Chapter 11 10 страница

" A slight dispute on the proper distribution of pay, " Oberyn replied almost on reflex as he raised his spear. " A few of our number thought they were entitled to all of what we found and fully intended on leaving the rest of us behind. The rest of us had issue with that idea and, well, they lost the argument. "

" Oh, " the bastard of the Warden of the North replied elegantly, rubbing the back of his neck. " Alright, well, what do we do now? "

" Now? " Oberyn replied, hefting his spear over his shoulder. " Now, we wait for the sorcerer to return from whatever fight he's hogging all to himself. And then we figure out how to man our boats plus an extra skiff with less than a quarter of the manpower we started with. Either that, or we begin sorting what we have and start leaving things behind. Something that I'm sure no one wants to have happen. "

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the boy frown in thought before turning northwards and staring off into the distance. Oberyn considered himself a master of reading people, one had to be if you were to survive the games of nobles and the games in the fighting pits. In a fight, the slightest twitching of a hand or shifting of the eyes or even the shifting of one's weight could tell the opposition exactly what their next move would be. And in the game of the nobles, one's eyes or twitching or one of a hundred slight tells could give away a lie or the truth. So, when Oberyn saw the bastard of the North go stone still as he faced the north when he was relaxed but a moment before, a hundred warning bells started sounding in his head.

Tightening his grip on his new spear, he moved to stand side by side with the boy. Jon's eyes were pointedly facing northwards and had an almost…detached look to them. As if he were seeing without seeing, if that even made sense. " Master Nox is still fighting…something dark. Something strong, but…wrong. So very wrong. It's as if the Force itself is rejecting the thing's very existence, " Jon said almost emotionlessly as if he were describing the weather.

Looking at the boy out of the corner of his eye, he kept his attention northwards. " Is he winning? "

Jon shook his head. " I…I can't tell from this distance but… Wait. What – What is that? "

The sense of dread increased tenfold as he watched Jon turn whiter than the snow of his homeland. " What is what boy? "

Jon's answer came in a single word as his eyes grew large and went skywards. " Run! "

Not a moment later, an ear splitting, chest rumbling roar came from the sky, chilling the very blood in Oberyn's veins as he looked skywards. What he saw was impossible. Yet, it was there. Dropping from the clouds and flying low enough to scrap the tops of the buildings was the very creature that allowed the Targaryen's to conquer almost all of Westeros. A dragon. " Scatter! Now! " he yelled, running off to his left and, on instinct, grabbing Jon by the waist and putting himself between the dragon's path and the young boy.

The heat was the worst. Even though Oberyn was well clear of the dragon's path, he could still feel the heat of the dragon fire down to his very bones as the beast of legend passed them by, scorching everything in its path. Which included two more of their number who were too awestruck to move. The only saving grace he could think of was that the flames of the dragon killed the two hapless sailors so quickly that they didn't even have time to scream nor, he hoped, to truly feel the pain of the fire turning them to little more than piles of ash.

" Someone better tell me I'm fucking sleeping on a pile of gold back in the fucking vault! " the young Umber yelled. " Because there is no damn way that a dragon just passed us by and tried to fucking cook us! "

" This isn't a fucking dream, Umber! It's a fucking nightmare! And one we're all sharing! " a second voice, the Karstark boy he believed, shouted back.

" We need to get into the buildings! " Dacey Mormont shouted. Her mace held tightly in her hands as her gaze remained skywards. " The thing can't burn us if it can't find us! "

" No! " Oberyn blinked, the voice hadn't come from him, but rather from the young bastard boy he'd been protecting, who'd suddenly shrugged him off and marched out into the open. " Dragonfire can melt stone, even this stone here in Valyria. We go in between the buildings or in them, and that dragon will turn them into ovens. And we can't stay here, if one of those flames hits the boats, we lose our only way of getting out of here in any timely manner. "

He was reasonably impressed with the boy's logic. Between the buildings would give them the option to hide, but it would limit their mobility and if the dragon hit them with a burst of fire, those stone homes would turn into ovens to cook them alive. Out in the open had its risks, but it was the better option. But regardless of out in the open or into the city, they had to get away from the boats to prevent the dragon from targeting them. Hopefully.

