Free The Last Dragon Chronicles: The Fire Ascending by Chris D'Lacey Page A

  as
    ‘sometimes’. How they had appeared, I did not know. But Voss had followed my puzzled gaze and he could now see the lines for himself.
    He stood up, throwing the meat aside. The raven cocked its head in hope. Itdanced what it knew could be a ritual of
    death, then caarked once and stole the entire joint, dragging it away to a sheltered lip of rock. Voss put the knife

    away and drew the horn again. He pointed it squarely at me. Out of its tip came three dark lines of twisted light.
    The unicorn bayed, setting off the horses.
    The men stirred and began to call, “Voss, what’s ’appening?”
    I heard Grella scream, “No, leave himalone!”
    But by then the dark light had struck myforehead. I jerked and kicked as theshadow force the Fain had warned me
    about swarmed through my mind. I saw Voss’s mouth curl round the words, but the voice I heard came directly from the Ix.
    You will tell us what you know about
    Isenfier .

They probed my memories and pulledout the image I had seen with the tornaq. Isaw the dragon and I saw the child. Shehad wings on her back. A human girl withfeathered wings   .   She was kneeling ongrass. In a valley between hills. Therewere other humans with her. And dragonslike Galen in the sky above.
    You will locate this timepoint   , said the
    Ix.
    I screamed as darkness pressed uponmy auma from a thousand different pointsof space.
    But just as quickly, I was free of itagain. When I shook myself back to fullalertness, Voss was staring at the peak ofthe mountain and his men were trying tocontrol the horses and the unicorn was

    even more demented and the moon had
    risen and there were eagles in the sky and there was so much heat coming out of the rocks – and so much snow coming down the rock face.
    The first slide took Gunn’s friends over
    the cliff. It gathered them up like pieces of fluff and carried them into the empty sky. They made no sound as they fell. All that could be heard was a distant   whump!   as
    their   bones   smashed   against   their unmarked graves. Voss leaped up and turned the horn upon the next fall of snow. A bolt of the dark light struck it. The air filled with crystals of sparkling black ice. I lost sight of Voss, but saw an eagle swoop down and sink its talons into Gunn’s chubby face. He let out a shrill,

    gut-wrenching cry and turned a circle with the bird still fixed to his head. I didn’t see
    what became of him and I did not care to
    imagine. By then, Grella was at my side. She hastily untied my hands.
    “The cave!” she shouted. “It’s our only chance!”
    But as I got to my feet, a vast shadowappeared behind the crystal cloud. Everyliving thing present – me, Grella, Voss,the horses – must have thought we hadbreathed our last. Galen had come, withhis wings spread wide, hovering in theway that Yolen had described to me instories in the cave. He flipped his wingsonce and we were scattered like seeds to
    the back of the ledge. Through the swirling ice, I saw his jewelled eyes lock onto the

    unicorn. It was baying at him with all its
    might.
    I heard Grella crying, “No, no!”
    But before I could wonder what she
    meant, Galen had brought his giant tail round and driven his triangular isoscele into the unicorn’s anguished heart. I had never seen a more appalling sight or heard such a brutal squelch. But as the unicorn buckled, its body turned white and its eyes shone blue. It collapsed onto its side and crumbled into ash. In death, Galen had given it peace.
    My thoughts immediately turned to Voss. I remembered Yolen saying,   With the unicorn gone, his powers will be diminished . Yet Voss was showing no sign of fear. I was shielding Grella tight in

    my arms when I saw him approaching the lip of the cliff. Three eagles circled, wanting to attack. Galen snorted, keeping them back. This was going to be the dragon’s kill.
    Then Voss did a very strange thing. He raised his arms high