She selected another vial that looked just the same and gave it to him. Once Alustriel had passed out the rest of the potions, Khelben raised his hand as though making a toast, and the Chosen drank the magic down.
The effect was swift, but not instantaneous. By the time they finished their potions, the Chosen had shrunk to the size of elves. They continued to diminish before Galaeron's eyes, their fingers growing so small they had to grasp the vials in their whole hands. Alustriel produced two green pills from somewhere within her cloak. Though they could not have been much smaller than peas, in her fingers they looked more the size of Cormyr's purse- hogging gold lions.
'Swallow this when you are ready to be rid of us,' she said. 'There is no hurry except that imposed by your hunger… but in the Lady's name, don't eat! There are some ways I never wish to pass.'
Galaeron reached down to take the pills and said, 'Have no fear of that. I doubt Aris and I will be dining at any banquets.'
Galaeron turned to pass the pill along and found the giant staring south into the forest, his brow drawn into a deep furrow.
'Aris?'
'The dragon-it's coming back,' the giant whispered. 'Ten seconds, perhaps twenty.'
Galaeron passed Aris's pill up-he had to tug on the hem of the giant's tunic to get his attention-then looked back to the Chosen. They were still waist-high.
A faint hiss drifted down through the treetops, and a familiar darkness appeared in the woods ahead.
'We're not going to make it,' Galaeron whispered.
Khelben looked up at Ruha. The witch paled-at least what little could be seen above her veil-but nodded and began to rub her hands together. Galaeron started to protest, but was reminded of the difficult decisions they had already made when his hand started to throb again.
By the time he turned to say his good-byes, Ruha was already racing away from them. She murmured a word of magic, and the sound of her whispering feet began to reverberate through the forest. A soft pulse sounded down through the leaves as the dragon flapped its huge wings, then its black shadow abruptly turned and swept off in pursuit of the fleeing witch.
'Fare you well, my brave friend,' Galaeron whispered.
'You won't be rid of her that easily, elf,' Storm said. She stood only about as high his knee, and her voice was little more than a tinny hiss. 'Ruha spent her childhood dodging blue dragons. She'll be there waiting when Shade falls.'
'I pray so,' Aris whispered. He looked down, then kneeled and extended a hand. 'I think I can do it now, if you're ready.'
'I don't think we'll ever be ready for something like this,'
Khelben said, stepping onto the giant's palm, 'but if you can do it now, the sooner the better.'
Aris tipped his chin back, then dangled Khelben over his open mouth.
'And remember not to chew!' Khelben ordered.
Aris dropped him headlong into his gullet, then made a sour face as he struggled to swallow without closing his mouth. For a moment, Galaeron thought his friend would choke and send Khelben flying through forest, then the arch-mage's black boots finally vanished into the giant's gaping mouth.
Aris made a loud gulping sound, then lowered his hand again.
Laeral and Storm exchanged uneasy glances, and Storm waved her sister forward.
'By all means.'
'You're too kind,' Laeral said with a grimace, then she stepped onto Aris's palm.
She had grown just enough smaller that the giant was able to gulp her down without gagging, and Storm went down even easier. That left only Alustriel and Dove, who-at ankle height-were still too large for Galaeron to swallow.
While they waited, Dove turned to Alustriel. 'You're sure we won't suffocate?'
'That's what the water breathing magic is for.' She looked up at Galaeron and added, 'You will remember to drink lots of water.'
Recognizing it as an order and not a question, Galaeron merely nodded.
'And we won't be digested?' Dove pressed.
'We're Chosen,' Alustriel said. 'A little stomach add isn't going to hurt us. And I do have protection-'
The flicker of a far-off lightning bolt flashed through the forest, followed almost instantly by a muffled crackle. Galaeron glanced over and saw the distant glow of a burning tree.
'What now?' he asked. At about twice the size of his thumb, Alustriel and Dove were still too large for him to swallow-at least without chewing first 'It has to be coming this way.'
'There's only one thing to do.' Alustriel waved a tiny arm, and the five vials shattered into sparkling dust. 'If you wait here, the dragon will know you want to be caught'
The steady throb of wings beating air sounded from the direction of the burning tree and began to grow rapidly louder, and the dragon's dark shadow sailed through the forest in their direction.
Galaeron snatched both Chosen up in his good hand and shouted, 'Run, Aris!'
The giant spun and crashed off to the west. Trying to keep hold of the shrinking Chosen without suffocating or crushing them-in his panic to escape the dragon for a few moments longer, the absurdity of that concern did not strike him-Galaeron turned southward and sprinted along the bank of the stream. He was making it more difficult to capture them both, but he had to try as hard as he could to escape. A dragon that old would know if he tried to make it easy.
The dragon's shadow arrived to the terrific rushing of leaves as the trees shuddered beneath the buffeting of its wings. Galaeron stopped-more from terror than conscious will-and dropped behind a fallen log. The beast passed overhead so closely that he could smell the odor of fresh lightning still clinging to its scales and hear the high branches scraping its belly. He thought for a moment that it would take him before he could swallow the Chosen, but it continued on westward, chasing the crashing steps of Aris.
Galaeron opened his mouth to sigh in relief and found himself panting for breath. The dragon plunged into the forest with a horrific sound of crashing and splintering, and Aris bellowed in shock. The cry changed to one of pain and fear, then rose into the air.
And that was all. The giant was gone, just that fast.
Galaeron remained motionless, half-expecting to hear Aris's body come crashing back into the trees when the dragon realized it still didn't have him. When the giant's cries only grew more distant, he finally stood and looked down at Alustriel and Dove. They were about half the size of his thumb now, small enough that even an elf could swallow them.
'Aris was taken,' he reported, 'but I think it missed-'
The leaves shuddered with a sudden rushing as some-thing settled in the treetops, then the trees began to groan and creak beneath some great weight. Galaeron was seized by such an aura of cold terror that his shadow rose inside him and set his mind whirling in a black tornado. Slowly, he raised his eyes, and above the treetops he saw what looked like black, bare limbs curving across the few visible wedges of starlit sky.
Galaeron stood there, frozen in terror and confusion, trying to understand what he was seeing. An enormous black cord of bare vertebrae snaked across a smear of open sky a dozen paces to his right, bringing into view a fleshless, horned skull as large as a roth?.
The skull slowly rotated around until Galaeron found himself looking into the burning blue star of a huge, lifeless eye.
Galaeron! Alustriel's voice came to him inside his head, slicing through the black fog of fear that was clouding his mind. Now!
Even in his dragon-inspired panic-and this was the worst he had ever experienced-Galaeron knew better than to raise Malygris's curiosity by swallowing the Chosen in front of him. Instead, acting as much by instinct as by plan, he spun on his heel and fled, bringing his hand to his lips as he ran and sucking the pair into his mouth.
A huge claw crashed down above him, bringing with it a torrent of leaves and splintered wood and trapping him in a cage of bony talons.
'Not so fast, elf,' Malygris said. 'You are the one I have been searching for.'
Galaeron swallowed and felt the Chosen sliding down his throat. With any luck, he had remembered not to
