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Ok .. so you might be wondering how a date with Wolfie and getting ready to spend a quiet Christmas in Switzerland with everyone ended up with me fighting a dragon. An undead dragon filled with rage. A very large and rage filled undead dragon filled with rage. At least that's not me complaining about Wolfie or the way he kisses <g> or the fact that he has taken to wearing my marker almost as if it were a faction glyph (most people might wear one faction glyph, and I and Wolfie both wear glyphs for the lightwalker and the bitter king, but Wolfie said "three's a charm" and wears the marker I put on him as if he is a member of three factions -- one of which no one had ever heard of -- lots of the shidhe do that). Which led Tinda to ask for one, and now Tinda wears an indigo faction glyph along with his bitter king faction glyph. To say the least, that hasn't slowed down the gossip when it got around that there was an indigo assassin glyph worn by the Bitter King's son and at least one other person. The magic in the markers is ancient and unusual (it works only one way, I can find them, they can't find me) and not subject to analysis from a distance, so the fact that I have ancient magical faction markers has just added to the whole buzz.  It was cute when Wolfie did it, but Tinda's added himself and Amber wanted one too.  That means I can always find Wolfie, Tinda and Amber (though I found out that when she goes out on dates with Parakile she hands the marker off to Ariel). Well,  back to fighting with a dragon, it all started when we figured out that Tinda's girlfriend had been kidnapped as the result of Shalgathi conspiracies and plotting. What they had hoped to do I'm not certain of, but the end result is that she ended up in the slave market, with her memory jumbled, and badly abused. Nothing hides for long from Michael's white raven and once Michael started trying to figure it out with some help from the Bitter King's wife, the whole story was revealed and got back to both the Gold Court and the Black Court. The Joyous King swore vengeance, but, really. Maybe if his wife had sworn vengeance and the target was in Court, but no one expected him to be able to do anything about his anger and discovering just who and what was responsible. The bottom line was that Peace and Parties go to the Joyous King, War and Vengeance to the Bitter King or the afflicted parties.  In this case, what it really meant was if Tinda really wanted her parent's permission to progress to the second stage of being affianced to Lyria (ok, I was calling her Linda, but that got me glared at, and the name is really a use name, not even a real title name, so I've given her a better one), he needed to avenge the slight to her person. Which he was anxious to do, probably being angrier than the Joyous King and just as manipulative, sometimes, as the Joyous King's wife. There I was with the group, we had used the gate to visit Tinda at the High Court before going back to Switzerland to open presents. Talking and chatting and even giving Porkchop twenty pounds of the best cuts (that dog can eat!), while we wandered through the High Court of the two kings for the winter festival. Tinda asked us to walk with him and I was thinking that we were just making a formal courtesy call as a part of the journey to Switzerland when everyone goes quiet and the Joyous King starts swearing out his wrath. I kept a straight face. Next thing you know, Tinda has promised to pursue and to exact the final price and we are all swept up with him. It made sense to follow as quickly as possible, once Michael had the trail, though I was planning to wait until after Christmas to let the buzz from the discovery die down and let them have some false confidence, and I didn't plan to grab a bunch of kids as if they were a hero band and go off in public pursuit.  Public pursuit I'd leave to the Bitter King's paladins, they owe me one for all the magic flowing through them from the gems I brought back. It is true what they say about some elves in love, it pulls all the blood out of their brains. Don't know what's gotten into me, getting catty and sarcastic. Must be the way Tinda told me to fight the dragon and he and the rest would take care of other matters. Anyway, back to the story.  Maybe if things are quiet for Valentines day with Wolfie I'll be back to myself. At least Tinda gave us some gifts, so we opened some presents before we started on this particular adventure. Wolfie got a Ashara with the great lightning path leap in it, so once a day he can leap like lightning to something he can see if he has the tree figurine (a white almond tree) hung around his neck and if he remembers to use it. Darn, I'm being catty for other people, Wolfie was delighted and gave him a knife in return. The knife always returns to its sheath when named, which could make it useful the next time Tinda or Lyria find themselves disarmed and in trouble. The rest of us received jewelry of some sort, with Michael and Parakile being given cuff links. Pretty cuff links.  Elves of most types often do not observe Christmas as Christmas or just give trivets and the like.  But Tinda really wanted that knife and I think that Wolfie was pleased to get the Ashara. Anyway, the trivia aside, we took the gate from the High Court to where the Shalgathi had fled upon hearing Lyria was returned to Court, which took us to a place we had been before. Chasing the link through the gate, we found ourselves at the market gate in the city of towers on the world Wolfie found by tacking the Manticore back to where it had come from. That meant that to find those particular Shalgathi we would follow a path led through the city of towers, though much to my surprise the trail led into the desert from the city, headed South. That is where we would go, with a quick stop to see the weavers. Since finding the gate and setting marks, I've stayed out of that desert. The guilty parties had traveled over land, and the scent of them seemed wrong -- I suspected them of being either undead or transmogrified (the most common path being the "ever-burning" which grants one of the Shalgathi great power from flame and heat, but unending pain. It usually drives them mad, but whole communities have embraced the flames). That could mean