Page 5 of Storm Dragon
It took a day and a half to pay respects to their fallen Kinsmen and women and release the souls of their Brethren to the Heavens. With heavy hearts and bone-deep exhaustion, the Enforcers lay down to rest, knowing as Dragonkin’s elite group of Warriors, they would most likely be sent to battle evil again very soon.
Pulled from a deep Healing Sleep by the sounds of chanting and the scent of putrid herbs, the Guardsman was unable to open his eyes or move any of his extremities. Reaching out with his other senses, the Enchantment he’d had since before he was born barely made it as far as the tip of his nose. Caught in the strongest dampening field he’d ever felt, the unmistakable stench of Black Magic slithered up his nose, filled his every sense, and set its sights on King Dorman.
Fighting the Darkness with all the strength he had, the Guardsman mentally called to his brethren, flinching from the pain of his own Magic being thrown back in his face. It was too late. They had also been caught in the snare of taint and Sorcery.
Turning his focus back to the Wizardry holding them all hostage, Storm pushed his pure white Dragon Magic into the oily tendrils of the offensive Curse, and Dorman poured every ounce of strength he possessed into the fight. Fiery steam blew from the Dragon King’s nostrils as man and beast fought together. For several long, tense seconds, Ruairí was sure he’d found a way to save them all.
A flash of light, a puff of noxious smoke, and a menacing chuckle filled not only the mind of the powerful Guardsman but the even more daunting Dragon King. Assaulting his ears, the gruff, gravely sarcastic voice he’d only heard once before boomed, “Do not waste your energy, O’Cleary. You’re going to need it to survive.”
Before Ruairí could respond, the chanting grew louder, the stench of Evil stronger, and the realization that he and his Brethren were helpless to defend themselves had him shaking with fury and rage. Eyes flying open, the sting of Black Magic thick in the air, he saw nothing but the black robes of the multitude of tall, cloaked figures in every direction. Faces masked, their voices low and ominous, their discordant chanting grew louder with every breath, harsher with every minor note.
He tried to open my mouth. He willed himself to scream. He begged his Dragon King to roar, to growl, to spring forth and burn them all to the ground, but he was helpless to do anything but lie on his pallet and wait for the next demoralizing and humiliating act of the Sorcerers.
Willing the offensive noise to stop, or at the very least, drop the volume to a dull roar, a tall, grotesquely thin figure in a blood red, crushed velvet cloak appeared. Walking forward as if she were gliding on air, she waved her claw-like hand, and her hood slid down her oily, ebony hair like mud down a mountainside during a storm.
Pulling a large silver disc from under her thick wrap, she lifted it into the rays of the full moon and shouted over the chanting, ‘Today we claim victory over the forces that seek to extinguish our beliefs, that choose to look to the Light instead of the Almighty Darkness, and those that denounce the ways of old. We lay to rest their finest, their elite, the strongest they have– their Enforcers– so that we may spread the Power and Glory of the Dark to all the lands.’
How did they know who they were? The Enforcers operated in the shadows. They were a mystery to even those of our own kin. How did that woman, a Wizard who was spewing horrific rhetoric, not only know of them, but of their mission? It was the first time since losing his parents that Ruairí felt true fear.
Trying anything and everything to move, he was helpless but to watch as she walked to each Enforcer, knelt down beside them, and placed a glowing silver disc over each of their hearts. Smiling wickedly, she uttered a singsonging gibberish in a language neither Guardsman nor Dragon King had ever heard.
When she finally came to perch beside him, her sharp, knobby knee pushing into his ribs, Ruairí fought and pushed and beat against the Spell holding him hostage. Sadly, it was of no use. He couldn’t help himself, much less than those he called brother.
As an evil smile snidely curled her lips painted black with juice of the berries of the black bryony and yew plants, she placed a kiss on his cheek before whispering, “Let the burn of the fruit tinting my lips be the first of many painful sensations you endure for all eternity.”
The tainted talisman was heavy over his heart. His skin grew hot as the scent of frying flesh filled the air and pain shot throughout his body.
Wanting nothing more than to jump to his feet and leave only the corpses of the enemy littering the ground, the hairs on the back of Ruairí’s neck stood on end as the Sorceress’ adenoidal voice rang out above the chanting.
As grating as metal scraping glass, she taunted, “Picture it. A perfect world where the humans are enslaved and the Dragons and their pitiful Allies have been destroyed. Think of how wonderful it will be when we, the true believers of the Dark Lord, rule the land. When Black Magic is the religion of the faithful and we are all preparing for the return of the Morning Star, Lucifer, as he is made flesh once again.”
