Author's note: Again, thanks to those that commented and reviewed throughout this story. Remember, your comments keep me writing.

Part 7

Notching one more arrow on the fly, I let it loose into the first mercenary in line and then dropped my bow. Three steps and I leaped into the air drawing my sword, following my teammates into the fray of battle.

A few of the Rhino-bears reared back and swiped at us. They were obviously war-trained, but since they didn’t have long sharp pointy bits of steel as weapons, the only thing they did was lose forepaws or hoofs, whatever they were. It did have the added advantage of throwing their riders around so they couldn’t be as effective.

Kog didn’t bother checking to see if I killed the Dragonkin, instead he insured he was dead by loping off his head with the heavy battle-axe he used most proficiently.

My Luck Blade bit into the chest of the second mercenary as he was lifting his sword to defend himself, and I had to bounce off the beast he was on to avoid a thrown dagger from the next in line.

By that point everyone scattered.

Fred was still in the tree line annoying the riders with arrows from his bow.

Five of them were down before I had to avoid one of the Rhino-bears charging. Little magical laser-beams embedded themselves into the side of the beast and I knew that Shae had fired a Magic Missile spell at it. It roared loud and hard.

Not so good.

The stealth portion of our mission was over for sure after that announcement to the hillside.

I slit its throat anyway. My Elf ears couldn’t take much more of that at close range. Its rider tumbled off, but he was nimble enough to land on his feet and attacked me without delay. With a parry, I pinned his longsword to the ground and followed up with my dagger into his chest.

When I looked up to take on my next target, all that was left were the Rhino-bears, and they were starting to make tracks back the way they came.

Shae ran up to me with my bow in hand. With a grimace, I folded it back up and stowed it on my back. Everyone knew what would happen if we were discovered early.

“Plan B.”

Fred cursed and kicked one of the felled mercenaries. “We were almost there.”

Kog didn’t look too happy either.

“Open it up, Shae.”

She nodded. From around her neck she pulled out a necklace and sent a pulse of magic through the stone attached.

“Sorry guys, but we can’t be tracked,” I said. “This has to look like a scouting mission gone bad if we’re going to succeed.”

A few moments later and the air ripped open again. Sam said something in Infernal that I couldn’t exactly hear. That’s one problem with the demon language. It’s too subtle. I understood it well enough, but one hiss sounds just like any other if spoken soft enough.

Kog still stood there defiantly. “Kog stay, kill Dragonkin.”

I gave him my stern face. “Do I need to kick Kog’s ass again?”

I could hear his teeth grinding together and he looked like he was weighing the chances of taking me on with an actual weapon, so I tried to defuse the situation.

“We’re coming back, Kog, just not tonight.”

He gave me another nasty glare, but backed off. Instead of complaining anymore, he reached down and grabbed ahold of one of the Rhino-bear’s and dragged it through the portal with him. Fred nodded at me and then gave Sam a look of longing before she joined him.

“Stay safe,” he said to Shae and me.

The Bard, Steve nodded grimly as well. “Good luck. We’ll be waiting.”

More than half of our team disappeared behind the tear in the air after it closed.

I turned to Shae. “Save your magic. I’ll jump us away.”

She nodded and I slid to her side. “Hang on, this might feel weird.”

Shae didn’t even get a chance to ask before I pulled her into a shadow and exited from another, deep into the forest.

“Cloak,” I ordered. She made sure her entire body was covered by the Cloak of Blending while I stayed half in and half out of the shadows, impatiently watching the mountainside for activity.

It didn’t take much longer before my Infravision saw a gigantic heat source shoot out of the side of the rock face at a very high altitude.

“There!” Slipping my hand around her waist, I said, “Hang on. This one is a long jump.”

The level of any particular Shadowdancer dictates how far they can travel through the shadows. A beginner can only manage ten feet or so. At my level, I can go a little over a mile, but I still need to see where I’m going.

From what I knew about Dragons in general and Barry’s intel in specific, I knew that Lyzax was a very paranoid Red dragon. That meant she wasn’t going to go sharing her lair with any males or for that matter any females either.

While I was sure there were a number of ways into the mountain fortress, it would take forever to reach our goal. The surest and fastest way was to find Lyzax’s bolt hole and then drop down through that while she was otherwise occupied, much like she was when strangers were attacking her patrols on the hillside. Not to mention sensing a portal opening that close to her lair had to be gnawing at her.

Plan B took that into account. If we tripped up and announced our presence then Shae and I would proceed alone. Normally it would just be me, since I was the stealthiest of the group, but she was the only one with the proper kind of magic that could activate the signal stone that let Dá»rdor know to open a portal.

It was a tricky jump.

The cliff face was shear and smooth at least a hundred yards on any side. That would prevent an intruder easy access. The lip of the large hole was barely enough to capture a decent foothold. That meant I had only a second or two before I had to shadow jump again to the bottom.

Shae swayed, but I had a firm grip on her waist.

“Carnac!” I whispered as low as I could.