fire as their strong suit rather than water, but regardless, it meant a lot of desert. We moved quickly, but I'm just not a big fan of grit and sand and fleas, not to mention some of the other things that deserts are famous for. Of course they were like the Ixat who fled to the realms of fire and opened the everburning path, both fire creatures and undead, which I realized when the sand erupted and dead creatures and fire golems assaulted us. Parakile and Amber were overjoyed, though the rest of us weren't quite so happy. Antichaos broke the undead, Amber drank down the fire and Parakile bound and struck through it with hardness. Ariel's cold shattered the rest, though we had to provide her with cover as they seemed more than strong against her. Michael guarded her closely, though it turned out that his pin swallowed fire as well as (well, probably better than) the King's pin. Flaming, burning undead are not my favorite thing. Not the skeletons, not the drauger, not the wraiths, not the men of steel and bone. Which leads me to a conversation I had with Michael about the fact that he was leading us on a path that led to so many darn critters and other things. "Michael ..." "Yes?" "There can't possibly be this many creatures in the desert like this, can't you find us a way around this never ending series of traps and autonotonous creatures?" "Well, if it was just you or I tracking them down, probably, but the entire desert is layered with confusion and loss, only this path leads us through it to those we seek. If we leave the path, we are going to lose the track." "Michael, are you sure?" "Yes, the faction of the Shalgathi we are chasing is the Burning Smoke faction, and they are hidden in this desert, with only this path that leads through it. Of course they've taken steps over the years to protect the way. Mostly with fire." To think that this was not quite the fire I imagined when Tinda asked us all to travel home  for a visit to the High Court's hearth and to spend some time with him for Christmas before we settled down to the quiet of the school Amber and Ariel are finishing up at. That boy is going to get into trouble, he keeps pulling these stunts. He knew he would be asked for this revenge as a gift, or something to manipulate us all into helping him, so he could do it all on his own, without asking for help from his father, and it ended up with me facing a dragon. I mean, really. Though if he had asked straight up, I'd have been on the hunt, regardless of how much I hate dragons, because I hate the chaos tainted evil ones more. Hunting them is what the blue lodge did (and does, somewhere, I can feel them when I use the mirror). Oh, I should add I'm not that fond of golems either. Not the ones of fire, or rock, or the ones of molten metal, not ones shaped like men, not ones shaped like scorpions, not ones shaped like minotaurs,  Not even the kar manta path NauShalgath golems. Though we made it through all of those things littering the way to the enemy strong-hold, not to mention the random perils of the desert and the wandering packs of starfish and Ixat and even a couple of the burning efreet of the djinn. Though that did lead us to the final encounter, which meant face to face with that dragon I was talking about. Though just as the dragon showed up, I caught a glimpse of the Shalgathi, and they were fire and darkness just as Michael said, the chaos reek strong on them. Without their shells, wrapped in magic. I hate those things too!

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I'm willing to bet Tinda knew about that dragon. Those darn Shalgathi summoned it when we finally caught them, they weren't traveling that fast through the desert and we caught up with them before their stronghold. They weren't fighting their way through things, but working past the guardians, not to mention just the pace of travel, was slow for them. Then we had to decide about trying to fight with them and it at once, or fighting with the dragon alone while they attempted to flee deeper into the desert.  You can guess what happened, "Hey Indigo, you don't mind fighting the Dragon ...." .... well not exactly, but close. Though here I am fighting with an oversized undead dragon as it spits lighting at me. Those of us who could fly engaged the dragon, the rest decided to run down those who summoned it. I only hope Wolfie rips their hearts out before the dragon finishes the rest of us off. With any luck that will break or weaken the magic behind this huge thing. Did I mention it was a big undead dragon? Spitting lighting at us while refusing to land, though snapping and clawing as it passed by. Good thing I've got the grey veil -- it is helping me avoid the lighting's fury, though not hiding me at all from this particular creature. This fight is Ariel, Michael, Tinda and I, with the darn thing focused on me, while the rest of them pound away at it from a distance.  Just what I always wanted, to be dragon bait, dodging and moving through the air as my curses hinder it and the hard fire I leave behind me pains it. Though just one bite and I'm finished, heck, one good strike with those claws if it connects. The glancing blows have already been almost more than my armor could take, magic or no magic. Merry Christmas to you, too, Tindalasse. If I make it out of here . I know, you are asking yourself, could it get any worse? Of course the answer is yes, and I'll bet you saw it coming.   There are several different types of undead. Some are just bodies moved by magic, golems that use bones or flesh for their substance instead of clay or brick. Then there are dead bodies moved by restless spirits and the harsher versions of those, the once dead still moving. Some of those can reach some of the memories of the dead if the brains are not too rotted out. Sometimes they take bodies before death, but that sort of undead life is a sort of parasite. Then there are the restless dead, drawn back to their bodies for one reason or another. All of the first three types are nasty enough in their own way, but being undead is just a shape they've got, so to speak. A golem or a magically bound and moving skeleton, both are magically motivated constructs.  Parasites are parasites.  