Dragon Hunter

Chapter 40: Children of the Shadow

Cooper fought not to whistle in astonishment. Saddahk was the dragon that wrote the Annals? Rather, forged it with magic so it could watch the Cosmos and record the most significant of events? What were the frickin' odds that it would be the very dragon responsible for starting him on this journey that he would rescue from the planar Eternal Forest?? Ironically, if he was playing a video game right now, he would've called that a 'deux machina', a plot armor point introduced to help push the story along by granting an instant solution to a thorny problem.

Then he was leaning forward as, with a wave of his hand, Saddahk sent a wave of golden light cascading over the ancient book. He then opened it and carefully began turning pages.

Rather, it looked like he was turning pages. Only every third or fourth thing that Cooper's astonished eyes took in were actual pages. The rest were complex formulas, or intricate images, sometimes even maps and diagrams of cities, places, even entire worlds, each sliding first into, then out of sight with the dragon's motioning hand. All that was hidden in magical layers beneath the pages were now being brought out by Saddahk's powerful touch.

'Well. Looks like that side trip to Kulda'ark is no longer necessary,' Cooper found himself wryly thinking. If Saddahk could unlock the secrets of the Annals, he would have everything he needed to find the Crown of Oberon. Well, almost everything. He still needed a portal back to his own universe!

Saddahk pausing in his page turning was enough to pull Cooper out of his thoughts.

"Here," the silver said with a nod as he tapped the page and an image of a bright star moving from one side of the image, which was divided down the middle by some sort of border, to the other, played out.

"The Crown crossing out of the Garden to Earth. And there, the Sidhe carrying it to Balmora, which was their capital on your world, Cooper. They stored it there in their great Vault of Ancient Trees while their sages began to study it. And ..."

Saddahk paused with a frown as he peered at the Annals for a long moment.

"First Flame grace me," he finally said, looking up. "I don't think the Crown left ... guhhhh!"

Cooper's eyes flew wide as he watched Trezm's bloody length emerge from the were-form's chest. Then a hard foot in Saddahk's back sent him sprawling. Which revealed a frowning Kennedy standing there, his expression thoughtful.

"Well," the dokkersvelf said musingly, looking from the bloodied dragonsteel sword in his hand to down at the injured silver. "That worked better than I expected!"

"Kennedy??" Theron gasped, dragging his eyes off the stricken Saddahk to round on the elf from the other side of the mirror. "What ... what have you done?"

Cooper wasn't sure if it was instinct, or the fact that things had just gone monumentally sideways. But even as Saddahk fell awkwardly forward, blood gushing from his wound, he was bringing up Talos to aim squarely at the dokkersvelf's head. And found himself looking at a targeting map.

If Kennedy was actually a dragon, there was only one faction that would want a Primal dead. A faction that was supposed to be long dead!

"Motherfucker!" he tautly hissed. "You're First Ring!"

Looking up and over at the human, Kennedy smiled thinly.

"Very good, Cooper," he said. "As I said, you humans, and you in particular, are far more clever than the elves give you credit for."

The thin smile vanished as Kennedy made a gesture with his hand. And, before he could pull Talos's trigger and punch volcanic glass through Kennedy's forehead, Cooper found himself unable to move. A second gesture in Theron's direction froze the Sidhe elf as well, although Theron was still too shocked by the betrayal to move.