A Night of Dragon Wings

LYANA



Ships burned along the Pallan, a line of fire blazing across the desert. Once this river had teemed with life. Merchants, soldiers, and fisherman had sailed upon their barges and cogs. Reeds, palm and fig trees, and rustling fields had lined the riverbanks. Ibises, falcons, jackals, and hundreds of other animals had drunk from these waters. Today under the cruel sun the river crossed the desert like a scar, her sails, trees, and farms burning, her animals fallen or scattered.

This place was the vein of Tiranor, Lyana thought, pumping blood to her capital. Today we burned this vein and left Irys to choke and rot.

The capital perhaps was choking now, but her sister city—Iysa, great southern jewel of the desert—still pulsed. Lyana kept flying south, her host around her: thousands of dragons and griffins all bearing riders. Before them in the desert, the Pallan widened into a sprawling oasis, and here rose the white walls and towers of Iysa.

Lyana had heard stories of this city. Here did Tiranor build her ships, forge her steel, and mine her jewels. She had imagined a place bustling with enemy forces: battalions of archers upon the walls, phalanxes of wyverns and phoenixes circling overhead, and swarms of nephilim festering and screeching for blood.

Instead, as she flew toward the white walls, she found a ghost city.

The walls of Iysa stood barren, their battlements like sun-dried jaws upon sand. The towers stood silent; no war horns blew upon them, and only a single, tattered banner flapped from one, hiding and showing the Golden Sun. Lyana frowned, flying closer. Behind her flew her warriors.

"It's too quiet," said Wila, her rider. "Nephilim guarded every cog along the river. Won't they guard a city?"

Lyana sniffed. She could smell the rot of nephilim, but could not decide if they lurked here in hiding, or had left their stench and fled. She flew higher and over the walls. Below her, the streets of Iysa spread like a barren labyrinth. Shops, temples, forts, homes—all lay silent and still. Lyana saw no movement but for a few flapping tunics upon lines and a dog that fled into an alley. Docks stretched into the river, naked of ships.

When Lyana looked south of the city, she saw many footprints in the sand heading toward distant hills. She squinted and gazed into the horizon; she could just make out fleeing beasts aflight, perhaps wyverns or nephilim.

"They fled the city," Lyana said. "They heard of our approach. They ran rather than fight."

Lyana heard the creak of Wila tugging her bowstring.

"I don't like this," the rider said. "Nephilim—the spawn of demons—fleeing from battle? Something is wrong here. This is a trap."

"Let's be careful," Lyana agreed. "As far as we know, Solina loaded up the city with Tiran fire, and some poor bastard down there is just waiting for us to land so he can blow the place up."

They circled above the city—dragons, griffins, riders. Their wings scattered dust and leaves and bent the trees below. By a domed temple, movement caught Lyana's eyes. She stared down, squinting, to see several men cowering in a courtyard. They wore rags, iron collars encircled their necks, and dust filled their white hair. Welts and blood covered them. Chains ran from their ankles to heavy iron balls the size of watermelons, too heavy to even drag.

"The city folk left their slaves," Lyana said. "Those too old, weak, or wounded to flee with them."

She circled above the temple. Rough bricks formed its dome, and several palm trees swayed alongside it. When her shadow fell upon the slaves, they wailed and covered their heads. They were thin, ribs showing between the tatters of their rags, and whip lashes covered their backs. Blood stained their lips.

They're dying of thirst and heat, Lyana thought. She looked around the city, cursing. Damn it. She could still smell rot here somewhere—did nephilim hide in these houses, or did their stench merely linger? Was this a trap and the slaves the bait?

She looked over her shoulder at her rider. Wila sat with an arrow nocked, her face stern and her golden hair billowing. Her breastplate bore the bull horns of Osanna in silver, and a golden pin—shaped like the walls of Confutatis, the White City—clasped her gray cloak.

"Wila," Lyana said, "keep that arrow nocked. We're going to help these men."

