Luthien had lived his life beside the oceans of the great whales, had seen the bodies of giants taken down from the mountains by his father's soldiers, had nearly been bitten apart by the monstrous turtle in the other room. And he, like every other youth in Eriador and Avon, had heard many tales of the dragons and the brave men who slew them. But none of that could have prepared the young Bedwyr for this sight.
The great wyrm slowly uncoiled--was it a hundred feet long?--and rose up on its forelegs, towering over poor Oliver. Its yellow-green eyes shone like beacons, burning with inner fire, and its scales, reddish gold in hue and flecked with many coins and gemstones, which had become embed-ded during the beast's long sleep, were as solid as a wall of iron. How many weapons did this monster possess? Luthien wondered, awe-stricken. Its claws appeared as though they could rend the stone, its abundant teeth gleamed like ivory, as long as Luthien's sword, and its horns could skewer three men in a line. Luthien had heard tales of a dragon's fiery breath. He knew then what had melted the ore in the walls near where he and Oliver had entered, and knew, too, that it wasn't the turtle that had destroyed those stalagmites. The dragon had been there, four hundred years ago, and had taken out its frustration at being imprisoned.
And now it stood before Oliver, seething with rage.
"YOUR POCKETS BULGE WITH MY JEWELS, LIT-TLE THIEF!" the beast roared, the sheer strength of its voice blowing Oliver's hat to the back of his head.
Oliver unconsciously dropped his hands into his pockets. He kept his wits enough to slip aside from the ashen remains, away from the one spot in this chamber that was relatively clear of dragon treasure.
Luthien stood open-mouthed, amazed that this reptilian beast had spoken.
Of course, the dragons of the ancient tales spoke to the heroes, but Luthien had considered that an embellishment on the part of the tale- teller. To hear such a mon-ster, a giant winged lizard, speaking the language of the land, was perhaps the most amazing thing of all.
"WELL?" the beast went on, still looking only at Oliver, as though it hadn't yet even noticed Luthien. "DO YOU NOT WISH TO BEG MIGHTY BALTHAZAR FOR YOUR PITIFUL LIFE?"
"I only wish to stare at the magnificence before me," Oliver replied suddenly. "I came in to find, so I thought, only the treasure, and that was magnificent indeed. So very mag-nificent."
Luthien could hardly believe that the halfling would make any references to the treasure, especially with so much of it obviously in his pockets. He could hardly believe that Oliver found any voice at all in the face of that wyrm!
"But it was not thoughts of your treasure that brought me here, mighty Balthazar," the halfling went on, trying to ap-pear at ease. "It was to beg sight of you, of course. To let my eyes bask in the magnificence of the legend. You have slept away the centuries--there are not so many dragons about these days."
"IF THERE WERE MORE DRAGONS, THEN THERE WOULD LIKELY BE FEWER THIEVES!" the dragon an-swered, but Luthien noticed that there was some measure of calm in the monster's voice this time, as though Oliver's compliments were having some minor effect. The young Bedwyr had heard, too, of the vanity of dragons--and by the tales, the greater the dragon, the greater its conceit.
"I must humbly accept your description," Oliver admitted, and began emptying his pockets. Coins and jewels bounced on the floor at his feet.
"But I did not know that you were still to be about. I only found a turtle--in a lake not so far away. Not so great a beast, but since I have never seen a dragon, I thought that it might be you."
Luthien's eyes widened, as did the dragon's, and the young man thought the wyrm would snap its serpentine neck forward and swallow the halfling whole.
"You can imagine my great disappointment," Oliver went on, before the wyrm could move to strike. "I had heard so very much about Balthazar, but if that turtle was you, then I did not think you worthy of such a treasure. Now I see my error, of course." The halfling stuck his hand deep into a pocket and produced a large gem, as if to accentuate his point, and calmly tossed it onto the nearest pile of treasure.
Balthazar's head swayed back and forth slowly, as if the beast was unsure of how to react. It stopped the motion briefly and sniffed the air, apparently catching a different scent.
"I do not wish to disturb your treasure and did not wish to disturb your sleep," Oliver said quickly, his facade of calm somewhat stripped away.
"I only came to look upon you, that I might view the magnificence of a true dragon once in my--"
"LIAR!" Balthazar boomed, and Luthien's ears hurt from the volume. "LIAR AND THIEF!"
"If you breathe at me, you will surely ruin so very much of your gold!" Oliver cried back, skittering to the coin pile. "Am I worth such a price?"
