Night of the Dragon

TWENTY-ONE

Iridi had not abandoned her companions, at least, not according to Rhonin's back-up plan. The draenei felt otherwise, though, and prayed that she would soon be able to return to help the wizard and the others.

And, by helping them, she had to either finish freeing Zzeraku— whom she especially felt ashamed of leaving behind—or, miracle of miracles, find Krasus and Kalec.

If they still lived.

The trouble was, the priestess had no time to do any of what she desired. She could sense Sinestra's monstrous creation converging even now on the cavern and, through the staff, that it was more powerful than ever. Indeed, some of that power came from a most disturbing force...the energies of the other staff. Iridi wondered if the murderous thief realized just what he had done.

As for the draenei, it had not been by her own staff's power that she had vanished, but rather a one-time spell that Rhonin had given to her just for this emergency. All she had had to do was think of the need to escape and then stare in the direction she wanted. Rhonin had purposely created the spell so that she and only she would know her destination.

However, she had not gone where she had expected. While the wizard himself could take her from one point to another, the spell he had given her had for some reason not been as efficient. Now Iridi stood In the midst of some tunnel somewhere within Grim Batol with no notion as to her location or how she might manage to help anyone.

Then, a noise that she by no stretch of the imagination would have desired to hear filled the tunnel. By now, she recognized the savage growls and hisses of the skardyn and, if she estimated correctly, there were more than a score heading her way.

And barely had the priestess thought that than the skardyn poured toward her from a side passage. They clearly had not been hunting for her, but, the moment that her presence became clear, the monstrous dwarves let out hisses and howls of anticipation. They raced toward her, teeth bared.

Iridi turned the staff, using the lower end to catch the first skardyn in the throat. As that one fell, a second seized the staff by the long handle and clung to it. The weight forced the draenei's arm down.

Another skardyn leaped at her as she was pulled down. The priestess stretched out her foot, letting the creature's own momentum be the force that knocked it out when its head struck. Iridi then swung the staff around, using the skardyn clinging to it as a weight against its comrades. She bowled over three, then let go of the naaru gift.

It vanished, sending the skardyn who had held onto it rolling down the corridor. However, the scaly dwarf did not go far, for almost immediately it collided with an immense, black form.

"Draenei..." he rasped. "Keep her alive...barely..."

The remaining skardyn closed on her. Iridi raised her hand to summon the staff—

With startling reflexes, the drakonid lashed her wrist. Iridi's hand jerked and the staff, just materializing, faded to so much mist.

Rask pulled and the draenei fell forward. As she did, she managed to summon again the staff, but by then the skardyn were almost upon her.

Then, a battle cry filled the passage. From behind the drakonid lunged a single dwarven warrior who appeared to have only one good arm... and one hand at that.

Iridi could not believe her eyes. "Rom?"

The dwarven commander swung hard at the drakonid, who ducked at the last moment. The flat of the ax head caught Rask on the side of the skull and while from most warriors that blow would not have been enough to even bother the drakonid, from the powerful dwarf it managed to stun his much larger foe.

But Rom did not follow up, instead, racing toward the draenei. Iridi, meanwhile, had taken advantage of the dwarf's appearance to regain her footing. She kicked at one startled skardyn, then tripped another with the staff.

However, in the low, narrow tunnel, the naaru gift proved as much impediment as help. It was too long to properly maneuver with so many skardyn around. Iridi finally dismissed it, instead relying on the battle arts taught by her order to all its members.

The momentum of a skardyn enabled her to send the creature into one of its comrades. The priestess leaped over another foe, then kicked back with one leg as she landed, sending the skardyn into a wall.

Rom, meanwhile, simply cut his way through the bestial figures like a farmer scything grain. Three skardyn fell before he reached Iridi, with two more propped against the walls, clutching their wounds.

That way!" he growled, indicating the opposite direction from which he had materialized. "Where does it go?"

"Somewhere! 'Tis all I know or care! Going back's not an option, my lady!"

