"Who are you?" the colonel asked.
The bowman looked at the soldier with utter disdain, as though the question was one that ought to have required no answer. "I am Argusto Conquillas," he said, "Lord of Herica and the Sumran Islands."
"I know who you are," the colonel said. "You're a long way from Herica."
Creedy grunted. "He's Lord of shit now, a dragon fetishist and a Haurstaf toy."
Conquillas shot him.
Creedy tried to turn away. He was fast, but not fast enough. The arrow tore through the air like a thunderbolt, crackling with black fire. It passed clean through the bridge of Creedy's nose and then out of the right side of his skull behind his eye, before disappearing into the vaulted wall sixty yards behind with a sudden bang. Ida gaped at the spot where it had vanished. She could still hear a furious snapping sound receding into the distance as it continued on its path beyond that wall and through the foundations of the city itself.
In the heartbeat before Creedy howled and clutched at his face, Ida glimpsed a bloody mess where his right eye had been.
The colonel's men reacted with uproar. Banks grabbed Creedy, who was screaming and worrying his head with bloody fingers. The crows yelled and lifted their hand-cannons. Wheellock dogs clicked back.
"Hold your fire!" the colonel shouted.
Conquillas was holding up a green glass bottle the size of his thumb. It had a small copper stopper wedged in its neck. An arrogant smirk formed on his lips. Behind him, the dragon leaned closer and purred deeply.
"You know what this is?" Conquillas said.
Ida's moistened her lips. Was that a sea-bottle? One could buy an apartment in Valcinder with one of those.
The colonel lowered his gun. "There are innocent people in here."
"No human is innocent." Conquillas unplugged the stopper and threw the bottle high into the air, towards the soldiers. Great arcs of dark green brine sprayed out of its open neck – too much liquid, far more than such a tiny container could possibly hold. The bottle bounced three times, then clattered across the ground and, still spewing brine, disappeared under one of the shelves.
The colonel hissed. The liquid had splashed his shoulder, soaking his uniform. He jumped down, his whaleskin boots slapping into the wet floor, then turned to his men and said calmly, "Find that ichusae and seal it, please."
Banks clambered down after the officer, and was quickly joined by the two crows. The colonel was already on his knees, crawling across the ground as he tried to reach under the opposite bank of shelves. But then he muttered in frustration and stood up again. "Give me a hand to push it over." He pressed his body against the shelf, heaving at it with his shoulder. The other three men joined him, and together they pushed.
The shelf tilted back and then slammed to the ground, spilling trove everywhere. Scores of relics clattered to the ground and smashed. Brine coursed and bubbled across the floor between them. The four soldiers were raking through the treasure, kicking and flinging it aside. "Here we are," the colonel said, reaching down.
Ida felt a gust of wind batter her face. She looked up to see the dragon take to the air. Conquillas and the child had disappeared. With its wings shimmering, the beast seemed vague, illusory. Its crystal claws flashed. It roared.
"Wings!" Banks cried.
"Thank you, Private." The colonel already had his hand cannon trained on the dragon. In his other hand he held up the bottle. Gallons of brine continued to bubble and froth out of the tiny container, soaking his gloved fist. He forced his thumb down on to the open neck to try and stem the flow, but the pressure was too great. Jets of green liquid sprayed across the fallen treasure. "I'll need that stopper, Private Swan," he said. "As soon as you can."
"Here colonel!" One of the crows had located the stopper.
The great serpent spread out its wings and then fell upon the sharkskin woman lying on the ground sixty paces from the soldiers. Ida turned away just as its open jaws darted down. The woman's scream was cut short by the sound of crunching bones.
By now the colonel had sealed the Unmer bottle. He wiped it dry on the edge of his whaleskin boot and then slipped it into a pocket on the front of his uniform.
The dragon raised its head, blood and brine dripping from its maw. Nothing remained of the sharkskin woman's corpse but a few scraps of meat. It snapped its teeth; its neck reared back like a viper about to strike.
The colonel walked towards it, his hand cannon levelled at its head, and spoke in that same guttural language the serpent had used. "Yva feroo raka. Onolam nagir."
"Onolam?" the dragon replied. A prolonged booming noise, perhaps a laugh, came from its throat. "Nash, nagir seen awar. Bones and blood, little mortal. The laws of men mean nothing to me."
"Conquillas was right," the colonel said. "You are ashamed of your addiction."
The dragon lowered its long neck, hunched its body behind its forelegs, and hissed. Ida could smell the sea upon its breath – the heady stench of salt and metals. Red eyes burned malevolently in the gloom.
And then it pounced.
The sheer power and speed of the creature was astonishing. It shot forward, a blaze of white armour and crystal, its bloody maw open wide.
The colonel fired his hand-cannon into the creature's mouth. To the sound of an enormous detonation, the dragon's head blew apart and spattered across the vaulted ceiling. Chunks of meat rained down far across the marketplace. The massive jaws slid to a stop against the colonel's boot.
He turned to face his men. "How is Creedy?"
Banks was cradling the sergeant's shoulders. "He's lost his looks, but he'll live." The pair of them were covered from head to foot in dragon blood. Banks looked around at the mess and grinned. "Supper's on you then," he said.
The colonel shook his head. "I never much liked the taste of dragon."
By the same author
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