“It is only a young dragon, and one of its wings is shredded. A young gold. Apparently we killed the mother some time back. We’ve only just discovered the wyrmling now. It’s not a great threat, but why let it live to become one?” The colonel paused and seemed to consider. “And, no, Captain, I don’t want you to assassinate the dragon. Highlord Ariakas wants you to. The orders come directly from him. You are to use the mountaineering gear to climb down into the cave, find the dragon, and slay it. The ropes will also help you drag its head back here.”
“Let me go it alone, sir,” Bulmammon said. “These Sivaks will only get in the way.”
The colonel shook his head. “They go with you. Those are also the Highlord’s orders. The Sivaks, and Private Baeron.”
“Private Baeron?” Bulmammon scowled. “What do I need a puny human tagging along for?”
“Highlord’s orders. Set out immediately. Good hunting, Captain.”
Bulmammon snorted.
*****
Captain Bulmammon set a breakneck pace, intent on reaching the North Pass above the Temple of Huerzyd before daylight had completely quit the sky. The private kept up, stride for stride, though sweat glistened on his face. The Sivaks marched afterward in heel-pounding double-time. They crossed the bridge and charged through the slums, the sound of their footfalls clearing the streets for blocks ahead of them. As they pushed past the Temple of Huerzyd, the last sliver of sun shone on the western Newsea. It was dark when the team began the winding climb toward the North Pass, but the red glow of the harbor volcano gave them as much light as did the sun.
The path they traveled was an uneven dirt trail studded with footworn rocks. It climbed steeply through switchbacks and past basalt outcrops. Blasted plants clung here and there on the volcanic mountainside.
The group marched onward, silent except for the scrape of scales on stone.
They crossed a saddle of eroded sand and climbed from basalt to granite. The peaks ahead were not volcanic, were older, rounder. Scrub brush gave way to trees-oak and ash and fir-that glowed so red from the calderas below that they seemed to burn. Captain Bulmammon led his troops into the shadow-dark woods.
Private Baeron drew his belt dagger. The blade flashed inexpertly in his hand, as though he’d used it for nothing but shaving-and didn’t even need it for that. Bulmammon grinned and shook his red-coxcombed head. This human-an assassin!
Emerging from the tortuous trail through the woods, Bulmammon led the squad through a mountainside meadow and onto a promontory, which afforded a view of the fiery city behind them. In the center of the grassy knoll stood a huge oak beside the trail, its limbs splayed.
Bulmammon halted so suddenly that Private Baeron nearly ran full into him. Baeron swerved as the draconian’s head swung around and fixed a red eye on him. “Put that dagger away, Private! You’re liable to hurt yourself!” As the young man resheathed his dagger, Bulmammon turned back toward the tree. Behind him the Sivaks snarled and snapped among themselves.
Bulmammon spent a moment studying the tree, and the rope that dangled loosely some ten feet above his head. Slowly he turned and scowled at his troops.
“There is a traitor among us,” he rasped.
Though no Sivak made any apparent motion, a susurrus of protest and disbelief ran among them.
Furious, Bulmammon advanced on the soldiers. He reached the nearest subordinate and seized the grapple ropes wound in bandolier-fashion around the creature. He shook the draconian, and wrenched the ropes free.
The Sivak glowered. “I did nothing, sir!”
Bulmammon did not seem to hear. He walked away from the line of draconians and toward the huge oak. With a flip of his clawed hand, he flung one of the grapples up over the stout hanging-limb, and kept walking. The line paid out from his hands and the grapple whistled over the branch. The hooked end arced down, caught short on the rope, and whipped rapidly toward Bulmammon’s head.
He caught the hook. Iron rang against iron-hard scales.
Bulmammon turned back, faced his task force. In one hand, he held the grapple by its stem. In the other, he held the loose end of rope, allowing the line to uncoil behind him with each step. “One of you is plotting my death.” The Sivaks looked at each other, then back at the Aurak. Oddly, they made no protest. It was Private Baeron who intervened. “Sir, that’s nonsense!”