Northern Storm

Chapter Twenty-One

Word spread like wildfire, didn’t it?’ Kheda looked across the clouded waters of the bay, stirred by the passage of countless ships.

‘Despite the rains.’ Risala stood with him on the stern deck of the Gossamer Shark, fingering her necklaces.

The trireme was drawn up on a beach almost entirely hidden by shelters hastily improvised from palm fronds and tents deftly rigged from sailcloth and spare oars. Fire pits smoked damply in the humid air. Most had already been quenched to black scars on the mottled sand. The multitude who’d slept and eaten ashore were gathered in earnest conversation or stood in silent groups considering the undulating green hills indistinct in the dense mist rising from the sodden trees. The sky above was an unrelieved pale ^grey.

‘It doesn’t seem to worry them that it wasn’t this dragon that sank the Mist Dove,’ Kheda said softly. ‘Most of the islanders never even saw the fire dragon. Some of them never even saw hide or hair of the savages. They all want to share in this, though.’

‘They all want to play their part in ridding Chazen of this evil.’ Risala studied the crowded shore. ‘This is their chance to fight at long last instead of running and hiding. It’s something for their children, for their future.’

‘Something to expiate whatever wrong choices or steps in the past led Chazen to this plight.’ Kheda nodded. ‘Something to still the dubious whispers and snide speculations behind Redigal hands or Aedis sails,’ he added more prosaically. ‘Let’s hope so, anyway.’ Away from the shore, fast and heavy triremes alike were anchored in disciplined lines while fishing skiffs clustered in haphazard companionship around the fat-bellied merchant galleys. Flat-bottomed boats toiled through the gaps, outstripped by lithe dispatch boats stirring up spray with dashing oars. Voices shouted questions and ‘instructions, answers and agreement ringing with common purpose. ‘It helps that the dragon chose to lair as near to the centre of the domain as makes no difference,’ Risala commented.

‘Do you think that’s significant?’ Kheda looked down the length of the ship to the prow where Velindre stood, tall and slender in her guise of a zamorin scholar.

Can we trust her, when she grieves so openly for this base creature she created? She seems to mourn it more than Dev. But she’s shown us where it is, when she could have concealed it and let it die unseen. She really wants that ruby egg.

‘I don’t know.’ Risala shrugged. ‘It certainly can’t hurt to have so many hands raised against the beast. I doubt it’ll be that easy to kill, even wounded.’ She twisted the silver chain of tiny shark’s teeth around one finger. ‘But we can only go onwards.’

Is that more wisdom in chance-heard words? Or simply a statement of the blindingly obvious? Does it matter? We’re committed now.

The Gossamer Shark’s helmsman and shipmaster were both down on the rowing deck. Kheda lowered his voice nonetheless. ‘Has she let slip any hint that the creature could have found gems to strengthen itself?’

Risala shook her head with complete conviction. ‘She says it’s weakening fast.’

‘There’s been no word of it making any attacks,’ Kheda mused quietly amid the hubbub of the anchorage. Not where it could have found sapphires for its sorcery.’

‘Plenty of people have seen it on the wing, though.’ Risala glanced at him. ‘She was right—you couldn’t have kept it quiet.’

‘Let’s hope this course of action all turns out for the best, then.’ Kheda shoved the wide belt drawing his hauberk close firmly down on to his hips. The dagged edge of his bronze-ornamented chain mail chinked softly against the gold-embossed metal plates of his leather leggings.

A time to look every measure the warlord, I think

‘Your swords, my lord?’ Risala proffered two scab-barded blades and the double belt to secure them. The swords were not a matched pair: one was Kheda’s, the other had been Dev’s.

Kheda took the weapons, face impassive. You’d make a fair body slave.’

‘Sorry, my lord, I’m not going up against that creature.’ Risala shuddered, and then her face betrayed a new concern. ‘Who is going to be at your shoulder?’

‘Mezai for one.’ Kheda nodded down into the depths of the trireme. ‘Along with Ridu, Eshai and probably the whole sail crew.’

Down on the rowing deck, every man was abandoning his oar to don some scavenged chain mail or a thick leather jerkin. The Gossamer Shark’s contingent of trained swordsmen moved slowly among the rowers, handing out a miscellany of swords. Eshai, the helmsman, earned himself a sharp rebuke from one of the armoured warriors for trying an amateurish parry in the confined space.

‘I couldn’t ask you to stand at my shoulder again.’ Kheda smiled, his words soft. ‘You’ve already gone into more danger on my account than anyone should have had to face.’

‘I’ve been wondering where the stars stood at my birth,’ Risala remarked wryly, ‘and what the soothsayer missed, or chose not to tell my mother, for fear she’d faint dead away.’

‘I’ve more need of you here anyway.’ Kheda’s tone hardened as he gazed at Velindre. ‘Keep a close eye on her. She’ll regain her full strength once the creature is dead.’

‘What do you suppose she’ll do?’ asked Risala apprehensively.

‘I hope she’ll disappear in a lightning flash and leave us loudly thankful that we’re rid of such an unexpected and dangerous deceiver.’ Kheda sighed. ‘I don’t suppose she will. She’s set on having that ruby egg.’

Is it truly dead? There’s been no new spark of life within it. Could the death of this cloud dragon give it some new power?