" Listen to Snow! Get your asses towards the outskirts of the city or I'll kill you myself and save the dragon the trouble! " he shouted, motioning with his spear in the direction they were to go before turning and speaking quietly to Jon, " I hope whatever task the sorcerer sent you on, boy, gave you some kind of trick to deal with the dragon. "

" I just might have a 'trick up my sleeve', Prince Oberyn! " Jon Snow shouted as the two ran towards the outskirts of the city.

The movement was brief, but out of the corner of his eye Oberyn noticed Jon touching the sleeve of his tunic on his right arm. 'I see, he meant that quite literally. I'm interested to see just what the sorcerer sent him after. ' " Careful with that cavalier attitude, boy! I might just start taking a real liking to you! And, if not me, then Ellaria certainly will. She likes witty young men af-"

" Shut the fuck up! " Asha shouted from just ahead of the two of them. " Think with your cock later, Prince! Dragon first! Fucking after! "

Despite the situation, Oberyn felt his face split in a smile under his mask as he stared at the Greyjoy woman's backside. " Is that an offer, Lady Asha? "

" Here it comes! Scatter! "

At Snow's warning, everyone scattered off to their left or right, taking whatever cover they could find. 'Shit, ' Oberyn cursed, tucking himself behind a building's corner just as he could hear the dragon's roar and the beating of the beast's wings. 'We're not out in the open yet! That thing lets loose a blast like last time, and we're all cooked! '

Just as he could start making out the form of the dragon through the mist, he noticed something that had slipped his attention when he ducked for cover. And that was the fact that Jon Snow was no longer beside him. In fact, that boy was standing out in the middle of the street, staring down the dragon that was on a direct path for him. 'Fucking fool! ' Obery cursed, ready to burst out from his hiding place and tackle the boy out of the path of the dragon. 'I don't fancy taking a swim in these waters, but if I go fast enough I should have enough to take the both of us into the water and – Whatis he doing? '

Any action he was about to take halted as he watched Jon casually raise his arm. This action allowed his right sleeve to roll back and revealed some sort of golden armlet on the boy's right forearm with a ruby gem in the center. A gem that started glowing brightly just as the dragon's maw opened and flames leapt forth, consuming the boy and everything around him.

Ducking back, Oberyn closed his eyes. 'Fuck…I got distracted! I couldn't save the boy! Damn it! What was he fucking thin—' His thoughts were cut off as a torrent of wind rustled his clothes. The flames from the dragon weren't dissipating. If anything, they were gathering, right above where Jon had been standing.

The Prince of Dorne had seen and experienced a lot in his life, more than almost any could ever hope to see or experience. But the sight of the Bastard of Winterfell, standing amongst a raging vortex of flames with his hand held above his head, his face twisted into one of great concentration? That was something else. Something new, even for him. With a yell rivaling any war cry he'd ever head, Jon turned, the vortex of flame following his movements as if a slave to his will. The flames formed into a ball and, launched like it was a stone out of a trebuchet right into the back end of the dragon. The beast of legend gave of a cry as it flailed in the air before crashing through several buildings.

After picking his jaw up off the ground, Oberyn was the first to react. Eyes bouncing continuously between the downed dragon and the boy, he slowly and cautiously approached the Bastard of Winterfell. " Alright, I'll bite. What in the Seven Hells did the sorcerer send you after that allowed you to do…that? "

" It's this talisman, " Snow answered, his face looking more than slightly drained, but his eyes remaining in the direction where the dragon had fallen. " I'm not sure how, but it almost…enhances my Force powers to manipulate fire. But only fire. Master Nox never spoke of anything like it before. "

" Well, that's convenient, " Dacey Mormont remarked, her mace at the ready as she took kept her eyes in the direction of the fallen dragon. " But please tell me you weren't dumb enough to use that thing on a dragon without knowing it would work. "

