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And then Nilrasha fell on him, pushing his neck to the sand, opening windpipe and blood vessels, and SiMevolant let out a gurgling protest as he died.
“Nilrasha, you’ve come again.”
“I never thought I could fly so fast,” she said, dropping beside him. “You’re not badly hurt. Just cut up.”
“You must go up. Help the others.”
“I’ve no armor. Rayg had time and materials to make only three of the underside leathers. AuBalagrave and his dragons are wearing them.”
“The plan could fail. We’re deep beneath the Rock. You should leave, so you have room to run.”
“In victory or defeat, I’m determined to die at your side, my love.” She looked up. “Here! You! Bat. Get over here. I’ve work for you.”
Uthaned himself, a gray mouse who could fit in the Copper’s nostril, fluttered above his ear.
“The blood is in pools on the dragon-barrack floor, m’lord,” Uthaned said. “The dragons rise just high enough to kill their men in their fall.”
The Copper always regretted not being able to see it.
As Rethothanna related it to him later, like all well-fought battles, it was over before it was begun. The bats had opened veins on most of the dragon-rider mounts, numbing and cutting, numbing and cutting, and letting the blood run into the washing gutters.
In another cave it might not have worked—some attendant might have noticed the blood pooling on the floor—but not in the shining confines of the Rock. The black surface concealed the damage done until it was too late.
So when the alarm was sounded and the men ran to their mounts, the woozy beasts slipped and bumped. Those who even beat their wings hard enough to rise soon passed out, crumpled, and fell to earth. There was a terrible toll in broken necks and backs on the dragons, but the dragon-riders had it even worse.
Of course, a healthy patrol was up over the Rock, as always, and it took many lives before the hag-riders were plucked out of their saddles and their maddened, confused mounts crippled. Even AuBalagrave, one of the few dragons with his belly armored against crossbow bolts, fell with a poisoned arrowhead in his jaw. But other dragons battered and swatted the flying hag-riddens, or plucked the men off while they were reloading their weapons.
There was bitter tunnel fighting against the Andam, but the Drakwatch distinguished itself. Old NeStirrath fell at their head when a wounded human plunged a poisoned blade into him. Of all the names of the fallen from that day, his glory lasted the longest.
The Imperial line had been reduced once again. Now only a handful remained.
Imfamnia fled. Some said she had chains of gold clutched in each claw. Others said she was heavy with SiMevolant’s eggs. Or SiDrakkon’s. Or a dozen other rumored lovers, earning her the title “Jade Queen” in the Anklene Histories. None could say where she went.
A small group of men and dragons barricaded themselves deep in the rock with a reserve of food and water. They refused all attempts at parley until the Copper tottered to their tunnel, supported by Nilrasha. He dragged with him a woman clutching a squalling babe.
He showed the pair to the men at the other end of the tunnel and issued the only offer he could to give to the poison-men, for it was the only one their savage, half-formed brains could appreciate:
He summoned his best voice. “Surrender and give your lives over to us, or we’ll kill each of you, your wives, and spit your babes for roasting. The choice is yours, men: fair treatment as thralls, or death.”
Two committed suicide in despair. The rest sensibly chose thralldom.
And it was only while limping out of the Imperial Resort, with dragons and thralls alike calling him “Tyr RuGaard” and Nilrasha “Queen Ora,” that he realized what he had become.
Epilogue
An Anklene, with the assistance of two elvish thralls, stitched him up. His good sii soon functioned again, though the scarred hide on his haunch never grew a proper set of scale again, just a sort of scabby covering like a turtle’s shell.
He had to make a great many decisions from the Tyr’s shelf, but he grew used to much of the labor required of a Tyr, to the point where he looked forward to the challenges, such as rebuilding the alliance with the griffaran. He even made a sort of art of delegating authority. The real trick was matching the right sort of brains and brawn to each task.
“Rayg is a clever man. In the world I intend to build, clever men will do very well. As long as they understand their place in the Spirits’ grand design,” he said to Rhea as she scrubbed him one morning. He had to confess that he liked the smell of bath-water with a slippery woman in it. But all things in moderation.
“You might want to communicate that to him,” Nilrasha said as she performed her own ablutions.
Rayg had been kept busy studying the dragon-riders’ weapons and equipment in the hope of making improvements. Now and then he complained that he should be freed by now, but the Copper always reminded him that the bridge was not yet built.
“Release me from this trivia and I’ll finish it in thirty days,” he grumbled. But he’d grumble more in the ore mines, seeing to improvements in the hydraulics, the Copper reminded him.
Bath done and breakfast down, the Copper hooked his mate at the wing and walked her to the balcony overlooking the now-public Imperial Gardens. And yes, he had a review to do, then a short speech to give to the newest generation of Drakwatch and Firemaidens.
