And it seemed an eternity.
Jo thought she heard Karleah murmur, “Something’s … no, it’s not right—something’s wrong—” Jo tried to open her eyes but couldn’t. Keep a grip on the staff! she told herself. If you let go, you might end up inside rock!
Moments stretched to minutes and then on into endless days before the uneasy travel passed and Jo felt herself returning to her solid form. She opened her eyes and blinked dazedly at Karleah and Braddoc, The dwarf returned her gaze with the same measure of disorientation.
The wizardess let go of her staff and collapsed to the ground.
“Karleah!” The shout came from Dayin, who stood nearby. Karleah had teleported them to the hill where they’d asked Dayin to stay with the animals. We’re safe, Jo sighed as the realization of where they were set in. She turned to Dayin, who was helping Karleah sit up.
“What’s the matter, Karleah?” Johauna asked. She gestured back toward the hill covering the dragon’s lair. “Why was that such a rough transport? Are you still able to send me back to the lair to kill the beast?”
The old woman’s tiny eyes were wide with terror. “Something’s wrong! There’ll be no going back to the lair. We’ve got to get back to the castle, Jo … immediately.”
Jo bit her bottom lip and narrowed her eyes. “But I’ve sworn vengeance for Flinn’s death. That dragon is never going to get any weaker than he is now! I’ve got to kill—”
“And I tell you all my magic has been drained from me!” Karleah interjected. Her black eyes flashed. “Don’t you see? We almost didn’t make it that time! I can’t send you back to the lair because … my magic’s gone!”
Verdilith watched the creatures vanish. They flickered in and out for many moments, and he wondered if the old woman’s spell would fail. When at last it seemed unlikely that they would return, he seeped out of the crevice in the ceiling he’d hidden in. His misty form floated gently to his bed of gold, the mist settling through the mound.
The dragon rued the theft of some of his hoarded treasure, all save one piece. He’d known every item the squire and the dwarf picked up, and he’d been tempted to attack again. But he had held his rage in check and watched and plotted. He was too weak now to attack them all, especially now that his magic had been drained away. But he would not always be weak. That would change. That would change.
Verdilith’s misty form sank into the cracks between his coins and jewels and other items. He sank down to the very depths of his treasure. Ah! It is good to touch the first gathered, he thought as he reached the very roots of his hoard. And it is good to be rid of that box!
An evil chuckle emanated from the mound of gold and spread out through the cavern. The dwarf had found the box and couldn’t resist it: preternaturally featureless, marvelously simple, finely crafted, solid and guileless, like the brain of the dwarf himself. The iron box had called to the iron in the dwarf’s soul. When he had picked up the accursed box, a shadowy smile formed along the cave’s misty ceiling. Verdilith considered the other items the grubby creature had pilfered to be almost fair payment, a kind of service fee for taking Teryl Aurochs horrible box from his lair.
The dragon assembled his thoughts, a difficult task in this form, particularly situated as he was within the treasure. Teryl Auroch gave me the box, knowing what it would do, knowing it would drain me. Now the mage himself will know the pain he has caused. Verdilith frowned mentally, then added, I serve him no longer. By the time he comes looking for his precious box, it will be lost, I will be whole, and Wyrmblight and its bearer will be broken.
The dragon turned his thoughts to the squire and her comrades. Invaders. Ignorant and weak. Women, two of them were, he reminded himself. He had thought Flinn’s death would be vengeance enough for him. But it isn’t Flinn. The sword’s the thing. It’s what cut me. It’s what hungers like a tongue of steel for the taste of my blood.
He shifted, coins and gems sifting down, disquieted, around him. I had held that sword in my claw, he thought, incredulous. I had wrenched it against the stones. Why could I not break it? Why did I let the bitch escape with it? She will die for this. But not merely die. She will suffer and die. It is a matter of poetics.
And the sword … I must destroy it. But how? Upon this question, he thought for a long while.
Perhaps days.
At last he thought, I must see Teryl Auroch about this sword. He will have something to destroy it. The mist that formed the dragon’s body threatened to seep away into the ground beneath his treasure. With a struggle, Verdilith pulled the mist closer together. He would have to change now; he was too weak to hold this form together much longer. Ordinarily, changing back into his natural form would be a simple and sensible matter; ordinarily he could heal his wounds in dragon form. But these were desperate days.
The dragon gnashed teeth of mist, disturbing a single coin as he did so. That accursed box! he thought. It stole his healing spells, rendered his magic items worthless, seemed to drain his very soul. Only his natural ability to shapechange remained—his gift from the Immortal Alphaks.
Verdilith shuddered. He had to pull his form together and change now … or dissipate and die. But he feared the change. His wounds were worse in dragon form—tearing wider, filling with gems and filth. For that matter, the transmogrifications were growing longer, more difficult, as he weakened. But death would be worse.
The dragon pulled the mist up and out of the treasure hoard until he was floating above the golden mounds. With a supreme effort, he focused on the transformation. The mist gave way to something more corporeal; it solidified, shaped itself, and hardened. Scales formed, hair grew, and blood pumped through his veins. Talons and fangs lengthened and sharpened. The dragon opened his golden eyes, and his body dropped a little to the treasure hoard below.
His left front claw buckled under pressure, and Verdilith fell immediately, writhing in pain. He screamed. The dragon clutched the claw to his copper breast. Searing pain shot through the wyrm’s arm, and then he succumbed to merciful blackness.
Verdilith fell into a dark sleep, his slumber broken by fitful dreams. His left arm throbbed, and he tried to stretch his claw. The arm moved a little, and the pain subsided momentarily, but then it came back fiercer than before. The green wyrm gave a little whicker of distress. He sank deeper into tortured dreams—dreams fueled by his foreclaw, dreams centering on the flashing great sword and the darkness of death that surrounded it.
A strange, high-pitched whimper of fear escaped the dragon’s curled lips, along with a drop of greenish-yellow spittle. The odor of poisonous bile wafted into Verdilith’s nostrils and the dragon quieted, comforted by the familiar stench. His dream deepened, and somewhere inside him the pain was joined by hatred for the sword.
Chapter IV
A man on a chestnut horse approached Johauna and her companions as they turned their mounts onto the castle road. Parts of the knight’s armor shone in the late afternoon sun, and the rest was covered by a midnight-blue tunic embroidered with three golden suns. Behind him rode two guards, each carrying their spears upright in formal greeting. Jo had wondered if the baroness would send a guard to formally meet Flinn and his comrades upon their “victorious” return to the castle.
Jo clenched her jaw. Only there’s no Flinn to return triumphant, she thought. The baroness is greeting a party who has lost its hero—a party who hasn’t even avenged that hero’s death. Jo’s mind slipped back a few days to a conversation she’d held with Karleah and Braddoc. They’d been sitting around the campfire the night after they’d attacked Verdilith. Karleah was adamant about leaving in the morning and heading back to the Castle of the Three Suns.