The Dragons of Ash and Smoke (Tales from the New Earth Book 5) Read online

  Tales from the New Earth: Book 5

  The Dragons of Ash and Smoke

  By

  J. J. Thompson

  Text Copyright © 2015 J. J. Thompson

  All Rights Reserved

  “No, I'm not a hero. I'm just someone who's been in the wrong place at the right time.”

  - Simon O'Toole

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Links and Things

  Chapter 1

  “Wake up, laddy,” a rough voice said from out of the void. “Come on now; you've slept too long.”

  Slept too long? I'm not dead?

  Simon O'Toole, former middle-aged I.T. guy, Changling, young wizard, struggled toward consciousness. The blackness that had surrounded him for an eternity was pushed back reluctantly as he reclaimed his life, his destiny still unfulfilled.

  He opened his sticky eyelids and was met by a blur of muted colors and flickering light. He reached up to wipe his eyes and was surprised at how weak his arm moved in response. And when he had dug the gunk from his eyelids and was able to see his right hand, he stared at it in disbelief.

  Simon had been skinny ever since his body had Changed, back before the dragons had destroyed civilization, so he was used to his fingers looking thin and delicate. But what was shocking were the lines of white scarring that criss-crossed his fingers, his palm and the back of his hand.

  He turned it this way and that, frowning at it in confusion. When he raised his left hand, it matched the right. The fingers all moved as they should, but the white tracing of scar tissue was all over his skin.

  “Well, it's good to see that your hands work just fine,” that voice spoke again, gruffly. “The cleric said they would, but those gods of hers are flighty at times.”

  Simon turned his head to the left and his eyes widened in surprise.

  “Stanis!” he exclaimed, his own voice a dry croak.

  The short, squat dwarf, son of a noble, was sitting on a heavy wooden chair next to the bed the wizard was resting on. His thick black beard was intricately braided, interwoven with gold trinkets and hanging to his waist. It parted now in a bright smile and his dark eyes, deep in their sockets, lit up with delight. He had a large, aquiline nose that lent him a regal air and his wide mouth displayed white, even teeth.

  He was wearing light armor; chain mail over leather, that tickled with a faint music when he moved. He wasn't armed though.

  “Ah, so you recognize me. That's a good sign, I'm told.” He leaned forward and peered at Simon. “How are you feeling, young wizard, hmm?”

  “Feeling?”

  Simon turned his head and looked up at the ceiling. It was made of rough-cut stone, a dozen feet over his bed, and was flickering with shadows from the torchlight reflecting on it.

  “I'm feeling fine, I guess. Where am I?” he asked as he turned his head to look at the dwarf again.

  “You are in our capital city. You couldn't pronounce its dwarvish name, but in your tongue it would translate to Kingstone.”

  “Kingstone,” Simon repeated and smiled a bit. “I like it. But how did I get here?”

  “What is your last memory?” Stanis asked him, still watching him closely.

  The young wizard frowned as he tried to remember. There had been a battle, hadn't there? He had fought a brown dragon. No, that wasn't right. He had fought the brown dragon, the primal. Yes, that was right.

  “I went up against the primal brown, didn't I?”

  “Aye, that you did. And you won too!” Stanis exclaimed with a broad smile. “I never would have believed such a thing was possible. But apparently you should never bet against Simon O'Toole, master wizard.”

  “Hardly a master,” Simon protested, his face getting hot. “Just lucky, that's all.”

  “Ha! Lucky, is it? Well then, that's four lucky battles in a row, because there are four dead primals now and you were prominent in all of their deaths. Not a bad accomplishment for a lucky wizard, I'd say.”

  “It sounds better than it was, believe me,” Simon told him. He looked around the room slowly, taking in his surroundings before he attempted to get up.

  The bedroom was large, as was the bed he was lying in. Torches burned in brackets along the walls and there were many bookshelves stuffed with scrolls, books and odd statuettes and carvings. The walls, like the ceiling, were made of dark, rough stone.

  The bed was covered with a thick, bright quilt. Blues, greens and yellows made it a cheerful chaos of colors and brightened the otherwise rather gloomy room. The mattress under him was soft and comfortable.

  “So I'm in the dwarven capital. How long have I been here?”

  Stanis toyed with his beard, twisting a braid as he stared at Simon with a calculating expression.

  “This may come as a bit of a shock, young man, but it's been a while.”

  Simon struggled to sit up and the dwarf reached out and put a rough hand on his back to help him. He moved the pillows to prop the wizard up and waited until he was comfortable.

  Looking down at his arms, which were bare, Simon gasped. The scarring twisted and ran up in lines and whorls from his hands all the way up to his shoulders. It looked like someone had stitched white threads into his skin in abstract designs. It wasn't horrible looking, but it did seem unreal to him.

  “Was I injured in the fight with the primal brown?” he asked as he turned his arms this way and that, looking at the scars closely.

