Aranya Treasury - The Complete Shapeshifter Dragons Series, page 199
Just peachy, Your Star-ship, came the immediate response.
As they conversed rapidly, Iridiana asked Pip what on the Islands a peach was. The Pygmy girl was equally confused. “Perhaps it’s a Remoyan cultural artefact?” she suggested. “Oh – Aranya! You were right. Thoralian is far from as dead as we had hoped.”
Aranya saw nothing.
As she juddered through five spontaneous transformations, Iridiana spluttered, “He has – took – Azhukazi’s – powers.”
Aranya began to ask how her twin knew. She had also been alerted to a change in the stream still issuing from the dark tunnel mouth. The numbers had thinned. Now she sensed a magical signature of epic proportions but familiar character about to emerge. An icy frisson played down her spine, but Aranya was ready for this. Ready for battle. She had expected such a ploy from Dramagon as soon as Thoralian had symbolically turned over his spirit. Why had she dared to hope he might have perished?
Hope could be so foolishly attractive.
Zip. Silver. Get that Academy out of here!
We aren’t ready yet, Silver replied tersely. Catching the tenor of her thoughts, he snapped at once, As you command, Star Dragoness. Moving!
Pouring power into the gravitational constructs provided by the Dragon Librarian, the massed Dragons of the Academy caused their home to sluggishly build up a turn of speed. Aranya admired Silver’s mental strength and agility as he switched between monitoring the acceleration, shoring up their defences and combatting the creatures homing in upon them as if the Academy were a shining beacon.
A beacon!
The idea fizzed in her mind like the best berry wine.
Aranya knew the Great Onyx was limited in the help he could directly offer. Perhaps he had already bent the rules in providing a clue about Auli-Ambar which had enabled them to travel this far. But help sourced of one’s own means was a different matter.
Spinning upon her axis, she scanned the heavens. Where in the boundless reaches of space, amongst billions upon billions of stars, might she locate her kind?
Those who had called to her before?
Be a beacon. Summoning up her memories of the scant few words she knew, she began to project in every direction with all of her strength, /Stardrop. Peril, peril, peril./ Dip the head. Every direction meant the full sphere, did it not? /Stardrop, peril. Stardrop, peril …/
Pip gaped! “What does that … holy Fra’anior! Iridiana, do you feel –”
“I think so. It just … tingles, yes?”
“Aye! In my mind, something weird – you’re so weird, Star girl. Do it again!”
“Just trying to call for help,” Aranya smiled. Weird to call for help? /Stardrop, peril./
“Mercy!” Pip yelped. “That’s awesome. I feel as if there’s something inside just waiting to be woken up, and – you aren’t hearing anything back, are you?”
“Not yet.”
When she queried them with her eyes, both Dragonesses rapped, “Keep going!”
She called again and again, but with dimming hope.
Meantime a huge paw reached out of the tunnel, putting an abrupt halt to their conversation. It was black and spiny like the Shao’lûkayn, but from a distance of four miles, the spiky outline made it resemble a hairy spider’s appendage. It shifted and gripped, levering the body behind upward. The mighty paw burned into what little horiatite had been left unscathed, but unlike before, this creature did not expire upon contact with the magic-bearing crystal – rather, it appeared to feed upon or assimilate the magic. The spines rippled eagerly as another appendage reached out, and then the mighty black body slithered out, filling at least two thirds of the tunnel with its circumference, and in length, the beast outstripped Zankaradia by a considerable margin.
Iridiana whispered, “It even looks like him …”
Aye. There was something of the Thoralians in that stance, in the long, serpentine belly and the muscular power of its frame, but that was where any resemblance ended. This creature was apparently pure Shao’lûkayn, perhaps the essence of those creatures distilled and revived in a new form. It had no eyes. No ears. Nothing but the endless, spiky sable body and a savage, thorny mind that oriented at once upon the trio of Dragonesses who had taken a protective position midway between this new threat and the departing Academy.
Aranya! Its voice groaned against their minds. Remember us?
That presence was threefold and hateful, everything that the Thoralians had always been.
Aranya shrugged. I recognise this excrescence of ugliness, aye.
