FA+
Shop
788
Views
Views
7
Favorites
Favorites
Category
Story / Fantasy
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 120 x 61
File Size 27.2 kB
Report this content
More from RaddaRaem
Listed in Folders
Shady Impressions:Deceit, Dragons, and Dances with Gravity#7
Sleep deprived, cranky, and sore. You’d be hard pressed to find someone less presentable than Russo, at least as far as would-be dragon slayers go. Scrambling together some last minute preparations for the looming showdown, the mage tries to familiarize himself with his latest spell with which to protect himself, the one Kaya reluctantly bestowed up him. Pressing at the boundaries of his understanding of magic itself, Russo stumbles upon some unheard of applications for his barrier spells. …And yes, he is going to abuse the hell out of it.
Icon is © to
DemonRoni
FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Chapter 43
It wasn’t a throbbing or excruciating pain, the mage noted. Russo rolled onto his side, grunting at the undesirable sensations that accompanied his shifting weight. His limbs were sore and stiff, muscles having been flattened between his own body weight and the cold unforgiving floor. Every time he turned his head, it felt like a taut string stretching down from his neck to his shoulders was pulled to its breaking point. Even in a relaxed position, flat on his side and head resting against his makeshift pillow, the strain on his back remained.
“And we’re already off to a great start,” he grumbled, arms cradled around the back of his neck. Blinking rapidly, flecks of sleep caught in his eyelashes collected along the sides of his eyes. “How is someone even supposed to feel the day they go out and slay a dragon?” The thoughts tumbled painfully through his head and upon his lips. Tired, hungry, and filled with a welling sense of dread? Hell if he knew.
A rhythmic plodding echoing around his ears certainly didn’t help any. Nuzzling into the side of his cloak, Russo tried to ignore the dragoness pacing heavily back and forth at the mouth of her cave.
“Conditions are not what I would call ideal,” Kaya mused aloud, snow drifts crunched loudly under claw. Gray clouds, fat and heavy with precipitation, hung low in the sky. Rays of the sun could be seen poking between the cloud cover here and there, reflecting off the fresh layer of snow that blanketed the forest. “Still…” Given how heavily it had snowed last night, less sunlight was better. Were the sun to shine at its brightest, the very land itself would become a shimmering and blinding mirror at the altitudes their duel was to take place.
“Better to have to worry about my wings freezing up than not being able to see I suppose…” On a day like today, the air would be thick with moisture, water droplets eager to cling to her form. Might have to enlist the mage’s aid if it came to that. Sheets of ice were sure to form on her appendages the higher up she went, and she’d need them melted or shattered before they became a hazard. “Rested, Russo?”
“No.” He heaved a heavy sigh and braced his elbow against the floor. “But it’s not like I’m going to get any less tired as the day drags on.” Pushing himself off the floor, he uneasily steadied his balance.
She continued facing out towards the forest buried under all that white and simply nodded. “If you have any reservations, now would be the time to voice them.”
“Where to start?” A wry laugh tumbled forth from his lips. “Of course I have reservations and misgivings about this whole thing. Who in their right mind picks a fight they know they might lose? Much less one with a god damned dragon?!” Shoulders slumped, Russo dipped down and yanked his dirtied cloak off the floor. As he brushed off the layers of dust and grime, Dark’s sneering visage danced across his mind. That hollowed out jackal’s face with the crescent bobbing between his empty eye sockets taunted him, giddily reminding him of the illusion of choice.
“But I’ve made my decision.” Russo had countless options available to him. Even with the amount of emphasis he placed on his own survival above most others, his rarely used and rusted over moral compass outright forbid him from disregarding Jem’s well-being. With that in mind, his choices winnowed down to near nothing. “I can always more or less kidnap and just drag him back to Tedrah…” Just grab him, teleport them both back home, and it’s a done deal. That would be the smart thing to do… if he had never met Dark. Taking the god’s perplexing and trying influence into account, his choices narrowed down even further. “If I don’t suffer through some sort of trial or ordeal now, Dark will organize one to plow me over later.” Gritting his teeth, the human resolved to suck up the abuse here and now. Cloak wrapped tight around his form, Russo pulled down his hood, eyes burning bright under the shadows cast upon his face. “Let’s just get this over with.”
Kaya cocked her head to the side, turning a wandering eye back towards her guest. “It’s funny, the more I think about it. Here you are, tired and afraid, and still you compel your weary body into battle. Well aware of the danger, the risks, and the idiocy involved.” She turned to face him, the mica dragoness deeming him worthy of her full attention. “Nearly every other mortal before you recklessly barged into my abode, shielded from their own ignorance and the world around them, blissfully unaware of the difficulties and dangers that awaited them.”
“Your point?”
“Heh, I just find it amusing is all. As self-centered as you are, you embody those concepts those idiots hold near and dear,” she tapped away at her scaly fingers as she counted off virtues, “Courage, resolve, strength; far better than they ever could.”
Huh. Wasn’t expecting to get a compliment out of her. Albeit, a somewhat backhanded one. But, still, a compliment! “Thanks, I think?”
“Think nothing of it.” Plodding forward, her serpentine tail lashed side to side behind her. “Familiarized yourself with that new spell of yours yet?”
“Just about.” Holding his hands out from his body, a wall of blue-green magic materialized before Russo’s palms. Pulling his fingers up against the back of it, the edges stretched up and inward. With a little time and coaxing, a magical semi-circle shield stretched from the top of his head down to his ankles. “I can probably get this whole thing to wrap around me…” Okay, so forming the barrier above his head and expecting it to stretch all the way down to his feet was pushing it. Casting it at waist or chest level seemed to be working out pretty well, it wasn’t asking too much to have the barrier stretch a bit going both ways. What if…
“You’re investing too much magic into each spell,” Kaya corrected him. “If you can’t grasp the basics of spellcasting then this will have been for nothing.” Traces of irritation were present in her voice, as if she were a teacher who expected her pupil to know better.
“Not like I asked,” he was tempted to mouth back. Biting back his tongue, he rolled with the punches. His ego could take the hit. Even he knew better than to turn down magical pointers from a dragon.
A clawed finger poked at his gloved hands, dissipating the gathering energies. “Shape the magic when it’s still accumulating and malleable. Then strengthen it into a barrier.”
“Alright, alright.” Still not entirely certain just what the hell he was doing, Russo went through the motions of generating another dragon scale infused shield, this one with significantly less magic behind it. Maybe he could shape it and then pump more magic into it, hardening its form as he went?
Without warning, a thick scaly tail swung into it. Offering up little in the way of resistance, Kaya’s appendage sailed through the spell, shattering it to pieces and whapping at the mage’s feet. What looked like bubbling shards of green glass clinked against the mage and the ground, the magic given physical form sizzling into sparkles of light.
Or not. “…Again?”
The mica dragoness arched her brows in response.
“Alright.” Russo’s eyes turned down towards the shards fading into nothingness caught in the crumples of his cloak. “Again.” Okayyyy so had to get the shape nailed down first thing. Hmm. He tapped a warm mitteny finger against his chin. This was just so backwards to what he was used to! Usually all you did was imagine the spell, primarily its physical effects, and invest the necessary resources into it and hey ho you have a spell. The shape and form came together simultaneously, it wasn’t like you pieced the constituent parts together as if building a puzzle. Want to cast a fire spell? Fathom a searing and terrible heat above your palm, pump the magic where it needs to go and there’s your fireball. Wasn’t like he had to coalesce a ball of energy and THEN imbue it with flames. The barriers were no different…
Kaya watched on curiously. Chin resting in a cupped hand, she cracked a smile at seeing him so deep in thought, her words echoing in his mind. Someone heeding and thinking long and hard about what she said? Goddamn, this really was a delightful change of pace.
