Warsinger James Baldwin (read this if TXT) 📖

off and collapsed, the tunnel folding down behind it.

“We can't leave her in there if she dies!” Karalti squeaked. “Her spawnpoint is in the Dregs, and the Dregs are underwater now!”

An awful chill passed through me. Karalti was right. Suri's cell was now full of tons of stone and water. If she died and respawned there, she'd continuously wake up and die, wake up and die. It was the exact same scenario that had turned Ororgael from a bitter-but-otherwise-ordinary guy into an authoritarian mongrel who considered himself to be the rightful god-king of Archemi.

“She's not dead,” I insisted. “She's in our party... if she died, I'd get a notification or something.”

But as the minutes passed, even I began to feel uncertain.

In the swirling cloud of dust, I saw a glimpse of red. There was a heavy clanking that could be heard over the deep crunch of shattering stone deep within the collapsing labyrinth - faintly at first, then louder as Suri mounted the ramp. She was almost seven feet tall in her black horned armor, carrying the limp forms of the two prisoners she had rescued over her shoulders.

Around Karalti and I, every one of the Fireblooded and a good number of the other prisoners went to their knees.

“Sultira!”

“Sachara malik'i!”

The Dakhari began calling out as she came to a stop, as confused as we were. She looked to me. I shrugged.

“Righty-o then.” Suri carefully slid one of the swooning men down into the crook of her arm, and lowered him to the ground. She said something harsh in Dakhari to them all and made a shooing motion. People rushed forward to take the injured, and then ran with them down toward the gate as more ominous sounds ground out underneath our feet.

“You ready to go, lover boy?” Suri said.

Before I could reply, there was an ear-splitting crack from deep below our feet. The ground lurched, and the gatehouse folded inward like a house of cards. The prisoners and rebels reacted before we did - they ran, sprinting toward the gatehouse and the exit.

“Karalti!” I vaulted off Cutthroat's back.

“Okay!” The smaller woman was off just behind me. She unequipped her armor and flung her arms wide. Her small frame blurred into a shimmering mass of color.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” The ground was starting to tip. I equipped Cutthroat's muzzle and harness. They appeared on her body like a bondage outfit. She squawked in protest. “Get ready to swing up and fly!”

“There's no time for the harness!” Karalti ducked down, spreading a wing. Suri scrambled inexpertly up the slick leathery surface. I Jumped from the ground to Karalti’s shoulder, hooked a foot under the saddle grips, and flopped down on my belly to help the woman climb.

Cutthroat honked in confusion, turning this way and that as the stone beneath us began to split and rupture.

“Cutthroat!” Suri screamed her name as I hauled her up to the saddle. “Stay!”

Karalti bellowed, and as soon as we were all on her back, she surged into the air, driving up a storm of dust and broken rubble. “Hold on, everyone!”

“Grab the straps and saddle grips!” I shouted back. “Don’t let go!”

Suri flattened herself as best she could, yelping when Karalti pivoted in the air and thundered down, reaching for Cutthroat with her long hind feet. The hookwing cried out piteously as the stone liquified to sand beneath her claws, and she abruptly sunk to her knees - only to be pulled free like a cork as Karalti snatched her up like an eagle grabbing a fish out of a lake. The drag caused Karalti’s whole body to shudder.

Karalti beat her wings frantically, striving to climb into the air as the biggest monster I’d ever seen surged up from the earth toward us. Five fleshy lobes peeled back from a fang-lined tunnel that could comfortably fit a subway train. The [Sandworm Queen] had three black skulls next to her name. My eyes widened. She was Level One-fucking-Hundred.

“We're going to Taltos!” I roared. “Don't let go!”

Tentacles reached for us from below, but my dragon was faster. Suri and I had barely braced ourselves when she folded into nothingness and vanished.

Chapter 11

We hung in a motionless, bone-chilling black void. I couldn't feel the other players, the saddle, or sense Karalti's mind. Fear began to gnaw at my guts as the nothingness dragged on and on... but then, I felt a rush, like the sensation of rising up through cold water, and we burst out into the middle of a raging thunderstorm.

Karalti roared as the wind sheared under her wings and sent her careening to the side. She was a strong flier, but the air around Vulkan Keep, the Volod's castle, was so rough that she almost went tumbling over. Suri screamed with real terror as she lurched into a steep dive, pulling her wings close in an attempt to streamline her body and minimize resistance.

“Hold on!” I yelled back to her, bent over the front of the saddle. “We have to get out of the shear!”

“Don't worry! We'll make it!” Karalti's mental voice was tight with strain as we plummeted through the metal-gray clouds and broke out into the rain. Lightning flashed by us, splitting the sky with the burned-plastic stench of ozone.

I knew from experience that the lighter an aircraft was, the worse the turbulence. As large flying things went, Karalti was pretty light: her innate magic reduced her terrestrial weight by three quarters while flying, meaning she weighed a bit over two and a half tons on the ground but less than one when she was in the air. Her body jerked up and down and side to side as we streaked toward the parade ground at Vulkan Keep. I could see it already - the huge plaza attached to the Volod's skyport was blazing with lights, marking the way for incoming airships. As soon as I sighted it, Karalti read the image from my mind and angled in that direction.

The rain slashed us as Karalti broke