FOOLS!! The voice battered them. Dramagon has recreated us in a form greater than ever before. Our power is multiplied; indeed, we are a new kind of power in; nay, even above any of this world! Even Infurion hath perished before mine hegemony!
As the creature spoke, Aranya sensed a tickle against her mind – exactly the type of tickle Pip had just been speaking about. She breathed, Keep him busy.
Gone. There was no way she could have imagined it, was there? Languages did not arise from nothingness. Pip and Iridiana felt the same.
/Peril! PERIL!/ How she mewled, like a helpless kitten.
Waiting. Breathing … anticipating …
With a sensation like the tiniest prickling of light-warmth upon her mind, a voice replied with a hint of consternation, /Stardrop, what ails thee? Are you the one called Hualiama – nay? You are another! Quinesstaralia! Stars! ATTEND!/
The voice was male, the timbre of its song like an unearthly tenor playing notes upon starlight, and its presence an unfolding of long-dormant faculties in her mind. Aranya felt as if she were a bud being unfurled as the being focussed upon her, before the communication wavered fiercely. They were so unimaginably distant, she could hear them only through applying her utmost focus.
Cutting in and out, voices called urgently, /Peril – indeed, most – pressing need! Together, now!/
/Alert substation – farseer – /
/Why’s – exposed?/ queried another voice, this one as clear as sonorous bells. /The Danigarus Quadrant is no place – / As if the link had been severed by a knife, they were gone.
Aranya spun to Iridiana and Pip. Did you hear that?
No, they chorused.
No? Her jaw creaked like a badly oiled hinge. Huh?
Below, Thoralian skittered a few miles across the moon’s surface, his long splayed legs making easy progress across the ranges of crystal. After pausing to eat his fill of horiatite, the creature oriented itself upon the trio of Dragonesses and sprang upward. It did not make it more than a quarter-mile off the surface, but then a spigot in its hindquarters area must have opened, because a steady stream of Shao’lûkayn spat backward, pressing the creature into motion.
He said, See, even space flight is no trouble in this form. Soon, the barriers will fall and the feasting will begin!
Pip replied, I killed you before, Thoralian, and Iridiana next. Aranya, I believe it is your turn to vaporise this hairy slug – that will make our tally one each.
Feckless little stars, jeered the leviathan as they retreated steadily, keeping the Academy at their backs. You think three can succeed against all that I am? Dramagon has reincarnated my being in a far superior form. My powers eclipse those I previously possessed by an exponential margin.
Even his mind had been changed. There was still a hint of three-in-one, Aranya realised, but the personalities seemed to have blurred into one another, making a greater whole – perhaps, a servant more perfectly befitting Dramagon’s designs?
Cracking open its toothless maw, the creature spat Shao’lûkayn at them. Faster. Faster! The black bodies blurred across the gap, taxing their starlight to the maximum as the creatures imploded mere feet from the Stars. They were forced to retreat as the resultant dust adulterated their shining.
More? You want MORE? Even my breath is death incarnate!
/Stardrop!/ Aranya stiffened as the voices – many voices this time – rang inside that part of her mind which was so unfamiliar and unused. /Attend. Quickly, open your consciousness to examination./ She tried, but it was long, breathless seconds of that slight mental itching sensation before a glorious voice chimed, /Legacy-quartile, upper septuplet signature markers confirmed! Oh, Astralior, we are – /
/Blessed!/ cried the tenor, at a volume that made even her paws tingle.
/To arms! To arms, brother and sister stars! The stardrop – / This cry swelled into a thunder of light, so powerful that Aranya’s senses swam. She must have blacked out momentarily, because when she recovered, Iridiana was cradling her in her paws, the Thoralian-thing was jeering at her weakness and Pip snorted:
Superior form, Thoralian? You’re the one farting black spike balls all over the Moon!
Iridiana cracked up; as embarrassed as Aranya was by Pip’s frankness, she was hilarious. She could not help but laugh too.
Enraged, the black creature expelled a violent flurry of attackers, but they expired both in starlight and in a stream of golden particles that passed around the Dragonesses and sizzled toward Thoralian. He countered with a greater outpouring than before. He was also coming on faster than the Academy was accelerating, firing at them with apparently inexhaustible resources.