But Balthazar didn't seem too worried about his treasure. It looked to Luthien as if the reptilian beast was actually smiling. It turned its head to put its huge maw directly in line with the halfling and hunched its armored shoulders so that its neck was partially coiled.
Then the beast straightened suddenly and sniffed again, and its great head snapped about--so quickly that the move-ment stole the strength from Luthien's knees--and dropped its lamplight vision over the young man.
Luthien stood perfectly still, frozen with the most pro-found terror he had ever known. This was the fabled dragon-gaze, a spellbinding fear that often fell over those who looked into the eyes of such a beast, but like the tales of a dragon's ability to speak, the young Bedwyr hadn't fully ap-preciated the notion.
He appreciated it now, though. His mind screamed at him to throw aside his weapons and run away, and truly he wanted to, but his body would not move, could not move.
The dragon looked away, back to Oliver, who was staring in Luthien's direction curiously.
"WHO IS WITH YOU?" the beast demanded.
"Not a one," Oliver answered firmly.
Luthien did not understand what they were talking about--they had both just looked right at him!
"LIAR!" Balthazar growled.
"You have already said that," Oliver replied. "Now, what are we to do? I have given back your treasure and I have gazed upon your magnificence.
Are you to eat me, or am I to leave and tell all the world what a most magnificent dragon you truly are?"
The dragon backed off a bit, seeming perplexed.
"They have not seen you in four hundred years," Oliver explained. "The tales of Balthazar grow less, do not doubt. Of course, if I were to be gone from here, I could renew the legends."
Crafty Oliver! Luthien thought, and his admiration for the halfling increased a hundredfold in that moment. The mere fact that Oliver could speak under that terrible gaze im-pressed Luthien, whose own mouth was still cotton dry from fear.
The dragon issued a long and low growl. It sucked in its breath forcefully, straightening Oliver's hat on his head.
"Ah, ah," the halfling teased, wagging a finger in the air before him.
"Do not breathe or you will ruin so very much of your gold and silver co- ins."
Luthien could hardly believe it, but the halfling seemed to have this situation in hand. The young man drew strength from that fact and found that he could move his limbs once more.
But appearances could be deceiving when dealing with dragons. Balthazar was weighing the situation carefully, even considering the halfling's offer to go out and spread anew the legend. Such tales would no doubt inspire others to come to the lair, would-be heroes and treasure seekers.
The dragon wondered if that might be the way in which it would at last end its imprisonment and be free to fly about the land once more, feasting on whole villages of men.
In the end, though, lazy Balthazar decided that it really didn't want to have to continually wake up and deal with up-start heroes. And Balthazar had already determined that this foppish halfling was a liar and a thief.
The wyrm's head snapped forward, so quickly and terribly that Luthien cried out, thinking Oliver surely eaten. Up came the bow, Luthien nocking the strange arrow as he raised it.
Worldly Oliver, who had studied fighting tactics in the finest schools of Gascony, including tactics used against leg-endary beasts, was not caught unawares. He dove forward as the dragon's head came down, drawing his rapier as he rolled. When he regained his feet, he prodded the blade straight up, but sighed resignedly as the slender blade bent nearly in half with no chance of penetrating the dragon's armor.
Up reared Balthazar, swishing its great tail, beating its leathery wings so fiercely that the wind from them halted Oliver's advance. Purple cape flying behind him, the halfling squinted against the onslaught and put his free hand on his hat to hold it in place.
That would have been the end of Oliver deBurrows, taken in the bite of a dragon's mouth, but Luthien let fly the arrow, hoping and praying that it was something special.
It arced for the beast, then was deflected by the tremen-dous wind and seemed as if it would hit nothing but the floor. It never made it that far, exploding unexpectedly in midair.
Rockets squealed and bursts of multicolored sparkles filled the chamber.
Balls of sizzling light whooshed out in wobbling lines, one heading straight for Balthazar's face and forcing the dragon to dodge to the side. A red flare rocketed straight up and blew apart with a tremendous, resounding ex-plosion that shook the chamber, rattled the coins and gems and nearly knocked Luthien from his feet.
Balthazar's protesting roar joined in the echoes and squeals.
Oliver had the presence of mind to run off under that cover, thinking quickly enough to bend and scoop Brind'Amour's oaken staff as he passed it. He ran straight for Luthien and would have run by, but the young man
reached out and grabbed the staff, which was nearly twice the stumbling halfling's height.
