Page 21 of The Dragon’s Captive

Caught between crumbling rock and a furious dragon, Kate was out of options. Vilka was on top of her. His claws closed around her and swept her into the air just as the rock beneath her crumbled and fell into a void.

Kate let out a cry of pure fear as she hurtled above the collapsing mountainside, propelled once more by the wings of the dragon who owned her. She had been saved from one disaster, but there was another playing out before her.

The mountain was splitting open and hot air was spurting from the fissures in the rock. She had never seen anything like it, a current from deep within the ground that carried her windmills into the air and the portal generators as well.

Kate watched all her hard work be blown into the ether, a total waste of…

Bang!

A sudden booming sound deafened her for a moment or two, her blink reflex making her eyes close. When she opened them again, she saw that her mission had not been a total failure. The portal had opened. But it was not a small, manageable aperture like the first one had been. It was a long, narrow gash in the sky. There was no way she could ever fit through it, even if she had the ability to fly, which she didn’t. Unlike the smaller portal, which had been sustained by steady current and closed when the power was cut, this one seemed to be self-sustaining—much like the one that had started the first dragon war.

She stared and screamed out of fear and frustration and sheer anger and shock. This was a mess unlike any other. The whole thing had been a complete disaster. Her last chance at escape had led to some kind of cave-in of a mountain and a slit in the sky that was of no use to her whatsoever. Kate would have cried bitter tears if she were not too transfixed by the passing of the ground far below her dangling feet. Traveling by dragon was never going to come naturally to her. Her knuckles were bright white with the effort of holding fast to Vilka’s claws.

The return to the fortress was eye-wateringly fast and in minutes Vilka was setting her down on the parapets. He transformed instantly and took hold of her with strong hands, giving her a none-too-gentle shake as he thundered his anger at her. “What have you done!”

“I was trying to go home,” she explained frantically. “I don’t know what went wrong, I don’t know why the mountain did that!”

“You’re about to find out,” he said grimly, looking toward the mountain, which was still quaking and rumbling so violently that even the fortress beneath their feet shook. His hand was locked on the collar she still wore, keeping her close to him as she watched what to her eyes looked like the world crumbling in on itself entirely.

The mountain was growling, a deep, primal sound that she knew was the grinding of rocks together, but that almost sounded like the fury of a wild creature. Kate had never felt fear like this before. She was being confronted with the capacity of the very ground beneath her feet to reshape itself at will. If Vilka had not come for her, she would have been turned into human bacon, seared on the elemental explosion destroying the terrain. Even at a distance it was obvious that the mountain was crumbling, opening up into a grand crater that seemed to have been lurking beneath it for a very long time.

The chaos was not limited to the terrain either; all around the fortress, the dragon men, Vilka’s soldiers, were taking their flight forms and speeding into the sky. There was something almost involuntary about their actions, the way they screamed and whirled and called to one another as they sped toward the crater and cartwheeled in the turbulent draughts rising from the chasm.

“What’s happening! Why are they flying around like that?”

She had to yell to be heard over the cacophony, and still her voice was almost carried away in the cry of a hundred dragons circling above what had been the mountain but was now a jagged crater from which a roar continued to issue.

A volcano? Was that what it was? There was a strong smell in the air, something like sulfur, but not quite. It was bitter and acrid and it filled her nostrils with every breath. But there was no lava and there were no plumes of smoke—though there did seem to be heat, judging by the way the air above the crater waved and wriggled and made everything behind it shimmer like a mirage.

Her eyes went wide as something emerged from the hole. A dragon, but not like any of the dragons she had seen so far. This dragon had a head so large it seemed to be as big as the mountain it had destroyed in emerging. It was massive, monolithic, leviathan, scales gleaming green and gold, great eyes bulging as a mouth full of teeth like skyscrapers opened and let out a cry that sent the flying dragons into a frenzy of diving and darting, like moths around a light bulb.

Frozen with horror, Kate watched as the dragon emerged from the ground much like a train passing at crossing; it seemed to go on forever, the length of its neck winding into the sky as the larger bulk of its body began to ascend and suddenly wings burst from the earth, showering the surrounding areas with dirt and stone for miles. They cast a shadow over the sun, blotting out the light over the entire plain and fortress besides. Their span was unthinkable, and every beat of its wings sent powerful winds buffeting across the plains, snapping trees like twigs.

She quaked, her knees weak, her stomach churning with a fear she could barely contain. What she was seeing was so majestic and frightening, so undeniably dangerous and yet so awe-inspiring, tears coursed down her face and she was unable to take her eyes off it. Green, gold, turquoise, it shone with bright colors that looked to her as fresh as a newly shed reptile.

It flew high into the sky and out toward the ocean, taking Vilka’s dragon legions with it in its wake, arcing around to return toward the ground that had once served as its chamber and then passing over the fortress proper, before repeating the circuit. It let out regular rending cries that made pure fear spear through Kate’s heart.

Vilka dragged her into the fortress, which mercifully had clearly been built to withstand the emergence of the massive dragon.

“What was that!?”

“That is a world eater,” Vilka said. “His name is Avastias and this fortress is here to guard over his slumber.” He spoke somewhat mechanically, as if he were in some measure of shock.

“You’ve never seen one of those before, have you,” Kate said. “That was… he’s…it…” She couldn’t find the words to express herself. What words could there be for something that seemed to defy the very laws of creation. The dragon, the world eater, it was so large and so terrible, and it had been beneath the ground the whole time she had been there, totally undetected. She could barely believe what she had seen, but adrenaline was coursing through her body, making her hands shake and her breath come in short, fast little gasps. There was no doubting the physical manifestation of seeing such a creature—and she could still hear its cries as it performed its waking ritual in the skies outside.

“I was never meant to see him,” Vilka said, his tone tense. “The world eaters are supposed to remain asleep. They awake every few thousand years. Most dragons will never see one—they call to the souls of our kind in a way which takes them in thrall. I have lost my legion to Avastias.”

“Wow. That’s… what are the odds of that?”

“Rather high, thanks to you,” Vilka snarled at her suddenly.

“Me? What do you mean, me?”

“Your portal seems to have had a major hand in waking Avastias. His slumber has been a disturbed one, and there is no telling what the consequences of that will be. His calls have taken the dragons who once roosted here, and they will not return to earth or take their walking forms again until he sleeps.” His hand clasped around the nape of her neck, holding her almost uncomfortably tight. “Thanks to you, I have lost not just the world eater I was posted to guard, but my entire legion with him.”

“Sounds like a bad day for you,” Kate said. “Sounds like you should have let me go when you had the chance.” Her words were unsympathetic because she was still terrified, but more than that, she was angry. She would not take the blame for this. Vilka had never told her not to make a portal because of the giant dragon. He had never mentioned anything like this.

“It has been a very bad day,” Vilka agreed. “And it will prove to be an equally bad day for you, I promise you that.” His hand tightened on the back of her neck. “You are more trouble than Avastias himself. You are the very definition of trouble. And you are not sorry at all, are you.”