ivy.”
She stared at him, his bland pretty face with its carefully kept three days scruff and wondered if she could reach his Realm too. “It’s not that kind of itch,” she shrugged. “It’s warning me of magic in the area. Strong magic.” Her eyes widened. “Dragon Magic! I’ve been feeling it since we’ve hit the Sentinels but this is stronger. It’s him, the Black Dragon. He’s alive and near here!” She whirled on her closest soldiers, just outside the walls of her sumptuous tent and Secrest stopped her.
“Send Martinez. He’s a tracker and won’t be spotted.” She nodded, called the soldier and gave him explicit directions and spells to locate, track and subdue the magic that was the Dragon. “You have your radio, Martinez?” Secrest asked. Strangely, their Realm’s devices worked there as well, even without electricity or radio waves (which were just another form of the energy of magic.)
“You’re looking for the Dragon, the magic can only sense him in his large form, and if he’s smaller he doesn’t put off enough emanations to register. He somewhere on the Marsh Road heading towards Khafra.”
“Can I kill him?” The soldier asked skeptically.
“He is weakened, most likely near death. If you strike here,” she poked him in the chest just below his xyloid process, “you will hit an old wound where his scales are the weakest. Therein lie his two hearts. You must pierced both to kill the beast. Bring me his heart and his eye, they are both powerful talismans.”
“Yes, sir,” he saluted and slipped out as silently as a ghost.
*****
Murphy flew on strong wing beats carrying the Prince as if he were only a small package and not worthy of notice. The sky was a blue so pure that following the bird seemed almost as if following a ghost yet the gargoyle never faltered. Somewhere over the marshes, the bird alighted and Murphy set the Prince down on his feet in a small meadow near a copse of trees. The bird fluttered on the rock and disappeared in a small flash that was so brilliant, it caused a sorry looking mule to rear to a stop in harness, provoking a round of curses from the driver, an old man in a ragged cloak. An old woman, still tall and firm sat in the back.
“Easy, Corby,” she said and stared at the pair. “You’d be the folk come to rescue the Dragon Prince and Princess?” She nodded. “Best hurry, then. He’s not so well and the Red Bitch knows he’s here.”
Murphy ran for the cart and uncovered the boy, cried out as he saw Raven’s condition. “Is he still alive?”
“Yes,” the woman smiled sadly. “This is Princess Caldor, and Commander Tegan.” She pointed beyond her at the men approaching behind them in a cloud of dust. “Those would be Jasra’s elite forces.” Corwin put his hand on the wagon and reached for Luke’s Trump. The last thing Jasra’s men saw was Murphy’s middle finger as they disappeared from the road.
Chapter 39
The sight of a mule drawn cart appearing out of nowhere into the palace courtyard caused more than a few eyebrows to raise, especially when the gargoyle burst into the palace proper carrying a nearly naked young man and escorted by a larger group than which he’d left.
Luke took one look at the boy and his face paled. “God! He looks just like Merle! Is he alive? Penn, call Dr. Arianas as fast as you can. Here, Murphy use this room!” He flung open the door to a bedroom that had clearly been the Queen’s and Murphy gently laid the boy on the satin and silk coverlet, smoothing back the lank greasy hair. His touch seemed to evoke a response, Raven moaned and moved his lips asking for water.
Marcus and Roelle were the last to arrive and both nearly fainted as they saw Raven. The doctor pushed his way in and gently examined him to begin barking orders but Corwin stopped him.
“Luke,” he said tersely. “I’m going to call Random and have him bring my physician straight here. Is that okay with you?”
“From Earth Realm? Sure. Whatever you need,” he returned swiftly. Fifteen minutes later, Dr. Flauvel had the boy hooked up to fluids, blood and painkillers while he treated the infected wound in his chest. “Broken ribs, the shoulder is fractured, collarbone and maybe his ulna. His temp is 104.9° and his lungs are full of rales. He’s got pneumonia, his blood pressure is 88/58 and his pulse is 125.”
