TITLE: Ruins and Explorations. Chapter Two of 'The Songs of Summerset and Midwinter'
AUTHOR: Pythia
RATING: 15
CHARACTERS: Giles, Willow
FEEDBACK: Will be appreciated E-MAIL: pythia@tiscali.co.uk
SUMMARY: Sharshall was a city of wonders before the Fall. Many of those wonders remain - but these days even simple sightseeing can be dangerous ...

Disclaimer:

BTVS, its characters and the world it depicts isn't mine. It belongs to Joss and all those other people who helped him make it a reality.
'Dungeons and Dragons' isn't mine either. That was a wonderful idea thought up by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, and is currently owned by Wizards of the Coast. The campaign world this story is set in, however is mine - as are most of the various characters who live there.

Interesting things in this chapter: a combat sequence I played out with dice (and then had to translate into actions ...) and a discovery or two about Cullie's Quaternity, a couple of which I knew about, while the others I didn't, until they brought them up ... Still trying to adhere to D&D rules (which seems to have had some 3rd edition sneak in along with the 2nd) - so updating stats on all the characters, their spells and their magic items, as well as rolling dice whenever combat is initiated. At least one of them goes up a level in this chapter! I am still exercising DM's discretion on occasions. It's my world, and the gods are on my side ...

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Morning arrived with soft influx of light, the slow sweep of a dying winter's dawn easing into a chill touched day.  Flux was awake almost as soon as the day was, easing himself out of the cocoon of his bedding to pad, silent and barefoot, across to the mirror surfaced pool so he could dip in his ritual chalice and draw out a deep cupful of the crystal clear waters for his morning devotions.  He didn't conduct the rite quite so formally every day, but it seemed disrespectful not to do so after spending a restful night in the heart of the still blessed enclave.  He knelt at the pool's edge, took the chalice in both hands and lifted it in devotion, murmuring the litany of gratitude and blessing that he'd been taught almost as soon as he could walk, and which had long since sunk into his breath and his bones, making his existence a walking prayer to the goddess he served.

“Blessed Sulis, who moves among the waters and renews the world with your tears, hear my words and know my heart.  For I thank thee for the gift of another day – this day that you have sanctified and made fresh with the rains of the night, the tumult of the rivers, and the stirring  of the deep seas.”  He lowered the chalice and bowed his head over it, continuing the chant in a soft undertone. “Bestow on me thy blessing, as a faithful child of thine order.  Let me bathe my soul in the glory of thy waters, let my body be refreshed, and my heart be made clean.  Inspire within me the courage of thy name and let me be worthy of the wisdom that is thy gift to the world.  For with it I will protect the weak and defend the innocent.  I will stand against the shadow.  I will serve thy cause.  And I will praise thee as I praise those who stand beside thee.  In the heart of the Earth, in the power of the Air, and in the spirit of the Fire, thine is the wisdom of the waters.  Thine are the depths, wherein all things are born.  Before thee I am nothing but a single drop in the ocean of thy majesty.”

He took one, long swallow – tasting the cool freshness of the spring – and then he dipped his fingers so that he could sprinkle the final blessing over the curve of his clean shaven skull.  Power sparkled in the gesture – an unexpected bonus, since he was merely marking his devotion, not calling on the goddess directly – and he felt the shiver of a blessing whisper through his bones.

“Thus may it be,” Cullie murmured reverently behind him, and he smiled.

“Thus, indeed.  And I'm thinking you'd do well to light a candle here before we leave,” he said.  “She blessed it.”  He stood up, turning to offer her the chalice, and her eyes went wide.

“Truly?”

“Truly.  Without the asking, too.  The power in this place runs deep.”

Cullie's eyes flicked to where legends slept and bronze scales caught and reflected the early light.  “I noticed,” she said, a little dryly.  She half reached for the chalice and then let her hand fall away.  “You'd better keep it.  The dead sleep lightly in this city, remember?  We may wake a few on the way out.”

“Aye.”  Flux nodded grimly, remembering the last time they'd had to deal with the restless dead.  “Well, let's walk softly and pray we don't.”

“ You pray,” she half joked.  “And I'll let you take point …”

He rolled his eyes and stomped away to unroll the hole so he could find an empty flask to fill.  Cullie stayed at the poolside for a moment, then moved across to poke the embers of the fire into reluctant life.  Ashley was awake and taking a moment to scribe in her journal; Meldew, as usual, was the last to stir, twitching grumpily in his sleep and waking himself up with a sudden grunt that spilled him from his tangle of blankets.

“Morning,” Flux noted from the bottom of the hole.  “Are we awake and with the world today?”

The alchemist peered at him blearily.  He was not a morning person as a rule, and waking early after a cold night on hard stone tended to make him a little testy.  Back home at the tower it was easy to sweeten his mood with a cup of hot tea laced with plenty of honey, but out in the field they usually had to endure his grumps until his mind and his body sorted themselves out and realised they were both awake.  “I don't know,” he grimaced.  “Did we meet a dragon yesterday?”

“We did,” Flux grinned, bouncing on one foot as he tugged a boot onto the other.  He'd not entirely believed it himself, waking in the cold stir of dawn and taking a moment to consider if his memories of the day before were no more than a vivid dream – and then he'd sat up, and all doubt had fled in an instant.  At sometime during the night the Lord Watcher had managed to coil himself into the exact pose that dwarves still stamped on the back of bronze tradebits – the higher end coinage, worth almost as much as a Summer's gold crown, and twice the value of a silver sail – although Flux now knew that no coinage stamp would ever capture the sheer presence of a true dragon, no matter how skilled the artist that sculpted it. 

“And is he still … here?” the alchemist questioned warily.  Flux's eyes darted towards the Bronze's resting place.

“Well, now,” he answered, “he's not flown off in the night, if that's what you were thinking.  Nor has he vanished into thin air, or turned out to be naught but one of Issamov's marvellous mechanicals, all cogs and key turning.  At least,” he added with a thoughtful frown, “I don't think he has – but you could always take your staff and go give him a poke if you wanted to check …”

Meldew glowered at him, all irritation and morning thunder.  “Oh yes,” he muttered, groping around for that self same staff and using it to help himself to his feet.  “Because I have such a fogged head in the morning that I can be persuaded to poke valuable property at a creature more than capable of biting both it and me, in two …”  His grumble tailed off as he turned and found himself staring at the subject of their discussion.  Wings that had been little more than darkened shadows in the night now lay draped like shimmering banners over the Bronze's gleaming flanks, catching the morning light and reflecting it back in a dance of iridescence; there was something – some sense of majesty – about the sight that stilled the breath and stirred the heart.  Flux had felt that moment catch at him, even in the grey of dawn.  Meldew took a half step back, almost as if he'd struck – and then he pulled in a shaky breath and swallowed and nodded, suddenly far more awake than he'd ever been, that soon after waking.  “Idiot,” he muttered softly, half under his breath – although whether he was berating himself, or belatedly finishing his complaint, Flux would never know. 

“When you've both had your fill of staring,” Cullie called across with a grin, “we need to break camp.  A good swift start and we'll be halfway to the Edge by nightfall.  Gods willing,” she added softly.   “Ashley, would you sort out a cloak or something for the Lady Willow?  I'll – uh,” she took a determined breath, “- go … wake our – guests.”

Flux and Meldew exchanged a look – and then the dwarf was scrambling out of the hole and hopping after Cullie's brave stride, tugging on his other boot as he went.  There were moments when he and the others were more than willing to give their leader's fiery impetuosity full rein, and others – like now – when cooler heads and wiser choices needed to intervene.  For all they knew, the Lord Watcher would be grumpier than Meldew if woken unexpectedly, and until they had some idea how he might react to being disturbed, the moment would need to be handled carefully.

There was a reason the alchemists' texts described the use of their fiery powders as waking the sleeping dragon …

“Oh,” he heard Cullie chuckle softly.  “That's just too … I can't disturb that. ”

Flux hastened to catch up with her, grimacing at the note in her voice.  You weren't supposed to find the envoys of the gods amusing .  Dragons were serious business.  On the other hand …  He walked round her to see what she was smiling at, and found an involuntary grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.  It wasn't done to laugh at a Dragonkin, let alone a true Dragon, and yet …

The firechild was tucked up under the Bronze's wing like a babe, fast asleep against the shimmering flank; her hair spilled round her like a halo of flame, and her slender figure was curled in on itself, snuggling down into the deceptive softness of dragonhide.  She looked younger than she had before, the tenderness of youth revealed in her artless slumber.  Chit of a girl , Cullie had called her, just before her Guardian had revealed his presence.  She was neither a ‘chit' nor wholly a girl – but it was a charming sight, seeing her lying there like that, her presence gentling the Dragon, cloaking his terror and the true depth of his power.  He was barely more than a child himself – fifty years he'd claimed the night before, not quite denying his embarrassment at the admission.  Fifty was barely adolescence for his kind, or so the stories said.  The great wryms – a hundred, two hundred feet long – had nurtured their wisdom for a thousand years or more.

A pair of babes, the two of them, fast asleep in the ruins of a world that had witnessed the destruction of their kind.

And dangerous ruins, at that.  They might be safe enough within the enclave, but it wouldn't do to sleep so artlessly elsewhere in Sharshall - not when hungry shadows lurked at the edges of perception, waiting to take advantage of the slightest inattention.

Flux nudged Cullie from her amused stare and took a half step forward, intending – if acting without too much thought could be called intention  - to reach up and shake the girl from her sleep.  Then he stopped, frozen by a sudden wisp of terror that leapt, unbidden, to seize his heart.

The Bronze was watching him.

The Dragon had one eye half open, a slight, narrowed stare that pinned Flux to the spot with the certainty of a spearpoint.  Dragonfear the stories called it – that sense of a presence so vast, so awe-inspiring, that brave men were humbled and lesser souls ran screaming in fright.  It took a true hero to stand up to such a look with anything less than a trembling heart. Even if the Dragon concerned had intimated that you might – might possibly – be worthy to be called a friend …

“Good morning,” Flux heard Cullie say, her voice overbright and her words suddenly – and unusually - tremulous.  She was a brave soul and a hero, but it seemed not even she was immune to that considering gaze.  “Sleep well?”

The Bronze lifted his head – he'd been resting it on his forelimbs, tucked up as neatly as a cat – and glanced down at his still sleeping companion with what had to be a fond smile.  Then he blinked, and turned his attention to the two of them, tilting his horned head to get their measure.  His eyes now held hints of curiosity along with lingering amusement, and Flux found himself letting out the breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding back. 

All those colourful tales and lurid legends – even the few more accurate accounts he'd managed to gather over the years – faded into pale sketches when matched against the real thing.  He really hadn't been expecting that.

“Strangely enough,” the Lord Watcher was saying, in that warm and resonant voice, “I did.  Good morning to you both.”  He glanced up at the broken dome and the hints of blue sky that were beginning to emerge from the softness of dawn.  “You're early risers, I see.”

“We've a long way to go,” Cullie explained chirpily, her normal confidence reasserting itself.  “And this isn't a safe place to stay.  Not for long.”

“Safer than most,” Flux couldn't help drawling, fascinated by the curves of the Dragon's neck, by the shift of muscles beneath the metalled skin.  Only the gods could craft such a creature, but he could see - in the divine design – some of the inspiration that had shaped the strength and beauty of his ancestral home.  “With him around.”

The Dragon chuckled, and Flux froze for a second time.  Fire and metal , what was he thinking ...? 

“My pardon, Lord Watcher,” he started to stammer, and earned himself a second chuckle, this one even more indulgent than the last.

“Oh – good lord,” Giles murmured, his tone both pained and amused.  “Flux – Master Wireform – please … I know that you're concerned about offending me, and .. I am very conscious of being … slightly more intimidating than I am generally used to … but – really … there is no need to walk on eggshells around me, and I can assure you, I am not going to take offence at some offhand or casual remark intended as a joke.”  He lowered his head a little further, so as to meet Flux eye to eye.  “I do have a sense of humour, you know.  Hard as that may be to believe.”

He was nose to nose with a dragon.  Even closer than he'd been the day before.  Close enough to see each gleaming tooth, to study the curve of each nostril and count the pattern of scales that circled each deep and discerning eye.  He could smell the taint of dragon breath, warm with a hint of unspecified spice, and he could feel the whisper of it brush against his skin, almost like a soft caress. 

And that was all it took – that moment of suspension, balanced between the total awareness of the power he faced, and the dawning realisation that, despite all that power, there'd been no hint of arrogance or condescension behind the proffered words.  The dragon had meant exactly what he'd said. 