" Well, I wasn't sure that it would work that well against dragonfire, " the boy said before hastily adding. " But I did use it to kill a firewyrm with its own fire. At least I think I did. So, I just assumed that it would work as well against a dragon. "

The ease with which he said drew many up short, no doubt as they remembered their first and only encounter with one of the most dangerous creatures in perhaps the entirety of the known world, now that dragons were extinct… Well, maybe not completely extinct seeing as they were now facing one. But as Oberyn drew close enough to touch the boy, he had to reassess his original thoughts on him looking drained. Drained would be an understatement. He looked as if he'd just sprinted from Sun Spear to the Water Gardens during midday. 'Not surprising. While I might not know about this brand of magic the sorcerer and the boy use, there has always been one rule that all magic abides by. It's taxing. Those two have been using their magic nonstop for days to guide us and keep us safe. And Jon, by his own admission, has already finished fighting off firewyrm and now he just used his power to deflect dragon fire. A feat thought to be impossible! '

" The boy has given us a chance, " Oberyn called out, forcing himself out of his thoughts and back to the matter at hand. " He's brought the dragon to the ground, which gives us a chance to kill it. "

" Wait, you want us to go on foot and hunt that fucking thing? " The Karstark lad all but shouted. " Did you see how fucking big that monster was!? "

" Yes, " he nodded. " And while it is in the air, that big fucker will be impossible to kill without a heavy scorpion or ballista. So, our best – our only – chance to survive this is to try and kill it once it's on the ground where we can reach it. "

" But how are we supposed to kill it? " Umber growled. " We might hate those dragon fuckers, but we know of them well enough. Their skin is tougher than heavy plate armor. Not to mention, you ever try and hunt a bear? You corner them and they get ten-times as vicious, which this beast now is. And not to mention, you need to drive your spear damn far into the bear in order to kill it. How the fuck are we supposed to get in close enough to not only stab it, but I doubt even our new Valyrian steel weapons will be able to get past those scales. "

" Master Nox's lightsaber, " Jon spoke up, stopping the retort that was on the tip of Oberyn's tongue. " A lightsaber can cut through anything. I've seen him cut through steel, wood, even solid stone with little to no difficulty. If there is a weapon that can kill a dragon, it is that. Master Nox is far away but, I can sense he's returning. "

" Then that's what we'll do, " Oberyn decided, ending the discussion. " Snow will use his…magic to nullify the dragon fire. The rest of us will keep it occupied and once we get it to ground, we try and kill it. And if all else fails, we hold it off long enough for the sorcerer to get back and have him finish the job with—"

" Something's coming out of the mist! "

Turning, Oberyn squinted off into the distance of the mist clouding wall that was just barely visible that had once served to contain the city of Valyria. At first, he couldn't see anything through the mist. But that didn't last as he soon saw figures shaped oddly like men limping through the fog. Mishappen men with skin the color and texture of the very stone walls that surrounded them. And as if to truly make their situation any worse, he could hear the distinctive beating of heavy wings and the roaring of the dragon as it once again took to the sky.

" Fuck me, " he muttered. " Just what we needed right now. Fucking stonemen. "

The reaction from everyone was about what he'd expected as everyone, from noble to laymen and from man to woman, took a step back in fear and disgust. Grabbing the sleeves of his tunic and making sure they were fully covering his arms; he popped his collar up and then took a two-handed grip on his spear as he stepped forward. " Form lines! We fight in groups of ten to give others the chance to rest. Make sure every piece of exposed skin you have is covered in something before you step forward to fight. "

No one moved to join him. No one save the one who couldn't as Snow proved to have the biggest set of balls as he rearranged his sleeves and drew the short Valyrian sword Nox had given him from the vault. " Not you, boy, " he said, holding out his spear and blocking the boy's path. " You're the only one who can deal with that fucking dragon when it comes back around. The rest of us will keep the stonemen from reaching you. "

The boy looked like he was about to protest, but a distant roar from the dragon still in the sky must've brought the situation they were now in around to the boy. And with little more than a nod, he moved back as his daughter, Asha Greyjoy, Dacey Mormont and the Small Jon all stepped forward with weapons held at the ready.