The restless dead need help or banishing (a lot of evil returns to walk the earth as the restless before their final end draws them under). But then there are the lyches and others who have willingly embraced transmogrification, nasty evil just made nastier. This dragonling was undead not because someone had found a dead dragon and breathed movement into it with magic or an undead parasite. It wasn't drawn back to earth to fulfill some unfinished agenda. It was as twisted hearted and corrupt as a chaos spawn creature could be, a dragon who had embraced the kar manta way. And it was summoning rage, a dragon's true rage that cuts through illusion and draws down on the target, which just happened to be me. I could see the fire behind its eyes. Which meant that my magical resistances to its lightning, my misdirections and everything else were about to be shredded by the rage. Of course that would guarantee that it would pretty much ignore everyone else as long as its rage remained locked on me. First thing I did when I felt the rage was draw on my mark and end up behind Tindalasse on his drepnir. Guess I thought they would be faster than the dragon and we could just run and pound. Took me two seconds to realize that the dragon had a lot higher airspeed than even Tinda. Then the solution hit me and I was with Wolfie, in the middle of a fight when my curses made all the difference and the glow of the bull gave them all strength, though I could feel the dragon coming, probably no more than seven or eight minutes away. I'm amazed at how much distance they had covered in a running fight while we were dancing with the dragon. When I felt for the dragon is when I also realized we had killed all the Shalgathi, the dragon didn't need to stay with the summoning and binding broken, but the rage was bringing it in anyway, and it would rip through the fabric of magic and sea spun glass that made up the Burning Smoke stronghold like a knife through butter on a warm day. It took me a minute to explain what was happening. Two more seconds to think about using another mark and then wondering who the dragon who go after if I broke its lock on me, which could happen if I used a mark. Twenty seconds to make it to the mouth of the stronghold they had chased the Shalgathi into (with a quick glance at the broken gates and a smile from Parakile and Wolfie) and two more seconds for Marie to start sending arrows into the air to greet the dragon -- she has some range on those arrows sometimes. Then I was adding curses to the arrows, Parakile took a bundle of them and began to weave hard fire and traps into them before I cursed them and Marie fired them, and Amber started raising a huge fire from under the sand (think of a meteor dropping from the sky, now imagine one rising from under the ground instead). Then the dragon arrived to be greeted by a great rush of magic and power -- not to mention the group chasing it and pounding at it from behind with all the magic they had was having an effect -- it wasn't moving near as fast as it had been. Then Wolfie gave me a kiss and vaulted into the air and called on the Ashara. With a crack of thunder he was propelled by magic, a lightning leap onto the back of the dragon, into that heartstopping maelstrom of fire, cold and killing magic. My heart almost dropped out me, but Wolfie was wrapped in shadow and he was tearing the undead life out of the dragon faster than the storm of magic corroded his vital force. With a great cry of triumph he severed the master kar manta node in the creature's back as it finally snapped from the focus of its rage to face unmortal peril (hmm, what do you call mortal peril faced by an undead creature?  I hope I've got that right). I heard Wolfie in my mind "catch me" and he jumped away from the dragon as it tumbled from the sky out of control, its will over its flesh shattered as surely as the frame of a man with a broken back. Wolfie jumping through the twilight sky. You know, I don't think I would have been able to keep playing tag with the dragon -- it would have probably gotten me before we got it. But when the rage broke out and I thought I was toast (see, I've learned another figure of speech), that was what let us beat the thing, that long period of time when it was so intent on eating me it did not deal with the deeper threats. Of course I wasn't thinking all of that then, I was focused to make sure that I caught Wolfie too, pulling myself to his mark and then pulling both of us back to safety.  That dragon fell a long way, it had still been about three or four football fields in distance away from us when it broke. The earth shook, thought the fountain of erupting fire that Amber at called ate at the thing all the way down, and fire swallowed it when it finally hit. Which left us to decide what to do with the mess and if there was something we could make a trophy of, once Amber was finished burning the bodies and we all responded to the Kjttha brood mass until the sand was purged of that chaos. That is a nasty mess to have found, though we also found the lance of the heavens which will make a great gift for Tinda's father.  It's loss had been the doom of the Bitter King supplanted by the Basilisk King. I'm sure there is more to the trail than just these and their home burrow of fire and darkness deep in the sand, but these were the heart of this node at least and satisfied Tindalasse's sense of elven justice and anger. Burning Shadow was always a small faction, relying on stealth and a stronghold other Shalgathi could not endure or reach, deep in the sand. But that they had a brood mass speaks of either greater cunning than I would have given them credit for or tendrils I would not care to have to confront. By the time it was over, I still had some Christmas vacation time left -- and no, I'm staying home for New Year's eve -- I know a magically dangerous holiday when I see it. I'm staying at the school with Amber and Ariel and not coming back or Oregon until the holiday is long past. School doesn't start until a week later anyway and Wolfie has promised me that he will just sleep by the fireplace like a big wolfish blanket and let me lean up against him and study and read quietly. It is going to be a nice, safe, quiet time. Maybe I'll try hot cocoa. I've been told it is better than kissing. Merry Christmas to everyone, even Tindalasse, and a Happy New Year!

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