Rope in one hand, Brind’Amour’s staff in the other, he climbed the highest rock he could find and bade Oliver to scramble atop his shoulders.
“You will have to get up higher if you wish to swing across!” the halfling pointed out, and Luthien, looking all about for sight of the turtle, handed the staff to the halfling. The young man reached up as high as he could along the rope’s length, bent his knees and tensed his legs.
A roar from the corridor behind them launched Luthien into action. He leaped from the rock as high as he could, scrambled hand over hand to get as high a grip on the rope as possible, and tucked his legs under him as he and Oliver swung out over the pool.
They weren’t even near the middle when the drag on the trailing rope slowed them and Luthien’s legs splashed into the water. Knowing what was to come, the desperate man climbed, hand over hand, to pull himself out of the hot pool, then kept climbing, remembering the awful reach of the giant turtle.
The weight as they came out of the water halted their swing altogether, and the two began to rotate slowly as the rope untwisted.
“I do not so much like this,” Oliver remarked.
“Give me the staff,” Luthien replied, and the halfling gladly handed it over, using the opportunity of two free hands to scramble a bit higher on Luthien’s shoulders. Oliver was already thinking that if the turtle snapped at Luthien, he might be able to leap atop the thing’s back and run toward the far shore, then spring out and swim for his life.
He hated the notion of leaving Luthien behind, though, for he had taken a sincere liking to this brave young human.
Luthien, hooking his ankles around the rope and hanging on with one free hand, unexpectedly began to loop himself about the rope, increasing the swing and nearly dislodging Oliver from his shoulders.
“What are you doing?” the halfling demanded.
“At least this will be safe,” Luthien answered, and as he came around, he used the momentum of the swing to aid his throw and hurled Brind’Amour’s staff toward the far shore. It skipped off the last few feet of water and settled, floating near the bank.
“I thought you meant to try to use the silly thing!” Oliver protested. He ended with a squeal as a loud roar told him that Balthazar was entering the chamber.
“How would I know how to use a wizard’s staff?” Luthien quipped back.
“You would not,” came an unexpected answer from the shore. The two hanging companions looked over to see Brind’Amour calmly bending over the water to retrieve his valued item. As the rope rotated, the two then saw Balthazar come up to the other shoreline.
“Caught in line between a wizard and a dragon,” Oliver remarked. “This is not my very best day.”
Luthien grabbed on tight and tried to steady the rope, looking from one powerful adversary to the other. Balthazar issued a long, low growl at the sight of the wizard, and Luthien did not doubt that the dragon remembered well that day four hundred years before, when Brind’Amour and his cohorts had sealed the cave.
“In Gascony, we have always found wizard-types to be amusing, if a bit benign,” Oliver remarked, seeming not so optimistic despite Brind’Amour’s appearance.
“Go back to your hole!” Brind’Amour called to the wyrm.
“WITH YOUR BONES!” came the not-surprising reply.
Brind’Amour thrust his staff before him, and crackling bolts of black energy shot out from its end. Luthien and Oliver both cried out, thinking that they would be caught in the barrage, but the wizard’s bolts arced around them and sizzled unerringly into the dragon and the stones around the beast.
The dragon roared in protest; rocks exploded, and parts of the ceiling fell in, engulfing Balthazar in a cloud of dust and debris.
“In Gascony, we could be wrong,” Oliver admitted, and both he and Luthien dared to hope that Brind’Amour had won the day.
Neither of them had dealt with a dragon before. As soon as the energy was expended, the debris settling to the floor, Balthazar reared up and shook himself free of it, looking more angry than ever but hardly wounded. If he had not been so amazed, Luthien would have let go of the rope and let himself and Oliver splash into the protection of the pool, but he was too entranced to move as Balthazar’s great head shot forward and his mouth opened wide, sending out a line of white-hot flames.
Brind’Amour had already enacted his next spell, though, and like a great rolling wave, the water between the companions and the wyrm rose up suddenly in a blocking wall.
Fires hissed in protest and clouds of steam rose about the lake. Hot droplets splattered back from the force of the breath, nipping at Oliver and Luthien, who could only close their eyes and hold on.
It went on for what seemed like minutes, Balthazar’s unending breath drawing Brind’Amour’s powers out to their limits. When Luthien dared to peek out, it seemed to him as though the watery wall was inevitably thinning. Then it fell flat suddenly, and Luthien thought he was surely doomed.
But ended, too, was the dragon’s breath, and Luthien could hardly see the massive wyrm through the cloud of thick steam. He heard splashing, though, as Balthazar steadily advanced.
“What are you doing to my rope?” he heard Oliver gasp. He looked at the halfling, then followed Oliver’s incredulous gaze to the water and the loose end of the rope. Luthien’s eyes widened as well when he saw the spectacle: Brind’Amour had somehow transformed that end of the rope into a living serpent, which was now swimming toward the far bank and the wizard.
The water then churned under the companions—they had almost forgotten about the turtle!
The snake/rope crawled onto the shore and, following Brind’Amour’s frantic directions, looped itself about a rock and began to tighten, pulling the companions up at an angle away from the water and the turtle.
Oliver looked back and nearly fainted dead away, staring into the evil and angry eyes of the dragon not more than a dozen feet away. The halfling tried to speak, but got his lips all tied together, and instead began tapping Luthien frantically on the shoulder.
“HELLO, THIEF AND LIAR,” Balthazar said calmly. Luthien didn’t have to look back to know that he was about to become lunch.
The dragon jerked suddenly; there came a huge splash from below. Oliver looked down as Balthazar looked down—to see the snapping maw of the turtle tightly clamped on the dragon’s great leg.
The rope was taut, then, and Luthien began half crawling, half sliding toward the far shore.
Hot water splashed over the companions as the behemoths battled in the lake. The dragon roared and breathed forth and a new cloud of steam joined the first, and the agonized shriek of the startled and wounded turtle cut the air. Luthien finally let go of the rope altogether as they neared the shore and dropped onto the beach, Oliver still clutched tightly to his back and neck.
“Run on!” Brind’Amour prodded them. The wizard understood that the turtle would not last long against the likes of Balthazar. He looked back to the lake one final time, sent forth another black-crackling bolt of energy, and ran after Luthien. Then he produced a magical light, for Oliver had left the still-burning torch on the far bank.
The three had barely exited the chamber, climbing back into the corridor strewn with broken stalagmites, when they heard Balthazar splash ashore, calling out, “THIEVES!” and “LIARS!”
Now the landscape favored the wyrm, with the three companions having to scramble over and around the tumbled blocks. Luthien finally spotted the fist-sized swirl of blue glowing energy, but he heard the dragon right behind them and did not think he had any chance of making it.
Brind’Amour, chanting wildly, grabbed the young man’s shoulder suddenly—Oliver’s, as well—and all three took off from the ground, flying, speeding for the wall.
Balthazar roared and loosed another line of flames. Oliver screamed and covered his head, thinking that he would smash into the stone. The lights of the tunnel expanded, as if to catch them, and the dragon’s breath was licking again at their backsides as they entered the wizard’s tunnel.