A very roundabout way of saying be yourself perhaps but then, dragons had long lives.  They could afford to squander a sentence or two.  Flux Wireform felt himself relax, almost as if he'd passed some unspoken test; he let a small grin surface on his face and responded with a casual shrug.

“Not that hard,” he said.  “Now, believing it of Meldew, that's stretching the imagination …”

“Hey,” the alchemist protested from the other side of the camp.  “I heard that.”

“You were meant to,” Flux shot back, and winked at Giles, who rolled his eyes and snorted softly. 

“Enough,” Cullie commanded, shooing Flux back towards the fire.  “You can annoy Meldew later.  Will you wake the Lady Willow, Lord Watcher?” she asked politely.  “It will take us some time to escape the city, and we should be as far from here as we can by sundown.”

“Of course.  But – please, just … Giles will do, Lady Cullandra,” the Dragon reminded her.  “I'm not convinced we've earned these titles of yours.  Not yet, at any rate.  But I have been giving some thought to your …concerns, about my presence.  I believe I might be able to … attempt a - a change,” he concluded.  “Less … conspicuous that way.”

Change?

Flux's ears pricked up at that, a little leap of delight catching at his heart.  The tales were full of dragons who could shift their form, with a great many stories in which they chose to hide themselves and their power in the wrappings of men and dwarves and elves – and even disguising themselves as baser creatures, as horses and cunning foxes, and wise talking birds who would lead heroes to their destinies …

“Uh – yes, I suppose it would be.”  Cullie's bemusement added a hint of laughter to the excitement fluttering beneath his ribs.  That was politeness talking, not awareness of what might be about to occur.  Had she not been listening when he'd entertained her with his tales? Flux hurried back to his abandoned bedding, torn between not wanting to risk Cullie's ire if he caused delay, and a longing to stare and stand witness.  Would it be impolite to turn and watch?  Could the Lord Watcher truly shift and change?  He pondered how it might happen – in a flash of light, perhaps?  Would there be a swirl of power and a dramatic clap of thunder?  Or just a rippling of muscle and bone and distorting skin?  Shiftings – those undertaken by choice - were a matter of will and determined deformation.  And until the art was mastered, they were as painful as those imposed by involuntary means.  Potions and curses, and even the changes wrought by rings or spells tended to hurt .  He'd spent an uncomfortable day forced into the shape of a dog once, and had no desire to repeat the experience.  But dragons –in the tales, dragons shifted from one form to another without hesitation … and without much effort, if half the stories were true.  “Besides – I am Cullie to my friends.  If that is not presumptuous of me …”

“Not at all.”  There was a kindness – and gratitude – in that gentle acknowledgement, that would put many a noble lord or lady to shame.  “Willow and I are a long way from home.  And you've been far more gracious and considerate than either of us have a right to expect.  I hope we can be friends.”

“So do we all,” Meldew muttered as he dropped the cooking pots back into the hole.  Flux chuckled and bent to hastily gather up his bed roll.  There was a hint of concern and a great deal of hope lying beneath the wry bite in his friend's words.  The lanky alchemist had faced a great deal of disillusionment over the course of his life, and he'd crafted his cynicism with determined effort, creating an armour that helped protect him from broken promises and unfulfilled dreams.  He'd followed Cullie on this wild dragon chase simply because she'd asked him to, predicting disappointment in order to avoid it – and probably not expecting to endure more than their usual sort of adventure and find a magical trinket or two.  And yet, here they were, in the company of legends – legends who, in some ways, were nothing like what the stories suggested, yet in others, were every inch the epitome of a bards tale. Not even Meldew could deny the possibilities, or the potential purposes that lurked within the gifts of the gods – and the dragon and his kin were gifts indeed, breathtaking, inspiring, and utterly, utterly terrifying. 

In a good way, of course …

A soft gasp from Cullie lifted Flux's attention from rolled bedrolls and folded blankets. There'd been no flare of light, no swirl of magic, not even the sound of those bone cracking, muscle popping, agonised distortions of form the Chosen of Terra sometimes employed.  Nothing but a blink, and a brief stir of displaced air – and he'd missed it.  Where, barely a moment before, there'd been a dragon, a sleepy dragon-kin sliding from the warmth of his flanks with a yawn – there was now a man, cautiously rising to his feet.  A tall, stately figure of a man, with short dark hair lightly peppered with hints of grey.  He was dressed in the Bronze's colours – dark, close cut leggings and a shirt of deep shimmering blue green – topped by an oddly styled long leather coat, seemingly dyed to match the sweeping shading of his dragon wings. 

Willow was staring at him with wide eyed wonder.  So was Cullie.  The moment held for a breath – and then the Firechild uttered a wordless squeal of delight and threw herself into the man's arms, hugging him with a sudden, fierce enthusiasm, and the son of Smelter Wireform broke into a grin that threatened to split his face in two.

Every inch a legend?  Perhaps he should make that every foot . 

Because, even disguised as a man, the Sword of Sulis towered over them all …

Part Two

“… so I thought you could wear one of my spare tunics over your gown, and then, if we belt Cullie's spare surcoat – the padded one – over that, and you take Flux's spare cloak …”

Willow wasn't really listening.  She nodded and smiled, and moved her arms as Ashley directed, letting the elfkin wrap her in a makeshift outfit better suited to travel than her flimsy dress – while her eyes and her attention remained firmly fixed on the familiar figure currently engaged in quiet discussion with Meldew.  There was a grin so broad on her face that her cheeks were hurting, but she couldn't have reduced its width, even if she wanted too. 

It wasn't just that Giles had managed to figure out how to pack all that solid, sculptured dragon stuff  - wings and talons and tail and fins and all the rest of it - into six foot of seemingly human flesh, although that was a pretty impressive start.  Nor was it because his figuring had included how to use some of that stuff to construct clothing – practical clothing, at that, shirt and jeans, Doc Martens … and, inevitably, a leathery wing coloured version of his favourite coat.  The one that had determinedly remerged from his wardrobe the moment he'd set foot back on English soil.  Buffy had mistaken called it a duster, since it held some resemblance to Spike's ubiquitous leather trademark – and Willow remembered Giles immediately launching into an indignant lecture over the differences between some high street fashion house's attempt to cash in on ‘western' styling, and the genuine practicalities of the Australian drover's coat.  As interpreted by a very expensive English tailoring company apparently … although that might have been less ‘interpreted' and more ‘original designer' shipped out with boatloads of would be colonists.  Or criminals.  Or something.

Buffy had been reeling for days.

Even so, the coat wasn't the reason for the grin, although seeing it stirred some odd feelings that might have included a touch of homesickness and a tugging sense of how much they'd sacrificed – just how different this world was from the one they'd left behind.  No, the grin had been utterly inspired by the man who'd emerged from the dragon he'd become – because, given most of the night to work out the how , and the little that was left to work on the what – Giles had somehow managed to avoid all the potential pitfalls of self perception and recreated himself almost exactly the way he'd looked the last time she'd seen him …

Well, okay ... exactly was a teensy exaggeration.  This version of him looked a lot less stressed for a start.   And his previously pale and somewhat worryingly pasty complexion – the one developed over endless late nights, long days buried in his office or the Council library, and months of an uncertain English winter – had been upgraded to a far more healthy glow.  Not quite a tan perhaps, but definitely an improvement in both colour and quality; that – together with the loss of the pinched and slightly strained tenseness that had come to haunt his features in the past couple of years – had brought back the Giles she knew and hadn't realised she was missing.  Confident, competent Giles – the one capable of stern admonition, measured statesmanship, forbearing patience, Ripper backed intimidation, or Rupert inspired warmth and affection.  Her Giles; Scholar, Scooby, Warrior, Watcher – and … something more.  

Because, wrapped in that familiar, almost heart-aching guise, he still managed to present echoes of the breath-taking creature he'd become.  Something in the timbre of his voice, perhaps - some hint of draconic quality –  or maybe in the sheer solidity of his presence, truly dwarfing Flux, looming over Cullie, and even managing a good inch or two over Meldew's lean height.  There was something else, something in the depths of his eyes that spoke – to her, at least – of power and strength and something coiled inside him.  He may have taken on a more recognizable shape – but he was still the Dragon, and still very much wrestling with what that meant.

“Boots,” Cullie declared firmly, appearing directly in front of her.  She was holding up exactly that – a pair of soft ankle boots, made from what looked like amber suede.  “My … dancing boots, actually, but they're Elven crafted and made to fit the feet that wear them.  I don't.  Much.  My father gifted me with them … back when he was trying to make a court lady of me.  But they're better than nothing.  For rough ground, I mean.”

Willow frowned for a moment, and then glanced down; the gleam of copper touched toenails glinted at her from beneath the hem of her dress.  “Oh,” she realised, lifting one heel up and round so that the flimsy fabric fell away and the sweep of her scale patterned leg was revealed.  Her anklets jangled softly as she moved.  “Ah.  Okay.”

She'd hardly given a moment's thought to her lack of footwear; the polished marble of the enclave floors had probably been designed to be walked about on with bare feet, and she'd been so comfortable with it that it had felt perfectly natural to do so.  Perfectly natural to scramble up soft dragonhide, too … a sudden memory of silky warmth beneath her toes, her feet digging in to get purchase as she climbed, brought an embarrassed smile to her face - although, if your friend and mentor did invite you to treat him like furniture, it was probably better to do so shoe or boot free. 

Not so much the outdoor travelling thing though.

“Thanks,” she said, taking the boots, which were kind of neat; they had slightly pointed toes, and gold stitching around the top – just enough to hint at decoration without being flashy about it. 

“You're welcome,” Cullie smiled, and moved away again, nodding at Flux as he carefully folded up the now closed and returned-to-a-sheet-of-fabric hole.  Willow had been really, really impressed with the magic the device required, and she was even more impressed now, seeing several cubic feet of space – and all the items in it – being nonchalantly tucked into a belt pouch.  That was part of the wonder of this new world of theirs – that, while the sort of technology she took for granted seemed remote and unimaginable, there were marvellous enchantments and sorceries being used with the same kind of matter-of-fact confidence with which she'd once turned on lights, run herself a hot bath, or heated up TV dinners in the microwave.

Magic as technology , she pondered, trying the thought out for size and wondering if it really was as simple as that.  It made a kind of sense that – having magic, people would find sensible and timesaving uses for it, rather than just throwing flashy spells about on battlefields – but she knew that power inevitably came with a cost, and had learnt – the hard way – that it should always be respected, rather than abused. What was it Cullie had said?  When the mages of the Moonborn sought to steal the power of Wisdom and Destiny, they wrought havoc among the stars …  A civilisation build on magic – and magic as convenience, taken for granted every much as electricity and computers and plastic – might well have forgotten the need to temper the acquisition of power with the wisdom to not use it … and if there truly was an equivalent of the First Evil lurking about to tempt darker appetites and power hungry ambitions …

What you got was apocalypse.  And she was standing in the results of that, in the ruins left over from a world destroyed, a civilisation overthrown by its own hubris – or at least the hubris of a few, very powerful, ambitious men …

“Very fetching,” Giles said, eyeing the boots that were still dangling from her hand.  “I understand they work much better if they're actually applied to the feet, rather than carried in the hand, but – uh – whatever works best for you, I suppose.  I'm not exactly an expert in the – um – fashion business.”

Willow nearly jumped.  She'd been so distracted by her thoughts that she'd totally failed to spot him walking over to her – and he'd done so as quietly as a cat, almost as if he'd been the one walking barefoot across the stone.

Her eyes involuntarily darted down to check, and then up again, her thoughts leaping around like jumping beans.  There were boots on his feet, but were they actually boots , or bare feet pretending to be boots?  And if the latter, why would he be able to walk so quietly , because his actual feet were big enough to stomp Flux flat and cover him completely afterwards… did he still weigh the same as the Dragon should, or did the magic shift all that too – and if it did, where did it go ..?

“Willow?”  His question held concern.  “Are you alright?  You seem a little –distracted.”

“Hmm?  Oh.  Oh – ah, yeah, I'm fine.  Just fine,  Just … well, you're you – but you were you before, and you're really still the you you've become, but you're you disguised as you – that is, a person shaped you, which is really dragon shaped you being you, and … you …”  She paused to throw him a chagrined smile.  “Sorry.  Zoned out for a moment, trying to figure how all that worked , which is so not the point, because – well, magic , right?  I - I guess.”

