The Chronicles of Ragg: Volume One: The Sword of Gabriel - Softcover

Flanagan, Bob

 
9781458210333: The Chronicles of Ragg: Volume One: The Sword of Gabriel
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1458210332 ISBN 13: 9781458210333
Publisher: AbbottPress, 2013

Synopsis

Ragg can't get the images out of his mind. He can still picture his village burning and his grandfather caught in the clutches of a dragon. It was then that Ragg-trying to escape the small, dark cave in which his grandfather had hidden him-vowed to exact revenge. He won't stop until all the dragons of the land are dead. In his mind, the only good dragon is a dead dragon. As he ventures with his new canine companion, Verlon, Ragg seeks to destroy every dragon he finds. But in the process, he discovers the truth about his grandfather's death, the dragons, and his own destiny as he journeys farther into the valley of death's shadow. Every step brings him closer to the truth and closer to danger. The more he learns, the more complicated things become. In the midst of his fight between good and evil, he makes friends and discovers enemies. Ragg's character is tested, and he must determine if he will become the warrior his people need or if he will remain a lost young man bent on soulless revenge.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The Chronicles of Ragg

Volume One: The Sword of Gabriel

By Bob Flanagan

Abbott Press

Copyright © 2013 Bob Flanagan
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4582-1033-3

Contents

1 The Lair of the Dragon'lil...............................................1
2 The Water Beasts.........................................................5
3 The Grove................................................................8
4 The Shot.................................................................13
5 Fire and Anger...........................................................17
6 The Promise..............................................................23
7 The Deep Green Forest....................................................26
8 Fire and Thunder.........................................................31
9 Cantonuk Mountain........................................................36
10 Dragon's Lair...........................................................42
11 The Castle Dragon's Claw................................................47
12 The Rod.................................................................52
13 Iron Bars...............................................................58
14 A History Lesson........................................................60
15 The Great War...........................................................67
16 The Return of the Army..................................................82
17 Make Ready for the Feast................................................93
18 Fight to the Death......................................................102
19 The Tunnels.............................................................106
20 The Trail of Darkness...................................................117
21 Among the Scian.........................................................125
22 The Decision............................................................138
23 Reunited................................................................153
24 The Souls of Eastali....................................................160
25 Into the Castle Keep....................................................169
26 Stone Cold..............................................................182
27 The Next Step...........................................................189
28 The Right Plan..........................................................196
29 Tunnels and Darkness....................................................205
30 The Secret Laboratory...................................................213
31 Talon and Darkness......................................................216
32 Parting Company.........................................................224
33 Melok hu Agrowl.........................................................231
34 Myst Falls..............................................................238
35 Lake Frigusio...........................................................248
36 The Chase...............................................................257
37 Empyrean's Messenger....................................................263
A Vade Mecum of the Ywa Language...........................................269


CHAPTER 1

The Lair of the Dragon'lil


The cave was hot, but his toes were cold. Why are my toesalways cold when sweat drips from my brow? Ragg thought. Hehad stayed motionless in a dark corner of the cave for most of theday. Nevertheless, he was hot and his toes were very, very cold.His nerves pulsed throughout his body. His stomach churned andtightened. He shuddered again.

Ugh! This smell is going to kill me long before the dragon'lil getshere. I'll bet that old bag of cow dung is laughing now. He's probablydown the valley somewhere drinking ale, eating gnorl, and tellinganybody who'll listen how he convinced a lad to buy and pour goatpiss all over himself.

The old traveling trader was a man of some ill repute, buthis advice was truly sound: no fool would go hunting a dragon,especially in its cave, even if the dragon was a 'lil type, withoutcovering up his own scent. No matter how young and clumsy thedragon was, they all could smell a human. Some argued that evenbefore they hatched, dragons could smell a human's scent.

Oh, and if the goat piss wasn't bad enough, the bat dung in myhair is worse than sleeping in a bed full of fleas. He used all hispower to resist scratching his head. How I want to jump in a river.I don't care how cold it is.

The hairs on his calves stood on end. He thought he had hearda noise, but he'd been hiding so long he wasn't sure.

There it was again! Was it closer now? He couldn't tell.

Just then a voice whispered, "Don't breathe."

Out of the corner of an eye he saw a shadow move. Slowly,very slowly. Not moving with any grace but coming closer.

