The Dragon's Teeth

 

A storm was sweeping across the sea from the darkened south, casting down rain and billowing wind, and the seaside outpost of Jinan lay beneath a pall of smoke.  Fires burned in the houses and outside in the forest, and warriors gathered there, making magic for their final war.  In the harbor six ships lay at anchor, their sails gathered in against the coming storm, and in the distance, on the edge of the horizon, there lurked the shadows of the ships of their enemies.

For days the enemy fleet had swept in with the dusk and battered the ships and shore with cannonfire, raking their targets, seeking to break up the defenses.  Dhatun, the warrior of the Ekwa, was the one who commanded now Jaya was gone, and though he was fierce and proven, his rule was tenuous.  Already warriors had begun to slip away into the jungles, feeling the gods had abandoned them.  The daily blasting of shell and flame had only made things worse.

The Reaper stood at anchor, more massive than any other ship in the harbor.  She was battered from her ordeal at sea, her hull splintered and her beams cracked.  She could not stand and do battle with the enemy ships, and the five others were low, lean craft made for speed rather than power.  Dhatun knew if they left the harbor they would be hunted down and destroyed.

So he waited, sure that the enemy would not want to risk the close confines of the lagoon.  They would not want to come ashore and fight a battle that would cost them blood.  They would keep him bottled up here until more ships arrived.  The enemy detachment was eight ships, three of them massive war-craft meant for battle.

Now they were coming close again, racing in a line through the heavy breakers as the wind picked up speed.  Lightning flickered under the stormclouds on the horizon, and the thunder was distant, like drums.  The people in Jinan hunkered down behind walls and trees, ready to weather another volley from the enemy.

The first ship swept past the headland and into the mouth of the bay, and its guns began to shout, bursting forth clouds of black smoke and jets of fire.  Cannonballs punched through the ship hulls at anchor, bounced inland and smashed through walls.  Every gun fired, and then the next ship, and the next.  Smoke erupted from the forest as hot shells struck home, splintering trees and setting brushfires.

The captain of the lead ship turned his craft back out to sea.  The storm would come in before nightfall, and by then they would have to anchor around the point and wait out the weather.  The devils might come by night, but in the rain and wind they would not be able to mount a large enough attack to be a threat.  He looked southward, seeking there the sails of the reinforcements he waited for.  Instead he saw a wake moving fast, the westering sun lighting it like a trail made of gold.

It was like a whale sign, but it was coming too quickly for that.  He raised his spyglass and saw a narrow, scaled back set with spines as long as a man’s body, and standing among them was a naked woman bearing a spear.  He saw the savage war-paint on her skin and the light in her eyes, and he felt a sting of fear between his shoulders like venom.

The wake drew closer with terrible speed, and then the beast driving it reared up from the water like something from a nightmare.  Green-black scales dripped with seaweed and the fanged head rose higher and higher, jaws opening hideously wide.  The captain stared, opened his mouth to call out but could make no sound before the crew saw it and began to howl in terror.

The sea-dragon rushed on them and the immense jaws closed on the sterncastle and tore it away in a shattering spray of splinters that fell like rain.  It crushed the wood between its teeth and shook it apart, and then it hissed like a boiling cauldron and vomited forth a steaming torrent of foul-smelling venom that fell on men and ship alike and burst into blinding white flames.

The heat was so tremendous and savage that it sounded like an explosion, hot wind rushing over the ship, carrying the flaming vitriol with it.  Men shrieked as they were consumed on their feet, burned alive down to bone before they could even fall.  The deck exploded from the intensity of the fire, sending men flying like dolls.

Jaya stabbed her spear upward and screamed for battle as her steed turned away from the burning ship and set its fury upon the next ship drawing near.  The dragon roared its terrible roar and scythed through the water, so quick and agile it made the ships seem like pigs caught in mud.  He threw a coil over the deck and crushed down, grinding men to paste.  She saw the rails and the boards of the hull bulge outward and then crack under the force of the onslaught.

The hull sheared apart and the ship began to flood.  Already the other ships in the flotilla were beginning to fall out of line, turning for the open sea.  Cannonfire boomed and splashed the water around her beast, but she saw the hot iron shot glance off the scaled hide, and she laughed.  The power of the gods would not be slain by weapons such as that.

The first ship, burning like a torch, exploded as the fire reached the powder stores, and Jaya felt the detonation go through her like a hammer-stroke.  The third ship in line was turning away, but still close, and she gave a nudge with her spear-haft and her steed turned and spat out a jet of his deadly venom.  It exploded into white fire before it even struck, ignited by the touch of the air.  The fire lashed across the hull from the side, igniting every plank and plate, melting through the copper armor and searing down to the wood.  Cannons glowed red and then burst apart.  The ship reeled away, men leaping from the decks into the sea.  They burned like white phantoms, and even as they sank out of sight they still burned.

