Azure Bonds

5 Mist

The dragon, though she had not bothered to rise, was no longer balled up like a cute kitten by a fireside. Her front paws curled beneath her bulk, her body rested comfortably below the level of her rear haunches, and her neck curved in a relaxed S-shape. Even seated in this way, her jaws hung twice as far above the ground as Alias’s perch on the raised altar, and her reptilian golden eyes looked down from another ten feet higher than that.

From what little Alias could see of her belly, it was a twisted mass of scarred, purple and violet scales. Several of the scars were still fresh and oozing—compliments of the adventuring party that had tried to defeat her but failed.

With those long tendrils hanging down from her chin and face, Alias thought, she looks like a cat. I guess that makes me the mouse. Then the swordswoman noticed, tucked behind the monster’s left ear, a raven regarding her with a stare as unblinking as the dragon’s—the only one that had not retreated to the ceiling. The dragon’s spy.

“Poor dear,” rumbled the dragon. “Are you ill-versed in the common tongue? Where do they send these robbers from, anyway? Asken bey Amnite? No. You don’t look like a southerner. Cheyeska col Thay? Not that either. Do you speak any language known to the Sea of Fallen Stars? I detest not knowing where my next meal is coming from.”

The dragon’s ramblings shook Alias from her trance. The beast had transfixed her with a gaze that would have done a basilisk proud, yet here she was, nattering like some fishmonger’s wife. Alias tried to speak several times, until the words found purchase in her throat and she spat out, “I come from Cormyr.” For the moment, she added mentally.

“Oh, so you are native flesh,” said the dragon, coiling her neck back as if to view Alias in this new light. “How precious. I do hate foreign mystery meat. They put such odd things in their bodies.”

Alias blinked hard, fighting the sudden drowsiness that descended on her. First the dragon’s gaze, then its rich, rumbling words, seemed to drain the energy from her body, as if the rest she had received earlier in the week had done her no good. This must be what they call dragon-fear, Alias realized. She shook herself out of the lethargy.

“I am no foreigner, but Alias of the Inner Sea, swordsmaster and adventuress,” she announced.

“Oh, really?” replied the dragon. “You must forgive me for not knowing anything about you, but I’ve been so out of touch. I am Mistinarperadnacles Hai Draco. You may call me Mist. And I’ll call you … supper? Yes, it’s about time for a light, early supper. So nice of you to deliver yourself.”

The dragon shifted its weight, and Alias saw for the first time the front paws of the beast, huge, three-toed triangles, each corner of the triangles sporting a claw. Further up each foot glinted an opposing dew claw. All the claws were as crimson as fresh blood.

Alias held up her sword with both hands—not to attack, but as a warning gesture. She replied, “You must forgive my unwillingness to serve as your meal, O great and powerful Mistinarperadnacles, but instead I think I will challenge you to the Feint of Honor.”

“The Feint of Honor?” Mist echoed the last words with a tone of surprise. Then she chuckled, a sound that echoed like thunder about the cavern. “What can you know about the Feint of Honor, O Supper?”

Alias stepped back until her back was touching the wicker of the cage and replied, “It is the proper name given to the ritual combat of subdual instigated in the most ancient of times by the wisest of dragons.”

Mist sniffed, “And I presume you know why?”

“Because, in the most ancient of times, your people fought amongst themselves so fiercely that many promising wyrms died. Indeed, scholars believe you may have wiped yourselves off the face of the land had not the Feint been decreed.” Alias pressed her calf against the cage bars in hopes that the halfling would notice the dagger in her boot.

“Yes. True enough.” The dragon nodded, settling back on her haunches. “Having heard of this custom, all manner of militia and mercenary have come barrelling into my home and the homes of my brethren, beating on us with the flat of their blades, firing blunt-headed fowling arrows, and generally disturbing our rest until we are forced to destroy them just to regain our composure. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. It implies a lot of ignorance.” Mist twisted her neck so that her jaws were uncomfortably close to Alias’s head. “You see, the Feint is a code for dragons. It has nothing to do with you puny, but delicious, mortals.”

