Treasures of Fantasy - Margaret Weis [172]
Skylan was weak with relief. Flinging himself off the horse, he hit the ground running. He was on one side of the fire pit. Treia stood on the other. She looked straight at him and gave a thin smile. Her lip curled slightly. She threw the spiritbone into the fire.
Skylan gasped in horror and jumped into the fire pit. Raegar started to leap in after him. Treia laid a restraining hand on his arm.
The spiritbone lay on top of a smoldering log. The fire burned hot. The water had doused part of the blaze, but tongues of flame licked the spiritbone.
“Too late,” said Treia.
CHAPTER
16
* * *
BOOK THREE
Skylan, looking up, could not see the stars. The gods, looking down, could not see the world.
The bright moonlight disappeared. The ogre warriors were plunged into darkness. They could see nothing beyond the fires of destruction, and they looked fearfully to their shamans, who stared uneasily at the black and starless sky.
The light that beamed from Aelon’s temple went out. The people in the streets and on the barricades might as well have been struck blind. They, too, stared into the sky.
On board the Venjekar, the only light was the red fire in the eyes of the carved head of the Dragon Kahg. Sigurd hung the spiritbone from the nail on the masthead where it belonged. Sheltered by the trees along the shore, the ship bobbed gently on the rippling surface of the river. The Venjekar had been hiding in the shadows, but now all the world was in shadow. The air was still, the heat oppressive. A pall of smoke from the burning buildings on the waterfront hung over the water.
“A storm must be brewing,” said Sigurd.
In the arena, Treia was ecstatic. She had summoned the darkness. This was her doing. The fire in the fire pit still burned, and by its light, she could see that Xydis was impressed, Raegar awed.
A hot wind stirred her hair. She lifted her arms to the heavens and raised her voice.
“Dragon of the Vektia! You are mine to command!” She spoke the words, but no words came out.
Treia shivered. Where was her voice? She could feel the words in her throat, feel herself shouting them, but once they left her throat, they were swallowed by the darkness like the moon and the stars.
A sliver of terror pierced her. She tried again, concentrating all her being on the dragon.
“You are mine to command. . . .”
Empty nothings. Raegar was now staring at her in alarm. Xydis was starting to look worried. In the royal box, the Empress had applauded at first, charmed to see the moon and stars disappear, but as time passed and nothing else remarkable happened, she grew bored.
“We are leaving,” she said, and picked up the little dog.
Wings, gray as smoke, trailed glowing sparks. Blue flame crackled and rippled over blue scales. Eyes, cold and pitiless and soulless, gazed down upon the world and saw a void that must be filled.
The Vektan dragon spread its blue fire wings. Rain fell in torrents. The dragon breathed and cyclones twisted out of its mouth. Lightning flared from its claws and thunder cracked from its mouth.
The wind began to rise and rise and kept on rising.
Panic welled up inside Treia. She could scarcely keep her eyes open for the rain blowing in her face. The wind smote her, trying to knock her down. She had to find the spiritbone. She had to hold it in her hands. Then, perhaps, she could gain control of the dragon.
“Hevis, help me!” she screamed.
But the god had fled, fearing Torval’s wrath. It was Raegar who heard her. He turned to her, his face contorted with fear and rage. Beside him, Xydis was calling upon Aelon, demanding that the god seize the dragon and send it to fight ogres.
Aelon did not answer. He, too, was lost in the dark.
The rain deluged the fire, putting it out. The fire pit began to fill with water. Lightning flared and Treia saw the spiritbone and Skylan standing over it, reaching out his hand.
As Treia jumped into the fire pit, a bolt of lightning struck the touchstone boulder very near where she had been standing. The boulder shattered.