“An afterthought…” Was that the problem? The shapes of his spells were always an afterthought, something Russo never dedicated any real mental effort towards. Niggling ideas scratched at the back of his head, generic, almost subconscious assumptions of what a fire or ice or barrier spell ought to look like. Magic was will power given form after all. It wouldn’t be entirely unreasonable to think even subconscious inclinations could play a hand in crafting and shaping magic. “Augh, couldn’t this whole rethinking of magic itself have happened sometime less… urgent?”
His understanding was progressing along nowhere near as expeditious as she would have liked. “I am asking him to undergo an entire paradigm shift in his spellcasting,” she casually admitted. Some patience was warranted on her end. The mica dragoness lowered herself to the ground, her cold and scaly belly hungrily draining what ambient heat remained in the bedrock below.
“Does that mean my spells can take on any shape I want?” His head buzzed at the implications. He smacked his hands against his temples in an attempt to tide the flood of ideas threatening to overflow his imagination. “Stop stop stop, no more thinking.” Russo closed his eyes and began breathing in deeply and slowly. Fingers clenched and unclenched. Slowly and rhythmically, he inhaled and exhaled, the human focusing solely on the physical sensation of a tingling warmth flowing through his veins. As it flowed to and from his fingertips, a weak magical aura surrounded his hands. “I have magic gathered, so, you know, that’s half of the spellcasting done. Now imagine… imagine a hand shaped… wait does that really even count as a shape? Fuck it, it does now.” Shaking his head, he regained his focus. “Imagine a barrier, a little one, wrapped around my hands. A dragon scale barrier.” He felt his gloves grow heavy. The magical energy seeping out of and gathering upon his hands stained through the fire proof accessories, slowly manifesting and solidifying upon the dark fabric. “Strong, but pliable. Hard enough to beat back swords.” His wrists and fingers went stiff. “But flexible enough to allow me movement. To let me bend my fingers.” The constricting pressure around his digits eased up but the heaviness remained.
Blinking her pearly eyes, Kaya gazed down at the dragon scale gauntlets that now adorned his arms. The green aura of magic surrounding his hands had hardened into a barrier, overlapping circles dotted across the surface. Shit. She was not expecting him to interpret her directions so liberally. Oh Lord, this was just rife for abuse. “Not… quite what I had in mind, but very well.”
“Wait, that worked?” Opening his eyes, Russo was astonished to see immediate results. “Woah.” Hands curled into fists, he knocked his knuckles together. Sparks chipped off where magically melded scale met scale.
Her teeth clacking together, the mica dragoness was eager to stifle any further lines of inquiry. “Now that that’s out of the way, you should be able to craft a spherical barrier without-”
“Huh. So if hands count as a shape… does that mean I can make a people shaped barrier?”
Dammit dammit dammit. Oh why bother. “You’re just going to find out for yourself, regardless,” she muttered. An irritated sigh slipped forth from her maw when Russo went ahead and found out that, yes, you can make a people shaped barrier. Kaya rubbed a clawed hand against her forehead as the human oohed and ahhed and marveled at how bitchin’ the spell was.
Covered head to toe in a softly glowing green barrier that conformed to his body, the mage snickered at his newfound knowledge. Magical lasers still would have been preferable but holy hell, this was a close second.
“Care to put that newfound application of your spell to the test first? Better to find out how well it holds up now than on the field of battle.” Rising to her feet, the dragoness eyed the human warily. Kaya’s club of a tail twitched expectantly behind her.
“Guess a little test run couldn’t hu-” One instant Russo was staring up at and conversing with a dragon. The next, he started formulating a question, curious as to why oh fuck Kaya what’s with your taiAAAAHHH. After that, he found himself majestically flailing through the air. Even more after that, he found himself embedded into a cave wall, taking in an eyeful of the lovely limestone rock formations scraping against his face. His mind still reeling from the turn of events that had transpired, he peeled out of the Russo shaped indent in the wall and landed with an oof. A handful of stalagmites crumbled beneath him, chunks of rock catching between the scales in his barrier. Staring up at the rocky ceiling, he rested his hands against his chest. “I don’t know whether to be mad that you just slammed me into a wall or happy that I survived it.”
“You could always take solace in the fact your new spell functions as intended,” the dragoness cheekily replied.
Grumbling, Russo rolled off of the debris pressing into his back. Nerves still shaken, he slowly ran his hands over his arms and shoulders. “Even if I’m more or less invincible,” his barrier began to fade, rocks and pebbles slipping through its surface and bouncing against the huamn’s form, “…for the moment, anyway, that doesn’t mean I enjoy getting smacked around!” Gradual realizations about the limitations of his new spell’s applications accompanied a droop of his shoulders. The mage’s posture and poses weren’t static, he was always moving. It would take a constant flow of magic to keep a barrier snugly wrapped around him, to constantly mold and shift its shape to cling tight to his body.
“Your magic consumption has likely worsened,” her jaw went slack as her forked tongue caught against the back of her jaw, “but at least you are capable of defending yourself from the worst Gyorrkith has to offer. We’re as ready as we’ll ever be at this point.” With a flap of her serpentine wings, the mica dragoness worked warm blood out to her leathery limbs. “Before we depart though…” Pressing her four clawed feet into the ground, she pushed off the beaten rock. The scraping of her claws echoed around the cavernous entrance before a single flap of her wings left the reverberations bouncing around them broken and distorted. A gust of air strong enough to blow back the flurries and snow drifting in nearly lifted Russo off his feet. Gliding back to her trophy pile, she brushed aside the upper crust of armors.
“Looking for something?”
Shoving her clawed hands deep into her pile, she mentally gauged the depths her limbs sank to. The upper layer belonged to the latest lot of fools that had harassed her this fall and summer, some even prior to Gyorrkith’s latest rampage. Just beneath that were the armors she had liberated from those who had befell her in the spring. And further below that, she could feel a layer of warm fur brush against her claw tips. There we go, last winter’s haul. Scaled fingers clenched tight around her prize. Gently extracting it from the tangled mass of mesh and metal, she lobbed a bundle of furred coats and cloaks at the human. “You’ll be needing these. Toss on a couple of layers under that fireproof cloak of yours.”
Russo’s eyes narrowed. Lice and vermin aside, this would have proven a wonderful makeshift mattress. “Any reason you waited until now to mention you had this veritable treasure trove at your disposable?” Kaya responded with a toothy grin. “…God dammit. I even asked you where I could sleep last night!”
“If I recall correctly, you never did ask what I had available for you to sleep on.” Kaya sniggered as a stream of consonants and vowels mashed themselves together as Russo let out some sort of exasperated exclamation.
Arms and legs buried three layers deep under cloth and fur clung tight to the sides of the dragoness’ neck. Limbs quivering, Russo quickly found himself suffering from a case of vertigo.
