Omnixius
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DKP 6-19 Dangerous in any form.
🕑 Added 2021-02-28 17:04:26 +0000 UTC“You are sure the effect of your weave has worn off?” a woman's voice said, drawing Thayle out of a haze that clouded her senses. It sounded almost familiar, a type of speech she had heard before, but where?
“My weaves ended hours ago, and your concoction has run its course,” A second voice said. “They should be able to feel her again.” This voice was articulate and powerful, carrying with it a regal tone that hinted at nobility.
“Good, then they will be coming,” the first woman replied, her voice more clear as Thayle began to place the type of speech.
“My part in this is done,” the regal voice said. “The master is pleased with your cunning, but I hope you know what you are doing?”
“I would not have gone to such great lengths to secure your aid if I did not,” The other woman said with an eastern accent that reminded her of Mingfe. It had the same speech pattern and inflections as if the two were practically sisters.
“And as per my orders, the aid has been rendered. Now I must be away. The master does not want me not to confront the dragons.”
The conversation ended as her senses began to clear. All she remembered as leaving Lilly's side, and then something grabbed her from behind, and all was black. She heard a door open and quickly close as she blinked in the dim light, struggling to sit up.
The room was lit by a single candle placed on a small table at the center. The dim light left the walls and corners shrouded in darkness, but her dragon sight quickly brought everything into view. It was a tiny space, barely ten paces across, with wooden walls that were aged and split. The air smelled earthy and damp, causing her to guess she was in a cellar under a house. She was sitting on a pile of straw that her captors must have meant for a bed. There was a single wooden door with metal bracing on the wall across from her. The only other object in the room was a single wooden box on which sat a woman.
She was dressed in black flowing fabrics with a clearly defined top with an opening just below her breasts that exposed her stomach's dark skin. The face was hidden in a black veil, but her eyes burned with a cruel intensity that never looked away. Her hair was black as her clothing and tied into a long cord down her back. On her fingers were many rings with various stones on slender banks. Around her neck were three or maybe four necklaces of golden beads or silver chains. The woman sat motionless with her hands folded in her lap as if waiting. Thayle assumed the woman expected her to be blind in the dark, so she decided to spoil her fun.
“You are dressed far too warmly for the cold of the north,” Thayle said as she sat up and looked directly at the woman.
“So it is true then?” The woman said in a slow voice that dripped of an eastern accent like Mingfe’s. “You share the gifts of the dragon.”
Thayle realized her folly and regretted giving away anything useful to this stranger. The damage was done, and now was the time to be bold and see how much she knew already.
“I share in more than that,” Thayle said in a threatening tone. “How dare you abduct the champion of Ulustrah.”
“Ha, your tone betrays your annoyance. You would be wise to rethink your next decisions.”
Thayle wondered what the woman meant by rethinking her next action. Did she know Thayle planned to attack her? A logical assumption, she supposed, but how had her tone given it away? She decided to be more careful and play for time to learn about her captor.
“Tell me then, who are you, and why have you brought me here?” T
The woman raised a hand, and her fingers danced in the air weaving a spell. The room took on a faint golden luminescence as the woman leaned forward, her eyes reflecting the dim light.
“I am Na'yashuc, the shadow of the sands, the dagger of Zahdain Grand Mistress of Assassins,” The woman said, her voice dripping with danger. “You are being held in a secure location; that is all you need to know.”
“That wasn't my question; I asked why are you holding me, not where?”
“Ah yes, why hold the heart of the would-be emperor? Why take the one the dragon treasures above all others? Because we know what it is you share with the dragon, and we know they will come for you,” the dark woman said, her voice soft but threatening.
Thayle understood the implication of the threat immediately. Gersius and the others would discover her missing and use the pull in the bind to find her. They would follow her and come directly to the trap this woman had waiting for them. Thayle reached out over the bind to see where they were now, hoping to warn them. They were someplace behind, distant but coming closer. They were already on the hunt, but it was they who were being hunted, and she was the bait.
“I can see it in your eyes,” the woman said in her accent. “You understand now what is about to happen.”
“I understand that you are making a huge mistake,” Thayle hissed. “Why would you want to stop Gersius from saving the land the restoring Balisha? Thayle asked, bargaining for more time and information as she tried to figure out what to do next. She wasn't bound or restrained in any way, and the connection to her goddess was fully intact. There was nothing to prevent her from standing up and calling on divine power, but then this woman must know that. Thayle assumed the stranger had some method to ensure she didn’t get the upper hand. She had to play this game a bit longer and see if she could deduce the danger and turn it around.
“Zahdain cares nothing for your politics or your goddess. She and I care only for the bounty that is on your heads. A price so high it will make a legend of my master,” the woman said dispassionately. Thayle watched intently as the woman spoke. Her aura was faint, as if magically hidden, but she still saw something. This assassin told the truth when she said she didn’t care about the politics, but she lied when she said they were just a bounty.
“So the people attempting to save the lands from the Gorromogoth are worth more to you dead than alive?”
“No,” the woman said, shaking her head. “They are worth much more alive, but dead will have to do. We have learned that taking you and your family alive is very risky.”
“And the land will be torn asunder in war and death that will only spread east. What will you do when the Doan are swarming across your hidden lairs in the desert?”
The woman lifted her head and cackled with a laugh that came from her belly. “I serve the master of the Doan fool woman. When his armies reach me, I will be rewarded a place as one of the new order's queens. My lady Zahdain will be a queen of queens for killing the man Gersius and his Lilly dragon. I possible I will make the process painful, I am sure their suffering will please Zahdain.”