‘What can she want with it?’ Risala was as mystified as Kheda.

‘I don’t know and I don’t want to know,’ he said firmly. ‘And I don’t really want her revealed as anything more than a zamorin scholar.’ Kheda looked at Risala, his face grim. ‘Can you kill her if she betrays any sign of magic when the beast dies?’

Risala nodded slowly. ‘Yes, my lord.’

Seeing the pain in her eyes, Kheda had to fight a powerful impulse to fold her in his arms. At that moment, Shipmaster Mezai came swiftly up the ladder from the rowing deck. Kheda busied himself donning his double-looped sword belt and securing the twin scabbards on his hips.

‘Are we ready, my lord?’ The mariner was wearing a hauberk showing signs of rust only recently scoured away and with some fierce dents in the solid metal plates inset to protect his vitals. He gripped a heavy blade more suited to forcing a path through virgin forest than to swordplay.

‘We are,’ Kheda said resolutely. Mezai summoned the whole ship’s crew with a rousing shout. ‘Come on, lams, let’s have the beast! For the Mist Dove and everyone who died on her!’

Kheda bade Risala farewell with silent eyes as he waited his turn to climb down the stern ladders as virtually the Gossamer Shark’s entire complement spilled along the side decks. As he slid down the last few rungs to the damp sand, he turned to see countless eyes fixed on him. Hunters from the hills of Boal and Esabir brandished their square-ended hacking blades. Lads with them carried bundles of the sturdy lances that could bring down a hook-toothed hog. Most sweated uncomplaining beneath the thick hide tunics they more usually wore to save themselves from a goring by some water ox, with high collars to foil the tearing neck-bite of a jungle cat springing from a tree.

Fishermen rested on their long, barbed spears, some bare-chested, more with some attempt at armour fashioned from latticed knot-tree bark more commonly used for crab traps. Youths without either weapons or armour stood burdened with swathes of heavy net and coils of thick pitch-blackened rope. Men more used to sailing the domain in search of trade were ready to join the hunters and fishermen. Like the Gossamer Shark’s crew, they clutched a motley selection of weapons and a curious array of armour, new and old, in styles drawn from every local domain of the Archipelago and some from far beyond.

Is that some sign, that merchants and mariners can arm and armour themselves so readily when only a warlord’s designated warriors are supposed to carry swords in his service? Dev used to trade in forbidden weapons, didn’t he?

Thrusting away that painful thought, Kheda picked out the bowmen lending their strength to this enterprise. A few carried their bows in hopes of seeing some weakness where a shaft might pierce the dragon. Most of those he recognised as archers from the Chazen residences carried the polearms that usually gathered dust, stored against some disaster when the untrained household would be the last line of defence.

Slaves and servants are all the defence the residence has at the moment. I hope no opportunistic pirate thinks to attack Itrac while every eye and blade is turned against this dragon. At least that bastard Ulla Safar’s too far away to try taking such advantage, even if he did hear some rumour of what was going on. The Chazen swordsmen were drawn up in precise troops amid the milling crowds, steel hauberks bright, polished helmets gleaming even in the dull overcast. Kheda looked for Ridu but couldn’t see him. He set the thought aside resolutely and took off his own helmet so that his face could be seen more clearly and an immediate hush fell around him. Ripples of silence raced outwards until the only sound was the idle play of the sea. Every face turned to Kheda: openly anxious, taut with apprehension, all utterly deteimined.

‘You are here to do Chazen a great service today.’ The words sounded thin and insincere in Kheda’s ears. He cleared his throat. ‘We have a difficult and dangerous task ahead of us. We are looking to kill a creature bigger than any I have ever hunted—and if any of you have ever tried harpooning a sea serpent or a whale anywhere near as big, I’m amazed you’re here to tell the tale.’

Nervous laughter shivered through a few people. His next words killed it.

‘This creature has magic to call upon as well as its size and strength. I don’t know what it may try, to confuse us or kill us, but we must expect it to wield its unnatural powers. We must not let this undermine our resolve. We must fight our way through such attacks to kill the creature itself and that will put paid to such malevolence. We will end this evil blighting Chazen.’

He scanned the intent faces all around. Here and there he noted the uncut hair and beard of a soothsayer. The sages were nodding with approval as they clutched their baskets of prophetic stones or held augury doves dozing in little cages.

Kheda’s voice strengthened. ‘Do not fear the stain of magic touching you. Wiser men than us, through many revolutions of the heavens, are all agreed that the innocent victims of magic are not condemned by its touch. Every portent for Chazen has been positive of late, from the blessing of the prodigious pearl harvest onwards. The domain’s future is full of hope. We are here to claim that hope for ourselves and for those we love. The rains will wash this dragon’s blood from Chazen soil to be lost in the boundless depths of the ocean.’

A few men raised a belligerent cheer.

Kheda spoke again, his voice louder, harsher. ‘We know these beasts can be killed. This dragon we are here to hunt fought and killed the fire-born beast that first arrived to plague us. That evil is dead and gone and scales from its hide are token of that death and talisman to protect the lives risked here today.’ He pointed to men wearing scales on thongs of leather or plaited grass, dull as gouts of blood in the muted light.