“Are you really that doubtful of my capabilities?” Swaying side to side, the snow covered forest sank further and further below the duo. The dark and barren trees loomed above the landscape blanketed in white like branching monoliths. “You’re not going to fall. Calm yourself.”
“I’ve never been this high up before, alright?!” He gulped as he took another oh fuck all why did he keep looking over. Not even giants had a perspective remotely close to this. This was probably one of the first times any mortal had seen the world from this vantage point. Trees, towns, and paths could be squeezed between his fingertips. Toward the horizon he could make out that no-name village, a smoldering and ashen square amongst the otherwise pristine landscape. The majesty and awe was lost on Russo, for the most part. “I’m going to get a little nervous that there’s nothing stopping me from plummeting… from plummeting oh Jesus how high up are we now?”
“Quit panicking.” A wracking cough forced itself out of Russo’s lungs as he tried to gather himself. “For both our sakes.” Flapping her wings intermittently, the dragon’s ascent halted as she maintained a cruising altitude nearing one thousand feet. “The air up here is arid and thin. Focus on your breathing, lest you lose your head.” Kaya’s tone was as dry as the air itself. She knew better than to rush headlong into this confrontation, tiresome and grueling as it was to run through the motions. Necessary precautions and preparations needed to be made.
Drawing in air through his nose, his nostrils went numb as it drifted down into his lungs. The mucus lining his throat dried and cracked, kicking off another bout of coughing.
“Strange as it seems, you’ll find that the closer we gravitate towards that luminous orb looming overhead the colder it gets.” Casting her gaze up, a very faint glowing circle could be seen struggling to poke through the thick grey cloud cover. “This fight is primarily going to be an aerial one. We’ll give you a few minutes to accustom yourself to the…” Hmm. Battleground wasn’t exactly the right word.
“Wait what!? We’re fighting in the air? Why?” Grimacing as drafts of air nipped at his exposed ears, the human pulled down one of his many hoods tight. Lips began to crack and chap as well, prompting the human to pull up one of his multiple new coats up past his nose.
“Gyorrkith’s mobility has to be the first thing we take out if we’re going to beat him. He may not respect me, but he acknowledges I have power enough to harm him if he lets me draw close.” Kaya craned her neck around to regard the mage clinging to her back. “That ruby dragon’s not going to come to us and trade potshots. He’ll be eager to keep his distance, as will I, which is where you come in.”
Russo remained hushed, the whistling of the wind punctuating the silence between the two. “…You want me to warp to him? In mid-air?”
“Something like that,” she quietly acknowledged. “Your role in all this is to be the distraction that can withstand anything and everything Gyorrkith has at his disposal. The fact you’re near impossible to kill, provided your casting is up to snuff, should startle him enough to give me a chance to clip his wings.”
Flakes of rust peeled from the mental gears whirling through Russo’s head. Imaginary metal teeth locking in place, the mage put two and two together. “Was that the only reason why you gave me this spell?”
“Of course not.” Her wings flapped noisily, the pockets of air shoved beneath the dragoness propelling her upward. “There was the warranted caution on my end factoring into my decision.” Rolling to her side, the dragon’s wings angled themselves into a flat line. Kaya sliced through the air and circled back towards the mountain. “I don’t intend to fix one problem by creating another.”
Arms curled tight around her thick neck, Russo buried his face into her scales. “What do you care?” Breathing through his teeth, streams of heat hissed between the gaps in his pearly whites. “Not like you’ll be the one to clean up any messes I make.”
“It’s the peace of mind more I’m more concerned with.”
“K-kaya.” The muscles in his arms began to tug painfully, straining to hold his entire body weight. His world began to twist as the dragoness twirled above him, sailing through the air with her scaly belly facing skywards. Frantically he tried to lock his hands around one another, his wrists rubbing painfully against her coarse scales. “No no no NO NO NO NO NO NO.” Shoulders threatening to pull themselves up out of his sockets, the human’s grip failed. Before Russo even had a chance to scream, his ass plunked down painfully against his aerial perch. Completing her barrel roll in less time than it took to blink, Kaya had already swooped back beneath him. “Was that really necessary?”
“Did I not tell you that I wouldn’t let you fall?” Curling that long serpentine neck of hers to the side, she smirked at her passenger. That scowl glowering back at her only encouraged the dragoness further. “Teasing aside,” Kaya’s expression darked, “it’s time we get to work.”
Breaking her gaze, Russo nervously peered down at the ground below, all covered in white. Frozen over roads and paths cut through the countryside like icy veins. “Still don’t see how I’m supposed to get close to Greg, much less warp over to him.”
“I’ll take responsibility for your first few approaches.” Her attention was drawn back towards the outcropping of rock scraping against the sky she called home. “That’s the best I can promise, since Gyorrkith is going to ascertain our strategy quickly. After that point, it falls on your shoulders.” Gliding round the mountain, the forest surrounding the base gradually disappeared as the snow blackened. The plant life littering the ruby dragon’s side had been subjected to a scorched earth policy, prompting Kaya to scoff at the wanton destruction. Probably due to Gyorrkith’s desire to remove any and all cover for his opponents to take advantage of. The layers of ash had mixed with last night’s snowfall, coloring everything a sickly grey. “Make yourself a target he can’t ignore, force yourself into him. You’ll only have a handful of opportunities to learn from, so make them count.”
“Right, no pressure,” Russo mouthed to himself, his nerves nothing but frazzled. The anticipation and gravity of the situation were hitting hard and heavy. “How are we supposed to draw him out here anyway?”
Shrugging off subtlety like it were some unnecessary baggage, a guttural and reverberating roar echoed out of the mica dragoness’ throat. Her hissing loud enough to be heard over the gales of wind rushing past them, colorless magic pooled in her mouth. The soft glow of magic curved and reflected off her scales, bathing the human in a pale light. Neck arched forward, a beam of pure energy snaked forth from her mouth. With a sweep of her head, Kaya carved a path of destruction into the exterior of her neighbor’s domicile.
“That’ll work.”
Walls of snow and rock cascaded down the side of the mountain, burying the entrance to Gyorrkith’s cave under tons of stone and ice. “Ready yourself, Russo.” Spreading out her wings she let the wind catch against her leathery flesh, propelling them both higher into the atmosphere.
Clinging tight to her neck once more, the mage’s heart pounded in his chest. For a couple minutes the two of them simply watched and waited for the dust to settle. As the snow settled however, trails of steam could be seen wafting up from the mountainside. They rapidly morphed into thick and smoky clouds of mist that condensed back into ice, Gyorrkith’s flames and the freezing weather forcing the moisture to abruptly transition between states of matter. “That’s our cue, huh?” Forcing the lump in his throat down into his stomach, Russo gulped. Magic circulated throughout his body, those familiar tingles of energy clinging to his form him like a second skin.
What sounded like an explosion ripped across the land, its raucous cacophony signaling Gyorrkith’s arrival. A tendril of mist erupted out from the mountain, contrails of smoke following behind the figure pushing it forward. Walls of flame belched forth from the tip of the tendril, consuming and destroying it from within. Awash in fire the ruby dragon hurtled forth, every flap of his wings feeding the fading flames behind him.
