Doomraga's Revenge Read Online Free PDF Page A

deafening roar, Basilgarrad used his enormous strength, along with Lo Valdearg’s momentum, to lift the other dragon off the ground. He whirled his foe around and around, clearing the circle and using the bully’s body as a shield.
    Lo Valdearg, taken by surprise, could only release a strangled gurgle from his throat. The other dragons, pushed back by this huge whirling club, gazed on in fear and astonishment. No dragon in history had ever done something so bold in battle!
    “Kill him! Rush him!” commanded the orange leader. “You cannot be defeated by a single dragon.”
    His soldiers, however, wavered. Only a handful of them charged, and each met with a painful slam by the whirling body. Two were struck so hard in their heads that they toppled over, unconscious. And still Basilgarrad’s tail kept spinning.
    “Charge him, you fools!” The orange dragon shouted louder than ever, spraying sparks from his mouth. “Charge him now!”
    Just then, Basilgarrad arched his broad back and lifted his tail straight up—and with it, the helpless dragon who had become his weapon. Using all the strength he could muster, he brought down Lo Valdearg—right on top of the exasperated leader.
    The colliding dragons shrieked, while bones cracked and scales splintered. When all the clouds of ash finally cleared, Lo Valdearg lay sprawled upon the body of his leader. Moaning in pain, he rolled off and slammed to the ground. The orange dragon, whose back had been broken, never moved again.
    Confused, distraught, and thoroughly frightened, the other dragons scattered in all directions. They leaped into the air and flew away as fast as they could, not daring to look back, lest the bold green dragon decide to pursue them.
    At the scene of the battle, Basilgarrad surveyed the remains of the attackers. Just beyond the crushed corpse, Lo Valdearg, unable to fly, crawled away in anguish. After watching him for a few seconds, Basilgarrad delivered the most humiliating blow of all: He simply turned away.
    Swinging around to face Merlin—who, along with Hallia and Krystallus, gazed at him with grateful admiration—the green dragon narrowed his eyes. With gusto, he declared, “Let that be a warning to anybody who dares to call me a pet.”

5: F LAMES
    Words are like knives. They can spread butter and honey—or pierce a beating heart.
    Peering over the crater’s rim, Basilgarrad glanced at the portal’s mysterious flames, so like the green fire of his own eyes. Those flames could magically transport anyone around Avalon almost instantly—a dangerous way to travel, but very useful for creatures who weren’t lucky enough to be able to fly at dragonspeed. This particular portal had, apparently, brought Merlin’s wife and son to this fire-blackened realm. But why?
    “Oh, Basil,” said Hallia, her doe eyes full of gratitude. She lay her hand on the crusty black pumice of the rim. “You were marvelous. Truly marvelous.”
    He raised his enormous clubbed tail, then let it slam back to the ground, sending up ashen clouds on every side. “Fighting is just one of those skills you pick up,” he said modestly. “Of course, it helps if your opponent has a brain the size of a speck of dust.”
    “You didn’t have just one opponent,” countered Krystallus. He shook his head vigorously, which made his long white hair—so unusual in such a young man—swish against his shoulders. “You had nineteen! And you bested them all!”
    “That’s right,” agreed Merlin. He tore some tattered shreds of cloth off his sleeve and threw them aside. “That kind of fighting skill isn’t something you just pick up. It’s a rare gift that—”
    “I wasn’t talking about his fighting!” interrupted Hallia. She climbed a step higher on the rim to be a bit closer to the dragon’s face. Though her whole body could have fit inside the pupil of his eye, she gazed at him confidently, as his equal. “No, something else entirely.”
    “Not his fighting?”