The Dragon's Doom

The barge captain watched those askings, sighed, and said flatly, "Ask your one thing, Lord Delcamper."

"Why are we on the water? Silverflow barges don't normally travel by night, and I remember us tying up and bedding down. When I came awake, there were one or two of these fires and we were under way again. Why?"

The breezes brought them more screaming; the folk doing it sounded terrified. "Is Aglirta at war?"

The barge captain shrugged. "As to war, the shouting and the fires, I know no more than you do. Something's going on, aye, but all I can tell you is that we cut our moorings in fair haste, and left Sabbar dock as fast as we could."

Flaeros cast a look back at the grimly rowing sailors, and saw sweat glistening on them in the reflected firelight. It was a clear night, but more warm than chill, even right on the water. "Why?" he asked again, when it became clear the barge captain was in no hurry to say more.

"Sir bard," the man asked reluctantly, "have you ever seen lions with two heads, that turned into great snakes halfway down their bodies, and slithered along with no rear paws? Or doings like walking spiders as big as mules, but with dozens of snake-heads sprouting from the tops of their bodies?"

"N-no," Flaeros replied. "The lion-things are known to heralds, though, and are called krimazror, or krimazrin in the singular. The desert backlands of Sarinda were once full of them, the tales say."

"Ah. Well. That's very nice. Remind me never to take it into my head to go faring into the deserts of Sarinda."

"Master Rold," Flaeros asked firmly, "are you telling me you've seen such beasts this night? Here, in Aglirta? Real beasts, and not some wizard-spun illusions to drive you off a dock he was keeping open for someone else, say?"

"I saw no wizards," the barge captain replied stolidly, "or at least, no men in robes who waved their arms as they sneered and declaimed, but I did see beasts of both these sorts. Real beasts, Lord Delcamper. They burst onto the docks and bit the heads off some of the crew-and sleeping passengers, too-of the Taratheena, out of Dranmaer. It was tied up next to us, and when a lion-thing looked our way, I yelled at the lads to cut loose and push off into the Silverflow."

They were rounding a great bend in the river, and there were more flames ahead. Flaeros shook his head. "I don't doubt your word, master-but I can scarce believe it."

"Huh. You're not alone in that," the barge captain replied. "Now, Lord Delcamper, I'd best devote my full attention to avoiding sandbars and swimming monsters, and suchlike, so if you'll…"

"Of course," Flaeros said, turning away from the raised bow under the watchful eyes of the guards.

As he did so, a weird hissing call arose, faraway down the Vale, and seemed to sweep closer, picked up and echoed by unseen folk-or beasts-nearer at hand. As if in response, the pillars of flame bent, wriggled, and took on the shapes of serpents, snake-heads questing this way and that. Flaeros could just make out the heads and arms of a ring of worshippers gathered around the base of the nearest bright serpent of fire.

It bent toward the bank, a forked tongue of fire licking forth, and Flaeros felt its heat on his face. Instinctively he shrank away, murmuring, "I might have known! Always, 'tis the Snake-lovers!"

A low moan of recognition and fear arose on the barge. Flaeros looked back downriver, and then forward, and shook his head. Much of the Vale seemed to have erupted in whatever mischief this was.

Abruptly, a hay-barn perched high on the bank they were passing burst into flame-a blaze set by whoever was crying out in triumph, not a serpent-shaped fire, at least not yet-and in its sudden bright light, Flaeros and everyone else on the Silver Fin saw people ru

Staggering, and sinking down into things that grunted and snorted and ran now on all fours, reaching out with tentacles or crablike claws or spindly, barb-limbed talons.

People were screaming, people were falling and being eaten.

"Three take us all!" someone gasped, as a tall, elegant lady in a torn gown ran down the bank, hotly pursued by two youths. Almost at the water's edge they caught and clawed at her, raking her face and arms into bloody ruin. She bit them, snarling and pummeling, as the last shreds of her clothing fell away, and then flung herself atop one of them and held him down and drowning as she battled the other.

Flaeros and his fellow travelers on the barge stared in horror as hair was torn out and kicks and punches thrown recklessly. Everyone seemed enraged, one screaming man even turning with a roar to bite and claw the monster chasing him. Everywhere, folk were battling in barehanded, reckless savagery, like maddened animals.

"What's happened?” someone on the barge gasped.

"Magic," a barge guard said grimly, and spat disgustedly into the river. "The same blight that always afflicts Aglirta. Fell magic, from wizard or Serpent-priest. To rule it, they rush to destroy or maim it. Until Aglirtans rise up and rid themselves of such vermin, this is going to happen again and again. My father told me it raged in his time-and here we are forty-odd summers later, and how far has the Kingless Land come?"

"Well," Flaeros replied quietly, "they have a King now."

The guard looked at him. "Hah! And do they heed him? Do the Serpents bow, and the barons obey, and the people know peace?" He waved at the fires and screaming people on the shore, and added wearily, "Oh, for a true King! This land could be so great!"

"I think it is great," Flaeros said firmly, "to have survived at all. The Dwaer-Stones lost and lost again, Faerod Silvertree and his Dark Three, Bloodblade, the Rising of the Serpent, the death of King Snowsar… Aye, Aglirta has survived much."

The guard slowly surveyed the fires and the maddened folk busily slaying each other, and then grunted, "Survived? Well, aye, after a fashion, Lord Bard. After a fashion."

They exchanged grim nods as the barge slid on through the night of blood and madness. Here and there, bodies were bobbing in the waters now.

"Is that you, Tash?"

"It had better be," the Lady Talasorn told Craer, as she swung around a corner to embrace him, and unhooded a lantern. "We… we're a littie weary."

"Huh," the procurer muttered, "you're weary. Who's been swinging swords and jumping around like jesters while you three lounged around humming to yon Dwaer, I'd like to know?"

"Charming as always, Overduke Delnbone," Blackgult observed from across the chamber.

"One has one's reputation to maintain," the procurer replied, sketching an elegant bow.

"Evidently," the Golden Griffon replied in weary rebuke. "We felt the castings dwindle and end, so I presume the priests are all dead or fled, but I hope you sent Stornbridge to a fitting end?"

"One priest fled, aye," Hawkril replied, shouldering into the room, "and Craer did his usual dancing justice upon the unlamented tersept. But we've some grim news to report: The Serpents have unleashed something they call the Blood Plague, all over the Vale."

Embra nodded, looking pale and drawn. "It does seem widespread, yes. Fell and mighty, laying madness on folk who've never bent a knee to the Great Serpent as well as those who've come to his altars, so far as I could see. The altar fires…" She winced at the memory. "We had to leave off using the Dwaer, or be overwhelmed. So much magic, and so… twisted!

Craer nodded. "So, does anyone have anything trustworthy we can eat or drink?"

His fellow overdukes stared blankly at him, and then Blackgult- followed by Tshamarra, and then Hawkril-started to laugh.

"Well?" the procurer asked, folding his arms. "Are we now the masters of Stornbridge Castle? Should we find some chamber with food and drink that we can readily garrison, and get some sleep?"