“That’s our cue,” Kaya solemnly confirmed. Jagged teeth clamped together tight, ribbons of magic dripped down her chompers and collected along her gums. Narrowing her slitted eyes, her powerful wings flapped furiously. The element of surprise remain to be exploited, however brief the window was. It would be foolish to waste it. “This will be our first approach. Better have that new spell of yours handy, your landing might be a rough one.”
Nodding, Russo tapped his fingers against his palms. The magic coating his body hardened into the desired dragon scale barrier. “R-ready as I’ll ever beEEENGH!” Eyes gone wide, the human’s stomach dropped as Kaya arched her back, bumping her precious passenger up into the air. Her thick tail lashed back and forth, eliciting a Pavlovian fear response from the mage. Oh no.
Who dared to defile his home? To rouse his slumber? Such were the thoughts being roared onto the wind by an enraged dragon, heat wafting off his dark red form. Nowhere near enough snow had fallen the night before for the earth itself to creak and shift and groan under its weight. Something, no, someone prompted this. Gyorrkith’s scaly eyelids bunched together around the amber ovals lodged in his head when his invectives gave him reason to pause. Who among his potential enemies would even be capable of such a thing? Shaking the very mountain, sending avalanches bearing down at his doorstep. Eyes clenched shut, he listened intently to the answers carried upon the wind whistling past.
The low and steady beating of his wings called back… Gyorrkith’s browline creased. He forced the gait of his flight, the rising and falling of his wings, to slow. It was subtle, but his ‘echo’ faltered out of tune for a moment before righting itself. Head dipped low, the ruby dragon dived towards the ground below.
“As expected…” Kaya growled to herself, watching Gyorrkith promptly pull himself out of his dive and surge above her. Slowing to a halt at the top of his hooked ascent, the dragon twirled in place, leveling himself with the earth once more. “It took him no time at all to realize this was a ploy. He’s far too battle hardened for anything as simple as this to take him off guard.” Still, she couldn’t help but smirk. Old bastard’s instincts had played right into her hand.
While he righted himself and stabilized his flight, a faint and mumbled cry registed to Gyorrkith. Hah, ambush aside, the thought of someone being caught in that avalanche below brought a sneering smile to his face. The edges of his smile flattened when that cry grew in intensity. Turning his gaze downward, his expression contorted as he locked gazes with his aggressor. “Kajastaa?! Spitting out her name, flames flickered off his forked tongue.
Hovering in place, Kaya responded with a grin that oozed snark. Anything to hold his attention for just a few more seconds…
“It’s not like you to pick fights, Kajastaa,” he hissed, venom and malice boiling off his molten mouth. “Certainly not ones you’re ill equipped to writhe away from.”
“You’re absolutely right.” Her words slow to carry back up to him across the wind, her message left Gyorrkith uneasy. “And who says that I am?”
“What are…” That cry… no, muffled screaming, became impossible to ignore. How could it possibly be getting louder and louder at such great heights? His eyes swiveled to the bottom of his sockets, homing in on the source of the disturbance. The ruby dragon’s jaw threatened to dislodge itself from his skull due to how fast it dropped. “YOU AGAIN?!”
“Oh for... stop screaming!” The mica dragoness cupped her clawed hands around her mouth and called out to the projectile mage. “Are you trying to give your position away?”
Attention fractured, Gyorrkith’s focus was torn between the dragoness and the human. “Together? The b-both of yooOOOF.” A thunderous clap rippled through the air upon impact as Russo’s flight came to an abrupt halt. Slamming into the dragon’s torso, magical scales tore against physical ones. Kinetic energy transferred from one into the other, cracking and flattening the real deals in the process. Greg’s nostrils flared with a painful exhale. Jagged teeth grit and clamped together, the winged reptile forced to recoil in shock.
Bouncing off his chest, a confused Russo dazedly gave gravity permission to take hold of his flailing form.
“We have the advantage.” Her jaw stretched taut, muscles hidden in her face straining painfully, Kaya’s mouth became a vacuum for the latent magic energy drifting through the air. “Now let’s run with it.” A grey orb of energy struggled to maintain stability and shape within her maw, the steady flow of magic condensing into it rendering the spell dangerously dense and unstable. She flapped her wings harder and harder, determined to remain airborne as the welling magic collecting in her mouth forced her head and neck to hunch low. Clamping her mouth shut, the near solid mass clinked against the back of Kaya’s teeth.
“K-kaya!” Russo fearfully called out as the ground lurched up closer and closer. “A pick-up would be nice about now!”
“Good, he’s clear,” the dragoness mused in relief. Her slitted eyes went narrow as they swiveled from one target to the next.
Scraping at his chest, Gyorrkith leered down furiously at the human, appalled and enraged that the mortal was able to so much as make a dent in his bodily armor. He belched out a stream of flames, roaring when Russo sank out of reach.
Kaya bit down gently on the mass of magic gathered in her mouth, one of her front teeth puncturing its now solid surface. “You’ll find that human isn’t above getting in cheap hit, Gyorrkith.” Swathes of energy leaked out from the puncture and roiled violently in her mouth. “Nor am I.” Lips quivering, the dragoness’ mouth tore itself open as a beam of colorless energy exploded out.
“Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit,” Russo repeatedly muttered, then screamed, when Gyorrkith dived towards him. Jaw stretched wide, the rows of stony teeth lining the dragon’s gums grew in size and clarity upon his approach. Molten spittle dripped out of his maw and blew back past Greg’s head, a fire burning in the back of his throat. “KAYA!” A riotous mixture of crackling and hums answered his plea, prompting both the dragon and human to glance to their sides during their freefall. A dull burst of light obscured Russo’s vision as Kaya’s breath attack slammed into the ruby dragon’s side, peeling back layers of scales that flit and splintered into the wind rushing past.
Gyorrkith roared in pain and folded his wings against his sides, causing the now significantly more aerodynamic reptile to plunge past the human.
“I was under the impression you could warp,” Kaya chidingly stated as she circled round the mage. Diving down alongside him, she matched his speed before swooping beneath him and catching him against the base of her neck.
“Where the hell was I supposed to go?! It’s not like I can teleport wherever I like in the middle of the damn sky!” Sweat pooled against his body under those thick clothes, his breathing heavy and strained while his heart steadied itself. “That spell can’t work without a point of reference!” He peered over the dragoness, the ground below a uniform blanket of white. Oh yeah, real easy to pick a spot to teleport to a thousand plus feet in the air based on those distinguishing landmarks.
“Then use myself or Gyorrkith as waypoints for your spell.” Her voice rose with every flap of her wings to ensure she was heard over the whipping of the wind.
Teeth clacked together, Russo vaguely imagined looking down at a dragon shaped silhouette contrasted against the pristine land below. Turning his head side to side, he hurriedly tried to commit to memory Kaya’s backside. The shimmering scales decorating her serpentine neck, her wide and veiny leathery wings, and those spines curving upon her back. He’d be retreating to his only safe haven in the sky fairly often.
Clutching at his side, Greg’s clawed fingers brushed against exposed flesh. Stray flurries drifting through the sky clung to his body, those that found their way into his fallen defenses melted upon contact with his warm flesh. Slowly but surely the moisture hardened and crystallized in the frigid air, the expanding ice creeping beneath the surrounding scales and popping them out of place. Creaking his head up against his neck, Gyorrkith puffed out a ball of flame. The ice and his scabs adorning his flesh liquefied in the searing heat, the resulting scar tissue clenching tight and pulling the nearby ruby scales closer together. “If you’re so determined to conduct yourself as if you’re a threat to me, Kajastaa,” a snarling a manic grin spread wide across his ancient features. Spreading his wings wide, his descent flattened and curved upward as his flight path took on a split-S shape. “Then I’ll start treating you like one.”
FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Icon is © to
DemonRoniFIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Chapter 43
It wasn’t a throbbing or excruciating pain, the mage noted. Russo rolled onto his side, grunting at the undesirable sensations that accompanied his shifting weight. His limbs were sore and stiff, muscles having been flattened between his own body weight and the cold unforgiving floor. Every time he turned his head, it felt like a taut string stretching down from his neck to his shoulders was pulled to its breaking point. Even in a relaxed position, flat on his side and head resting against his makeshift pillow, the strain on his back remained.
“And we’re already off to a great start,” he grumbled, arms cradled around the back of his neck. Blinking rapidly, flecks of sleep caught in his eyelashes collected along the sides of his eyes. “How is someone even supposed to feel the day they go out and slay a dragon?” The thoughts tumbled painfully through his head and upon his lips. Tired, hungry, and filled with a welling sense of dread? Hell if he knew.
A rhythmic plodding echoing around his ears certainly didn’t help any. Nuzzling into the side of his cloak, Russo tried to ignore the dragoness pacing heavily back and forth at the mouth of her cave.
“Conditions are not what I would call ideal,” Kaya mused aloud, snow drifts crunched loudly under claw. Gray clouds, fat and heavy with precipitation, hung low in the sky. Rays of the sun could be seen poking between the cloud cover here and there, reflecting off the fresh layer of snow that blanketed the forest. “Still…” Given how heavily it had snowed last night, less sunlight was better. Were the sun to shine at its brightest, the very land itself would become a shimmering and blinding mirror at the altitudes their duel was to take place.
“Better to have to worry about my wings freezing up than not being able to see I suppose…” On a day like today, the air would be thick with moisture, water droplets eager to cling to her form. Might have to enlist the mage’s aid if it came to that. Sheets of ice were sure to form on her appendages the higher up she went, and she’d need them melted or shattered before they became a hazard. “Rested, Russo?”
“No.” He heaved a heavy sigh and braced his elbow against the floor. “But it’s not like I’m going to get any less tired as the day drags on.” Pushing himself off the floor, he uneasily steadied his balance.
She continued facing out towards the forest buried under all that white and simply nodded. “If you have any reservations, now would be the time to voice them.”
“Where to start?” A wry laugh tumbled forth from his lips. “Of course I have reservations and misgivings about this whole thing. Who in their right mind picks a fight they know they might lose? Much less one with a god damned dragon?!” Shoulders slumped, Russo dipped down and yanked his dirtied cloak off the floor. As he brushed off the layers of dust and grime, Dark’s sneering visage danced across his mind. That hollowed out jackal’s face with the crescent bobbing between his empty eye sockets taunted him, giddily reminding him of the illusion of choice.
“But I’ve made my decision.” Russo had countless options available to him. Even with the amount of emphasis he placed on his own survival above most others, his rarely used and rusted over moral compass outright forbid him from disregarding Jem’s well-being. With that in mind, his choices winnowed down to near nothing. “I can always more or less kidnap and just drag him back to Tedrah…” Just grab him, teleport them both back home, and it’s a done deal. That would be the smart thing to do… if he had never met Dark. Taking the god’s perplexing and trying influence into account, his choices narrowed down even further. “If I don’t suffer through some sort of trial or ordeal now, Dark will organize one to plow me over later.” Gritting his teeth, the human resolved to suck up the abuse here and now. Cloak wrapped tight around his form, Russo pulled down his hood, eyes burning bright under the shadows cast upon his face. “Let’s just get this over with.”
Kaya cocked her head to the side, turning a wandering eye back towards her guest. “It’s funny, the more I think about it. Here you are, tired and afraid, and still you compel your weary body into battle. Well aware of the danger, the risks, and the idiocy involved.” She turned to face him, the mica dragoness deeming him worthy of her full attention. “Nearly every other mortal before you recklessly barged into my abode, shielded from their own ignorance and the world around them, blissfully unaware of the difficulties and dangers that awaited them.”
“Your point?”
“Heh, I just find it amusing is all. As self-centered as you are, you embody those concepts those idiots hold near and dear,” she tapped away at her scaly fingers as she counted off virtues, “Courage, resolve, strength; far better than they ever could.”
Huh. Wasn’t expecting to get a compliment out of her. Albeit, a somewhat backhanded one. But, still, a compliment! “Thanks, I think?”
“Think nothing of it.” Plodding forward, her serpentine tail lashed side to side behind her. “Familiarized yourself with that new spell of yours yet?”
“Just about.” Holding his hands out from his body, a wall of blue-green magic materialized before Russo’s palms. Pulling his fingers up against the back of it, the edges stretched up and inward. With a little time and coaxing, a magical semi-circle shield stretched from the top of his head down to his ankles. “I can probably get this whole thing to wrap around me…” Okay, so forming the barrier above his head and expecting it to stretch all the way down to his feet was pushing it. Casting it at waist or chest level seemed to be working out pretty well, it wasn’t asking too much to have the barrier stretch a bit going both ways. What if…
“You’re investing too much magic into each spell,” Kaya corrected him. “If you can’t grasp the basics of spellcasting then this will have been for nothing.” Traces of irritation were present in her voice, as if she were a teacher who expected her pupil to know better.
“Not like I asked,” he was tempted to mouth back. Biting back his tongue, he rolled with the punches. His ego could take the hit. Even he knew better than to turn down magical pointers from a dragon.
A clawed finger poked at his gloved hands, dissipating the gathering energies. “Shape the magic when it’s still accumulating and malleable. Then strengthen it into a barrier.”
“Alright, alright.” Still not entirely certain just what the hell he was doing, Russo went through the motions of generating another dragon scale infused shield, this one with significantly less magic behind it. Maybe he could shape it and then pump more magic into it, hardening its form as he went?
Without warning, a thick scaly tail swung into it. Offering up little in the way of resistance, Kaya’s appendage sailed through the spell, shattering it to pieces and whapping at the mage’s feet. What looked like bubbling shards of green glass clinked against the mage and the ground, the magic given physical form sizzling into sparkles of light.
Or not. “…Again?”
The mica dragoness arched her brows in response.
“Alright.” Russo’s eyes turned down towards the shards fading into nothingness caught in the crumples of his cloak. “Again.” Okayyyy so had to get the shape nailed down first thing. Hmm. He tapped a warm mitteny finger against his chin. This was just so backwards to what he was used to! Usually all you did was imagine the spell, primarily its physical effects, and invest the necessary resources into it and hey ho you have a spell. The shape and form came together simultaneously, it wasn’t like you pieced the constituent parts together as if building a puzzle. Want to cast a fire spell? Fathom a searing and terrible heat above your palm, pump the magic where it needs to go and there’s your fireball. Wasn’t like he had to coalesce a ball of energy and THEN imbue it with flames. The barriers were no different…
Kaya watched on curiously. Chin resting in a cupped hand, she cracked a smile at seeing him so deep in thought, her words echoing in his mind. Someone heeding and thinking long and hard about what she said? Goddamn, this really was a delightful change of pace.