Thayle felt her blood boil to hear the woman speak of Gersius and Lilly so cruelly. She wished to see this woman stand before Sarah and speak so carelessly. That image gave her some pleasure as the woman went on, smiling as she boasted of how easy they would be to slay. She was playing a game of her own, trying to draw some reaction out, but Thayle wasn't in the mood. Instead, she took every opportunity to study the woman and the room again. Nothing new presented itself in the room, and the woman didn't appear to be armed. She could weave, but that would be of little use when Thayle was breaking the fingers.
“You’re playing a dangerous game. Gersius will smell a trap. He won't walk blindly into whatever snare you have set.”
“Gersius will come because he is a fool who loves. The dragon will come because she is a weakling who loves. Both will fall because of their love for you,” the woman said, her voice harsh and scolding.
Thayle's anger grew more intense as she scowled at her adversary. “You are a fool to think they will fall that easily. They are going to cheat your traps and slaughter your men before Lilly tears you limb from limb. You will regret ever having laid eyes on me.”
The woman erupted in another round of laughing and rocked back on her box. Thayle wasted no time and surged forward, hoping to catch her off guard. She dived into the woman and passed right through her, groaning as she slammed into the wall. Someplace distant the cackling laugh mocked her efforts.
“They will come, and I will catch them,” the woman said. “My lady will take her trophies and bring them before the Gorromogoth to collect the bounty, but you I have been taken alive. I will keep you and send you to our camp. There are many men who serve in the ranks, and never enough whores to keep them satisfied.”
Thayle struggled to her hands and knees as the voice faded away. She heard the threat but put it out of her mind as she focused on a healing song. Her bruise mended, and he sat back to fume over how easily she had been tricked. The woman’s image had been a trick of magic. No wonder she was so comfortable being alone and unarmed. Thayle knew of only one type of weaving that could work such a trick. Her people called them shadow dancers, an art that originated in the desert sands.
With the pain in her head subsided, she crawled to her feet and took a second look around the room. All was the same except that the woman no longer sat on the box. She approached the door and carefully raised a hand to touch it. There was a noise like tearing paper as a shock stung her, throwing her hand back. The door was warded with magic, and she would not be able to touch it.
A quick search of the walls showed that the wood was a covering over stone bricks. She was underground or deep inside a fortified structure, probably both. She was certain the only way in or out was the door on the far wall that she could not touch. If she was a priestess of Astikar, she could batter it down with hammers. If she was a priestess of Balisha, she could use the dragon claw to rake it down, but Ulustrah had no such blessings. All she could do was make plants grow. It was then as she had that thought and looked at the ceiling, wondering just how far down she was. It would be a risk, and her enemies would likely notice her efforts, but if she timed it with her lover's arrival, it might cause a disruption. All she could do now was sit and wait for them to arrive and hope her plan would work.
Giant red wings beat the sky as Sarah tore through it with frightening speed. On her back were Gersius, and Lilly, both wearing dire faces. Behind them rode three very nervous people who struggled to contain their displeasure. Tavis and Gedris were not at all pleased to be on this adventure, let alone flying on the back of a dragon. Ayawa was more composed, looking out over the landscape as it raced by.
Gersius, Lilly, and Sarah had spent the night searching for Thayle in an ever wider radius, and then almost at once, the strange sleepiness wore off, and they could feel her again. She was someplace south and west, but so far away she was little more than a candle flame in the void.
They would have to fly to catch up, so Sarah demanded she carry them since she could fly at much greater speed. Numidel and Shadros wanted to come, but Gersius feared this might be a trick to lure the dragons away from the army. He needed to ensure that some defense was in place in the event dragons attacked while he was away. Still, Gersius suspected a trap and wanted to make sure it was solidly turned in his favor. To that end, he put Sarah's much larger saddle to use and brought reinforcements.
That was a full day ago. Somehow Thayle had been abducted right out from under their noses and carried so far away that it had taken them a full day's flight to catch up. They were now far to the south of the common lands in a region known as Ebendar. A land of weak kings and weaker governments. Its kingdoms were often ripe with corruption and bandits. It was here, as they raced over the hills below, that Thayle finally started to feel closer. They had been in the air the whole time, flying as fast as Sarah could carry them.
Now the sun was an hour past dawn, and Sarah followed the pull of her wife with an unerring sense of purpose.
“How could she have gotten so far away?” Lilly asked.
“I do not know,” Gersius replied.
“Another dragon did this,” Sarah remarked. “Only a dragon could have carried her so far, so quickly. She was likely still being carried away as we began to follow.”
“But why would another dragon steal our Thayle?” Lilly pressed, her voice hovering on the edge of despair.
Sarah turned her head to look at the little blue who sat solemnly in her saddle, hair tied in a single braid to avoid it blowing in the wind.
“Child, we are at war with dragons. They do not wish Balisha to return and will use any tactic to prevent us from being successful. This is just another attempt to prevent our siege of Calathen.”
“This is a trap,” Gersius corrected. “The real danger will show itself when we get there, assuming they don't keep running.”
“There is nowhere these fools could run to be safe!” Lilly growled. “Nobody hurts our Thayle!”
“Lilly, as I said, this is most certainly a trap. Do not rush into this recklessly,” Gersius urged.
“You have warned me of that a dozen times now. That is why I agreed to your plan.”
“It is the best course of action,” he assured, but her mood over the bind said she disagreed. “You still do not like the idea of being cautious.”
“I don't like it, but you seem to have a knack for understanding the minds of the enemy.”
“It is a skill, Lilly. If you can understand your enemy, you can defeat him. We must be prepared for our foes to lay traps and try to mislead us, even turn them against them as I did with Yarvine.”
“Lies, deception, trickery. A dragon would never stoop to such tricks,” Lilly snorted.
