Firestorm (23 page)

As they slid down into the watercourse a huge shadow passed silently overhead, momentarily blotting out a large number of stars. Husam ducked his head and pulled Tembo down with him. An
ear-piercing shriek suddenly split the air, bringing a wave of fear even more potent than that inspired by the roars of the three dragons.

‘What on Areth is that?’ Husam asked aloud. He looked back. He could not resist.

‘That’s Shadow. You don’t want to mess with her,’ said a girl’s voice from no more than a few paces to his right. He whirled around. He could not see her through
the smoke and darkness, but she sounded calm as she continued. ‘I suggest you carry on running if you want to live. I would, if I were in your boots.’

At that moment the great shadow stooped. Husam whirled to watch in terrified fascination as it dropped like a stone from the sky onto the field from which he had just run. As it neared the
ground he realised the shadow’s target.

Kasau had almost reached the two waiting dragons when the deafening screech stopped him in his tracks. Confused, he looked around and saw the dusk dragon charging his line of hunters from the
right. A flash of annoyance that none of the hunters had followed him in his attack caused him to curl his upper lip back in a snarl. He knew instantly, however, that the roaring dusk dragon had
not made the unearthly screech. His eyes flicked upwards.

The dragonhunter dived to the right as Shadow dropped from the sky towards him like a giant falcon. Her massive talons missed him by a whisker, driving deep into the earth where he had been
standing a split heartbeat before. As he rolled to his feet he swept the air above his body with his sword. The blade did not connect. Despite her size and heavily armoured hide, Shadow was wary of
the dragonbone sword. She lunged, mouth gaping wide. Prudence stopped her short, just out of reach of the blade. For a moment, Kasau held her at bay and his mismatched eyes filled with fanatical
zeal as he leaped into the offensive.

Husam stood entranced by the scene, with Tembo at his side. He felt duty bound to help his embattled leader, but fear and indecision kept him from moving. Kasau pressed forwards, forcing Shadow
to hop back in a most ungainly fashion. The canny night dragon gave another dummy lunge as she did so, keeping the dragonhunter focused on her head and talons, whilst whipping her long tail around
to strike from the side. If she had tried the tactic in the daytime, it was unlikely that it would have succeeded. But in the dying light offered by the remnants of the dawn dragon’s fading
glow, Kasau sensed the danger too late. The night dragon’s tail smashed into him from the side with the weight and force of a falling tree.

The impact knocked him clear off his feet. Pain erupted in his chest as he fell and his sword flew from his grip, spinning end over end in a lazy arc. As he hit the ground, Kasau rolled, but he
was not fast enough. More pain exploded like red fire as great talons pierced his thigh and stomach, pinning him to the ground. Instinctively he grabbed at the talons in an effort to pull himself
free. They felt smooth and polished, like the marble pillars of the great temple in Mero where he had grown up, and equally as immovable, as he strained against the dragon’s deadly hold. His
strength was slipping away. He was soaked in his own blood. It was over. He knew it, but he could not accept it. Drifting smoke and the musky scent of the night dragon wafted over him. But it was
the meaty breath and the great gaping jaws descending towards him that ignited his spirit to a final act of defiance. With a shuddering gasp he drew his knife an instant before the great teeth
struck.

Husam winced as Shadow pounced like an oversized cat. He saw the night dragon’s talons impale Kasau, but to his amazement, despite the dragon’s deadly strike he saw the dragonhunter
reach to his hip and draw a dagger. What Kasau hoped to do with it, Husam could not begin to imagine, but before the dying hunter had a chance to raise the blade in anger, the dragon’s jaws
opened wide and bit him with the speed of a striking viper. Husam lowered his eyes quickly as the sickening sounds of Kasau’s death were followed by a strange, rumbling growl of satisfaction
from the dragon.

‘Roughly translated, I believe that was dragon for “Mmm, crunchy!”’ the girl’s voice said calmly from the darkness. ‘You’d better start running –
she’s got the taste for blood now.’

Husam was not about to argue with such obvious logic. He spun, but as he did so something hit him from behind with so much force that it picked him from his feet and threw him several paces
through the air.

‘Husam? Are you all right?’ Tembo asked, racing to his friend’s aid as he lay sprawled on the ground.

‘I think so,’ he gasped. His back still felt scorched and he could now smell that the hair on the back of his neck had been singed as well. ‘Whatever hit me didn’t hurt.
Let’s get out of here. This was a bad idea from the start.’ His heart raced and his chest was heaving as he fought for breath. He did not want to say more. His mind seemed suddenly
filled with strange pictures and sounds.

‘No arguments with that here,’ Tembo said quickly.

The big man hauled Husam to his feet and together they ran away into the valley as fast as they could. Had the light been better, or had Tembo paused to look his friend in the eyes before they
ran, he might have thought twice about following his friend. It was not until the next morning that he was to discover the strange change in Husam. In the early misty light, as they stirred the
ashes of their little campfire into life, a chill shot down Tembo’s spine. It was startling. His friend’s eyes were no longer their normal, azure blue – well, the right one was,
but the left had changed. It was darker. So dark, it was almost purple.

Chapter Twenty

In the morning, swathes of blackened grass and odd fragmented remains of weapons were all that marked the dramatic events of the previous evening. Elian turned the dragonbone
sword over and over in his hands as he considered what had happened. The sword looked identical to the one Kasau had carried, but that was impossible. Kasau and his hunting party were in Racafi,
hundreds of leagues south of their position. It made no sense.

‘Elian, I have a confession to make.’
Aurora sounded embarrassed. Considering her normal superior tone, Elian was surprised to hear the penitent note in her voice.

‘A confession, Ra?’ he replied, looking up into his dragon’s amber eyes. ‘What sort of confession?’

‘We’re not when we thought we were,’
she said cryptically.