He looked bemused for a moment, probably working through what she'd said – and then shook his head, probably deciding he wasn't going to make sense of it, no matter how he examined it.  Willow wasn't entirely sure she'd understood it either.  “Yes, well … I suppose that's one way to look at it.  To be perfectly honest,” he admitted, shoving his hands in his pockets and gazing at some point over her head, “I'm not sure I could explain how it works, but … it's more a matter of belief and will, than an application of power.”  He looked down at her again with thoughtful consideration.  “I suspect that matter – and for that matter energy – is more mutable and interchangeable than you and I are used to perceiving it as.  More things in heaven and earth … so to speak.”

She gave him a long, considering look.  “You have no idea how you do it, do you?”

“Well … no,” he admitted after a beat.  “Not really.  I suppose it's a … dragon thing.  As Buffy might say …”

Had Willow not known him so well, she might have missed the undertone in his words.  As it was, the message it conveyed was hard to read.  “Still freaking in there?” she asked sympathetically, and he sighed.

“A little.  Only to be expected, I suppose.”

“Yeah, well … saving the world, sacrificing ourselves to do it, rescued by gods, changed to serve their cause, coming here – and the whole, you dragon, me dragonkin thing?  Reason for freaking.  Me too.  A little.  Well,” she added for honesty, “freaking quite a lot actually.  But in a good way.  Kinda.”

Giles' lips twisted in a wry smile.  “Oddly enough,” he said.  “I know exactly what you mean.”  The smile twitched, half in self amusement and half in uncertainty.  “First day jitters, perhaps.  New place, new job …”

“New us?” Willow interjected warmly.  She earned herself a classic glare – one he could only hold for a moment before the smile sidled back, all chagrin and reluctant agreement.

“Quite.  But – new friends, new … opportunities.  New world to explore – oh … and new magic to learn.”  His hand dipped inside his coat and re-emerged with a folded piece of paper- one that he flipped open and handed to her with a flourish.  “Meldew's given us some study material.  This list is yours.  I have mine – “ He patted a spot on his chest – a hidden pocket, presumably, because thinking anything else was going to start up that whole how does that work thing again … “And if we've both managed to memorise every spell by the time we stop for lunch, we can exchange papers and study the other set too.  I don't think,” he confided, leaning a little closer, “that he thinks that either of us will get past the first two or three.”

Willow glanced at the paper.  There were a series of neatly scribed paragraphs written on it, each headed up with a single word, and marked with some sort of symbol at the start and end.  “Okay,” she said.  “let's see … Sharpen.  Spark – that might be useful -  Salt, Spice and Sweeten … Well, they all look simple enough.  What did you get?”

“Clean, Crack, Mend, Colour, and … um … Candle light.  All very straightforward.  Practice spells, really.  Cantrips , he called them.”  He paused, his expression becoming momentarily distant.  “Fingerclicks.”  He echoed the thought with the action, an abstracted click of his fingers that sent a crack of sound echoing through the air.  “The kind of thing you teach children with a touch of talent.  Ethan used to …”  he tailed off, and recalled himself to the present with a quick intake of breath.  “Yes, well … good idea to start with the small things first.  Less chance of things getting out of hand.”

Willow nodded in agreement, well aware of how that could happen – and knowing better than to ask about Ethan Rayne's youthful indiscretions, no matter how curious she might be.  She put her newly acquired boots on the floor instead, stepping into them while she took a closer look at what the neat, angular writing had to say.  “Small things?  Baby walkers with training wheels,” she concluded, having more or less got the first incantation on the first read through.  “Giles, I could cast these kinds of spells without needing to be awake back home.  And I got that mojo-glow thing almost instantly last night.  You did the whole – umm - “ Her hands flew wide to indicate something dragon sized and dragon shaped.  “- into – uh - “  Down again, collapsing him to human height.  “Almost without thinking about it.  Shouldn't we be starting with something a little more advanced than these?”

“I can assure you,” Giles said archly, frowning at the way Cullie's boots had somehow tugged themselves tight so that they settled into a perfect fit, “that I thought very long and hard about it.  And beginners need to start with beginner's exercises.  Even spells like these have their uses.  Just take one step at a time.  You'll be taking large strides before you know it.”

Part Three

“That's better,” Cullie said, amused to see that her boots looked much better on Willow's shapely feet than they ever had on hers.  The rest of the outfit was a little less flattering – but it was a lot more practical than letting her walk around the ruins in the flimsy, low cut kirtle dress she'd appeared in.  She was still wearing that, of course, under the knee length drape of Ashley's tunic and Cullie's own hip-sitting surcoat; it made an incongrous underskirt, its vivid colour a sudden startlement beneath the layers of soft grey, Warden green and Keeper blue. 

We've wrapped her in us , Cullie realised disconcertedly, recognising the belt that held the ensemble together as one of Meldew's.  There were two or three pouches hanging from it, and Willow had been carefully sliding a folded sheet of paper into one.  She'd looked up at Cullie's words and smiled, glancing down at herself to dismiss the effect with a little shrug.

“It's not quite my usual style,” she said.  “But then … neither's the whole ancient-temple-dress-clad dragonkin, thing, so …  I  guess - going with the practical's the best approach.  I think,” she added thoughtfully, tugging a little at her cloak to settle it, “ old me would be all ‘hey, this is great, and good with the warm layers, because it's kinda cold out.'  But I'm not so sure about the new me.  I know there's a .. chill, in the air.  And I can – feel it.  But I don't feel cold .  Not really.”

Cullie had been wondering about that.  There'd been a touch of frost overnight, and she'd had to steel herself to leave the huddled warmth of her blankets to face the freshness of the air.   Willow had been wandering around barefoot and barearmed before Ashley had managed to drape her in borrowed clothing, but it hadn't seemed to bother her at all.

“It's - brisk,” Cullie considered thoughtfully.  “But bearable.  Now … up North, past Landing, where there's snow still lying a foot deep this time of year … that's cold.  Colder still, the further north you go.  Or so they say.  I've never crossed the Highland border… although I've been a lot colder, out at sea.”

“Oh, aye,” Flux chuckled, striding back from his last minute moment by the pool, “when there's icicles bigger than me hanging from the rigging, and the wind cuts through mail and leather and skin – now that's cold.  This is barely bracing!”

“Quite,” Giles murmured, clearly taking a moment to picture the kind of sea freeze Flux was talking about.  Cullie seriously doubted that he was feeling cold; a creature designed to ride the skies or plunge deep into ocean depths was hardly going to worry about a little late winter chill.  Even if he currently looked a lot like her old riding master, who had hated winter weather with almost as much passion as he'd put into teaching her the arts of horsemanship.

Cartgarth Hillborn had been a grizzled veteran with a long standing service in the Lancers, a badly healed battle wound that left him half an inch shorter on his right, and a gruff, begrudging manner that had belied the quality of the man who wore it.  The shape that the Lord Watcher had assumed carried a similar hint of battle weariness – although it was tempered by a far more scholarly mien … and backed by a quiet sense of presence that was hard to describe and even harder to quantify.  Cullie had the feeling that – should he choose to – he could unleash towering authority, threaten with intimidating menace, or present a commanding dignity worthy of a true knight – or a king. 

If he chose to.  Right now, he'd cloaked himself in far less imposing cloth, presenting himself as something halfway between a competent warrior and an equally competent mage – which was something of an unusual combination, given the kind of focus and training both disciplines tended to demand.

And which is the truth and which the disguise? Cullie found herself wondering, watching him listen to Flux's expansive warnings about the dangers they might encounter on the journey ahead.  To someone unaware of his true nature, he might seem to be no more than he appeared – a minor noble man of middle years, semi-retired from knightly duties in order to pursue a long held interest in the more arcane arts.  Even the odd cut of his clothing could be easily dismissed as eccentricity – or evidence of foreign origins, which wouldn't be that far from the truth.   But if you knew – if you knew – you could catch a glimpse of something more in his thoughtful, attentive stance; the hint of hidden strength, a whisper of unlikely grace – and the echo of the Dragon, coiled behind his eyes …

“Are you going to stand around here describing the joys of Sharshall Fell,” Meldew questioned grumpily, “or are we going to get round to experiencing them?”  He'd interrupted Flux in full flow; the dwarf gave him a narrowed eyed glare that Meldew ignored with his usual determination.  “The time for lurid tales about this city is when you're sat safely in a Tavern a good many leagues away from it.  When you're here , the damned place speaks for itself.”

“Sometimes literally,” Ashley added, earning herself a startled look from Willow and a curious one from Giles.  Cullie sprang into action before he could formulate the obvious question – and get them back into endless discussion and explanation yet again.

“Time to move people,” she announced, striding towards the stairway they had used to enter the place the afternoon before.  “Flux, you and I will take point.  The rest of you follow a step or two behind.  Lord Wa-  your pardon, Giles – would you mind keeping rearguard for a step or two?  Just a backward watch – no need to keep distance.  No need for silence either – but let's try not draw to attention to ourselves, shall we?”

A glance back had confirmed Giles' acknowledging nod – and the sideways glance had caught Flux's knowing grin.  Ordering the likes of him , it teased, and Cullie responded with a stern frown.  Dragon or not, she was in charge of this expedition.  At least until fate – or the will of the gods – determined otherwise.

“Scoobies on patrol,” Willow said, sounding amused by whatever it was she meant. 

Cullie heard Giles snort softly in response.  “Quite,” he said.  “And me without my sword.”

The words were intended to be wry – and held no hint of censure – but they had Cullie fighting down a momentary flush of embarrassment.  It had never even occurred to her to offer either of them a weapon … Should she have?  Willow was so clearly gifted in magic that Cullie had assumed that she, like Meldew, would probably struggle wielding anything other than a staff.  True, Ashley had more than a passing skill with her daggers, but she'd learned those tricks from her father, and that long before her true calling was revealed.  Mages defended themselves with words and gestures, not cold iron or tempered steel.  But …dragons? 

What did they defend themselves with when they were not being dragons?

There was no time to ponder that now.  She had a spare sword, buried somewhere among her gear – but that was all packed away in the hole, and even if they stopped to search for it, it was a blade balanced to fit her hand, not the Lord Watcher's elegant reach.  He'd be better suited to a longer blade, something with length and weight to match his height.

Maybe they'd stumble over one, somewhere out in the ruins.  With luck, there wouldn't be anything using it to attack them …

Flux led the way up the water worn staircase, striding up the risers with his usual confident steps.  Cullie followed him at a more cautious pace, smiling a little at his determined exuberance.  He had plenty of reasons to be happy, and she didn't begrudge him any of them; he loved this kind of expedition since it challenged mind, body and spirit – and if the lure of Sharshall, with its hidden treasures and relics, its faded, but still noteworthy splendours, and the echoes of half-mythic history that whispered through its streets was not enough to put the bounce in his steps, then the presence and the promise of the Dragon – and his kin – among their company almost certainly was.

It wasn't quite that simple, of course, although Cullie was certain that Flux would argue that it was .  You were not supposed to question the gifts of the gods.  Miracles happened and you were meant to be grateful for them … And she was.  Who wouldn't be honoured – not just to be first to be among the first to encounter a child of the old forging after so many years, but to have been actually sent to greet him?  To have been chosen to welcome the champions of the gods, to aid those sent to guard and guide the world?

The echoes of that meeting were still resounding in her soul.

It was just … now that there was a Dragon, she didn't quite know what they were supposed to do with him.

A sword – like many of the gifts of the gods – was double edged and could cut both ways.  And this one – the Sword of Sulis herself - was a blade on which the destiny of Summerset, her King and all her people, was going to balance with breath taking uncertainty.  There would be those – power hungry nobles, greedy merchants, manipulative clerics or even ambitious adventurers – who, once they knew of his existence, would seek to sway the Bronze to support their cause, to exhort his aid, or look to use him to endorse their positions.  Men of worth might well seek to do the same.  It would be a dangerous game, whoever sought to play it.  Dragons were reputed to wield both creative force and destructive power.  They did not judge as men judged; they considered fate and consequence with eyes capable of witnessing outcomes centuries after the deed.  If the Lord Watcher were wise – and she had glimpsed a little of that wisdom already – he would not be long deceived by the politics of the moment, the lies of the ambitious, or the insincerity of self-centred schemers.

