When Frances had been a child, she remembered reading about dragons. Her books had gorgeous green dragons that loomed over hoards of treasure, fierce red dragons that had bathed their enemies with flame, serpent-like dragons that brought water and rain and her favorite of all, the good dragons that helped unlikely heroes and protected their towns and charges.
For a moment, she thought herself mad as she watched the purple dragon stalk out of the old copper mine. It was like her imagination had come to life. The monster stalked forward on its four legs, each sporting claws more than a foot long. Hot air puffed out of the dragon’s nostrils in small clouds as it reared up, and spread its wings.
Before it had been the size of a house, now it towered over Francee, the bridge that they stood on looking positively puny underneath it’s bulk
Frances looked over her shoulder to see Helias running. She would have laughed at his undignified pell-mell almost-tumble down the bridge, but she was far too scared.
The dragon was fixing its golden eyes on her. These eyes alone had irises larger than her head.
“Who disturbs me from my sleep?”
Hattie, having hidden behind Frances, gasped.
“You can talk?” Frances stammered, grabbing onto her student’s hand.
The dragon snarled, lips drawing back to reveal a row of yellow-white teeth, lining a mouth that could swallow Frances whole. “Foolish human. No…foolish mage. You have forgotten the tales of old and their warnings.”
In her mind, Frances thought to Ivy’s Sting, Ivy, everything you know about dragons please!
Only Ivy, much to Frances’s dismay, was just as shaken as she was. Yvonne fought some before, but she never killed any. It was only to drive them away when they came from the northern mountains, which was extremely rare! And they never spoke to her! Well, not like this. They were very intelligent, but they never spoke! Anyway, don’t fight it! There’s a really horrible curse if you fight one. Well, it’s not a curse, but it’s a mark called the Dragonbane Mark. It basically identifies you and every one of your descendants as someone who killed a dragon.
“I’m sorry, please forgive me. I’m an Otherworlder, I do not know of these tales,” Frances whispered.
“Then let me educate you, Planewalker. There are the dumb ice dragons of the north, and my kind, the Warmbloods. We are not dumb like our cousins. Now leave my nest or face the consequences.”
Frances took a deep breath. “Can you clarify by what you mean by your nest—”
The dragon roared. The screeching sound, redolent with power, with magic, whipped through the air. Frances saw some kind of liquid spit out from the dragon’s mouth. A split second later, the magic that was in the roar ignited the liquid, and a jet of flame spewed over Frances’s head.
The dragon continued to roar, igniting a circle of flame around the bridge, canal and mine. As flames raged, the beast bent its head so it was at Frances’s level. Even then, the head itself was taller than she was.
“Clear enough?”
“Yes. Hattie, let’s go,” Frances stammered, backing up. Stepping carefully down the bridge clutching her student’s hand, her eyes not leaving the dragon, Frances held her breath.
For the dragon was still peering at her. Its nostrils were flared, as it breathed. In and out, in and out, it opened its mouth, allowing for a forked tongue to dip out, almost as if it was tasting the air.
“You. Mage of lightning and fire. You said you were an Otherworlder.”
Frances swallowed. “Yes.”
“Then why do you smell like a dragonslayer—” The dragon blinked and growled. “Ah, no. It is not you I smell.”
Frances felt her heart sink. Almost at the same time, she and Hattie’s eyes met.
“Dad…dad said that great great grandmother killed a dragon. I thought…I thought that was just a story,” Hattie whispered.
“And she confesses!” roared the beast, stalking forward. “That welp is mine! It will pay for its foremother!”
Frances’s arms were shaking, but she stepped in front of Hattie, wand raised. “She’s just a child! She’s innocent!”
“So few of my kind are left because of the ancestors of these ‘innocent’ children! If not their children, then who shall pay for their crimes? Tell me, mage of storm and fire?”
“Mother?”
Frances’s eyes widened. She could see seven smaller dragons crawl out of the copper mine. They were purple as well, but a far lighter shade, more akin to lavendar. The largest of them was about five feet tall and had been the one to speak.
“Go back to the nest, Lakadara.”
“Great one—”
“I am Telkandra!” growled the dragon. “And I would know who you are to decide for a dragon!”
Frances tore her gaze from Hattie and took a deep breath. “Frances Windwhistler, also known as the Stormcaller, daughter of Edana Windwhistler, the Firehand. I do not presume to speak for you, Telkandra. But Hattie has suffered enough! Please!”