‘This second dragon paid heavily for its victory. I saw its terrible wounds with my own eyes. The creature is already grievously weakened.’ Kheda thrust his helmet back on to his head and drew a sword. ‘Let’s kill it for Chazen and look to the future!’

This time a full-throated roar burst from the crowd.

‘Mezai! Where are the scouts who volunteered to track it down last night?’ Kheda had to raise his voice to be heard in the din.

‘My lord!’ Before the shipmaster could answer, Kheda saw another familiar face forcing a path through the throng.

‘Beyau, what brings you here?’ Cold flowed through Kheda’s heart. ‘Is my lady Itrac all right?’

‘She is, my lord,’ Beyau assured him at once. ‘She gave me leave to join in this hunt. She sent this for you.’ He handed Kheda a double-folded and tightly sealed letter.

Kheda took it, aware that all eyes were suddenly fastened on him. He cracked the seals, sweat from his fingers darkening the pale reed paper. He scanned the letter and purposely smoothed an incautious frown from his forehead, replacing it with a wide smile of delight

‘We have another omen of blessing for Chazen.’ Kheda brandished the paper high above his head to include everyone in his shouted announcement. ‘My lady Itrac Chazen is with child! Let’s make sure she brings the new heir into a domain free from the shadow of any dragon’s wings!’

His words were drowned out by exultant cheers raised by those standing closest to him. Kheda stood looking at the letter.

Will you leave another fatherless child to be raised by a mother secretly relieved you are gone from her life? Will you leave Chazen with the disaster of an infant ruler prey to Daish ambition, never mind any other domain that might look to take advantage? This is all still far from over.

‘This won’t be such good news if we make so much noise that we frighten the dragon into flight, wounded or not.’ Kheda turned his back on the jubilation spreading across the clutter of boats in the bay, lest he inadvertently catch sight of Risala. ‘Mezai, where are those scouts?’

‘Here, my lord.’ Struggling for some belated restraint, the crowds parted to allow three disparate groups of men through to the warlord.

‘My lord.’ The leader of the first group bowed low before exchanging a glance with the man pushed forward by the second band. Each contingent showed a stamp of common blood and a harmony in their dress and weapons suggesting they were village hunting parties. The third gang was a loose collection of men whose stained gear and worn faces indicating the harder life of the solitary forest dweller. They had the darker complexions and wiry hair of hill blood rather than the coppery faces and sleeker heads of the coastal dwellers.

‘Where is the dragon?’ Kheda looked from the first man to the leader of the second group.

‘That pass leans to a narrow valley, my lord.’ The first man turned to point to a notch in the vine-choked trees cloaking the high ground rising from the shoreline. ‘The valley leads up to a broad terrace on the far side of that peak. That’s where the beast is lying up.’

Kheda looked but couldn’t even see a peak on the distant mountain shrouded by curtains of low cloud. ‘It’s huddled in between two ridges running down from the height,’ the leader of those from the second village added dourly. ‘Trying to hide itself under a stand of iron-woods.’

‘Is there space to get sufficient men up to fight it on this terrace?’ Kheda looked for answers among all the men.

‘Space enough.’ One of the forest dwellers took a pace forward, rubbing a hand over his close-cropped beard. ‘But there’s only the one path to get up there.’

‘Good day to you, Zicre.’ Kheda nodded a brief greeting.

‘There’s nothing but bare rock and scree at its back, my lord,’ the dour hunter continued. ‘We can only come at it from the front.’

‘I don’t think the beast is expecting attack,’ an older man from the first village said judiciously. ‘It’s not lying up where it could keep watch for anyone starting up the slope.’

‘It’s certainly sorely wounded, my lord,’ volunteered one of the second contingent. ‘A blind man could find it in the dark from the stink alone.’

‘And get his head bitten off for his trouble,’ Zicre commented, grim-faced. ‘If it’s not lying in wait, it certainly doesn’t want to be found.’ He fixed Kheda with a questioning eye.

Kheda looked calmly back at him. What would you ask me, if you dared? How did I know the dragon was here in the first place? Whether it would regain its strength if we left it alone? Could even so great a creature recover from the wounds you’ve seen? Why are we risking ourselves instead of just waiting to see if the dragon dies?

Because I think Velindre was right, mage or not, when she said this would be a form of purification for the domain. Because I have to know if I am condemned for bringing magic to this domain. What better wager than my life against this creature’s?

He looked away from Zicre to the first group of scouts. ‘How wide is the path to this terrace? How many men can we send up it abreast?’

‘Four or five.’ The man got nods of agreement from his companions.

‘Is there room for them to spread out, to let more of us come up behind?’ persisted Kheda. ‘If there’s only the one way to reach this beast, we must overwhelm it as fast as we can.’

‘Yes, my lord,’ several men concurred, their faces serious.

At the rear, Zicre looked grimmer than ever. ‘There’s space, my lord.’

‘Then let’s be on our way.’ Kheda walked past him and headed for the track between the tandra trees. Seeing their warlord disappearing into the green darkness stifled the last cheers still ringing around the outskirts of the impromptu horde. The men of Chazen followed their warlord; trained swordsmen, practised hunters, fishermen relying on skills learned performing very different tasks and villagers with unwavering determination to reinforce their shaky arms. The abrupt silence was broken only by the crack of brush and vegetation mercilessly subdued by their passing and the chink and rattle of armour. Even with the cool of the night lingering here and there among the shadowy trees, the air was close and oppressive.