“Maybe not, but a human cannot stand against a dragon. He must find some way to tip the balance of power in his favor. I can assure you that whoever these people are, the balance of power is very heavily tipped.”
“They haven’t seen power yet!” Lilly roared.
“They most certainly have not,” Sarah agreed.
“No,” Gersius said, his mood echoing her words. “No, they have not.” He did not want to slip into arrogance, but he knew that Lilly’s power was great and Sarah's was awesome to behold. The two of them together could fell giants and slaughter hordes of people. It was Thayle who was going to be the deciding factor. He was sure she would be used against them. A weapon to ensure they would surrender. All the power in the world would not matter if they dared not use it. That was why he made his plan and why he hoped it would work. It was the only way he knew to gain the upper hand in such an unknown situation. Still, he felt very sure of himself and pushed the feeling back, knowing full well he was borrowing Lilly's mindset. She was convinced the best course of action was to crash wildly into the enemy and destroy everything in her path.
“I am reading your thoughts,” Lilly stated. “What is wrong with being direct?”
“That is what they are expecting us to be,” Gersius said. “Which means they are ready to handle a direct attack by a dragon.”
“And what makes you think your plan is going to be any better?” she argued.
“We never formally held an announcement that Sarah was our wife because she asked us not to. Much of the camp doesn’t even realize it yet, and that includes some of our acolytes.”
“You're hoping our enemy is expecting you and I alone and instead is going to get Sarah,” Lilly stated.
“That is exactly what I am hoping,” Gersius said. “They may be ready for you, but Sarah might surprise them. Tavis, Ayawa, and Gedris are there to ensure we win if I am wrong and our enemies do know Sarah is coming.”
“And what if your enemies are dragons?” Ayawa called from behind. She was the only one of the three that looked even remotely comfortable to be on Sarah’s back and had even found it rather relaxing.
“Then I deal with them,” Sarah said. “The rest of you are to find Thayle.”
Gersius understood her anger, but it was a better tactic to decide how to approach once the destination was in sight. He hoped to take it by surprise, sending the three friends ahead to scout the danger and report on what they found.
“I have to admit I like Lilly’s idea better,” Sarah said. “Not to mention your plan has a flaw in it.”
“It does?” he replied with a smirk.
Sarah turned her head to look back at him and gave him a snort. “Just because they may not know we are husband and wife does not mean they won't be expecting me. Tactically it makes sense for you to bring the dragons. They may well be expecting all of us, including Shadros and Numidel, and thus be prepared. In which case Lilly’s idea thought direct might be the best, charge in and do take them into battle so fast they can’t react.”
“I know you trust in your strength, but our enemies are cunning. I am certain they will be expecting us to drop on them from the sky, which is the worst option. Remember, they were able to steal Thayle out from under our protection and hide her in a way we couldn't detect until it faded.”
“It faded with the tiredness,” Lilly added.
“I wonder if we were tired because Thayle was,” Sarah considered out loud. “Something was affecting her that was pressing on us over the bind.”
“What could have made Thayle so tired even we felt it?” Gersius asked.
“A sleeping potion,” Tavis interjected and caused heads to turn back and look at him as he clutched his hat tightly. “My homelands made extensive use of potions and elixirs, one of which was a simple liquid. It smelled so strongly that you didn’t even need to drink it. A good inhale of the scent was enough to put one to sleep for hours.”
“That could be it,” Gersius said. “I felt exhausted as well, but I assumed it was stress from my workload.”
“Who would use such a thing on our wife?” Sarah asked as she looked back to study her passengers. Tavis took on a dour look as Sarah narrowed in on him. “You know something; I can tell it from your expression. Speak up, man of fire.”
Tavis cleared his throat and had to shout into the wind to be heard clearly. “My people and the desert tribes have fought for hundreds of wars. Their chief tactic is to use the assassin guilds to raid and pillage, and they have done just that many times. They have stolen the secrets of the potions and frequently use them to kidnap people of importance. I fear to say it, but you have to consider the possibility that this is the work of the assassins.”
“It makes sense,” Ayawa agreed. “The Father Abbot hired them to stop you, and they kidnapped you once before,” she stressed and looked to Gersius.
“In practically the same way,” Tavis added.
“Which means this is absolutely a trap,” Sarah growled. “They needed her alive so we would be able to follow her into their nets.”
“Yes, it is a trap, one which we need to spoil,” Gersius replied as his mind began to work on the possibilities.
They flew on for another two hours as the pull grew to the point where they could feel faint impressions of Thayle's mood. She felt desperate and confined, like a prisoner awaiting execution. At this point, Gersius had Sarah land and pointed out the direction to Tavis and Ayawa, who nodded and ran ahead to find the danger. Gedris stayed behind with a great deal of disagreement but spent the time speaking to Lilly.
They returned less than an hour later to report that their enemies were in a fortified tower inside a walled yard. The walls were as tall as a strong tree but only lightly guarded by two patrols of three men each. Tavis had used his weave to project his sight and looked into the yard to find it was nearly empty. A few small buildings built into the wall itself and a half dozen ballista armed with barbed harpoons. There were no guards to be seen, so he pressed on toward the tower only to find his sight blocked by a protective weave.
“Why is it so lightly defended?” Sarah asked.
“Maybe they don’t think we can find her?” Lilly offered, confused about it herself.
“I doubt that,” Sarah disagreed. “If they used this sleeping potion, they must have known it was going to wear off. The fact that they knew to hide her presence in the bind from us shows they know a lot about us.”
“Forgive me for intruding,” Tavis began. “But I don’t think the sleeping potion would have rendered you unable to feel her in the bind. That had to be a weave, and I fear we have seen weaves like this before.”