This deep in the mountain, it was doubtful that we would come across anything of the living variety. Paranoid Dragons don’t tend to have guards. Anyone insane enough to go against an adult Red in her own lair got what they deserved.

Killing a Dragon isn’t as easy as poking it with your sword. Their scales would stop anything less than a magically sharp weapon, and even if you managed to pierce their hide, you had to reach a few feet into their body to hit any vital organs. The heart isn’t conveniently located in a soft spot that any fool could shoot an arrow into. That would defeat the whole purpose of having natural armor.

You had to have an edge when fighting the monsters, which was why we were there in the first place.

The bottom of the shaft led to two passageways. There was one that led only to darkness and the other that led to a yellow glow in the distance.

Shae’s hand squeezed my side, and I could feel a faint tremor in her touch. She was scared out of her wits.

One more jump took us to the edge of the light. That’s where I released Shae and took her hand in mine. The Circlet let me know nobody was in the general vicinity, so I entered the lit chamber and nearly fell over at what I saw.

“We’ll never find it,” gasped Shae.

The mountain was hollowed out much like Barry’s lair back home, but about four times as big, most of which was taken up by what looked like a nest. At the center were four eggs that each had to be two feet wide at least. Surrounding it were gold, silver, platinum, and copper pieces, treasure, jewelry, precious stones, closed chests, weapons of every type, and worst of all, the skeletal remains of what I suspected were her past victims.

I shook my head. “Look for a black and bronze chest. We know it’s here. Hurry, and don’t even think about getting greedy this time.”

Shae and I split up, rounding the treasure trove. All the while, I kept stretching out with the Circlet to make sure we weren’t being snuck up on.

“Ar’ri!”

Running over to the other side, I saw Shae pushing a lot of gold to the side, revealing a large black chest. My sword was in my hand in seconds.

“Back up. We don’t have time for subtlety.”

I didn’t care if Lyzax knew we’d been there. Our scent would be proof enough, so my thieves’ tools weren’t of any use. Once Shae cleared, I brought the blade down against the latch and severed it from the chest with a single blow. Kicking it open we were treated to something rolled up in a black cloth.

“It’s cursed,” Shae snapped before I touched it.

“Crap!”

Looking around, I spotted a metal quarterstaff. “How about that one?”

Her hands hovered over it for a second before she grabbed it and tossed it to me. Using the end of the staff, I prodded the cloth. It took a lot more time than I was comfortable with working it out of the chest, but eventually it fell to the side and I lunged for the item we came for.

The end of the quarterstaff was turning black and green as I dropped it to the side and reached in, placing my hand on the hilt of the greatsword and pulling it out without any trouble. The blade was around four feet in length and the hilt another eight or nine inches. Something that big should have been much heavier, but it felt as light as one of my daggers in my hand.

I was spellbound by its intricate beauty, the long lines, the jeweled guard molded in the shape of two dragon claws, the dwarvish runes inlayed into the blade itself.

Shae shook my shoulder. “Ar’ri?”

Blinking, my attention on the sword broke. That’s when I noticed my Circlet screaming at me.

“Oh god, hide! She’s coming back!”

Shae pulled a ring out of her belt pouch and slipped it on her finger. She went invisible a second later.

“Get by the tunnel, I’ll distract her and meet you by the shadow on the right,” I said hurriedly.

Looking around, I noticed there weren’t any shadows anywhere. The light in the cavern was provided by several glowing globes hanging from the ceiling. Fear finally raised its ugly head in my chest. I wasn’t sure if it was caused by the approaching dragon or knowing I there was no way for me to escape without confronting it in its own lair.

Without wasting any more time, I leaped to the center of the nest and finished sheathing my regular sword when Lyzax’s head poked through the passageway. She was sniffing roughly. I knew she’d find Shae quick enough if I didn’t distract her.

“Lyzax!”

Her head fully emerged and I’d never seen a more fearsome creature in all of my life, and that was just her head. She roared! The walls and floor shook, and I’m not too proud to say I pissed myself. As light as the greatsword was before, it felt like it weighted a thousand pounds in my hands when I faced the wrath of an enraged Red Dragon.

She stalked into her lair, growling so deep my bones hurt. I backed up and tried my best not to collapse on the spot.

“You dare enter my lair and steal from me!”

Lowering the sword, I held it over one of the eggs. “Don’t come any closer.”

My voice sounded a whole lot braver than I actually felt.

Lyzax’s eyes flashed in anger. “Elf-kin you are dead. Your family is dead. Your entire race is dead for this. I will personally melt the flesh off of your bones inch by inch, and then feed it to my hatchlings.”

I believed her. “If you come any closer, you won’t have any hatchlings. You recognize this sword?”

Her eyes centered on the weapon and then shot to the open chest. Steam started shooting from her nostrils turning the air more than humid. The flame that was building up within her would be massive. I reared back and started to bring the sword down on the first egg.

“NO!”

