He came with his army and all the time we had spent running had been for naught. We were back on his turf, in Szeged proper and it had been ravaged by Amber forces. Death and destruction were everywhere. I stood in front of the pair and hissed, blowing a stream of super heated fire at him. He deflected it with a gesture as if it were nothing to him. Unleashing a bolt at me, I reared up and spread my wings as far as I could guarding my two companions from his mystical fire. The blast from his hands hit me on the chest and sparkled on my scales. Most of it bounced off save for the still tender spot where Julian’s lance had pierced me and the Master had prodded me with his sword. He looked disgruntled as if he had expected different results.
I nudged them to run and they did not move; I pushed them to get back on me and they did that willingly. When I spit out the tube that Rinlon had brought me, he caught and opened it to reveal the Trump of Cabra. I was gambling that it would work with my dragon eyes and before the Master could loose another magic bolt, we were flying through to the Lighthouse. I heard his roar of outrage and shivered. The last thing I saw was his enraged face as he uttered a spell that faltered as it hit the power of the Trump, stopping before it could follow us.
I circled the Lighthouse and did not expect to see an army camped around it or a navy out to sea. As we popped out into the azure skies above the light, an armada of warships let loose a volley of spears and arrows at us. Several hit my body and bounced off, unable to penetrate the diamond hard scales. Others went through the more delicate membranes of my wings and tore gaping holes. It was the harpoon from the flagship that did the most damage. Over the screams of my passengers to stop shooting and my sudden dart to avoid a new barrage of arrows that would hit them, I flew right into the path of a three pronged steel shaft trailing ropes and a net. As luck would have it, one of the prongs hit the same spot as Julian’s lance and drove deep into my chest. I screamed and immediately, my wing muscles refused to function. I spiraled, falling lower to the sea, trying desperately to keep aloft in a shallow dive . The sailors winched in the net as it expanded to encircle me. Blue blood sprayed the air. Vialle and Rinlon’s voices soared above the shouts of the soldiers but only I could hear them. Frantically, I aimed for the beach not knowing if the two would survive a fall even into the water. Smaller boats put out and rowed towards me. My vision was going. I couldn’t see whose standards were on the nearest cutter.
I fell out of the sky and hit the edge of the beach and the water like a ton of bricks. Half in the water, half on sand. Gouged a crater with my weight yet cradled my two riders as if they were precious eggs. “Run!” I thought pushing them away. I blew them onto their feet with a huge breath, and could not understand why I couldn’t catch another. They wouldn’t leave me. Men in uniforms leapt ashore and held the pair at sword point. I managed to roar and a tiny blast of steam squeaked from my throat but no flame. The net tightened and they dragged me onto my side, back out into the water.
Rinlon shouted and fought them. I heard Vialle’s cries of anger and despair. Fought so very hard to come to their aid. Moaned as the pain of the steel embedded in my chest gave way to horror as the Master and his forces arrived and began firing on the ships.
“The Queen!” I heard from a dozen seamen and within minutes, her name was echoing from thousands. Men surrounded her and ran with her to the Lighthouse. Rinlon stayed and made his way to my side.
“Raven,” he gasped, staring at the metal shaft hanging in my chest. “What can I do?” I lowered my head, put my front legs onto the pole and pulled it out with a tremendous jerk. My scream drowned out mens voices and the sounds of the battle. The rush of blood alarmed him, he took his cloak and pressed it into the wound. His face paled to stark white as he said, “my god, Corbel, I can see your heart!”
I grunted, raised myself up and one handed, threw the harpoon at the Master. It fell short because my strength was gone but a black winged man caught it out of the sky and sent it on. Jurt laughed and cast another spell, seemed stunned when neither spell worked or the gargoyle was affected. He stood on the spear, aimed it, rode it like a surf board to its destination.
Sailors swarmed me, hacking at those parts of me that they could reach. Mostly, I ignored them save for the one that used an ax on my tail. He cut off the forked barb and I screamed at the fresh agony, reached back and snapped the surprised hacker in half. Came face to face with Sir Julian who lunged for my eyes with his sword. It was exquisitely painful as he sheared into my eye with a smoothness that at first, seemed as if I’d only blinked. My vision burst into sparks flaring like rockets, I shook my head tearing loose his blade as half my world went dark. He was grinning fiendishly as he leapt over my head and onto my neck riding me like a bronc.
I rolled over dislodging him, nearly crushing him under my belly but the movement made me bleed more and weaken. I couldn’t breathe fire, I couldn’t raise my head and barely saw Rinlon fighting for his own life at the hands of a Bactrain warrior. I heard him shouting ‘NO!’ somewhere off to my left as Julian raised a sword on my outstretched neck. The entire world stopped. I saw out of my one eye the glee on the Master’s face, the blood lust on Julian’s, the horror on Rinlon’s as the blade descended. Time stood still. The Pattern waited, the Logus waited as my last and final death began.
His sword fell. Reverberated as it bounced off stone. I swore I saw chips fly but I could have been wrong, I was blinded, mortally wounded and losing blood as if from a leaking water hose. The last thing I saw was the stone gargoyle between me and the razor sharp blade in my uncle’s hands.
Voices murmured over my head and concern was in their tone. Puzzlement, horror and sympathy. Traces of conversations that made me restless in my delirium. My neck still hurt, my eye throbbed with a dull ache and there was a fire raging in my chest. I coughed because it hurt to breathe and it hurt worse than I could bear it when I coughed. It felt like my entire body was fracturing in pieces and coming out from my lungs.
“You can see his heart beating,” one of the voices fretted. “I don’t know how to treat...dragons. Only men, centaurs, fauns, wyverns and hippogriffs. He’s too large to transport to the Hospital Clouds and besides, they’ve never treated a dragon, either. If he could convert, I could help him.”
“If he converts, he’ll be dead in minutes,” replied the voice I thought sounded familiar. “Do you know how to help him, Sergeant Rinlon? My Queen?”
The Green Lady was back. I tried to move and see her but something held me immobile and I was too weak to do more than pull feebly at the ropes. “He’s trying to fight the restraints. Tell him not to move. If he starts bleeding again, I won’t be able to stop it. He’s almost out of blood, anyway. I can barely get a blood pressure.”
“Raven. Dear boy, listen to me,” my Queen said urgently. “You must lie still and let the healers work on you. We can’t move you and he’s still out there. Murphy managed to get a harpoon in him. He’s wounded and has retreated to his last redoubt. He’s on the run, Raven.”
Not dead. The Master was not dead, he was merely waiting for me to die so he could harness the power and destroy both realms. I crawled forward scant inches and a gargoyle sat on my head and held it by the horned spikes over my eye. I could see out of only the one and that was just of a dim, wavering stone statue.
“Still, Corbin, my Raven,” it spoke. “Still as a mouse in the courtyard or I will box your ears.” Something about the threat made me listen. I kept as still as he requested and slipped into coma. From which I did not expect to waken.