“In the camps,” Sarah agreed as she considered the ones she had recently liberated. The women were held behind walls protected by a massive weave of ancient power. She had taken a moment to study one and realized it contained elements of dragon power. “I haven't thought to discuss this yet, but some of the runes used in those weaves are dragon in origin. Whoever made them is either a dragon or highly skilled in knowledge I would have thought lost in the war.”
“Did you recognize all of them?” Tavis asked as Sarah reconsidered the ward she broke.
“Not all of them. I am a fire weaver and well versed in the standard weaves of dragons, but some of them were unrecognizable to me,” she admitted.
“But those weaves were stationary. Thayle was hidden from us while she was moved,” Gersius pointed out.
Tavis nodded his way but explained that a small weave that affected one person could have easily been cast directly on her. The camps were made by a shaper to contain a large number of people and hence required anchors and weavers to sustain them.
“All of this makes sense,” Sarah said and as she bent her long neck down. “But if such a weave hid our wife, why did it suddenly fail?”
“Because you and Gersius are right, this a trap,” Ayawa stated. “They brought her out here to a specially prepared battlefield.”
“But you see very few guards and nobody in the yard to operate the weapons?” Gersius asked to get clarification.
“That doesn't' mean there aren't hundreds inside the tower,” Ayawa pointed out. “I would need to watch the place for days to get a more accurate count.”
“We aren’t waiting days,” Lilly stated in an angry voice. “I want my Thayle back now.”
“Child, please be calm. We are going to rescue her soon,” Sarah urged and looked back to Gersius. “So, what is your plan?”
Gersius took a few steps, lost in thought as he considered a plan. The enemy knew how the bind worked and took steps to cloud it while they carried Thayle away. This meant the enemy knew they could feel one another over it and would follow. It didn't make sense that the compound was so lightly guarded unless they hadn't taken Sarah into account. She had reached the destination in half the time Lilly would have needed; perhaps they didn't believe they could be attacked so soon?
Still, there was the problem of Thayle being used as a means to force their surrender. This meant he needed to find Thayle first and establish her condition. They could use the bind itself to do that, but it would require them to be at the walls to talk to her.
“No, it doesn't,” Lilly said as she read his thoughts. “Haven't you noticed how much the binding changed when Sarah joined?”
“What do you mean?” he asked, looking up from his thoughts.
Lilly looked up at Sarah with a weak smile before explaining how they used only to be able to talk over a hundred paces or so, but since Sarah joined the binding, she could hear their thoughts over nearly the entire camp. It was one of the driving reasons why she had to go out so far to be alone and pray.
“I have noticed it is changed,” Gersius agreed. “Perhaps it is large enough that we don’t have to be inside.” He nodded and looked to Tavis and Ayawa as a plan started to form. “I need you to get us as close to the walls as you can so we can speak to Thayle.”
“You won't be going anywhere near the walls with her,” Ayawa remarked and pointed to Sarah. “She stands over the trees.”
Sarah huffed and took off her saddle before showing Lilly where the battle dress was kept. She looked for a dense copse of trees to move behind before a massive cloud of black surrounded her form. Lilly rushed to her side after the flash, and a moment later, Sarah walked out, pulling her hair through a golden ring.
“Let’s get this over with,” Sarah insisted as she rejoined them. “I have a fort to raze to the ground.”
Ayawa and Tavis led the way, helping them get closer and closer as Thayle's presence grew in the bind. Once the walls were in view, Lilly reached out, and with tears in her eyes, she made contact with Thayle.
“Thayle!” she said over the bind.
“Lilly, be careful this is a trap!” Thayle shouted in their minds.
“We have deduced that already,” Sarah said. “Are you well, child?”
They were all relieved to hear she was fine and unbound but locked in a room she suspected to be underground. She warned them that one of the women spoke with an eastern desert accent and was an accomplished weaver. She also suggested the woman might be a shadow dancer, a dangerous type of weaver from the desert tribes.
“Do the words shadow dancer mean anything to you two?” Gersius asked.
“Shadow Dancer?” Tavis said with a jerk of his head. “What made you ask that?”
He relayed Thayle’s warnings as Tavis’s face started to sink. It was clear he was bothered by the revelation and looked past Ayawa to Gedris.
“Shadow dancers are a rare, highly trained type of weaver assassin. They can somehow move from shadow to shadow without crossing in the open. They can also hide in a shadow to be nearly invisible. They hate my people because of our use of fire and its ability to remove the shadows. It was a shadow dancer that stabbed Gedris and nearly killed her,” he said as Ayawa turned on Gedris and took her firmly by the shoulders.
“Maybe you should wait by the saddle.”
Gedris looked hurt as her hands curled into fists. “I am coming with you. You can’t keep asking me to wait while you take all the risks. What if one of you is injured while they are busy fighting? Who is going to heal you?”
“Who will heal you if you are injured like that again?” Ayawa asked.
“We will be nearby, and your task is to find Thayle who can also heal,” Sarah interrupted to Ayawa's angry glare. “Do not look at me like that. You took her into your life. She should come in equally.”
Tavis put a hand on Aaywa’s shoulder as she relented and turned to Gersius. “Well, you have your answers. What do you plan to do now?”
“We do exactly what they expect. We attack,” Gersius said. “But we don't do it the way they want.” He laid out a plan where they would wait for Ayawa and her family to slip inside then attack the keep from the ground over a wall. Sarah would tower over it and take out the siege engines, and then they would take the inner yard to see who comes to meet them.
“And what if we haven’t found Thayle yet?” Ayawa asked. “They might still use her against you.”