A raccoon in heat has more grace than this dragon'lil. It's tired,he concluded, very tired.

He slowly drew back his bow and lifted it.

The dragon'lil stretched and arched up, filling the cave.Even in the darkness, the lad could see his target: the soft, whiteunderbelly. He took aim. But then, suddenly, the dragon'lilshrieked horribly.

Ragg's eardrums stretched and pulsed at the high pitch.

Just then the underbelly lifted high in the air. Ragg let loosehis arrow. In a split second, the arrow struck with deadly accuracy.Deep into its flesh the arrow sank. Blood flowed.

The dragon'lil writhed in pain. It stumbled and crashed intothe far side of the cave.

Ragg stared at his foe and now understood the dragon's firstscream. Blood flowed from two wounds! A second arrow waslodged in the dragon'lil's neck just below its throat. What anamazing shot, he thought. He said aloud, "Who could have madesuch a shot?"

"I did," a man replied. "And now keep quiet or we will bothbe ashes before the sun rises again. The 'lil can still burn us up.It isn't dead yet!"

The dragon'lil flailed back and forth. Again it screamedhorribly. It tried to spew fire but couldn't. It spotted Ragg. Itreadied to lunge at him. Another arrow suddenly hissed throughthe air from where the voice had come. It struck the 'lil in its lowerjaw and sank deep.

With a sudden crash, it collapsed. It stopped moving. It wasdead.

A torch was lit from where Ragg had heard the voice. A tall,caped figure moved toward the dragon'lil. The man bent over thebody of the collapsed beast.

Numb at the sight of it, Ragg drew near the caped man. Stillnot sure whether it was dead, or who this man was, he blindlyasked, "Are you going to drink its blood?"

"Never! Never defame the dead. Even a dragon'lil," the manretorted. "Drinking its blood is some ignorant myth told tofrighten village folk into paying money to dragonslayers. Theblood of a dragon is just that. It's blood. It has no special power,nor does it give eternal life."

"How do you know?" Ragg asked.

"Because I have killed plenty of dragonslayers," he repliedcoolly.

The man moved to the head of the dragon. Ragg heard himdigging and cutting into it. Crack. Crunch. Crack. Crunch.Crack. Then he heard a sucking sound followed by a hiss of gasand another loud crack. Finally he heard flesh ripping. Then heheard it all over again, several more times. What is he digging outof the dragon?

"But this—this is worth twenty gold pieces in the Southlands,"the man said. He tossed three large teeth to Ragg. "They're yours.You shot well. You deserve a share of the prize."

Ragg stared at them in the dim torchlight. He did not reallycare for the teeth, but they mesmerized him nonetheless. Hestared at the 'lil. Its body still shimmered. In the torchlight, hemade out the purple, green, and black of its scales. They remindedhim of the feathers of grackles. He saw them at home, trompingthrough the wood in flocks of a dozen or more, turning over leaves,squawking and chattering to one another while the sun reflectedoff their feathers, which changed colors in the sunlight. Withevery movement, they changed from green to purple and then toblack. The dragon'lil's scales seemed the same, he decided.

Ragg was right to notice the scales. All dragon'lil scalesshimmered in this way. Not until they were about ten years olddid their true color emerge. Then the dragon's scales permanentlybecame one of those three colors: green, purple, or black. Thatwas also the time they grew the most. They slept and slept in thefar reaches of caves. They lay undisturbed for years. Then theyemerged full-grown, hungry, and mean.

That was when they were most dangerous.

Was this the dragon? Ragg wondered.

"Are you going to stand there staring at it all day?"

"What?" Ragg had forgotten about the man.

"I am going to torch the body. You need to get out or the gasesfrom the fire will kill you."

The dragon'lil began to burn. The fire spread quickly acrossits body.

It burns so easily but never burns itself up when it breathes fire,Ragg mused.

CHAPTER 2

The Water Beasts


Ragg let out a shout but stayed in the frigid water. Hehad to clean himself. The smell of the goat piss on his clothes andthe bat dung in his hair was too much to tolerate any longer. Hedunked into a deep pool, letting the water wash his long hair.Underwater, all was quiet. He counted: forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven ...