Kheda led the way up towards the notch in the higher ground that gave on to the valley leading up to the dragon’s lair. The taciturn Zicre slid through the swordsmen to follow close behind him, swiping unnecessarily at opportunist tangles of striol vine choking beny bushes and lilla saplings striving to claim their share of the rainy season’s bounty. Behind, the sound of hacking blades grew louder as men spilled off the narrowing trail into the thicker growth, oaths and obscenities meeting thorns or whipping twigs fighting back.

The sound of hunying feet on the bare earth and muffled protests stiffened Kheda’s spine. He glanced back over his shoulder and acknowledged Mezai and Beyau with a stern face that instantly quelled their stealthy attempts to edge past Zicre, who was still following close behind Kheda.

The forest was still and silent all around. Distant bird-song and the calls of loals were muffled by the mists, with the distorted shrieks of some unidentifiable creature reverberating off an unseen cliff face. A flash of movement caught Kheda’s eye and he saw a golden-crowned matia clinging to the wrinkled grey trunk of an ironwood. He blinked sweat out of his eyes and when he looked again, it was gone. He and his men could have been the only living creatures in the forest.

Apart from the blood-sucking flies. Feeling the burning bite of black sweat flies, Kheda scrubbed fiercely at one cheek with the back of a gloved hand. Beside him, Zicre paused and looked to the rear. Kheda did the same and was surprised to see how far up the incline they had already come. Glimpses of the dull turquoise sea were just visible through the crowded branches of the spinefruit trees overhanging the trail. Down among the trees, the men of Chazen were forcing their way forward, all sweating profusely. The forest around them was thick with mist, drifting upwards to join the unbroken cloud cover. Kheda looked up to see the thin cloud silvering as the hidden sun strengthened. The heat of the day was beginning to build. Somewhere in the pungent depths of the forest a stream chuckled and he saw thirsty men break off from the main thrust to search for the relief of its waters.

Wordlessly, Zicre unslung a battered gourd from his shoulder and drank deeply before offering it to Kheda. The warlord took it with a grateful nod. His tongue felt like damp cotton, thick in his mouth, and the oppressive heat seemed to weigh more heavily with every breath. That and the burden of Zicre’s eyes fixed on him.

What are you thinking? Why the unspoken questions in your eyes and the shadow of doubt? I was the one who brought lore from the north to join battle with the invaders and their savage sorcery coming unbidden to these waters. And I lost Daish for my pains, so that’s hardly the best endorsement of my wisdom. Is all I’ve done for Chazen enough to redress the balance? Is that what you’re wondering? Kheda handed Zicre back his gourd. ‘You’ve some herbs in there I can’t quite identify.’

Zicre smiled briefly and restoppered the gourd. ‘Yes, my lord.’

‘What can I trade for the secret?’ Kheda wondered aloud.

‘We’ll see.’ Zicre shrugged. ‘Later, if we get the chance.’

His dark gaze locked with Kheda’s.

You’ve seen the dragon, haven’t you, Zicre? You know what we’re up against, wounded or not.

‘My lord?’ As the scouting parties paused to suck greedily at their waterskins, Beyau and Mezai forced their way through to draw close to Kheda, their faces concerned.

‘Is everything all right?’ Kheda asked. The shipmaster was drenched with sweat.

Beyau granted the scouts a cursory glance. ‘Let me lead the first assault, my lord,’ he begged unexpectedly. ‘I was trained to be a warrior for Chazen.’

‘And you want to test your fate here against the guilt you still feel for surviving when so many of those warriors died?’ Kheda asked with quiet sympathy. ‘Don’t try to second-guess your destiny, Beyau, just accept it and go on with your life. As for leading this assault, no, that is my duty and I will neither shirk it nor let any other man claim it from me.’

He turned his back on the startled faces of Beyau, Mezai and the scattered scouts. As impassive as ever, Zicre walked silently beside him as they covered the last stretch of the track leading to the rocky cleft in the ridge of high ground.

Not far now, my lord,’ the hunter observed quietly. ‘We need to stick to the sides of the valley. It’s all marsh in the bottom.’

Now Kheda could see the stream he had been hearing all the way up the slope, flowing down from a peak still hidden in mist. The water of endless successive rainy seasons had carved a channel down the rock only to find its path to the sea barred by this stubborn ridge. It pooled in indecision before turning to seek another route and the reek of ancient decay fuelled afresh by recent downpours rose from the spreading bog.

Zicre smiled humourlessly at Kheda’s unguarded grimace. ‘If you think that’s bad, wait till you smell the dragon.’

Kheda didn’t answer, heading down towards the narrow path that Zicre indicated. He moved slowly, to be sure of his footing and to allow the rest of this diverse multitude of dragon slayers to keep pace with him. Not everyone was so careful on the awkward slope and the slippery, crushed vegetation was treacherous underfoot. Kheda couldn’t help but grin as startled yells were hastily stifled by splashes from the bog.

Then he caught a gust of a smell so putrid it made him retch. Recollections of revolting encounters flashed through his memory.

That spotted deer dead of an arrow to the throat and unseen in a thicket until an incautious woodcutter filled the campsite with the foetid gas from its bloated belly. The hunt when we came across a hook-toothed hog drowned in a wallow, skull picked clean by carrion birds and beetles, the rest of it disintegrated into a slough of foulness roiling with maggots. That time we found a courier dove fallen into a water cistern and realised we’d bathed in water tainted with that matted mess of slimy decay. Clapping a mail-backed glove to his mouth, Kheda fought to control his heaving stomach. ‘The dragon?’ he asked Zicre with a gasp, trying to ignore the sound of vomiting behind him.

The hunter nodded silently as he tied a rag around his mouth and nose. He handed a second strip of cloth to Kheda. The warlord caught the pungent scent of chaelor oil and pressed it gratefully to his nose. ‘How exactly do we set about attacking it, my lord?’ The other men who’d scouted out the valley drew up around Zicre as the hunter spoke, all their faces expectant. ‘Once we’re up on the terrace.’ The men of Chazen were spreading out among the trees; some were still doubled up emptying their guts but most were standing upright, faces muddy with apprehension and nausea.

Kheda took a slow, careful breath to avoid any spasm of queasiness and did his best to pitch his words to carry to the farthest man he could see without speaking overly loudly.

‘First and foremost, we cannot risk letting the dragon fly away, so we must foul its wings with nets and ropes.’ He glanced at the contingents from the fishing boats. ‘Those of you without much armour, tear into its wings, ripping the membranes. For the rest of us-’ he included everyone with an impromptu blade in his gaze ‘—if its hide is proof against another dragon’s teeth, it’ll be proof against the best swords. So we attack its wounds. We set it bleeding again. It’s already weak. We want it weaker still’

‘Weak is one thing, dead’s another,’ interrupted Zicre, ignoring looks of outrage at his temerity. ‘How are we to kill it?

‘The quickest way to any creature’s brain is through its mouth or its eyes.’ Kheda fixed the hunter with an unwavering gaze. ‘That’s my task. What I need the rest of you to do is keep it distracted by so many attacks that it doesn’t realise what I aim to do, until it’s too late.’

Confused protests rose from Beyau and Mezai and others besides, while the armoured warriors of Chazen tried to force their way closer to their warlord, with fervent assurances that they would be at his side, their swords with his.

Kheda ignored them all as he looked at the rugged shoulder of the peak, a dark shadow against the mist lightened under the strengthening sun. ‘The path leads up round that spur?’ He looked to Zicre and got a silent nod of confirmation. ‘The terrace is beyond that?’

He drew a deep breath, grateful for the pungent chaelor oil masking the stench of decay. Setting a punishing pace up the hill, he was soon feeling the strain in the backs of his thighs and calves. As the path widened to claim a broad, undulating ledge at the base of the peak, men drew level with him on either side. Beyau was surrounded by waniors of the Chazen household, their armour brilliant with beads of moisture, the muffled light of the sun turning their naked blades to dull silver. Mezai was in among the fishermen burdened with their nets and ropes, other men from the Gossamer Shark gripping clubs and long knives.

A broken knife edge of rock rose sheer on one side, the broad ledge falling away into a confusion of forest on the other. As the slope grew less cruel, Kheda pushed on faster, Zicre still at his side. Beyau and the swordsmen ran with them, faces grim beneath the brow bands of their polished helms. The tramp of the countless feet behind Mezai and the mariners reverberated across the steep valley.

Kheda rounded the shoulder of the peak and the hollow of level ground between the two ridges running down from the peak opened up before them. Some of the biggest ironwoods he had ever seen had claimed this sheltered, fertile spot for their own. Hidden from foresters who would have cut them down long since and thought them a mighty prize, they had soared upwards.

The great grey trees with their lofty crowns of dense green leaves looked no more than saplings behind the massive bulk sprawled in front of them. The reek of decay hung stifling in the air. The dragon lay awkwardly, hindquarters slumped to one side, stormy-blue hind legs drawn up to its pale grey belly, its massive tail, dark as thunder cloud, curling around. The wounds torn in its hide by the dead fire dragon gaped wide, dark bruised flesh barely visible beneath clusters of flies and beetles, intent on feeding and not caring if their prey was alive or dead. Every now and again the dragon’s skin twitched in a feeble attempt to shake off the tormenters. A few flies were dislodged, only to return with buzzing eagerness. Where beetles fell away, their place was instantly taken by newcomers from the glittering horde scrambling over and around each other. The ground below the creature was a crushed mass of bushes and saplings foul with blackened blood.

There was more life in the front end of the dragon. It rested on its chest, forelegs braced, white crystal claws digging into the shattered twigs and leaf litter. Its massive blue-grey head swayed from side to side, hoary spines bristling with malice the length of its long, muscular neck. Eyes blue as sapphire glowed with malevolence beneath frosty brow ridges and it opened its mouth to hiss menacingly, long cobalt tongue flickering over teeth like steel sword blades. With a rattling clap, it spread its wings.

It couldn’t spread them very far. The rents torn by the fire dragon had ulcerated horribly. Purple slime soiled the cloudy membrane, oozing from the spreading wounds. The creature’s defiant hiss turned to one of agony as it let its wings fall back in painful disorder.