“You will have to find a way to prevent them from doing so,” he said and turned to Sarah and Lilly. “If nobody comes to the yard to face us, you two will have to take your human forms and enter the building.”
“I have no qualms about that,” Sarah said.
“I can fight like this if I have to,” Lilly added.
Gersius turned back to Tavis and Ayawa and set them into motion, moving around to the back wall to slip into the fort and hopefully find Thayle.
“This is a terrible idea,” Ayawa said as they moved closed to the walls. “He should have brought his army to surround this place.”
“What choice did they have?” Tavis asked. “It would have taken the army weeks to march here. His only hope of recovering Thayle and maintaining his march on Calathen was to use what Sarah could carry.”
“Sarah has room on that saddle for another thirty people,” Ayawa pointed out.
“Where would they sit?” Gedris asked. “The saddle ridge runs down her back.”
Ayawa glanced at her with a smile and explained how more could have sat to either side of the ridge because Sarah's back is so broad. With additional ropes, she could have carried some of their elite soldiers to aid in the battle.
“That would have taken more time, and many would-be terrified to fly on her back,” Tavis said.
“You didn’t seem to be bothered by the ride,” Gedris pointed out as she looked to Ayawa. “At least not like I was.”
“I have ridden large creatures before,” Ayawa admitted. “There is a rare breed of animal in the southwest of our lands. They stand nearly as tall as Sarah, and some of the tribes use them for war with the south lands.”
“Why must everything be used for war?” Gedris asked.
“Because nobody has the strength to unite people anymore,” Tavis said. “All men think the only way ahead is to conquer their neighbors and build empires that collapse after their deaths.”
“Their children will fight over what was left, and enemies will attack because they are perceived to be weak,” Ayawa added as they arrived at nearly the opposite side of the fort. She took one look at the stonework and let out a frustrated sigh.
“The stone is too finely crafted. We won't be able to climb it.
“We have to find a way inside,” Tavis said. “Gersius will make his move soon.”
“We need to tell them to wait,” Gedris said.
“We don’t have time to go back,” Ayawa replied and looked to Tavis. “Can you use a weave to get fly a rope to the battlements?”
“I can make them lighter for you to throw,” he replied. “But I can’t make them fly.”
“You want a rope to scale the wall,” Gedris said as a smile spread. Ayawa looked up in alarm as Gedris sang as quietly as she could, causing plants to stir at the base of the wall. A moment later, vines began to crawl up the surface, clinging to the stone with ease. She kept up her song until the vines were near the top, then ceased and sat back with a smile.
“Now, if our husband makes us lighter, we can climb that,” she said.
Tavis smiled as he tipped his hat to Ayawa. “Who would have thought a priestess of Ulustrah would make scouting easier?”
“I never believed her blessings would be useful for our craft, but she has proven they can be used creatively,” Ayawa greed. “Now get us inside before that fool begins his plan. We have lost too much time getting back here and waiting for those vines to grow.”
Tavis began his weaves, touching them one by one until they were light enough to use the vines. Carefully they waited for the patrol to pass and easily scaled the walls to arrive at the battlements and look into the yard. The yard was unguarded, with the ballista sitting ready to be used.
“They planned to skewer Lilly the moment she arrived,” Ayawa said before double-checking to see they were behind the patrols. “Thankfully, we warned them before they tried flying in.”
“Let’s hope it helps,” Tavis said and went to look over the lip of the battlements to prepare to jump down. It was from here he saw a faint white glow and held up a hand to stop them.
“What do you see?” Ayawa asked, coming to his side.
“There,” he pointed to a corner. “I didn't notice it with my sight, but that is another rune stone.”
“Like in the camps?” she asked.
Tavis looked around the yard and saw another and then another. From this vantage point, they were easy to see, and their presence indicated a dire problem.
“It's a trap for a dragon,” he said, turning to Ayawa. “The ballista are a decoy to make him think that was their plan. They want him to attack the yard, so they are inside the wards.”
“We have to warn them,” Gedris said, but it was already too late. A second later, a roar split the air as Sarah stood over the wall looking into the yard. A gout of fire sent the ballista up like kindling as Lilly dived into the yard, her blue scales glistening in the light.
“Lilly, no!” Tavis yelled, but his voice was drowned out in a roar. All they could do was watch in horror as Lilly hit the ground, and the magic was triggered.
Lilly let out a terrible wail and began to thrash as white smoke poured off her skin. Seeing her in danger, Sarah smashed through the wall and ran into the same wards only to begin wailing herself. Gersius was thrown from her back as the two dragons smoked and burned their forms, turning to light in a flash and leaving behind two naked women lying face down on the lawn.
Gersius was on his feet in a moment and ran to the stricken women as dozens of dark garbed soldiers poured out of the tower. He stood alone against well over fifty assassins as smoke and embers from the burning ballista drifted overhead.
“What do we do?” Gedris said in a panicked voice as Gersius drew his blade and prepared to meet them alone.
“We pray,” Ayawa replied as she drew her bow. “Pray somebody comes to our rescue, or none of us are leaving this place alive.
Gersius looked about as the dark soldiers formed a ring trapping him at the center. They halted their advance as a blackness like a shadow formed a dozen paces before him, and a woman stepped out.
“So easily you are snared,” she said in a voice that rang with the same accent as Mingfe. “The great Gersius and his dragons defeated out of love. I knew you would come for the priestess, and your desire to rescue her would blind you to the danger.”
Gersius thought feverishly for a solution as the woman smiled at him mockingly. The fort hadn’t been guarded because they needed them to get inside. The ballista were just props in a trap, meant to mislead him on how they planned to fight the dragons. That was why they were not manned and the walls so lightly guarded. Even the lack of patrols outside in the forest was more evidence that they needed him to come to the yard. This woman was right; even though he had suspected a trap, he was blinded by his need to get Thayle back. He wondered if this was a side effect of the bind, something of Lilly's absolute panic to recover Thayle.
