Light Dragons 03 - Sparks Fly

the wall.
    “Must be the fortress graveyard for people not buried in the crypt,” I said to myself, turning back to the area and searching it for signs of life.
    A little flash of red through the green leaves had me gasping in surprise and shock, followed swiftly by terror. The sight of bodies forming out of nothing sent me running back along the wall. I didn’t stop to explain when I got to Brom and Nico; I grabbed my son’s arm and dragged him after me as I raced down the stairs and across the bailey.
    “Baltic!” I yelled as both Brom and Nico asked me what was wrong. “Baltic! We have to get out of here. Now!”
    “We can’t until it is safe for me to take you and Brom,” he said, appearing at the head of the stairs and tossing a metal negret down onto a stack that sat at the base of the stairs. “There are fewer of them coming now. Another hour or so and we will have depleted their forces enough that I can take you away.”
    “We don’t have an hour. We have to go now!” I insisted, starting for the chapel. “We’ll have to go out the bolt-hole and blast with dragon fire any negrets that remain.”
    “Ysolde!” Baltic said in his most domineering voice. “I insist that you allow me to decide when it is safe for you and Brom to leave.”
    “Thala’s here!” I yelled over my shoulder, pausing long enough to gesture toward the north. “She’s not in Nepal; she’s here !”
    He froze for an instant, then smiled.
    I shivered at the smile.
    “Good. We will capture her and take her to the watch.”
    “You don’t understand. Oh, for the love of the saints-” I shoved Brom at Nico and marched back to Baltic, taking him by the arm and trying to pull him after me. “She’s not alone!”
    “She has ouroboros dragons with her?” He shrugged, refusing to allow me to budge him from where he stood. Pavel slowly came down the stairs, looking curious.
    “No, she doesn’t. She’s in the graveyard. And unless I’m way off base, she’s resurrecting the dead people there.”
    I’ll say this for Baltic: he may love a battle, and will happily fight when the odds are greatly against him, but he’s not stupid; he knows when the time is upon him to retreat.
    That time was now.
    He had to see for himself, however. While Nico and I whipped together a makeshift stretcher in which we gently rolled the still-unconscious Holland and his arm (we couldn’t find his ear), he and Pavel went up onto the north wall, returning almost immediately with identical grim expressions.
    “Liches,” Baltic said, moving me aside as I threw myself on the tomb, trying to slide it back. “We will leave now.”
    “I can’t go with you!”
    We all turned to look at the woman who stood in the doorway, Savian next to her. She held up her hand. “Someone has to get this off, because I’m sorry, but I really cannot leave.”
    “Look, I know you feel some sort of loyalty to Thala-”
    Her face twisted in pain. “No, it’s not that at all. It’s-it’s ... Oh, it’s too complicated to go into now. You just have to believe me when I say I can’t leave.”
    I turned to Baltic. “She’s been nothing but helpful since we got here. Would you go ahead and break the handcuffs? Savian lost the key to them, so you’re going to have to use brute strength to get her free.”
    “He won’t be able to,” Savian said wearily as Baltic started toward Maura.
    “Don’t be silly. Baltic is extremely strong, and even stronger in his dragon form.”
    Savian shook his head. “These aren’t mortal handcuffs, Ysolde. They’re titanium, spelled, warded, and scribed with not one, but two banes. They are unbreakable, even by a dragon.”
    “Oh goddess,” Maura said, moaning as she put one hand to her head. “What am I going to do?”
    “I have another set of keys in my flat,” Savian told us. “If we can get back to England, I can unlock them.”
    “You’re just going to have to come with us,” I said loudly when Maura vented her spleen on him, telling him in no uncertain-and sometimes anatomically impossible-terms what she thought of his ineptitude. “I know it’s not what you want, but we have no choice, and no time to stand here arguing about it!”
    The negrets in the tunnel were taken by surprise when not one, but three dragons all descended upon them, filling the entire passageway with fire. Brom and I carried Holland-over Savian’s protests that he felt fine, really, and the fact that he fainted when he stood up a