He spoke truly. Rask had recovered and the black drakonid even now shoved his way past skardyn, the whip once more ready. For the first time, Iridi also paid attention to the heavy ax the senior guard had strapped to his back. Rask could not use it well enough in this tunnel, which was why he needed the whip. However, she did not think it wise for her or Rom to be near when the ax would prove more an option. The drakonid looked capable of chopping either adversary in half with but a single swing.

Rom pushed her ahead of him, although whether that was a safer position was debatable. Iridi said nothing, more than willing to defend them from any who attacked from the front.

"Gods!" the dwarf burst out. "Wish I had my hand back! I'm itchin' all over! Figures those damned things would have fleas!"

But fleas were the least of their concerns, for although they had left many skardyn behind, more than enough pursued. Rask either urging them on or, if they were too slow, tossing them out of his path.

A spherical missile shot passed her head. Glancing back, Iridi saw that some of the skardyn were armed with the sinister crossbow devices she had seen in the great cavern. Now and then they would pause to fire, then continue their chase.

The two still had no idea where they headed, but they ran there as fast as they could. However, the way was not entirely clear, as skardyn dropped out of holes in the celling or popped out of those in the ground. Word had evidently been passed on ahead, although Iridi could make no sense of the snapping and growling the creatures made.

Behind her, Rom let out a grunt as a skardyn leaping out of a side passage snagged his leg. A second joined it, the two quickly dragging the dwarf back.

The draenei summoned the staff, thrusting the crystal into the feral faces. So near to Rom, she dared not use the staff's power to its fullest, but a sudden blaze of light called up by her was enough to make both skardyn squeal, then release their holds and slip back into the comforting dark. Even more so than dwarves, the mutated creatures were sensitive to brightness.

As she helped Rom to his feet, a hulking form loomed over both.

Grinning, Rask pulled back the whip.

Iridi thrust the staff up. Rask easily avoided it by leaning back.

But the drakonid was not her target. Rather, it was the ceiling above him. The staff broke loose some of the rock... causing more to collapse.

Releasing the staff, Iridi grabbed Rom and pulled him forward. Rask made a belated snatch at the dwarf's boots, but missed.

The draenei and the dwarf ran as the passage caved in where Iridi had struck.

"You know, ye could've brought the whole damned thing down on us!" Rom commented, his manner of speech slipping to olderhabits under pressure.

"I perceived a fault that I thought would work for us just as it did," the priestess explained. "I followed the same principles my teacher used when showing novices like myself how to defend against physical attack."

"Well, any dwarf who's lived in tunnels most o' his life will tell ye that fault you hit could've just as easily burled us rather than block the drakonid's way."

She did not respond, suspecting that he did indeed know better than she. Still, the fates had been kind to her, at least for that moment. How long that might remain the case, though, Iridi could not say.

They came to an intersection, where they paused to choose a path. Neither she nor Rom could here tell which might be the better choice.

The dwarf glanced behind them. "The skardyn'll still be digging their way through... unless they know a better way to reach us." He eyed the draenei. "I know I was lost, but what were you doin' here, my lady?"

Iridi quickly told him her tale, finishing with Rhonin's spell that had enabled her to vanish in the face of Sinestra's wrath.

"So, the wizard's here, eh? I'd say good, but what you've told me makes me wonder if anythin' has a chance against that bitch and her damned creation!"

"I believe Zzeraku can help us...and will be willing to."

"Zzeraku—that what you call that thing they got tied up?" He gave her a wide-eyed stare. "You really think freein' that thing's a good idea?"

"Yes. Rhonin also believes that we need to free him. That was why he wanted me to be able to flee even without him. Zzeraku is key...."

The dwarven commander rubbed his bearded chin. "Lettin' loose another terror in hopes it'll stop the other! I must be mad to believe you know what you're doin'...." He considered the two tunnels. "Pick one."

Frowning, the draenei hesitated, then indicated the one to their right.

"My luck's been bad for the past hours and since I'd have chosen the left. I think we go your way."

"As simple as that? We take a guess?"

Rom snorted. "You're a priestess of some order. I bet your teachings have something to say about luck or guesses...."

She nodded. "One makes their own luck, good or ill... and there are no guesses, merely faulty concentration."

"Yeah, that sounds like something a priest would say." And, with that, Rom started down her choice.

