Gaven watched as the dragon flapped up and away from the ship, clearly both hurt and daunted by the blast of thunder and lightning.
“Gaven!” Rienne’s voice behind him jolted him around just as a great gout of flame washed over the deck.
The gold dragon flew above the highest mast, blowing a stream of fire from its mouth to cover the whole deck with a blanket of fire. To his surprise, Gaven didn’t see any of the crew-just Rienne, standing near the main hatch, surrounded by leaping flames. She cried out.
Drawing a quick, deep breath of the searing hot air, Gaven thrust his arms out to the front and back, and a great blast of wind swept the fire from the deck. Rienne fell to her knees.
Gaven cursed, and lightning flared in the clouds. A flashing bolt speared through the gold dragon, knocking it into the water with a great splash. He ran to Rienne and bent to help her stand.
“Never mind me,” she gasped. She pointed weakly behind him.
Gaven spun around just in time to catch the full brunt of a blast of frozen air streaming from the white dragon’s mouth. Frost crusted on his eyes and mouth, ice formed in his hair, and a layer of rime coated the deck. He staggered backward a few steps and slipped, landing hard on his back.
“First you dare trespass in our land.” The dragon landed on the deck again and prowled toward Gaven. Its voice was a low growl. “Then you have the audacity to hurt me. Now I plan to eat you alive.”
Gaven struggled to get his feet under him again, but the deck was too slippery.
“Is this dragon talking to you, Gaven?” Rienne stepped over him and took up a stance between him and the dragon. She didn’t speak or understand Draconic, and Gaven wasn’t sure whether the dragon understood Common. But it didn’t matter. “What a waste of time,” Rienne said, and she and Maelstrom began their deadly dance.
Gaven spoke a quick spell to sheath his body in a shield of flickering violet flames that warmed his body and turned the frost beneath him to water, and then to steam. He sprang to his feet, sliding his greatsword from the sheath on his back. Another arcane word made crackling lightning spring to life along the blade, sparks flying off into the air. He edged forward to stand beside Rienne.
The dragon reared up, batting at Maelstrom with its front claws but unable to stop its incessant whirling. Rienne had already scored its hide with several long gashes, and fear was in its eyes. It spread its wings and flapped them hard.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Gaven said in Draconic. He sprang forward and slashed the muscle where the dragon’s wing connected to its body, and that wing crumpled at the dragon’s side. The dragon roared its pain and fury, then brought its front claws down hard on Gaven.
The sword clattered from his hand as he fell to the deck. The dragon’s weight on his chest knocked the wind out of him, but then the beast roared again and drew back, seared by the flames around Gaven’s body. Gaven swung his arms and brought his hands together in front of him, and a boom like thunder knocked the dragon backward.
This is harder than it should be, Gaven thought. Have I led these people to their deaths?
The ship rolled beneath him, and Gaven found himself sliding toward the gold dragon on the tilted deck. His sword slipped just out of his reach.
Gaven got to his feet once more. “I’m finished lying on my back now,” he growled in Draconic. “Get ready to see what the Storm Dragon can do.”
The gold dragon recoiled at that, and the white was still reeling from the blast of thunder and Rienne’s unrelenting assault.
“That’s right,” Gaven growled. “I am the Storm Dragon.”
Wind swept around the ship and gathered quickly into a whirlwind that pinned the gold dragon in place, tearing at its wings and snatching the breath from its snout. Lightning flashed within the walls of howling air, searing the dragon’s scales. The wyrm opened its mouth, but it had no breath to roar.
With only a glance in its direction, Gaven thrust a hand toward the white dragon and pierced its body with another blast of lightning. It crashed to the deck, and a final slice from Maelstrom made sure it didn’t move again.
The gold dragon beat its wings furiously against the whirlwind. Gaven snarled, and a thunderous crash exploded inside the swirling air. The dragon’s wings crumpled, and another crack of thunder crushed it. With a wave of his hand, Gaven sent its body hurtling off the deck and into the water.
CHAPTER 9
Past Greenheart, the trees that gave the Towering Wood its name grew taller and broader-older, Kauth realized. An ogre couldn’t circle one of their massive trunks with its arms, and one of the giants of Xen’drik couldn’t reach their lowest branches. Their broad leaves were larger than a soldier’s shield, and their gray-blue bark could have served as armor. At times he felt as though he walked through a grand cathedral, the trees supporting a soaring roof, a place of sacred beauty. In other places, where the trunks grew closer together, it felt more like a labyrinth, when the farthest he could see in any direction was straight up. There the beauty became something awesome and terrible, daunting him with the sheer age of the forest and its trees. It seemed unearthly-strangely enough, considering that it must have been the place in Khorvaire where the worldwas most like it had been before goblins and humans built their cities and empires.
Sevren led their party along a course as straight as the forest allowed. No paths wound among the trees, excepting places here and there where deer or other animals had trampled the soil and dead leaves down into something like a trail. Still, Sevren’s sense of direction seemed unerring-whenever Kauth was able to determine the direction they traveled, they were still heading northwest, the shortest way through the forest to the Shadowcrags and the Demon Wastes beyond.
The woods teemed with life, but the animals kept a safe distance from Kauth and his party. Squirrels scampered up trees at their approach, rabbits broke cover and hopped away, birds fluttered up out of reach. Larger animals stalked just at the edge of their vision, appearing only in glimpses between distant trees. Kauth found himself most aware, though, of the favored creatures of the Children of Winter-the spiders and scorpions crawling at their feet, hunting their own tiny prey among the detritus of the forest. A centipede the size of a viper writhed its way alongside Kauth’s path for a few unnerving moments, and he shuddered at the memory of their confrontation with the druids on the road.
At night they pitched their tents wherever they could find space. Kauth repeated his nightly ritual beside the embers of their small fires, cementing his identity in his mind to make sure he didn’t slip out of it while he slept beside Vor in their little tent. His focus grew stronger each night, the unwelcome memories of Kelas and his early training intruding less often into his thoughts. Each night he hardened his heart to the impending death of his comrades, only to find himself warming to them again as they walked through the days.
On the fourth day of their journey, as he laughed at Zandar’s latest quip, he wondered how and when he had become so weak.
Six days outside of Greenheart, the trees thinned, and ferns and shrubs crowded into the patches of sunlight in the spaces between. Sevren pointed out scattered blocks of stone-the crumbled ruin of an ancient wall-mostly covered with lichen and creeping vines.
“That explains the thinning trees,” the shifter said. “There’s probably a paved area not far ahead. The trees will grow through it eventually, but it takes time.”
“We should skirt the ruin,” Kauth said.
“Are you serious?” Zandar said. “This is our specialty.”
Sevren nodded. “We can afford a brief diversion from our journey. Vor?”
“This is how we make our living,” the orc said. “If there’s nothing of value in the ruins, it won’t take long for us to determine that, and we won’t have delayed our journey. If there are treasures to be found, it’s worth a small delay.”
Zandar clapped Kauth on the shoulder. “I’m afraid you’re outvoted, friend.”
Kauth thought briefly of pulling rank, asserting his role as leader of the expedition. Then he remembered that the others had stripped him of that authority back on the caravan, after they caught him in his lies. He shrugged in