Telkandra smiled, as only a dragon could smile, pitilessly.
“Let me make this clear for you, Frances, for you have been the most courteous human I’ve met in centuries of life. If you don’t give that halfbreed up, I will rain fire down on those who have settled here.” The dragon chuckled as Frances’s mouth dropped open. “Oh yes, I know they’ve moved here. I see new cooking fires in the distance. I can smell them. That’s why it took me so long to pick out the dragonslayer’s kin from the scents. So unless you want me to revel in the screams of Alavari and humans once more, then you will release this ‘Hattie’ to me.”
Barely able to form the words, Frances had to swallow and cough, before she could reply.
“No…you would hurt no one else?”
Telkandra snorted, a puff of air whooshing past Frances, blowing up her hair. It bathed Frances with a foul, strangely manure-like smell.
“So long as you do not come into my nest, you have my word that no one else will be harmed.”
Frances let her arm fall to her side.
If she fought Telkdandra, she might lose. Her love, his friends, all of the refugees would die. She might die and be sent back to Earth.
Her new home, her hard fought happiness, all that she’d gained, would be lost in an instant.
If she gave Hattie up, all of that could be avoided. Telkandra had sworn not to hurt anyone else, and while Frances was going to make sure Dwynalina and Anriel stayed far from Athelda-Aoun, it seemed that the dragon had every intention of keeping her word. After all, she wasn’t gobbling Frances up right there, and she could.
It would just take the death of one child, who’d already tried to kill her, who’d helped betray them to Helias, even if inadvertently.
But what would Timur and the others think? They’d hate her.
Except to Frances’s horror, she realized that no, her friends, her mother, even Timur wouldn’t hate her. They’d be dismayed and be surprised, but she could see them forgiving her for the choice, she could see them telling her that there had been no good choices.
And Hattie was an orphan. Nobody would mourn her.
Frances, aghast at herself, horrified she was going this train of thought, glanced at Hattie. She hoped that the sight of her student would shake her awake from what had to be a dream. She hoped seeing her student’s horror and dismay would kick her out of what had to be an insane line of reasoning.
As her brown eyes took in the half-troll’s expression, met her student’s dark blue eyes, Frances froze.
Hattie’s eyes were filled with tears. She was breathing in and out. Her free hand was clenched tight in a fist. She was trying to stand up straighter. Yet, her shoulders were sagged, and as Frances took in the girl’s tearful expression, she saw Hattie’s lips move.
There was no sound, but Frances didn’t need to know how to read lips to figure out what her student had mouthed.
‘It’s alright.’
Frances stared at her student in disbelief, only to watch as the half-human forced a watery smile to her lips and nod.
She stared as Hattie was replaced by the image—no, memory of someone who she knew far too well. It was that of a broken girl without hope, who hated who she was, felt trapped by the world she found herself in, and had nooone to care for her.
Dragonfire had nothing on the inferno that came to light in Frances’s heart. Sparked by shame, tindered by her trauma, fueled by keen fury at the injustice of it all, the flame drove the numbing fear from Frances’s body.
She looked the dragon in the eye.
“No.”
Telkandra’s smile vanished. “Be reasonable, Frances.”
“I cannot. I’ve already hurt Hattie enough. I helped orphan her. I will not let you kill her.”
“If she is an orphan, than nobody will care. I have seen it all too often.” Telkandra’s muscles rippled as she to crouch on the bridge. “I lay claim to her life. She is marked by the actions of her foremother.”
“I care. She’s my student and how dare you, a mother, bargain for a child’s life because of some ancient revenge!” Frances almost sang those words, but even if she hadn’t, she could feel the air crackle with her magic as she drew it around herself. She could hear Ivy whispering new spells into her mind, and making suggestions on what spells to use.
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“Then you shall die screaming!”
“Hattie run!” Frances let go of her student’s hand and slashed her wand crying out the notes to her lightning spell, Ivy lending haste to her casting. Forks of bright plasma arched toward the dragon.
Telkandra had lunged forward, the lightning struck her head on and the dragon screamed as archs of energy travelled over her scales.
She didn’t stop however and even as the dragon slammed into the bridge, she slid down towards Frances.
Frances was about to leap off the bridge when she saw Hattie staring at her, an unabashed smile of stunned relief on her face. Grabbing her student, Frances leapt off, screaming notes.
