Page 275 of Dragon Avenger (Age of Fire 2)

“I haven’t touched so much as a winter cabbage,” Wistala said. “I was all politeness to your girl.”

“I will still kill you,” the Dragonblade said.

“Let me speak first,” Wistala insisted. “Our kind have shed rivers of blood, matched against each other. I would have the flow stopped. Shall it always be thus, one family slaughtering another, until the ending of the world?”

“Or the ending of dragons,” the Dragonblade said. “Calls for peace are always made by those at a disadvantage.”

Wistala hugged the road, covering her belly with stone, readied to parry blade or spear with wing-points. “Come then,” she said. “Let’s start the madness afresh.”

The boy raised the bow, sighted with his good eye, but his father held him back. “You must let me finish, as well.” He plunged his spear point-first into the dirt beside the road. “There’s been enough killing for one day. You came to my doorstep and did no harm—”

“You would believe a—,” his son said.

The Dragonblade glared at him. “I believe this one. And my eyes. I see no smoke at our part of the lakeshore. And shut it, you fool hounds!”

Drakossozh looked thoughtful for a moment, and the dogs, silenced for only a moment, started up again. “The dwarves will pay no more hide-bounties, at least not for a long while. Perhaps I should take up chickens. They taste better and do not singe off one’s eyebrows. You have your peace. What is your name?”

“Wistala.”

“Ah. You are only the second dragon to ever escape me, Wistala. Wear that with pride, as you do that little bauble between your eyes.”

“Who was the first?” Wistala said.

“A drake, a young gray.”

Wistala’s hearts stopped. “What? When?”

“A dozen years ago or so,” he said. “I’ve heard no more trouble of him, I expect he died raiding some farmer’s pigpen. No scales, you know. He would be—wait, you two must be related.”

“I hope so,” Wistala said, wishing the Dragonblade’s dogs would cease barking. It detracted from the solemnity of the moment.

“Now I do fear to let you go. Were two such resourceful dragons to meet up again . . . but something in my heart says it will not go ill for me, or my family. Go, Wistala. No blade or arrow of mine will touch you.”

The boy fired, and the Dragonblade threw up a blur of an elbow that knocked the arrow off its path. It skittered harmlessly down the rocks. Wistala gulped, it was just as well they had not fought.

“Eliam, you vex me. But we will talk at home. Go, Wistala, and let my dogs quiet, before I finish off the pack myself.”

Wistala took a deep breath and launched herself into the air. She watched the spear point until she was out of range.

The old dragon proverb: Trust, but keep an eye open.

Epilogue

Wistala sat in the old troll cave, near the entrance where the air was cleaner, and dictated her memories of the battle that destroyed the Wheel of Fire, and much of the combined barbarian power in the north, to Lada.

Of Rayg she had no happy news. A great many dwarves fled down their mysterious holes to the darkroads as Thul’s Hardhold fell, and as Rayg hadn’t been carried off by the barbarians or been found among the dead, she assumed he’d fled for his life with them. The barbarians had caused so much destruction, it was doubtful that he could return through Hardhold, even if he wanted to. But he was in the company of dwarves who would respect him, very different circumstances from abject slavery in the north.

The thaneship had passed to Ragwrist, of all people, as Mossbell was the largest estate in the thanedom with Galahall divided between Hammar’s barbarian relations. Wistala had sold him Mossbell for a song—literally, for he had a wonderful voice. Now Ragwrist complained of his generosity to his tenants, driving him to the poverty of only drinking wines from the less renowned vineyards.

The circus went to Brok, who kept it out of barbarian lands, where dwarves were increasingly unwelcome, perhaps justifiably.

The Green Dragon Inn still stood, and tall tales had grown up around it and its sign. People in later years reached up to touch it for luck, and heard stories so bizarre and inaccurate, Wistala would have smiled to hear.

Widow Lessup retired with Yari-Tab in the modestly restored Mossbell hall and devoted herself to feeding and supervising the surviving cats, who kept the mice from nibbling the hooves of Dsossa’s “north herd” of white horses.

What remained of the Wheel of Fire Dwarves came under the leadership of Lord Lobok, who, if he ever led his fighting dwarves out of the mountains again, would be assured an entertaining place in the annals of military history.

Speaking of which, Wistala had no particular desire to accomplish a war history, but the librarians had asked for a dragon’s-eye memoir, and they would get one. It was the least an Agent of Librarians could do, before setting off in search of her brother.

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