My ears, already aching, were close to being seriously damaged. I met her gaze straight on and nearly dropped to my knees at her thoughts. She was truly enraged and calculating, devious and evil, but most of all she feared for her unhatched eggs.

Lyzax stepped back, deeper into the cavern. “You may go, but know this, intruder. I will find you. I will not rest until I am picking your innards from my teeth.”

She was lying so hard about letting me go that I probably didn’t need the Circlet to deduce that one. “You’re lying. As soon as I step away, I’m dead.”

Her yellow eyes flashed again. “Who are you to dare question my given word?”

The longer I was in her presence, the more fear slipped away. “I am Ar’ri Bauquinea of Earth, Champion of Barristix the Bronze Dragon, who you’ve been threatening for the last few years. See, you sent your minions to kill my family already, so now I feel I have to do something to kick your red scaly ass. You brought it on yourself Lyzax.”

Her tail slammed onto the floor, shaking the entire cavern. This time, I did fall, but my new sword didn’t waver. Cracks sounded along the walls and the floor, but most importantly one sounded directly in front of me.

“Oh crap. You did that. I didn’t.”

The Dragon’s eyes widened. “No,” she almost whispered… well whispered to her. I’ve come to figure out that a dragon just can’t whisper. It’s impossible. “Step back, Elf-kin. By all the gods of Qrynn if you do not…”

“You’ll burn me, crush me, kill me?” I snapped back filling it with as much sarcasm as I could manage. “Exactly how many different ways can you kill someone more than you’ve already said?”

Another loud crack sounded from the eggshell.

“Go, take your trinket and go. You have my word you will come to no harm until we meet next.”

There was serious fear in her voice. This time she was telling the truth, but I couldn’t take the chance that she wouldn’t change her mind a second after I cleared the nest. Before I knew it, the shell cracked again and the hatchling stuck its head out meeting my eyes straight on.

Something reached down into my head and flicked a switch inside me. That’s the only way I could describe it.

“NOOOOOOO!”

Lyzax’s tail smashed into the ground, knocking me to the side, breaking the connection between me the newborn Red Dragon. That’s when the ceiling started to cave in.

The glowing globes that provided brilliant light throughout the cavern started falling, which created tons of nicely dark shadows across the nest.

Don’t ask me why I did it, but I grabbed the little dragon and pulled it into my arms before disappearing into the closest shadow available. A second later I was in the bolt hole standing next to a now visible Shae. She had her back to me and we both watched as the ceiling came down on top of the nest crushing what remained of the eggs and pelting Lyzax as she tried to rescue them.

“Ready to go?”

Shae jumped and spun around. Her eyes went wide at what I was carrying. I passed the sword off to her. “Hold this.”

“Ar’ri, that’s a baby dragon!”

Before she said anymore, I grabbed her around the waist and jumped us to the top of the bolt hole and then again to the forest below, and for good measure, I pushed the limits of my Shadowdancing abilities to put as much distance between us and the mountain as possible.

Both of us stumbled to the ground this time. The baby dragon hissed at the abrupt landing, but didn’t offer any resistance against me.

I heard Lyzax roar again. Looking back, I saw a jet of intense flame shoot out of the bolt hole we’d left only seconds before. The sky was lit with burning Dragon Flame which allowed me to see her exit the hole and fall down the side of the mountainside. From the looks of it, one of her wings appeared bent at an odd angle.

Off in the distance, I heard other dragons answering her call.

“Shae, now might be a good time to place a call to Dá»rdor.”

The necklace was out and in her hand. A pulse of magic later and we waited quite impatiently for the portal to open.

“Ar’ri, you have a baby dragon. W–What are you doing?”

I honestly didn’t know so I shrugged. “I had to take him. He’s innocent. It’s not his fault that his mom is a freaking psycho.”

“Yeah, but it’s a Red Dragon. They’re evil!”

I looked down at the little thing, well he wasn’t that little. Maybe a foot and a half long in body and he felt like he weighed thirty pounds or more. Letting the Circlet tell me what his alignment was, I smiled. “Right now he’s True Neutral. I’m not leaving him here.”

The portal finally opened, and I could see Barry and Dá»rdor clear enough. “Come on.”

We stepped through together and the Sorcerer closed the portal as soon as we were clear. Barry got one look at what I was holding and he nearly freaked. Scuttling backward we were treated to a hell of a transformation. His clothes exploded off of him and his body ballooned into Barristix in a matter of seconds.

The baby Red I was holding hissed at the Bronze, struggling against me to get down.

Looking at it, I snapped. “Stop it. Behave.” Bringing my attention to Barristix, I did the same. “You’re scaring him! Back off!”

The Bronze’s mouth dropped open. If you’ve never witnessed a great Bronze Dragon utterly befuddled before, it was quite the sight to see.

Dá»rdor was wide-eyed. It was the first time I think I’d ever seen him out of his depth. Stunned, yeah, I’ve seen that already. Frightened? Sure. This was more along the lines of poleaxed.

