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.The humans and other Chosen might have overlooked them, but Ether would not.Indeed, she had not.As she gathered herself into a vaguely human shape and swept the city one last time, she felt only the dragoyles and the nearmen left to be dealt with.However, within the castle, she felt something more.Something that had turned her away once before.Something that needed to be dealt with.She whisked toward the castle.Myn touched down in the castle courtyard.The inhuman guards who opposed them were reduced to ashes by a carefully aimed blast of flame.Myranda climbed to the ground and thrust her will at the door.A ripple of magic visibly distorted the air, but it splashed uselessly against the door.Myranda focused her mind and released another volley.This time the air crackled, but still the door stood.There was a magic far more powerful than hers set against her.“Myn, can you get us inside?” Myranda asked.The dragon turned to the door.She retreated until the gates of the castle wall were at her back, then slowly lowered her head.Iron hard muscles under gleaming red scales propelled the massive creature to frightening speed.When she struck the door it was like a crack of thunder.Wood splintered and creaked.Rust-encrusted metal twisted and warped.The very frame that held the doors in place buckled, but they held.Myn shook her head and retreated again.A second time the ground shook and the walls shuddered, knocking free months old ice and snow.A third and final charge hit like a battering ram.The ragged remains of the door exploded into debris as Myn blasted through.A red carpet slid and bunched under Myn's claws as she tried madly to stop herself.Myranda rushed in after her.This was the castle's entry hall.Once again Myranda found herself in a place that, as a girl, she could only have dreamed of seeing.Unlike her mad dash through Castle Kenvard, this place actually met and surpassed the dreams of her youth.Intricate tapestries lined the walls.War banners hung proudly.Suits of ornate armor worn by kings and noblemen stood at attention between massive, towering columns that disappeared into the darkened vault above them.The air was warm, and the smell of burning candles still hung in the air.This place was empty now, but it was alive.Perhaps just minutes ago there had been servants and guards here.Myranda turned.Ropes had been thrown over the edge of the wall.Boots scratched against the wooden gates of the castle's outer wall.The hordes outside were fighting their way past their own defenses to get in.Her eyes turned again to the wonders around her.This was the true history of her people.The very history that had been stripped from them.Marble was engraved in ancient languages.Above the hallway leading into the castle proper was a map of the world that still bore the old borders, the old names.The world before the war.Here and nowhere else, the identity of the north seemed to have survived, and it was about to become a battlefield.Already it was scattered with the splintered remains of the door.“Myn, you won't fit through the hallway, you have to stay here.but I have another job for you.You see this? All of this? This must not be destroyed! Myn, keep those soldiers from entering this place.I'll be back as soon as I can,” Myranda stated.Myn shot out the shattered door and planted herself just outside, a predatory gaze focused on the wall.She heard the echoing footsteps of her friend retreating down the hallway behind her and longed to follow, but Myranda had spoken.Her talons flexed in anticipation, splitting the stone of the courtyard, and her mighty tail swept and coiled.The scent of the enemy soldiers was in her nose.It was a scent she would never forget.The D'karon creatures came in many shapes, but there was a quality of the scent that never changed.It was out of place, not a part of nature, and it was etched permanently in her mind.Dragons have a long memory, and the scent of those that had killed her was not one she was going to forget.She intended to return the favor.Deacon finally forced his way to a staircase.When he'd wrestled the doors of the church open, he somehow had expected to find it empty.What he found instead was a huddled crowd of aristocrats and dignitaries.These men and women hadn't known a moment of true hardship in their lives.The war was, to them, a distant thing.Something others dealt with and hardly worth noticing.Now it was on top of them.Deacon's arrival found them pressed against the opposite wall, not a single one of them willing to risk holding the door shut against the onslaught.When it was clear he meant them no harm, the pleading had come.In the space of a few minutes he'd been pulled in every direction, had half of the kingdom offered to him, and had to turn down many a daughter and dowager's hand in marriage in exchange for safe passage from this war zone.It continued as the more desperate of them followed him up the steps.“Please,” begged a round, red faced man dressed head to toe in silk.“I own a great deal of land.Help me to escape and you may name your price.Be reasonable!”“I mean to help all of you, now stay back! This could get dangerous,” Deacon said, pulling free of the man's insistent grip and rushing up the stairs.The heavy footfalls followed him for a half a dozen steps before wheezing to a stop and slowly thumping away again.Deacon spiraled up the steps, urgency and duty driving his failing limbs.Soon he was high enough that the battle was just a distant clamor below him.At what had to be the top of the precarious flight of stairs was a locked door.It did not remain locked for long, the merest whisper from his skilled mind springing the delicate mechanism open.He rushed inside.There were ropes nearly as thick as his arm leading into the darkness overhead.He cast a spell at the bell itself, but the massive piece of brass barely budged.Reluctantly he grasped the heavy rope and heaved.His feet lifted from the ground, and slowly the roped drifted down.The voices below rose in terror once again and the sound of pounding footsteps echoed up the tower.In the back of his mind he realized that he'd not managed to heave the brace back into place.The bell thumped faintly.He leapt and heaved the pull again.As a second weak ring echoed down the tower, but as it echoed back up, it was joined by a familiar voice.“Stop!” Caya cried as she finally made it to the landing.“No need for that.The monst.the prodigy is doing an excellent job.”“Ivy? How?” Deacon asked, slowly releasing the pull.“She's leading them on a circuit around the city, zigzagging through the streets.I've never seen anyone move so fast,” Caya explained.“She's changed.what color is her aura?!” he asked urgently.“Blue.Does it really matter?” the veteran asked in puzzlement.“Blue is fear.It doesn't last long [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]