“Do you want him in the hospital, Eric?” Corwin asked.
“He won’t make it there. This body is too weak. He shown signs of severe malnutrition, and he has no reserves. I doubt he’d survive another move.”
Roelle pushed her way to the bedside holding out a small vial that held the glimmering blue potion swirling as if the night sky was entombed within. “He needs this,” she said breathlessly. “It’s the rest of the Seven Stars. With it, he’ll be whole.” She saw the old woman. “Peggotty!”
The herb woman smiled. “My true name is Annaliese I am also a mage. The child is right, the Dragon Prince must imbibe the Seven Stars to make right his form. As for the sacrifice required, he has made it four times over and each one of you has pledged to honor him with your own. So, all it requires now is a drop of each of your blood.”
Lyndseye extended her hand first and Annaliese gently picked up the Princess’s roughened hand with its splintered nails to prick the fingertip with a leaf from the star anise plant. The blood crawled up the leaf’s vein and soaked in, turning the color to a pale rose. With each successive drop, the leaf turned to that same halogen blue that was almost unbearable to look at. Everyone in the room contributed and the leaf absorbed it all. When there were no more, the Herb Mage crushed the leaf in her hand and drops of blue incandescence dripped from her palm into Raven’s mouth.
His face flushed, he moaned and whimpered, all expression smoothed from his visage and his clenched body. He exhaled and a faint puff of smoke lingered in the air. His breathing deepened and evened out. Dr. Flauvel retook his vitals and sighed in relief and amazement. “His heart is at 90, BP has come up to 102/68 and his respirations are 12. I can still hear some rales but not bad. He’s still in a coma. We need to get him on so
me food, antibiotics and 02. Let him rest.”
“We’ll sit with him,” Corwin and the others said. Luke, Cathorian and Dr. Arianas left the Amber group. Tegan and the Princess introduced themselves and both Corwin and Roelle saw the look in her eyes as she studied Raven. Corwin saw Roelle’s hand in Marcus’s and smiled a secret little smile. He couldn’t keep from stroking his grandson’s flesh, as precious a gift as he’d ever received from either Amber or her Shadows.
“Can we clean him up?” Lyndseye asked and the doctor nodded. “Just don’t move him too much. I need to cast his shoulder and arm. Corwin, can you get me some x-ray plates, plaster and cotton?”
The Prince nodded, thumbed out his Trump and was gone. He returned in mere minutes carrying the requested items while Tegan busied himself with ordering hot water and meals brought to the bedroom. In a rapidly short time, the bedroom had been converted into an ICU and lunchroom. Tegan set to with the appetite of a longshoreman and fell asleep over his meal. The Princess pushed him back onto the chair and stroked his hair. “Such a loyal friend,” she whispered. “I would’ve died but for him.”
“We still might,” Corwin said. “If we don’t stop Jasra.”
Lyndseye put her hand on the prince’s forearm and stared up at him from her impressive five foot height. Her sea green eyes brimmed with tears. “May I speak to you in private, Prince Corwin?”
He hesitated but the doctor nodded. “He’ll be fine, Corey. Nothing drastic will happen in the next ten minutes.”
The Prince, still attired in Luke’s Army uniform followed the diminutive girl out into the hallway. “There is a legend about my family, my Lord, which goes back ten thousand generations. Around the time of the Dragon wars. There were many dragons in the Eastern kingdoms and they preyed on many folk until my ancestor fought the leader of the Horde of Dragons and forced the ban against their killing and burning. In fact, he banished them from Khafra entirely. Legend states that my ancestor raised the Sentinels to protect us from them. He also demanded a future task from them that they were honor bound to obey. If that future person could master the Dragon Lord. I know that Raven is the Dragon Prince and that he knows how to raise the Horde. That is the only thing that will stop the Red Queen.”