Dragon Rule - E. E. Knight [98]
As matters turned out, it was just as well they rested.
They arrived midday. AuRon and Natasatch’s cave looked quite primitive. The dragons used to smoothed corners and holes bored for venting and drainage there. But still, it felt safe and warm for the travelers, and they settled in for a long nap, albeit in a cave sized for two dragons rather than four.
A faint howling of wolves woke AuRon from sleep, slightly squashed between bulky Wistala and even bulkier Shadowcatch.
He roused his fellow exiles with tail slaps.
“The wolves have some news for us?” Wistala asked.
“They’re far off, I can’t pick up what’s being said, the echoes are confusing the sounds. It’s a danger call,” AuRon said.
AuRon hadn’t had reason to creep to his own front portal in all his years on the island, but this time he did.
Staying in the shadows, he peeped out. Ouistrela stood there, a male AuRon didn’t recognize beside her. Hard to believe Ouistrela had taken a mate.
There were men, shaggy barbarians of the north by the look of them, behind and before her, the ones to the front with evil-looking spears, the ones behind with great bows and heavy dragon arrows.
“Ouistrela, what’s all this? You’re standing on my doorstep with armed men?”
She was bristling for a fight and clearly enjoying her moment. “I’m here to evict you at last, AuRon. You and your pitiful band.”
He sensed the others falling in behind him, tensing.
“What right and what cause allows you to tell me to leave my own cave?” AuRon asked.
Glittering green alighted next to her. Imfamnia!
“You have visitors, I see,” AuRon said. “Imfamnia, we’re keeping our side of the bargain. We’ll live here quietly.”
“I’m afraid not, AuRon,” the once-and-future Queen called back. “Remember that clever trick you pulled in Uldam? NiVom and I did. You’re looking at the new Protector of the Isle of Ice. Ouistrela will find the duties light and the meals hearty. The Isle of Ice is part of the Grand Alliance. It is you who broke the arrangement, not I.”
“It’s a trap,” the Copper said. “Fly for your lives!”
Wistala and Shadowcatch led the way, by virtue of their bulk and heavy scale, shielding AuRon and the Copper.
A ropy mass fell atop them from the upper rim of AuRon’s cave.
Nets! No ordinary fishing nets, either, but dragon-nets of chain and barbed hooks.
Falling on them like an oversized octopus, the nets engulfed Wistala and Shadowcatch. AuRon worked one side with sii, trying to untangle them, listening as arrows sang through the air.
The heavy net may have held one powerful dragon. But two, such as Wistala and Shadowcatch, tore it to pieces. Pieces of it encumbered them still, but they stood on sii and saa ready to fight.
“You!” Ouistrela said, spying Shadowcatch.
With that Ouistrela launched herself at the black.
Her fury spoiled the aim of the blighter and human archers. Some loosed anyway in their excitement and struck their own leader.
The heavy, unknown red stood stupidly, not knowing if he should join the contest below or wait for the archers to bleed their enemies.
“Idiot!” Imfamnia shrieked, backing away from the fighting. “Griffaran, tear their throats out!”
“AuRon, ware! Griffaran,” the Copper called.
Colorful, taloned lances swept down from the heights. Five.
“Only you have a chance against them,” the Copper said.
One against five? AuRon admired his brother’s definition of “a chance.”
Wistala was shielding AuRon with her muscular bulk. Arrows and bolts and heavier projectiles bounced off her armored skin the way rain ran off a cliff face. He could achieve little on the ground—he jumped into the air, beating his wings madly to gain speed and altitude.
The griffaran swerved, coming at him from either side.
Oh, will you!
AuRon felt his wings and spine protest at the backbend, reversing course like a cracking whip.
The griffaran had evidently never flown against a scaleless dragon before. Their heads came together with a satisfying konk!
The third overshot.