Dragon Alliance: Rise Against Shadow (23 page)

They could have flown the whole way to Battle Point, but that would have taken several days, even with the speed of a gold dragon and a giant eagle. Jodem’s staff’s dragonstone started to glow, and with a bluish mirage-like shimmer of air around him and his giant eagle, they disappeared. Gallanth and Mkel visualized the air space over the walled city of Battle Point, and Mkel saw the familiar blue streaks of light form around them and then blackness. This only lasted a second, but the empty feeling of the inner space between points always reminded Mkel of total nothingness. In any event, they emerged over the city without error and began to circle around as Gallanth gave a greeting roar to announce their presence. This was to assure the tower guards and Battle Point land dragons that he was friendly and not a chromatic dragon seeking battle.

The walls of the city were made of heavy granite and limestone rocks that came from the quarry roughly five to six miles away. There was a smaller wall inside the main city wall, which was hastily built after a momentous battle over thirty years ago. The outer wall was at least sixty feet high, taller in many places. The city itself covered over fifty square miles, making it much bigger than Draden, but still not nearly as big as many of the coastal Alliance cities such as Atlean, Lancastra, and Fathracia, and nowhere near as large as Draconia. The central keep, which held the homes of the mayor and other government officials, as well as the backup headquarters for the commanding general of the legion stationed at Battle Point, now also housed several other key buildings and structures. The troops and various forces of the legion were stationed in barracks that ringed the inside of the city walls. The city itself held two hundred to three hundred thousand at any one time, but could hold much more.

Battle Point sat on the west side of the small river that ran south from the northern plains. It eventually grew wider and deeper as it neared the southern kingdoms and eventually emptied into the large inland Ontaror Sea that lay just north and east of the Fire Mountain chain, over eighteen hundred miles south. It also fed the vast swampland in that region. Battle Point was always bustling with activity. It was the central trading outpost and waypoint between all kingdoms east of the Alliance border as well as those in the north and south. Alliance forces at Battle Point created a degree of stability in the region, which allowed trade to flow freely.

There were three patrols of mounted hippogriffs coming and going in the air above the city besides Gallanth and Jodem, along with dozens of other non-military hippogriffs and flying mounts. Mkel could see the crowds in the markets below stop to look up at the circling gold dragon and giant eagle. In a couple of minutes, a squadron of hippogriffs rose up from the stables and barracks located in the southern area of the city, which was also the largest landing within the city’s walls, to meet and guide Gallanth and Vatara to their landing site. It was customary to escort a metallic dragon down to the landing. The escort was a type of honor or salute to the dragon and rider, for the arrival of a metallic, especially a gold or silver, meant the population would be a little safer and the legion or Alliance forces present had a powerful ally. A visit from a gold dragon also was rumored to mean good luck for that community. There was partial truth to this, for nothing in this world could face a gold dragon in battle and hope to survive one on one. Additionally, the higher metallic dragons, especially golds, inspired courage and uplifted the spirits of those who viewed them or were in the presence of one.

As the twelve mounted hippogriffs gained altitude and lined up with Gallanth and Vatara, the squadron leader waved to Mkel. The hippogriff riders alternated as lancers and missile soldiers, with either short composite recurved bows or repeating crossbows. They flew in pairs or wing mates to complement each other with one lance and one archer. They still wore the traditional banded or scale armor of the Alliance soldier, but it was more padded because of the colder temperatures that aerial riders encountered.

“Captain Mkel, Lieutenant Americ, sir. I am here to escort you, Gallanth, and Master Wizard Jodem to the lower field,” the young Alliance officer said to Mkel through his seeing crystal.

“You lead and we will follow,” Mkel responded, “but make sure to give us a wide berth, for the draft from Gallanth’s back wings when he lands is enough to topple your hippogriffs.”

“Yes sir, we will circle the city one more time to give the people one more good look at Gallanth, the mayor’s idea, and then you can land in the center of the field in front of the barracks and stables. We will land just after you and behind you,” the lieutenant instructed.

