CHAPTER 7 - MABINOGION - Part 3

Roarr reached the rope ladder first and began climbing right away. Gwydion hurried Cat up the ladder and as the other Kingsguard arrived, he shoved them forward to climb.
Dog went up, followed by Heat and then Worm and Feather stood waiting. The two men and the elf looked at each other for a moment and all three knew they had thought the same thing.
“Listen you two,” Gwydion spoke first, “The Host isn’t coming, so no one has to stay and die. Go! I’ll cover you.”
“I thought about this for a long time,” Feather argued. “I can’t let anyone else stay in my stead. I’ll stay, you two go!”
Gwydion started to open his mouth to argue when Worm stopped them both.
“Cullen will kill us if his brother doesn’t make it and I have no one who will miss me except the ‘guard! Both of you go before that thing reaches us!”
Worm shoved the Asrai at the ladder and when he grabbed it, Worm pushed Feather into him so he had to climb. The two of them started up and Worm waited at the bottom.
The streets looked empty now, but everyone knew something big and bad was on its way. Worm glanced up and saw the other two disappear into the hole above him. He turned and grabbed the ladder and started climbing.
Half way up he heard sounds he couldn’t describe, like someone breathing, but too close. He turned to look and saw two giant eyes watching him. He froze in place and stared at the two eyes.
Then an enormous mouth opened and fire exploded in front of him. He heard Feather scream his name as the flames washed over him. He wondered why it didn’t hurt and then he was just gone. Even his skeleton was turned to ash.

Gwaelod watched the others arrive and he told them to climb. As a group they demanded he go first and relenting, he decide he would. He climbed up the ladder as only an elf could and he was in the hole in just minutes. Then he turned to look down and watch the others.
Crow leaped up and started climbing just as fast as the Asrai had. The thin man was quick; Gwaelod had to give him that. Below him, Farmer and Stone started up. The two men were coming fast but then the Asrai noticed Deep and Bray arguing.
He couldn’t make out the words, but clearly they had worried about being last and Deep must be telling Bray it was his job to go last since he was the Captain. Bray pushed him and suddenly it looked more serious than a talk.
Finally Deep relented and started climbing. Gwaelod helped Crow get in the tunnel and head back. Then Farmer and Stone made it in. Deep was climbing in the hole when Gwaelod saw the two red eyes a short distance away.
Then the mouth opened and the Asrai grabbed Deep and yanked him into the tunnel. Flames swept across the tunnel opening and baked the stone and dirt. Gwaelod pulled Deep along as he hurried into the tunnel, trying to get deeper before the monster got closer and blew fire up into the tunnels.

Aki, Fox and Anton saw the Queen’s globe explode and the Host seemed to fall apart right then. They suddenly turned and ran away into the city. Aki stopped the Xho from chasing them, thinking they would be better served by following slowly until they recovered Cullen from the castle.
Then his sharp eyes saw the massive shadow rise up from the far end of the city. He knew he was seeing the Dark Master almost before the thought had formed. He just commanded Anton to turn and run.
Anton saw the stark fear in Aki’s fine features and he didn’t question the command. He followed it by shouting the same thing and telling the Xho to turn and run.
It takes more than a few moments for an armed force to move, let alone turn around and go the other way. Aki, Fox and Anton were looking back across the cavern as the men turned and told other men to run away suddenly. There was confusion but they started to move.
The elf and the Priest saw flames reach across the cavern and light up the holes in the cavern wall. Anton couldn’t make out what the flames had come from but he could tell that something large and dangerous was in the city and that the order to run was a wise one.
Men started to move away and Anton pushed them to go faster as he turned away from the massive flames cutting across the city shadows. He hoped Cullen was leaving as well.

