Dark, tearful eyes flashed. "I know you not, sir," a constricted but furious voice snarled, from under Arkle's hands, "but I am Maelra Bowdragon-and I've had quite enough of being forced to do things by mages!"
With a sigh of relief the Master of Bats let go of her throat and stepped back. He was jostled and almost sent sprawling by Ithim Bowdragon, plunging forward to embrace the daughter he'd thought lost-but who'd just spell-sought him across much of Asmarand. Uncle Dolmur was not far behind.
The Bowdragons collapsed into joyful hugs and tears. Arkle Huldaerus watched their laughter, feeling more lonely than he ever had before, and suddenly tears were welling in his own eyes.
He turned away, wiping at his eyes furiously. It would not do to miss a single glimpse of what was now unfolding in his scrying-globes.
It would not do at all.
Ezendor Blackgult knew he was dying. The pain alone told him that, even without his watery, blood-filled glimpses of his own charred ribs and limbs, returning to him as he slipped helplessly out of dragon-form-and fell just as helplessly across the body of a wounded and dying Lord of the Serpent.
Lying sprawled on his back with the clear morning sky of Aglirta above him, the Golden Griffon mumbled to no one in particular, "I want to hear birds sing again. I don't know why."
As always, Hawkril Anharu reached him first. The great mountain of an armaragor reached down as gently as any wet-nurse, to half-raise his old master, cradling Blackgult in his arms.
The Golden Griffon smiled wearily up at him as darkness came in waves, taking his breath with it. "Good friend," he said swiftly, while he still could, "have my barony. You more than deserve it. I've done much of… what I wanted to do… chased many dreams, and… even caught a few."
Embra Silvertree was crashing toward them across the jagged, tumbled rubble now, heedless of her own safety. "Father!" she cried.
Blackgult kept on speaking, because he had to. "I… wanted love, friends, wealth, danger… and excitement… and I haven't been disappointed."
His daughter reached him and fell to her knees, sobbing, "Father!"
"Hah," the Serpent-priest sneered weakly, from where he lay beside her, "did you think it was going to be easy to kill a god?"
Embra stared at the dying man with fire rising in her eyes. "I do believe," she said softly and deliberately, "I feel the Blood Plague taking hold of me at last."
She snatched out her dagger and drove it firmly through one of the priest's eyes, not flinching when his gore fountained over her.
Incredibly, the Lord of the Serpent did not the right away. Choking on his own blood, he cried, "Serpent, aid me!"
Nothing happened, and his next cry was fainter. "Serpent?"
Blood bubbled from the lips of the Lord of the Serpent as his remaining eye glared at Blackgult, and then turned to gaze back up at the woman who'd brought him death, and was still bent over him, dripping his blood.
"I expected so much more," the priest whispered reproachfully. "You've all been such a disappointment." And he turned his head toward his own shoulder and looked away from them. One last tear ran from his eye, and he died.
A serpent slithered from the neck of the priest's robe and reared up to strike at Embra with a malevolent hiss-and she grabbed it just below the head, flung it to an exposed patch of marble floor, and stomped on its head with one booted foot, shuddering.
Then she whirled back to her father, and burst into tears.
One charred arm reached up and caught hold of her arm in a last, vise-hard grip. "You're… my daughter, all right," Ezendor Blackgult whispered hoarsely, giving her a fierce, pain-wracked smile. "Live… well. Go on to glory, with Hawk… Save Aglirta!"
She leaned forward to stroke his face, through her tears, but he struggled up and forward, trembling. As the Golden Griffon thrust himself forward, trying to reach her lips and kiss them, the light went out of his dark eyes… and that iron strength ebbed, until his fingers fell away from her arm.
27
The Renunciation of the Dragon
Trembling with grief, Embra Silvertree bent forward the few inches of space her father had died trying to cross, and kissed his dead mouth fiercely.
And a gout of shining blue flame rose from within Ezendor Blackgult and hissed out of him, into her.
Swallowing it, Embra gasped-and froze like that, her lips parted and her eyes staring wildly. Flames of that deep and splendid sapphire hue licked up all around her, appearing from the empty air around her body. In their midst, the tall and slender Lady of Jewels was tugged upright, as if plucked by unseen strings, and held there, motionless in the rushing flames. Blue fire roared up all around her, but touched her not.
The Aglirtans now stumbling cautiously through the ruined Throne Chamber, their king among them, stared at her doubtfully. She gave no sign of seeing or hearing anyone.
"He's dead! Blackgult is dead!" a palace guard gasped, staring down at the man fallen on his face at her feet. "The Dragon is dead!"
Armed men burst in through several archways as he spoke, breathless from their race up from the docks.
"The Serpent's dead, too! Aglirta is free at last!" a courtier cried.
"No," a new voice snapped from behind King Raulin Castlecloaks, as a blood-wet sword burst through the royal breastplate from behind. "Now Aglirta is free!"
The king reeled, and then toppled forward as the Tersept of Ironstone shook the gurgling, dying Raulin off his blade, snatching the crown from the king's head in the same motion.
"Behold your new King!" he roared, as he crowned himself.
His armaragors standing with him took up the cry: "King Ironstone!"
"It's customary," Craer Delnbone remarked, as he sprang from atop a broken wall to crash down atop Ironstone's shoulders, slitting the man's throat with a dagger and striking the crown from his head to clang and roll on the floor, "to have just one king in a realm at a time. Orele?"
The Lady of the Wise was already picking her way forward through the rubble to where Raulin lay, the sorceress she'd just healed at her side. Wordlessly the old woman turned to Tshamarra, and the last Talasorn sorceress fed her what magic she had left, to heal the king.
The moment it was clear the Lady Overduke's magic was bent on healing and not blasting them down, Ironstone's men surged forward with a roar-but were met by royal warriors headed by Hawkril, Hulgor, Flaeros, and Craer, who sprang to meet them, striking savagely with their blades.
In a trice the Throne Chamber was in an uproar of men swording each other, chambermaids screaming from the balconies, tersepts shouting orders, and hurrying folk. Royal guards led by Suldun Greatsarn rushed into the room to form a defensive ring around the stricken king-and some of the courtiers shifted their shapes into warriors wearing Flowfoam armor, plucked up weapons from among the fallen, and joined them.
More arrivals from the docks charged in with swords drawn, novice Serpent-priests with venomed knives slipped in among the royal warriors and started slaying, and the clang of steel became deafening in the shattered Throne Chamber. Men were dying bloodily everywhere. Embra stood like a living torch of blue flame in the center of the tumult, and tersept turned on tersept to settle old scores.
On her knees above a blood-drenched Raulin Castlecloaks, Tshamarra Talasorn went pale as she spent the last of her power. Swaying, she almost fell over on her face-but Lady Orele put a steadying hand around her shoulders, ignoring an armaragor bearing down on them with bloody sword raised.
The man was still two hurrying strides away when Hulgor Delcamper crashed into him from one side and Flaeros Delcamper hit him from another. The young bard smote his foe so hard that his sword broke, its riven ends singing past the Lady Talasorn's nose. Snarling, Flaeros drove the broken stub of the blade into the man's face, and they crashed to the floor together, rolling-the bard trying to deal more harm to his foe, and the warrior lost in pain. Hulgor ended it for him with a sword-thrust, and kicked the body aside to grin encouragingly at Orele.