Too many servants of the Shadow , she thought, and shuddered.  She'd been growing increasingly disillusioned lately, seeing the ideals she'd been raised to serve tarnished by less than noble deeds, and the honour of the kingdom she loved threatened by men who seemed to have only their own self-interests at heart.  Raiders – always a problem on the southern coasts - had been growing increasingly audacious in their attacks.  Outlaws and brigands threatened trade routes and travellers.  The King was surrounded by manipulative politicians and lost in a sea of confusing politics when his people needed firm leadership and decisive policies - and the ogres were coming down from the north and staying down, invading Summers lands with a boldness they'd never shown before.  It was as if the Shadow had crept out of the darkened places it had claimed for its own and was moving openly through the Kingdom, tainting it with a miasma of desperation and despair, corrupting hearts and minds and unsettling even the purest and most dedicated of souls.

The Oracle had sent them into the heart of Sharshall to find a weapon – and they had come, seeking something with which to strike against the growing dark.  Flux clearly thought they'd found it – but could a single sword, a lone shield, truly defend the world against the terror that threatened it?  A battle, not for earthly spoils, but for the souls of men? 

Could legends and myths rekindle the dying flames of faith and inspiration? 

Could two souls – even if they were dragonborn, blessed with the favour of the gods -  be enough to turn back the onslaught of the Shadow?

Part Four

We're the good guys, you know? Got diplomas in world saving and everything.

Willow was beginning to regret her bold words the day before.  Not that they weren't true , as such, just that maybe – just maybe – she might have over promoted herself a little; she knew next to nothing about this new world she'd arrived in, and was about to travel across what sounded like a really dangerous part of it without a compass, a guidebook, a weapon, or any other means of defending herself.  Her magic was still an unknown; she'd learnt one spell that allowed her to see what might be magical, and what wasn't – and a few … fingerclicks, as Giles put it; cantrips that were little more than parlour tricks and flashy exercises.  Hardly the stuff to encourage bold steps up a steep, dark staircase that led who knew where, especially as the ceiling looked kind of gross and slimy, and the steps weren't much better.  Were getting worse, in fact, the higher they climbed …

She was fighting down a very real temptation to utter an undignified eep and scurry back down the stairs into the suspect safety of the enclave. Not because she was scared as such, but …  she just wasn't ready .  It was almost worse than wrestling with stagefright.  How would it look, to have been sent by the gods and given all these gifts and responsibilities, if – on only her second day on the job – she ended up making a total fool of herself?   

She knew that she wasn't supposed to.  She knew that being dragonkin meant she already had ticks in the awesome column – she had Slayer type strength for a start  – and that once she'd been able to learn some of the spells Meldew and Ashley had tucked away in their spellbooks, she'd be right back in the magic groove with all the others in the list of major mojo wielders. 

It was just that – right now – far from being some mystical, warrior witch sent to save the world, she felt far more like a nervous teenager heading out for her first blind date.

There were three things keeping her from collapsing into an undignified and gibbering wreck.  One was the warmth of Cullie's boots, which were doing a magnificent job of keeping her feet dry and slime free.  The second was the firm stride of Cullie herself, her metal heeled boots clanging up the stone with the confidence of a seasoned Slayer – along with the equal confidence of the rest of her quaternity, who, Willow realised, were pleased to be heading home, and assured of their ability to get there. And the third was the reassuring presence of the person climbing the steps behind her.  Not so much because it was silly to feel scared when you were being escorted by … well, by a dragon … but because it was Giles . 

Who'd been a solid, dependable presence right from the start of Buffy's battles on the hellmouth, and had gone on being one since, through all the terrors and the traumas, and the ‘oh-my-god-we're-going-to- die' stuff – and that included his stern determination to save her from her descent into grief stricken evilness, which had been pretty scary and out of control even from her side.

If there was anyone she'd want watching her back in this situation it was him – and maybe Buffy, and perhaps Xander, but … either of them would be freaking a lot more and dealing a lot less, which would be understandable, but not exactly a lot of help, right there and then.  With Giles around, she felt … safe, in that whole ‘we're in a whole heap of danger, but we're going to make it through' way that he'd always made her feel.  Protected.  Anchored.  Ready to face up to anything …

Apart from frogs, of course.

Because of that whole frog fear thing, which was kind of deep and hard to deal with. and which Kennedy had laughed about and never, really , understood .  Did they even have frogs in Summerset ..? 

“Hold!  Everyone stand until we know the way is clear.”  Cullie's command was soft, but her upraised hand gave it authority. 

Flux had already vanished around a turn in the passage; Cullie followed him a moment later, leaving Meldew to peer cautiously after her, and Ashley – a step below him – to draw a dagger from her belt and stand warily on guard.  Willow stopped at a lower step and stood on it, wishing she had something to hand that she could hit things with, and feeling less than reassured by all this wary caution.  She'd feel better if she had some meaningful magic to call on, but she didn't.  Nothing that would be any use, at any rate … 

“All right?” Giles leaned in to ask the question, his voice soft and his hand curling gently over her shoulder, so that his fingers sank into the folds of Flux's cloak.  It was a comforting contact, and she glanced back to share an anxious smile and a slightly nervous nod. 

“Fine,” she said in a squeaky whisper, then grimaced because there was no way he was going to be fooled by that .  “Okay, not so fine.  A little … on edge.  I guess.”

“Hardly surprising,” he murmured, glancing thoughtfully up at Meldew's watch on the darkened stairway.  “I'm a total nervous wreck back here.”

“Really?”  She hadn't expected that.  “ Really?   With you being all … winged, tailed and scaley under there?  Or in there.  Or … however it is it works …”

“ Especially with my being … yes, well … as you said.”  He was standing behind her, two or three steps below – which meant that their heads were close together and they could converse softly enough not to be overheard by their company.  “Willow – these people expect a lot of us.  Their gods expect a lot of us – and while I have every confidence in you .. and myself, I suppose – being able to rise to the occasion as we have done in the past … there are just so many unknowns about our situation.  I have no idea what I'm supposed to be capable of in my … acquired form.  Nor do we have any real idea of the culture, the moirés, the manners, or the … do and don't of this society.  We could insult someone with a word, horrify another with casual behaviour, or even breach a religious taboo without being aware of it …”

“Wow,” she reacted, her eyes going wide.  “And all I was afraid of was making an idiot of myself …  But, hey,” she realised, glancing back at him with a nervous grin, “there's no real danger in us doing the religion thing, is there?  Because we're the envoys of the gods.  So kinda ahead on points with that …”

He took a moment or two to think about that.  “I hadn't thought of it that way,” he murmured eventually.  “But … you may well be right.  I suppose … it's hard to argue the righteousness of rituals and sanctity with a creature created by the gods themselves.  Not something we should abuse though,” he added, with wry consideration.  It sounded like good advice.

“Look and learn before opening mouth and inserting foot?”

His fingers tightened briefly on her shoulder, offering a gentle squeeze of affection that both assured and reassured in equal measure.  “Exactly,” he said.  “Willow …”  He hesitated for a moment, then added: “Back – at the rift?  I was desperately wishing there'd been some other way.  That there would have been no need for you to sacrifice yourself.  But … despite the fact I would much rather you were safe at home … I have to admit that – I'm glad you're here.  Because this would be a lot harder to do … alone.”

Willow shivered at the intensity of his words.  Maybe that was the dragon thing, adding weight to his voice, stirring her soul along with her heart – or maybe it was just the honesty in the admission, in the depth of the feeling it conveyed.  She'd always known that he cared about her – in what, if she'd ever thought about it, she'd have identified as some abstracted, friend-of-my-slayer and part-of-my-unconventional-family way – but there was nothing vague or distant in his confession.  Just a heartfelt and slightly apologetic sincerity that couldn't be mistaken for anything else.

“You're not alone,” she said, reaching up to lay her hand over his.  The lump in her throat was hard to swallow.  “ Safe is a kinda relative thing when it comes to working with Slayers and dealing with apocolypsy situations – and home is where the heart is, right?  With you ending up here …that's me torn in two no matter which side of the rift I end up standing.  Besides - there's no way I'd have let you do the self-sacrifice thing back there without me, so … no angsting about it.  Okay?"

His pause might well have had more to do with what she'd said about home than his having to think about what she asked – because there was no mistaking the hitch in his voice when he finally answered her.  “I will … try,” he said.  “But I can't promise.  Not when it comes to … concerns for your welfare.”

Willow glanced back at that, her newly enhanced vision catching the look on his face with perfect clarity despite the gloom.  Dragons, it seemed, were as uncomfortable about admitting mushy type feelings as well-bred Englishmen were.  Especially when whispering them in the dark amongst company neither of them knew well enough to trust with such intimacies. 

“I can live with that,” she smiled, squeezing his hand to let him know she knew what he was talking about.  Then she added, with firm resolve – and equally firm resolve-face to back it up:  “Providing I can do the concerny stuff too.  Without you getting all ‘don't you worry yourself about me,' and ‘I'm a grown man, Willow,' because … well, I - I care.  So …”

He acknowledged her squeeze with a gentle one of his own.  “As it happens,” he said “I am far from being ‘grown,' if Flux's tales hold any veracity.  But – you have a point.  And … I suppose … the right.  We are in this together, after all.”

“Oh.”  She'd been expecting him to argue – or to deflect the substance of her statement at the very least, to deny the need for anyone to care about him … but then, had his tendency to distance himself over the last couple of years had been about self-deprecation, or had it been deliberate self-sacrifice?  Had he not felt worthy of their care, or had he made a conscious decision to allow his family to fly free?  And how much of that had been about Buffy and her pigheaded anger at him for being willing to question her choices and challenge her decisions?

When, exactly, had he realised that none of them were children anymore?  Because here he was, acknowledging her right to be as concerned about him as he was going to be about her, and it was all equal partners stuff, and not at all I'm the grown up here that she'd been more or less expecting. 

“Right.”  She reviewed what she'd been going to say and decided that it didn't matter.  Or rather, that it did matter, but it really went without saying.  “Point to me then.”  She frowned over what that might mean.  “Are we keeping score?”

“Apparently.”  His acknowledgement was wry, but his eyes were laughing at her – and suddenly Willow knew that – whatever happened to them in this new world, whatever challenges they might face – they were going to be okay.  Friends and partners and family .

Closer than kith and kin, as Tara might say.  Or dragonkin, if you wanted to get pedantic about it.

Part Five

Daylight was an eye squinting brightness after the gloom of the tunnel.  Cullie paused at the broken lip of the staircase and gave her eyes a moment or two to adjust.  Just because most of the Shadow's foulest creatures tended to avoid exposure to sunlight didn't mean that it was safe to step blindly into the open; there were other things, just as dangerous, that could be creeping through the ruins even at this time of the day.  Or even pretending to be ruins – you had to be sharp eyed to spot a mimic lurking among a jumble of broken columns, or to distinguish the hunting gargoyle that might be using a half ruined wall as a perch.

“Something was scuffling about up here last night.”  Flux was crouched just inside the tunnel entrance, studying the broken ground spilled out beyond it.  Scrubby vegetation struggled for existence in among the heaps of rubble that spilled down from where the tunnel emerged into the air.  The edges of angled blocks and  stretches of weathered paving hinted at what might have once been an ornate forcourt, while remnants of pillars suggested that the stairs might once have reached even higher levels in a bulding that had long since tumbled away.  The enclave had been the centre of a vast complex once; they'd picked their way through a laybrynth of mounds and walls and half buried buildings to reach it, and they'd be hard put to retrace their steps with any certainty.

“Tracking us?”

“Could be … hard to say.  Should have brought one of your Rangers with us …”

Cullie snorted.  She'd actually suggested the idea to Brin before they'd left; her High Harrier had looked at her as if she were insane, before bursting out laughing at what he'd thought to be a joke.  Her company would follow her into battle without question, and her Rangers roamed the woods between the borders of the marsh and the lower ferry crossing with a skill and bravery that the other Warden Protectors envied and admired.  But cross over the Edge?  Hunt in the Sharshall Fell?

Only fools and heroes risked their lives in those sorts of ventures – and Brin Farwalker was no fool.  He was no hero either, and he would be the first to admit it.  Just a man who loved the wildlands more than he cared for crafted walls, or crowds of people.  He was skilled in tracking, was happiest hunting, and was the best animal trainer south of Shim – but he had no stomach for twisted creatures, and shied clear of the shadow touched unless he absolutely had to deal with them.  He was even wary of the more exotic beasts that sometimes made an appearance in the Forests, saving his staring for those few tame specimens that Travellers occasionally brought into town.

She wondered what he was going to make of a Dragon …

“Whatever it was, it's not here now.”  Flux uncurled from his crouch and stepped out into the day, the pale sunlight glinting off the gold chasing on his helmet.  His glance skywards was reflexive, but brought no cause for alarm; his eyes were down and scanning for a way through the ruins before Cullie had finished her own upwards sweep. 

