Treasures of Fantasy - Margaret Weis [178]
But the shadow was dark and bloated. It blotted out the stars and swallowed the moon. It looked like death given wings, a tail, a head, and a crest. Death made to look like a dragon. Death made in mockery of dragons.
The Dragon Kahg was baffled. What was this hideous monster? Where was the Vektia?
Lightning crackled from the dragon’s claws. The beast opened its hideous maw and a roaring wind swept down from the heavens, flattening the willow trees on the distant side of the bank, tearing the roots from the ground with rending, snapping sounds, and hurling them into the river. The wind struck the Venjekar a blow that seemed to Kahg to be personal, malevolent, aimed at him. The ship heeled and nearly went under.
It was then Kahg knew the truth as the gods had always known. Creation is destruction. Destruct to create. Create to destroy.
The Dragon Kahg struggled to right the ship in the lashing rain, to keep it afloat. The Venjekar left the shore and began to sail away.
“Sigurd! Stop!” Bjorn cried. “What are you doing? We have to wait for Skylan and Aylaen!”
“I’m not the one sailing the goddam ship!” Sigurd roared. He pointed at the dragon.
Shaken to the soul, Kahg wanted only to flee the hideous thing in the sky. He roared out the name of Vindrash. The goddess either could not or would not answer.
Hailstones thudded on the deck and the heads of the Torgun, driving them to seek shelter in the hold. Lightning smeared the sky. The smoke of the burning city lay on the banks like a hideous fog. The Venjekar crept along, hugging the shore, hiding among the rushes and the trailing branches of the ruined willows.
Kahg could hear the Vektia rampaging through the heavens, hear its howling. Its fury was mindless. The Vektia, wise and all-knowing. Kahg could have wept if he hadn’t been so enraged. He hid the ship beneath the trees, not because he feared the Vektia might see him, but because he did not want to see it. He loathed the sight of it, made to look like a dragon.
Something hard and sharp struck him on his carved wooden snout. At first Kahg thought he’d been hit by a bit of windblown debris, but then the object struck him again, this time harder, chipping off a chunk of wood. He looked to see a hammer fall back to the deck, narrowly missing the boy who had thrown it.
Kahg glared. The faery child. The boy was a sodden mess; he seemed oblivious to the rain. He picked up the hammer by its wooden handle, careful not to touch the iron head, and brandished it threateningly.
“You have to go back for Skylan!” Wulfe cried.
Skylan, Kahg thought. Which one was Skylan? The dragon could not keep all these humans straight. The ship kept moving.
The boy peered through his sopping wet hair in the direction of the sky. “That’s not a dragon, you know. It’s old. Really, really old. It used to run wild, but then the gods of the Uglies captured it and chained it up.”
Kahg’s red eyes flared. His gaze cast a garish aura on the boy.
“If you throw that at me again, whelp, I will smash you flat!” Kahg snarled.
Wulfe lowered the hammer and backed away. “You have to go back for Skylan.”
Kahg changed course suddenly, bringing the ship around, a difficult maneuver in the wind-whipped river, but he managed.
“Thank you!” Wulfe yelled, waving at the dragon.
Kahg’s eyes glittered. He had not reversed his course for the sake of the faery child or for this Skylan, whom the dragon finally vaguely remembered.
The Dragon Kahg had abruptly reversed course because he had been about to sail into the midst of the ogre fleet.
CHAPTER
20
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BOOK THREE
Skylan scoured the riverbank searching for some sign of his ship and praying to Torval that the Venjekar was not lying at the bottom of the swollen river. He could find no trace and he wondered bleakly what to do.
They could not remain here. The river was rising, and this part of the bank would soon be underwater. All were exhausted, including the horses. He was about