He was suddenly alone with the beacon fire, here on a dark hill somewhere in Aglirta.
Ingryl Ambelter looked up at the stars, and then at dawn coming over the far mountains in the east, beyond the vast Loaurimm… the peaks that spawned the mighty Silverflow. He smiled. Soon it would all be his-every last tree, castle, gem, and lass of it. Soon…
"That should do it," he said aloud, calling on the Stone to spin himself a scrying-whorl. "There's no need to risk myself on Flowfoam-I'll watch from here."
"Oh, but there is," an old, familiar voice said coldly and firmly, as the air parted in Dwaer-shimmering. Gadaster!
Even as Ambelter stared at the skull-headed sorceress and snatched for control of his Stone, letting the whorl collapse into a crackling whirlwind of scorching flames, the slender arms that had belonged to Maelra Bowdragon lifted two Dwaerindim, one in either hand-and sent bolts racing at him.
Ambelter clawed desperately at the Thrael, calling up its full force in such frantic haste that Serpent-priests screamed and fainted up and down the Vale.
Desperately he dragged power out of his Dwaer, into the Thrael, to wrap himself in a great shield-But the bolts slammed not into the Great Serpent but into his Stone.
It flashed, ringing like a bell-and vanished from the hilltop, taking a startled Spellmaster with it.
Idiim Bowdragon clawed blindly at the Master of Bats, his eyes fixed on the saying-globes. "That's my Maelra!" he screamed. "I must go to her! I must-"
Dolmur cast a calming spell on Ithim even before their host could shake himself free of Idiim's hands.
The younger of the two old Bowdragon wizards blinked-and then suddenly seemed to remember that he was in the tower of the Master of Bats, and stood within the power of that fell sorcerer, whose bats were whirling around the chamber in a great angry cloud, even now.
"Your daughter?" Bats settled thickly on the shoulders of Arkle Huldaerus, their eyes glaring in unison at Ithim, as their master said derisively, "She holds two Dwaer-Stones in her hands. Whatever you were hoping to do, don't bother! She needs aid from no one-and there's nothing all three of us and everything in this tower can do against what she wields." He turned back to the flickering globes. 'Just watch."
The Dragon soared above the palace, vast and scaled and terrible. Whirling in the air on wings of bright flame, it clawed at the glittering stars and roared in delight.
This was power! Gods, this was… beyond belief.
Tshamarra Talasorn basked in the screams from Flowfoam beneath her, the puny Serpent-spells crackling up at her to stab too short, and fall away. She lashed her tail, exulting in her sheer might as she banked and soared and slid in rolling curves through the air…
Gods, if Craer could see her now! He-
Craer.
In a trice she turned and roared down out of the sky, claws spread, jaws opening. These fools below were endangering her beloved, menacing her friends, threatening Aglirta…
She struck savagely, smashing through bodies until she came to a ragged stop in the gardens. There she bit and tore, slashed with her tail, and spat flame until none were left but the burning, broken dead, and men who screamed as they fled. Then the Dragon bounded into the air, turned, and plunged down again, slashing out with a claw as she raced low over a garden meadow, transforming frantically running men into torn, tumbling meat.
Again she swooped, diving over a turret to pounce on shouting Serpent-priests, snapping with her jaws and bouncing once on her belly, grinding men beneath her. Bones snapped like twigs, screams fell silent, and she bounded aloft again.
More Aglirtans were hastening from the other end of the isle, howling and hacking mindlessly at each other as they came, running before the whips of Serpent-priests. Tshamarra crashed down into them, pouncing ruthlessly, and savaged everyone she could reach with claws and flame. Strange burning sensations slid down her throat-the plague, she realized dimly, twisting and fading under her own powers… and then she was alone with the dead again, and her bloodlust was fading.
Gods, what power! Yet she'd been slaying helpless commoners. The Dragon shook herself, licked her talons clean, and then peered about, seeking Serpent-priests.
There-robed men, weaving spells against her through a palace window! She thrust talons through the casements, clawing away the stone pillars between windows when some of the men ducked back out of reach, and tore open the outer wall of the room. One slash of her scaled arm crushed the rest of the screaming Serpent-priests against the walls, and they fell and lay still.
Horns of the Lady, she could slay snake-mages almost by looking at them!
Tshamarra went in search of more, prowling around the palace like a great scaled cat, peering and thrusting aside greenery. Dozens of men bolted from such cowering cover when she exposed them. Most she let run, but those who wore Serpent-robes she bit or cooked with the fire she could spew.
When no Snake-worshippers remained alive on the docks and terraces, and in the wooded gardens, the Dragon turned again to the palace, looking in every window. Many times she spat fire into its inner rooms, and heard men shriek and sizzle as they died.
As her slaying went on and the dawn sky brightened upriver, a jangling began to sing and echo in Tshamarra's head-strange high discord that she heard in her mind, its echoes rolling as if across vast distances, but not in her ears. With every death she dealt it grew louder, its tones more frantic. It sounded like a knife sawing through taut harpstrings of metal-a sound she'd heard once when a drunken bard had taken out his fury on a rival's prized instrument-and it grew wilder as her blood-toll mounted.
Then there came a time when the flash of a spell rocked a tower of the palace-and the Dragon peered in at its windows and found five Serpent-priests striding through the smoking bodies of the guards they'd slain, and studying the door of a small, secure chamber. Tshamarra Talasorn recognized that door. Behind it lay a room where some of Embra's enchanted gowns hung, girt about with small magics that kept off the dust.
She snarled fire in at the men-and at the same time thrust one claw in through another window, not caring if she shattered the wall around it, only that her scales blocked the door they'd come in by.
The Priests of the Serpent cursed and wailed and shaped spells in a desperate frenzy-and the Dragon breathed fire in at them until there was nothing left outside that charred wardrobe door but ashes.
And as they died, the jangling sound rose to a sudden shriek-and something snapped. With a wailing of many despairing voices, it all rushed away into nothingness…
And the Thrael was no more.
All over the Vale, Priests of the Serpent stiffened, screamed, and their heads burst into flame. Most froze where they stood, and burned like torches.
Fangbrother Maurivan was one of them, crumpling to his knees on a hill above Stornbridge with the throat of a vainly struggling Mistress of the Pantry Klaedra clutched in one clawlike hand-while he wrenched at her string of coins with the other. Blazing, he toppled over onto her, and they both burned.
Up and down the Silverflow folk of Aglirta cried out, fell to their knees in soaking sweats, and starting sobbing and trembling as the Blood Plague left them forever, leaving behind only the memories of what the Serpent-priests had done to them… and the revulsion.
In the sky above Flowfoam the jangling, singing sound burst forth, audible to all, and bringing with it a great gash in the air-a rift of dark fire and a bright shimmering flash rising out of it… a flood of short-lived radiance that vomited forth the whirling body of a man.
That spreadeagled form spun wildly, trailing black flames, and grew with horrible speed, welling up into something serpentine and monstrous, with a great flat many-fanged head… and the Great Serpent reared up, hissing, behind the Dragon as it glided around a tower of the palace-and pounced.