As they ducked and weaved away from an overwhelming flurry of spikes and ash, he sneered, Despite you and your luminously challenged allies, Zankaradia, I shall reduce this Academy to dust. Then I shall peel your brain-casing like a fruit and sup upon what lies within.
But the hatchling said quietly, What moved you so, Aranya?
I think I found aid …
/O beauteous stardrop, we are aid indeed,/ cried the tenor voice. /In the time of your relative, Hualiama, we released the Yhishaalylia, or the Shining Ones, to be your benison – but now the Sankûraguz move against you in power! Why are you so fearfully exposed? Why – /
The female chimed, /We are your great grandstars, to borrow your quaint terminology, o luminous kin-beauty who illumes my soul with joy’s pure radiance! I am Quinesstaralia, and this is Astralior – /
/Open to us – speech shall be given thee,/ sang the male, clearly almost beside himself with excitement. Aranya had a sense of great fonts of light swirling and exploding like fireworks within his soul, while his vocal tones wobbled between multiple octaves.
How could he not sense or intuit that they were under heavy attack? That was the reason her starlight was exposed. One paw at a time.
We are three, she tried to communicate. /Stardrop, stardrop, stardrop!/
Why could she not express herself?
There was a startled silence out there, a silence wherein Pip and Iridiana cried out urgently and the Corundum Red groaned. A Thoralian mental attack was in progress, clamping down upon their minds like monstrous, burning pliers, but Aranya’s core attention was far, far away, yearning for that poignant contact with her great grandstars – her mind wanted to burst at the tidings – when the communication zinged back to her in a wild paroxysm of joy:
/Three? THREE! O, let myriad stars rejoice!/
Starlight ignited within her soul at their unbridled exultation. Crushingly tender. Searing. Immense and miraculous and unstoppable. Somewhere, a host of starry voices trilled:
/Sing, o Stardrop! Let thy voice be heard! Summon all starlight within, and shine, shine, SHINE!/
It was as if the melody of their joy released her, at last, to find her own voice. It was not physical singing that they meant, but a liberation of the capacity of starlight within her. To be, to receive, and to give out in ways she had never imagined. Aranya opened herself with unbridled exuberance. She attracted and inveigled so much light into her being, from every possible source – from the risen suns, from the effulgence of Mystic Moon, from her world’s own shining and from the farthest stars – that it seemed to her that surely, her demands must snuff them all out in an instant. Yet, the converse was true. Her glory made them greater. No, this glory was her gift. It was glory that must be given away.
A star could never hide her light. She must shine for all.
Chapter 35: Sneaky Stars
ARDAN’s UPTURNED FACE was glowing. He could feel it. A third sun beamed its pristine illumination upon them all, outshining the Mystic Moon by far. Aranya! That quality of light could only be his beloved, but she shone with an intensity of incandescence far beyond anything he had known from her before. Searing. Unbearable to look upon, yet he must. He was mesmerised.
Oh, how his hearts thrashed the insides of his chest!
Only the sight of dark motes homing in on that astonishing display adulterated his joy. Windrocs circling! Ravening powers gnashed their maws in futile wrath. He sneaked a glance back along his spine spikes. Asturbar looked as if he had just swallowed a miracle for breakfast. The planes of Ri’arion’s features, usually so austere, conversely seemed softened by his unabashed regard.
Ever so softly, the Fra’aniorian said, “It’s still a battle royal, but our girls are doing it! May the Great Dragon strengthen them all …”
His voice broke the spell.
Asturbar clapped him upon the shoulder. “You still manage to find words after seeing something like that? You’re creepy, man.”
* * * *
Gathering the splendid song of stars within her being, stirred and electrified in ways for which she could essay no description Aranya called upon her sisters and invited them to partake. Pip. Iridiana. Receive, imbibe, and give out with me. /Stardrops! To arms!/
Carolling her delight to the heavens, Iridiana echoed, /Stardrops!/
Pip could barely speak, not even in her mind. /Stardrops?/ And then she cried, BE LIGHT!