Suddenly, as he broke the surface of the water, he was attacked.From out of nowhere, two creatures clawed him and bit into hisclothes. He screamed for help, but he heard only laughter. Tryas he might to free himself from these two beasts, he couldn't.They were powerful, dark creatures. They swam with vigor andpurpose.

Though they bit into his clothing, they did not bite him. Hesensed they were not attacking him as much as dragging himback to shore.

His knees touched the sandy river bottom. In the water hehad floated with ease, but now back on land, with his clothingsoaking wet and his hair mopped across his face, he was heavyand helpless. As he stood, he stumbled under the weight of hisclothes. He tossed his hair back and wiped the water off his face,but before he could see clearly, the beasts began to shake andshower him with water. He heard more laughter.

Ragg opened his eyes. "Well, you're no help," he said.

On the riverbank stood the man who had helped him kill thedragon'lil. Still laughing, the man said, "I'm Trallian, and youmust be the sorriest-looking dragonslayer I have ever seen."

"Well then, I don't need your help," Ragg replied.

"Of course not, but I think they disagree," Trallian said,casting a nod to the two magnificent beasts standing on eitherside of him. Ragg looked at the two deep-black animals. Theirheads reached almost to Trallian's waist.

"What kind of beasts are these? Dogs?" Ragg asked. "Theycan't be. They're enormous."

"They're werfoudlons," Trallian replied. "Dogs from the north.Their loyalty and devotion are matched only by their strength andskill in water. There is no better dog in the world. Many a manowes his life to his werfoudlons. They are quiet and good hunters.When the snows come, they will keep you warm as a fire. Thesetwo are yearlings. Their mother had them in late spring."

Ragg bent down to the dogs' eye level. One immediatelyapproached him, wagging her tail. Ragg rubbed her face andstroked her back. She licked his face and his hands. The other dogapproached as well. Soon Ragg and the dogs started to wrestle.After rolling in the grass for some time, the three of them werealmost as dirty as before. They jumped back into the river againand played in the water some more.

Finally, after they had emerged from the river, dried off, andsettled down, Trallian said, "I am going to camp here for a dayor two with the werfoudlons, until the river water lowers and wecan cross. You're welcome to stay, provided you don't have to runoff and kill another dragon'lil."

Trallian soon had a warm fire burning.

The Werfoudlons were fun, Ragg thought. And I haven't had funin many months. "I can stay," he said. "But only for a day or two."

My journey of revenge can wait that long, he thought.

CHAPTER 3

The Grove


The next day, Ragg decided to make himself useful. Heset out to hunt for deer. He gathered his long bow and a quiver ofarrows. Just as he was about to head out, the smaller of the twoyearlings rose and wagged her tail.

"Verlon wants to join you," Trallian said.

"If it's no trouble with you, Trallian, I would enjoy hercompany."

"Verlon loves to hunt; by all means. You'll find no better guideand tracker than her. She never gets lost."

Leaving the riverbank, Ragg strode off into the woods withVerlon at his side. The sounds of the bubbling water cascadingbetween stones and over logs faded quickly. The dense forestturned away the river noises, so now he heard the sound of songbirds. Ragg heard swallows and wrens chirp and cheep in thebranches. He maneuvered easily among the leafy arms of the trees,quietly striding deeper and deeper into the forest.

He stepped across a bubbling brook filled with deep, coldblack water. Life teemed all around the brook. Tiny flies swirledjust above the water. A fly hatch, he thought. He looked carefullyinto a deep dark pool, and a quick flash darted in the water. Oh,a brook trout, he decided. Not too big, though.

Thick green moss grew at the water's edge, covering the groundfor several feet. The moss even surrounded trees sprouting up fromroots that seemed to drink the water.

He and Verlon ventured farther into the woods. They came tothe top of a rise and entered a grove of trees with narrow leaves andlight-brown bark. The trees stood narrow and tall, only several feetapart. Ragg had never seen such trees before. He paused to admirethe beauty of the grove. They seem all together, he thought. They'renot separate trees but one living thing with many shoots reaching upto the sky.

He formed a prayer on his lips: "La Goth, La Gath, la gynthcranuth dramoor." He had learned these words from his grandfatherback home on Isle Greymoor.

It was there, when the stripped bass would run into the covechasing the finger fish, that his grandfather repeated those words.He said, "Ragg'lil, my young lad, I have a secret to share with you.But you must be very careful whom you, in turn, share it with."The wind whipped his thick gray hair across his brow, covering hisdeep-brown eyes. He stiffened and straightened himself. In thatmoment, he looked years younger. The lines on his face seemedto melt away and his face glowed.