Wila frowned. "My lady, I don't like this. Nephilim waited for us on the beaches. They hid along every league of the river. This place is too quiet. I say we burn the damn city from the air."

A sigh clanked Lyana's scales. "I would, but… Wila, too many innocents have died. We have slain too many women and children. How many cowered in the hulls of the ships we burned—the wives, sons, and daughters of merchants shipping supplies to Irys? How many women and children now hide in that northern capital as dragons rain fire upon it?" She shook her head. "We do not crave the death of our enemy's innocents. We are not Solina; she slew our children with relish. I have killed my enemies, Wila, and perhaps while doing so, I have killed innocents too, bystanders whose only sin was standing too close to those who seek my own death. This will haunt me. This blood I cannot wash from my hands. This blood I had to shed. But here in this city, seeing abandoned slaves cowering below me, I cannot blow my fire. If I did, would I not be as Solina is? Fighting a monster, would we not become monsters ourselves? I will save them if I can. If I can save the innocents of the enemy, perhaps after all this blood and fire, I can save my own soul."

She dived toward the courtyard. Her claws clattered against the cobblestones, and the chained slaves whimpered.

Lyana whipped her head from side to side, sniffing the air. The drool and pus of nephilim seeped between the cobblestones and puddled in a corner; the stuff reeked. The creatures had been here not hours ago.

"Please," whispered a slave, an old man with a white beard. "Please don't hurt us, don't burn us, please…"

Still in dragon form, Lyana approached the chained men. In the sky, griffins and dragons circled over the city; some were descending to land upon roofs and streets. The chained slaves flinched whenever a shadow crossed them.

"I'm not going to hurt you," Lyana said. "Where are the nephilim? Where—"

Stars.

Lyana growled and took flight.

Stars damn it.

These slaves were not chained to balls of iron. They were chained to clay balls of Tiran fire.

She had not soared fifty feet when the temple ceiling crashed open, the doors shattered, and nephilim burst screeching outside.

The air cracked. The Tiran fire exploded below. Fire raged and white light flooded Lyana, and the slaves' blood splattered her. Her ears rang, and claws grabbed her leg, pulling her down. She roared.

As she plummeted, she glimpsed the rest of the city. From every temple, fort, and hall, nephilim burst into the sky. Tiran fire exploded. Flames and blood showered across Iysa.

Lyana crashed back onto the temple courtyard. One nephil grabbed her leg, and three others leaped onto her. The slaves were gone; nothing remained of them but blood and gobbets of flesh. The temple walls had shattered opened; archers stood there, and arrows flew at Lyana.

She roared and blew her fire. Upon her back, Wila screamed and fired her own arrows. Lyana's flames crashed into a nephil, slamming it against a wall. Another leaped onto her shoulder, and claws dug, and Lyana screamed and bit. Her teeth sank into the beast's flesh, and she tasted its rot and maggots.

"Take her alive!" shouted a Tiran soldier in the temple. "Her horns are gilded—this one is a noble. Take her alive!"

Lyana screamed and flapped her wings, struggling to rise. She kicked wildly, freed herself, and flew ten feet.

Three more nephilm swooped from above, crashed down onto her, and she slammed into the cobblestones again. They cracked beneath her. She roared and blew fire.

"Wila, run!" she screamed. She did not know if her rider even lived. Arrows peppered her, clattering against her scales. One pierced her chest, and Lyana roared in pain, and claws tore at her, and teeth bit, and pain flooded her.

Light and song and ringing flowed across her.

Her magic tore free like a bandage from a wound.

She lay in human form, the nephilim dwarfing her. She gripped her sword. She drew a foot of steel. She screamed and claws grabbed her, tightened around her like a girdle of bone, and lifted her.

She screamed and kicked and spat, tried to shift again, and shouted every curse she knew. She was still screaming when they shoved a sack over her head, and wings flapped, and her legs kicked in midair. Wind whipped her, her head spun, and terror pulsed in her chest.