[MS 5095]

Chapter Two

Draken old and Demon Lord
Sat together on golden hoard,
Spoke of cursed Nightmare Sword
That bound the Warding Wyrd of Mord.

- Stanza from The Guildmaster Scrolls
Recorded is MS 5095 by Black Quill,
scribe to the Monastery of the Kai

The dragon raised its head from the piled wealth that served as its bed, and drew into its nostrils what a human would have considered a vast rush of air. The exhalation glowed and was magnified a thousand-fold by the finery on all sides. It served to illuminate a hunched figure standing at the bottom of the massy pile. Its presence caught the dragon’s attention immediately.

"You know that place from whence I came," it said, formally. "You know, for we were both hammered out by Him upon the Stones Anvil. Out of Darkness we came, and to Darkness shall we return. Darkness we serve; to be saved by it, or to be damned."

"I hear you," the dragon responded laconically, "and I acknowledge your presence. What news, O Voice of Shadows?"

"This news, rider of ill winds. The anchor has been uncovered, but not uprooted, and the beacon flares once more. What was cast out shall return; Him whose name we revere comes again. Yet that all might thus be accomplished, the Dwimorblaed must be found and Mord’s Wyrd unbound."

The dragon’s cyan eyes narrowed, and it set the rituals aside. "I have heard you, Voice of Shadows. Remove your nauseous carcass from my sight. I wish to think on these matters the more."

The hump-backed thing put a hand to the gaping hole in its chest and inclined further forwards, so that its shoulders almost touched its knees. Then the Voice of Shadows turned and limped away, carrying the reek of pestilence with it.

Alone in the deeps beneath the Bor Range, Sinnagar lay down his head and closed his eyes, and went into the kind of sleep which dragons alone enjoyed. For them, thought does not end with the onset of rest; and Sinnagar pondered long upon the scrap of news which he had been offered.

What was cast out shall return; Him whose name we revere shall come again.

The dragon flew in its dreams.

Naaros.

Another time, another place: the Age of Eternal Night, the wasted Doomlands. Below, there was fire--plumes that rose towards him out of roiling smoke, coming dangerously near at times. Yet the flame could cause him no harm: for Sinnagar was not there, and the outcome of the war that raged below had been decided many years gone by.

Naaros.

Suddenly, the fortress came into view. Its lower battlements were drowned in the uppermost cloud layers, and its pinnacle rose to impale the stars on its needle spire. It was all quarried from a ruddy stone that exhaled a heavy redness into the air. Its presence was both sickening and devastating.

Naaros.

This was the seat of Agarash the Damned.

And there he was!

There he stood, upon the loftiest balcony: Naar’s most potent avatar, a towering reptilian incarnation in whose eyes shone the passion infernal. In his claw was a sword of great strength; and yet only three possessed the lore to name it. Among the peoples of the Darklands it was known as Adar-Dagenar--the Desolater. The Elder Magi called it simply Kai-Rashad-- Sun’s Bane. But to dragon and Sommlending both it was Dwimorblaed, the Nightmare Sword.

In a few moments it would all be over; Sinnagar had seen this brief conclusion to a lengthy war a dozen times before. The Elder Magi would complete their ring and the fortress--and then Naaros would be destroyed, and the Doomlord condemned for all time.

Far below, around a lake of molten lava, the Elder Magi, harried on all sides by the Agarashi, joined hands. Light flared, brilliant and dazzling; the air was heated by a monumental wave of flame; and all that was Naaros ran and bubbled, falling to the ground like so much warmed-up jelly. Then there was a vast tearing, and into that unseen crack was Agarash pulled, wailing impotent curses that were cut short as the gap closed.

The Agarashi Empire had fallen. The Age of Eternal Night--ended.

A dozen times the dragon had seen it happen, but not once had he uncovered the fate of Dwimorblaed. The last moments of the struggle were all of blinding light, so intense that even one so old and crafty as Sinnagar could not pierce it.