Barristix finally snapped his jaw closed and cocked his head. “Ar’ri Bauquinea, what have you done?”

I raised an eyebrow. “What? Didn’t see this one coming? Not as all seeing as you led me to believe? Huh, who woulda thought?”

His eyes snapped up to meet mine. The Circlet announced his presence, but kept him out of my head. I could see the annoyance on his face at not being allowed through to speak to me. He’d have to talk like normal people did. That was almost reason enough to leave the thing on all the time.

“How in name of the Ten Races did you manage a maternal bond with a Red Dragon, Ar’ri?”

It was my turn to be poleaxed. I looked down at the baby dragon and it looked up at me. It wrinkled its nose, shot out a tiny blast of steam and squeaked out a noise in Draconic, the language of Dragons.

Looking back up to Barristix, I saw an amused grin, and on a Dragon those are kind of scary. “Welcome to motherhood, Ar’ri. Your hatchling just called you, Mama.”

~O~

“What is this?”

I held what looked to be some sort of armored baby bottle. The Wyrmling — that’s their proper name, by the way — squirmed in my arm and tried it’s best to reach for the bottle.

“That how my mother fed me before I learned to transform,” Barry explained, now that he was back to his human form. “It’s a single malt scotch with nutrients and cayenne pepper added.”

“You’re giving my newborn dragon booze?”

He gave me a withering look. “It’s the closest thing to mother’s milk he’s going to find on this planet, Ar’ri.”

With a moderate amount of skepticism, I brought it to the Wyrmling’s mouth and it latched on quick. Just for good measure, I narrowed my eyes at Barry.

“Now that he’s occupied, would you care to tell me how you managed this unlikely feat?”

Shae and Dá»rdor disappeared somewhere, so it was just us in the cavern, so I gave him the short version of the story. When I got to the point where the ceiling fell on the other eggs he winced, but when I reached the part were Lyzax took a nosedive of a few thousand feet I got his attention.

“Oh really!”

I nodded and the Wyrmling started squirming. Taking the bottle away, I noticed that it was empty and then stared at the little dragon. “Do I have to burp him?”

“No, dragons, as a rule, don’t normally get gas.” Barry reached for the bottle. “You’ll need to do that once every four hours for the first two days and then we can get him on some solid food.”

I groaned.

“Hey, you’re the one swiping baby dragons from their mothers. This one’s all on you.”

Getting up off the floor with a thirty pound dragon in your arms isn’t exactly easy.

“He isn’t going to go burning down my room is he?”

Barry chuckled. “No, it’ll be a while before his breath weapon works. The most he can do for the first month is steam clean your clothes. Just make him a nest with your gold and gemstones and he’ll settle right down.”

So much for that Ferrari.

“I’ll have someone bring up some more bottles. Remember, every four hours or you’ll have him gnawing on anything he can find.”

Once I was out of the cavern, the Wyrmling got really interested in everything that was going on. It was mostly a lot of hallways and a number of doors, but still. It was all new to him.

Fred and Sam nearly crapped themselves. After the mutual hissing between Sam and the Wyrmling was over, they got to know each other and settled down.

“What’s his name?” she asked.

I shrugged. “I haven’t really thought of any. It’s not like they have any baby dragon name books on the internet or anything.”

Fred ran his finger down the spine nubs. “I think it’s totally cool, dudette.”

“You do realized how big these things get, right?” Sam said.

I nearly laughed. “Yeah, I faced her mother. Speaking of which, I need to take a shower and… um, never mind.” I wasn’t about to tell them I wet myself.

My arm felt like dead-weight by the time I made it to my room where I was surprised to find a decent sized box with my share of the haul from the Lab job beside the bed with the gold pieces arranged like a small bed for the dragon. The gems I’d picked out were in there as well. The dragon squirmed in my hands again until I set him down in his new nest. He stood up on shaky legs and then twirled around a few times until he found a good position then dropped down, curling up and looking at me.

He made a squalling-like noise then set his head down and closed his eyes.

~O~

Virtually four hours to the nose I jerked awake to hear the worst high-pitched wail I’d ever heard.

“I’m up. I’m up.”

I looked at the clock by the bedside and saw I’d only been asleep for barely two hours. The dragon was standing by the bed looking up at me. The bottles were on my dresser. A quick shuffle over and I grabbed one and then returned to sit on the bed. While I lifted the little whiner up onto my lap, a knock sounded at my bathroom door before it opened.

“You okay, Ar’ri?”

The light from the bathroom was enough to kill my Darkvision. “Yeah, it’s time for Junior’s feeding, sorry he woke you.”

She smiled at me as I brought the bottle to his mouth. “He said, Mama, Hungry.”

I looked at her incredulously. “You speak Draconic?”

Shae nodded as she sat down beside me and stroked at Junior’s cheek spines. Red Dragons have a boatload of spines sticking out on either side of their cheeks and three rows of them down their backs through their tails. Luckily, Junior’s were still stubs.

