“Oh, you’rekidding.”
Amma’s breathy excitement brought Damien out of the morbid thought. The goblins had been toiling about their clunky, dangerous-looking machines, and one began to produce some kind of steam. For a moment he thought the creatures had simply set it on fire and the dragon’s job would soon be done for it, but then huge swaths of canvas unfurled from its sides and began to beat just like wings, and the contraption that looked like it should have been in Anomalous’s tower was lifting off of the plateau into the height of the cave.
“Basest beasts,” Damien muttered. They wereflying. The goblins were fucking flying.
It was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever seen, three goblins seated in a basket, one piloting while the other two worked some sort of lever to keep the thing aloft. Few things flew, things with wings, most of which he loathed, and things that could shift into things with wings, and that was about it. He supposed he would have to add goblins to the list.
Dragons flew too of course, and like creatures with that ability, they often used height to their advantage. If one was too far from the ground to be reached, one could certainly control the battlefield. Though the massive cavern the goblin’s enemy was currently residing in was perfect for something like a dragon to fly through, hiding up on the rocky ledges and swooping down to breathe fire and gobble up, that hadn’t been Damien’s experience. No, the infernal terror had hidden itself instead, using its innate abilities to shift in and out of the shadows and simply give chase.
A group of goblins bustled over then to show off the spears they’d fashioned, the tips sharp, but incapable of breaking dragon scale. They were perhaps narrow enough to slide between the scales, but that would require aim. One of thegoblins who had attempted to bathe Damien earlier claimed to be able to assist with that and showed them something like a massive crossbow, mountable to the ground and requiring two to load and shoot.
After touring the wild tools and machines that the goblins would be utilizing, they sat and attempted to strategize. The discussion was repeated until the goblins seemed to at least halfway understand, and for a few moments, Damien actually missed Xander’s sharp mind, but then hated his memory again almost immediately. After, Damien and Amma sat through a five-course, entirely mushroom-based meal, and then finally retired to a private chamber with a bed that had been expanded just enough by additional soft things stitched together to accommodate a human. Amma insisted he snuggle in beside her, and he had no qualms about that even when a forgotten needle poked him in the back—she was the king, after all.
Wrapped up together, Amma fell instantly asleep which only made sense—it was exhausting lording over things, especially ones so dumb—but Damien lay awake considering how he had organized what would essentially be the demise of so many of the goblins. Together, their actions might be just enough distraction to allow Damien to banish the dragon back to the infernal plane where it belonged. Someone had brought it here, for nefarious purposes surely, but then abandoned it, likely because it was impossible to control.
Poor thing, he thought, and then finally fell asleep too quickly to realize how ridiculous that thought was.
“It time.” Skoob’s seriousness, clad in a bandoleer filled with chipped eating utensils, would have been comical if not for the fact they stood outside a dragon’s lair.
Some of the minikin goblins who had been enlisted to fight were lining the hall, many more spread throughout the cave in larger tunnels above that led to the dragon’s cavern,waiting for their signal to begin the onslaught. Damien hoped they had been quiet enough to not alert the beast, though they were surprisingly stealthy even maneuvering huge contraptions through tight tunnels.
The largest goblin, Ewigog, was standing beside Skoob and had taken out the relatively massive hammer he carried, holding it outward, sledge first. Atop it, the few goblins who followed Ewigog’s orders laid their own weapons, and even Skoob presented the fire poker he carried into the mix. They glanced up at Damien who only observed, and then Skoob gestured to the crossing of their weapons.
“You may be ugliest concubine, but also bravest.”
Damien rolled his eyes but unsheathed his dagger, mimicking the others. Then a broken chair leg poked up from beneath the pile.
“Absolutely not.” Damien plucked the tiniest goblin from the ground by the scruff of its neck and carried it to where Amma stood, Vanders sitting atop her shoulder again but looking like he might disappear at any moment. Damien thrust the goblin into her arms with instructions to hold it back at all costs, and then was abruptly grabbed and hauled toward her.