The water from the canal swooped up and like Kwent from so long ago, formed a slide that caught the falling pair and brought them down to the ground.
“Hattie, run, get help!”
The half-troll blinked, horror suddenly back in her eyes. “But I can’t—”
“You will pay for that, Frances Stormcaller!”
“Then hide!” Frances screamed, pushing Hattie towards a building. She looked up. Telkandra was opening her mouth. Knowing what came next, Frances seized cobblestones, bricks, loose wood and rocks and flung them at the dragon’s mouth.
As Frances expected, Telkandra shut her maw and the debris bounced harmlessly off her scales rather than hitting the opening where the fiery venom would come out. Not stopping, and never staying still, Frances fired a barrage of spells.
Yvonne’s shieldmelter spell was followed by a lance of ice drawn from the canal water, then by a bolt of her own blue magic and finally another lightning spell that she’d used her ring to charge while continuing to cast.
Telkandra leapt into the air, and the shieldmelter spell sailed harmlessly underneath. The ice lance, had been angled higher as Frances had expected the dragon to leap up, but the dragon batted it out of the sky. The followup bolt of magic knocked the dragon slightly off course, but Telkandra continued to dive at Frances.
Only for her lightning spell to again hit the beast. It let out a bellow, limbs flailing, its wings seizing up, it crashed onto a house and landed awkwardly on the ground.
Yet, Telkandra didn’t know the meaning of quit. It breathed out, venom igniting into a jet of flame.
Frances threw up a shield, leaping for cover around a building as she did. Her shield shattered but slowed the flame. Even then, as Frances tumbled into the alley, she was screaming. A stray speck of flaming venom had set her armored robes on fire around her left leg.
The pain was unbearable. Frances tried to beat it out, only for her mage robe’s sleeves to catch fire. She splashed water from the canal over it, hissing from the agony, and only then did the fire cease, revealing that the metal itself was warped. Frances was sure she’d gotten a second degree burn.
Too late did Frances realize she’d been too distracted. There was a rumble and a screech of claw on stone, as Telkandra ripped apart the buildings that flanked Frances to make room for her head.
“Yours is the first, Frances,” growled Telkandra, opening her mouth.
“Get away from her!” Hattie screamed.
A bolt of dark blue magic, perfectly aimed, hit the side of Telkandra’s neck, the dragon scowled and turned her head. Frances immediately took the opportunity to slam every ounce of rubble she could grab into the dragon’s face, trying to aim for its eyes.
That made the dragon howl and as it blinked, trying to clear the dust now blinding it, Frances limped away as fast as she could. Adrenaline numbing the pain, she quickly ran through the buildings.
Rounding a corner, she almost slammed into Hattie.
“I told you to hide,” she gasped.
Hattie swallowed, and simply said, “You’re my teacher.”
Frances almost laughed and accepted Hattie’s offered shoulder. “We need to hold on just a little longer. Help will be coming.”
Hattie skipped a step, prompting Frances to glance at her student. There was a guilty look on the half-troll’s face.
“Frances, Tamas—General Helias. He said he’d be launching an attack today.”
Frances’s eyes widened. “Oh shit.”
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Timur could hear the dragon. The defenders on the wall could hear the dragon. The critical problem was none of their attackers could hear the dragon’s roar.
A veritable rain of bullets, and a few bolts of magic soared over the parapet. They kept the defender’s heads down. Timur could only peek out behind a merlon before having to duck behind the battlement. Already the small cannon the Kwent garrison had brought had been taken out by a fireball, which had scorched several of the humans manning it.
“They’re advancing on the gate!” he yelled.
Aloudin fired a bolt of magic over the wall and dodged the return bolt of flame. “Dwynalina, we’re going to need you soon!”
Dwynalina growled, “I still think I should have gone with Anriel.”
“You’re our only trained combat mage, Dwynalina, and if you leave, they’ll be through the gate in seconds!” Timur exclaimed. He didn’t wait for Dwynalina’s reply. The prince scurried along the parapet.
“I know you’re scared shitless. Dragon to our rear, Helias’s soldiers to our front, but if you run, we’re all dead! Your loved ones will all be dead! And you won’t make it out of this unless we stick together!” bellowed the prince.
Timur’s encouragement was drowned out as a boom shook the walls and the outermost gate exploded in a shower of splinters. Some kind of gunpowder charge had blown a hole through the gate and it’s locking bar. The enemy now were charging through.