“It’s a hard language to learn though. But given your bond, you should be able to figure out his needs easily enough. Maybe Barry or Dá»rdor can figure out something to help.”

That’s when she spotted the nest of gold and grinned. “Already started hording has he?”

I sighed. “Yeah, they grow up so fast.”

We sat there in companionable silence for a few minutes listing to Junior suck on his bottle before I posed a question that I had been itching to ask. “Everything okay with Dá»rdor?”

She nodded. “He apologized profusely. At the end, I felt sorry for the old guy. The guilt was radiating off of him.”

“You’re a better person than I am. I would have milked him for all sorts of things.”

Shae giggled. “Who says I didn’t?”

My eyes widened at her sneakiness. “What did you do?”

She gestured casually with her head. “I told him about how helpless I felt watching you face off Lyzax all by yourself. He’s loading up my staff with a few spells that should prove useful the next time we face off.”

I was suitably impressed.

“Plus, I have access to his Lab any time that I want, with some limitations.” Her face came alive at that point. “I wish you could see it, Ar’ri. It’s amazing. He has so many spellbooks. He’s probably forgotten more magic than I’ve ever learned.”

Junior started squirming again, and I pulled the bottle away then let him down to the floor. He went over and sniffed at Shae then returned to his nest, curled up and closed his eyes.

She patted my leg. “I better let you get some sleep. You’ll be up again soon enough.”

~O~

It went on like that for the next four weeks.

I was officially grounded until Flamestrike — that’s Junior’s new name — was sufficiently weaned off the tit, so to speak. Everywhere I went, he had to go or destruction would follow. The first time I snuck off to grab a snack from the cafeteria, I came back to find my mattress being ripped apart. I was only gone for ten minutes, tops.

In the short span of a month, he grew to a little over four feet in length. Goes to show you what a diet of rabbit and squirrel does for a dragon, not to mention the two gallons of single malt scotch formula he runs through every day. I tried to slip in a cheaper blended brand, but the little snob snubbed it.

Barry’s been teaching him the ways of being a good dragon, you know, like not eating humans if they anger you. He’s even giving me lessons in Draconic… shoving more crap in my brain is more like it. Picture Rosetta Stone on steroids with a little magic added to help with the absorption rate. Within two weeks I was able to talk to my adopted dragon, for the most part. There are still some words that don’t work properly without a thin forked tongue and a mouth of teeth to grind, but I can get my point across.

The one problem I was having concerned his nest. Simply put, it wasn’t big enough. He pretty much surrounds it now instead of it surrounding him. Given that Red Dragons are natural hoarders, if he doesn’t have enough treasure and sparkly things then he can’t sleep properly. Sounds like some people I used to know.

Any way you look at it, an insomniac dragon is a grumpy dragon.

“Mama, can we go treasure hunting?”

I marked my place on the map of Qrynn I was studying for an upcoming raid to see Flamestrike sitting by the table with such a pathetic but hopeful look on his face. Giving him a reluctant smile, I reached out and brushed my hand over his head. His spines were starting to lengthen and sharpen slightly.

“Flamestrike, you remember what your Uncle Barry said. It’s not safe for you to hunt on your own until you at least get your breath weapon.”

He shuffled a little closer and I could see his eyes widen and somehow he’d gotten his pupils to dilate a little. Considering he’s got those vertical lizard slits to work with, it was quite an accomplishment.

“But what if you go with me and we can bring Aunt Shaeria and Aunt Samantia. Nobody would mess with us then.” He saw the look of denial once again on my face. “I can’t sleep, Mama. Even when you spread out the gold and gems it’s not enough.”

He slumped and set his head on the table.

I sighed. “Honey, you know I can’t leave here until you can control yourself while I’m gone. But I’ll make you a deal.”

Flamestrike lifted his head up a little, hopefully.

“If you can be without me for a single day, I’ll go out and see if I can find something to add to your nest.”

He looked to the side, like he was trying to think hard about something. “I can’t go with you?”

“Not until you can get your fire working.” I pointed at him. “That means working on it down in the cavern, not in the bedroom.

It took a few moments, but he set his head back on the table and sighed with resignation. “Okay.”

~O~

I brought Flamestrike down to the cavern for his daily training. Barry had an obstacle course built. It was more like a playground, just directed to be run through instead of aimless play. While my little dragon was teetering on a balance beam, Barry and I sat down to go through the next mission.

“You were right,” I admitted. “He’s ready to be on his own for a little while.”

“That’s just experience, Ar’ri, not prescience. I remember how eager I became at that age. It was worse for my mother, since there was no place she could acquire that much gold without going broke.”

I cringed at the thought. “What did she do?”

Barry leaned back and played with his Dew can. “I made due with loose change, quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies. She threw in her jewelry to take the edge off.” He chuckled to himself. “I whined for weeks on end, but I was able to get some decent sleep. Reds have it a lot worse than the rest of us. It’s so engrained into their personality. They just naturally know the worth of their hoard. If it’s not enough then, well, badness.”