“Acknowledged, Lieutenant,” Mkel agreed.

The hippogriffs flapped their brownish white wings almost in unison as they tried to move ahead of Gallanth and Jodem for the final circle around the city. Gallanth was a much faster flyer than a hippogriff, but he was cruising at almost a stall speed to allow the half-hawk, half-horse creatures to move ahead of him. It must have looked like an impressive sight from the ground to see the twelve hippogriffs in a V formation in front of Gallanth’s immense seventy-five-yard wingspan.

“The crowds do love a show,” Jodem said to Mkel through his crystal.

“It is all flattering but totally unnecessary,” Gallanth added to both of them.

“Yes, but it is a tremendous morale boost to the city, modest dragon,” Jodem responded.

“Yes, wise wizard”, Gallanth responded with a slight tint of sarcasm in his voice.

Mkel felt Gallanth’s body dip to the right as they followed the hippogriffs around the city’s circumference. They swung wide out below the southern boundary of the city to allow a straight flight onto the landing. Mkel looked through his crossbow’s sight at the legion’s headquarters building at the north end of the landing. He saw General Daddonan and his staff gather outside the building to watch Gallanth and Vatara land.

Gallanth started his approach and quickly began to descend. He flew over the southern wall of the city roughly one hundred feet above the ramparts so as to not knock off any soldiers on the wall from his wing wash. He back winged quickly so as to not stir up too much grass and dirt close to the barracks and headquarters building. If he wanted to, the power of the wind from his wings could knock over an ogre. The bludgeoning power of his wings could kill an ogre or manticore and severely injure a hippogriff or griffon, but he could modify that power to a pretty good degree. The squadron of hippogriffs continued to soar over the legion headquarters building and split to circle back and land by their stables.

The gold dragon landed with a soft but noticeable impact tremor. Gallanth was always careful to land as softly as possible, but weighing dozens of tons does not make this an easy task. He folded his wings and began to walk to the crowd gathering at the headquarters building.

“It looks like they’ve assembled an entourage to come out to greet us, Gallanth,” Mkel said with a smile to his dragon mate.
General Daddonan is always up for a little pageantry, and his staff follows him like a herd of sheep
, the gold dragon resonated again with a slight sense of humor, which was more than usual for him. He must be sensing something wrong, Mkel thought to himself, but still had to laugh out loud at his dragon’s joke.

Gallanth stopped short of the legion headquarters building and the gathered staff. General Daddonan gave a cursory bow to Gallanth, after which Mkel saluted the general and gave his greeting of good morning. He put his backpack on, grabbed his crossbow, and slid down Gallanth’s neck to his waiting front foreleg. Vatara landed beside Gallanth and Jodem also dismounted.

“Welcome, Gallanth, Captain Mkel, Master Wizard Jodem, welcome to Battle Point,” General Daddonan said with a friendly but commanding smile.

“Good morning to you, General Daddonan, gentlemen,” Gallanth said with a modest but booming tone.

“Yes General, good morning to you,” Jodem added, for it was still morning, but two hours ahead of Draden.

“Sir,” Mkel nodded.

“Gentlemen, please come in. We have the council room set up for you. The tea is hot and there are our best sweetbreads there. Come, we have much to talk about,” General Daddonan added as he turned to walk up the steps. “Gallanth, you can rest yourself outside the windows of the council room to our right,” he added.

Jodem and Mkel looked at each other to acknowledge that they both knew what he was going to propose. A stable hand walked over to Vatara and guided the great eagle to the stables. Gallanth gingerly stepped over to the area in front of the large windows of the council room of the headquarters building and lay down. Mkel could feel this, for the tremor of his massive body settling on the grass made the council room shudder.

“I understand why the Weirs are honed out of solid rock, I don’t think our landing could handle him here very often,” the general said with a slight smile.

“I could always create my own door to your council room, General,” Gallanth said from outside the large room’s windowed wall, which he now filled. In laying down, he also took up most of the space in the courtyard in front of the building.

“No, Master Dragon, I think you are fine just where you are, as long as it suits you,” General Daddonan quickly replied as Gallanth rested his head on the ground, which still allowed him to look into the council room’s open windows. “Now please, Captain, Jodem, sit. You must know why I’ve asked you to come all the way out here, so I will not insult your intelligence and will get right to the point. There has been a lot of hostile activity in this area in the last several months. Some we can trace to just roving bands of orcs and human marauders from the unclaimed territories in the east, but there is a growing power and organization to the attacks as well as an underlying Morgathian influence.

“The Kaskar clans to the north and the Northern Ontaror kingdoms to the south are also experiencing a great deal of unrest and unprovoked attacks from young chromatics,” the general continued. “They are having internal problems as well, but they are blaming each other, and even the Alliance, which makes as much sense as an Enlightened senator trying to find his common sense.” The general’s joke brought some laughs.

“They blame the Alliance?” Mkel answered with a slight sense of irritation. “We are the ones who provide stability to this whole region. Without this city and your legions to stabilize the area, the trade that takes place here would cease, and open warfare would result. Nobody wins for long if there was no Alliance presence, sir.”

“You said that these hostile forces were gaining in both power and organization?” Jodem asked.

“Yes, we are seeing increasingly more powerful creatures accompanying the orcs and human warriors as well as several moderately powerful sorcerers. I will have Colonel Sykes give you a more detailed picture,” Daddonan explained.

The colonel stood up and said, “Master Dragon, Jodem, Captain, approximately three weeks ago we became engaged in a skirmish that quickly escalated into a good-sized fight about sixty miles south of here, outside a small river town that is one of the many stops on the way to the Ontaror inland sea. A routine patrol encountered a company of orcs that were being led by a small band of common giants, with a mountain giant in charge. They were threatening the town and claiming that any support to the Alliance would mean their destruction.

“The patrol had to call for reinforcements to deal with the giants,” Colonel Sykes continued, “so a mixed task force of land dragons, heavy cavalry, and hippogriffs were dispatched immediately. Our wizard Andellion also accompanied them just in case. A fierce battle ensued, but with the aid of the combined task force, the tide quickly turned to our side. We killed most of the common giants and wounded the mountain giant when a drow wizard teleported in, riding a nightmare. A squadron of orcs riding giant wasp-like hymenoids also entered the fight from the east. The surprise attack took us off guard as the drow unleashed several powerful offensive spells before Andellion could react and eventually counter him. He defeated the dark elf, but the drow was not easy to kill.”

The colonel paused.

“Around the same time,” Colonel Sykes added, “a group of our rangers on a patrol observed a green dragon attack one of the more powerful Kaskar horse clans to the northwest of us. They eventually drove it back but not before it inflicted a good amount of casualties on the horsemen.”

“They drove off a green dragon? With what?” Mkel asked with intense curiosity.

“They have developed a type of arrowhead made from volcanic black stone that is so sharp it can penetrate the hide of certain lesser dragons. It will shatter on metal, though, because it is brittle,” Sykes answered.

“Yes, and I imagine it is much more effective on white, green, and black dragons due to their lack of a magic shield,” Gallanth added from outside the window. “Precisely, Gallanth,” General Daddonan added.

“Tell me more about the drow, Colonel,” Jodem said with concern.

“He died in combat, felled by an arrow shot, and finished by the claw of a hippogriff after Andellion depleted his magic power in the exchange. Andellion was injured, though, and is recuperating in the healers’ guild now. The drow did not have any Morgathian markings on his cloak, and the orcs did not carry any standard, not even a tribal one,” Colonel Sykes added.

“His magical power was derived from a dark crystal, I presume?” Jodem asked.

“Yes, imbedded in his staff, as usual,” Sykes said.