“Nothing to say, loving fool?” the woman pressed as a few laughed at him.
“Why take her so far away?” Gersius asked to stall for time. “Surely there was someplace closer you could have planned your ambush.”
The woman walked toward him, swaying her hips seductively as she reached up and pulled the wrap from her face. She had the dark skin of the desert and full red lips painted to highlight their color. Her eyes met his as she came to a stop and placed hands on hips where two long daggers rested.
“I needed to pick someplace far enough away to ensure that only you and your dragons came,” she said. “Anywhere closer, and you might have been tempted to send your armies.”
“You will pay for hurting my wives,” he said in a tone that carried the threat of a promise.
“Haha,” the woman cackled and threw her head back. “You are in no position to threaten me. Your dragons are defeated, and you stand alone.”
“Lilly? Sarah?” Thayle cried over the bind. “Please tell me you're all right. I felt a terrible pain.”
“Lilly and Sarah are hurt,” Gersius said silently back as he stared down the dark woman. “I need time to heal them, but I am alone and surrounded.” Even as he said that, Sarah began to stir, lifting her head as the shadow woman snapped a finger.
“Skewer her before she comes around!”
Gersius went to stop the man that moved, but the woman suddenly rushed him daggers in hand as she leaped into the air and began a series of vicious cuts. He was forced to confront her head-on as a man headed for Sarah with a spear raised. The soldier let out a gurgled cry as the arrow went through his head, falling lifelessly to the side. Others moved to finish the task, but the nearby fires suddenly came to life.
“What is this?” the woman hissed and jumped back, flying through the air an impossible distance.
The fire formed waves and rushed at Lilly and Sarah, creating a solid wall around them to prevent anyone from reaching the wounded dragons.
The shadowy woman looked up and saw Tavis on the walls, his hands glowing orange as he chanted a weave. She also saw the dark-haired woman with a bow aimed directly at her head. Just as the arrow loosed, she faded into the shadows, narrowly escaping the deadly shot.
Sarah rolled Lilly over and was grateful to see she was unharmed. With a quick blessing of respite, she gifted Lilly a boost of stamina, and instantly those blue eyes came open.
“Child, quickly, you must get to your feet,” Sarah urged as fighting broke out on the other side of the flames.
“What happened?” Lilly asked as she stood, feeling very vulnerable.
“We blundered into a trap made specifically for us. It stripped us of our dragon form, and I am sorry to say I cannot take it while we are inside.”
“Then what do we do?” Lilly asked in a panic.
Sarah smiled and began a weave that summoned the contents of their saddlebags to their feet.
“We do the only thing we can do,” she said with a smile.
“Kill him!” the shadowy woman said as she vanished into another dark corner.
Gersius met the first two head-on, using his frost breath to blind them before cutting them down. The next three were thinned with a dragon's claw blessing before he killed the remaining two. The others had to work to avoid the fires and arrows, but they managed to reach him in twos and threes, running at him with the practiced skill of a soldier. Only his tricks and blessings were keeping him alive, and that would only last so long. By the time seven of them were dead, the doors in the yard burst open. To his frustration, more men spilled out to join the fight, turning the tide hopelessly against him.
Tavis began to strain as his eyes started to glow from maintaining the fire. His breath came out with wisps of smoke as Ayawa glanced his way.
“Let it go!” she yelled as he began to shake. She turned to tackle him when the light ceased suddenly, and he stumbled back.
“What happened?” Gedris asked, rushing to his side to see if he needed a heal.
“She took over the weave,” he said and pointed into the yard.
The three looked down to see Sarah in her battle dress standing tall in the middle of the ring of fire. A single hand was held high, weaving a delicate pattern in that air as the flames began to dance to her command. Her eyes blazed with red light as she pointed a long silver sword at the mass of men rushing to Gersius.
Fire raced out in waves, breaking to pass around Gersius. It slammed into the masses of men setting the black cloth on fire and scattering them. Lilly raced to his side, wearing the light plate armor of her order with a sword in each hand as Sarah snapped a finger and released the flames before walking with graceful steps to join them.
“Did you think we would be helpless without our dragon forms?” Sarah asked the mass of men who now moved away.
The cackling laugh returned as the shadow woman appeared on a wall. As she did, dozens of guards also appeared from ramparts and began to rush at Ayawa and her family, forcing them to leap from the walls and use the weave of weightlessness to land safely in the yard. They ran to where Gersius and the others stood and were quickly surrounded.
“Well, this didn't go according to plan,” Ayawa growled as she aimed her bow, ready to fire.
“I assume you haven’t found Thayle,” Gersius asked.
“We hadn’t even gotten into the yard,” Ayawa replied as the dark woman vanished into the shadows and reappeared on the ground.
“My trap is going to make me the greatest of all the assassins,” she said. “To kill Gerisus, his dragon, and the ancient red who has allied with him, plus the two thorns in the side of the Father Abbot in one single blow.”
“You have seriously overestimated your capabilities,” Sarah said.
“Ha, and you are no longer a dragon. No doubt you have discovered you can’t take your form. You are nothing but an angry woman now, and you are not the only one who knows how to weave.”
Sarah smiled and leveled the sword at the woman. “Care to see how angry I am?”
The woman smiled and gestured to her guards. “Kill them all for the glory of the Gorromogoth!”
The dark tide rushed in as the six formed a line to meet them.
“Keep the fire to our backs,” Gersius said. “Force them to take us head-on.”
“Only a fool would take us head-on,” Sarah said. “And this yard is full of them.”