Flamestrike unfurled his wings and leaped from a five foot stand beating them rapidly, but they were still not developed enough and all he was able to do was land on the ground below without a resounding thump before dashing off to the next obstacle.

“He won’t be satisfied here, Ar’ri.”

I looked over at him, scowling slightly. “I know.”

The conversation was already becoming old. Red Dragons didn’t become proficient in magic until they reached adulthood, and by that time, Flamestrike would be trapped in the cavern, unable to go anywhere else due to his size. Their natural armor prevented magic from working properly. It was one of the reasons Dragons were so hard to fight. Only their own magic affected them to any worthwhile degree.

“I’ve been looking for somewhere on Qrynn that he can call his own. But the entire place is taken already.” Gripping my pen, I looked him in the eye. “I’m going back on active duty, today. If Flamestrike is going to be able to live in peace then I need to take out the opposition.”

Speaking of the five foot long terror, he slid to a stop in front of me.

“Mama, did you see the jump? I almost flew!”

Grinning at him, I leaned in to hug his neck. “I sure did sweetie. You’re doing so well!”

He didn’t wait for anymore praise, before dashing off to run the gambit again.

“I know you haven’t gotten anywhere with the sword, Barry, but I need it.”

When we originally returned from Qrynn, Shae gave the greatsword to Dá»rdor so that he could discern its secrets. Nothing that he tried worked. The most he could tell was that the blade was unnaturally sharp and deadly. That was about it. If you know anything about magical weapons then you already know that pretty much any blade that is tempered with magic is unnaturally sharp, like my Luck Blade for instance. However, there are different degrees of effectiveness.

It’s a fairly easy system to figure out. A plus-one weapon generally means the height of human ability to forge without magical means. Then each level above that increases its effectiveness. Some weapons are specifically made to defeat specific creatures or to cut though certain things.

Evil’s Bane’s — that’s the name of the greatsword — purpose, as far as legend states, is to destroy non-human creatures that are evil, no matter what kind of creature they are. Don’t ask me how; that’s what Dá»rdor was supposed to figure out.

Sometimes only action will reveal a weapon’s true nature. Facing one’s enemy, using it to fight, saying a command word, there were an infinite number of ways to discern a weapon’s purpose and power.

“You have a plan already in place?” he asked.

“Yeah, I just need Fred, Sam, and Shae. Where we’re going, Kog won’t be able to fit.”

His eyes narrowed. “What do you plan on doing?”

Looking back at Flamestrike, I saw him leap again from the five foot stand and actually glide for a few moments.

“The others need to face a real dragon if they’re going to be able to beat the fear they radiate. So we’re going to the bottom rung.”

Once I’d said that, Barry knew exactly who I was talking about. “Obsydiax.”

I nodded. “Black Dragon.”

~O~

Flamestrike looked heartbroken as he sat there in the cavern watching us. Shae volunteered her gold to widen his nest while we were away so he could sleep properly. It still wasn’t enough to make a proper bed for the dragon, but it would help.

“You’ll behave and listen to Uncle Barry while I’m away, right?”

He nodded. “Don’t stay for long, Mama, okay?”

I sighed and brushed a hand down his hardening scales. “Only for as long as it takes to make sure you have a proper nest. You’re going to be getting very big soon. Make sure you finish all your formula if you want to grow up big and strong.”

His mouth opened and he showed me all his sharp needle-like teeth. The third row was coming in nicely.

“Lady Ar’ri,” Dá»rdor called from his place in front of the Fire Diamond.

I looked back then I grabbed Flamestrike’s head and kissed him on the snout. “I’ll see you soon. Be brave for me.”

The pathetic look dropped off his face while he attempted to look older and stalwart for my departure. “Bye, Mama.”

“Bye sweetie.”

At my approach, Dá»rdor opened the portal and the four of us dashed through.

The greatsword was strapped to my back a lot lower than I was used to. Due to its length, I couldn’t wear it on my hip or it would drag the ground, and wearing it high on my back prevented me from fully unsheathing it properly. In short, it looked like I was hauling around a giant sword that I couldn’t use.

Everyone else had what was now their standard equipment. They’d been on missions of their own during my downtime. Mostly it consisted of meeting with villages and people we knew sided with us, arranging for safe houses and opening trade relations.

Under Lyzax’s rule, virtually all of Qrynn suffered. Disease ran rampant, crops were spoiled, and earning a living was virtually non-existent. At times, it was every man for himself. So you can probably see how when Shae and Fred arrived with a Bag of Holding, containing nothing but MREs, they were hailed as servants of old times returned.

Potions cured a number of problems, and purified village wells. Minor weapons increased hunting abilities and kept bandits from running roughshod across the land.

All in all they were very productive while I was going insane for lack of anything to do but care for a baby dragon.

It was mid-afternoon when we arrived far in the south. A hundred leagues to the east lay Elven land and many times that to the north Lyzax was hopefully still nursing a broken wing, but probably not. What lay before us was a swamp.

Late summer had fallen over the land, so the water level was low and in a lot of places dried up. The only thing we had to worry about was the wildlife, for the most part. We had to keep in mind natural hazards: quicksand, mog pits, leeches in the water, and so forth.

Each of us had a quarterstaff on this adventure. It’s presence obvious as we poked the ground in front of us as we made our way into the thickest of the marsh.

“It stinks,” Sam commented.

Fred was up on his dragon lore. “It’s the Black. They magically poison the local water to keep things away from their lair. If enough dead bodies surround the place then nobody really wants to investigate why. ”

I nodded in agreement. He was one of the players that faced off the Black Dragon from my past. Fred actually survived; David’s Cleric, not so much. He was the one that got doused with Acid Breath. Now David was Shae and she got to go through the whole thing all over again. However this time, she was loaded for bear… or dragon rather.

“Yeah,” I said. “So make sure not to drink the water. You really don’t want to be out here with a case of Montezuma’s Revenge, ‘cause I’m not sharing my toilet paper.”

Sam grinned and rolled her eyes.

Fred got his quarterstaff stuck in some soft ground and pulled it out with a dull squelch. “Where’s this place at again?”

I took off my pedometer and checked the distance we’d already walked. “About three more miles.” With a grimace I stopped and looked around. “We’re well within his hunting grounds. Let’s keep the chatter down and make sure to check the water for any movement. I don’t want to get surprised by this thing.”

We had to double back a couple of times to avoid big pools of water. It wasn’t that I was afraid of leeches or anything since we were all wearing those ski suit things under our leathers, but I’d seen way too many horror flicks where the stupid characters always waded through the swamp only to be sucked under by the monster that they already knew was out there. There I was, all along, yelling at the screen at how stupid they were. This time, I took my own advice.

Another hour went by and we’d probably progressed an additional two miles. It was slow going for sure.

“…”

Stopping, I turned around and looked at Shae. “I’m sorry, what’d you say?”

She cocked an eyebrow and looked at me weird. “Nothing.”

I looked around. “You didn’t just whisper something to me?”

Shae shook her head.

Shrugging it away, I scanned the woods and looked for ripples in the dead water. With nothing there I looked up into what sky I could see. Nothing again.

I’d wasted enough time and turned back to making slow progress toward our goal.

~O~

The swamp thinned out because the ground started to rise. Conditions didn’t seem to improve though. Surrounding grass was brown and thin, the trees old and gnarled, the atmosphere dark and dreary. We were very close. Memories started to come back to me from the encounter with the previous Black. The smells were the same and the inevitable feeling of oppression pressed in.

“Psst.”

Sam stopped and looked back. I could already see Fred’s face. He could feel it too. Gathering together, we kept our voices as low as possible.

“The entrance to his lair is somewhere around here. It won’t be big. Maybe a five to ten foot circle or cave entrance. Weapons out and eyes open.”

Slowly I withdrew the greatsword. It was held by a hard-leather sheath strictly for this mission. There was no need to alert anything with that cliché metal scraping against metal sound.

“Evil approaches.”

I spun around and Shae jumped back looking at me like I was about to lose it or something. My head jerked left then right. She gave me the universal signal for what the hell is up with you? It looked like she was going to say something, but I held a finger to my lips. It wasn’t her that said anything to me. I was sure of it, since the voice was male and the only male around was Fred. He was a good ten feet away and the voice sounded like it was right at my ear.

“Something’s screwing around with me,” I whispered.

Sam was already twenty yards away, and Fred half that distance. The area cleared of trees, which was ominous enough for me. The bare space would make a perfect landing place for the…

“DRAGON!” Sam screamed as she leaped to the side to avoid being taken out from the Black shooting into the sky from a camouflaged hole in the ground. Brush and branches exploded everywhere.

“Teams! Find cover!” I yelled.

Fred whipped out his tarp that Dá»rdor assured us would resist a spray from the Black’s breath weapon. Shae was right behind me, the translucent stone on the end of the staff was lit in preparation for my defense since I was the one that stood the best chance of killing the thing.

The plan was for Fred to distract it by making it protect its eyes from his arrows and Sam was supposed to protect him from any minions that happened to be around.

Ditto with Shae.

Me? I got to charge Obsydiax with the big honking sword. I’ve got to talk to Barry about better working conditions. OSHA would have a hissy fit. Before anyone realized it, the Black dropped from the sky and landed with a resounding THUMP while simultaneously spraying us with his breath weapon. Shae’s magical shield flared in front of me. Before it had a chance to stop, I stepped into a shadow and reappeared at the shadow that it was casting on its right side, raised the greatsword high, I brought it down as hard as I could against his hide.

“YESSSSS!” the unknown voice yelled. “AGAIN!”

Obsydiax, screamed, and then screamed again when one of Fred’s arrows took out its right eye. The dragon rolled to its left, away from me and its wings unfurled to take flight.