He was dissatisfied. Where had it fallen? More importantly, had it survived?

I am given the task of finding it, the dragon thought. And find it I shall. But not here, it would seem.

Elsewhere, Sinnagar opened his eyes.

It was day; that much was obvious, for the black drake’s cavernous demesne was close to the surface, and the light filtering down from the outer world was a wan shade of mote-filled gold. Sinnagar raised himself up from his hoard and made towards it, towards the light and the cold rush of air from without. There, at the naked opening, the dragon spread his wings and hurled himself outwards into the gulf.

He was black, so dark as to appear glossy and smooth. But the appearance was deceptive; for all over he was armoured in scales, across which a blade might slide but never pierce. Very old he was, and great of size, his wingspan that of one of his lesser brethren from snout to tail. He had been mighty during the War of the Wyrms, and had played a vital part in the destruction of Cynx. But for many a long year now he had dwelt underground, moving only during the most monumental of upheavals in the crust. Yet he had not been stirred from slumber when Naar called forth the False Dragons once again, and with good reason.

On he flew over many leagues, though few were the eyes that saw him; for this was the Great Bor Range, and what settlements there were, were widely scattered. The kingdom of Boradon was far to the west of his path; Anarin and Starn lay beyond the blue Tentarias; and the dragon flew east, not south, though he would be forced to angle that way before long.

Sinnagar found his safe crossing due east of Garthen, taking advantage of an overcast to hide his passage. Thence south and south-west his journey took him, until at last he landed on a great ash plain in the midst of nowhere.

It was a testament to the Doomlord’s strength, that his realm had endured against nature’s hand for so long; that even after five ages, the land remained completely sterile.

There was the rent, the chasm, that fiery gulf opened up by the violence of a magical battle so intense that the very earth began to melt and run beneath the combatants' feet. To the east rose the shattered peaks of the Darkwall: the rest of the ring encircled the Doomlands was completed by the proud Dammerdons.

Sinnagar pondered even as he circled. He was knowledgeable in the lore of Magnamund, but his ken fell short here: who knew where the Nightmare Sword lay now? (Though he fancied that one of his cousins, or even an Agarashi, might have borne it out of Naaros before the towers fell. But then, what blade had he seen Agarash wielding against the Elder Magi in his vision if not the Nightmare Sword?) Most of the High Banes were at the black dragon's disposal. He elected to summon them.

A ray of sunlight broke through the heavy cloud layer and alighted upon the ashes of the cremated land. The dragon felt no remorse for the desolation: it knew pride. Once, they had been great: once, they had ruled the Last Battleground of Aon. But nostalgia and patriotism would get him nowhere. A new banner had to be erected, and fast.

The dragon lifted his head and sang the names of the runes, uttered words that were primordial sounds, and so invoked the High Banes with thunder rolling; not through the clouds, but through the air itself. With a great exertion of will that forced him down to the basaltic valley, Sinnagar twisted the threads of time and opened up a Shadow Gate, a-swirl like in the manner of a black hole, a long tunnel into the night. Through this came gibbering things, nameless things, things with inconstant and tormented bodies, barely recognisable as living beings. Yet they had power, great power, and they were numerous and deadly.

"My orders are simple: much I leave to your imagination," intoned the fire-drake with almost sonorous formality. "Go out into this world, this Magnamund, and seek out the Dwimorblaed, the Nightmare Sword. The door into the Void must be forever broken: the battle between the Lords of Light and of Darkness must come to a head! Thus do I charge you, and thus you shall obey. Return here, to Naaros, when this task is done. Send the spawn of Helgedad this way during your travels. There will be a rallying, and an armament, and this world will be sundered for all time!"

Wordless, they left; and as they made their way out of the Doomlands, up through the high and broken passes, they began to assume form, take upon themselves a constant guise, until, solid and fully-formed, they entered into the green lands to set about their charge. 

More coming next issue. . .