Brindle Dragon Omnibus 3

  Power of Three Boxed Set

  Brindle Dragon Omnibus, Books 7 - 9

  Jada Fisher

  Copyright © 2019 Fairfield Publishing

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Except for review quotes, this book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without the written consent of the author.

  This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  Time Warp

  1. And the Fight Goes On

  2. It’s Just the Beginning

  3. Not a Substitute

  4. Too Unfortunate for a Coincidence

  5. The Bones of a Plan

  6. Thinking Backwards

  7. Shifting the Balance

  8. The Stuff of Legends

  9. Unto the Children

  10. Round Trip

  11. Home Again

  Captured

  1. In the Mouth of the Beast

  2. Unwelcome Company

  3. The Worst is Yet to Come

  4. Rock Bottom

  5. Long Road to Recovery

  6. Calm Before the Storm

  7. Outrageous Demands

  Power of Three

  1. No Surrender

  2. It All Comes Back Around

  3. How the Mighty Have Fallen

  4. False Religion

  5. Just Like Everybody Else

  6. Lost with Nowhere to Turn

  7. No One Likes a Surprise

  8. From Beginning to End

  9. Leave None, Take None

  Epilogue

  Thank You

  Fantasy Reads Newsletter

  Time Warp

  The Brindle Dragon, Book 7

  1

  And the Fight Goes On

  A claw scored its way down Eist’s arm, glancing off her borrowed armor when it reached her elbow. The attacking monster snarled, as if offended that she dared to protect herself from its wrath.

  Eist swung her halberd around from where she had been fending off a group making a concentrated attack on a weak point in the Margaidian army, slamming the butt of the weapon under the creature’s chin. It stumbled, which allowed her to move her weapon in another clean sweep that stopped her from being rushed while also cleaving the thing in two.

  But like most of the creatures, that didn’t mean the end of it. Its bottom half flopped over, all legs and tines and spikes, before melting into black liquid, while its top half rushed her on its arms, jaws snapping again.

  That was when Dille dove in between the fighting Margaid men, shoving a vial into the creature’s mouth. It bit down on instinct—barely giving Eist’s friend enough time to yank her hand out of its jaws—and as soon as its teeth broke the glass, it was propelled into the air by an orangey plume of fire.

  “Is that a new spell?” Eist asked curiously as her friend came up behind her and pressed their backs together. It was a common stance for them now, if anything about their situation could be common. It had always been Yacrist’s go-to—

  Eist cut off that thought, but not in time. Grief and guilt crashed into her, a double-edged sword, slicing at everything she thought she was.

  It had been a week since that fateful night when she had let her friend be snatched up and used by her people’s greatest enemy. It was all her fault. If she had just been stronger, or faster, or even smarter, Yacrist would be with them.

  But he wasn’t. He was gone and they were back at Margaid, fighting every single day.

  …but the Blight wasn’t around either.

  Eist tried not to think about that. Because when she did, it made her think about how the next time she faced off against that dark, evil creature, it would be in the body of the man she might have loved.

  That thought made her heart squeeze terribly and she rushed forward into the horde of abominations still trying to get into the city. It was rash. It was dangerous. But the only thing that made her forget about everything she had done was the intense heat of battle. She just needed to turn her mind off and be.

  Or maybe not be at all.

  Part of her, even if it was a small, cowardly part, couldn’t help but wonder if the world would be better off without her floundering in it. Because in all the years since she had met Farmad in that forest, had she really done anything? Saved a handful of people from the canyon, maybe, but that was it. She’d done far more harm in losing Yacrist.

  Black sprayed across her, obscuring her vision, and a different scene began to play through her mind. She could see Yacrist right in front of her, clinging to her, his tears dripping down her neck as he begged her to forgive him. She had tried so hard to keep a hold of him, to ignore the head of the tentacle as it pushed against her middle, to ignore the blood spilling down the front of them, making her clothes warm and tacky from the scarlet.

  She could feel it, smell it, breathe it, and it was all so overwhelming.

  Teeth latched into the back of her tunic and she was lifted off her feet. Eist struggled for a moment, thrashing violently, but stopped when she felt a familiar rumble.

  “Fior?” she asked, rubbing at her face with one of her sleeves. But she had forgotten that she was wearing bracers, so the hard armor mostly just smeared the black liquid deeper into her features.

  Ugh.

  Sheathing her sword, Eist used her hand instead. But as soon as the weapon was put away, Fior threw her upwards. She didn’t panic, however, and waited for her thighs to hit his solid back after he dove under her.

  Sure enough, she landed right where she was supposed to and could dedicate two hands to wiping her eyes clean of the gunk. Blinking several times, she looked out at the battle to see that both of her witch’s eyes were in full force, reality burning in bright gold despite the fact that it was midday.