He leaned in close to his twelve-year-old grandson. Helooked directly into his eyes. He held the boy's hands. "You seethose fish?" he asked, pointing to the bay below. "You and I didnothing to deserve those fish. They come not at our command,and they'll leave before long. The men in the village will catchmany of the fish in their nets. The nets will bulge and strainfrom the weight of so many fish. We will eat for many moonsbecause these fish have run into the cove. They come into thecove because that is their life. We catch them because that isour life. We did nothing to deserve the fish, yet we will feast onthem because the world is abundant, and we must be thankfulfor that."

Ragg looked at the men plying the water with their longskiffs, throwing their nets into the school of striped bass. Thewater teemed with them. There were more fish in the cove than hecould count in a lifetime. He saw how quickly the men strainedagainst the weight of their nets. Grandfather was right; many fishwould be caught.

"But, Grandfather, what is the secret?" Ragg asked.

"The secret is that behind all this—the fish and the water, theland and the sky—there is only La Goth. There is only one forcebehind all that has been created. Everything and all are beholdento him. That is why we say, `La Goth, La Gath, la gynth cranuthdramoor,' which means there is only one who rules, and all thathe created praise him."

Grandfather asked him to repeat these words several times,until he was sure Ragg had memorized them completely.

But Ragg was confused. "I don't understand these odd wordsyou use."

"Ragg'lil, these words are the ancient words of our people.When we came here to this island some years ago, all the eldersagreed not to speak of these words. They became forbidden."

"But why?"

"You must understand"—his grandfather leaned in closer—"theseare not our lands. No. Our lands are on the mainland tothe west." He motioned with his arm. "We were forced to livehere after a mighty war, which destroyed nearly all our people.Those few of us who survived scattered throughout many lands.We were separated, but we survived. We are a strong people. Wehave survived on this island.

He reached down, grabbing a handful of dark, moist earth.

This land has been good to us. La Goth has been good to us.We are not forgotten in his eye. His promise to us remains. Wewill again be one people."

He continued, growing more passionate now. "These wordsbecame forbidden because those who fought against us did notbelieve there was one creator of the earth. They believe there aremany creators. Gods for the sun and the moon. Gods for thetrees and the land, for the water and all the animals." He shookhis head. "They believe in gods for the wind, rain, fire, and cold.And they believe we were wrong to think our creator was betterthan all others and above all others.

He allowed the wind to blow the dirt from his hand.

"So for us to survive, we need to keep these words hiddenand secret. That way we will not be found out. We will not bepersecuted.

"To this day, there are those in this world who seek to destroythose of us who survived. When we came here from our valley onthe mainland, the leaders decided our sacred words must not bespoken anymore by anyone. But these words are too important.They are special and sacred."

He wiped the last of the dirt from his hands.

"These words we use to communicate with La Goth. Sothey must never be forgotten. We must never forget how wecommunicate with the one and only true La Goth. That is why Ihave taught you these words, the sacred words of our people."

Ragg was still confused, but he understood better. He smiledat his grandfather. "Thank you for telling me, Grandfather. I willnot tell anyone these words."

He felt a stronger bond between him and his grandfather.He watched as the old man bent to the wind. He sensed the glowleave him.

Ragg turned to see the men below. There would be plenty offood this winter. He thought, La Goth, La Gath, la gynth cranuthdramoor.

Ragg shook his head. He brought his attention back to thetrees around him. He looked at the grove again, the grove thatseemed to be one living thing. He sensed the presence of La Goth.He repeated, "La Goth, La Gath, la gynth cranuth dramoor." Yes,he thought. One day all will be made right.


(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Chronicles of Ragg by Bob Flanagan. Copyright © 2013 Bob Flanagan. Excerpted by permission of Abbott Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Publisher
AbbottPress
Publication date
2013
Language
English
ISBN 10 
1458210332
ISBN 13 
9781458210333
Binding
Paperback
Number of pages
282

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9781458210326: The Chronicles of Ragg: Volume One: The Sword of Gabriel

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ISBN 10:  1458210324 ISBN 13:  9781458210326
Publisher: Abbott Press, 2013
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