The Sword of Wayland by Gavin Chappell
* * * * *
The goblins set their prisoners down with a metallic clatter on the cavern floor. Oswald shook his head blearily, his nostrils wrinkling at a sulphurous stench. He looked around him. His eyes widened as they lit upon the ghastly forms that slumbered in the centre of the cave.
Alfrun coughed feebly.
‘What’s that smell?’ she choked.
‘Look,’ Oswald said. She raised her head, and stared in dismay.
At first they looked like two enormous boulders, one white, the other red. The red one was closest. Alfrun’s eyes widened as she realised that what had resembled a rock was a reptilian creature, curled in a ring at the centre of the cave. The other boulder was another creature.
It was difficult to gauge its length, but from its massive proportions, Alfrun guessed that the Red Dragon must be at least thirty feet long. A scaled, equine head rested on claw-tipped forelimbs, nose nestled in a long, thick tail, wickedly barbed. Two bat-like wings were folded on its back.
‘The Red Dragon!’ cried the goblin king. ‘Behold our greatest ally!’
Grimbert sneered. ‘Wait until we have woken it, first,’ he said. ‘Our plans are not yet at fruition. And we must be careful not to wake the other - the White Dragon would destroy us!’
King Caradawg was gazing in silence at the sleeping beasts, his hand on his sword hilt. Oswald stared enviously at Wyrmbane.
‘If only I had that sword,’ he murmured.
Alfrun nudged him.
‘I’ve got this knife,’ she said quickly, raising her chained hands to reveal the dagger Edwin had given her.
‘I fail to see how that will help me slay the dragon,’ Oswald murmured.
* * * * *
‘The woses are gaining on us!’ Hywel shouted from below.
Edwin swung himself over a rocky outcrop, and glanced back down the cliff. Beyond the desperately scrambling Welshmen, long streams of hairy wild men were rushing through the darkness of the wooded valley floor.
He looked up. The hilltop was no more than twenty feet above.
‘Keep going!’ he said, and scrambled on.