“Not so, O Mistinarperadnacles. True, many humans may attempt subdual without following the formal codes, and their senses are as bootless as a halfling. And he who walks in here without sense, walks in here unarmed. You are then entirely within your rights to exterminate them as you see fit.” Alias felt a pat behind her knee, a signal, she hoped, that the halfling had understood, but she had no sensation of her dagger being slid from her boot. “But you may not with honor deny a challenge properly made—”

“Your speech is oddly accented,” said the dragon. “I think you come from beyond Cormyr.”

“Unless, of course,” Alias continued, “you are a common dragon. Then, of course, you may behave as you will.”

Fire flared in Mist’s eyes. “And do you know the formal codes, O Supper?”

“I know first to ask the dragon’s name if it is not already known,” replied Alias.

“Common courtesy, at the very least, common sense as well.”

“At this point, I must say you have offended me. You have monopolized the services of this halfling, an offense to art; you have kept her imprisoned in this cage, an offense to humanity; and you have referred to me as Supper, an offense to my honor. For these barbarities, Mistinarperadnacles, red mistress of flame and sunsets, I challenge you!”

“Quite nice,” said the dragon. “Your composure does you credit. You astonish me, young one. This is a custom veiled in antiquity. I don’t believe one sage in a hundred could recall the formalities so precisely. Just where did you acquire this knowledge?”

Alias did know the answer to that question. She remembered it, but she did not know how. Instead of trying to answer Mist’s questions, she continued with the terms of challenge.

“My weapon will be this single blade.” Alias indicated her sword with a nod of her head. “You may use your claws. No biting, no breathing fire, and no magic.”

Steam was beginning to rise up from Mist’s nostrils, indicating the beast was no longer amused or intrigued, but losing her patience. Alias continued hurriedly, “We fight until the first three hits or until the other surrenders. If I am victor, I demand you free the halfling Ruskettle and allow both of us to leave your lair safe and free.”

“What? No demands for a chest of gold or for me to leave this happy land and never to return?” Mist mocked her.

“None,” Alias replied flatly. According to the code, the more demands she made, the more compromises she would have to make toward the dragon’s terms. If they even came to terms. Steam now poured from Mist in great billows.

She could breathe fire anytime, Alias thought. If her ego and pride don’t bind her to the ancient code, I’m dead meat.

“It is a sad state of affairs,” Mist growled, “when a dragon cannot use those gifts invested in her by Tiamat. At the very least, I must use my claws and my teeth. We will fight until you are dead or you convince me to surrender. In compensation, if you win, I will grant you a chest of gold. I am a generous spirit, you see.”

“Accepted,” Alias replied without hesitation.

The dragon reared back, her head raised into the stone dome high above. The raven flapped noisily from her head. Surprised, Mist could only foolishly repeat, “Accepted,” thus locking herself into the agreement.

“The code is honored, the pact is made,” Alias declared and lunged forward beneath the dragon’s chest. She slashed out with her sword, catching the beast just below the forward knee. The blow was not forceful enough to cut into the scales, but it hurt. The dragon roared, and her knee buckled so that she toppled forward. Alias dashed between her hind legs. Careful to avoid the creature’s tail, the swordswoman dragged her blade across Mist’s purple-plated rump, knocking loose a few half-healed plates.

Mist howled and spun about. Her gleaming eyes seemed to burrow into Alias. “Foul!” she hissed. “You used the sharp side of your blade.”

“Our contract did not limit me to the flat of my weapon, wyrm!” Alias shouted, dodging backward to avoid the slash of the triple scythes at the end of the dragon’s paw.