With one quick look over her shoulder, the draenei followed.

His roar again shook Grim Batol. Heedless of the presence of their mistress's enemies, the skardyn in the great chamber scattered for the nearest holes. The dragonspawn and the one drakonid remained, but even the black behemoths looked as if they wished they were elsewhere.

The reptiles his "mother" had called raptors cowered, fear so unknown to them that they suffered the greater for it now. Even the skardyn's cousins, the dwarves, pressed themselves against the walls as if hoping not to be seen.

Dargonax laughed. Creating fear in others was a sensation he found he enjoyed.

There were only three who did not cower. Dargonax had never seen the nether dragon before, although he had tasted much of the captive's essence. The nether dragon could not move, but rage clearly ruled him. Dargonax admired that aspect of the other dragon, if nothing else. He was far, far more than this pitiful prisoner, far, far more than anything... except those that his "mother" had promised would come next.

She, of course, was the second of the three. Still in her mortal guise, she smiled with pride at what she had wrought. Dargonax spread his vast, leathery wings as best as the chamber allowed, the needle-sharp points at each end scraping the very rock. His amethyst form could have filled it completely had he stretched himself to his fullest. He was two, perhaps three times the size of the nether dragon. The edges of his body had a misty glow to them, as if they were not of substance, but shadow.

"This is my child," Sinestra informed those who could still listen, but one in particular. "Is he not magnificent?"

But the third of those who dared be without fear curtly replied, "He's a damned obscenity...."

Dargonax thrust his massive head at the insulter. A hundred teeth each the length of a sword filled a mouth capable of swallowing a dozen raptors in a single gulp. At the front of the mouth, monstrous fangs twice as long as the other teeth gave the twilight dragon an even more nightmarish "smile." Atop his head, curled horns that thrust back, vied with wicked barbs and spikes that descended down the skull and neck and then seemed to explode in incredible number all over the rest of Dargonax's humongous form. Each time the twilight dragon breathed, he also seemed to swell a little more. His pupilless orbs, larger than a giant's shield, reflected the puny robed figure about to die.

"No, my Dargonax!" commanded Sinestra, her tone showing no concern for the behemoth's victim. "Not... yet..."

He drew back. His body pulsated, shimmered. He looked at the black dragon. "But, Mother... you do not command me, anymore...."

The gargantuan beast started to lunge again—and suddenly pain wracked his body. He twisted and turned, but could not escape it. It felt as if his body were about to rip into a million tiny pieces....

"Now did I not warn you about behaving?" Deathwing's consort purred. "Did you think that you had outgrown my control? You know that you can never escape what is within you...."

He could not answer, the agony too much for him to do anything but scream. He, the most monstrous of beasts, fell upon the chamber floor, writhing.

And a watching Rhonin, who knew the powers wielded by one of the Earth-Warder's flight, wondered just what spell she had cast, for it was not normal. Indeed, knowing there had been a familiar foulness about it, one that he had not felt since... since he had destroyed the Demon Soul during the fall of the orcs here.

The wizard's eyes widened. Since the Demon Soul...

As for the behemoth, he finally recovered enough to gaze at his creator and tormentor. "You tricked me! You tricked me!" he managed. "But I am stronger! Stronger! I am Dargonax! I am—"

He screamed once more, then stilled. His body continued to shimmer... its glow at one point almost perfectly matching that of the insidious creation of Deathwing.

"You are what I say you are...." Sinestra said with a mad smile. "My loving child..."

Vereesa ran back into the chamber where Krasus hung. "Did you hear that?"

"Yes, it has begun. She has unleashed doom upon all of us."

"Great one—Krasus—is there anything I can do for you?"

The dragon mage managed to focus on her. She knew the truth, that he could see. There was no sense telling her otherwise. "No...it is up to you and Kalec..."

At that moment, they both heard a groan from the other chamber. The high elf looked from Krasus to the sound and then back again. She appeared caught between conflicting desires.

"Go to—go to him—" The effort was too much. The red's world swam. Vereesa became a blur.

“I will return shortly!" she called to him. “I swear!"

