Legends of the Dragonrealm: Shade Read Free Page A

gestured. The guards’ weapons twisteddown to the street, the tips digging deep into the stone. Several of the soldiers stumbled, some falling to the ground.
    There was another rumble from the direction of the crowd, one that had nothing to do with Shade’s spell. He felt Cabe Bedlam’s nearby presence.
    “You must stop this now, Shade! It’s for—”
    It’s for your own good! How many times had he heard those words from the ones who felt that they knew best for him? They meant well, they had all meant well, but they had always proven themselves even less able to comprehend his curse than he.
    Before the wizard could finish speaking, Shade drew a line at his feet. The street peeled upward, forming a wall between him and his adversary. Cabe Bedlam, ever mindful of the lives of others, did not dare cast blindly, exactly as the sorcerer had hoped.
    Before Cabe could compensate, Shade again tried to transport himself away. His surroundings shimmered, changed.
    A savage set of teeth nearly tore off his head.
    Shade had more than once perished in grisly manners that made even this moment seem tame, but that in no way diminished his desire to avoid such a fate. He muttered under his breath and a tendril of energy encircled the reptilian maw barely a foot away.
    The riding drake clawed at the fiery bands keeping its jaws clamped tight, but its efforts only garnered it singed nails. Shade forgot the beast as its rider, another blue-tinted, reptilian warrior, flung himself at the still-disoriented sorcerer.
    The drake officer outweighed him by at least half again as much, most of it muscle. As the pair collided, Shade stared full into the false helm. The inhuman eyes narrowed with anticipation of battle and the lipless mouth twisted into a grin filled with predatory teeth.
    Shade succeeded in bringing a hand between the drake and himself. Through the glove, power radiated.
    His foe went flying over the head of the startled mount. The drake warrior crashed into the side of a building, shattering the clay face andeven cracking part of the stone beneath. The armored figure slid to the street, senseless. It would take more than such a collision to slay or even much injure one of his kind, and the sorcerer had not had any such desire. He had come here only to save himself, not to add further blood to his foul legend.
    Of course, not even Cabe Bedlam would likely appreciate such care on his part. They knew what he had been, what he might still become.
    Shade prayed for a few moments’ respite, just enough to clear his head and recoup the strength he needed to finally fling himself from Irillian. However, at that moment, the riding drake did a curious thing that promised the sorcerer would have no such chance. It started heaving, rasping for breath, even though the sealed jaws would not have prevented the beast from inhaling or exhaling.
    The reptilian mount rose on its hind legs. Onlookers in the area, only now realizing that there was a danger here, fled as the creature swelled in size and quickly began to transform.
    A shock of energy devoured the magical ring the spellcaster had placed around the jaws. The beast hissed at him, then roared, “ Accursed warlock, you will at last pay for the sundering of Irillian!”
    The drake already stood several times his size and now looked more sleek, more aquatic. He bore vestigial wings smoothed for swimming through the turbulent seas and had a crest that bent far back, the better to enable its wearer to cut through the waves.
    The leviathan was now a brilliant green-blue. The eyes, once those of a simple animal, filled with an intelligence clearly of a high degree.
    Irillian’s lord had possessed the beast. The Dragon King loomed over the nearest buildings. Compared to him, Shade was but an ant.
    The transformed drake opened its mouth wide, but fire was not what emerged. Instead, a fierce plume of water shot at the sorcerer.
    Shade fell to one knee as tons of water struck. Yet, the plume