  Actually… There was something different about the gold. It wasn’t in ribbons or leading her anywhere. They stretched under the earth like a spider’s web, except it wasn’t in a circle. Maybe the roots of a tree would be a more accurate description. They laced across the entire ground, ending right at the gate of the city.

  Huh.

  That was interesting.

  Eist looked to the horizon again, waiting for the dark shadow of the Blight to show, for that thick inkiness that always gave her chills. But there was nothing. No hint of that malevolent being and its constant need to devour.

  No hint of the energy that it would pump into its creatures.

  That stirred something in Eist’s mind. Fragments of spells or stories that she had read back when she had been searching for something to save her grandfather. Or maybe it had been when she’d pored over those books with Yacrist.

  Those same books that had opened the door to the Blight for him. The ones that had created the path that would steal him away from her.

  She should have listened to her gut. She had known that those books were bad. Had known that something malicious lurked inside.

  But she hadn’t held her ground.

  Why hadn’t she held her ground?

  So many questions. So many condemnations. But none of them would bring him back. She needed to delve deeper into the books, deeper into the archives, but she couldn’t do that if she was just fighting all the time.

  Anger and despair bubbled up in her gut. She hated this. All of it. This wasn’t what her grand life as a dragon rider was supposed to be like.

  She just wanted all of this to stop. She wanted Yacrist back. She wanted her friends and her family and no more dread of a world-ending cataclysm over their heads.

  Her vision was again drawn to the shimmery lines underneath the earth. Something told her that they used to be much brighter, much more…grand. Some deep part of her, the same part th
at always compelled her to follow the golden bonds she saw, wanted to touch them. To reach out and call upon the old, old magic that no doubt flowed along that path.

  Eist pressed her knees into Fior’s side, urging him downward. There was a sort of epicenter at the heart of it all. Right in that cavern that the Blight had opened up in their third week of battle. She remembered dropping dozens of rocks in there, but now the entire thing glowed in bright, celestial hues.

  She guided him down closer, closer, until they were in danger of not being able to pull up in time without crashing into the ground. And then, just when she could feel the downbeat from Fior’s wings bouncing off the ground, she ordered him to roar.

  And roar he did.

  It wasn’t like the one that had driven Yacrist far below the earth, but it was still mighty, making her teeth reverberate. The rocks below either flew out of the way or crumbled into dust, opening up the crater and revealing what was below.

  It was…beautiful.

  Eist stared, enraptured, at the sparkling blue, pink, green, and other hues of it all. It was a miasma of twinkling, blinding color that she felt inexplicably drawn to.

  It didn’t take long for her mind to suggest what it was to her. Finally, after so much time reading about, thinking about it, wondering about it, she knew what it looked like for their world to have some of that energy that was supposed to feed and run through everything.

  She didn’t know why it was there. Maybe in freeing the Blight, they had freed something else. Maybe it was some sort of last line of defense.

  Or maybe it was just for her.

  That idea made Eist lick her lips as they continued to dive toward the swirling colors far below. It felt like it was calling to her, beseeching her. Who was to say that it wasn’t for her? Weren’t she and Dille the only true magic users she knew? How many with dragon’s blood still roamed after the cleansing in the generation before her?

  Suddenly something clicked in Eist’s mind. The outlawing of magic had happened just before her parents had been born and had reached its furor while they were still relatively young. Had…had that been a machination of the Blight? Had it purposefully tried to get rid of any who had opposed it?

  It made sense. If her parents hadn’t studied secret, forbidden magic, if they hadn’t had gifts that were supposed to be long lost, then the Blight would have won during that fateful battle instead of being locked away.

  Grinning to herself, Eist reached toward the magic, welcoming it to her like one might welcome an old friend.

  After all, she’d been waiting so long to meet it.

  The swirling colors didn’t react for a moment, just twisting and shimmering, somewhere between tangible and ephemeral. But then, just like an oiled torch suddenly bursting to flame, it roiled to life, shooting up to engulf Eist and Fior.

  It was as if she was instantly blasted with sunshine, warm, welcoming, and pure. Eist could feel wind rushing past her, and yet she was surrounded only by the bright energy of her world. It tickled at her, it soothed her, it filled her with so much confidence and righteousness that she wondered why she ever doubted herself.

  Every bit of her basked in its radiance. She felt as if she were being taken apart and built anew. All the hurt, the scars, and the darkness within her were whisked away to never be thought of again. She was a child of dragons, child of magic, child of her world, and it would see her whole.

  Time didn’t exist while she and her dragon were there, held in the cradle of life energy. But after long enough, that unrelenting assuredness told her that it was not the moment to rest. That would come eventually, but there was far too much to do. Too many wrongs to be righted and friends to save.