“O ho!” Mist cackled, following up her first assault with a thrust from the other front paw. Alias twisted and rolled away as claw tips scored deep into the wall she’d had at her back a moment before. “So you are now a lawyer as well as a fighter!” Mist taunted as she yanked her claw from the rock, causing a small avalanche of stone to topple down.

Alias retreated back among the treasure and bone piles, sparing only a glance for the now-empty cage on the altar. She averted her eyes quickly so as not to alert Mist to the halfling’s escape. Have to keep the wyrm’s attention on me, Alias thought. Unfortunately, that should be no problem.

Instead of lunging her neck toward the warrior, Mist retreated and rose to her hind legs, unfurling her wings. The leathery folds of flesh caught the subterranean breeze like sails, then fanned the air back in powerful waves toward Alias’s corner of the cave.

The last raven retreated to the roof to avoid the assault, but Alias had no way to evade the force of the wind. She was lifted from the ground and buffeted over several large treasure chests. Her rough passage knocked the arm and leg guards off one side of her armor and left her pinned beneath a granite statue of some forgotten Hillsfar noble.

She began squirming out from beneath the stone, but Mist loped forward and laid her chin down on top of the statue. Her fetid breath made Alias gag. Mist’s mouth tendrils curled in glee. Alias closed her eyes, certain she was about to have her head bitten off.

“So, little lawyer,” Mist hissed, “I can slay you now by fire, for who would know I violated the codes?”

“Well, me for one,” came a high-pitched but resonant voice from above. “And you know the old saying—tell a bard, and you tell the world.”

Mist whirled around in surprise. The halfling bard stood on the ledge by the opening to Alias’s back door. She leaned weakly against the rock wall, but her eyes sparkled with mischief and vengeance. Alias took advantage of Mist’s inattention to escape from the embrace of the Hillsfar noble and began to climb up a wagon loaded with treasure.

Ruskettle strummed a chord on her tiny yarting, a miniature guitar with seven catgut strings. “Now let’s see, this is spur of the moment, mind, but how about—” The bard began to sing:

“Then of course we’ll need a chorus for everyone to join in on,” Ruskettle continued hurriedly:

Alias cringed at the lyrics’ strained meters, but had to admire the singer’s nerve. Great clouds of steam filled the dome above Mist’s head. The bard hadn’t a chance of outrunning the fires that had to be burning inside the wyrm. Instead of escaping, though, Alias noted, she risked her hide to gain time for me to wriggle out of danger.

Goaded forward by the image of a roasted halfling and a failed mission, Alias launched herself from the lid of a large cask toward the dragon’s head. She fell short of her mark, but managed to catch a fistful of the tendrils hanging from Mist’s chin. Arching her back and kicking her legs like an acrobat, the swordswoman swung herself backward, over the side of the dragon’s mouth, past her dripping, exposed teeth, beyond her steaming nostrils, and landed squarely on the bridge of the dragon’s nose.

Alias wedged her blade between Mist’s eyes, so that the creature’s pupils crossed, trying to focus on her foe.

“Match was until surrender,” Alias panted, sweat rolling down her face in rivulets. Her exhaustion deepened with her proximity to the dragon’s steaming and foul exhalations, yet she tightened her grip on her hilt. “Do you surrender, wyrm, or shall we see how much of your brain I can reach when I plunge my blade into one of your eyes?”

For Alias, the next few moments were frozen in time. Steam rose about her and water splattered to the floor, but the principals of the tableau stood motionless: the dragon considering the value of her eyesight and the length of the warrior’s blade, Alias trying to remain perched on the creature’s scaly nose, Ruskettle awaiting the outcome, so eager to witness it she would not flee like a sensible person.

Finally Mist hissed, “This time, little lawyer, you win.”

“I accept your surrender,” Alias replied. She kept her gaze on the creature and her sword over Mist’s nose. No blanket of condensing steam poured from the beast’s mouth to indicate she had cooled her inner fires.

