The Core Lords, though, had prepared their onslaught well. Roger observed that all the larger warriors of the Enemy, all the generals and officers, were all creatures with enhanced night-vision. Besides all the Minion hordes, there were battalions of ogre-like giants running amok, butchering and bludgeoning anything they could get at with their huge clubs and axes. There were squadrons of spider-like men too, hairy and black, running about below them and wielding venom-dripping swords, at least four swords to each spider-warrior. And there were others there too, evil creatures of a kind that Roger couldn’t even put a name to.
Then Roger’s vision suddenly blurred and darkened, and he found he was flying amongst a cloud of inky, bat-like creatures. He stifled a short scream of alarm and ducked and again realized that he wasn’t actually physically there at all. Feeling rather sheepish that he’d been scared out of his wits unnecessarily, he steeled himself to really look and confront what was happening all around him.
But the vicious-looking squadron, of what turned out to be a species of deadly Bat-hawks, soon flew onwards, leaving Mavis and the children to do the same. He looked behind him in horror as he saw the Bat-hawks dive-bombing down, one by one, like the Stuka bombers had done in the Great World War of the Thirties. The once peaceful volcano homes below were all being mercilessly bombarded, the Bat-hawks firing out ferocious blasts of incinerating flame, setting home after home and creature after creature on fire.
“The Fire-Worm Lords are well skilled in all the powerful arts of heat and fire. They can easily manipulate any flame and bend it to their wills.” Mavis solemnly mind-cast to them. “Only they have the knowledge that is at least the equal to the True Dragons of Under-Erf. But they are creatures of pure and malicious evil who wish only for death and destruction or the slavery of all other forms of life.”
Mavis continued in her flight for a moment in silence, as Roger and Mary gazed on the horrors below, in stunned disbelief at the sheer scale of the carnage. But then she continued, “And you must understand this, children: besides their great powers over all Heat and Fire, they also have great powers of Mind. This, along with their control of Fire and of Erf-quakes, makes them a formidable foe. It has only been the True Dragons who have stopped these foul creatures from dominating the whole of the Under-Erf, for many, many eons.”
As Mavis flew along, skimming low over the land, Roger saw the last ruddy, red rays of light were being extinguished from the cavern’s high ceiling. The only light left was that of the erupting volcanoes and the burning trees and animals.
About them they saw once beautiful fields and forests, as well as wild animals, all aflame. And although the Dragon Volcano homes had long ago been made secure and tamed by the True Dragons, these too had somehow been re-ignited by the Fire-Worm Lords.
Roger saw, here and there, the huge, distinctive form of a Fire-Worm Lord burrowing into the base of a Volcano and then causing it to erupt with a sudden and violent explosion.
Cone after cone exploded, belching out great pyroclastic flows of gas, rock, and colored flame, high into the black and blood-red sky. Many-tongued rivers of lava snaked across the shattered landscape, drowning all plants and creatures as they flowed relentlessly onwards, engulfing everything they found in their silent, sliding seas of dismal death.
Mavis spoke to them again, her words echoing loudly in their shocked, mind-shared heads.
“You children have witnessed the most hideous and heinous Battle of the Black Cavern, of nearly a thousand years ago. For this, not long after, is what this day came to be known as; The Dragon Kingdom and the Home Cavern-World was eventually saved, but at very great cost.” She paused, obviously feeling the emotional pain of these ancient events but then continued on, “It was my future husband who saved us, Lord Commander Nevets Yelgnal, Sky Marshal and Dragon Minister for Peace and Security, at this particular time.”
Mavis fell silent and Roger had the distinct impression she was controlling herself at the mere mention of her illustrious husband. He didn’t want to intrude on her privacy, but Mary asked the burning question anyway.
“What happened to your husband Mavis? Is… is he still alive then?”
“In our true, present time… I, I don’t really know… but I do hope so, Skyling child,” Mavis answered hesitantly, obviously not wishing to say anything further on the subject.
They now swooped up towards the cavern ceiling. Roger was shocked at seeing how ugly it now looked. The black goo had congealed and doused every last beautiful glimmer from it. But he had no further time to reflect on such matters as Mavis flew straight through the rocky ceiling, just as if it wasn’t there.
Then everything again went dark and still.
CHAPTER 17:
THE BEGINNING OF THE END
They flickered out of existence momentarily and then reappeared at a different part of the Dragon’s Cavern-World. It was later in the day now, but the natural daily dimming-cycle the Cavern ceiling's lights usually went through was redundant. The only light left to illuminate the horrors of the landscape below came from the erupting volcanoes and the many areas where raging fires ravaged their way across forests and fields.
“There is now one last event of this day to show you and one I dread more than any other; But for our… our bonding, it is necessary,” Mavis told them, sounding exhausted.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, Mavis,” Mary replied, her own heart feeling as broken as the Dragon’s, at witnessing all the death and destruction of that black day from the overwhelming forces of the Minion-armies of the Core Worm Lords.
“And we will do whatever we can to help you, Mavis. We promise,” Roger added.
“I know you will dears,” she replied, “but now I must show you the saddest day of my life and the most evil and terrible act that precipitated the long decline of the High King, Divad Sivad, my Father, and from that, the slow decline of the True Dragon Empire too, these last thousand years. For where we go now, truly was… the Beginning of the End.”
They spiraled down toward a particular volcanic Home-Cone thus far standing unscathed. This being where Mavis’s very own, beloved Mother, the Dragon Queen, Anivad Sivad, had been flying resolutely towards, with her baby Dragon, Mavis, clutched tightly to her breast.
The three spirit-entities of the elder-Mavis, along with Roger and Mary, as part of her time-travelling consciousness, now mentally joined with the new-born and unique and innocent viewpoint of Mavis, as a baby Dragon.
The desperate Queen, Anivad Sivad, (now known to the children as Mavis’s own mother) held her dragon baby tightly in one taloned claw, causing her to squeal and squirm in protest, as she flew onwards, frantically evading fireball after fireball and blast after blast of deadly venom-spit.
“Ow! I felt that!” Roger yelped. “My ribs feel bruised.”
“So, did I!” Mary exclaimed. “Seems everything Baby Mavis sees and feels, then so do we!” She explained to him.
Queen Anivad battled on through the sooty, flame-licked sky, making her way towards the ever-nearing, relative shelter and safety of her eons-old, Dragon Home-Cone.
Roger felt the wind rush by his dragon scales and ruffling through his still feeble baby wings. For whatever baby Mavis felt or saw or heard, he did too. He could smell the cloying stink of Sulphur and soot and smoke, in the flame-streaked air. And he saw it through baby Mavis’s new and innocent eyes; All the flaming fireballs streaking through the skies and all the thunderous explosions and the crackling cacophony of the many fiery infernos engulfing the ravaged land beneath him. But what was worse, he could also hear the horrific screams.