Wrath and fury clenched into a tight fist within the pit of Ruairí’s stomach. The need to fight, to stop the madness, to rid the world of true Evil filled every fiber of his being. The unmitigated rage morphed into a form all its own. It beat against the iron bars of the putrid Curse with wild abandon. Never before had the Guardsman felt
so helpless, so impotent, so completely inept. Filled with emotions he’d never been forced to face, both Guardsman and Dragon King flew into a wild frenzy with no outlet or release.
Cackling with insanity of too many years in the presence of Evil, the Sorceress mocked, “Enjoy your eternity of agony and pain, Storm.” Ruairí’s nickname dripped with revulsion and scorn as she spat, “Lay in your tomb of silver, shackled with chains forged just for you and your brothers, surrounded by dirt and tortured by the most heinous the Dark Lord has ever blessed, knowing that we won. We laid the notorious Ruairí O’Clery and his infamous cohorts to rest.”
Jerked from his pallet by the cruel hand of devilry, the sharp tip of skeletal fingers dug into the bicep of his left arm, right before the horn of a saddle struck his ribs. The air was knocked from his lungs as he was unceremoniously thrown over the back of his own horse, the terrified animal telepathically calling to his master.
Using his mental connection to the Palomino Mustang, the Guardsman sent waves of calm through their bond. His vow of revenge was strengthened, and his last hope of escape shredded as currents of the same evil taint controlling the Guardsman flowed from his faithful steed.
Circling the horse and paralyzed Guardsman, the Conjurer’s voice oscillated from baritone to soprano, male to female, laughing to threatening in a constant myriad of tones and tenors that invaded Ruairí’s mind. Instantly mesmerized into a dreamlike state, he had no way to discern reality from fantasy. Had his cheek not been lying against the buckle of his saddle and the horn not been boring a hole into his side, the Guardsman would have been lost.
Sadly, that was when the Wizard grabbed a fistful of his hair and jerked his head back as far as it would go. Pain shot down his spine as it was bent in all sorts of unnatural ways, but it was the jagged tips of the Elven ,’s talonlike nails biting into the flesh of his cheeks that literally drew blood.
Twisting his head until he was looking up, Ruairí looked into the deep hollow darkness where her eyes should’ve been. Fetid breath coated his face as the Illusionist taunted, “Will you spend forever so deep in the Earth that not even that bitch, Mother Nature can find you? Or at the bottom of the sea, where you spend eternity drowning and reviving in an endless circle of torment? Will the flames of Hell burn the flesh from your bones over and over for all eternity? Or will you feel the barbs of the Executioner’s whip and bleed endlessly?”
Throwing back her head, the long, inky, tangled tendrils resembling hair jerking to and fro, she shrieked, “May he know it all! May he suffer endlessly? May he never know peace as he pays for the lives of our brothers and sisters he killed! May he pray for freedom, and his soul be crushed when I rip the heart from his Fated Mate yet to be born.”
Throwing Ruairí’s head downward with such force that his nasal bone shattered when it made contact with the hardened leather of the embossed fender of his saddle, her insane pleasure at his pain echoed to the Four Corners. And there was nothing he could do. Nothing but watch blood flow freely down his face and huge drops of the crimson liquid hit the ground with an audible plop, plop, plop.
“Take him away,” the Sorceress hissed. “Lock him in his tomb and let him wait. Let him wonder what we are doing to his brothers. Let him imagine their torture.”
Trying with all his might to stop the onslaught of memories, not wanting to see anymore, the sweetest sound that ever danced through the Ether reached his ears a split second before his sanity was completely lost. The dulcet tones were sweet, soft, and so pleasing that they literally infused his heart and soul with something he was sure he’d lost, something he’d never thought he would feel again, something he hadn’t known he’d missed until that very moment– Hope.
Her voice was a gentle melody that soothed his battered soul and called to his wounded heart. As harmonious as an expertly played harp, it didn’t matter that she was talking to someone else; it only mattered that he heard her and that she never stopped speaking.
The longer he floated along the lyrically beautiful waves of her voice, the clearer the image became and the more he was sure that not only was she the one whose Magic had called to him, but that she was the most beautiful creature who’d ever existed. Letting his eyes slide closed, the vision burst to life, the picture so real the scent of wildflowers and fresh rain filled his senses. There, right before him, stood the most breathtaking woman ever created with big, brown eyes that sparkled with a mischief he wanted to experience every day for the rest of his forever.
