a tale of dragons part 15
#15 of A tale of dragons
I have a very big problem, and I don't know what to do about it. I've completely lost the ability to write good action scenes. It sucks. I just can't do it any more. I'll try to correct that in this chapter, but please, tell me what you really think about the fight scenes. (Namely, how do they compare to the older ones?)
Another short chapter. Sorry.
I need a good name for a spin-off series of to charm a dragon with a catchy name featuring a Trouble pun. (Like: More Trouble for Hyran and Amethyst, getting into Trouble, a little bit of Trouble, Trouble always cums in threes, when Trouble strikes, something like that.)
And please ignore any random mention of 'creature' in my stories. For some reason that word is starting to sneak in and replace words that start with crea. (Like creating) and feel and fell get mixed up too. (Words with double letters get mixed up a bit too. sorry)
Wow! Big week! A ton of new chapters. And I've been spending every minute I can get in yiffchat too. The more time I spend in there, the more writing I get done. Strange.
BTW wolf_goddess, you naming right has been changed to two of Matimura's and Kylara's children. So email the names you want.
A tale of dragon's part 15
Matimura awoke to a pointed draconic head hovering upside down over him. He recognized Kylara's distinctive face, and tried to say some kind of hello, but found that his body was rebelling against everything he tried to make it do.
"Don't try to move." Kylara said gently, quickly changing to her full size and picking him up in her large paws.
"You shouldn't have done magic." She rumbled, looking down at him with concern.
Matimura was suddenly struck by the fact that he was in love with a towering, fire-breathing dragon that ate humans.
"I'm taking you home." She said gently, spreading her wings and lifting off.
Turning his head to the side, Matimura could see the camp spread out below him in the darkness, lit by sporadic fires fuelled by broken tents.
He could see the sparks of blades meeting, and could hear the sound of clashing metal, the roar of massive creatures locked in titanic struggles. Part of him yearned to be back down there, wielding his sword to protect himself from harm. But another part of him realised that he had someone else to look after now, and so he made no protest as Kylara winged him off to her lair.
* * *
Brian was, as usual, in a bad position.
He was surrounded by a ring of ninja, each one holding the cliché swords they always carried, ready to carve him up.
"Don't you people ever learn?" He asked the group at large, before launching into an attack.
He leapt forwards, turning as he went, two swords slicing along the length of his chest, opening his shirt but missing the skin.
As he spun, he whipped his sword out to the right, catching one of the ninja across the back of the throat, cutting into his spinal cord.
He kept spinning, this time lowering his sword, so that it connected just above the knee of the next ninja, cutting off the lower part of his leg.
Brian leapt up and forwards, turning in the air so that he was completely above another enemy, his sword slicing sideways, cutting the ninja's head in half along a sideways axis, a spray of blood marking the location of his next victim.
Brian landed, and immediately leapt again, some unknown sense telling him another enemy was behind him. He landed feet-first on the ninja's shoulders, leaping backwards off them, pushing the ninja forwards into the ground, landing on another ninja's shoulders and slamming his sword down through the top of his head, the tip of the blade protruding from his chin, before Brian leapt down lightly and yanked the sword backwards and upwards, cutting the ninja's face cleanly in half.
Several more rushed him.
Brian parried to the left, dropping into a crouch, punching one of the ninja in the knee, dropping him to the ground, before he spun again, picking up another sword, and holding them in the ready stance.
They rushed him again.
Brian blocked with the left sword, letting his enemies momentum carry them past him. He sliced up the ninja's back with his other sword, opening up the centre of his back, revealing his spine.
He spun, his left sword flashing out, cutting under the swipe of another ninja's attack, catching him across the stomach, the blade lodging there.
Brian left it where it was, and kept spinning, his remaining sword whistling as it cut another ninja across the side, just above the hip, spilling his intestines across the ground.
Brian grabbed the sword that was embedded in the now dead, but still standing ninja, yanking hard and kicking at the same time, sending the inanimate corpse into a group of three ninja.
Another ninja rushed him, this one seeming to be the leader of them.
The enemy lashed out with his sword, a massive overhead blow designed to cut him in half.
Brian blocked with both swords, holding them in an X above his head, the blade held between them.
He twisted the blades, so that his enemy's sword was on the bottom of them. The ninja, caught off guard, unwisely kept pushing downwards. Brian stepped forwards, flipping his sword over his enemies back, and then ramming it back towards him.
The tip of the blade narrowly missed Brian's side as it exited the leaders naval.
Brian leapt over the leaders head, flipping as fast as he could. As he was about to hit the ground, he lashed out with his foot, slamming the hilt of the impaled blade hard, sending the leader again a tree, the sword sunk into the trunk, holding the rapidly dieing man immobilised.
Brian flipping his remaining sword, whirling and letting the blade go, so that it spun through the air on a horizontal axis. There was a thud as the blade hit the tree-trunk, digging right in. The leaders head slowly slid off his shoulders onto the ground with a sick thud, before the severed arteries in his neck started spraying blood into the air.
The ninja's who still remained melted into the night, disappearing to fight another day.
* * *
It would be several more hours before the men in the camp finally pushed the attackers back, until they retreated into the darkness.
Brian was pretty much unhurt from the battles, although he knew he would probably have a few more scars and some very sore spots come morning.
He was much more worried about Miralage. The fight had gone right through the area where she had been hiding.
He ran to the place where she had hidden, seeing that the building that had contained her room was burning, rafters falling into the debris with heavy crashes.
Brian could only stare at the carnage, wondering what could have happened to the little red dragonet? She couldn't have died could she?
He heard a pained whimper from near the centre of the ruins, in a place lit by sporadic fires, and leapt in, ignoring the hot coals and fire that licked along his legs, focussing entirely on the spot where he had heard the sound come from.
Brian could the sound clearer now. It was obviously Miralage, giving little squeals of pain or indignation as she tried to move under the weight of a beam that had fallen over her.
Brian, feeling pure adrenaline rush through his body, grabbed the burning beam and lifted it out of the way with raw strength.
He immediately settled down in the ash and coals besides Miralage, quickly searching across her body fro broken bones.
He was aware of a burning sensation across his back, but wasn't really worried about the fact that his shirt was burning right off his back; he was more worried about Miralage.
The little red dragon tried to squirm away from him, but he held her down, wondering why there weren't any broken bones or injuries on her body.
Then he saw the burnt strands of hair on her body, obviously from that gigantic bear that she loved so much. He smiled as he realised that she must have hidden under it and that the soft bear had protected her from the beam's full weight. Her scales must have been strong enough to resist the searing flames as well, because there wasn't a single burn on her little body, and she didn't even seem to notice that she was lying on a bed of coals.
Miralage stood up shakily, still a bit unsteady from her ordeal, and then threw herself into his arms, holding on tightly around his neck and nuzzling him happily.
Brian smiled, even though he was started to become acutely aware of the flames all around them.
He burst out of the doorway in a shower of sparks, unnecessarily shielding Miralage from the worst of them.
He set her down on the ground a short distance from the burning building, sitting down besides her and checking over his own wounds, while Miralage nibbled irritably at a wing, trying to clean away the clinging ash to no real avail.
She looked up at him for second, and then crawled on to him, curling up into a ball in his lap, content to lie there. Brian gently stroked her cheeks while she purred softly.
She suddenly reached up and kissed him, not the polite kiss, but a full-blooded kiss of fiery passion, making Brian first tense up, and then relax, content to enjoy it while it lasted, the building collapsing, neither of them noticing as embers danced in a whirlwind around them.