“An afterthought…” Was that the problem? The shapes of his spells were always an afterthought, something Russo never dedicated any real mental effort towards. Niggling ideas scratched at the back of his head, generic, almost subconscious assumptions of what a fire or ice or barrier spell ought to look like. Magic was will power given form after all. It wouldn’t be entirely unreasonable to think even subconscious inclinations could play a hand in crafting and shaping magic. “Augh, couldn’t this whole rethinking of magic itself have happened sometime less… urgent?”
His understanding was progressing along nowhere near as expeditious as she would have liked. “I am asking him to undergo an entire paradigm shift in his spellcasting,” she casually admitted. Some patience was warranted on her end. The mica dragoness lowered herself to the ground, her cold and scaly belly hungrily draining what ambient heat remained in the bedrock below.
“Does that mean my spells can take on any shape I want?” His head buzzed at the implications. He smacked his hands against his temples in an attempt to tide the flood of ideas threatening to overflow his imagination. “Stop stop stop, no more thinking.” Russo closed his eyes and began breathing in deeply and slowly. Fingers clenched and unclenched. Slowly and rhythmically, he inhaled and exhaled, the human focusing solely on the physical sensation of a tingling warmth flowing through his veins. As it flowed to and from his fingertips, a weak magical aura surrounded his hands. “I have magic gathered, so, you know, that’s half of the spellcasting done. Now imagine… imagine a hand shaped… wait does that really even count as a shape? Fuck it, it does now.” Shaking his head, he regained his focus. “Imagine a barrier, a little one, wrapped around my hands. A dragon scale barrier.” He felt his gloves grow heavy. The magical energy seeping out of and gathering upon his hands stained through the fire proof accessories, slowly manifesting and solidifying upon the dark fabric. “Strong, but pliable. Hard enough to beat back swords.” His wrists and fingers went stiff. “But flexible enough to allow me movement. To let me bend my fingers.” The constricting pressure around his digits eased up but the heaviness remained.
Blinking her pearly eyes, Kaya gazed down at the dragon scale gauntlets that now adorned his arms. The green aura of magic surrounding his hands had hardened into a barrier, overlapping circles dotted across the surface. Shit. She was not expecting him to interpret her directions so liberally. Oh Lord, this was just rife for abuse. “Not… quite what I had in mind, but very well.”
“Wait, that worked?” Opening his eyes, Russo was astonished to see immediate results. “Woah.” Hands curled into fists, he knocked his knuckles together. Sparks chipped off where magically melded scale met scale.
Her teeth clacking together, the mica dragoness was eager to stifle any further lines of inquiry. “Now that that’s out of the way, you should be able to craft a spherical barrier without-”
“Huh. So if hands count as a shape… does that mean I can make a people shaped barrier?”
Dammit dammit dammit. Oh why bother. “You’re just going to find out for yourself, regardless,” she muttered. An irritated sigh slipped forth from her maw when Russo went ahead and found out that, yes, you can make a people shaped barrier. Kaya rubbed a clawed hand against her forehead as the human oohed and ahhed and marveled at how bitchin’ the spell was.
Covered head to toe in a softly glowing green barrier that conformed to his body, the mage snickered at his newfound knowledge. Magical lasers still would have been preferable but holy hell, this was a close second.
“Care to put that newfound application of your spell to the test first? Better to find out how well it holds up now than on the field of battle.” Rising to her feet, the dragoness eyed the human warily. Kaya’s club of a tail twitched expectantly behind her.
“Guess a little test run couldn’t hu-” One instant Russo was staring up at and conversing with a dragon. The next, he started formulating a question, curious as to why oh fuck Kaya what’s with your taiAAAAHHH. After that, he found himself majestically flailing through the air. Even more after that, he found himself embedded into a cave wall, taking in an eyeful of the lovely limestone rock formations scraping against his face. His mind still reeling from the turn of events that had transpired, he peeled out of the Russo shaped indent in the wall and landed with an oof. A handful of stalagmites crumbled beneath him, chunks of rock catching between the scales in his barrier. Staring up at the rocky ceiling, he rested his hands against his chest. “I don’t know whether to be mad that you just slammed me into a wall or happy that I survived it.”
“You could always take solace in the fact your new spell functions as intended,” the dragoness cheekily replied.
Grumbling, Russo rolled off of the debris pressing into his back. Nerves still shaken, he slowly ran his hands over his arms and shoulders. “Even if I’m more or less invincible,” his barrier began to fade, rocks and pebbles slipping through its surface and bouncing against the huamn’s form, “…for the moment, anyway, that doesn’t mean I enjoy getting smacked around!” Gradual realizations about the limitations of his new spell’s applications accompanied a droop of his shoulders. The mage’s posture and poses weren’t static, he was always moving. It would take a constant flow of magic to keep a barrier snugly wrapped around him, to constantly mold and shift its shape to cling tight to his body.
“Your magic consumption has likely worsened,” her jaw went slack as her forked tongue caught against the back of her jaw, “but at least you are capable of defending yourself from the worst Gyorrkith has to offer. We’re as ready as we’ll ever be at this point.” With a flap of her serpentine wings, the mica dragoness worked warm blood out to her leathery limbs. “Before we depart though…” Pressing her four clawed feet into the ground, she pushed off the beaten rock. The scraping of her claws echoed around the cavernous entrance before a single flap of her wings left the reverberations bouncing around them broken and distorted. A gust of air strong enough to blow back the flurries and snow drifting in nearly lifted Russo off his feet. Gliding back to her trophy pile, she brushed aside the upper crust of armors.
“Looking for something?”
Shoving her clawed hands deep into her pile, she mentally gauged the depths her limbs sank to. The upper layer belonged to the latest lot of fools that had harassed her this fall and summer, some even prior to Gyorrkith’s latest rampage. Just beneath that were the armors she had liberated from those who had befell her in the spring. And further below that, she could feel a layer of warm fur brush against her claw tips. There we go, last winter’s haul. Scaled fingers clenched tight around her prize. Gently extracting it from the tangled mass of mesh and metal, she lobbed a bundle of furred coats and cloaks at the human. “You’ll be needing these. Toss on a couple of layers under that fireproof cloak of yours.”
Russo’s eyes narrowed. Lice and vermin aside, this would have proven a wonderful makeshift mattress. “Any reason you waited until now to mention you had this veritable treasure trove at your disposable?” Kaya responded with a toothy grin. “…God dammit. I even asked you where I could sleep last night!”
“If I recall correctly, you never did ask what I had available for you to sleep on.” Kaya sniggered as a stream of consonants and vowels mashed themselves together as Russo let out some sort of exasperated exclamation.
Arms and legs buried three layers deep under cloth and fur clung tight to the sides of the dragoness’ neck. Limbs quivering, Russo quickly found himself suffering from a case of vertigo.
“Are you really that doubtful of my capabilities?” Swaying side to side, the snow covered forest sank further and further below the duo. The dark and barren trees loomed above the landscape blanketed in white like branching monoliths. “You’re not going to fall. Calm yourself.”