" Well, it appears you women have bigger balls than most, " he smiled under his mask as the stonemen started picking up speed towards them as they advanced. " Let's just hope you are as skilled. "

Lashing out with a high-spinning hook kick, Nox felt the attack find purchase against the face of the false-god, stunning the being as his Force-empowered limb sent him stumbling back. Capitalizing on the opening, Nox used a Force push to send the stumbling Balerion reeling head over heels down a small ravine. Reaching back, he grabbed hold of a boulder, easily lifting the nearly one-ton object over his head and sending it down the ravine. The false god had just barely managed to right itself in time to see the boulder approaching, and by then it was far too late to do anything but take the attack head on. Which resulted in the boulder passing almost effortlessly through him as it turned his body into a bloody red paste, forcing Balerion to once again expend the energy to create a new one rather than just repairing the old.

Knowing he had a moment, Nox let his sense of awareness expand. 'Almost there. Just a small distance further and this will end. '

Feeling a disturbance, Nox ducked in time for Balerion's sword to pass over his head. Switching to form four, Nox twisted and turned his body, becoming the very weapon he wielded as he danced and parried around Balerion's desperate attacks.

" Die! Die! Die! Die already, you fucking slave! " the false god shouted as he continued chasing Nox, his blade finding nothing but air and the edge of his lightsaber as Nox stayed ahead of Balerion.

The once-man was powerful, there was no doubt about that. In fact, if the battle was to be decided by sheer power alone, Balerion would probably have been able to best him. But power was only part of the battle. To be a true warrior, one had to be skilled enough to wield both the power and one's self effectively. And while the man was decently skilled with a blade, he could not combine his power and skill and transform them into something greater. At best, he could be considered on par with a high-ranking Lord of the Sith. Not even a Darth, let alone a Dark Council Member. The only reason why the fight had not already ended was because of his more than slightly annoying regeneration capabilities.

Deactivating his lightsaber, Nox twisted into an aerial as Balerion overextended a down sweep with his sword at his legs. Before his feet touched the ground, Nox hit Balerion with a Force push and used the recoil of the attack to flip and twist himself over backwards so that he landed on his feet facing the false god, his lightsaber activating the moment he solidified his stance on the ground. Digging the point of his lightsaber into the ground, Nox channeled a rivulet of dark side energy though the blade and into the ground. Dragging the lightsaber through the ground, Nox sent a wave of dust and superheated debris towards his adversary, temporarily blinding the still recovering Balerion and allowing Nox to once again get a killing strike in. This time piercing the being's heart, or at least where his heart should've been, before wrenching the blade out through his chest and under his arm.

Not giving his enemy the chance to recover, Nox flicked his left middle finger off his thumb on the lightsaber hilt, sending a concentrated burst of Force energy the size of a fist into the unwounded side of Balerion's chest. The concentrated strike hit the false god with the force of several tons packed into a few square inches, throwing the man back through the air for nearly thirty meters before his back struck a wall. The wall collapsed from the force of impact, covering the immediate area in a shower of debris composed of stone, mortar and wood. Raising his left hand, the newly freed clump of debris rose into the air a good fifty feet. Closing his fist, he compacted the debris into a single sphere before throwing it down on the false god, the mass just barely reaching terminal velocity before it impacted the ground where the false god still lay.