Mist has no intention of honoring the pact, Alias realized. She wants me dead even more than ever, but she doesn’t dare try to kill me unless she can get the tell-tale bard with the same blow. All she has to do is breathe fire once I’m standing beside Ruskettle.

Alias’s mind scrambled for a scheme to delay the dragon’s attack, hoping that the halfling had enough wits to play along. “I’d like to be let down over there by my friend,” the swordswoman said.

“But, of course,” Mist replied, her tone full of sugary venom. The dragon kept her head perfectly steady as she swung her neck over to the ledge, anxious that Alias should not slip or lean on the blade and drive it into an eye.

Alias hesitated before she stepped off Mist’s snout. Winking at the halfling, she said, “That ring of fire resistance makes you a lot braver than usual, bard.”

“What? Oh, yeah. The ring of fire resistance. Well, you know my motto: If you got it, might as well flaunt it. You think I’d have risked singing to a dragon without one?”

Alias leaped from Mist’s head to the ledge and sidled behind the halfling, as if to use her tiny body for a shield. The swordswoman’s heart pounded as she ordered the dragon, “Now go fetch the chest of gold you promised me.”

Mist’s eyes narrowed to tiny slits. Steam rose from her nostrils. Tymora, make her believe the ruse! Alias prayed silently. The dragon turned her head away from the ledge and lumbered toward a pile of gold. Alias swallowed hard.

“Why didn’t you kill her when you had the chance?” Ruskettle whispered through clenched teeth.

“And fall to my death or get crushed by a dragon in her death throes? No, thank you. That wasn’t what I was paid for. Now, let’s get out of here.”

“What?” the bard asked.

“We’re leaving,” Alias replied, grabbing a handful of the halfling’s cloak. Alias slipped into the passageway leading out of the lair, trying to tug the halfling with her, but Ruskettle jerked herself loose.

“We have to wait for the gold,” the bard insisted.

With an exasperated growl, Alias grasped the small woman by her shoulders, pulled her into the passage, and shoved her in the lead.

Their way dimly lit by the runes embedded in Alias’s flesh, Alias prodded and pushed at the halfling until they reached the upper cavern where the swordswoman had waited for Akabar’s scouting report. Once they reached this point, however, Ruskettle twisted from her grip and dropped angrily to the floor. Alias slipped her sword arm into her cloak before the halfling caught sight of the glow of the sigils.

“Why’d you do that?” the bard demanded. “She was going to get us some gold!”

“Stupidhalfling!” Alias panted, her words running together. “Mist is a red dragon! That makes her as greedy and as untrustworthy as an Amnite merchant! The only thing that stopped her from burning us to cinders was the fear you would escape and tell someone.”

“But she believed your story about me having a ring of fire resistance.”

“For the moment. But if she had sniffed any jewelry on you when she first kidnapped you, she would have made you take it off. You aren’t wearing any rings. Any minute now she’s going to remember that, and then—”

Cool air from the outside rushed down the passage. Alias could picture Mist sitting by the ledge, inhaling deeply, smoke from her hidden forges pouring out of her snout.

“Come on!” the swordswoman shouted, picking up the halfling, tucking her under her arm, and running for the surface exit. Ruskettle was unexpectedly heavy, and between the extra weight and having to check her footing, Alias felt as though she were running underwater.

A roar began behind her, a deep rumbling sound. Harsh cries followed—ravens, she realized, caught in the conflagration. Her back grew uncomfortably warm as the dragon’s breath chased her down the passage. If she didn’t reach the exit quickly, the approaching wall of super-heated air would do her in before the beast’s metal-twisting flames even reached her.

The heat grew unbearable, and Alias wondered if she might already be burned so badly that she would die but her muscles and mind didn’t know that yet. The halfling was still squirming in her arms as she made a final leap toward the opening in the mountainside, praying to Tymora that she would clear it before the hot air singed her flesh and the fire stripped it from her bones.