Elian thought about that statement for a moment. It made no sense. ‘What do you mean not
when
?
’
he asked. ‘Surely you mean not
where
?’

There was a long pause in his mind. Elian could feel Ra’s presence and a little of the emotion in her hesitation to answer.

‘The dragonhunters last night were the same group that we met in Racafi,’
she said slowly.

‘Impossible!’ Elian answered immediately. ‘There’s no way they could have got here in the couple of days since we escaped them.’

‘That would be true if it had been just a couple of days, but it hasn’t. I pondered on it last night. It was Shadow who confirmed my suspicions. When we came through that last
gateway I made a mistake that is likely to make our lives rather difficult for a while.’

‘What sort of mistake?’ he asked, his mind replaying the last transfer.

‘Well when I explained the nature of the gateways and my ability to travel through them, I omitted one rather important fact. The relationship of time between our world and the one on
the other side of the gateways is not linear.’

‘Not linear? I don’t understand. What do you mean?’

‘Whenever I go to the other world, I allow my dragon-sense to lead me to where and when I’m supposed to be,’
Ra explained.
‘However, when I come back I normally
concentrate on emerging here in our world on the day after I left. On that last jump the strain of making the gateway took all my concentration, so I allowed my dragonsense to lead me. I expected
to arrive here the day after we left Cemaria, but we didn’t. We effectively spent three weeks in France. The dragonsense is a strange instinct. We dragons believe it is tied in with our
destiny.’

‘Three weeks! But I thought we had lots of time before the harvest moon. If you’re right we only have . . .’

‘Just over six weeks to complete the quest,’
Ra finished.

Elian nodded as he checked her calculation. This did not give them long to find the four orbs and get back to the Oracle. They would only have about ten days to track down each orb. Then a
thought struck him.

‘What if . . . what if next time when you take us through the gateways you concentrate on bringing us back here before now? Go
back
in time! We could get the three weeks
back,’ he said excitedly.

‘It can’t be done,’
Ra answered.
‘When a point in time has passed, it’s gone for ever. If I concentrate I can emerge an instant after we left, no matter
how long we spend on the other side. But I cannot take us into the past. The time is lost to us. I’m sorry.’

Elian nodded. ‘Well, we must trust your dragon-sense. If we’re meant to succeed, we must still have time. We’ll just have to make the most of every heartbeat from now
on.’

‘Then we must leave now. It’s a long way to the enclave of the day dragons and I won’t be able to open another gateway safely for some days yet.’

Elian did not need to ask why this was the case. He could still feel an echo of the mental fatigue he had experienced through the link when they came through the last gateway. He did not want to
use the gateways again until Ra was recovered sufficiently. The dangers involved in getting stuck in the other world were too great.

To Elian’s surprise, when he returned to the campsite, Nolita was ready to go. There was a glint of determination in her eyes, which before had only been displayed in denial of her
destiny. Now she seemed set on continuing the quest.

They struck camp, taking care to ensure the fire was totally extinguished, but leaving the shelter intact. Assuming they found the orbs, they would be coming back this way, and having the
framework in place would save them a lot of effort when they returned.

Buoyed by her triumph of the previous evening, Nolita tried again to approach Firestorm. She needed to ride a dragon to continue the quest. It made sense that she ride Firestorm, but no matter
how hard she tried, it was as if an invisible force repelled her, making her stomach heave the moment she began to move in his direction. The nausea, frustration and fear brought tears to her eyes
as she was forced to accept defeat.

Some heroine! she thought.

Firestorm crouched quietly on his haunches and watched her silent battle. It was frustrating to be so powerless, but he knew that anything he did would only make it harder for her.

Elian noted that the fear in her eyes looked as strong as ever as he helped her up onto Ra’s back. He could see the muscles around her jaw bunching as she clenched her teeth together in an
effort to control her emotions. Her face was deathly pale, but there were no protests today. She took her place silently and clamped her hands tightly around the pommel of the saddle.

Pell refused to abandon his solo quest for the night orb. He launched first on Shadow and as soon as she was airborne the night dragon turned eastwards. Pell gave them a final wave as Shadow
powered upwards in the long climb over the mountains, and on towards the great continent of Isaa and the enclave of the night dragons.

In resignation, Kira shrugged and took the lead, leaping across the meadow on Fang. Elian adjusted the dragonhunter’s sword that he had rigged across his back. Shadow had eaten the
scabbard, so he had been forced to improvise. Since Elian had lost his sword to the dragonhunters during their first encounter it felt right to take this one in recompense.

‘Just you be careful with that thing,’
Ra warned, her voice disapproving. ‘
I don’t want you inadvertently sticking me with it.’

‘I’ll do my best,’ Elian said, chuckling. ‘Hold tight, Nolita. We’re off.’

Once more, Elian delighted in the thrill of the take-off run and the feeling of wonder as the ground fell away beneath him. He sensed that Nolita was rigid with fear, but she did not cry out. He
felt strangely proud of her. Her actions the previous evening – warning them of the approach of the dragonhunters through Firestorm – had shown considerable bravery.

Her calm account of the encounter had given cause for amusement. Firestorm confirmed through Ra that the conversations she had described were accurate. ‘Mmm, crunchy!’ Elian smiled
to himself. Nolita had plenty of nerve when it came to facing down people. Pell had not been able to see it, of course, but Elian suspected that Pell often only saw what he wanted to see.

The morning mist was thin. Above the murky layer the sky was totally clear of cloud. The white-capped mountains, shouldering into the vast ocean of blue, made for breathtaking views. The wind
had dropped overnight, so the turbulence of the previous day was no longer a cause for concern. Today the air was smooth, clear and crisp. Perfect, Elian thought. If Nolita could just relax when
it’s like this, she might learn to enjoy flying.