Throwing up a Force Barrier, Nox defended himself against the falling stone and wood that was thrown up into the air in result of the makeshift asteroid he'd just hurled down on his opponent. Once the debris had stopped falling, Nox let his barrier drop and calmly walked towards the broken wall. 'I'm actually impressed that he managed to go through this wall without disintegrating in a 'splat'again, ' he thought as he observed the hole that had created in the wall surrounding the ruined city of Valyria. 'Either he's durable, or this wall was not nearly as impressive as it looked. Although…considering they had dragons that could fly over any wall built, I'm sure they didn't really care if their constructs were structurally sound or not. '

Walking over the debris, he calmly observed the swirling mass of dark side energy as Balerion once again reformed his body. " Your regeneration is slowing considerably, 'Balerion', " he said the name mockingly, jumping down from the pile of debris so that he could watch the finalization of the reformation. " I suppose that I should welcome you home…But I know for a fact that the current tenants are not all that pleased with you, so I wouldn't really be expecting a warm reception here. "

Once whole again, Balerion looked around wildly as he spun in the debris. Slowly, a low rumbling began in the creature's chest that quickly turned into a fully belly laugh. " Ahaha, so this was your great plan, slave? Bringing me to Valyria, my home, the place I have been unable to set foot into since my Ascension. And why? Did you think the Archon's spell would weaken me? Make me mortal? Ha! They are but toothless worms pretending to be dragons, when I am the only true dragon of Valyria! "

" Do you care to put that to the test? " Nox asked calmly. " The Archons gave their very lives to erect the barrier that has kept you barred from this place for nearly four hundred years. Are you so sure of your victory know that you are willing to put your will against not only mine, but of the lost Archons as well? "

The creature faltered. It was only for a split second, but Nox caught it. 'Good, all according to plan. '

" I do not fear those dead worms! " Balerion shouted, and in the distance Nox could hear the undead dragon howl in response to his master's cry. " They are dead and gone! And their magic has worn off such that I can step foot in this city once more! And now, slave! You shall die! "

'Jon. It's time. '

Standing in the center of the twenty men at arms and nobles, Jon kept his eyes and his senses firmly skywards. Around him, the others fought to keep the stonemen away from him, which allowed him to keep his concentration on locating the beast overhead that was trying to fry them all alive. Sensing the dragon swooping lower through the fog once more, Jon focused on the talisman in his right hand as he prepared himself to once again fend off the dragonfire that could melt stone.

Concentrating on the talisman on his arm, he held his hand high as the dragon got close enough that he could see the beast's jaw open as the fire swelled within the back of its throat. Bracing himself for what he knew was coming, he kept himself fully focused on the dragon as the flames spewed out. The heat was almost unbearable, as well as the pressure that seemed to weigh on his shoulders as the gem on the talisman shined, giving him the strength and focus through some means he still didn't understand to hold the flames at bay. But this attack was different from the last, and vastly different from the very first onslaught. It was…well, weaker. He hadn't been able to notice it earlier. But now that it'd come to his attention, he could sense that with each pass the dragon made, the flames were getting weaker and weaker for some reason.

'Am I getting stronger? ' he wondered as he directed the flames into the river water, quenching the flames. As if to answer his unasked question, his body answered him as one of his legs gave out and he dropped to a knee as darkness began creeping in on the corners of his vision.

" Jon! " several voices shouted at once as Jon struggled to regain his footing.

The plan, if one could call it that, had been going well for a time. The arrival of the stonemen had forced them to forgo going outside the walls of the Valyrian to fight the dragon in the open field. Which unfortunately left them boxed in with buildings to one side, water to the other and only a single path forward and back. Thankfully, the stonemen were neither numerous nor were they attacking from all directions, which allowed Prince Oberyn and the rest to prevent any of the diseased from reaching him. But it had also cost the group two more of their number to do so. Despite the almost insurmountable odds being sent against them in the form of the dragon and the stonemen, they were holding their own. But there was a problem. A major one.

" I'm alright, " he forced out, doing his best to hide just how badly he was lying with that.

He was nearing his limit and he knew it. A lot of Master Nox's training had been focused on, what he called, surpassing his limits. Which usually meant running, lifting stones, or fighting until the point of physical exhaustion and then using the Force to either purge that exhaustion or to perform some other task. Other times, though, he would have Jon, Robb, and Arya use the Force until they fainted, usually by forcing them to hold stones several times heavier than a man in the air for hours on end. And having succumb to that form of training more than once, Jon knew that he would not be able to keep using the Force like this for long.