“And if we move fast, we won't be here when it comes back.”  She leant back into the tunnel and whistled an advance – two short, high pitched notes that sounded like birdsong, but would be a clear signal to anyone listening for it.  Meldew's low pitched whistle answered her, echoing a little in the mouth of the tunnel.  “What do you think?”  She moved forward to join Flux at the start of the downwards slope.  “Head south east and hope to hit a throughway?”

He grunted, as only a dwarf can.  “We can hope ,” he growled.  “But I'd rather find one by looking for it.  If we cut through the district there –“ The swing of his hammer indicated a route somewhere to their left, a stone lined valley leading into an area of more recognisable walls and paving, “we can work our way south, get up onto the higher ground … avoiding that patch of trees we skirted yesterday … and get a sensible view of where we want to be.”

“I know where we want to be,” Cullie said impatiently.  “Climbing over the Edge and heading back to Farferry.  But … you're probably right.  We don't want to stumble into a crack – or find ourselves fighting the sort of thing that comes out of one.  Even if we can't find a throughway, we should be able to see the Shar – and that'll lead us straight to the Edge.”

“Aye.”  Flux couldn't argue with that logic.  “And straight over the Cascade …”

“In which case,” Meldew interjected from behind them, “ I will fall like a feather.  You will merely plummet.  Although, with your luck, I'm sure your goddess will ensure you plummet straight into the plungepool, rather than bounce off the rocks at the bottom.”

“Praise her, and she will,” Flux responded heartily.  “ Your's would be rolling out the rocks to catch me …”

“Oh, good Lord.”   The exclamation was more of a gasp than anything else – a soft breath of astonishment that had nothing to do with Flux and Meldew's banter, and everything to do with the vista that lay in front of them.  Cullie glanced back.  The Lord Watcher – Giles , she reminded herself – was staring out at the ruins of Sharshall with a stunned look on his face.  His eyes couldn't possibly get any wider – unless, of course, he resumed his true form …

“Wow,” Willow echoed from beside him.  “When they said ruins , I kinda thought … well, Rome .   Or Athens.  This is …”

“Hiroshima.  Nagasaki.  Cologne at the end of the war.  And Rome.  Athens, Olympus, Knossos … Troy at Hisarlik .  All rolled into one.  Even Giza would be lost in this.  Machu Pichu too …”  Cullie didn't recognise any of the places they were talking about, but she could hear reverence echoing in their names, hear a lineage of history and ruin tumbling through their inventory.

“Frisco after a quake?”  Willow suggested, joining in with the bemusing catalogue.  “New Orleans after Katrina ..?”

“Yes – yes. that's close,” Giles acknowledged with an abstracted nod.  “Less flooding here though … There was fire, I think.  Fire and fury from the heavens …”

Cullie shivered.  She was familiar with tales of the Fall, and she'd seen enough of Sharshall  - and Two Rivers, and some of the other shattered places, too - to be able to imagine a little of what it might have been like.  But the hushed note in the Dragon's voice suggested that he was imagining exactly what it had been like – and it both awed and horrified him.

“This is all impact crater, isn't it?”  Willow's eyes were measuring the depth of the hollow and the distance between where they stood and the resumption of the streets beyond.  “Bombardment, and fire … and earthquake?  But there's so much left standing .  And – is that – “ she waved at the distant shape of the arching Orchid Palace, five of its outward curving towers still intact enough to dominate the cityscape.  “Even possible?”

“The architects of the old world wove in stone and glass and metal and magic,” Flux said softly.  “They built to please the eye, not the laws of nature – but their skills and their art were lost in the Fall.  We don't even have names for half the materials they used, and they had ways of using those we can name that defy everything we know about them.  Bridges of glass as thin as a finger and stronger than steel.  Metal that remembers the shape it was made in, no matter how much you distort it.  Wood that doesn't burn.  Stone that does  … This place is full of wonders as well as danger – and some of the dangers come from those wonders, so you must be wary.  Sharshall guards its secrets well.”

“This city is immense .” Giles was staring across the ruins, seemingly picking out shape and detail even at great distance.  Cullie wondered how far he could see; hawks could spot the shiver of prey from immense heights – and surely dragons were made to soar in much higher reaches than ever a hawk might go.  He could probably see for leagues …

“No-one knows its true extent,” Meldew offered, moving across to squint in the same direction, although his eyes were hopeless at seeing any distance.  An inch from his nose, and he could read you a page of script carved into a cherry pit – but anything more than a hundred yards away would need to be written in letters ten feet high.  “The Fell extends along a good quarter of the Edge, and there are tumbles and ruins and tombs scattered even further than that - fifty leagues or more.  The bulk of the ruins though – this bit – is close to twenty leagues long, fifteen wide … and at least a league deep.  If not more.”

“Deep?” Willow questioned with a squeak.  Meldew nodded. “So they say.  There's a whole warren of caves and tunnels beneath us – sewers and cellars, passageways, caverns, chasms, tombs and hidden dungeons.  Legend has it there are deep tunnels that let you travel from one end of the city to the other without ever seeing the sun, and even deeper ones that led to other cities elsewhere in the world.  I don't know if that's true or not, but there are – cracks.  Places where the ground has split apart and the deeper layers have been revealed.  Fell things dwell in the undercity, and only a fool would venture into it by choice.”

Cullie shuddered a second time.  She'd ventured into some of the caves along the base of the Edge, but she'd never gone far, and never wanted reason too.  Crossing the Fell was bad enough; adventuring beneath it was nothing but madness. 

Willow was nodding, taking in the warning with worried eyes.  Giles, however, quirked a sudden smile.  “Oh, good lord, of course, ” he exclaimed, a chagrined revelation dancing in his eyes.  “City this size … they had an Underground .  Wonder if they played a version of Mornington Crescent …”

Part Six

Willow was still chuckling as she scrambled down the slope of the crater in Ashley's wake.  The look of bemusement on Cullie's face had been a real Kodak moment – and if she'd had a camera to capture it, would have taken pride of place in the ‘Welcome to Summerset' album she'd be using it to create.  She didn't have a camera– not even the magical equivalent of one – but the memory of that look was one to treasure all that same.  Giles had just been … well, being Giles , of course, distracted by the wonders of the city and assessing them with academic curiosity and insight.  She could hardly blame him for having an ‘ooh shiny ' moment when he was surrounded by the lure of ancient ruins, the promise of unknown magic and artifacts, and the irrefutable evidence of the history of their new world.  Neither of them had expected the city to be so vast – nor to be so impressive, with so many buildings still standing after the impact of devastating apocolyspe and the passing of five hundred years.  Huge swathes of it were hidden under a blanket of vegetation, and other areas – like this one – had probably been pulverised to dust by falling moon meteors, but enough remained in view to dance and dazzle the eye.  Sharshall had not been a utilitarian city, with acres of stark office buildings and souless apartment blocks; there were remnants of ornate carvings on almost very surface, hints of colour glinting from glazed tilework and stained glass, and statues and columns and collonades twisting away into a maze of squares and streets in almost every direction.

A truly magical labyrynth , Willow marveled, then sighed.  In the hands of the bad guys …

Flux's tales about the dangers of the place were one thing – but the evidence of the darker forces that occupied the city were all too obvious once you started travelling across it.  The Lord of Blight manifested his presence through ugly, twisted vines that sported equally ugly protuberances of mould and fungi.  The slime in the tunnel had been bad enough, but stopping while Cullie prodded at a pool of it in a doorway and seeing the pool prod back was decidedly unsettling. 

They'd skirted that building – which was only half a building really, since its roof had collapsed in on one side – and travelled a little further along the lip of the crater before heading into the complexity of streets and alleyways, toppled walls and tilted pillars that lay beyond.  It was soon pretty evident that Blight's brothers – Stagnation and Decay – had also put their mark on the place.  The remnants of an elegant atrium contained an ornamental pond where the water so foul that its surface buzzed with flies the size of hummingbirds.  Unpleasant smells wafted out of some of the gaping doorways, and – once or twice – Willow glanced through a shattered window to spot what looked like gnawed bones littering the mosaic floors within.

Despite all that, the city seemed far more fascinating than frightening.  The sun was bright, if not warm, and there was barely a hint of wind in the sheltered streets.  Cullie and Flux took turns in scouting the twists and turns ahead, ignoring the intricacies of the architecture while focused on the threat of wildlife – or un life, if any of the dwarf's stories were true.  Ashley seemed to be sketching or perhaps mapping their route, helped by the occasional pointed observation from Meldew – and Willow and Giles slowly fell further and further behind, stumbling a little over the uneven surfaces, and totally distracted by details and the distortion of ruin.

Willow had somehow expected these deserted streets to be eerily silent, and to have to walk with stealthy steps to avoid disturbing it.  But there was a surprising hint of background noise – not as intrusive as the sounds of an occupied city might be, but enough to relieve the tautness of total silence and suggest that there was both life and a natural world lying somewhere beyond the ruined walls.  A moment's careful attention caught the sounds of distant leaves rustling in an equally distant wind, the lilting note of a songbird, the raucous call of what was probably a crow, the muted murmur of running water, and the soft buzz of insects and bugs going about their daily business.

A regular hive of industry in fact …

“This place …”  Giles had paused to take in the scenery around them, his eyes drinking in the tumbled stones, the half raised walls, the hints of paving, and the earth covered mounds that spoke of further ruin hidden beneath them.  “I could spend a lifetime here.  Excavating.  Unearthing the knowledge of the past, the lessons for the present …”

Willow smiled at the longing in his voice, hearing the echo of the scholar within the warrior, the academic that had become slowly buried beneath the weary administrator that running the Council had forced him to become.  “It might be fun,” she admitted, repeating his sweeping glance and thinking about the treasures that the ruins might conceal.  Artifacts.  Books.  Gems.  Magic …  “Me Marion Ravenwood, you Indiana Jones, huh?”

It was meant as a tease – but actually, she could picture it – could see Giles in the battered leather jacket, wearing the Fedora … and carrying the whip.  Although she suspected he'd feel more at home with a sword.

“Howard Carter, if you please,” he corrected a little indignantly.  “Nothing fictional about my archaeological qualifications, I'll have you know.  Arthur Evans, perhaps.  Or Schliemann, looking for Troy …”

He sighed and strode off after their new friends; Willow trailed after, empathising with his inner battles.  They had a world to explore, and couldn't afford to be distracted by one small and ruined corner of it – but it would be an incredible opportunity, to study this lost civilisation, to unearth the mysteries of this world's golden age.  And he was a dragon.  He might well have the lifetime to do it in.

“So, tell me,” she said, half running to catch up with his long legged stride, “just how many expeditions have you been on, Dr Giles?  And on how many of them did the local wildlife take every opportunity to try and eat you?”

He threw her a look – one of those mildly amused, half an eyebrow raised, you'd-be-surprised looks that he'd perfected over the years.  “Well now,” he considered, offering her a hand to help her scramble over a fallen pillar.  “There was that trip to the ghoul infested ruins in Sarkapour … and then, those Ikilax demons nesting in a pyramid in lower Mexico … “  He smiled at her expression.  She'd been joking.  He clearly wasn't.  “I was on active duty for the council long before I was sent to Watch over Buffy, you know.  Last in a very long generation of Watchers,” he reminded her.  “Fighting monsters in the midst of mystic ruins runs in my blood …”  

The sharp crack of breaking stone, a startled yelp – and the sound of a very nasty hiss – brought both their heads up.  Giles took off without hesitation, running towards the source of the alarm; Willow – pausing only to review and then grimace over the decidedly less-than-useful-in-combat spells that Meldew had prepared for her that morning – followed hastily in his wake, her heart pounding a little at the prospect of danger and the possible sources of it.  Anything might lurk out there, Flux had said.

Although … when he'd said anything, her mind had naturally pictured the kind of horror she was used to – horned demons, shuffling zombies, and tentacled terrors, like the beast that had once lurked in the entrance to the Hellmouth.  

She hadn't expected a slug.