The men of Chazen crowded behind their warlord, each man lending courage to those gathered close around him, inadvertently pressing Kheda forward. He raised his sword slowly, then cut it down with an audible swish. He was already running, Zicre on one side, Beyau on the other, mariners, waniors and huntsmen hard on their heels.

The dragon disappeared. A veil of mist opaque as silk came down before their astonished eyes. Kheda barely hesitated, plunging on through the fog. After a moment’s indecision, the men with him followed. The whiteness wrapped around them, denser than ever. Kheda looked from side to side and found he could barely make out Zicre or Beyau even though he was close enough to touch them. He slowed just a little.

‘Where is it?’ Beyau asked through clenched teeth. ‘It can’t have flown away.’ Shivers wracked Kheda and he looked down to see frost forming on his chain mail. Not on those wings. And we’d have heard it.’

‘What magic is this, my lord?’ Zicre’s sweat-sodden clothing crackled as he fought against its sudden icy embrace.

‘We must kill it before we all freeze to death.’ Kheda gasped. The all-enveloping mist deadened his words and he realised he could barely hear anything beyond aim’s length either.

‘My lord?’ It was Mezai, teeth chattering uncontrollably, breath frozen white in his beard. ‘Come on,’ Kheda said with difficulty, his jaw stiff with cold.

‘My lord!’ Barely coherent, Beyau threw himself at Kheda and knocked the warlord off his feet. The dragon’s head appeared out of the deathly mist, snapping at the void where Kheda had just been standing. Mezai and Zicre stumbled forward, brandishing their weapons. Their yells of wordless defiance were instantly swallowed by the fog swirling ever denser around them.

‘I got it!’ The ice in Mezai’s beard cracked as he grinned, proffering his crude hacking blade.

Kheda pulled himself painfully to his feet, chilled thighs and forearms aching bone deep from the impact on the brutally frozen ground. ‘Well done.’ An icy smear of dark-blue blood glittered on the burnished steel of Mezai’s weapon.

‘Here, my lord.’ Zicre bent to recover a scatter of small blue-white scales with fingers withered by the cold.

Tossing aside the chaelor-soaked rag, Kheda held out a gloved hand and examined the scales the hunter laid on his palm. They were edged with putrid flesh where they had been ripped from the underside of the dragon’s jaw. He closed his hand around them and felt them crumble. When he uncurled his fingers, all he held was glittering powder.

Velindre said it would fade away to nothing.

‘Perhaps its hide won’t be so tough after all,’ said Zicre cautiously.

‘Come on.’ Kheda threw the dust away, brushing his hand against his thigh.

They advanced slowly, Kheda at the forefront, the other three behind him to make a rough arrowhead, every man’s eyes looking in all directions. Shadows in the fog fleeted on the edge of vision. Noises came and went so fast they might just have been imagined. Kheda ripped off his helmet and threw it away. ‘My lord,’ Beyau protested.

‘Seeing and hearing have more value than armour in this.’ Kheda strained eyes and ears. ‘Are we the only ones going forward? Can you hear anyone else?’

A scream ripped through the mist and the clouded air swirled violently around them. More yells tumbled’over each other, punctured by a rattling sweep. Then the mist gathered ever closer, deadening the noise.

‘Its tail?’ hazarded Zicre through clenched teeth. He brushed frost from the front of his tunic but the oiled leather vanished beneath a fresh layer of white.

‘Where’s its head?’ Kheda gripped his sword tight with aching fingers and peered into the fog. He could feel cold moisture seeping through his hair to trickle down his scalp and temples.

A stealthy current in the air alerted him an instant before he saw the sapphire glint of the dragon’s eye cutting through the white mist. Its blue head darted forward, jaw agape, cobalt tongue lashing, blue-black blood dripping from its chin. Kheda didn’t flinch, sweeping his sword around and up to slash at the slack hide beneath the dragon’s jaw. He ripped the blade away and ducked sideways to lose himself in the mist. The creature’s roar of pain made the fog all around throb.

Kheda tensed at a swirl of the vapour then relaxed as the other three emerged and crouched beside him. ‘We have to catch its head somehow,’ he told them forcefully, ‘so we can force it down and have at its eyes. We have to blind it!’

‘We’ll find a net.’ Mezai was shivering so violently he looked like a man in the grip of fever. Jerking his head at Beyau, he stumbled backwards to vanish in the white mist. The swordsman hesitated. ‘Go,’ Kheda ordered.

Zicre moved to stand with his back to Kheda’s. Do you think it can see us through this?’

‘I don’t know.’ Kheda shivered as the other man’s weight pressed the frozen padding beneath his mail against his chilled flesh.

His words were lost as sobbing forced its way through the dense mist, cut off short in a horrifying gurgle. The dragon’s hiss rasped through the blinding fog, seeming to come from all directions. Kheda drew his second sword and shifted his weight from foot to foot.

‘Ware!’ Zicre shouted and flung himself sideways as the dragon’s forelimb raked through the mist, glittering claws ripping across at chest height.

Kheda wheeled around, dodging awkwardly. He flailed blindly with his swords and made contact more by luck than judgement. His blade ripped a claw from its socket, the crystal talon nearly skewering Zicre before it disappeared into the enveloping fog. The dragon bellowed and its head loomed above him, teeth bared, dodging bloody blue saliva. Kheda stood his ground and hacked at the beast’s neck and jaw with all his strength. One blade clashed against its teeth. The dragon recoiled, only to snap at the blade, shattering the tempered steel to lethal needles. Kheda flinched from the blinding shower, fleeing blindly. The dragon’s foreclaws struck him a glancing blow on his mailed back, sending him tumbling over frozen vegetation that crackled beneath him. He rolled over on to his back, raising his remaining sword. A shadow darkened the fog, pierced by a glint of sapphire flame.

‘Hey!’ Zicre found a fallen spear underfoot and flung it at the mist-shrouded dragon.

Kheda heard the polearm strike with a solid clunk. The dragon’s head whipped across to snap at Zicre, trailing tendrils of haze and slaver. Diamond drops spattered Kheda’s armour. The steel rings and inset plates of his hauberk cracked and split where the drool landed.

‘My lord.’ A hand grabbed his shoulder. It was Mezai.

‘Are you hurt?’ As Beyau hauled him up, Kheda realised there was a rent in the back of his chain mail. No.’ He gripped his remaining sword and scanned the white opacity for the dragon and Zicre alike. ‘Have you got a net?’

‘And grapnels,’ Mezai confirmed with bitter satisfaction.

‘What’s happening?’ Kheda strained his ears for any sound that would offer an answer. ‘Where are the others?’

Before anyone could speak, the dragon attacked, murderous maw agape and intent on Kheda. The warlord waited until the last instant before darting aside, hacking at the side of the creature’s long, scaly face. Mezai threw a grapnel at the dragon’s head and the curved tines tangled in the crest of spines at the nape of its neck. It roared and reared up, trying to shake off the biting metal teeth. Zicre appeared and flung himself on the rope to add his weight to Mezai’s, pulling the barbs ever deeper into the creature’s flesh. ‘Chazen! Here! Chazen!’ Kheda shouted into the empty mist as loudly as he could, moving between the dragon and the two men, lest it try biting at them.

The dragon was more concerned with the immediate cause of its pain. It ducked its head in a futile attempt to escape the tormenting grapnel. Beyau seized his chance and flung a broad net over the beast’s head, the wide mesh weighted with pierced and polished stones. The dragon shook its head with a furious hiss, snapping at the weights dangling just out of reach. It licked at the net and the rope crumbled to dust at the touch of its freezing saliva. ‘Chazen!’ A second net came spinning out of the mist, the web black against the encircling pallor. It landed squarely on the dragon’s head and men followed it. Kheda knew some of them from the Gossamer Shark, and others who had volunteered as scouts. The rest he didn’t recognise. A double handful ran to lend their strength to Mezai’s rope, slipping over the icy ground. Their combined weight began inexorably dragging the dragon’s head downwards.

More ropes and nets appeared from all directions, everyone intent on snaring the dragon’s head. The creature roared with fury, fighting the binding cords and cables. It clawed frantically, first with one forelimb, then the other.

‘Let me get at its eyes!’ Kheda stood, watching and waiting, sword at the ready.

The dragon bellowed and reared upwards, dragging those closest off their feet as they clung to their ropes in frozen terror. It slashed at them with murderous talons and two men fell backwards, eviscerated in a single stroke. One rolled over to land at Kheda’s feet, the bloody void of his abdomen frozen solid before he came to rest.

‘Chazen!’ The men of the domain raised their vengeful cry. More rushed forward to haul on the ropes and grapnels tangled in the dragon’s spines. Nets smothered its muzzle, caught in its teeth. It tore at the mesh with a forefoot but only succeeded in ripping the lethal fangs from its own jaw.

‘Bring it down!’ Kheda yelled.

Mezai raised a breathless chant that the warlord recognised from the Gossamer Shark’s rowing deck. Hoarse with exhaustion, other mariners joined in. Fishermen picked up the rhythm in the next breath and the hunters and merchants weren’t slow to follow. With every man’s might brought to bear together in the rhythm of the gasping, tuneless song, the dragon’s head dipped. They drew it further down with every beat. The wheezing chorus took on a menacing, exultant note. Kheda watched the creature’s burning sapphire eye brought lower and lower. He gripped his sword and waited for the moment to strike. As the dragon’s scaly jaw dipped to touch the ground, hailstones fell so thickly that Kheda couldn’t see through them. Big as the most precious pearls, they bruised his head and face brutally. Gasping and squinting through the pain, Kheda stumbled forwards. He could barely keep his footing on the icy spheres and his feet were so numb he couldn’t feel them. All that mattered was that he could still see the dragon’s eye glowing blue through the mist.

Cries of distress rang through the fog and the coordinated assault dissolved in pain and panic. Kheda pushed past some nameless islander still clinging to a rope despite the jagged ice lacerating his bare hands. Drops of the man’s red blood were falling frozen to join the drifts of hailstones now ankle deep.

Kheda was close enough to see the dragon lashing with its blue tongue at the nets draped over its long face. The ropes tangled around its neck and forequarters were breaking and crumbling away as it clawed its way free. It had a dead body pinned beneath the other forepaw, its talons embedded in the man’s back, the corpse already half-buried beneath the hail.