  “Not against that dragon, no,” Stanis said slowly. “Your injuries came later. Now, as for how long you have been here...”

  He paused and Simon turned his head to look at him.

  “Go ahead,” he said with a reassuring smile. “I was knocked out for a week once; the last time Clara healed me.”

  “Clara. Yes. Well, it's been quite a bit longer than a week, actually. You've been convalescing for just over six months.”

  “Six months?”

  Simon sat bolt upright and gaped at Stanis.

  “How is that even possible? What the hell happened to me?”

  “You really don't remember?”

  “I really don't. Just a vague memory of fighting the brown and then nothing. It's like my mind was wiped cleaned.”

  “Wait a moment. I want to bring someone in before we continue speaking.”

  The dwarf stood up and abruptly left the room, leaving Simon lying there, bewildered.

  Six months, he thought. My God, what happened?

  He looked at the mass of fine scarring and then lifted the quilt and looked down at his body.

  He was only wearing a loincloth and his body was paler than ever. The scarring was even worse there. His chest was covered with thick cords of scar tissue and it ran down across his stomach to his legs.

  He moved his legs and wiggled his toes. Yes, everything worked a
nd he was still in one piece, but how badly wounded had he been to have been kept in a coma for six bloody months?

  Simon heard some footsteps, lowered the quilt and watched the door.

  Stanis came back in followed by the first female dwarf that the wizard had ever seen.

  She was the same height as Stanis and almost as broad, but unlike stories in the old fantasy novels Simon used to read, did not have a beard. She was wearing a sleeveless leather tunic, leather trousers, boots with iron soles that clanked as she walked, and had thick blond hair tied back into a long braid.

  Her broad features were attractive and she had twinkling blue eyes. Altogether she looked a lot more approachable and friendly than Stanis did, even though Simon knew that the dwarf had a kind heart.

  “Sir wizard, allow me to present Opheilla. She is the cleric who has been taking care of you during your...extended stay with us. Opheilla, although you do know Simon intimately, this is your first chance to meet him face to face, as it were. So may I introduce you to my favorite human.”

  The cleric gave Stanis a dark look and pushed him to one side. Then she smiled and extended a hand to Simon.

  “It is good to meet you,” she said in a deep but pleasant voice.

  Simon offered his hand and it was engulfed in hers.

  “Thank you. It's good to meet you too.”

  She nodded and sat down on the chair next to the bed. Stanis stepped back and watched them quietly.

  “You looked a little surprised to see me when I entered,” she said. “May I ask why?”

  Simon adjusted his pillows and pushed himself up a bit more before answering.

  “Well, it's just that, no offense intended, but I thought that Clara would be the one taking care of me. She's done it before, you see. To be honest, I didn't actually know that the dwarves had clerics among them.”

  “We don't begrudge aid from the gods, sir wizard,” Stanis spoke up. “We do not espouse magic, most of the time, but healing is a gift we will accept when it is offered in the name of the Light.”

  Opheilla nodded at that.

  “That is correct. And we do use magic as well, young wizard. May I call you Simon? I would not want to presume.”

  “Please do,” he replied quickly. “You've taken care of me for months. It would be weird to start being formal now, don't you think?”

  She chuckled; a warm, friendly sound.

  “Thank you. We use magic, but only on our creations; machinery, armor, weapons, that sort of thing.”

  She hesitated, glanced back at Stanis who made an encouraging gesture and looked at Simon again.

  “Your friend Clara was not able to aid in your recovery because she was...unavailable.”

  “Unavailable?”

  He didn't like the sound of that, or the cleric's cautious tone.

  “What do you mean? Where is she? In fact, where is everyone? I would have thought that my friends Kronk and Aeris would have been here, at least.”

  “Who?” Opheilla asked blankly.

  “The wizard has two elemental servants that usually accompany him on his travels,” Stanis volunteered.

  “Oh, I see, Well, things have changed a lot since you were injured, my friend.”

  “Changed how?”

  Simon looked from the cleric to Stanis and back again.

  “Look folks, it's obvious you're holding back something here. Would one of you please just tell me how I got here? What happened to me? And where are my friends?”

  His hands were clenched so tightly on the quilt that the scars flared white and looked like a network of cobwebs under his skin.

  Opheilla put a hand over his and he felt a rush of warmth flow into him.

  “Easy, young wizard. Breathe slowly. What we do not need right now is a setback in your healing.”

  Simon closed his eyes and tried to calm himself down. He hadn't realized that he was actually panting in his anxiety.

  “Good. Yes, that's better. Now, Stanis, it would be best if you told my patient exactly what happened. It will be less stressful to know the truth.”

  “Very well,” the dwarf said and moved to stand next to the cleric.

  Simon opened his eyes and watched him fearfully, dreading to hear the news but desperate for it at the same time.

  “Six months ago,” Stanis began, “you fought and won against the primal brown dragon. That was after a visit to the elven lands. Do you remember that?”