A big, oozing, dark purple coloured slug – a heaving monster at least eight feet long, with slime edged frills and four big ugly eyes that sat at the end of its jutting eye-stalks … 


* * * * * * * *

Flux was too busy cursing himself for not spotting the creature when he crossed the square to feel any real fear at its appearance.  His fear was for Ashley, whose misplaced step on an unbalanced flagstone had disturbed the thing.  Her uncertain footing, coupled with the slug's eruption from its hiding place, had sent her sprawling across the broken paving – and she'd landed with a wince inducing crack that sounded distinctly ominous.  At least she was still moving – and trying to move fast, since the monster had reared up and was coiling back to make use of its most devastating weapon.  He'd stilled his first instinct – to charge in with an angry yell – since he knew that the weapon in his hand would be useless against the beast's yielding, rubbery hide.  He reached for his second weapon instead, pressing his hand over his heart and praying for the goddess to honour him with her blessing.  A familiar, yet still awe inspiring sense of presence answered him, arming him and those around him with a lifted spirit and a sharper sense of the world.  The slug spat.  Ashley rolled – and the foul bubbling gobbet of slime impacted on the stones well away from her floundering sprawl.  Vapour hissed up from where it hit, the acid in it strong enough to damage the stone.

Cullie charged past him, yelling her furious battle cry, her sword out and swinging.  Her leap was designed to side swipe the thing, slashing at its mantle without taking her close enough for it to strike; Whisper's blade bit clean and hard, and then its wielder was rolling away, bouncing up into a defensive stance, a safe distance from the monster – and its glutinous trail.

“ Flam! ” Meldew's voice snapped commandingly – and after it a flaming flask of oil arched across the square and shattered on the paving stones.  He'd missed the beast – but the flare of fire that pooled out from the broken flask had it slithering backwards, and gave Flux the opening he needed.  He ran to Ashley's side, offering her his hand and pulling her quickly to her feet.

No, make that foot .  Her leg left gave way beneath her, spilling her weight against him as she rose.  Man or elf would probably have gone sprawling.  Fortunately, he had his father's sturdy build and his mother's obduracy; dwarven feet held their ground with ease.  “Steady me,” she hissed in his ear, her hand darting out past his nose, and her fingers twisting into an arcane gesture.  Pain was creasing her face, and her body was trembling.  A lesser mage might not have managed to cast, but the Rowan born was skilled beyond her years – and tenacious enough to focus her mind despite the distractions of pain. 

“ Volatil ferre fund,” she gasped, and three daggers of light shot from her finger tips, burying themselves deep into the monster's hide.  It writhed back in shock, its flabby bulk crashing down on the stones hard enough to make the ground shudder.

“ Salar ! ” Another voice had joined the fray, summoning magic with determined command – albeit with a quiver of apprehension, and a less than textbook pronunciation.  It was an inspired choice, however; the sudden shower of salt sent the slug into a frenzy.  “ Salar !” the Lady Willow declared a second time, a lot more confidently than the first. 

The enraged slug swung round and spat at her.

She clearly had no idea of the danger.  She was standing out in the open, probably thinking herself a good distance away from direct attack.  Slugs didn't move fast, and this one was just as ponderous as its agricultural cousins.  But a creature didn't need speed when it came armed with a weapon that could fly as far and as fast as an arrow.  A weapon, what's more, that could strip flesh from bones: a thick gobbet of purple slime hurtled across the distance and struck the Firechild straight in the face.

Flux's stomach clenched and his heart stuttered with shock.  Sweet goddess , he mouthed, his mind scrabbling for prayers and litanies he couldn't find, let alone formulate.  

“ No , “ he heard Cullie yell in horror.

And beyond that, a sound he'd never heard and yet could not mistake – a wordless snarl of rage and fear ripped straight from a dragon's heart.  Lightning suddenly speared across the square, striking the slug and wreathing it in a dazzling curtain of light.  It shrieked in agony, arched up for a moment - and then collapsed into an oozing heap, smoke writhing from scorched and peeling flesh.

Silence fell across the square.  The silence of a world that had – in a bare breath - shifted from frantic combat to the numbing stillness of death. 

Part Seven

“Willow?  Willow ? ”  The Lord Watcher's voice tore through the moment, rich with hope and roughened with understandable terror.  Flux lowered Ashley to the ground, well aware that she was trembling, but equally aware that the last thing they needed was a grief stricken dragon deciding to tear the city apart stone by stone.

“Rest.  I'll be back,” he advised, and left her, knowing that Meldew would be with her in a moment, seeing Cullie rush ahead of him on the same desperate errand – or perhaps on another of her own.  Flux didn't particularly want her seeing the ruin of the Firechild's face either.

If there was any face left to see …

“Ewww, yuck .”   The complaint was a disgusted one – and made Flux stumble with astonishment.  He skirted round the remains of the slug in time to see Willow scraping slime out of her eyes, her features twisted into a look of utter repugnance.  “Nah, nah, nah nah,” she was saying, waving slime slicked hands at the anxious figure hovering beside her.  “No touchy.  I'm ick . ” 

She was that – and more, her copper locks dripping with a goo that hissed and ate holes in her borrowed cloak whenever it landed on the fabric.  But her flesh, and her hair, and every part of her that should have been bubbling with agony, should have been dissolving into liquid and vapour beneath the acid's kiss, was whole and unhurt.  The only thing that seemed to be showing any kind of damage was her dignity.

“You certainly are,” Giles observed, the hint of asperity in his voice camouflaging whatever other emotions he might be wrestling with.  “Serves you right.  You know better than to charge in like that.  With no weapon, no information – and no idea what you were doing!”

“I knew what I was doing,” Willow snapped back.  “You salt slugs.  And I had the salt thing – so – I assaulted it …”  Her anger trailed off, her expression dropping into chagrin as if only just realising why he might be upset with her.  “I didn't know it could spit like that.  I just thought … I wanted to - help.  What kind of shield am I, if I can't help protect people?”

“A poor one,” Giles acknowledged reluctantly.  He stepped a little closer, looking down at her dripping countenance with an expression that conveyed exasperation, affection, and pride in equal measure.  Flux knew the feeling.  It was his own response whenever Cullie did something foolishly impulsive and heroic – which was more often than not, when they went adventuring like this.  “But that's no excuse for standing still when something spits at you.  You're perfectly capable of casting a spell and dodging at the same time.  It could have been … that is, i- it might have been …”

“Deadly?” Cullie interrupted with a gulp.  She'd been staring at Willow in disbelief, much as Flux had been doing.  Spells of protection, a magical device, maybe even one of Meldew's potions might have provided some defence against the acid's bitter attack – but she'd confessed to knowing no spells, had had no time to even sip from a potion bottle, and Ashley's casting the night before had clearly shown that neither of their new companions possessed even the most basic of magic trinkets.

Giles turned and frowned at her.  “Yes.  Exactly.”   The frown deepened for a moment, and then his eyes went wide.  “ Ah … ”  He glanced back at Willow, who was looking puzzled.  “Just … how deadly?” he asked.

“The sharding stuff eats through stone,” Flux said bluntly.  He stomped up to stare at Willow – keeping out of the way of drips - and she found him an uncertain smile.  “Why aren't you dead?”

“Uh – “ she ventured, glancing up at Giles, who shrugged helplessly.  “I-I don't know.  I'm … highly alkaline?”

That earned her a soft snort; she turned on its originator with a sudden flare of indignation. 
“Hey,” she said.  “Not helping here.  I could be.  Well – okay, I couldn't be, but … there has to be some reason.  You're knowledge guy.  You work it out.  And then find me a towel.”  She looked down at her slime coated hands and grimaced.  “Or something …”

“We need water,” Cullie said, glancing round.  The shattered fountain at the heart of the square was empty, of course.  Flux had the skill to summon a little of the goddess's bounty, but he doubted he could call up enough to wash away more than a token of the taint.

“No we don't.”  Giles sighed, and reached for Willow's shoulder.  “ Ablu , ” he whispered, stripping the slime from her sodden locks and restoring some of their gleaming beauty.  She looked startled for a moment, then smiled.  “Got it?” he asked. She nodded.  “Got it.  Ablu .”  She used the cantrip to clean her hands, and then her face, grinning at the effectiveness of the command.  Flux and Cullie exchanged a wary glance.  It took mage apprentices weeks to master the simplest of cantrips, and even then they'd wield them clumsily, without finesse.  Yet these two were spelling them out with confidence after a few short hours – and Willow hadn't even seen that one written down.

Dragons, Flux thought, and grinned.

“We should move on,” Cullie advised, glancing around with concern.  “This will have attracted attention.”

“Aye,” Flux agreed.  “And we don't want to be tangling with the kind of thing that'll come sniffing round that corpse.  Besides, we need to get Ashley to a safer place so I can see to the damage.”

“Ashley's hurt?”  Willow was instantly concerned.  “Did it spit on her, too?”

“No.”  Flux began to lead the way back down into the square and round the slug's corpse, which was still steaming gently in the pale sunlight.  Never anger a Dragon , the sages said, and it was extremely sage advice.  Teeth and claws were not the only weapons they possessed.  “Well, yes, but it missed.  She's twisted her ankle - or a knee.  Probably nothing serious.”

“That's a relief.”  Giles fell into step with Willow, leaving Cullie to take rearguard for a moment or two.  “Although potentially awkward for travelling.”

“It's fixable.”  The corpse wasn't steaming, it was smoking.   The scent of it was ugly and acrid, and caught at the back of his throat.

“Unlike sluggo, here.”  Willow grimaced at the dead creature, stepping fastidiously over the glutinous lines of its trail.  “Who is totally toast.  You don't think that was just a little overkill, Giles?  I mean - skewered, seared, salted and flambéed?  And when did Meldew teach you the lightning thing, anyway?”

Giles' expression went from amused to embarrassed, all in a moment.  “He … uh … didn't.”

“Didn't?”  Willow was on a roll.  “Don't you didn't me – I saw you.  Kind've a blurry saw you, but I did see you.  Hey – “ she realised a beat later, “you didn't cast it, did you.  You just … well, growled , and then – blam !    Which is not how this spell casting stuff works.  Do you know something I don't? Or is it another of these – dragon things?  Oh goddess ,” she gasped, not giving him a chance to answer.  “It is, isn't it!  It's totally a dragon thing.  You can spit lightning!  That is so cool!  Except – aren't dragons supposed to breath fire?”

“ Gold dragons breath fire,” Flux said, wondering if it was being dragonkin that enabled her to talk so long without seeming to draw breath.  “Bronzes call lightning.  Flames aren't much use underwater.”

“Oh.”  Willow thought about that for a moment.  “Yeah.  That makes sense.  So what do Coppers do?”

“Spit acid … Fire and metal ,” he exclaimed, turning to stare at her.  “ That's why.  The metal bears the gift, and the gift respects the metal … When the gods made the dragons,” he explained, since both of them were looking at him in bemusement, “they gave them weapons to help them hunt and defend themselves.  Ignis gave fire to Terra's gold.  Adonis bound lightning into Sulis's Bronze.  Sulis gave Adonis's Silver the freezing cold of the northern seas, and Terra gifted Ignis's Copper with acids drawn from the deep earth's blood.  A dragon can't be harmed by its own breath – and you are copperkin.”  He spread his hands wide, unable to resist the classic storyteller's gesture of revelation.  “So that's why the slug spit had no affect on you!”

Part Eight

Ashley's knee was twisted and the joint was already swelling up by the time they returned to the far side of the square.  She was back upright, balancing on one foot and leaning heavily on Meldew, both of them well aware that loitering next to a corpse in the depths of Sharshall was a dangerous occupation.  Cullie had been wiping down Whisper's blade as she walked; now it was clean again she slid it back into her scabbard and briefly touched the elfkin's shoulder in a gesture of sympathy.  “I'll scout ahead,” she offered, knowing that Flux would be too concerned about his patient to focus on anything else for a while.  “There should be somewhere safe nearby.” 

 I hope …

The wound wasn't life threatening, but staying where they were might well be, and Flux needed time to work his miracles.  Ashley's face was ashen.  Moving her any distance was going to be difficult.

“If we had time,” Meldew was saying, “we'd rig a litter …”

“Allow me.”

Giles stepped up – and gallantly swept Ashley up, lifting her into his arms as if she weighed almost nothing at all.  She gasped – partly in pain, but mostly in surprise – and had to throw her arm around his neck to steady herself.  “Sorry,” he apologised, carefully shifting his grip to settle her more securely against his chest.   “Don't know my own strength as yet … ”

Cullie's lips quirked at that, despite the seriousness of the situation.  His words triggered inevitable memory; that of the first day she'd donned one of her most treasured possessions.  She'd wrested it from a rude and barbarous sea raider during the defence of Runsmouth – literally wrested, since the man who'd owned it had refused to give it up without a fight.  The magical girdle that now cinched her waist bestowed on its wearer a strength akin to giants – small giants, perhaps, but enough to give her an edge over an ogre … and more than enough to have made the fight she'd won it in one of the hardest battles she'd ever fought.  In the day's turn after she'd acquired it, she'd managed to break a door in two, crush two tankards, and inadvertently sink a ship.  Of course, sinking the ship had helped win the battle they were in, but she hadn't meant to punch a hole through the bulwarks – and Flux had teased her about it for weeks afterwards. 