Oliver cried out as if struck, then opened his eyes wide, re-alizing that it was only Luthien. He willingly gave over the staff and ran on, grabbing the torch, the young man right be-side him.
Balthazar roared again, as the two exited the chamber, and loosed a line of fiery breath.
Luthien and Oliver were around the corner in time, but de-flected flames licked at their backsides and prodded them along; the stone of the corner crackled and melted away. Luthien couldn't resist the urge to look back and see the bared fury of the mighty dragon. Oliver tugged him along fiercely, suspecting that even the slightest delay would put them right in the middle of Balthazar's next flaming blast.
The rocket fanfare continued in the treasure chamber. Above it, the fleeing companions heard the scraping tumult of the dragon's stubborn pursuit.
"THERE IS NOWHERE TO RUN, THIEVES!" Balthazar roared. The great wyrm entered the corridor, claws digging into the stone so that it could pull its huge mass along and breathing forth its deadly breath once more.
Luthien and Oliver were long gone, down the passage and through the next chamber. Luthien thought of turning with the bow and putting a few shots behind him, but he scowled at his own stupidity, wondering what those little arrows were supposed to do against the likes of the armored dragon. He popped the pin out of the bow instead, folded it, and tucked it into his new belt, near the small quiver.
The companions continued to widen their lead, the dragon's bulk working against it in the narrow corridors, but then they came to the one barrier--the underground pool--where Balthazar would have a tremendous advantage.
Luthien started to the right, toward the ledge, though he knew that they could not possibly get all the way along its narrow length before the dragon caught up to them. He saw that the rope was still on this side, still loosely looped about the boulders, and so he turned and went for that instead.
Rope in one hand, Brind'Amour's staff in the other, he climbed the highest rock he could find and bade Oliver to scramble atop his shoulders.
"You will have to get up higher if you wish to swing across!" the halfling pointed out, and Luthien, looking all about for sight of the turtle, handed the staff to the halfling. The young man reached up as high as he could along the rope's length, bent his knees and tensed his legs.
A roar from the corridor behind them launched Luthien into action. He leaped from the rock as high as he could, scrambled hand over hand to get as high a grip on the rope as possible, and tucked his legs under him as he and Oliver swung out over the pool.
They weren't even near the middle when the drag on the trailing rope slowed them and Luthien's legs splashed into the water. Knowing what was to come, the desperate man climbed, hand over hand, to pull himself out of the hot pool, then kept climbing, remembering the awful reach of the giant turtle.
The weight as they came out of the water halted their swing altogether, and the two began to rotate slowly as the rope untwisted.
"I do not so much like this," Oliver remarked.
"Give me the staff," Luthien replied, and the halfling gladly handed it over, using the opportunity of two free hands to scramble a bit higher on Luthien's shoulders. Oliver was already thinking that if the turtle snapped at Luthien, he might be able to leap atop the thing's back and run toward the far shore, then spring out and swim for his life.
He hated the notion of leaving Luthien behind, though, for he had taken a sincere liking to this brave young human.
Luthien, hooking his ankles around the rope and hanging on with one free hand, unexpectedly began to loop himself about the rope, increasing the swing and nearly dislodging Oliver from his shoulders.
"What are you doing?" the halfling demanded.
"At least this will be safe," Luthien answered, and as he came around, he used the momentum of the swing to aid his throw and hurled Brind'Amour's staff toward the far shore.
It skipped off the last few feet of water and settled, floating near the bank.
"I thought you meant to try to use the silly thing!" Oliver protested. He ended with a squeal as a loud roar told him that Balthazar was entering the chamber.
"How would I know how to use a wizard's staff?" Luthien quipped back.
"You would not," came an unexpected answer from the shore. The two hanging companions looked over to see Brind'Amour calmly bending over the water to retrieve his valued item. As the rope rotated, the two then saw Balthazar come up to the other shoreline.
"Caught in line between a wizard and a dragon," Oliver remarked. "This is not my very best day."
Luthien grabbed on tight and tried to steady the rope, looking from one powerful adversary to the other. Balthazar issued a long, low growl at the sight of the wizard, and Luthien did not doubt that the dragon remembered well that day four hundred years before, when Brind'Amour and his cohorts had sealed the cave.
"In Gascony, we have always found wizard-types to be amusing, if a bit benign," Oliver remarked, seeming not so optimistic despite Brind'Amour's appearance.
