Zojja rushed up to the creature and set her hands on its leg. An orange curtain of flame blazed from her fingertips and ripped through the leg. The flame split the icy limb and sent steam blasting from it. Falling back, Zojja slapped hands on the other leg and blasted it, too. The thighs of the giant slid outward over the calves and cracked, dropping the torso. It struck ground and shattered. Cracks raced up it, and blocks of ice dropped loose. The fangs that were just then biting down on Logan disintegrated, and the thing came apart around him.
Buried to his chest in chunks, Logan said, "Nice job, little one."
"Little one!" Zojja seethed.
"You'd rather be big? Like Eir?"
"No," Zojja grumped. "Little is fine."
They turned to see that their teammates had the other giants well in hand. Sandy was pummeling the next two, and Caithe had scrambled up the back of a third. As it thrashed, she plunged her dagger into the seam at its neck and twisted. The neck cracked. The head slid off its massive shoulders and plunged face-first to crash on the floor. Bits of giant skull skittered out all around.
Eir, meanwhile, loosed shaft after shaft at the remaining giants.
Boom! Boom! Boom! They fell.
Suddenly, there was only silence in that deep, dark place.
"Onward!" Eir called.
Leaping over melted monsters, the companions formed up again and charged deeper.
"Ahead is the inner sanctum," Eir called out to them. "The Dragonspawn will be there."
They ran onward a thousand more paces before they reached the end of the chamber.
And it ended abruptly.
The team stopped atop a cliff that overlooked a deep, dark chamber. They couldn't see the bottom, but the space was far from empty.
A guttural roar erupted from it-a mob incensed at the sight of invaders.
"The inner sanctum," Eir said. She raised her bow and shot an arrow into the chamber. It flared, showing a mob of norn warriors-or once-norn.
None retained a fleshly body. All now were made of ice and stone. Some had great spiked clubs for hands. Others had frozen plates jutting from their backs. Still more had monstrous faces stretched by forests of icy fangs. The arrow flew past them, showing perhaps five hundred before it struck the far wall and exploded.
"What in the Foefire are those things?" Rytlock wondered.
"Icebrood. Hundreds of years old, corrupted by the Dragonspawn. We'll take this battle to them."
"Phase Three?" Rytlock guessed.
"Phase Three," Eir said. "Snaff, stay up here and control Sandy. Caithe, stay here as well and guard him."
"Yes," the sylvari agreed.
"What are we doing?" Rytlock asked.
"You, Logan, Zojja, Garm, and Sandy are going down with me to fight them, to draw out the Dragonspawn." Turning, Eir nocked three shafts and sent them down into the cavern. Three more arrows followed, and three more before the first volley struck the floor. The arrowheads exploded, blasting apart their foes and clearing a patch at the cliff's base.
Eir slung her arm over Sandy and said to Logan and Zojja, "Climb on."
They did.
"Sandy, give our charr friend a ride," Eir commanded.
The sand golem grasped Rytlock and slung him up to piggyback.
"Take us down," Eir ordered.
The golem bounded from the cliff's edge and plunged. On the way down, Eir loosed six more shafts, tearing holes in the enemy army.
Sandy landed at the base of the cliff, legs flexing to take the impact. Eir, Logan, Rytlock, and Zojja rolled free and scrambled to their feet. Garm landed heavily beside them.
"Charge!" Eir shouted, sending arrows ahead of them. Explosions cleared the way.
Behind her came Sandy, marching over the icebrood. Giant feet crushed the ice minions, and giant hands smashed them. The few icebrood that evaded Sandy ran headlong into the charr, the man, the asura, and the dire wolf.
"At last, real combat!" Rytlock roared.
He reared back as a frozen sword glanced off his armor. Lunging, he rammed Sohothin through the body of an ice monster. The creature split, shards sliding past each other to splash on the ground. Rytlock spun around and seared the head off another warrior.
Logan meanwhile traded blows with one of the icebrood. Its ice axe rang against his breastplate, but his war hammer cracked against its knee. The warrior toppled to its back. Logan leaped on it and emptied its head with his maul.
He jumped back and flung his hand out. His fingers smeared blue aura in the air, solidifying it in a shield before Zojja. The icebrood pounded up to the shield but couldn't reach the asura apprentice.
Zojja sent gouts of flame bursting from her hands and melted the monsters all around.
Garm bulled through ranks, smashing them down to break on the icy ground.
Shattered shards, broken bodies, steaming pools-the comrades flattened the icebrood.
But then a blue-white light erupted in the center of the chamber. It emerged from the icy floor and pierced the ceiling and cast all in its horrid glow. Out of that shaft, a figure took shape. Its crystalline back was hunched and spiky, and spiraling energies infused its frigid frame.
"The Dragonspawn!" Eir cried, halting her team.
Even the icebrood fell back from that horrid presence.
The Dragonspawn's eye sockets beamed a wicked blue light across them all, and its icicle fingers weaved strange magics in the air. It spoke in a voice like ice grating on stone. So, you have killed a hundred of my warriors?
It was hard to reply, hard to scrape words together. The shaman's mind was filling the chamber, infusing every mind with its aura. Only the tattoos kept the companions' minds from being taken over entirely.
At last, Rytlock managed a few words: "We've killed… half your army."
A deep moan came, a sound of infinite misery that evolved into a drone of delight. Not half. Not one-tenth! The Dragonspawn flung out its algid arms, and purple light jagged from its fingertips.
The walls of the cavern shattered, tumbling to the floor to reveal more of the icebrood. Rank on rank, the dragon minions stretched into the unseeable distance.
Your sandman and your tiny band cannot kill them all. Nor will you kill me. Instead, I will make you my own.
Eir closed her eyes, fighting against the Dragonspawn's aura. She mustered the words "You have no power over us."
So many have said that, the shaman replied, and have been wrong. It beckoned to its troops. Come to me!
Thousands of icy feet pounded the ground. The icebrood converged on Eir and her companions.
"We must escape," Logan muttered, fear creeping up his spine.
"Sandy can get us out," Rytlock added.
Eir shook her head. "That's the Dragonspawn talking."
Rytlock said, "Your plan has failed."
"Not yet." Eir pulled another exploding arrow from her quiver.
"What are you going to do?" Rytlock raged.
Eir drew the gray vial from her pocket. "Adapt the plan." She rammed the vial into the explosive head and said, "Phase Four." Eir aimed at the Dragonspawn and launched the shaft.
The arrow whined through the air and crashed into the shaman's icy chest. It exploded. A fireball engulfed the Dragonspawn, embedding tiny gray powerstones all across its figure. The shaman's mesmeric mind, which once filled the cavern and drowned out all other minds, suddenly imploded.
The mental onslaught ceased.
Eir and the others could think again.
The Dragonspawn was cut off from every mind in the chamber-cut off even from the mind of its master.
The marching armies faltered. A thousand ice warriors halted. They had obeyed the Dragonspawn because it was the champion of their lord. Now, it was only a terrible, foreign power in their midst. They turned from Eir and her comrades and turned on the Dragonspawn.
They were no longer marching but running, converging on the spectral creature. The icebrood tore into the Dragonspawn. They ripped off its icy arms and cracked open its body and shattered its head. Each time a shard came away, though, the storm of energies around the Dragonspawn whipped wider. It became a whirling cyclone. Its circling arms bashed into its attackers.