Dragons had no need to magically enhance their strength, of course - but it might be hard to judge the application of it when compacted down into human form.  Ashley seemed safe enough though, her injured leg lifted well away from contact with the ground, and the rest of her cradled with firm, but gentle consideration.  It certainly solved the problem of moving her – and move they must, since the scent of death was beginning to draw unpleasant attention.

“Eww,” Willow reacted, wrinkling her nose as she spotted the first hint of an ooze sliding up from under the paving stones.  “What's that?”

“Clean-up crew,” Flux muttered, while Meldew hastily backed up the shattered steps, his hand reaching for a dangling oil flask.  “Our reason for not hanging around.”

“Time to move.”  Cullie led the way, aiming for speed while avoiding stupidity.  It was unlikely that there'd be much lurking this close to where the slug had holed up for the day, but it was always better to be wise before an event than after it.  Keeping the company of dragons gave no guarantee of safety, even if they could throw bolts of lightning at their foes.  Sharshall was well known for harbouring nasty surprises – and the dead had no qualms about who their neighbours might be. 

A curving street, a short downward stair, and a small plaza later, she was pausing to assess the safety offered by the angles of half fallen walls and the mound of hard packed debris inside them.  There was a scattering of bedraggled ivy hanging down on one side of the construction, and what looked like half of a curved stone bench in the middle of it; one entrance – defendable – and no immediate sign of tracks, spoor, nesting, or carcass litter.  The walls were high enough to offer concealment, but not so high as to threaten collapse, and the subsidence of the upper floors had filled all the nooks and crannies at street with a concrete of rubble and dust that even the slipperiest of slimes would struggle to ooze through.  It wasn't camping site quality, but it was more than good enough for a rest stop – which made it exactly what she'd been looking for.

“In here,” she directed, stepping up through the doorway and standing to one side to let the rest of them pass.  There were the remains of painted murals on two of the walls – art far inferior to the elegant images that had been on display in the enclave, although most of the images were still recognisable.  If you were willing to squint. 

“Oh, very nice,” Meldew muttered, glancing at the nearest panel, which contained a rather garish rendition of what looked like harpies feasting on a kill.  “You couldn't have found us somewhere with a little class?  Like a brothel?  Or a slave market?”

“Looking at naked bodies again?” Flux questioned, following Giles as he carried Ashley across to the white marble bench in the middle of the room.  “You can do that at home.”

“My anatomical treaties are hardly …” Meldew started to retort, then drew in a huffy breath and shook his head in annoyance.  “I am not going to start all that again.  It was an honest misunderstanding … and you are not going to let me forget it for years to come, are you.”

“Of course not.”  Cullie started to grin at the matter of fact confidence in Flux's response.  “Dwarves have long memories.  And even longer …”

“ Flux !”  Her scandalised snap was automatic- and elicited a smirking grin from both dwarf and man.  Ashley giggled, leaving Giles and Willow to exchange a rather bemused glance.

“She's easier to wind up than you are.” Flux's shot at Meldew was affectionate; what he got back was a wry look and a long suffering sigh.

“Only because she was raised at court and happens to be a lady.  Born and bred.  Delicate sensibilities, you know.”

“I do not have -” Cullie started to say, then firmly closed her mouth, took a deep breath and started again.  She knew better than that.  They were in hostile territory, Ashley them was injured, and this was how they coped.  Flux deflected anxiety with jokes, Meldew put things into perspective with mockery – and she tumbled into middle of their teasing with indignation, every time.

Gods, but she loved her quaternity.  Every one of them.

“Alright,” she said.  “Putting my sensibilities aside …”   Willow was smiling at her, a smile that held both empathy and amusement.  It was a pleasing smile, and one that was a pleasure to see, especially after that moment of heart stopping panic in the square.  It even held a hint of mischief, which made it hard not to smile back.  But Cullie had more serious matters to consider first.  “Let's focus, shall we?  We need to be much closer to the Edge than this by the end of the day.”

“Aye,” Flux agreed, turning back to where Ashley now sat, her leg propped up along the length of the stained marble bench.  “And we can't ask the Lord Watcher to be carrying our lass all the way across Sharshall.  No matter how good he is at it.” 

“Hardly a … demanding chore,” Giles assured him, sounding vaguely discomforted by the hint of praise.  “Is she going to be all right?”

Flux rubbed his hands together and then stretched them both out, palms extended over Ashley's knee.  “If the goddess is willing, she will.  And if not …”  He paused to offer his patient a reassuring smile, “then we'll be begging the old man for one of his draughts, and he'll be complaining about it for the rest of the way home.”

“I will not,” Meldew protested tetchily.  He'd moved round to study the other painted panel, leaving Willow staring at the first, her expression squirming between fascination and disgust.  Cullie was hoping that disgust won; they really weren't the kind of pictures that anyone but a Darkling would want to hang on a wall.  “They're made to be used.  I just don't see the point of using them when we have alternatives at hand.”

“ In hand,” Flux muttered, closing his eyes for a moment.

“In heart,” Ashley corrected softly.  “The potions take time, Flux.  You know that.  Especially with a break or a sprain.  Your way … heals more than just the hurt.  Besides,” she added, “unlike a potion, you don't get used up in the application.”

“Only a little.  And that soon cured with a good night's sleep …”

The miracle happened without fuss; the barest whisper of words, a barely seen glimmer of light around dark-skinned hands, and it was done.  Ashley drew in a deep breath as the blessing swept the pain away, and then bent her knee and flexed her foot with decided relief.  “Thank you,” she said.  “And thanks be to Sulis, who blesses us.”

“Thanks be,” Cullie echoed, along with Meldew, who's quiet but heartfelt murmur belied all the gruffness he liked to hide behind. 

“In her name, be welcome,” Flux answered, twisting round so he could rest his weight on the edge of the bench.  He wasn't one of the Keepers of legend, through whom, it was said, the gods could call a soul back from the jaws of Death as easily as a mother called her children home; channelling even that small amount of power was a demanding experience.  It would take him a moment to recover his strength.

“Remarkable.” Giles looked – and sounded – impressed.  “And extremely effective by the look of it.  A simple laying on of hands or … is there more to it than that?”

Flux threw him a wry glance.  “It's a gift.  I ask – and it comes.  Sometimes it comes easier than others … and sometimes it doesn't come at all.  That was … easier than usual.”  He grinned, finding sudden revelation in the curious – and fascinated - gaze with which he was being observed.  “Mayhap you inspire me, Lord Watcher.  Bring the certainty of her presence closer to my heart.  Hard to doubt My Lady, when her sword stands close to hand.” 

Part Nine

They made good time after that, heading south and east through the devastated streets and trying to avoid trouble as much as possible.  That sometimes meant making complex detours, skirting the edges of impact craters or backtracking when the street they followed began to turn foul or to reek with odours drifting from the menace of a crack.  Just before midday, their route took them into tribal territory, and Cullie had to wave them into hiding once or twice, the heavy scuffle of rough booted feet giving plenty of warning as hunters from the tribe wandered by in search of easy prey. 

Meldew muttered something about a bunch of gobs – or hobs, whatever they were – not being that much of a threat, but apparently in Sharshall finding such a bunch generally meant there would be a much larger bunch close by.  Cullie explained – in quiet and terse words – that the city tribes found safety in numbers and their hunters and scavengers never ventured too far from the support of the main group.  It was easy to spot when they entered this particular tribe's hunting ground though, and they skirted its edges, planning to leave it again as quickly as possible. Willow had gone a little pale at the sight of the first boundary marker, but by the time they passed the fourth she was paying much more attention to the tribal colours it displayed and far less to the spear pierced pile of rotting, severed heads that made up its base.

“Same icky yellow banner, with equally icky green daubs … ” she noted, peering over Ashley's arm as she added the marker's location to her map.  “Handprints, I think.  And no, I don't want to know what they use for paint.  There's nothing further down the street though.   Does that mean we've reached the edge of their territory?”

“Hopefully, yes.  Or,” Meldew frowned down at the skull pile, “make that … hopefully no.”

Giles, of course, was paying attention.  He'd never been particularly squeamish when it came to dealing with dead or gory things.  A little fastidious perhaps, but also fairly fascinated; Willow had sometimes wondered how the old kind of Watcher training had covered that kind of stuff.  Sessions in abattoirs, or attending post mortems perhaps.  Courses in demon dismemberment.  Chainsaws 101 …

“I take it that … um …skin in that particularly unpleasant shade of grey is not the usual colour for these … hobs, of yours?”

“Only the semi-dead ones,” Flux said dryly.  He was watching Cullie scout the street ahead, and he was poised to break into a run,  ready to sprint to the rescue, should she be in need of it.  “It's a sickness.  The body wastes, the eyes sink in, the skin goes grey … and the victims get this overwhelming urge to feast on raw flesh.  Dead or alive.  They're not fussy.”

“Or fastidious,” Meldew interjected.  “Ghouls are messy eaters.  Once the shadow gets into them, they have this bone-chilling, paralysing touch.  They use it to capture prey – and they'll start eating long before you stop breathing.”

“Eww,” Willow shuddered.  She'd been doing a lot of that today.  “And I thought vampires were bad.”

“They are.”  Giles had hunkered down to get a better look at the tumble of skulls and rotting flesh.  “But at least they choose whether to pass on their curse or not,   I suspect the … sickness … that creates a ghoul is a little less selective in its victims.  Broken skin?  A bite?”  He glanced up at Meldew, who nodded confirmation. “Like lycanthropy, but somewhat more obvious in its infection …”

“It depends.”  Ashley tucked away her mapping parchment and wrapped her arms around herself, shivering a little as she did so.  That might have been the wind – it had grown stronger as they'd clambered through the streets, and had a chill bite to it – but Willow didn't think so.  “There was a man in my village.  Caught the sickness – no-one knew where, or when.  He hid the wound – and his growing appetite.  Infected his whole family.  Wife, children … They lived out on the village boundary.  Lured in visitors – offering them a meal, shelter for the night.  He'd bring in their goods to trade, and nobody suspected a thing.  Until winter came and the trade traffic stopped. They started snatching children from the village instead …”

Meldew was there in a step, wrapping one long arm around her shoulders, giving her a look of both comfort and concern.  “You were brave, little sparrow.  You found your power.  And we burned their nest, remember?  Burned it – and them, to chars and ashes.”

She nodded wordlessly, turning to briefly rest her forehead against his shoulder, accepting his comfort and clearly seeking to compose herself. “Elves – and elfkin – are not affected by a ghoul's touch,” the alchemist explained.  The look he was giving Giles held a hint of defiance, as if he expected him to be contemptuous at Ashley's moment of weakness.  All Willow saw was comprehending sympathy – but then, Giles was well aware that even the strongest of young women had to take an occasional time out when recalling how they faced overwhelming horror.  “But her friends were – and she could not defend them all.  She could barely defend herself.  Had I not … well, maybe Terra herself tripped my horse.  I don't know.  But it meant I was there to hear her cry for help.”

“I wasn't crying for help.  I was screaming.”  Ashley had recovered herself enough to look up at her mentor with wry gratitude.  “And then he arrives, covered with snow, waving his staff and crying out incantations …”

“I'm hardly fool enough to charge into a house full of ghouls undefended.  I stepped into the space between seconds, called up a small earth elemental, and let that distract them while I hauled you and those other imps out of the way.”

“And then he fireballed the entire house,” Flux interjected.  “Best way to deal with the sharding things.  Not a lot argues with Ignis' gift.”

Meldew snorted.  “Hardly a moment of finesse,” he said.  “I don't generally resort to such crude battle spells – but I was travelling alone, had it in my head just in case, and it was the quickest and easiest way to deal with the problem.”

“When you said you ‘called up a small earth elemental…'”

“You can cast fireballs? ” Willow exclaimed excitedly.  “Oh wow.  You have so totally got to teach me that!”

“ … never mind,” Giles concluded with a small sigh.  “We'll discuss the niceties of the magic later.  Willow – small steps, remember?”

She did, and she grimaced a little contritely at his admonition – but after their encounter with the slug, and being avoidy around the hobs, and now all this talk about ghouls …  she'd knew she'd feel a whole lot better if she had access to one or two spells with a bit more oomph behind them.  She was this ‘sheild of Ignis' wasn't she?  Fire spells should be totally her thing. 

Right?