The other ships were already turning from the battle, putting on every scrap of sail to try and gain speed.  The winds from the oncoming storm were confused and backed around the compass, and moments ago that had not seemed to matter, but now it mattered very much.  The shallows seethed with the coils of the dragon, and Jaya laughed as her enemies scattered into the oncoming winds.

She let them go.  There would be time for her revenge on another day, but for now she had to go ashore and show herself to her people.  She had to reverse the rout that had already begun, and which would destroy her conquest if she let it go on any longer.  By the light of burning ships in the falling blaze of the setting sun she turned her steed away and toward the darkened shore.  She stood on the keeled back of the dragon and then dove clean into the dark waters, glad to feel the embrace of the waves.

o0o

She waded ashore like on of the old ones, born of the sea, and the soft sand was littered with scraps of wood and broken glass.  At the waterline she saw a line of stakes rooted deep in the strand, and on them hung bodies, lashed to the wood and left for the wind and sun and the beaks of sea-birds.  Some had been there for many days, some less.  Some were dead, their skulls already picked down to red meat, and some still lived.

Bastar was here, hanging from the stake the farthest out to sea, and he yet lived.  He lifted his head and looked at her from red-rimmed eyes, his lips cracked and split by drought even as his skin was streaked with salt from the sea-spray.  He tried to speak, but his voice was only a croak.  Jaya looked at him for a long moment, and then she struck through the ropes with the blade of her spear and he fell to the sand, lay there shaking and weak.

She watched to see if he could stand, and he did, so she knew he would live.  She looked ahead and saw people gathering on the waterfront of the town, a dark knot of men and women, lit from behind by a towering bonfire, and she stalked toward them.  Her displeasure must have blood, and so she would spill it.

She came close to them and saw the fear on their faces, in their white eyes, and she planted her spear-haft in the ground and stood beside it, naked and uncaring.  “So this is the proud fleet I left behind.” she said.  “Ships of war filled with those sworn to death and blood.  Cannons and steel and fire and all you can do is cower here in the shallows while our enemies sail at will.”  She glared at them until they looked away, one after the other casting their gazes down.  Some of them fell on their knees, some wept.

Dhatun pushed his way to the fore, his face a mask of fear and unbelief.  Even beneath his paint he looked waxy and uncertain.  “My Chief,” he said.  “We. . . we thought. . .”

“You thought I died,” she said.  “Perhaps you even hoped for it, so you might become great in my absence.”  She came closer to him and he shied away from her.  “I ripped my ship apart and was cast into the sea to save you.  And by your skill I see that you did save the Reaper.  It sits there, at anchor, helpless and useless.”

“It is damaged,” he said.  “It cannot fight as I – ”

“Then why is no one aboard, working to repair it?  Why do all the ships lie at anchor, useless and waiting to be blasted apart?”  She glared at him.  “Have I taught you so little?  Have you learned nothing?”

“The other ships all scattered I know not where,” he said, refusing to meet her gaze.  “We have not the force to fight – ”

“You have not, and yet I do.  I was cast into the sea and naked I have returned.  I have no armor, no sword, no ship.  I have crossed the sea and now I have driven away those you lay helpless before.”  She sneered.  “I have relied upon you, Dhatun, and you have failed me.  You have almost destroyed in days what I took years to build.  You thought to wait for the enemy to leave, and then you would take the ships you had and sail away, master of your own fleet.  How many of my loyal fighters did you hang upon the shore to die?  Not only Bastar, but all who are not Ekwa, I am certain.  You are of your own clan, and no other.”

“He is one of them!” Dhatun spat, his own anger coming forth.  “He is Morda, like those who hunt us and who have enslaved these islands.  He has no place here!”

“I do not stand for this,” she said.  “My blood is the royal blood, and no other bloodline matters.  Ekwa, Morda, Untani, Tau’ta – I will forge them all as one to make the sword with which I will carve an empire from the embrace of the sea.  If a man or a woman stands beside me and sheds their blood in my service, I will call that one my subject, and not cast them aside because of their birth.”

She took her spear up and pointed it at Dhatun, the tip almost touching his throat.  “You have stood beside me, you have bled for me, but by all the gods I name, you will set aside all else but my service or I will kill you with my own hand, and not leave your fate to the wind or the tides.”

He cast his sword down into the sand before her.  “Slay if you will,” he said.  “You know I will serve none if it is not you.  And I know I cannot lead in your place.”

Jaya drew back her spear.  “Then let us be as one people, as we must be.  There can only be those who serve me, and our enemies.  We must be as one, or we will be broken to pieces.”