But as she departed, Krasus began an accounting of his own life. He did not have long and he wanted to know if he had actually done much of worth to Azeroth or if he had merely been pursuing a vanity of his own. Would those who recalled him after he was gonethink of him with good thoughts... or curse his memory?

Yet, barely had he started when a light filled his eyes. A brilliant, soothing light that took away all of his agony.

So... there is no more time... I am already dying.

A voice called to him, then. There was a distinct familiarity to it and, since it was female, he chose it to be the one that meant the most to him.

"Alex-Alexstrasza?"

A figure formed in the light.

Vereesa rushed in among the eggs and molten pits, fearful that the blue's weakness had turned his condition for the worse. However, upon seeing Kalec, the ranger stopped short.

A bright illumination surrounded the younger dragon, but it differed from that of the chamber or of the Demon Soul near Krasus. It had a pleasant warmth that even Vereesa could feel, a warmth that reminded her of the rising sun.

Kalec murmured something. One hand reached up as if to caress an invisible figure leaning over him.

At the same time, the ranger heard a voice from where Krasus hung...a feminine voice.

Thinking that Sinestra had returned, Vereesa did not hesitate to rush back to the red dragon's aid. She knew very well the odds were against her, but did not care.

But when she entered, there was no sign of Deathwing's insidious consort. Indeed, there was at first no sign of the dragon mage, either. The stalactite hung perfectly clean, not even a trace of Krasus's life fluids clinging to it or pooling on the floor.

Confused, she turned around in search of him—

A powerful fist caught her in the chin. Vereesa spun about, then fell.

"Well, what a delight to see you, my dear cousin," Zendarin growled. "That makes two objectives still dealt with before I departthis madhouse...."

Stunned, Vereesa rolled onto her back. "Where—what have you done with him?"

The blood elf glanced contemptuously at her. "If you're referring to that mongrel creature you call a mate, I've done nothing with him, although since he's come to your ‘rescue,’ I imagine he'll soon end up in the gullet of her beast!" He swung the staff at her, the crystal point just barely grazing the ranger's thigh. Vereesa let out a howl and rolled farther away as if blown there by a fierce wind. "I'll deal with you in a moment, cousin. I've something far more important than you awaiting me right here."

Zendarin turned on the reconstituted Demon Soul. With the staff, he began drawing a circle of light around the dread artifact.

He meant to steal it, Vereesa saw. Steal it from his own ally. The ranger was tempted to let him do it without any trouble, for surely it would weaken Sinestra's efforts, but she had no idea what had happened to Krasus or whether she might, in the end, need the Soul to find or cure him... assuming that he was even alive. More to the point, surely nothing good could come of her cousin wielding the artifact.

If only there was some way to destroy it! But Vereesa believed Deathwing's consort when she said that nothing born of Azeroth could now affect the evil object.

Her gaze narrowed. But the same could not be said for Zendarin himself...

She gripped the tiny blade, waiting for the moment. As Zendarin finished his circle—and the glow of the Demon Soul grew muted— the high elf threw.

But something made her cousin turn at the last moment. He brought the staff between him and the soaring blade. Vereesa's missile deflected off the staff.

Zendarin hissed as the blade left a dripping crease along his left cheek. He aimed the staff at his cousin—

The ranger was already on the move. The blood elf's strike only decimated rock and dirt. He spun around to face her just as Vereesaleapt at him.

Zendarin had all the lithe grace of any of their kind, but he was no practiced ranger and, despite her recent shift to motherhood. Vereesa was still more than fit enough to be one of the best of her calling. She fell upon her cousin and the two struggled, the staff the only thing between them.

They crashed against the base of the Demon Soul's resting place. One side caved in, showering them a moment later with limestone and more. However, the artifact itself—still surrounded by the energy of the staff—remained exactly where it was even though it no longer rested on anything.

With a glare, Zendarin tried to send her hurtling away. However, Vereesa gripped the staff tight, the results being that both were spun around and around and around.

Again, they fell into each other, this time with the blood elf atop.

"You're weak!" he growled in her ear. "A fading memory of a fading people! The high elves are gone... The blood elves are ascendant!"

