Page 127 of Dragon Outcast (Age of Fire 3)

“It’s that cursed wall that did it,” Nivom said. “See how the causeway runs along it? They could fire down on us, throw rocks. Rothor and NiHerrstrath tried climbing it, but they were picked off from the towers.”

Some of the Ghi men had ventured out beyond the broken gate and were crowded around the corpse of the dragon, cutting trophies of their victory.

The Copper suddenly noticed something about the wounded and the survivors. “What happened to the Firemaidens?”

“SiDrakkon grew desperate. After the first rush against the gate was thrown back, he sent the Firemaidens to lead the blighters. Some fell under the towers. I think that’s Agania there, being lifted by those rats.”

The Copper approached HeBellereth. The blighters had managed to get the horrible, hooked spear out, and the dragon lay on his side, panting. He rolled an anguished eye at the Copper.

Nivom shut his nostrils and walked over to the hanging meat.

“Can you walk, sir?” the Copper asked.

The dragon managed to right himself. He got his hindquarters up, but managed only a short, shaky rise on his sii before collapsing again. “No. I’m vanquished.”

“I’ve been vanquished too,” the Copper said.

“Yet…” the dragon said, “you wear laudi.”

The Copper inflated his lungs, looked down at the wounded drakes struggling up the slope. He couldn’t say who was talking or where the words were coming from, only that he was angry about the sacrifice of the Firemaidens, and the wretched humans across the river, pulling teeth and claws from the corpse of the dead dragon. “Not yet! Drakwatch of the Lavadome, you’re hurt but you’re not dead. Not yet!”

A drake pulled himself out from the rocks at the bank of the river.

“Up. Up, drakes,” the Copper said, rearing onto his hind legs, a strange clarity in his mind. “Climb. On three legs if you have to.” He waved his shriveled limb to emphasize his point.

One drake made it only a few paces before collapsing.

The Copper scrambled down the hill. The drake, a coppery color not much different from his own, was bled out, his gums and eye sockets almost white.

“Vanquished,” the drake said. “Cry vanquished for me. To what little glory I’ve earned I depart this—”

“Not yet! Climb on my back. I’ll get you up the hill. You’ll heal and get another chance at them.”

Six or seven blighter warriors were gathered nearby, resting and chewing on some kind of leaf. Some no longer had their spears or shields.

“Up the hill,” the Copper said.

They looked at him blankly as the drake climbed on his back. Luckily he was slender-framed. The Copper gestured with his snout. “To the top. Top.”

The Copper appreciated the hill’s difficulty more on the way up than on the trip down. Especially with the weight of a drake supported by only three limbs. The Ghi men would have a hard time coming up it, at least from the riverside.

The wounded drake’s claws relaxed and he slipped off. The drake’s tongue hung out as he breathed.

“Can you grip my tail?”

The drake didn’t answer; he just closed his teeth around the Copper’s tail, then shut his eyes. The climb was harder, not to mention painful, with the deadweight of the drake pulling at his tail, but he made it to the others.

The wounded drake breathed no more. The Copper pried the jaws loose.

He thought furiously. The drakes would lose heart, staring at that cooling body.

“I don’t know this drake. What was his name?”

“Nirolf,” another said.

“This is Nirolf’s hill, then. Let’s put him in those rocks, there, where he’ll have a good view of the fight.”

“Why name a hill after one who was vanquished?” a drake asked.

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