Sir Germanius smiled, “You’re a good boy, Jon,” he said. “But you’re young and headstrong. You listen to your father if you ever make it back to Tanelorn, and I want you to promise me something.”
“Of course,” said Jon with a nod of his head, “anything.”
“Take Sir Sorus with you. You two are bound together I think. Take him back to this Tanelorn of yours, keep him with you and keep him safe.”
Jon nodded, “I will.”
The two men then turned to Sorus who stood there, a sheepish look on his face, and suddenly he found tears in his eyes, “I don’t want you to die, Germanius,” he blubbered and hated himself immediately.
“What you want doesn’t matter,” said the old knight with a smile as he patted the young knight on the shoulder. “It’s time for me to die. You watch me kill that dragon and tell everyone back in town; my grandson lives in the hills west of Red Roost. You tell him how I died, and you tell the First Rider.”
Sorus nodded as the tears still came down his face, “I will, Sir Germanius. You can count on me.”
“I know I can,” replied the knight and then turned towards the cave mouth and strode inside.
A moment later they heard his voice calling, “Great dragon of the north, I have news of your allies, they are slain by a giant but they told me of the staff!”
There was a sudden babble of sounds from beyond the door as the acoustics of the large cave seemed to turn all conversation into a muddle.
“Give him a few moments to get away from the cave entrance,” said Jon. “He’ll move off to the side so they’re not looking directly at it and then we make our move.”
Sorus nodded and pulled out his sword, “I’m with you, Jon.”
“I know,” said Jon. “It looks like I’m to take you back to Tanelorn. There’s no getting out of that promise I made to Germanius, so you’re stuck with me.”
Sorus nodded and they waited for a few more seconds and then Jon pulled his mammoth stone sword from its scabbard and raised it up, “For the Gray!” he shouted and dashed into the room. Sorus didn’t have a moment to contemplate the war cry but simply shouted out, “For Elakargul” and charged in after.
Sorus watched Jon as he loped across the smooth marble floor of the immense cavern, immediately broke into a sprint of his own, but fell further behind with every stride. The seven foot tall teenager moved with apparent languid motions but covered ground faster than a sprinter, which left Sorus far behind. Up ahead stood the first dragon the young knight saw outside of pictures, a dragon child much like the one upstairs but with green and white scales, and a darkling elf with purplish black skin, silver hair, and a twinkling set of chain mail on his breast and arms. In front of them stood Sir Germanius, his arms spread out as if in appeal although the eyes of the three foes eyes locked on Jon Gray as he dashed towards them his sword raised above his head.
Things seemed to move in slow motion as Sorus willed his legs to move faster. The darkling elf moved first as it pulled a slim, curved blade from the jeweled scabbard at his side and lunged towards Jon and shouted out something in a language that the young knight did not understand. The dragon child looked towards the white dragon in confusion and the creature itself, just as Jon described with two long, thick horns protruding from its head, turned to face Jon with a look of anticipation in its eyes.
“Jon Gray,” it said in the plainest words Sorus ever heard in his life. “My master told me you might be meddling in these affairs. I’m glad it will be I, Snowball the steed of Lord Wh… Argahaha,” it screamed, and Sorus noted Sir Germanius’s sword plunged deeply into its neck.
The dragon child hissed, charged towards the old knight, and drew a wicked blade from its side with a quick motion.
“Watch out!” screamed Sorus still halfway across the great chamber and Germanius pulled the blade from the creatures neck but not before it reached forward like a snake with one talon and grabbed the wrist of the old warrior. Sorus heard the snap from across the room clearly, but the broken sword arm didn’t stop the old knight as he pulled a longer dagger from his belt with his left hand and lunged forward towards the beast’s mouth. The creature opened its jaws wide enough to encircle the waist of Germanius and bit down with a terrible crunching sound as the teeth bit into chain armor.
Germanius plunged the dagger into the creature’s head between the two horns and a fountain of blood spewed out of his mouth. A moment later the dragon child plunged his blade into the old warrior’s lower body which hung kicking and squirming in the mouth of the creature.
“Damn you,” screamed Sorus, and suddenly he was there, on top of them, as he rushed past Jon and the darkling elf and towards the dragon child. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the elf raise up his sword to parry Jon’s sweeping blow and heard a strange little tinkle sound, but then he was upon the dragon child who busied itself plunging its blade into Sir Germanius a second time. He lunged forward the point of his own sword aimed at the creatures exposed back but it half turned, perhaps as it heard his cry, and the blade slid along its right shoulder and sliced through a thick leather breastplate but failed to damage the creature.
Sorus’s momentum took him past the dragon child and into the side of the dragon itself where he bounced off the hard scales and took a step backwards. He spun around just in time to see his foe lunge with its sword and the young knight managed to parry the blow with a quick down stroke and then whip his own blade up towards its throat, but the creature was too quick and dodged backwards and out of the way.
Screaming with fury, Sorus launched himself towards the creature and was inside a sword blow that would otherwise have cut him in half. He wrestled with the thing for half a step but then it stumbled over something and went over backwards to the floor with Sorus on top. The dragon child tried to wriggle away but the brewer hacked downwards with a chopping motion, the very bottom of his little sword slicing into the thing’s face and cutting through its lower jaw to expose a complete second set of teeth embedded below its main fangs.
“Ahhh,” he screamed as the thing tried to raise its head and bite at him. He struck again with the bottom edge of his sword and pushed down with all his strength until he felt the blade bite heavily into bone. Blood was everywhere but he raised his sword again and jammed it down at the throat of the creature, slicing through its neck as more blood shot out. He raised his sword yet again and felt a heavy hand restrain him. He spun, without thinking and slashed at the hulking figure behind him but a thick stone sword blocked his attempt and there was a sudden strange little tinkling sound. When Sorus brought the blade back it was light, and when he looked at it he realized it had snapped in half. He gazed up through the haze and saw Jon Gray’s intent gray eyes.
“So… sorry,” he said with a shake of his head. He staggered to his feet, his legs unsteady and his hands trembling. “I got carried away,” he went on and looked at the broken sword in his hand but did not really see it. “I think it’s broken,” he said.
Jon nodded his head. “You’ll have to take Sir Germanius’s,” he replied with a motion of his head behind Sorus. The young knight felt the anger and energy suddenly drain from his body, and he wanted to fall down, but he managed to turn and see the old knight still in the jaws of the white dragon with his small blade buried in the thing’s head. On the ground near him lay his long sword where it dropped when the creature snapped his wrist.
“I don’t know,” said Sorus and looked back at Jon, who nodded his head a single time.
“Of course you do, he wanted you to have it, you know that,” said Jon with a motion of his head towards the sword again.