Dragon Apocalypse (The Berserker and the Pedant Book 2) by Josh Powell

now!”
    “Mumble mumble… grow back… mumble mumble,” said one of his Pellonias.   Arthur nodded.
    Melody went over and picked up the sword. Maximina stifled a chuckle.   There was another round of rapid discussion. Finally Arthur set the head back down on the pedestal and knelt on the floor.   Melody walked behind him, raised the sword, and struck Arthur in the neck.   Blood spurted and Arthur screamed.   His head did not come off cleanly.   Melody hacked at the neck once more, twice… the screaming stopped but Melody had to saw at the neck a bit before the head finally came off.
    The Pellonias retched, vomiting on the floor.
    Pellonia was about to give the signal to charge when amazingly, the remaining members of The Lightning Brigade began to argue and gesture some more.   Apparently, Rufus wanted the head for himself.   Pellonia drew back into the shadows.
    They argued for a few more moments, then the other wizards set the Head of Venka onto Arthur’s headless corpse.   It fell off.
    There was a lot of hand waving after that, and some shouting.   Finally Rufus said, “mumble mumble mumble… waited too long… mumble mumble.”   Melody cut his head off, it was cleaner, seeing as she’d had a bit of practice and they quickly stuck the head on his corpse.   It fell off, too.
    “Seems like a lot of heads falling off of people today,” Pellonia mused.
    Seeing that they were down both Arthur and Rufus, Pellonia decided they had a large enough advantage, leapt from the shadows, and yelled “Charge!”
    Gurken ran through the hall, followed by Maximina running on the ceiling, Apocalypse sailing through the air, and Ohm jogged behind them strumming his lute.
    Maximina pulled to a stop and said, “Oh, no!   Gurken, it’s a—”
    Gurken slashed his axe into Melody’s head, which wore a a shocked expression on her face.   It passed clean through, meeting no resistance.   Apocalypse let loose a gout of flame at the three Pellonias. They screamed and covered their heads.   The flames passed harmlessly through them.   Pellonia lunged at the mysterious man in the cloak, passing through him and landing on the floor with a clatter.
    “—n illusion,” Maximina finished.   She sighed.
    A booming laugh echoed through the halls. “Ha ha ha haahaaahaa.   Oh, that’s rich.   That’s good.   That was delicious, Pellonias.”
    “Thank you,” came the sound of three Pellonia voices.
    The Arthur with the decapitated head, Melody, Rufus, the three Pellonias and the mysterious man in the silken cloak all vanished.   An orb floated in the air above them, beams of light retracting into it.   The orb flew over to the hallway entrance where The Lightning Brigade now stood.
    “As if I would cut my own head off…” Arthur chuckled.   “…in order to gain more power.   The Phage…” Arthur pointed to his head,   “is in this head.   And in this one.” Arthur pointed at Melody. “And here and here and here,” Arthur said, pointing at the Pellonias.   “It would be rather self-defeating to cut off our heads when that’s where the Phage reside.”
    “Who is this poor fellow anyway?   Where did you even get a severed head?” Arthur asked, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes.
    Everyone looked at Maximina.   “What?   Why is everyone looking at me?”
    The Lightning Brigade sauntered over to the pedestal.   Arthur picked up the head and studied it.
    “Caput Mordent!” Maximina yelled.
    The decapitated head’s eyes opened and it bit Arthur’s hand savagely.   Arthur screamed and tried to toss the head away, but it maintained a vice-like grip with its teeth.   Melody and the Pellonias laughed while Rufus ran over and tried to yank the head off of Arthur… the decapitated head, not Arthur’s head.
    Melody walked over and picked up the sword from the other pedestal and struck the head with it.   The force of the blow knocked the head from Arthur’s arm, tearing a bit of flesh from