An arrow killed the first one, a weave of red lines the second. Sarah killed the third and Gersius the fourth. Lilly exploded into a rhythmic dance of swinging blades as Gedris covered her flank with her knives. Before ten heartbeats, both women's blades were red, and the battle was begun in earnest.
Frost and fire breaths were used to terrible effect, as were weaves and tangling vines. Still, some of the assassins were skilled in avoiding the blows, and many threw small knives and spikes. Sarah was the first one hit, but she hardly slowed. Ayawa was next, but she too kept fighting. Gersius took several, but the thick armor of the dragon knight protected him. Lilly took a terrible cut to the stomach but was only winded, the flexible scale armor preventing a serious injury. Gedris did her best to avoid direct combat, putting her blessings to use to slow the enemy and heal minor wounds. Still, she was forced to fight when Lilly was too exposed, and her knives ran red with blood.
Below them, in a tiny room, Thayle paced in anxious tension. She could feel the mood of her lovers above and knew they were in danger. She felt Sarah's injury and Lilly's sudden loss of breath and knew it was a battle that was dangerously close to going the wrong way. She knew if the fight were desperate, the assassins would come for her. They would use her as a means to end the battle, so she enacted her plan and reached out in song. It wasn't long before dust began to fall from the ceiling and tiny roots appeared, growing into the cracks and crevices. She guided the growth to the door, causing roots to begin cracking the wooden planks off the walls before finally falling away to reveal the stones beyond. As more began to grow, the stones became loose and soon began to tumble away. A few moments later, the door lurched to one side, then finally cracked and splintered as the growth broke it free of its frame. There was a snapping noise as the weave that protected it failed, and Thayle smiled to know she was free of her cell.
“I have the door open,” she said over the bind. “I am coming out to find you.”
“Child, be careful!” Sarah urged in an angry voice. “This place is crawling with assassins.”
Thayle smiled and began another song causing the growth to part and open a passage. She quietly slipped out of the room and into a larger dark chamber beyond. This one was full of tables covered with maps and papers. She realized these were dispatches and letters of the enemy, along with maps showing their movements. She understood what a prize this would be for Gersius, but there was no time to sort through it now. She ran for a hall on the other side to find a stairwell. Up she went, the sensations of battle crawling through her mind as her loved ones were pressed harder and harder. She arrived at a large room with four doors on stone walls and a row of simple cots along the back. This space was being used as a barracks for a small number of soldiers, and Thayle could easily guess where they were now.
“Quickly, we must bind the woman and bring her up,” a man’s voice said from someplace beyond a door.
She heard the voice and quickly hid behind one of the beds. She carefully looked under it to see a door burst open and three pairs of feet run for the stairwell. They vanished down the steps as Thayle had a wonderful idea. She could not allow them to report she was free, so she ran for the stairs and began to sing. The blessing began drawing more roots to the shaft until they loosened it enough to cave it in. The men were trapped but so too were all the maps and letters. There would be no getting that information now. With a sigh, she turned for the open door and prayed there were no guards left in reserve.
Gersius was finding it hard to keep his footing as the bodies piled up. He was also starting to feel the weight of his armor and was drawing on Sarah's strength to keep up his momentum. The battle was still hopelessly against them, but the enemy expected only him, not six who could fight with practiced skill.
The dark woman weaved bolts of pure shadow at them, but they were avoided or intercepted by glowing shields. Tavis countered her fire with red bolts of Daghost, keeping the woman moving and screeching in anger. They were holding their ground but sooner or later would tire, and the enemy's numbers seemed inexhaustible.
Sarah was forced to turn as men got around her side, and she called to the fire, setting them ablaze for daring to challenge her. She took a sword swing to the side, but the battle dress's metal spines blunted the strike. In anger, she called to the flames again, hurling balls of fire into the crowd until a crossbow bolt sank into her shoulder.
“Lady Sarah,” Tavis said as he broke away and came to her side. He reached out and called to the flames spreading them into another wall to protect their flank until Sarah recovered.
Sarah yanked the bolt from her shoulder and cast it aside before staring him in the eyes with her blazing orbs. “Why are you holding back?” she demanded. “You could clear this yard, couldn't you.”
Tavis shook his head as he went pale. “I don’t dare something that powerful,” he replied. “I have already paid the ash price. Surely you can manage a weave of such power.”
“I would need to summon gold so I could consume it in the weave, but you humans can tap the weave of magic directly; it is your gift and one we dragons are quite envious of.”
“I can’t control it,” he said. “I would kill everyone in this yard that isn’t like you.”
“Gedris!” Lilly cried as Sarah and Tavis looked up to see her limping away, holding a badly slashed leg.
Just as Tavis was about to rush to her aid, a crossbow bolt struck his arm, causing him to drop a sword as he grabbed it with one hand. Sarah was to him in an instant, chanting a heal as she pulled it free, just as the bolt dropped, a mocking voice called out.
“Stop!” the shadowy woman shouted as she appeared on the walls where a dozen men and women with crossbows stood. Even more, soldiers spilled out of the doorways filling the yard with several hundred assassins, nearly tripling the number they had seen so far.
“This game has been entertaining,” she began. “But you are hopelessly outnumbered, and we all know how this is going to end.”
“With your death,” Gersius said as he pointed his bloodied blade her way.
“Ha, and will you make your beloved wife pay the price for your arrogance?” she asked.
Gersius was silent a moment as he reached out to Thayle.
“Thayle, where are you?”
“I am hiding in some kind of kitchen,” she replied. “I will find the way out soon.”
Gersius nodded and turned back to the woman knowing full well she was bluffing.
