Page 116 of Courting the Dragon King

“Just up ahead, Your Majesty,” the tall warrior monk said.

Konrad sniffed. “What is that smell?”

The corridor took a turn. Konrad jolted to a stop, reached for his sword, and drew it.

Faces of white bone and rotting flesh stared straight at him. The stench of decay filled his nostrils. An undead army of reanimated skeletons and corpses, along with dread knights, filled the large crypt before him.

And there, at the front of the room, stood Wraith amongst his family.

An icy numbness swept through Konrad’s body. His ears rang.

I was right. He betrayed me.

A part of him had resisted the idea and hoped he’d been wrong, despite all the evidence. But there Wraith stood with his family and the undead army, amongst those who wanted to tear Draconia down.

Then Wraith turned towards him. His eyes widened. “Konrad, run! They are going to kill you.” He sprinted towards Konrad, pushing through the undead. “Run! They are going to turn you into a bone dragon.”

A dread knight stepped up behind Wraith. He lifted his sword high and brought the hilt down onto Wraith’s back. With a broken cry, Wraith crumpled to the ground.

“Wraith!” For a second Konrad considered shifting. But the ceiling was far too low. He’d hit the roof and potentially bring it down.

Then, all of a sudden, a rattling sounded behind him. He turned back to see a gate rolling closed, blocking them from the corridor. A dread knight stared at him through the metal grills. He smiled.

Had the dread knight come up behind them? Or snuck around? Either way, there was no escape back that way.

“Arm yourselves and prepare to fight!” Konrad shouted.

The Draconian guards drew their swords. So too did the warrior monks.

The undead army approached. Necromancers at the front of the crypt stood, lips and hands moving as they compelled the reanimated.

Konrad widened his stance and adjusted his grip, ready to meet his attackers. They were vastly outnumbered. But Konrad would not go down without a fight.

The Draconian guards ran forward. But the warrior doves held back. Konrad had never seen warrior doves in battle. He wondered if they would be as unskilled and weak as so many joked that monks armed with swords would be.

But then the tall warrior monk lunged, stabbing her blade through one of the Draconian guard’s backs. The guard cried out. Then the stocky warrior monk did the same to another guard. Both Draconians collapsed.

“What?” But Konrad didn’t have time to work out what the fuck was going on. The warrior monks turned on him.

The tall warrior dove lunged. Konrad blocked the blow but didn’t have time to follow it up as the stocky monk swung at him. He jumped back. The blade sliced, narrowly missing his belly. He dodged and parried as the two attacked.

Then Konrad shoved the point of his sword through the stocky monk’s chest. He tugged the blade free as the tall monk dove at him with a cry. Konrad knocked her sword to the side and shoved his blade into her stomach. She gasped.

Breathing heavily, he yanked the sword free and turned.

All the Draconian guards lay motionless on the floor. Their blood pooled around them. The undead stood over them. Konrad bared his teeth, grip tightening around the hilt of his sword.

The reanimated swarmed forward. He hacked and swung. He took off arms and heads. But it was no use.

Skeletons and rotting hands grabbed at him. They ripped his sword from his grip and shoved him to the ground, face first. Pinned to the floor, he breathed heavily, struggling against those who now held him down.

A dread knight stood over him, smiling. His yellowed eyes glowed amongst his sunken skin. A fat fly walked across his cheek. “Turn him onto his back.”

The reanimated did as they were told.

“Hold out his hands,” the dread knight barked.

They grabbed Konrad’s hands, tugging them forward even as Konrad growled and strained against them. But there were too many. The dread knight held a pair of shackles. He leaned forward and snapped them around Konrad’s wrists.