Dragon Leader had just crossed the beach out over the Freshened Sea when his wingman broke in on the communications frequency.
"Smoke behind us."
Dragon Leader twisted in his saddle. A thin black curl of smoke was rising in the distance, back over the city.
He hesitated. Should they turn south again to check it out? It was probably an accidental fire or a new volcanic vent. Their orders had been to search for magic. Certainly it was not magic, he told himself. Therefore it was none of his business.
The welfare of his troop was his business and that demanded he get them to a safe resting place as soon as possible. The other members of the flight craned their necks to see and he could feel them waiting for orders.
"Not our pigeon," Dragon Leader said finally into the communications crystal. "Hold your course." The rest of the troop relaxed. He felt his wingman start to say something and he braced for a challenge to the order, but the challenge never came.
They had flown north for three more wing beats when he sensed a change in the formation. He looked back and saw his wingman sliding in.
The formation had opened out, as it always did on long patrols. Now the wingman was closing in to the precise Number Two position, tucked in tight to his leader’s right, exactly as he had been taught in riding school. In spite of the long hours they had been in the air, the younger man was sitting bolt upright in his saddle and he was ostentatiously checking his weapons and equipment in exactly the manner prescribed when leaving a combat zone.
Every maneuver, every patrol, you will perform as if it were the real thing!… by the checklist, mister!
He felt his subordinate’s eyes boring into him and he knew every other man in the flight was watching as well. Dragon Leader had seen nearly thirty winters and suddenly he felt all of them.
"Shit!" he muttered to himself. But he sat up straighter and tightened the straps holding him to the saddle. Then he pressed his knees into his weary mount’s side and with a wave of his arm turned his squadron south again over the City of Night.
Wiz thrust desperately at the snarling face just a few inches below him. The creature snaked its head to the side to avoid the thrust and snapped at the halberd head. Claws scrabbled against rough stone as the Dire Beast got first one foot and then another up on the stone ledge. Wiz chopped down at a leg, but the animal yanked it back and the blade struck sparks from the basalt. The head lunged forward and the jaws snapped like a pistol shot. Wiz was forced to give ground as the creature got all four feet on the stone. Behind the first, Wiz could see the head of a second Dire Beast climbing the same path.
Unbidden, Donal’s words came back to him. Put your back to the wall and die like a man.
Halberd in both hands, Wiz edged away from the snarling monster, back towards the wall. Hackles up, the creature advanced slowly across the rock.
Wiz bumped into the wall and nearly stumbled. He pressed his back against the cold, rough stone and raised the broken halberd. The two Dire Beasts split up and circled to either side of him. Wiz took a deep, gasping breath and squinted into the pale sun, trying to keep track of both creatures at once.
A shadow fell over his face. Above him he heard the sound of wings. Dragon wings.
What in the… ?
Dragon leader scanned the scene below. Down in the arena there were about a half dozen wolves or something attacking what looked like a lone man.
There was even a checklist for cases like this. It called for two dragons to drop low to investigate while the others stayed overhead flying a complex figure eight pattern. Dragon riders knew from bitter experience that there were things beyond the borders of men which were masters of illusion and used that power to lure men and dragons to their deaths.
Dragon Leader watched as the speck on the ground retreated before the two larger, darker specks that split up to come at him from either side. The checklist called for him to spread his formation out while the two scouts descended in broad circles, looking for signs of an ambush. Already the two dragon riders on the rear of the formation were drifting out and getting ready to spiral down on his command.
The tiny figure moved back against the central pylon and raised a weapon of some sort above its head. The attackers were now on either side of him, ready for the final killing lunge.
Bugger the checklist! Dragon Leader winged his mount over and signaled the rest of the squadron to follow. In a compact mass a dozen dragons hurtled down on the arena.
The Dire Beasts were so intent on their prey they had no warning. The first they knew of the dragons overhead was when a fusillade of missiles tore into their pack.
Suddenly two of the beasts were down with iron arrows in them. One of them bit weakly at the bolt that skewered through its flank and the other one was already still. Three more arrows vibrated in the sand where they had missed their targets.
The dragons swept low into the arena, their wingtips almost brushing the dark sand and the wind of their passage, raising clouds of sand behind them as their riders pulled them into steep turns.
The Dire Beasts on the rock hesitated, torn between the nearness of their prey and the threat from the air. Finally a gout of dragon fire decided for them and they broke away, leaping down the crumbled stone and sprinting across the arena pursued by arrows and bursts of fire.
One of the dragons settled onto the ledge behind Wiz. As the animal folded its wings, the rider swung off and walked stiffly to where he stood.
The man was dirty, disheveled and his eyes were rimmed red from fatigue and hours of squinting into the wind. Still he was the loveliest sight Wiz had ever seen.
"Lord, we have been scouring the World for you!"
"Just get me out of here," Wiz said weakly.
Part IV: RUN TIME
Twenty-One: Bed Rest
Sleep? Isn’t that a completely inadequate substitute for caffeine?
A hospital looks like a hospital anywhere you go. At least this one smelled of sweet herbs and fresh cut hay instead of stinking of disinfectant.
Wiz was in no shape to appreciate it. He was asleep when they carried him in and he was still asleep when Moira and Bal-Simba came to see him.
Moira bit her lip to keep from crying when Bronwyn and Bal-Simba ushered her into his room. They had cleaned him up, but he was thin and drawn with new lines etched about his mouth and eyes. He looked as if he had aged a decade in the weeks he had been gone. He was still and unresponsive and for a terrible moment she thought he was dying.
But Bronwyn touched her arm when she moved toward the bedside. "It would be best if you did not wake him, Lady," the healer said.
"What is wrong with him?"
"Shock, fatigue and starvation mostly. There was some sickness in his lungs but we cleared that up."
"What happened to him?"
"We are not certain," Bal-Simba told her. "He was kidnapped to the City of Night by what is left of the Dark League, but aside from that he has told us very little." He frowned. "He was not in very good shape when we found him."
"Best we leave now," Bronwyn said softly. "He needs to sleep for as long as he can."
"May I stay, Lady?" Moira asked. "I’d like to be here when he awakes."