  “Vaguely,” Simon replied, searching his memories. “I think, yes, I think I went there with my friends; Liliana the paladin, and Virginia, Anna, Eric and Gerard. Didn't I?”

  “You did. And you cleverly lured the primal back to our world, separating it from its servants and destroying it.”

  The dwarf smiled and gave him a gentle clout on the shoulder.

  “Well done, by the way. Your deeds have become legendary among my people. Why, young dwarves are telling stories about you as if you were one of our mythical heroes.”

  Simon knew he was blushing.

  “It wasn't as exciting as it sounds,” he mumbled and both dwarves laughed, a deep rumble.

  “No lad, it never is. So, to continue: you defeated the primal and then made your way back to the new settlement that your friends were building in the former state of Florida, I believe it was called.”

  “Did I?” Simon asked blankly. “That's weird. I don't remember that at all.”

  “Trauma can sometimes do that, young man,” Opheilla told him. “Intense pain and suffering can cause our minds to block the memory of the events that caused them. It allows us to heal without added suffering. You could say that it is a safety valve, so to speak.”

  “Right. Yes, I think I've heard that before.”

  “So you made your way to this new town,” Stanis told him. “But when you arrived, you found that the settlement had been attacked. Destroyed, actually. It was burning and all of the townspeople were missing.”

  “Wait. Wait,” Simon said and held up a shaking hand.

  He could suddenly smell the acrid stench of burning wood and his eyes watered as if irritated by smoke.

  “Is it coming back to you?” the cleric asked gently.

  “I...think so. I remember the smoke and the charred wood. The gates were open and the buildings... They were all in flames. But most of them had burned to the ground, so the attack was a few hours old.”

  Simon was seeing the scene as if he was walking through the village itself.

  “There were no signs of life. Just burning and desolation. Even the town hall. But it was warded, damn it! I installed the ward myself on the roof. How could it have been destroyed? And inside the hall...”

  He lay back and covered his face with his hands.

  “Oh God. Ashes. Piles and piles of ashes. All of them, dead. And the children. God, even the children.”

  His eyes burned with tears.

  “I failed them. Somehow my wards didn't work and I failed them.”

  He opened his eyes and wiped them roughly.

  “And then there was, I don't know, a feeling of darkness and I looked up and a red dragon was swooping down on me like some huge grotesque bird. It breathed flame and...that's all I remember.”

  “I see,” Stanis said softly. Then he grinned. “So you don't remember our daring deeds then? Now that is a pity. I'll warrant we earned a few stories from that, at least.”

  “Stanis!” Opheilla said sharply. “My patient is suffering and he blames himself for the disaster. Shrink your head back to its normal size and ease his pain.”

  The dwarf accepted the cleric's chiding and took one of Simon's hands in his; his rough and calloused palm hard but warm.

  “You did not fail them, sir wizard. The townspeople were betrayed by one of their own.”

  That statement caught Simon off-guard and he stared at Stanis in disbelief.

  “What?” he asked faintly.

  “One of their own, I said,” and now the dwarf's voice became grim. “There we
re survivors, my friend, and they told us what happened. Apparently a malcontent named, what was it? Ah yes. Henry. I believe he had an argument with your cleric friend, Clara. Who knows what it was about. At any rate, someone saw him some time afterward up on the roof of the town hall. When they asked him what he was doing there, he muttered something about repairs.” Stanis snorted. “Aye, repairs. What he was doing with removing the ward that you had placed up there. The fool.”

  “My God, why would he do that?”

  “Why do evil people do what they do?” Opheilla said with a shrug. “Who can say? We do know that this Henry person was not in the town when the red dragon descended upon it and destroyed it.”

  “Happily for your people though, we were,” Stanis said with a wide grin.

  Simon said up straighter, a small hope growing inside of him.

  “You were?” The dwarf nodded. “But why?”

  “Why? To visit, of course. It took some time to rebuild after the mutated dragons attacked this city. An attack you helped thwart, by the way,” he added with a wink that made Simon smile weakly. “But I had wanted to see Clara and the others for quite some time, to set up our trade again and all that. Imagine my surprise when we showed up at the old town of Nottinghill and found it deserted.”

  “Yeah. After an attack by wights, the people decided that they'd had enough of winter,” the wizard told him.

  “So we learned later. We used our scrying glass to find the new settlement and popped up the morning of the attack. Good timing, don't you think?”

  “The gods work in mysterious ways, Stanis,” Opheilla told him.

  The dwarf rolled his eyes.

  “There she goes again; typical cleric. Can't we for once just have a coincidence instead of all this divine mumbo-jumbo?”

  She gave him a hard clout on the shoulder and Stanis staggered back.

  “Watch what you say,” she growled at him and the dwarf, after a brief hesitation, bowed to her.

  “I meant no offense, lady cleric,” he said. It sounded sincere.

  “Good. See that you don't. The only reason that my patient here is alive today is because of the gods, so keep that in mind.”