  She almost didn’t even need to adjust her knees, Fior tilted his head and then they were shooting upwards, the warm wealth of light surging with them. They erupted into the daylight in a blast of colors, and Eist felt the mass of it move through her like she had always been a part of it.

  Perhaps she had.

  Looking out at the battlefield, she saw all of those dark, insidious abominations fighting. Clawing. Biting. But she also felt like she could see through them, down to the dark ties that bound them together.

  It was like her witch’s eye vision, except more. She could see how those inky lengths drained the light from the ground beneath it. She saw how it made things gray and dead. A blight indeed.

  It needed to be washed away.

  Opening her hands, she pushed out her fingers, as if she could shove the energy she was feeling down to the ground and scrub away all the filth.

  But…what if she actually could?

  “Cleanse them,” she growled, still euphoric.

  The light responded instantly, shooting out from her in every direction and bathing the entire land.

  It didn’t strike the creatures directly. No, instead it burst through every single dark tie, severing them and gobbling up all the energy contained within the bonds.

  It flowed like water, but lighter. Washing the land clean of the filth and every perversion that the Blight had placed upon it.

  As each tie was cut, the corresponding abomination burst into ash, its filth raining down to the ground. And the more monsters that were felled, the more light that burst forth from the very earth. Eist watched, her heart pounding with every surge of magic, and she realized that she was watching the battlefield be reborn.

  It was dazzling. Intoxicating. She could see life itself flowing into the earth under the dying monsters’ feet. And the more that it was rejuvenated, the more powerful and connected she felt. It built inside of her, tighter and higher. Brighter and hotter. Until suddenly, it all rushed upward in a vibrant wave and both she and Fior were snapped through the sky.

  She was standing in nothing again, a feeling she hadn’t had since all those years ago when she had been trying to save her grandfather. Once again, Fior was beside her, but instead of the little thing he had been that first time, he was fully grown.

  “How good it is to see you, my little ones.”

  Eist looked forward, the emptiness in front of her clearing to reveal a woman sitting on a throne. Her hair was as deep as midnight, almost impossible to see against the darkness, and her eyes were still that softly glowing, blue light. She was dressed in regal purple this time, and extended a claw-tipped nail to them.

  Fior trotted over happily while Eist bowed. She knew who she was in front of now.

  Arwylln of Caster. The first human born of a dragon and mother to all magic users. One of the first to fight the Blight and author of the book that had helped Eist save her grandfather.

  But the woman just chuckled at the show of reverence. “Stand, my dear. I have waited far too long to have you grovel at my feet.”

  Eist did so, stumbling forward to catch at the woman’s outstretched hand. When she did, it was like the light struck her all over again, filling her with things she didn’t understand but made her feel like she could fly.

  “You have done so very well, my little one. But there is so much more to do.”

  “I haven’t done anything,” Eist argued, mesmerized by those glowing blue eyes. Except they weren’t really eyes. She could tell that there was no form or body part within the empty sockets of the woman’s face. It was just pure magic. Or life energy. Or whatever it wanted to be called.

  “How can you say that when you just summoned magic back into the land?”

  Eist stared at her, which was probably incredibly rude, all things considered, but she didn’t know what to say. “What do you mean, I summoned it? I thought magic couldn’t be created or destroyed. Just…stolen. Which is what the Blight has been doing.”

  “Yes, you are right, in a way. But there’s been a…shift in things. The Blight has taken physical form, which means it’s connected to our realm in a way it never has been before. And what happens when nature finds a dangerous aberration?”

  “It destroys it. Or at least tries to.”

  “Very good.” The woma
n, or perhaps even a demi-god, Eist wasn’t really sure how that worked, gently tapped the tip of her nose while scratching the underside of Fior’s chin with her other hand. “That’s what is happening now. Magic that has been long dormant, unused and forbidden under the guise of the Truth of Three, is rising up. Because of past machinations, it’s cut off from that trinity, but you…you seem to be able to use it just fine.”

  Eist could feel her heart pick up.

  “So is that how we beat it then? I just summon all the magic in the world and burn it out of existence?”

  “Yes, my girl.”

  “Then what are we waiting for!? Send me back! I’ll scrub them off our world right now!”

  Her hand raised again to pat Eist’s cheek. “My dear, although the world is rising to the occasion, there’s not enough energy left to overcome that entity. If you truly want to destroy it, you must bring more magic back into the world. Restore the energy that has been stolen. Awaken everything that has been sealed away by so many years of mistakes by your kind.”

  Of course it couldn’t be that easy.

  “Then how do I get more magic? Wake more things up?”

  “That, my dear, is an impossible task, but you—”

  There was a crackling sound, and it was like the ground was ripped right out from under her.

  Eist jolted, and then she was snapped right back into her body above the battleground.

  She was back to the exact moment that she left, almost no time seeming to have passed, and she was nearly overwhelmed with the same sensations she had been feeling before she went away.