“Dwynalina!” Timur cried.
The half-goblin mage screamed several words of power and raised her staff. A wall of flame cut across the entrance, catching several Alavari soldiers in it. The purple fire continued to burn, even as some of the mages threw water on it, which evaporated in a hiss.
“That should delay them!” Timur ran to the parapet edge. “How’s that gate getting shored up?”
Epomonia looked up. “Pretty good! How long do we have?”
A respectable mound of dirt was growing in front of the second gate, dug up by all the civilians who were gathering around the gatehouse. It now blocked most of the gate, but since it was sloped, Timur knew that they could break through the top.
There was another roar and Timur looked up and froze.
He could see the dragon in the distance now, flying low, fighting what had to be Frances.
Dayren turned to the prince. “Timur, just send Dwynalina. We can hold onto this spot! That dragon is a greater threat.”
Timur wanted to agree. The worry in his heart almost overwhelmed him. He nearly nodded, but every other bit of knowledge he knew about dragons and strategy screamed at him to shake his head.
“No! They’re not going to stop just because they can’t get through the gate! We need to trust that Frances and Anriel can deal with the dragon.”
“Timur! Timur! They’re bringing ladders!” Venne yelled.
“Damnit! Make ready!” Timur ripped his eyes from the dragon and back to the walls. In his heart he hoped that sending Anriel and Olgakaren would be enough for Frances to survive.
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Running and firing, run and fire. That was what Frances was attempting to do with her burnt leg. The only reason she was kind of able to execute this strategy was because she was holding onto Hattie for dear life, and using her student as a moving crutch.
“There! No sorry! By the house that looks like someone stepped on it!” Frances screamed as the pair bolted for the next set of cover. Telkandra roared.
Knowing what was coming, the pair leapt behind a wall, just in time for Frances to throw up a shield.
The searing flames just missed, the wall catching most of the splash and Frances’s shield just managing to hold off the last droplets.
Frances screamed the aria to her lightning spell, firing a bolt of lightning. Telkandra tried to dodge, but the flash struck the dragon, and once again the beast halted, bellowing in pain.
But she was still alive and just, if not more angry.
“How is she still alive?” Hattie stammered, grabbing onto Frances. The pair ran again, Frances whipping up a cloud of dust to block them from view.
“Enough!” Telkandra plunged through the dust and Frances, looking over her shoulder grimaced as the dragon fixed her golden eyes on her. It lunged forward, claws swiping towards them.
“Shield!” Frances screamed. She and Hattie threw up barriers. The dragon’s claw caught them and flung them into the air. They spun, holding onto each other, Frances trying to catch her bearings as the world spun.
At the last moment, Frances saw they were plunging toward the ground. She imagined a cushion of wind slowing their fall and wailed out a note. The wind did pick up and when they hit, it felt like a very hard fall rather than a deathly one.
Of course, they tumbled, rolling in a tangle of arms and legs. Frances managed to stagger to her feet, but Hattie curled up into a fetal position, sobbing.
“Hattie, get up! You have to!” Frances snapped, finding Telkandra again. The dragon was breathing in. Frances, wincing, drew on all the magic she had left, ready to block another breath.
Several feathery figures plunged out of the sky. They hit the dragon, targeting her neck, her great violet wings and head. Telkandra grunted, whipping her neck and wings around, trying to bat away the harpies that were harassing her. Most of the harpies went flying, but a silver and grey plumaged one continued to claw at the eyes, screaming obscenities.
“Olgakaren! Out of the way!” Frances yelled, charging the shieldbreaker spell she’d used against Thorgoth.
The harpy lifted off, and Frances sent the bolt of magic blasting toward the dragon. Telkandra hissed as the magic slapped into her shoulder.
Yet, to Frances’s surprise, the spell had only seemed to puncture the scale and give it a miniscule hole. Red ichor flowed from the hole, but it wasn’t much.
“Don’t just stand there, keep blasting at it!”
A strangely colored arrow arched toward the dragon, hitting her in the side. Frances blinked as the arrow flashed with a soundless explosion.
Telkandra very much noticed this and howled, writhing with agony. The dragon slammed into several houses as it beat its wings, trying to get airborne. Frances fired another bolt of magic at the dragon, only for it to simply splash against the dragon’s scales and do nothing.
“Anriel, what works against dragons?” Frances demanded, as the half-goblin ranger ran down the street.
“This is one of the Warmbloods. Dwynalina and I thought we eliminated the last of them years ago. Looks like this one survived,” Anriel muttered.
“Eliminated—” Frances looked at the woman with wide eyes. “You and Dwynalina did what?”
“Kid, those dragons would not stop invading Alavaria. They prefer our warmer climates unlike their ice kin.” Anriel dragged Hattie up, and the trio ran to take cover in an alley. “Now to kill them, you need to cut their wing to shreds first. Make them immobile. Then we basically barrage them with every piercing or acidic spell you know. Something concussive or something that burns or breaks organic material. Their scales are like what makes our nails, but extremely hard and partially magical.”
“M—my lightning spell seemed to have some effect,” said Frances.
“Really? Well keep using it to bring it down.”
“What about her kids?” Hattie stammered.
Anriel’s head whipped around to Hattie. “Kids? You mean that beast has children?”
“Yes, seven of them—” Frances’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”
“Of course I would! Those things can reach full size in a year! If they laid eggs more frequently we’d be overrun!” Anriel grabbed onto Frances’s shoulders. “There is no reasoning with dragons!”
Frances pushed the woman away to look up for the dragon. It was circling, trying to go after the nimble harpies looping around it. “We’ll talk later.” Raising her wand she took a deep breath. “Cover me!”
Anriel notched an arrow to her bow. Hattie inched closer to Frances as the air became tinged with ozone. Frances finished her full aria and released it, letting the massive bolt of lightning leave Ivy’s Sting with an almost careless flick.
The flash smashed into Telkandra, and the dragon once again, plunged toward the ground. This time it landed on its side, flattening several houses near the canal. Somehow unscarred, but shivering, the dragon rolled onto its feet, hissing as Frances, Anriel and Hattie ran back onto the street.
“You! The Bloody Archer herself! So two dragonslayers will be killed today,” growled Telkandra.
“Two?” Anriel muttered.
“Hattie’s Dragonbane marked,” Frances muttered. She raised her wand. “Telkandra…please, think about your children. Who will care for them once you are gone?”
“I do this for my children, so the world has less dragonslayers!”
Venom once again poured forth, and the air was filled with its overpowering foul stench.
Anriel dodged spryly out of the way, Frances decided to try something different. The young mage raised her arms and howled.
Water from the canal shot right into Telkandra’s face. It pushed the jet of venom off course, a good portion of it going right back into Telkandra’s mouth, the rest spraying the venom into showers, much of which sprinkling the dragon.
The flaming venom didn’t seem to hurt the dragon, but it did enrage Telkandra, who charged forward.
Grabbing onto Hattie, Frances fired several bolts of magic. They didn’t divert the dragon’s charge, but Anriel’s magical arrow did. It hit the dragon head on, causing Telkandra to howl. Frances continued to barrage Telkandra, aiming at her wings with cutting and flame spells.
Holes ripped into the dragon’s wings. Telkandra continued to try to catch them, as if she hadn’t noticed. Only the distracting attacks from the harpies, the arrows Anriel continued to shoot the dragon and Frances continuing to use her lightning spell stalled the dragon’s advance, or bought the trio just enough time to dodge.
But just as they’d peppered Telkandra’s wings with holes, the dragon batted two of the harpies out of the sky. Olgakaren continued to attack, hitting the dragon with claws from unexpected angles, but it had made her and her fliers more cautious.
Anriel, older, and not as spry as she used to be, then was splashed by some venom. It set her cloak on fire, forcing her to throw it off and try to beat out the fire on her clothing.
That left Frances and Hattie facing Telkandra alone for one moment. In that one critical moment, Telkandra lunged, opening her mouth, venom spraying out.
Frances threw up a shield of blue magic, rubble from the ground, everything she could scrounge. She knew it wasn’t going to be enough. The venom was going to punch through. She wasn’t going to be able to stop this attack and she wasn’t moving fast enough—
Wait, why was she flying away? Frances blinked, her eyes taking in her student. The half-troll’s wand raised, screaming a note to a spell.
Everything slowed down. Frances’s makeshift barricade fell. The blue shield cracking and shattering, the rocks and rubble wrung apart. The inferno started to set the edges of Hattie’s clothing and hair alight.
Even then, Hattie was smiling.
“Hattie!”