“I’ve never been this high up before, alright?!” He gulped as he took another oh fuck all why did he keep looking over. Not even giants had a perspective remotely close to this. This was probably one of the first times any mortal had seen the world from this vantage point. Trees, towns, and paths could be squeezed between his fingertips. Toward the horizon he could make out that no-name village, a smoldering and ashen square amongst the otherwise pristine landscape. The majesty and awe was lost on Russo, for the most part. “I’m going to get a little nervous that there’s nothing stopping me from plummeting… from plummeting oh Jesus how high up are we now?”
“Quit panicking.” A wracking cough forced itself out of Russo’s lungs as he tried to gather himself. “For both our sakes.” Flapping her wings intermittently, the dragon’s ascent halted as she maintained a cruising altitude nearing one thousand feet. “The air up here is arid and thin. Focus on your breathing, lest you lose your head.” Kaya’s tone was as dry as the air itself. She knew better than to rush headlong into this confrontation, tiresome and grueling as it was to run through the motions. Necessary precautions and preparations needed to be made.
Drawing in air through his nose, his nostrils went numb as it drifted down into his lungs. The mucus lining his throat dried and cracked, kicking off another bout of coughing.
“Strange as it seems, you’ll find that the closer we gravitate towards that luminous orb looming overhead the colder it gets.” Casting her gaze up, a very faint glowing circle could be seen struggling to poke through the thick grey cloud cover. “This fight is primarily going to be an aerial one. We’ll give you a few minutes to accustom yourself to the…” Hmm. Battleground wasn’t exactly the right word.
“Wait what!? We’re fighting in the air? Why?” Grimacing as drafts of air nipped at his exposed ears, the human pulled down one of his many hoods tight. Lips began to crack and chap as well, prompting the human to pull up one of his multiple new coats up past his nose.
“Gyorrkith’s mobility has to be the first thing we take out if we’re going to beat him. He may not respect me, but he acknowledges I have power enough to harm him if he lets me draw close.” Kaya craned her neck around to regard the mage clinging to her back. “That ruby dragon’s not going to come to us and trade potshots. He’ll be eager to keep his distance, as will I, which is where you come in.”
Russo remained hushed, the whistling of the wind punctuating the silence between the two. “…You want me to warp to him? In mid-air?”
“Something like that,” she quietly acknowledged. “Your role in all this is to be the distraction that can withstand anything and everything Gyorrkith has at his disposal. The fact you’re near impossible to kill, provided your casting is up to snuff, should startle him enough to give me a chance to clip his wings.”
Flakes of rust peeled from the mental gears whirling through Russo’s head. Imaginary metal teeth locking in place, the mage put two and two together. “Was that the only reason why you gave me this spell?”
“Of course not.” Her wings flapped noisily, the pockets of air shoved beneath the dragoness propelling her upward. “There was the warranted caution on my end factoring into my decision.” Rolling to her side, the dragon’s wings angled themselves into a flat line. Kaya sliced through the air and circled back towards the mountain. “I don’t intend to fix one problem by creating another.”
Arms curled tight around her thick neck, Russo buried his face into her scales. “What do you care?” Breathing through his teeth, streams of heat hissed between the gaps in his pearly whites. “Not like you’ll be the one to clean up any messes I make.”
“It’s the peace of mind more I’m more concerned with.”
“K-kaya.” The muscles in his arms began to tug painfully, straining to hold his entire body weight. His world began to twist as the dragoness twirled above him, sailing through the air with her scaly belly facing skywards. Frantically he tried to lock his hands around one another, his wrists rubbing painfully against her coarse scales. “No no no NO NO NO NO NO NO.” Shoulders threatening to pull themselves up out of his sockets, the human’s grip failed. Before Russo even had a chance to scream, his ass plunked down painfully against his aerial perch. Completing her barrel roll in less time than it took to blink, Kaya had already swooped back beneath him. “Was that really necessary?”
“Did I not tell you that I wouldn’t let you fall?” Curling that long serpentine neck of hers to the side, she smirked at her passenger. That scowl glowering back at her only encouraged the dragoness further. “Teasing aside,” Kaya’s expression darked, “it’s time we get to work.”
Breaking her gaze, Russo nervously peered down at the ground below, all covered in white. Frozen over roads and paths cut through the countryside like icy veins. “Still don’t see how I’m supposed to get close to Greg, much less warp over to him.”
“I’ll take responsibility for your first few approaches.” Her attention was drawn back towards the outcropping of rock scraping against the sky she called home. “That’s the best I can promise, since Gyorrkith is going to ascertain our strategy quickly. After that point, it falls on your shoulders.” Gliding round the mountain, the forest surrounding the base gradually disappeared as the snow blackened. The plant life littering the ruby dragon’s side had been subjected to a scorched earth policy, prompting Kaya to scoff at the wanton destruction. Probably due to Gyorrkith’s desire to remove any and all cover for his opponents to take advantage of. The layers of ash had mixed with last night’s snowfall, coloring everything a sickly grey. “Make yourself a target he can’t ignore, force yourself into him. You’ll only have a handful of opportunities to learn from, so make them count.”
“Right, no pressure,” Russo mouthed to himself, his nerves nothing but frazzled. The anticipation and gravity of the situation were hitting hard and heavy. “How are we supposed to draw him out here anyway?”
Shrugging off subtlety like it were some unnecessary baggage, a guttural and reverberating roar echoed out of the mica dragoness’ throat. Her hissing loud enough to be heard over the gales of wind rushing past them, colorless magic pooled in her mouth. The soft glow of magic curved and reflected off her scales, bathing the human in a pale light. Neck arched forward, a beam of pure energy snaked forth from her mouth. With a sweep of her head, Kaya carved a path of destruction into the exterior of her neighbor’s domicile.
“That’ll work.”
Walls of snow and rock cascaded down the side of the mountain, burying the entrance to Gyorrkith’s cave under tons of stone and ice. “Ready yourself, Russo.” Spreading out her wings she let the wind catch against her leathery flesh, propelling them both higher into the atmosphere.
Clinging tight to her neck once more, the mage’s heart pounded in his chest. For a couple minutes the two of them simply watched and waited for the dust to settle. As the snow settled however, trails of steam could be seen wafting up from the mountainside. They rapidly morphed into thick and smoky clouds of mist that condensed back into ice, Gyorrkith’s flames and the freezing weather forcing the moisture to abruptly transition between states of matter. “That’s our cue, huh?” Forcing the lump in his throat down into his stomach, Russo gulped. Magic circulated throughout his body, those familiar tingles of energy clinging to his form him like a second skin.
What sounded like an explosion ripped across the land, its raucous cacophony signaling Gyorrkith’s arrival. A tendril of mist erupted out from the mountain, contrails of smoke following behind the figure pushing it forward. Walls of flame belched forth from the tip of the tendril, consuming and destroying it from within. Awash in fire the ruby dragon hurtled forth, every flap of his wings feeding the fading flames behind him.
“That’s our cue,” Kaya solemnly confirmed. Jagged teeth clamped together tight, ribbons of magic dripped down her chompers and collected along her gums. Narrowing her slitted eyes, her powerful wings flapped furiously. The element of surprise remain to be exploited, however brief the window was. It would be foolish to waste it. “This will be our first approach. Better have that new spell of yours handy, your landing might be a rough one.”
Nodding, Russo tapped his fingers against his palms. The magic coating his body hardened into the desired dragon scale barrier. “R-ready as I’ll ever beEEENGH!” Eyes gone wide, the human’s stomach dropped as Kaya arched her back, bumping her precious passenger up into the air. Her thick tail lashed back and forth, eliciting a Pavlovian fear response from the mage. Oh no.