Kheda grabbed at a twisted cord tangled in the spines above the dragon’s brow and hung on it with all his weight, levelling his sword. The dragon’s head darted down towards him, blue tongue seeking him like a serpent. Bracing himself as best he could, with all the strength he could muster, Kheda thrust the blade deep into the creature’s glowing eye. The sapphire orb shattered like crystal. Burning white fluid oozed along the sword, etching the steel like acid. Kheda held tight to the hilt and thrust again, leaning in with all his might, twisting the blade ever deeper. The burning whiteness ate away the sword’s guard and hissed against the fine chain mail of Kheda’s gauntlets. He held his ground as long as he dared then sprang away, tearing off his gloves and tossing them to the ground where they steamed with an acrid metallic stink. The dragon’s head slumped to the ground, long neck limp. The beast writhed in agony, convulsions rippling through its body to prompt shouts of alarm far away in the mist. Its long blue tongue curled around its muzzle, tentatively licking at its mined eye. A tormented moan escaped it, wretched and pitiful. ‘My lord?’ It was Beyau, offering Kheda a sword in a hand bloodied by rope burns and blackened by cold.

Kheda looked at the dragon. The creature was now motionless.

‘Wait.’ He gave head and foreclaws a wide berth as he skirted warily around it, to get a clear sight of its unwounded eye.

The glow of white fire in the sapphire depths was growing fainter. Kheda watched it fade to little more than a candle flame. The hailstones began to melt. The incandescence shrank to a mere pinprick. The fog dissolved to no more than a frail memory, misty around the treetops.

The men around him were exclaiming in relief or giving way to grief as they saw their fallen comrades. Kheda kept his attention fixed on the dragon’s eye. The light finally died and a warm breeze rolled up the valley.

‘Is it dead?’ Zicre looked at Kheda for confirmation, hugging an arm wrenched bodily out of its shoulder socket. Fearful faces all around begged for the same reassurance.

Kheda walked forward and laid a hand on the creature’s muzzle. The twilight-blue scales were cold but not with the burning chill of magic. No breath issued from the wide nostrils and the lolling blue tongue didn’t so much as twitch when he pushed it with a tentative foot. He looked again at the creature’s unwounded eye, now dull and clouded beneath a drooping eyelid. ‘Yes.’

Someone raised a shaky cheer of celebration and others soon joined in. Men pressed close all around Kheda, shoving at the dead dragon as if they needed to touch it to convince themselves it was truly defeated.

‘My lord?’ Mezai looked to Kheda for permission, his knife poised over one of the spines behind the dragon’s neck. Kheda nodded and watched the shipmaster dig out the needle-sharp scale. ‘How’s this for a talisman, my lord?’ Mezai grinned, exultant. ‘The Gossamer Shark won’t go down like the Mist DoveV

A group of huntsmen began disentangling the corpse of their friend from the dragon’s dead foreclaws, ripping out the talons for their own prize as they did so. Out of the corner of his eye, Kheda saw a troop of Chazen warriors set about hacking off the spiked tip of the dragon’s tail, brushing aside the dead flies and carrion beetles that the sudden cold had killed. Emboldened, others used the ropes to scramble up the creature’s sides, intent on digging their knives into the wounds already splitting its hide. The mountain hollow grew loud with congratulation, speculation and the heady joking of men who’d half-expected to die instead of see victory. The youth Ridu’s hysterical laughter rang out at some inane jest. Kheda smiled wordlessly and walked away. Men who had fled the fearful fog in the first place or broken beneath the murderous hailstorm emerged from the trees, shamefaced. Some looked hopefully to Kheda for permission to claim their share of the fallen creature’s teeth and scales. Others fell to their knees, faces in the dirt, begging for his forgiveness. He ignored them all.

‘My lord?’ Beyau caught up with the warlord, face anxious.

‘Don’t you want to claim a trophy?’ Kheda gestured back towards the plundered corpse. ‘Before the day warms up enough to start it stinking?’

‘There’s fewer dead than I feared, my lord,’ Beyau said stoutly.

‘Still too many for comfort.’ Kheda slowed reluctantly, seeing that Beyau was limping painfully. This creature would have died without their blood being shed. Didn’t I just bring these men to a meaningless death?

‘They made the choices that brought them to such a fate, my lord.’ Beyau’s face twisted with emotion. ‘And this is a victory for Chazen over magic and malice, at last.’

‘And a victory must be bought at a price if it is to have any lasting value.’ Kheda tried to keep the desolation out of his voice. He stared down at the ground for a moment, before lifting his eyes to the trees and the sky now clearing above them. ‘I want a tower of silence built on the beach,’ he said slowly. ‘Two, if needs be. The men who died here died for the whole domain. Let’s hope that gives some value to their families’ losses. And those who lived through this slaughter must remember those who didn’t, when they’re praised as heroes the length and breadth of these islands. See to it, Beyau.’

Still wracked with a chill that the hot sun couldn’t warm away, Kheda turned his back on the butchery of the dead dragon and began walking towards the coast. His sword scabbards hung empty in his belt. He realised he didn’t know if it had been his blade or Dev’s that had finally killed the beast. He decided it really didn’t matter.