Drums beat in the forest, and she heard shouting and animal cries on the gusting wind.  Voices raised, and then a messenger came pushing through the crowd.  He stared at Jaya and flung himself on the earth.  “The giants landed a force onshore to the east while their ships pinned us here,” he gasped.  “They are coming this way through the trees.”

She bared her teeth into the wind and lightning cursed the horizons.  “Good, let us gather our arms and our steel and go and do what we must.”

“We are not very many here,” Dhatun said.  “So many are on the ships, scattered about the islands.  We have only a few hundred here at Jinan.”

“Then there will be more glory for those who remain,” she said.  “Let us paint our faces and braid our hair for war.  Let us draw sword and sharpen spear.”

Dhatun still held against her.  “Call forth your sea-dragon, and let him destroy our enemies.”

She laughed and looked at the people gathered around her.  “He is here.  You are the dragon, and your swords and knives are the dragon’s teeth.  Let us call upon the gods to give us blood to drink.”

o0o

They gathered in darkness.  Several hundreds of the Utani, the Ekwa, the Tau’ta.  Men and women, the aged and the young.  Any who could wield a spear or a blade came together in the shadows of the trees as the last of the sunlight faded.  Jaya girded herself for battle with a swath of silk tied around her hips, hard leather guards on her arms and her shoulders.  She painted her face and her breasts with white clay and streaked it in her wet hair.  For too long she had relied on the weapons and methods of her enemies, and this time she would not make that mistake.  She would go to war as one of her kind, in the grace of the Unnamed Gods.

Her spear glowed like a deep-sea haunt in the utter blackness, and she led her force eastward through the jungles.  The people of the islands could move with complete silence in this place, as they knew the land and the trees and the beasts like no other.  They could make their own small night cries to cover the silence of the insects and birds as they passed.

Jaya knew the place she was seeking.  A creek came down from the highlands and dug a deep furrow as it drew close to the shore, and it made a natural barrier they could use as a base for defense.  She knew they could not stand on defense against the Mordani, but here they would stop them long enough to destroy them.

She sent scouts out ahead to smell out the enemy approach and she gathered her people and organized them as best she could.  Fifty at the creek behind the swell of the earth and the brush to serve as a battle line.  She put the others into smaller companies by what weapons they had, and how trained they were, and she set men to embedding sharpened stakes into the mud of the bank and down under the water.

She saw Bastar close to her, bloodied and bruised, yet refusing to stop.  He carried a sword and would not rest.  She touched him once, her hand tender on his sun-roughened skin, but she had no time for gentleness, she needed every hand for battle.  She saw the look in his eyes and knew the business between he and Dhatun was not finished yet, and it pained her to think of losing either of them.

When the scouts returned their news was grim.  The Mordani were coming with almost four hundred men, all armored and well-armed.  Spears and bucklers, swords and pistols and muskets.  They had no horse, and were all on foot, and they were hacking their way through the jungle by lamplight.  The men drew the path by the light of her spear, and Jaya made her dispositions for battle.

She was outnumbered by two-to-one, and it was worse than that, because the Morda had sent experienced fighters well-armed, and she had a ragtag force armed with whatever they had to hand.  Her only advantage was surprise and terrain.  The Mordani would be planning to march through the night and then attack Jinan at dawn.  They would not expect a night ambush, they would not be arrayed for battle.

She called Dhatun to her and gave her commands.  “When they reach the embankment, we will attack them from the flanks.  It will be on you to hold them here and keep them from forcing a crossing.  If they can cross the creek they will be able to escape us.  They must not cross.”

“Give me a hundred men,” he said.

“I will give you fifty, and each must fight as hard as two.”  She met his gaze.  “You will command those who are not the best fighters, because to defend the crossing is easier than attacking by darkness.  But you must hold them.  By spear and sword and blood.  Do not let them cross.”

“I will help him,” Bastar said from the dark.

Jaya looked at him.  “If you strike him down I will know it, and the death he offered you will seem like a sweet paradise compared to what I will do in answer.”

“Truly do I wish to kill him,” Bastar said evenly.  “But I am not a coward.  If I kill him I will face him with sword in hand, and we will fight.  But I cannot walk much further tonight.  I will stay here and help hold the line, and if I fall, then I will have fallen well.”

“See that you do not fall,” Jaya said.  “Either one of you.”

o0o

Jaya led them through the dark by the witchfire gleam of her spear, the weapon she had taken up from the deep, out of the grave of a dead king.  The night was alive with other lights, from the flicker of glowflies to the soft radiance of fungi growing on fallen trees.  By these feeble guides her force gathered, seeding itself along the path her enemies must take.  There was a path through the forest, and those who did not know the land would follow it.  Jaya set her people in a long line, and gave quick, simple orders.  When they struck the line at the creek, then the rearmost would attack as well, trapping the enemy in place, and then she would lead the assault through the center, seeking to cut them in half.  They must strike swift and terrible, to wreak fear as well as death.  In this dark place, terror would be their ally.