Radiance seemed to rush into the three Dragonesses and through them in great, dazzling beams of starlight. Gathering into a threefold meld of their unique light qualities, they beamed forth a brilliant strike against Thoralian.
He threw up his dark paws to deny them. NEVER!
Shao’lûkayn exploded forth from his being. The great dark creature reappeared from behind a shifting veil of ash, grinning manically as he dived for the trio of Star Dragonesses.
/Hold firm!/ Aranya cried.
They pounded him a second time, and a third time more luminously still, but each time he shook through the aftereffects, and now he was gathering his troops from every direction. He drew Dramagon’s Bequest away from their attacks upon the Mystic Moon and the heavily damaged lattice to fling them in a wild paroxysm of paws and draconian breath against the Stars and the Academy. Aranya heard Silver and Zuziana and Sapphire cry out back there, and Zankaradia joined them in combatting the incoming scourge, but for her part, she knew she must hold firm no matter the cost. They had to finish this. Finish Thoralian for good.
Yet he struck back with his signature cunning, pounding them with psychic strikes, Shadowing away to misdirect their attacks, and regenerating himself at a phenomenal rate using the techniques he had clearly stolen from Azhukazi the Iolite Blue. His form flickered and changed, shifting through the veils of ash that boiled off of him as he fought back; now he rematerialized to their right flank and swung hard with his massive black fist. A thousand Shao’lûkayn pounded the Star Dragonesses across the skies.
/Too strong … we cannot fail!/ Aranya panted dazedly, holding them together by the force of her will. /I’ll be the bulwark. Iridiana, strike force. Pip – /
The Pygmy Dragoness laughed wickedly. /Cause trouble? Thou, Aranya, our strength …/
Suddenly the little Onyx Dragoness spun to track Thoralian’s flanking movement, and she shouted, BE ENFEEBLED – BEZALDIOR!
Iridiana darted forth, fifty strong in her Chaos Beast manifestation, only this time she was filled to bursting with unsullied starlight. Flares exploded along the length of Thoralian’s spiky body, not just crumbling what was there, but blowing pieces right off of him. Desperate, hurting, he countered with his greatest broadside of darkness and fury yet, driving the Stars back foot by grudging foot as his never-ending assault brawled and bullied its way through the greatest concentration of their light. Pip kept gesturing, waving the dust particles aside as the colossal barrage thundered against them. Again and again, the enemy roused himself to greater heights, the power of his fury smoking liberally off his body now as the dark blurs of the Shao’lûkayn rattled against their light. Dozens imploded around them every second. Closer. Closer!
/Stand firm, o stardrops!/ belled the powerful voice from afar.
/Sing clear!/
/Never shall darkness prevail!/
/Let thy purity ream the enemy!/ cried Quinesstaralia.
Astralior sang, /Shine brighter, shine clearer, shine across the Universe, my beloved ones! Shine for love!/
/Gnnnaaaa …/ cried the nascent stardrops.
The circle of their light was being squeezed tighter and tighter by the unrelenting press of the enemy. No longer could they see the stars; barely even the suns’ gleaming through the press of bodies and the ever-churning smoke. Pip’s wings brushed hers. Iridiana surrounded them in coruscating, endlessly intertwining and coiling streams of mauve light. Just a dozen more feet, and one of these creatures must surely touch them and suck their magic dry.
Thoralian set to pounding them hither and thither with his paws, still striving to break through by main force. He did not believe they could withstand him. Each clattering blow tested their union of three. Each time his paws smashed together it was with a thunderclap that strove to drive spikes deep into Star Dragoness flesh, but they burned them away with but inches to spare. Pip and Aranya had both tucked in their wings. His power was devastating, a brooding corruption of magic which had been foul to begin with, e’er it had ever been shaped by Dramagon’s paws. Aranya sensed the Academy just behind them. They were all that stood between him and destruction.
No. Light could not be beaten down like this.
Light must penetrate the darkness.
Starlight could be her inspiration; imagination alone could limit her response to this fiend. Casting her artistic mind forth, Aranya drew the biggest sword she could imagine across the sky. A sword forged of pure starlight. She gave it an edge sharper than any steel, and a grip imbued with Pygmy strength. She emblazoned runes along its length, runes that spelled out:
