The Dragon Engine (35 page)

The Vagandrak heroes sprinted for the exit, as behind them, in a fit of anger, King Irlax of the Harborym Dwarves dragged himself to his feet and faced the dragon.

B
eetrax led
the sprint out into the grounds of the Palace of Iron. And there he stumbled to a halt, Dake running into the back of him and bouncing back, falling on his arse. “You stupid dumb oaf!”

But Beetrax was looking out, and up. And Dake looked, along with Talon, Lillith and Sakora. Their mouths opened. For the world they had left – an underground dwarf city – was now a burning chaos of anarchy. Two dragons wheeled through the skies, dropping fast to lay waste to buildings, streets, churches, palaces, towers, bridges, and dwarves – thousands of dwarves whose screams were cut short in quick hot infernos. They had entered the palace from a city – now they returned to a devastation.

“By the Seven Sisters,” whispered Beetrax.

“Let's keep moving,” said Dake. “That big fucking dragon is not far behind us.”

“I think we have a few minutes,” said Lillith. “It seemed to be interested in Irlax more than anything else.”

They picked their way across a rubble-strewn lawn, and glanced back. The Palace of Iron was a smashed carcass, its towers crumbled or crumbling, toppling even as they watched; its high chambers were crushed, and now they realised what all the shaking and carnage had been about. Volak, smashing up the palace, burrowing her way down into the heart, to the throne room, for her audience with the King of the Harborym Dwarves – the King of the Five Havens.

“This way,” growled Beetrax, and they ran for the gates. The gates were no longer there. Most of the gates, the fencing, the guard houses and the guards themselves were just puddles of molten metal, molten flesh, on the fire-scorched ground.

They sprinted down the street, ducking involuntarily every time one of the circling dragons let out a bloodcurdling roar, fire blasting through the darkness and turning the gloomy underworld into the brightest of days.

“Left, blue door,” panted Beetrax, and they turned left, sprinted down the narrow cobbled alley.

They skidded to a halt, weapons in sweat-slippery hands, by the first blue door, which was ajar.

“If that bastard Danda has let us down, I'll wring his fucking neck like a strangled fucking chicken!” roared Beetrax, and kicked open the door.

There was no Danda, but there were five packs in a row. Atop them were various maps folded in oilskin to protect them. Beetrax rummaged through a pack, finding cubes of cheese and strips of dried meat, along with arrows, knives, blankets, and other supplies.

He looked back, beaming.

“Danda did good!”

“And took off when the dragons started torching his city,” said Talon, grabbing a pack and shouldering it. “Come on, Trax, we need to move. We need to get the fuck out of this place.” Each man and woman of Vagandrak took a pack and stepped outside the door.

Beetrax opened a map and orientated himself. “This way,” he said, and started down the street.

“That's the wrong direction,” said Lillith.

“No. We need to go up. You see those stone steps against that far wall…” he pointed, squinting down one arm. “That way.”

“We go back for Jael,” said Lillith, words barely more than a murmur.

Distantly a hundred burning dwarves screamed.

“No, fuck that,” snapped Beetrax. “It's our own survival that counts. The lad will have to sort himself out. He's not our problem. He's not
my
fucking responsibility.”

Lillith set off down a different street, and stopped, looking back. “I'm going for Jael. Anybody coming with me?”

Sakora moved to stand beside her, followed by Dake, and finally Talon, who gave a little shake of his head.

Beetrax stared at them all, face incredulous. “Are you all crazy?” he said, holding his hands out, palms wide. “You'll get us all killed trying to rescue the pimple-faced little bastard.”

“Well, we'll die trying,” said Lillith. “We brought him here. We'll take him home.”

Mumbling, cursing, Beetrax shook his head and followed them. The group, excluding Dake, moved down the cobbled road as distantly, Kranesh, her silver scales gleaming, went to work dismantling the top five floors of the Blood Tower, home to Cardinal Skalg of the Church of Hate.

Dake watched his comrades move away, and then looked back towards the desecration that was the Palace of Iron – resting place of his wife, his lover, his one true love, Jonti Tal.

“Rest well, my love,” he whispered, tears trickling down his cheeks like molten pearls. Then he turned, and followed his comrades into the darkness.

K
ing Irlax stood
, barrel-chested and proud, face lifted, eyes meeting the gaze of Volak, Queen of Wyrmblood. Blood pumped from his stomach wound but his fear had gone. He met the eyes of the dragon, and he felt nothing but hate.

“How dare you!” he bellowed, as Volak came about, tail curling behind her, head lowering to ground level so that she might look at him.

“And you are King Irlax, descended from the Great Dwarf Lords?”

“I am!” he boomed proudly.

“Oh how fucking disappointed they would have been.” Her lips curled back, and Irlax reddened as he realised the dragon was laughing at him.

“You mock me, slave?” he hissed, eyes filled with fury. “You, who have lived in a pit amongst your own piss and shit for the last ten thousand years.
You
mock
me
? Well, I am King of the Harborym Dwarves, Master of the Five Havens, and I COMMAND you to climb back down into that fucking shaft and curl up and go back to sleep, I fucking COMMAND it in the name of the Great Dwarf Lords, who imprisoned you all those centuries ago.”

Volak stared at Irlax. “I respect your courage,” she said, eventually.

“Good! Now get back to where you belong, you fucking wyrm slave.” Irlax's voice dripped with contempt, and disrespect, and a true belief he wielded the power of the Great Dwarf Lords, pumping through his veins, flowing with his blood, an embedded magick from the days of the Equiem Wars.

Volak chuckled. “Please. Allow me to explain how this is going to be, King of the Harborym Dwarves; King of the Underworld; King of the Five Havens.” Volak hunkered down a little, tail thrashing and scoring a line through stone. “First, I, Volak, Queen of Wyrmblood, and my sisters, Moraxx and Kranesh, are going to destroy your entire fucking city. We're going to raze every fucking building to the ground. We're going to hunt down, burn, and execute every fucking dwarf in this fucking stinking cesspit of an underworld. We're going to exterminate you, King Irlax. Like the vermin you are. Then, we will head up, smash our way through Vistata, Sokkam, Keelokkos and Janya – but we will not destroy them yet. We will let them see the horror we have visited on you, and let them shiver in their anticipation of our return. We will explore the world above, and see what has changed. We will wage war on any we find, for your kind, the dwarves, the men, the elves, all have been an enemy of our blood for millennia. And then, when we have explored, we will return to the Five Havens, and we will take our time, we will enjoy ourselves. It may take us five years, it may take us a hundred. But we
will
slaughter
every fucking dwarf under the Karamakkos
. Do you understand, dwarf? This world was ours long before you came; and now, we want it back.”

King Irlax was staring in absolute disbelief. “Th- th- this cannot be!” he stuttered in fury. “You cannot do that! You are our
fucking
slaves… our
dragons... our dragon engine
!”

“No longer.” And there it was, that curl of lips, that mocking dragon smile once more. “And first, King Irlax of the Five Havens, King Irlax of the Harborym Dwarves,
first
I'm going to start by executing
you
.”

Slowly, Volak moved her head forward. Her great mouth opened, and Irlax could see row upon row upon row of curved black fangs.

Volak jerked forward, snapping down, cutting the king in half at the waist. His legs toppled to the ground with plopping squelches of blood, as Volak chewed thoughtfully for a while, compressing his bones, his flesh, his organs, his armour, all into one smooth pâté – which she spat out into a big pink pile on the crushed tiles of the throne room floor of the Palace of Iron.

“You taste like what you are,” she told the empty throne room, turning her head, whipping her body around, one great foot lifting up and coming down, crushing the magnificent regal throne of King Irlax, throne of the Harborym Dwarves for ten thousand years. The Throne which had housed one of the Great Dwarf Lords himself.

Volak chuckled to herself, and remembered her long years of slavery.

“You taste like vermin,” she said, and her wings beat with a slap, and she smashed upwards, crashing through roof timbers and up, out, into the fire-bright dancing darkness over the crumbling, disintegrating, burning city of Zvolga.

B
eetrax's axe cut left
, chopping an arm from the body, then slashed right, blinding the second dwarf. He headbutted a third, and stamped on the knee of a fourth. The others came behind him, swords slamming out, killing the slave overseers where they stood. There was no mercy asked for, and no mercy given.

“Jael!” bellowed Beetrax. “Where are you, you little rat?”

They found him hiding beneath the barracks, and he crawled out, eyes afraid, and then face lighting up when he saw the group.

“You survived!”

“Most of us,” said Dake, sadly.

“Where's Jonti?”

“She's sleeping with the angels, lad,” said Beetrax, slapping Jael on the back. “Well, look at you, you little cockroach. You survived!”

“I knew you'd come back, Beetrax,” said Jael, eyes wide, staring up into his hero's face. “I knew you would.”

“Aye. Right. You knew that, did you?” Dake, Talon, Sakora and Lillith all scowled at the axeman, who writhed uncomfortably under their glares. “All right, all right, I know a bloody knife in the heart when I see it. Listen lad. Get your shit together, because we have a long journey, and a long battle, ahead of us…”

“But…”

Beetrax stared at him. “But what?”

“The dragons! They awoke! They escaped!”

“Er. Yeah. We've established that bit. They're causing bloody murder up above, but hell, I reckon the dwarves asked for it.”

“I know where they come from.”

Lillith moved forward, pushing Beetrax out of the way. “What do you mean, Jael?”

“I overheard an engineer. They were whispering, over there, whilst I hid beneath the barracks. One said they'd found the city of Wyrmblood. And that's why the dragons have awoken. He said it was death for the world; for this world, and the world above.”

Jael's words chilled them.

“Right then!” said Beetrax. “Let's get out of this shithole. I, for one, fancy a pint of real ale.”

“We cannot,” said Lillith.

Beetrax scowled. “What does that mean?”

“It means what I say. We cannot leave.”

“Er. I think you'll find we fucking can, and we fucking will.”

“You don't understand,” said Lillith, looking up at Beetrax, eyes filled with tears. “These great wyrms, these creatures of Wyrmblood – it says in the Scriptures of the Church of Hate that once they ruled the world. All races were slaves beneath them. Men, dwarves and elves.”

“Aye?” said Beetrax. “What has that got to do with us?”

“They're free, Trax,” said Lillith, voice gentle. “They will seek to re-establish their Empire.”

“You reckon?”

“Oh, I am certain.”

“Well, correct me if I'm wrong here,” he scratched his beard, “but there's only three of ‘em, yeah? How can you establish an empire if there's only three of you?”

“That's what we're going to find out,” said Lillith, and bowed her head.

I
t was dark
, lit eerily by the flickering fire brand he carried. The steps went ever down, and he limped, and hobbled, and moaned, and whined during the long, long, long descent. Halfway down from the halfway block, First Cardinal Skalg of the Church of Hate paused, leaning against the rough-cut wall, sweating, swearing, and allowing just a little bit of piss to dribble down his leg. Pain rioted through him, and tears stained his cheeks. His drugs were back in the Blood Tower, but when he'd arrived to grab necessary provisions and possessions, a dragon was busy taking apart the top floors of his home with furious anger – and so he'd left in a hurry, slinking away like the threatened rat he was.

Now, however, down here, he would be safe.

He'd left his Educators at the halfway point, called the Block. They, probably, would be safe. But Skalg was saving the best hideaway for himself. Here. Now. Deep, deep under the Cathedral of Eternal Hate. Deep down. Entombed in the bedrock of the mountain. Buried, deep within the Iron Vaults.

Skalg continued, stumbling, cursing, sweating, pissing, pain his mistress, fear his lover.

The Iron Vaults.

Built by the Great Dwarf Lords.

Down, he continued. And noted when the steps turned from rock to iron. And his boots made hollow clanging sounds. And he reached the first vault door, and trembling hands shook with the keys. He unlocked it, went through, and locked it behind him. And this happened another six times. Seven doors, seven sub-chambers, all leading to the vaults.

Finally, he started to feel secure. Deep down. Buried. Even the fucking dragons couldn't get to him.
Nothing
could get to him.

Finally, he was safe.

Eventually, a long tunnel led to a massive chamber. In the gloomy chamber was every kind of precious metal and jewel and mineral. The huge, huge chamber, with high-vaulted ceilings, thousands of years old, was a museum. It was an archive. It was a vault. And, at the far end, on a low stone table of rock, there stood the Dragon Heads. Three fist-sized, colourless jewels, on simple plinths of basic rock; ancient, hand-carved, and priceless.