"Go back to your hole!" Brind'Amour called to the wyrm.
"WITH YOUR BONES!" came the not-surprising reply.
Brind'Amour thrust his staff before him, and crackling bolts of black energy shot out from its end. Luthien and Oliver both cried out, thinking that they would be caught in the barrage, but the wizard's bolts arced around them and sizzled unerringly into the dragon and the stones around the beast.
The dragon roared in protest; rocks exploded, and parts of the ceiling fell in, engulfing Balthazar in a cloud of dust and debris.
"In Gascony, we could be wrong," Oliver admitted, and both he and Luthien dared to hope that Brind'Amour had won the day.
Neither of them had dealt with a dragon before. As soon as the energy was expended, the debris settling to the floor, Balthazar reared up and shook himself free of it, looking more angry than ever but hardly wounded. If he had not been so amazed, Luthien would have let go of the rope and let himself and Oliver splash into the protection of the pool, but he was too entranced to move as Balthazar's great head shot forward and his mouth opened wide, sending out a line of white-hot flames.
Brind'Amour had already enacted his next spell, though, and like a great rolling wave, the water between the compan-ions and the wyrm rose up suddenly in a blocking wall.
Fires hissed in protest and clouds of steam rose about the lake. Hot droplets splattered back from the force of the breath, nipping at Oliver and Luthien, who could only close their eyes and hold on.
It went on for what seemed like minutes, Balthazar's un-ending breath drawing Brind'Amour's powers out to their limits. When Luthien dared to peek out, it seemed to him as though the watery wall was inevitably thinning. Then it fell flat suddenly, and Luthien thought he was surely doomed.
But ended, too, was the dragon's breath, and Luthien could hardly see the massive wyrm through the cloud of thick steam. He heard splashing, though, as Balthazar steadily advanced.
"What are you doing to my rope?" he heard Oliver gasp. He looked at the halfling, then followed Oliver's incredulous gaze to the water and the loose end of the rope. Luthien's eyes widened as well when he saw the spectacle: Brind'Amour had somehow transformed that end of the rope into a living serpent, which was now swimming toward the far bank and the wizard.
The water then churned under the companions--they had almost forgotten about the turtle!
The snake/rope crawled onto the shore and, following Brind'Amour's frantic directions, looped itself about a rock and began to tighten, pulling the companions up at an angle away from the water and the turtle.
Oliver looked back and nearly fainted dead away, staring into the evil and angry eyes of the dragon not more than a dozen feet away. The halfling tried to speak, but got his lips all tied together, and instead began tapping Luthien franti-cally on the shoulder.
"HELLO, THIEF AND LIAR," Balthazar said calmly. Luthien didn't have to look back to know that he was about to become lunch.
The dragon jerked suddenly; there came a huge splash from below. Oliver looked down as Balthazar looked down--to see the snapping maw of the turtle tightly clamped on the dragon's great leg.
The rope was taut, then, and Luthien began half crawling, half sliding toward the far shore.
Hot water splashed over the companions as the behemoths battled in the lake. The dragon roared and breathed forth and a new cloud of steam joined the first, and the agonized shriek of the startled and wounded turtle cut the air. Luthien finally let go of the rope altogether as they neared the shore and dropped onto the beach, Oliver still clutched tightly to his back and neck.
"Run on!" Brind'Amour prodded them. The wizard under-stood that the turtle would not last long against the likes of Balthazar. He looked back to the lake one final time, sent forth another black-crackling bolt of energy, and ran after Luthien. Then he produced a magical light, for Oliver had left the still-burning torch on the far bank.
The three had barely exited the chamber, climbing back into the corridor strewn with broken stalagmites, when they heard Balthazar splash ashore, calling out, "THIEVES!" and "LIARS!"
Now the landscape favored the wyrm, with the three companions having to scramble over and around the tumbled blocks. Luthien finally spotted the fist-sized swirl of blue glowing energy, but he heard the dragon right behind them and did not think he had any chance of making it.
Brind'Amour, chanting wildly, grabbed the young man's shoulder suddenly-- Oliver's, as well--and all three took off from the ground, flying, speeding for the wall.
Balthazar roared and loosed another line of flames. Oliver screamed and covered his head, thinking that he would smash into the stone. The lights of the tunnel expanded, as if to catch them, and the dragon's breath was licking again at their backsides as they entered the wizard's tunnel.