[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

monster but it also washed back at her.
She jerked her hand away from that weapon and gunned the buggy again. The
falling monster hit the glass dome over her head with a solid thud and slid
off behind her.
Page 160
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
One chum. She tried to be enthusiastic about her first kill, but a quick look
over her shoulder showed there were entirely too many where that came from.
All she could smeH was singed hair and blood. She felt
206 Holly Lisle
like she had the worst sunburn of her life, and if what she knew of burns was
correct, that pain was only going to get worse. She needed to look at the
compass to see which way she had to go, and she couldnt slow down enough to
pull it out other bag. The damned buggy had two speeds; stop and one-hundred
miles-per-hour.
On the other hand, she thought, brightening a litde. I'm not stuck in the
bathroom anymore, and now I don't have to walk.
"She shouldn't have a flamethrower or a machine gun,'
Birkwelch said.
Danyl ignored the dragon. "AH right!" he screamed.
"Good save, Minerva! Way to go." He typed furiously:
Miraculously, Minerva didn't run over anyone. She got out of town without
crash-
ing, and raced toward the place where her children were being held hostage.
"Does she always drive like that?" Biricwelch interrupted.
Danyl looked closer at the mirror. For the briefest of instants at a time, he
would get a glimpse of the speedome-
ter, The needle looked like it was glued at one hundred. He thought about it
for an instant, then nodded and laughed.
"Yeah. Usually worse."
"Eeep!" The dragon rubbed his long muzzle thoughtfully.
"She was driving a station wagon and nearly ran me down
guess I should have known." He watched a little longer. "I
wish she'd look behind her. I'd like to know how many of the
Weirds are keeping up with her."
"You don't think she lost them?"
"Not a chance." The dragon sighed- "Their magic doesn't compare to hers while
she's wearing a Ring, but flying is one of their specialties. She won't evade
them just by driving fast."
Darryl felt confident. He'd figured out the trick of mak-
ing messages appear in the air. He'd gotten her safely away from the disguised
Weird who'd caught her. And she was out
MINERVA WAKES
207
of the town and hadn't flattened a single pedestrian. He was getting the hang
of magic.
Page 161
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"So what does she need? What could get nd of flyine
Weirds?" 6
The dragon gave him a sidelong glance and said, "Well, I
could, if I were there. But I'm not"
"Can you get there?"
"Not in time. I'd have to go through the gate which would dump me at the
Hallyebenge, and that is a couple hours from where she is, flying fast."
Danyl nodded. "I see." He studied his typewritten page, with its cryptic
descriptions of the events he'd made happen in Eyrith, and nibbled on the skin
on the inside of his lower
T lip. "Yeah. Birkwelch do dragons come in flocks orwhat?"
"Only during orgies."
Danyl gave the blue dragon a nasty glare and the beast grinned-
"The term for large groups of dragons is a thunder. A
thunder of dragons." Birkwelch sighed and said wistfully, ^ There haven't been
enough dragons to make up a decent thunder in more than a century."
"A thunder." Danyl nodded thoughtfully. "Okay. Thanks."
Danyl began typing again.
-;" Out of nowhere, a thunder of dragons
V darkened the sky. They pimnmeted into the center of the Weirds, and drove
them from the air. The Weirds fled into the woods, and the dragons hunted them
down to devour theni-
He looked up at the mirror, eager to see his next miracle take place.
Immediately the fact occurred to him that it took a hell of a lot of dragons
to darken a sky. A whole hell of a lot. He hadn't seen so many flying things
since he watched
Hitchcock's The Birds.
A second fact followed right behind that first one Birk-
welch had fainted. At least Danyl assumed he had only fainted. He was sprawled
out beside and behind Danyl, his eyes partly open and rolled back so only the
whites were
208 Holly Lisle
showing. The dragon's mouth gaped, and his tongue lolled out to one side.
Birkwelch looked disgusting, Danyl decided.
He checked the mirror. Minerva had come to a complete halt. She was firing the
flamethrower with one hand and the machine gun with the other. She was
shooting indiscrimi-
nately, he noted and hitting more of his dragons than she was the Weirds he'd
sent the dragons to get rid of. Then he saw why. One of the dragons came in at
her low, fast, and from the side. Minerva caught the movement out of the cor-
ner of her eye, and turned in time to lay down a steady pattern of machine gun
fire. The big beast went down, crashing into the side of her buggy. Then he
saw the world lurch, as Minerva turned to face another monster that had
attacked from the other side.
Page 162
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"Dammit, dammit, dammit!" Darryl yelled, and ran back to the typewriter. He
sat down and wrote
The dragons quit attacking Minerva and concentrated exclusively on the Weirds.
They did not bother the little buggy as it drove off to safety.
"mat ought to fix it," he muttered.
He watched the mirror. Minerva was in the middle of a flame duel. A dragon on
her left belched huge gouts of fire at her. One on her right was keeping low
and just out of range of her machine gun. Others hovered in front. . .
waiting. The Weirds were nowhere around, but that seemed less comforting than
it would have seconds earBer.
"So leave her alone already!" he yelled. "Leave her alone, dammit!"
His hands pounded the keyboard.
The dragons are her not hurt Minerva. They dragons who eat Weirds
Minerva'''
friends. They will are good, friendly but will not touch
MINERVA WAKES 209
"That won't work." Birkwelch had come around, and was staring over his
shoulder. "Dragons are like people. We're creatures of free will. You can set
us up to fit into a scenario, but once the scenario is set, you cannot change
the natures of dragons on a whim." The dragon shook his head slowly. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]