A Night of Dragon Wings - By Daniel Arenson Page 0,29

flailed beneath him. He filled the chamber, barely able to move. The two-headed dog whimpered below him; it now seemed no larger than a rat.

Nemes spewed his fire.

The white flames crashed against the dog, and the creature screamed, a scream like children dying, like demons burning. It writhed. Its skin melted. Its blood boiled. Nemes kept blowing his fire, and the creature blazed, but still it squirmed and screamed and begged. Soon nothing remained of it but bones, but it would not die.

Nemes snarled. He let his flames die. He slammed down his claws and crushed the burnt, bony remains. He felt them moving under his foot, and he ground them down. Bones snapped and finally the creature's screams died to a whimper… then went silent.

When he shifted back into human form, Nemes groaned. His shoulder and arm were a bloody mess. He doffed his cloak, examined the wounds, and felt faint. As his heart thrashed, the blood pulsed and spurted. Head spinning, Nemes rummaged through his cloak's pockets, produced his old leather pouch, and pulled out string and needle. He had used these tools often: sewing little creations from the animals he caught in the forests, mismatching heads and bodies and legs, creating new animals that were stronger and more beautiful. Today he sewed himself, fingers coated with blood. When his wounds were sewn shut, they reminded him of his creatures, of the snakes with the heads of squirrels and the ravens with bat wings. He tore off strips of his cloak, bandaged the stitched wounds, and licked the blood off his fingers.

He looked around the room, seeking the key. Nothing but blood and burnt remains were here, staining the brick walls and floor. A doorway led back to another staircase; the stairs wound up into shadows. Nemes left the room and kept climbing.

When he entered the third floor, he felt the blood leave his face. Disgust rose in him. The stench of rot filled his nostrils and roiled his belly.

Rusted blades rose from the room's floors, walls, and ceilings like iron brambles; old blood coated them. Among this rusted maze, a woman's corpse sat in a chair, swarming with worms. Nemes had once dug up a week-old corpse; this woman reminded him of that maggoty old flesh. Her head hung low, the flesh so rotted, the skull peeked through. Her eyes were gone; larvae squirmed in the sockets. Jagged growths sprouted from her like horns, mimicking the spikes that rose from the floor; they were colored a sickly green and sprinkled with white splotches.

The woman was dead, but her belly was slashed open, revealing a fetus that squirmed and sucked for air. The coiled, red creature raised his eyes, stared at Nemes, and let out a wail. Sharp teeth lined his mouth, and his eyes burned red. The fetus tugged dangling veins inside the womb, and his dead, rotten mother rose to her feet. The fetus grabbed and tugged other veins; his dead host began to shuffle forward.

Nemes wanted to shift into a dragon, to burn the aberration down. Yet he could not; the blades thrust out from every direction, filling the room with rusted metal. If he shifted, they would pierce him like an iron maiden. He hissed and raised his staff. The fetus screamed, eyes blazing, and moved his dead mother forward like a puppeteer. The fetus tugged a vein, and his mother swung a clawed hand.

Nemes parried with his staff. The corpse's claws scratched grooves into the wood. The fetus shrieked and drove his host forward. The rusted horns that grew across the mother, diseased tumors like blades, thrust toward Nemes. He leaped aside, dodging the mother's growths, only to scratch his thigh against a blade that rose from the floor.

A throaty, bubbling chuckle rose from the fetus. The little beast licked his lips in delight. He tugged the veins mightily, and the mother lurched toward Nemes, claws swinging and horns thrusting.

Nemes sidestepped, sliced his cloak on another blade, and swung his staff. The wood cracked against the mother's head. The corpse's neck ripped and centipedes fled from it. The head dangled. The fetus howled in rage. The babe drove the corpse forward, and a rusted growth—one that sprouted from the mother's chest—drove into Nemes's shoulder.

Nemes grunted, wound blazing, and kicked. His foot hit the fetus inside the sliced womb. The creature screamed, bit at his boot, and Nemes screamed too; the small teeth pierced his skin. He swung his staff again, hitting the mother's