The moment Alias cleared the stone passage, Dragonbait’s tail snaked out from the right. The powerful muscles in the scaly, green ribbon knocked the swordswoman and her passenger down the slope of greasy grass.

Alias looked back. The opening where she had been only an instant before was now filled with flame and soot. The rock about the cave entrance melted in the heat, twisting and flowing until the passage was sealed shut. Silence settled over the mountainside.

Dragonbait rubbed his mildly scorched tail and gave a reptilian whimper. Akabar, upon hearing the sound of the dragon’s inhalation, had assumed a safer position several paces away from the back door. He now looked down at the soot-blackened women with amusement.

Alias looked down at Ruskettle, and it suddenly dawned on her why the halfling had been so heavy. On her tumble down the hill, the bard had lost, in order, Alias’s dagger, two pouches of gold coins, an opal the size of a cockatrice egg, a handful of jade statuettes, a ratty scroll, and a large, ornate book marked with the sigil of Akabar Bel Akash.

For half a score of heartbeats, Alias lay among the flowers of the mountain meadow. She gasped in the thin mountain air, trying to will away the stabbing pain in her chest and the searing agony across her back. She imagined the dragon-heated metal of her chain shirt burning through her jerkin and inwardly cringed.

Dragonbait, having knocked her and the halfling out of the direct path of the dragon’s breath, was at her side immediately, his clawlike hands on her shoulders, helping her rise. He smelled heavily of woodsmoke, but his chivalrous aid helped make Alias feel a little better.

Farther down the slope, the halfling was scurrying about, trying to recover the items lost in her tumble. She grabbed one of the leather-bound tomes, but a sandal-clad foot suddenly appeared and held it tight to the ground.

“I believe,” Akabar Bel Akash said, “that this particular item is mine.”

The halfling gulped. “You were the wizard in the caravan,” she piped, wheels visibly turning behind her eyes. “Of course. I brought this from the dragon’s lair to …” she sighed deeply, “… to return to you.”

Akabar harumphed and, keeping his foot atop the book, reached over and picked up the age-torn scroll lying near it.

“That’s for you, too,” the halfling offered, jamming the opal and the jade figures back into her pockets.

Alias had by this time removed her charred cloak and shucked off her chain mail shirt. The cloak was a total loss; the heavy cloth had taken the brunt of the blast. The heat had been enough to fuse portions of her chain into solid lumps along the back and leave the light leather jerkin beneath hard and cracked. The leather must have insulated her back just enough though, for what she could see of her skin there, while pink, was not charred.

Blind Tymora’s luck, Alias thought. Her back ached as though she had a sunburn, but no more. She abruptly shouted to the others, “Let’s get a move on!”

The newly rescued bard ambled up the hill with the mage. Akabar held his recovered tome pressed tightly under his arm and used his hand to hold open the battered scroll, scanning its contents as he approached Alias.

The halfling planted each foot firmly at shoulder-width, and stuck out her hand toward the swordswoman. “We haven’t been properly introduced. Ruskettle is the name, song and merriment the—”

“Not now,” hushed Alias. “Look. In about five minutes, ten minutes at most, the red reptile is going to check to be sure we’re dead. She’ll come lurching out of the cave entrance. It’s at least a mile to decent tree cover.…”

Dragonbait sniffed the air and growled. The halfling turned to the lizard and offered her still outstretched hand. Dragonbait backed away a step and bared his teeth. Ruskettle hastily lowered her arm.

“If we flee,” Alias said, “it’s likely we’ll be caught in the open and fried.” She arched her eyebrows and looked at the mage.

“Any suggestions?”

“Seal her in?” Akabar offered.

“Sure,” countered Alias. “Have an avalanche handy?”

“Mayhaps,” the Turmishman replied with a grin. He held up the scroll he’d been perusing. It was crammed with tightly calligraphed symbols. “This title says it is a spell to conjure a wall of stone.”

Alias’s eyes lit up. “Can you cast it?”