I couldn’t let that happen or we’d lose it, so I did something extremely stupid and leaped on top, right behind its wings. Obsydiax was only about twenty five feet long, including the tail, so we’re not talking massive monstrosity like Lyzax, but still.

Swiping from left to right, I took off both wings and then leaped again, an action that took about two seconds in totality. As soon as I cleared, a crack of lightning arced from Shae’s staff and slammed into the Black’s face. Static electricity filled the area.

“AGAIN! THE NECK!” the unknown voice yelled.

While Obsydiax looked temporarily stunned, I jumped in and drove the greatsword through the back of its throat, nearly decapitating the creature. Rearing back I stabbed the red meaty flesh underneath and left the sword there as I scrambled back.

The Black Dragon shuddered and collapsed to the ground.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Fred’s right arm was smoking as he hurried to remove his leather top. Sam backed away, her eyes wide with fright.

I wanted to help, but the ground all around Fred was saturated with acid. “Shae!”

“On it,” she said back with little emotion. She had kept it together. “Fred, stay still.”

Her hand arced in front of her and a cone of frost shot out all over the grass. “Hurry, get out of there.”

“Sam,” I called. “Don’t freak. I’m coming for you.”

She was barely holding it together after her first experience with the fear aura that almost all dragons possess. Stepping into a shadow, I emerged from behind and took her by the arms. She jumped anyway, but this time it was into my arms with a strong shudder.

Once she was safe, by Shae, and Fred had rid himself of his acid splashed leather, we took stock.

“Everyone okay?”

“No!” Sam snapped. “You didn’t tell me that fear thing was that bad!”

I shook my head. “It wasn’t. Compared to Lyzax, that thing was a walk in the park.”

She hid her face in Fred’s neck. I watched as Shae shrugged made her way over to the hole in the ground. With her foot, she kicked a broken branch over the edge and listened at the fall. When it hit she turned her head. “About a hundred, hundred and ten feet.”

Looking back at Fred and Sam, it looked like she was starting to shake off the aura of fear. “I’ll go down and check it out. Keep an eye on that sword. It’s possessed.”

That’s where the voice and the whispering were coming from, the sword. Oh, you wouldn’t know about that. Magical weapons are sometimes wielded by the fanatics that create them, at least this type of weapon. When they go out crusading against whatever pissed them off in the first place, they put their heart and soul into the blade… literally. It’s to increase the effectiveness of the weapon. Remember that thing I was talking about earlier about increasing the effectiveness of an ordinary sword by giving it a zap with the ole magic? Same thing.

Considering how it went through Dragon Scale like a hot scoop through ice cream, I’d estimate that it was one of the best blades ever made, at least against evil dragons.

They’re funny that way.

If I were to maybe use it against a Bugbear it might only act like a plus-two sword, but in its use against evil dragons it could very well be a plus-five Holy Sword. However, since I wasn’t a Bible-thumping Paladin, the Holy part was highly unlikely. I digress.

The trees along the edge of the open area cast enough shadows for me to step into and jump down to the bottom of the hole. My Darkvision eased in, and since there wasn’t a whole lot of heat down there, my Infravision wasn’t too active.

Black Dragons, by nature, weren’t very social creatures. They were pretty much the bottom of the totem pole. They generally got picked on by the other evil dragons and didn’t really like any living thing, except when they were hungry. Hence, the lack of minions, rodents, insects, arachnids, you name it.

The tunnel was clear enough.

When I stepped out of the shadow, up top, Shae jerked slightly. “Still a little jumpy?” I said with a grin.

I just received a glare and a smack on the arm. “You did that on purpose.”

“You guys want to go Dragon Lair diving? It looks clean enough down there.”

Fred glanced over at the neck of the Black. “You gonna to leave your sword there, dudette?”

I really didn’t want to pick it back up again. Fanatics tend to be, well, fanatical. It’s one of the drawbacks of fighting with an Intelligent Weapon. Sometimes the wielder will take on the traits of the presence. Basically the longer it was in my possession, the worse it was. My Wisdom ability score was pretty good; it wasn’t exceptional like a few of the others. That’s what determines who wins the battle of wills between the wielder and the weapon.

That laminated character sheet, that had all the neat information on it, would be pretty helpful at a time like this. Since the intelligence revealed itself, all the pertinent details would be displayed on the sheet, for the most part. But any way you look at it, I couldn’t just leave the thing sticking out of the dragon.

With regret, I walked over and looked at the hilt sticking out. “If you mess with me, I’ll leave you down in that hole, comprende?”

Grabbing on to the hilt, I pulled it out and swiped the blood off.

“Greetings warrior!”

“Great, now it talks to me.” Looking over to the group, I asked. “Can you guys hear this?” All of them shook their heads no.

“Does anyone have an oil cloth? Dragon blood can be corrosive if left on steel for too long. Now that you have me warrior, together we shall vanquish evil dragons everywhere!”

I groaned. “Great, I have a chatty sword as well.”

“Onward warrior! To the next great adventure! Taran-tarah!”

TBC...