Storm Dragon by James Wyatt

Author:James Wyatt
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Epic, Fantasy fiction, Dragons, Fiction, Fantasy, Eberron (Imaginary place), General
ISBN: 9780786948543
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
Published: 2008-05-06T11:46:38+00:00

PART

III

The cauldron of the thirteen dragons boils

until one of the five beasts fighting over a single bone

becomes a thing of desolation.

Desolation spreads over that land like wildfire, like plague,

and Eberron bears the scar of it for thirteen cycles of the Battleground.

Life ceases within its bounds,

and ash covers the earth.

CHAPTER

27

Darraun stayed in camp, staring into the fire. It was easier that way. Earlier, he had made the mistake of wandering out to look at the dragons.

On every ledge jutting out from the cliff they perched or wheeled through the air like seagulls. More huddled in circles on the ground outside the camp. Great four-legged lizards—some squat and strong, others long and sinuous—with wings folded alongside their scaled sides or fanning out above and behind them. Long tails lashed along the ground, and teeth like swords tore the flesh of the game and fish they caught. And these monsters, these dragons … they spoke.

It was the speech that really unnerved him. It was one thing to see a score of dragons as something like a flock of birds, riding the wind and roosting on the cliffs as if they jockeyed for the best roosting places and squabbled over fish. It was something very different to recognize them as a collection of intelligent creatures, gathered in this place for a purpose—a purpose they took very seriously. It made them less like a flock of animals and more like an army.

Of course, the closer Darraun got to any dragons, the larger he realized they were. Again, as they circled in the sky above, it was easy to imagine they were no larger than eagles. But when he rounded a corner and found himself face-to-flank with a red dragon, it struck him that many of these creatures were the size of a horse, and a few were larger than Vaskar. He stumbled away from a blast of flame that he was pretty sure had been meant merely as a warning, and retreated to the camp.

He caught enough snippets of dragon conversation on his brief stroll outside the camp to confirm that the dragons gathered here shared Vaskar’s philosophy, more or less.

“We’re not mercenaries,” a large black dragon had protested within his earshot. They spoke Draconic, of course, which made Darraun a little unsure of his understanding.

“Of course not,” a smaller silver had answered. “This isn’t about serving a human army. It’s about the Prophecy.”

Darraun stared into the fire. What part of the Prophecy did the dragons think they were accomplishing by fighting for Haldren? He thought he remembered Gaven saying something in the City of the Dead about a “clash of dragons,” but that seemed to imply dragons fighting other dragons. Or dragons fighting people with dragonmarks. Or dragons fighting the Storm Dragon. Or the Storm Dragon fighting Vaskar, for that matter.

“Thinking about the Prophecy makes my head spin,” he muttered.

“That’s why I don’t think about it,” Cart said. His voice startled Darraun, who had been so wrapped up in his thoughts he’d forgotten the warforged was there.

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