The magic-user nodded. “All I need do is use a simple trick to read the magic. That will evoke the powers locked within the text. Of course, it may not work.” He spread his hands in a gesture of uncertainty.

“Half a chance is better than none,” the warrior insisted. “Let’s try it out on the beast’s front door. Dragonbait!”

The lizard stopped staring at the halfling and followed the swordswoman and the mage over the scattered boulders that ringed the mountain. The halfling brought up the rear.

They don’t stand on ceremony much here, it occurred to Ruskettle moodily. As she walked, she pocketed her latest acquisitions, a ring and a small vial smelling of cinnamon.

By the time they reached the lair’s main entrance, steam was billowing from within. The cavern’s front opening was small but still quite wide enough for a dragon to pass through. From somewhere deep within, beyond their sight, a deep, throaty muttering rose and fell.

“Can the dragon use spells?” Akabar asked the halfling, concerned that the beast might have other, hidden talents.

“No. She’s just cursing,” the halfling explained. “The old girl talks to herself, deciding what she should do, where she should go, who she should eat, and so on. All that stuff.”

Alias said grimly, “Can we just seal her in and get out of here before she reaches a decision?”

Akabar held the scroll out at arm’s length and began intoning its spell in a low, melodic voice. Every so often, he would glance up at the entrance, then back to the paper.

Alias looked at her sword arm, but the symbols remained inert. Relief was quickly replaced by a sensation of horror as she spotted Ruskettle ambling over the stones directly toward the cavern’s mouth.

The small humanoid took up a position some twenty yards from the cavern and cupped her hands before her mouth. She bellowed, or at least shouted as loud as a small creature could, “Heyyy, Misty!”

All at once, the mutterings in the cavern stopped.

Alias held her breath. Akabar looked up and almost scrambled the spell by missing an inflection. He continued to read aloud, though faster than before. Alias looked for Dragonbait, but the lizard was bounding over the rock-strewn hillside toward the halfling.

Ruskettle continued her taunting. “We made it, you big sack of shoe leather! We got out, and I’m going to tell everyone you’re an oath-breaker! You jackass-faced salamander!”

Dragonbait was only halfway to the halfling’s position when a deep rumbling came from within the mountain, like the sound of an erupting volcano. The mage quickened his verbal pace yet again. Alias was torn between worrying that the mage’s speed would spoil the scroll’s spell and that the wall created wouldn’t be large enough to cover the lair’s entrance or strong enough to stop a dragon.

“Oath-breaker, Fight-faker!” brayed the halfling. Twin amber lights appeared far within the cavern, growing larger by the second. They framed a red, open mouth set with swordlike teeth.

“Flame-brain, Lame-brain, Tame-brain, oooff—” The halfling’s jeers were lost in a sharp exhalation as Dragonbait slammed into her, knocking her down the hillside for the second time in ten minutes.

The rising roar of the oncoming dragon now hurt Alias’s ears. Akabar was shouting as well, spitting out the last phrases of the incantation. The scroll itself was being consumed by the force of the magics and was burning bright yellow in the merchant-mage’s hands.

Everything broke loose in the span of a breath. Mist’s body appeared from the darkness, visible in the sunlight that shone only a little way into the cavern. The dragon was flying low and fast, about to shoot through the small opening, falling upon the party like a hawk among sparrows.

Then there was a great whooshing noise, and a huge wall of stone blocked the party’s view of the monster. They heard, however, a bone-crushing smash coming from the far side of the wall, and saw the barrier arc outward at its center, trying to contain the force of several tons of wyrm flying at top speed.

When the wall bulged, Alias was sure that the magical mortar would give. Astonishingly, it held, even losing half of the bulge by springing back some. Silence descended on the mountain meadow. Akabar collapsed by the burned remains of the scroll and put his head in his hands.

Ruskettle picked herself off the ground, scowled at the lizard, and shouted down at Alias, “That was hard work. When do we eat?”