They heard the Mordani long before they saw them.  Clad in their heavy armor, carrying long spears and swords and guns, they clattered and clanked and cursed their way through the undergrowth.  Jaya saw their lanterns and huddled down in the brush, her spear pressed low to the earth where the light of it would not be easily seen.

The lights of their lanterns seemed bright as the sun after the long dark, and they came on in a heavy column, five or six across.  Many marched with their helmets off, and only half of them wore their cumbersome armor.  The heat was a great trial for the giants, even at night, and from their pallid faces, Jaya guessed many of these were men brought from their far homeland, who had not had time to accustom themselves to the climate.

The column did not move quickly, and she held very still as she watched it pass, fearful that the slow progress made it too likely that one of her fighters would be spotted.  Yet there was no outcry, no call of alarm.  Her people had learned long in their bondage to the giants, and they hid with great craft, weapons hidden, faces painted, eyes narrowed to slits so there would be no tell-tale glitter.

It seemed the enemy straggled onward for a long time, and then Jaya heard the blood-screaming war-cries and the clash of battle at the front.  There were howls of pain and the sounds of shots, and the whole column before her seemed to draw back on itself, recoiling awkwardly as men stopped in their tracks, collided with one another, staggered for balance as they were suddenly caught in a press.

It was only moments before she heard answering cries from off to her left, at the rear of the column, as her left wing hurled themselves into the battle.  Jaya waited a long moment, hearing the sounds of war build.  She saw Mordani grabbing for their armor and unsheathing their weapons, struggling to find space to stand and fight.  They could not decide whether to form ranks or rush to help their companions, and they were torn between an attack on their front and the ambush in the rear.

An experienced commander could have forced them to respond with discipline, but Jaya did not allow time for that to happen.  She gave a scream and raised up her spear, and then she led the rush into the heart of the startled enemy.

Without their lines formed and their gunners prepared, the Mordani were almost helpless under the crush of her attack.  Unarmored, bearing swords and daggers as well as spears and farm tools, her warriors rushed on the enemy and dragged them down, hacked off heads and limbs and spilled entrails to cover the ground.  Jaya struck with her spear as supple and quick as a bolt of lightning, and no armor could turn it aside.  She pierced steel and leather and flesh and bone and left the dying in her wake.

Like a war-idol of old she rove through the column, her spear irresistible.  She took small wounds she barely felt, and her war-howls seemed to force the enemy back as though by the force of her breath.  By sheer ferocity she and her fighters split the line and sent them reeling apart, cut in two.  Jaya did not wait, but hurled herself and her warriors against the front of the column, grinding them between her and the line at the creek like stones grinding bones.

She felt it when their courage broke, as suddenly none were standing to fight her, but scattering into the forest.  Fallen lanterns broke and left pools of burning oil on the wet earth that lit the trees from beneath like the columns of an ancient temple, and by the red light the Mordani fled before they were slaughtered.  It did not save them, as her fighters hunted them through the dark, knives hungry for blood.

A wedge of Jaya’s fighters followed her to the edge of the creek and drove the last of the enemy into the cut, already filled with twisted bodies impaled on stakes and pierced by spears.  She drove them over the edge and then stabbed down into the mass again and again until it was still.

Screams of pain and terror still resounded in the forest, and Jaya knew her people would hunt until they could find no more prey.  The creek ran with fire and with blood, and the smell of slaughter was like iron in the night.  She crossed the water and found the other bank heavy with the dead, many of her own fallen among the enemy.  The Mordani had fought hard to get free of her trap.

Dhatun lay at the crest of the rise, at the very center.  His sword was bloodied and broken, his body scored by many wounds.  He lay within a ring of surrounding dead, and his teeth were bared in a death grin against the fall of darkness.  Bastar was nearby, leaning against a tree, bloodied and exhausted, but breathing.

“He fought like a tiger,” Bastar said, his voice rough.  “I have never seen anything like it.  He would not give way a single step.”

Jaya felt her eyes sting as she knelt down, put her hand on Dhatun and felt the slackness of death.  He had been the first to swear to her, and now he had paid his price.  She closed her eyes for a moment.  “Gather, all you who stood beside him,” she called.

There were twenty of them left, no more, and all bore wounds.  Boys too young to be men, women young and old, a white-haired man who leaned on a spear like a cane.  She looked at them and felt her control almost break loose.

“You have proved the greatest courage this night,” she said.  “From this night you are honored above all others.  You are the dragon’s teeth.  You lay down in the earth, and then you sprang up as warriors.  With you I will cut my way to a throne, and I shall not forget you.”  She looked down at Dhatun where he lay.  “I shall not forget.”