Cullen turned and barked a command for the other two to run deeper inside. He had seen flames shoot across the city rooftops and burned the ladders to nothing. He didn’t know who was there, but he saw two of his men die and he was angry.
“What are you going to do?” Idylls cried as Tris’tan started to pull her back.
“I’m going to put out that fire!” he responded, heat rising through him as the anger swelled in his chest. He turned and looked out across the city again watching the massive dark shape head towards the tunnel openings. He knew this creature was going to send more flame up the tunnels and more of his friends would die.
He couldn’t allow that to happen. He stood against the railing of the balcony and raised his sword. He closed his eyes and gathered spiritual pressure into the blade. He pulled energy, and friction and electricity out of the atmosphere around him.
He pulled and gathered until the Sword was gleaming in the dark. It shone like a beacon and the head of the creature looked his way, many, many feet below him.
Cullen hollered an Asrai war cry and swept the blade across in front of him. A massive arc or fire and lightening swept forward, rushing towards the side of the vast black shape below him.
The moment he released the energy of that attack, he climbed up the side of the balcony and up the outside of the tower. He scrambled up towards the glass ceiling as quickly as he could.
He heard the attack hit the monster and explode against its armored hide. The beast roared again, a death cry louder than anything Cullen had ever heard before. He glanced back to see that the shadow was moving again, coming to the castle and climbing up the side.
Cullen scooted higher up on the roof until he could touch the ceiling. He closed his eyes and began to gather power again. This attack needed to be stronger than the last. He needed the power of fire and force, lightening and strength, stone and wind, all of it.
The Sword began to glow again and Cullen heard a rumbling growl. He knew the shape was coming closer, edging its way up the side of the castle and at the last moment he opened his eyes and looked.
The deep red eyes were huge, like pools of fire below him. He could see intelligence in those eyes, intelligence and rage. It had an anger to match Cullen’s and it was coming to kill him. He had one chance at this and it had to work.
Cullen built up the pressure in the Sword and lifted it as hard as he could into the glass ceiling. He punctured the glass and released the power and there was an explosion of magic force that ripped the glass away.
The creature had almost reached him when the water from the river came crashing down and swept the beast away. Cullen saw its eyes blink and disappear into the swirling water that rained down into the city.
Cullen immediately climbed down and reached the balcony. He ran inside and found the two elves standing in the hallway obviously distressed.
“Come! I think I got him! But let’s get outside!” he commanded. He grabbed Idylls’s hand and pulled her along. Tris’tan raced behind them, just as quick.
They ran down hallways and through room, streaking down stairways and bursting through doors until finally the reached the steps of the front of the castle. They hurried down the steps and into the knee deep water that was rushing through the city and out the main gate.
They splashed through the river and out onto the wooden bridge and they saw the Xho army already across and headed back into the surrounding desert. Cullen continued to pull Idylls and his brother raced right behind them.
They ran all the way across the bridge and didn’t stop until they reached the camp. The camp was in an organized panic, people worried about the flame breathing shadow that had roared like an explosion.
Many faces turned to Cullen to see what they should do next. Cullen stopped running and stood there panting and praying that the water swept the creature away. He looked through his friends, trying to see who had died. He noticed that Bray and Worm were missing and Deep was being treated for burns.
His brothers were alive, he saw Aki’s team that had been on the bridge and Idylls was with him, although she was staring back at the mountain.
Then Cullen heard it. The whole mountain shook and rumbled. Everyone looked panicked as the ground shook with a fury. The volcano behind them shot a cloud of ash and smoke into the air.
It swirled and rained all around them like snow was falling, giving everything a dreamy quality. The mountain made noise and everyone watched to see if lava was going to shoot out the top.
Something came, but it’s wasn’t bright yellow or red, it was black, as dark as coal at night. And it was big. It looked big as it climbed out of the top of the mountain and turned its vast head towards the armed camp.
No one needed to be told that this was the Host’s Dark Master. This was Mabinogion. No one had ever seen one before but everyone knew that they were looking at a Dragon. It was alive, filled with hate and angry that its home had been invaded.
It rose up out of the volcano’s crater and perched on the edge of the highest cliffs. As ash and smoke rained down for miles around them, the massive Dragon opened up its leathery wings and it roared again.
Mabinogion had come.