Who dared to defile his home? To rouse his slumber? Such were the thoughts being roared onto the wind by an enraged dragon, heat wafting off his dark red form. Nowhere near enough snow had fallen the night before for the earth itself to creak and shift and groan under its weight. Something, no, someone prompted this. Gyorrkith’s scaly eyelids bunched together around the amber ovals lodged in his head when his invectives gave him reason to pause. Who among his potential enemies would even be capable of such a thing? Shaking the very mountain, sending avalanches bearing down at his doorstep. Eyes clenched shut, he listened intently to the answers carried upon the wind whistling past.
The low and steady beating of his wings called back… Gyorrkith’s browline creased. He forced the gait of his flight, the rising and falling of his wings, to slow. It was subtle, but his ‘echo’ faltered out of tune for a moment before righting itself. Head dipped low, the ruby dragon dived towards the ground below.
“As expected…” Kaya growled to herself, watching Gyorrkith promptly pull himself out of his dive and surge above her. Slowing to a halt at the top of his hooked ascent, the dragon twirled in place, leveling himself with the earth once more. “It took him no time at all to realize this was a ploy. He’s far too battle hardened for anything as simple as this to take him off guard.” Still, she couldn’t help but smirk. Old bastard’s instincts had played right into her hand.
While he righted himself and stabilized his flight, a faint and mumbled cry registed to Gyorrkith. Hah, ambush aside, the thought of someone being caught in that avalanche below brought a sneering smile to his face. The edges of his smile flattened when that cry grew in intensity. Turning his gaze downward, his expression contorted as he locked gazes with his aggressor. “Kajastaa?! Spitting out her name, flames flickered off his forked tongue.
Hovering in place, Kaya responded with a grin that oozed snark. Anything to hold his attention for just a few more seconds…
“It’s not like you to pick fights, Kajastaa,” he hissed, venom and malice boiling off his molten mouth. “Certainly not ones you’re ill equipped to writhe away from.”
“You’re absolutely right.” Her words slow to carry back up to him across the wind, her message left Gyorrkith uneasy. “And who says that I am?”
“What are…” That cry… no, muffled screaming, became impossible to ignore. How could it possibly be getting louder and louder at such great heights? His eyes swiveled to the bottom of his sockets, homing in on the source of the disturbance. The ruby dragon’s jaw threatened to dislodge itself from his skull due to how fast it dropped. “YOU AGAIN?!”
“Oh for... stop screaming!” The mica dragoness cupped her clawed hands around her mouth and called out to the projectile mage. “Are you trying to give your position away?”
Attention fractured, Gyorrkith’s focus was torn between the dragoness and the human. “Together? The b-both of yooOOOF.” A thunderous clap rippled through the air upon impact as Russo’s flight came to an abrupt halt. Slamming into the dragon’s torso, magical scales tore against physical ones. Kinetic energy transferred from one into the other, cracking and flattening the real deals in the process. Greg’s nostrils flared with a painful exhale. Jagged teeth grit and clamped together, the winged reptile forced to recoil in shock.
Bouncing off his chest, a confused Russo dazedly gave gravity permission to take hold of his flailing form.
“We have the advantage.” Her jaw stretched taut, muscles hidden in her face straining painfully, Kaya’s mouth became a vacuum for the latent magic energy drifting through the air. “Now let’s run with it.” A grey orb of energy struggled to maintain stability and shape within her maw, the steady flow of magic condensing into it rendering the spell dangerously dense and unstable. She flapped her wings harder and harder, determined to remain airborne as the welling magic collecting in her mouth forced her head and neck to hunch low. Clamping her mouth shut, the near solid mass clinked against the back of Kaya’s teeth.
“K-kaya!” Russo fearfully called out as the ground lurched up closer and closer. “A pick-up would be nice about now!”
“Good, he’s clear,” the dragoness mused in relief. Her slitted eyes went narrow as they swiveled from one target to the next.
Scraping at his chest, Gyorrkith leered down furiously at the human, appalled and enraged that the mortal was able to so much as make a dent in his bodily armor. He belched out a stream of flames, roaring when Russo sank out of reach.
Kaya bit down gently on the mass of magic gathered in her mouth, one of her front teeth puncturing its now solid surface. “You’ll find that human isn’t above getting in cheap hit, Gyorrkith.” Swathes of energy leaked out from the puncture and roiled violently in her mouth. “Nor am I.” Lips quivering, the dragoness’ mouth tore itself open as a beam of colorless energy exploded out.
“Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit,” Russo repeatedly muttered, then screamed, when Gyorrkith dived towards him. Jaw stretched wide, the rows of stony teeth lining the dragon’s gums grew in size and clarity upon his approach. Molten spittle dripped out of his maw and blew back past Greg’s head, a fire burning in the back of his throat. “KAYA!” A riotous mixture of crackling and hums answered his plea, prompting both the dragon and human to glance to their sides during their freefall. A dull burst of light obscured Russo’s vision as Kaya’s breath attack slammed into the ruby dragon’s side, peeling back layers of scales that flit and splintered into the wind rushing past.
Gyorrkith roared in pain and folded his wings against his sides, causing the now significantly more aerodynamic reptile to plunge past the human.
“I was under the impression you could warp,” Kaya chidingly stated as she circled round the mage. Diving down alongside him, she matched his speed before swooping beneath him and catching him against the base of her neck.
“Where the hell was I supposed to go?! It’s not like I can teleport wherever I like in the middle of the damn sky!” Sweat pooled against his body under those thick clothes, his breathing heavy and strained while his heart steadied itself. “That spell can’t work without a point of reference!” He peered over the dragoness, the ground below a uniform blanket of white. Oh yeah, real easy to pick a spot to teleport to a thousand plus feet in the air based on those distinguishing landmarks.
“Then use myself or Gyorrkith as waypoints for your spell.” Her voice rose with every flap of her wings to ensure she was heard over the whipping of the wind.
Teeth clacked together, Russo vaguely imagined looking down at a dragon shaped silhouette contrasted against the pristine land below. Turning his head side to side, he hurriedly tried to commit to memory Kaya’s backside. The shimmering scales decorating her serpentine neck, her wide and veiny leathery wings, and those spines curving upon her back. He’d be retreating to his only safe haven in the sky fairly often.
Clutching at his side, Greg’s clawed fingers brushed against exposed flesh. Stray flurries drifting through the sky clung to his body, those that found their way into his fallen defenses melted upon contact with his warm flesh. Slowly but surely the moisture hardened and crystallized in the frigid air, the expanding ice creeping beneath the surrounding scales and popping them out of place. Creaking his head up against his neck, Gyorrkith puffed out a ball of flame. The ice and his scabs adorning his flesh liquefied in the searing heat, the resulting scar tissue clenching tight and pulling the nearby ruby scales closer together. “If you’re so determined to conduct yourself as if you’re a threat to me, Kajastaa,” a snarling a manic grin spread wide across his ancient features. Spreading his wings wide, his descent flattened and curved upward as his flight path took on a split-S shape. “Then I’ll start treating you like one.”
FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Category Story / Fantasy
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 120 x 61px
File Size 27.2 kB
Comments