Page 66 of Dragon Fate (Age of Fire 6)

“I don’t know anything about that, Father. But then, I rarely hear anything down here. Even the blighters don’t bother to visit the cave much, with their idol gone.”

“Where did it go?”

“I’m not sure. All I know is that these stones, their flicker faded as the days passed.”

AuRon looked into the stones. He’d examined them, at leisure, when he lived in the cave. Sometimes he’d seen flashes of himself looking at the stone—not as a mirror would show but from another angle.

He thought he saw swirling colors now. Imagination?

He stared deeper. A figure moved in the stone—two-legged, a hominid, not draconic. It played in the stone like a shadow caught on the surface of a rippling pool. The figure faded and he saw a swirl of orange and red light, like slow-moving flame.

The Lavadome.

Were these crystals still drawing some kind of power from the old statue they’d so long accompanied? He wished he’d listened more to Wistala and DharSii. They were both interested in the crystal the Red Queen had given him when he served as her messenger to the Lavadome. They questioned him closely and he answered honestly, and afterward asked them what they were looking for.

The Lavadome, the eyepiece, the statue—they’re all connected, DharSii had said. If we could assemble all the pieces, I wouldn’t wonder that we’d experience a revelation.

Interesting, but he had to return to the matter at hand.

The dragon bodies weren’t just dumped in the river. The question nagged—why would they transport them so far? There was nothing between here and the Empire save a good deal of rough terrain. Perhaps on the journey they stripped off the flesh, tanned the hides, and boiled the bones. He’d heard that hominid sorcerers and priests considered dragon bones powerful, as either ingredients or icons. Perhaps he was on a fool’s errand after all.

No, it wasn’t like sailors to do anything but move cargo. Their vessels were chronically short of hands, and disassembling a dragon would be an enormous task. Would anyone even trust them with the work? He’d been on ships and barges before. They must have simply delivered their cargo to some station or other. There were logging camps, a defunct mine....

They could hide dragon bodies in a mine, he supposed. Salt might even preserve the bodies, retaining the value of the flesh, though he knew of no salt mine. When he’d lived here the blighters had just wrung salt from a clay pit where the mountainside met the jungle.

“There is a mine about somewhere,” AuRon said. “I remember Wistala mentioning it.”

“Yes, I think it was an old prospecting camp of the Ghioz, though the blighters maintained they were just working the mine so near the blighter mountains in the hope of provoking a war. It’s this side of the river, not far off it.”

He knew the ridgeline with the mine Istach spoke of once she described the topography in detail. He’d often hunted in those hills and woods when feeding NooMoahk and after he “inherited” NooMoahk’s old cave.

So with a half-full belly—it didn’t do to explore on too full a stomach, since digestion slowed the blood—he thanked his daughter and set out. He kept to the ground when he left the cave, taking dusty paths through the old ruins where once he’d played hide-and-seek with Hieba, just in case the new Protector was out and up early. According to Istach he ate hearty meals during the night and slept through the mornings, but AuRon had a lifetime of cautious habits spent guarding his thin skin.

The summer sun was hot. AuRon had forgotten how fierce it was in these mountains after the solstice. He gained altitude and found some cool air.

Ah, there was the lake, and the ridge. The mine must be between—

Movement behind caught his eye. A copper dragon was coming fast on his tailline. For a moment, AuRon thought it was his brother—they were of similar size and color.

AuRon executed a rising half loop to gain altitude on the Protector and face him.

“I’m neither assassin nor thief,” AuRon called. “I intend no harm to you or what’s yours.”

“Think you’ll take my title away, do you?” the copper dragon, who could only be FuPozat, bellowed. “I paid good coin, my whole inheritance, and no interloper, however beloved of the blighters, is going to take it away.” This speech left him panting and he banked to come at AuRon from the side.

The fool had missed his chance. If he’d been careful, he could have followed AuRon on a line between him and the sun and dove out of the light. Evidently he was a dragon not much used to hunting or fighting.

“What makes you think I’m claiming your title?”

“Word came in the predawn. Their old totem-dragon had returned to claim his own. Stooped and gray old blighters tell stories from their childhood of your days here, how you ate of their cattle only at festivals, and say that peace and plenty are returning with you! They’re feasting in their huts in your name!”

Foolish blighters. Well, it was Fusspot’s own fault. If he was mismanaging the mountains so much that the blighters were slaughtering fat calves in hope of AuRon’s return, perhaps Fusspot should levy a few less head in the name of the Empire.

In any case, rage had driven the Protector out of his senses. He was coming at AuRon like a crazed woodpecker, swinging in from whichever angle with no thought to altitude, wind, or AuRon’s suppleness of wing and body.

If he hadn’t been called to more important duties, he might have enjoyed toying with the enraged dragon. It was like playing dodge with a tortoise.

Each time Fusspot came at him, AuRon flapped hard and ascended. No scaled dragon could match him in a climb; thanks to the lightness of his frame, he was faster and could rise at a steeper angle.

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