“You have made a terrible mistake in bringing us here,” he began. “None of you will leave this place alive.”
The woman’s face took on an amused smile as she carefully raised a hand calling all the archers to aim their crossbows.
“I hope you have a plan,” Ayawa said as she leaned over Lilly, who was healing Gedris.
“I do,” Gersius said and looked to his wives. He had heard the conversation between Sarah and Tavis and understood both their concerns. Tavis could burn this yard to ash, but the risk he took might burn all of them with him. Sarah would survive only mourn the piles of ash that were once him and Lilly. On the other hand, Sarah could manage the weave but only by bringing gold here to consume in the effort. The time it would take to gather the gold she needed would be her downfall, and as a dragon, she detested the cost. However, there was another option, one that would solve both problems. With a smile, he looked directly at Sarah and boldly reminded her what it was. “My wives are champions of their respective Divines after all.” Sarah smiled and nodded as she glanced to Lilly, who also nodded back.
“Tavis, can you shield your family from the flames?” Sarah asked.
“What? Why?” He asked.
“Because I have no gold to work a weave of the size I want, and you cannot control one,” she replied. “I will have to use a different method to burn this filth away.”
“I can shield them for a few moments,” Tavis admitted.
“That is all we are going to need,” Sarah said and looked skyward as thunder began to roll. She raised a hand and called out in a loud voice to the heavens as clouds of pure midnight began to rotate, and a pillar of fire came rushing down. It crashed into the yard and spread out in all directions, engulfing them in its wake as it filled the yard from wall to wall. All around, assassins flailed in a futile effort to put the flames out as Sarah called on Astikar's righteous fire.
She then fell into a simple weave to beat the flames down and reveal the charred masses of men laying dead in great heaps across a blackened and smoldering ground. The heat was so intense the men on the wall leaped over the side to escape it. Many lay broken and dying outside, their gasps of pain fading as they died.
Gersius and Lilly stood untouched, protected by the bind to Sarah's heart. Tavis held Ayawa and Gedris in a huddle, protecting them in a globe of red light as he maintained a weave to shield them.
“Why is it so hard to breath?” Gersius asked as he coughed.
“The fire consumes all the air,” Sarah said. “It will balance out in a moment, but we need to do something about the temperature for our human allies.” She turned to Lilly and nodded, giving her permission to begin.
Lilly stepped up and sang a song to Balisha, causing a sudden chill to fill the air, and a moment later, snow began to fall, beating back the intense heat generated by the pillar of fire.
“You can drop your weave,” Sarah said. “The danger is passed.”
“Why in the name of the divines didn’t you do that sooner?” Ayawa roared when she was able to stand. “Gedris was cut to the bone. One of us could have died!”
Sarah turned to meet her accusatory attack with a firm frown and narrow eyes. “I knew there were more of them yet to reveal themselves. We needed to wait until that dark woman committed her entire army to be sure we got them all.”
“The others may have fled after a display like that!” Ayawa countered, but Gersius got between them.
He did his best to remind her that a priest of Astikar only called on such power in absolute dire situations. Since it was such a
drain of her divine power, Sarah needed to be sure it was well spent.
“You could have done this with a weave,” Sarah insisted, turning her gaze on Tavis. “It would hardly have taxed you.”
Tavis shook his head as he put his hat on and dusted off his sleeves. “I could have, but I would not have been able to control it and gone mad with the flames, cackling like that woman.”
Sarah glared at him with narrow eyes before giving off a humpf. “We need to find you a red dragon wife and bind you two so she can protect you from yourself. Until then, I will give you my blessing, it isn't the same, but it will offer you some additional protection.”
“We don’t need another wife,” Ayawa scolded as she took his hand. “And aren’t we here to find yours?”
“Thayle,” Lilly said and looked around. “We need to find her.”
Even as she said the words, Thayle came out of a side building and stopped dead in her tracks.
“What in the goddesses name happened out here?” she stammered before Lilly ran across the yard and tackled her.
“I am so sorry I got you hurt,” Lilly cried. “I didn’t mean it!”
“Lilly, it wasn't your fault,” Thayle said as she hugged the shattered woman back. “And they didn't hurt me at all. I was walking along, and suddenly a shadow move, and something went over my head. The next thing I knew, I was here, unharmed and annoyed.”
Gersius and Sarah were at her side in a moment as he wrapped her up in a firm embrace.
“I was worried I would never see you again,” he said with pain in his voice. “My beautiful Thayle, the binder of our hearts.”
“Gersius,” Thayle said, shocked at how strong his emotions were flowing for her. “I never realized how much you love me.”
“Of course I love you,” he replied. “I would have lost Lilly and my conviction to go on without you. If I had, I would never have met Sarah and known the true happiness you three can bring me. Nobody has ever worked so hard to make me so happy and done it at the cost of her own desires.”
Thayle was speechless as he set her down, and Sarah stepped up and took her into her arms.
“I was worried about you, my child. Like our husband, I can’t bear the thought of never seeing you again. I have come to understand the role you play in our relationship. Lilly may be the fountain of water in the garden, but you are the gardener, the one who uses that water to grow a vast sea of beauty.”
“I am truly overwhelmed by this moment, but can we please get out of this horrible place,” Thayle said as she looked about to see the smoldering bodies. The gruesome scene was scarcely the place for such loving emotion and every fiber of her being cried out to be away.
Gersius nodded and took her hand as if she might be stolen away again at any moment. Quickly they fled the keep, and once outside, Sarah resumed her dragon form. The saddle was singed but in working condition, and together they took to the sky and headed home, grateful that the day was won.
Comments
Sorry this was so late. I am still not fully happy with it, but my time is kind of crunched right now, and I needed to get this out.