Amma pressed a kiss to his lips that made him forget dragons even existed. He melted into it, limbs going weak as fear was chased out of him by flaring passion.
When she pulled back, her eyes were steely. “Come back so I can do more of that.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” he breathed, and then was unceremoniously bonked on the head by the tiny goblin’s weapon.
A bit more confidence swirling in his guts, Damien strode out into the lair first. The dragon would be lurking, using the shadows as camouflage, but it would be there—it couldn’t actually make itself immaterial. He was under no pretense thathe prowled unseen, but the dragon only needed to see him, not the many, miniature attackers that would be its doom—or just its annoyance before it killed them all. Still, he moved silently, not even casting as his spells would be too loud for an infernal thing, carrying his dagger unsheathed, other hand wrapped around the blade and already biting in.
Blood dripped steadily across the stone floor as he went. His heart pounded, pumping more from the wound. The beast would smell it, it would wake if it weren’t already, and it would come.
He brought himself to the largest beam of light pouring from an opening above and stood within it. Morning sun lit the small space, his blood pooling beside him, and he tipped his head up to peer into all the dark corners above, searching for any flicker of movement, any misplaced shadow that signaled the dragon was beginning its descent. He would have completely missed it if it weren’t for the tinkling of a rogue bit of metal behind him.
He whipped around just to see the head of the thing lifting up over the horde of trash it had collected. Scales black and shimmering like liquid as they formed out of the shadows, its body rose behind it, the talons sunk into the ledge, each large enough to leave a hole in Damien’s middle big enough to stick his own head through.
No reason to be stealthy anymore, Damien shuffled backward as the beast pulled itself up. Fearsome horns spiraled and glinted in and out of unseen darkness, scales following suit, body there one moment and gone the next as the shadows about it flickered. But its eyes, poisonously green and shining, remained locked onto the blood mage.
Unfurling fingers, blood ran from his palm, and he brandished his dagger as if it might do anything to the beast. The dragon seemed to grin then, knowing it couldn’t, and then Damien cast.
New shadows rose from the blood he had left splatteredacross the cave, each in the vague form of a man, and when Damien sprinted, so did they. If he were lucky, they would last long enough to confuse the beast, and if the goblins could remember, they would begin their attack as soon as the dragon struck out.
From behind him, there was a rumbling clatter, and then the cries of a hundred tiny voices made raucous by the echoing cave. Spears were flung, contraptions whirred to life, and all manner of chaos erupted around Damien as goblins flooded into the cavern.
The little beings struck out, darting toward their doom as Damien led the dragon, drawing its ire. The heat in the cave built, and there was a glint in the corner of his eye as he took a turn, fire burning in the thing’s throat. Damien skidded to a stop, whipping blades across the cave as the dragon reared back, slicing into the soft flesh of its neck. They drew blood and smoke, but it was not enough to stop the thing, and flames erupted from its maw.
Damien dove behind a thick wall of stone, taking an errant goblin with him, fire licking at the place he had just been. Already sweat-drenched, the goblin slipped right out of his arms and sprinted away. There was a squawk and a crunch, and Damien could only assume it had been crushed by the massive set of claws that came down to rock the entire cavern just beside his hiding place.
Damien sprinted back out into the opening of the lair, just beneath the beast. It saw him go, but did not lift into the air as he expected to pick him off, only swung its tail and attempted to whip Damien into the wall. He ducked, casting a shadow as additional cover, and continued on. The way the ground shook told him the beast was chasing after on all fours.
Glancing upward, Damien spied it, the trap finally set, and he corrected course to run beneath. A massive net dropped, justbarely missing him as he led the dragon right into the snare. There was no expectation that it would restrain the beast, but it would perhaps slow it for a moment, and the itchy vines woven into the ropes could provide annoyance if they touched unscaled skin. Damien was shocked then when he turned to see the dragon splay out flat on the ground beneath the web of shoddy knotted ropes and thorny tendrils.
