was the High King on his magical winged steed.
Normally Mikahl would have landed by the huge fountain in front of the palace, or even flown into the structure through one of the large rectangular holes left when Pael destroyed the glorious stained-glass depictions that once filled them. The presence of the elves, though, and the collective sorrow and concern his sword picked up from the group, brought him down between them and the soldiers. He nearly cursed when he saw Dieter. So much did the elf resemble Vaegon, and so weary and travel-drained was Mikahl, that he almost believed he was seeing a ghost.
Every human in sight had fallen to a knee, leaving the elves standing with uncertainty and utter astonishment showing in their wild-looking yellow eyes.
Dieter made a half-bow and the rest of his people followed. Mikahl stepped from the bright horse and placed his palm against Dieter’s heart, in the old elven gesture of greeting. Dieter smiled broadly as he returned it.
“You’re Dieter, then,” Mikahl asked, following Starkle’s buzzing path back to the palace with his eyes.
Dieter nodded. “You’re King Mikahl.”
“Aye.” Mikahl’s voice was soft and full of sadness. “Is this all of you who survived the demons?”
Again Dieter nodded. “The new Queen Mother and her escort still live, as well,” he said grimly. “We can feel her life force, but we know not where she is.”
“The demons are gathering to attack,” Mikahl said, wondering if Hyden Hawk was here. For some reason he knew his friend wasn’t. If he had been, these elven refugees would have long since been admitted to the city. “Come, Dieter, bring your people. I’m too weary to think about the past failings of our races.” Mikahl sighed heavily. “We will be lucky if we can win ourselves a future.”
Chapter 53
In the halls of Afdeon, near King Aldar’s personal teleportal, battle raged. The giants had contained most of the demons that emerged inside the tower city, but there was more than one teleportal built into the castle. Some demons had escaped, and now several bloody skirmishes were taking place on a number of floors. The demons and devils wanted out, but the giants fought them with fearless intensity. The hellborn creatures were either destroyed or driven back into the holes from which they were trying to escape.
Corva and Jicks fought madly at first, but had been forced out of the way by the giants and their wild- swinging axes and wide-bladed swords. At the moment they were shuttling spears and pole axes up from an armory on a lower floor.
After battling alongside the guardians with the Tokamac’s magic that first night, Hyden had gotten a grasp of how to manipulate the power of the crystal Verge. He’d accidentally blown a hole the size of a farmhouse into the side of the castle’s wall. Near that particular teleportal the icy air bit almost as sharply as steel, and the warriors had to fight in shifts to keep from exhausting themselves in the thin air. Hyden, now asserting his will over the Tokamac Verge instead of the other way around, was trying to clear the guardians back from the bottomless portal hole in the floor so that he could cast his next spell.
A Choska demon had broken free and was awkwardly fighting its way toward the blast hole Hyden had made in the castle. In the close confines, it couldn’t open its wings and gain the advantage of flight, but still its toothy maw and razor claws did formidable damage. More than one giant lay dead or dying.
A shout from Durge relaying the human wizard’s intentions gave Hyden the opening he needed. Some insectoid creature with beetle-like pincers on its antennaed head was half in, half out of the hole. It took the sudden pause in the giants’ attack as a chance to skitter all the way out of the breach. It almost made it.
Using the power of the ring he wore, and the magnifying crystal Verge, Hyden conjured up a sheet of ice slightly larger than the hole in the floor and easily a foot thick. Why he hadn’t thought of such a simple thing earlier was beyond him. The creature coming out of the hole was suddenly stuck. The lower quarter of its fat, slime-filled body was crunched and pinned in place by the massive slab. The big bug twisted and clicked and hissed, impaling a staggering swordsman through the chest with one of its pincers, and lashing the hand off of another with its flailing barbed forearms. The fit was quelled quickly, though, as other guardians carrying long poleaxes reached in and filled the bug’s exoskeleton with holes.
A sudden roar, so loud and powerful that even the Choska stopped battling for a moment, came from outside the castle. The Choska recovered its wits first and darted for the jagged opening to make its escape.
Hyden charged into a room where the door frame had been turned into an archway by the rumbling quakes earlier. He threw open the wooden shutters and climbed onto the enormous sill. When he looked out he expected to see the massive red dragon Claret. What he saw was as baffling as it was terrifying.
Two blue-scaled dragons, both more than a hundred feet from snout to tail, were spiraling through the pillowy steam. Both wyrms were drakes, and they seemed to be challenging one another to battle. Hyden sensed the territorial instincts roiling within them, almost as clearly as if he were thinking the thoughts himself. One of the blues came streaking by close, its sapphire scales glittering like sun-bathed jewels in the afternoon sun.
The Choska demon won free of the guardians and shot into Hyden’s view. It flapped its leathery wings frantically to carry it away from the giants’ castle. Then, seeing the dragons, it dove like a rock into the steam. Instantly, like a pair of winged canines chasing a thrown ball, the two blue dragons dove after it. The steam closed over their passage so quickly that the sky was now empty, as if they had never been there.
A distant roar came from below, followed by another and a short, high-pitched shriek. Suddenly, almost half a mile away, one of the blues shot up out of the steamy cloud with the limp, bloody Choska barely protruding from its mouth. The other dragon was right on its tail.
Brothers, Hyden decided. The two blue dragons were brothers, but why were they here? Where did they come from? The hope of riding one of them to Xwarda came and went as he probed their minds. These were wild wyrms that lacked the compassion and intelligence of a creature such as Claret. A yell full of pain came from inside the castle, drawing Hyden’s attention. Quickly, he ran back to the teleportal chamber and began healing those that he could. Most of those who were uninjured had gone on the lift to join one of the other battles still raging in the castle. When Hyden was finished healing, he went after them. Not far from another skirmish, he saw Cade talking to one of the captains of the guardians.
“Will you ice over this one, like before?” Cade asked.
“It won’t work here,” Hyden answered.
“Why not?” the giant asked, as if all of his hope escaped with his sighing breath.
“The hole I made in the castle up there keeps the cold air flowing over the ice slab,” Hyden explained. “Down here, the ice will just melt away. The closer to the cauldron we get, the faster it will melt.”
“Is there nothing else you can do?”
“I have an idea,” Hyden said, pondering cause and effect. Judging how much the Tokamac crystal’s power would exaggerate spell-formed stone, versus frozen water, was impossible to say. “You’ll have to clear the level below the teleportal just in case. Better yet, two levels, immediately under where the symbols are carved.”
Cade nodded and strode off to pass the order. The guardian captain led Hyden to the battle. Hyden wasn’t surprised by the amount of damage he could see as they approached. The loud clang of steel and beast, and the yells of excited giants filled the air. What looked to have once been a floor full of walled storage rooms was now nothing more than a rubble-filled expanse.
“We need a healer, wizard,” someone yelled. “Durge has taken…”
Hyden tuned out the rest of the words. It didn’t matter who it was. Knowing that it was one of his friends could only distract him from his efforts.
More than one giant needed healing. Hyden moved around them, and Jicks came staggering up only to collapse on the floor at his feet. Through the dusty chaos, Hyden saw Corva darting gracefully among the giants. The elf loosed an arrow here and there at a massive, tentacled creature that was destroying everything it came across. After making the healing gestures and speaking the words over Jicks, Hyden stood and started toward the hellborn monster with a purpose.
Hyden’s hopes were plummeting. Not about Afdeon or the battles raging around him, but about Xwarda and the Wardstone, and the fact that his brother had found his legions. The old bone reader had told them he would. She told them a lot of things. Without the teleportals, Hyden’s hope of getting to Xwarda in time to keep the