'Jon. It's time. '

The sudden voice in his mind sent a shock through him as if he'd been doused with a bucket of icy water. " Master? "

" The sorcerer is back? " Oberyn yelled as he speared a charging stoneman, then sidestepping to allow the once-man to fall on his face dead. " It's about time! Where is he? "

" Aye, " Jon nodded, trying to not divide his attention too much from the dragon overhead as he searched for Master Nox. " He's…in the city again! "

" Good! " Umber yelled, cleaving a stoneman in half with his new Valyrian great sword while making sure to stay clear of the corpse when it fell to the ground. " Tell him to kill that god's damned dragon then! "

" It doesn't work like that! " Jon shouted back as the dragon descended once more. It was the truth, he wasn't sure how exactly Master Nox was able to speak to him in this manner, but it wasn't as if he was hearing him. It was more like…feelings and pictures from a book that left a message in his mind.

Fighting through the exhaustion screaming through his entire being, he channeled the Force into the talisman once more, just as the flames of the dragon descended upon them. 'The flames are getting weaker! ' he thought as he once again pushed the flames away from himself and the others. 'But…why? '

" Then what the fuck are we supposed to do? " Asha asked her axes held at the ready, waiting for the next group of stonemen to jump out from the ruined buildings surrounding them.

As if to answer Asha's question, the sound of something crashing through multiple walls, followed quickly by the sound of a building collapsing brought Jon and the rest around to face down a pathway leading into the city. Something, gods only knew what, had crashed into a home less than a few hundred paces from where they were. They weren't given long to wonder either as a dark…mist almost, came from the wreckage and formed into almost arrow-like objects before firing off into the distance like they'd been loaded into a ballista.

The bolts of mist didn't make it far as they simply…ceased to exist midflight. Then Lord Nox was there, his blood-red glowing blade alight in his hands as he ran directly into the building the dark figure had broken through not a moment before. Within moments of him disappearing, the dark figure was flung out of the wreckage and across the wide street into the buildings on the opposite side. Once again, Lord Nox appeared right behind the figure, only… By the old gods, Jon had seen Master Nox fight in the past. Hells, he'd sparred against him for years and he'd always thought that he could somewhat hold his own against his Master. But now, watching Lord Nox defy almost every law of nature as he all but flew through the air, performed flips and turns that even mummers would think impossible…Jon knew without a shadow of a doubt that Master Nox had only been playing with everyone who'd ever sparred against him in Winterfell.

" No time for daydreaming! " Prince Oberyn shouted, shaking Jon and several others out of the trance they'd fallen into, so enthralled were they with the battle between Lord Nox and the strange figure in the distance.

Clenching his fist, Jon forced himself to look away from the fight between his Master and the unknown figure and turned himself back to the task at hand. 'I'm not angry he's been holding back! ' Jon said to himself, whether he was trying to convince himself that or not, he wasn't even sure. 'But now, now I have a true goal to reach! I will reach Master Nox's level! And it starts now! '

Eyeing the dragon, Jon concentrated on the talisman, pouring as much power as he could into the object as he could as the ancient beast once again descended from the sky. Only this time, it wasn't heading for Jon and the others. No, this time it was heading for Master Nox instead.

" It's heading for Lord Nox! " Jon shouted, breaking off from the rest as he sprinted as fast as his legs could carry him towards his mentor and Master.

The world seemed to almost slow as he watched the dragon draw closer and closer to Lord Nox. The ground shook and several ruined buildings lining the street collapsed as the dragon landed onto the street, its body acting as a barrier blocking Jon's path, preventing him from reaching Lord Nox.

" Master Nox! " Jon yelled as he watched on, helpless, as the dragon's head lowered, and its maw opened.

Dragon fire erupted from the beast, covering the street and all the nearby buildings that surrounded Master Nox and his advisory. 'No! ' Jon thought, his steps faltering as he watched the man he admired, trained under, and looked up too as a second father was blanketed in a wave of fire. 'No! '

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