“You should start with magic missiles,” Ashley advised, nodding her thanks to Meldew, who let her go with a sympathetic smile.  “That's what I did.  After he rescued me, he took me on as ‘prentice.  I wanted to throw fireballs too, but … it takes practice.  And aim.”

“And scorched eyebrows,” Meldew added wryly.  “I have promised to teach you everything I know, Lady Willow, and I will.  In time.”

She glanced across at Giles, who quirked a semi-wry smile and nodded: not so much giving permission , as offering acknowledgement.  She was an adult, and she'd been given a gift, and he trusted her to learn to use it responsibly.  Even if he did keep reminding her about it from time to time.  He couldn't help that.  He was Giles , and he knew her history, and he cared about her.  Apparently as much as she cared about him.

“Small steps,” she agreed, and grinned, because Cullie was back, and frowning at the way they were all standing round the boundary marker - as if it were an office coffee machine and a suitable place for them to hang around and gossip. 

“When you're ready …” Cullie prompted, and turned to stride off before anyone could sensibly respond.  Willow ran after her, leaving Meldew and Ashley to follow, and Flux stepping back to take her place at Giles' side.  They'd briefly talked about the need for that, to find ways to engage with Cullie's people and learn as much as they could about this new world of theirs.  Giles would have no difficulty getting Flux talking – might, in fact, have more problems getting him to stop – and Willow was going to leave the two of them plenty of room to discuss history and religion and philosophy and all the other kind of stuff that Giles wanted to know.  Not that she didn't want to know that stuff too, but she knew there'd be time get the crib notes from him later – along with all the thoughtful analysis and observations that he'd have to offer once he'd had time to think about things.

And there was a thought to store away for later, because Rupert Giles, previously man of towering intelligence and walking encyclopedia with arms, was now blessed with a dragon sized brain in which to exercise all those thinky, intellectual thoughts of his.  Which meant they'd have plenty of room to become both awesomely deep and scarily profound.  Hadn't Flux said something about Bronzes being renowned for their wisdom and stuff?      

And whoa , Cullie moved with the grace of a cat and the confidence of a slayer …

“Hi,” Willow offered, a little breathlessly, falling into step beside the armed and armoured warrior.  Breathless from sudden embarrassment, that is.  That short run hadn't taxed her at all.

Part Ten

Cullie didn't exactly jump when Willow appeared beside her, but she was decidedly startled.  She was on point and in focus, and she should have heard the Firechild running up behind her … except, of course, she was wearing elven boots.  Her elven boots, made for dancing and enchanted to help keep a light step and a soft footfall. 

“Don't … sneak up on me like that,” she snapped, more annoyed with herself for being caught out than she was with Willow for catching her.  “Not here, at least.  I might have mistaken you for a gob.”

“Sorry.”  The apology wasn't entirely contrite.  “Didn't mean to startle you.  And don't you mean a hob? I thought Meldew said - ?”

“He did.  But you're far too short for a hob.   You're also a little tall for a goblin, but they do cross breed from time to time …”

“Goblins?”  Willow frowned for a moment.  “And … hobgoblins.  Right .  Gobs and hobs.  Got it.  And … eww .  They cross breed?”

Cullie was trying to watch the street ahead, her eyes scanning for possible threat, and her body tense with anticipation.  Not that hard a job, usually.  She'd been trained for it, and she'd learnt enough in the field to understand the importance of that training.  But right now, with a curious copperhaired dragonkin bouncing along beside her, she was finding it hard to pay attention to the things that needed attending to. 

Because … well … Willow was being Willow .   And that was decidedly distracting.

“It's how they were made.”  Cullie was well aware that the boundary marker warned there might be a ghoul colony somewhere nearby.  So far she'd seen no obvious signs that suggested recent ghoulish activity, so she suspected that might be an ex- colony rather than an active one, but that didn't keep her from eyeing every ruined window and doorway on their route – or from keeping her hand on her sword as she spoke.  “The Three created each race to be distinct among themselves, but they made them close enough for children to be born from intimacy between them.  Hence  … elfkin, like Ashley.”  She glanced back, as much to check that the rest of her party was following as it was to emphasise the point she was making.  “Or dragonkin … like yourself.  The children born of men and dwarves are gnomes – although they tend to breed true for generations, so people forget they're descended from crosskin.  Even they forget sometimes.”  Memory quirked a half smile, recalling the astonished look on Crimp's face the day his much cherished wife had presented him with a completely human daughter.  There'd been talk, of course, but all bar one of Gimble Weatherwise's five husbands were gnomes – and the exception was a very well bred dwarf, so there'd been no chance of him being the one responsible.  Gimble swore blind that she'd no intimate relationships outside of the marriage bed, and both Crimp and Cullie believed her.  Besides, little Daisy had, quite clearly, inherited her father's eyes – which were engaging enough set in a gnomish face, but devastatingly cute on a four year old child …

“Long ago, long before the Fall … before Wisdom was built, or Destiny designed ... maybe even before the Meringian empire was sundered by war, there was an alliance of Mages – men, elves and dragons - who sought to understand the greater mysteries of life, to unlock the secrets that the gods had not thought safe to share.  They experimented with breeding programmes, forcing a mixing between the blood of dwarves and men and ogres and elves … and other beasts.  They created the half races.  Like the centaurs and the minotaurs.  The wemic and the harpy.” 

Willow frowned.  “Harpies – those women-bird things, in the murals, right?   I've heard of those.  But what's a wemic?”

“Half man, half lion.  Top half,” Cullie added, before Willow could ask the obvious question.  She knew it was obvious.  She'd asked it herself, the first time she'd heard about them. 

“Like a sphinx?”

“No, not really.  More like a centaur – arms as well as head and torso.  And sphinxes sometimes have wings, while wemic never do.  They're probably related though.  Created in a similar way …”

Willow took a moment to digest that.  “Sphinxes and wemics and centaurs.  Oh my.  Werebears and Rakshasa, too, I suppose.”

“Not … commonly.”  Cullie threw her a puzzled look, before remembering that she and her companion really didn't know anything about the world they'd been sent to.  “Weres … like the lycans … are usually the result of a curse.  Or the infection from a curse.  Shifters earn the art through ritual and training.  Terra grants the gift to some of her followers – and so does the Lord of Blight … although if you ever run into a manrat, it's safest to assume they're a were and infectious.  Just in case.”

“Uhuh.  Not their fault though?  The weres, I mean.”

Cullie snorted, carefully side stepping an unstable looking slab of paving.  “Depends on the were.  Some people see a benefit in being hard to kill …  But it takes a strong will to control the change.  And sometimes … in the early stages … they don't even know it's happening to them.”

“Yeah.”  They had started to pass a fairly substantial building. One with darkened doorways and even darker windows.  A faint chill hung around it, and Willow shivered and took a step closer to Cullie's side.  “Dated one once.  We had to chain him up three times a month …”

Cullie nodded and filed that one away for further consideration.  She thought she knew what ‘dated' meant – at least the way that Willow phrased it -  but she might be wrong.  And even if she wasn't, Sharshall's streets were no place to start discussing matters of etiquette and intimacy.

“So … hobs and gobs,” Willow prompted.  “Made like centaurs?  Or just … bad breeding?”

It was no place for a history lesson, either – but it was the easiest way to explain the dangers that might well be threatening their every step.  “A little of both …The arts of the ancient alliance were lost, a long time ago.  Only a few knew the secret, and they took it to their graves.  But the Mages that came after them knew that it was possible – and some of them tried to recreate the work, tried to engineer creatures of their own.  If they'd taken their time, studied and understood, and rediscovered those lost arts … well, dragons and elves may have that kind of patience, but not men.  They grew frustrated at endless failures – and fell prey to the whispers of the Shadow.  Those inner voices that say the end will justify the means. That the knowledge and the power is worth any cost.  They turned to dark magics and unspeakable practices.  They summoned imps and demons from the outer realms.  And they made – goblins.”  

“No way,” Willow reacted, her expression utterly sceptical.  “Work all that dark mojo, and the summoning stuff, for … come on,” she said.  “Splice together men and … spiders , or breed half demon things with wings and claws and other stuff … but goblins?   Goblins are just … lame.  Aren't they?”

Cullie shuddered, remembering the aftermath of the gob raids that she'd seen when she was young.  “You've never seen a goblin, if that's what you think.  They're an unnatural cross between imps and elves and dwarves, distorted by the blighted magic that made them other than the gods intended … and they were made to be used as slaves and servants by the mages that crafted them.  Individually, they may seem weak – but they are cunning and deceptive and cannot be trusted in any way.  When the Fist fell, and the Shards scattered across the lands, these places – Sharshall and the other cities – were not altogether abandoned.  Most of the people were killed, or fled – but some remained, scavenging in the ruins, clinging to what they knew in fear of what else they might find.  The goblins, released from servitude, banded together, forming … tribes.  They were further tainted by the magic of the Shards, and they fell to evil deeds and dirty habits.  They hunted sentient flesh, and where they found it, they played and they feasted.  Hobgoblins arose from foul and forced matings, born to tortured women whose own children turned and feasted on their flesh.  Some of them were probably ogrekin … but with goblin blood and goblin appetites.  And now the goblins lurk in fear of their own children, since the hobs hunt them down and make slaves of them.  They torture and torment them, in memory of their own murdered mothers – and when they can't find fresher meat, then a gobbet of gob is just as tasty to them as beef, or venison, or … manflesh, when they can get it.  The only thing they don't eat is their own … unless they become corrupted by the taint of a ghoul, of course.”

“Okay,” Willow breathed, her eyes wide   “Point taken.  Goblins bad.  And hobs … just a little … TMI.  This world of yours ... isn't very nice, is it.”

Cullie paused as they arrived at the next intersection, holding back her companion's advance with an outstretched arm and leaning forward to glance, right and left, just in case there was something lurking down either of the side streets.  “ Bits of it are wonderful,” she said, relieved to see nothing but deserted paving in one direction and tumbled rubble in the other.  “Sunrise - or sunset - over Midwinter castle.  The Tumbledowns, and the sea canyons east of Southport.  Bird calls over the Porbury Wetlands.  The Warden Forest at the height of summer.  The caves of Council in the Ironheights.  The floating markets at Runsmouth.  And Farferry at the end of the day, wood smoke cooking the evening meal and lamplight warming the way home …  But this – this – is a nasty and very dangerous place – despite all the trappings and the treasures and the lure of its mysteries.  Sharshall is not safe – and neither are you, up here with me.  You should stay in the middle of our group, where there is safety in numbers.  If we are ambushed I may not be able to protect you …”

“What?”  Willow stood stunned for a moment, letting Cullie stride purposefully ahead.  It wasn't that she didn't want the Firechild's company.  She was sweet and lovely, and fascinating in so many ways.  But she wanted her safe.  That moment just after the slug's attack, had been heart stopping - and she didn't want to repeat the experience any time soon.   “Excuse me?”  Willow caught up with her, anger creasing her face into a furious frown.  “You – protect me?   I don't need protecting.  I thought I was here to protect.  Shield of Ignis, and all that stuff.”

Words of prophecy, spoken by the Oracle and echoed by an ancient script in a dead city.  They'd thought they'd find weapons of power.  They'd been given children.  Gifts of the gods, innocent in the ways of man …

“It's just a title.  The naming of the priestess in the god's service.  I serve Ignis too,  And it is my duty to protect you.”  She tried to walk on, and Willow planted herself firmly in front of her, barring her way.

“Just a title.”

“Yes.”

“Like Sword of Sulis?”

“Well, yes, but  … the Lord Watcher …”

“… is a dragon .  Yeah. I got that.  I've also seen him fight – and sword is way more than a title, believe you me.  The gods gave us a job to do here – and okay, so we haven't figured out exactly what that is yet, but I'm beginning to get a good idea.  This world needs help.  You need help.  We're it.  And – hey – newsflash!  He's a dragon.  I'm half dragon.  I got the slayer type strength, and the armoured skin, and the anti-acid thing going … and, yeah, my mojo may be a little under par at the moment, but that's all about the knowing, not about the having .  I might not be able to wave a sword around as good as you do – but I've been patrolling with Buffy – hunting vampires, facing down demons, all that sort of stuff – since I was sixteen.  So – badness in the city?  Bring it on.  Bring it all on.  I can kick evil's butt just as well as you can.”

Cullie stared at her.  She had her hands planted on her hips and her eyes were flashing with fury and indignation – and she was awe inspiring.  Fire and spirit combined in one single, breathtaking presence that demanded attention.  Demanded respect.  Demanded acknowledgement.

And, perhaps, an apology. 

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