"Do not dignify yourself by thinking that you are even worthy of being called a blood elf, much less the race you forsake for that foul role!" Vereesa retorted. "I have faced others before you and they had more worth, more honor, than you! You are a thief, a murderer, and a parasite! Nothing more! All elven lines would reject you, just as I reject any blood tie between us!"

"How terrible for me! Spurned by my dear cousin who sleeps with animals..."

She shoved them both to their feet. "You are not fit to walk In Rhonin's footsteps...." The ranger spit in his face. At that moment, a desperate notion came to her, one so wildly improbable and yet the only hope that Vereesa had. "And without that stolen staff, you are nothing to anyonel"

He grinned. "Aah, but I do have the staff... and it can do many things for me, even while you cling to it..."

The large crystal turned as bright as the sun.

Vereesa threw her weight into thrusting the staff to her right. At the same time, she said a silent farewell to Rhonin and her sons.

The crystal struck the Demon Soul just as Zendarin unleashed the former's energies.

Someone grabbed the ranger from behind, tearing her from her cousin.

Zendarin Windrunner shrieked as both the head of the staff and the Demon Soul shattered. He was enveloped by energies from both, energies that tore him in opposite directions even as shards from the Demon Soul went flying throughout the chamber and the ruined staff burnt to ash. Zendarin, his face spreading wider and wider, reached for his cousin as if seeking her help.

The staff and its power were of Outland, not Azeroth. The ranger had prayed that its unusual energies would do what Sinestra had prevented her own world's magic from accomplishing—destroy the Demon Soul once and forever, even if it cost the high elf her life.

"You have all the magic you could ever hunger for," Vereesa murmured unsympathetically. Her own life meant nothing now that she had made certain of her cousin's demise. The children, at least, would be safe. "Why do you not savor it, Zendarin?"

The blood elf ceased shrieking as his body tore in two, the halves quickly dissipating In the spiraling energies. As the unleashed magic more and more filled the chamber, the ranger suddenly recalled her mysterious rescuer.

"We must keep moving!" Kalec shouted in her ear. "Hurry! There's not much time!"

He looked and sounded far healthier than when Vereesa had seen him last, but she knew that could not be due to the Demon Soul being reshattered. Not even the blue dragon could have recovered in the space of a single second, much less have also seized her before the energies could do with her as they had her cousin. Still, Vereesa was glad to see Kalec and grateful for his quick action.

He dragged her toward the other chamber, but the intense energies began to pull them back. Kalec cast a shield around them, yet that barely slowed their backward movement.

"It's too much for me!" the blue shouted.

"What can we do?"

"You do nothing!" shouted another voice. Krasus's voice.

And in the next breath, the unleashed magic suddenly condensed, then rose up through the very rock, vanishing. As it did, both the high elf and Kalec fell forward.

A stillness settled over the chamber, a stillness broken by gloved hands raising up both of them by the arm.

The dragon mage smiled grimly at the pair... and the miracle of Kalec's recovery was minute compared to that of the red dragon. Krasus was whole, utterly whole, although he did not seem so pleased by that.

"Praise be!" Vereesa hugged him. "But how? Where did you get the power to do all this, especially bind such a wound—" "I am not responsible." "Then, it was Kalec, after all!"

"I've done nothing for him," the blue piped up. "I don't even remember him having any wound. It was a bad one, I take it?"

"Sinestra drove a stalactite through his chest and left him dying upon the ceiling!"

Krasus grimaced at this recollection. "It was very nearly my time."

Kalec shook his head in wonder. "I'd think that I'd recall doing anything like that, if I even could do it. It was no miracle on my account that he's alive—"

"Ah, but there you are wrong, young one." As both looked at Krasus in puzzlement, the dragon mage solemnly explained, "Even though you have felt the loss of Anveena, you have also always felt that she was in your heart, your soul, have you not?" “I have. What of it?"

"I shall tell you as we move! There is much at stake!" As he led them toward another passage, Krasus said, "She left you a small token of her own love, Kalec. A tiny part of her that did not return to being the Sunwell. It was what kept you alive when, under Sinestra's influence, you sought to slay me."

"Great Korialstrasz... I never truly meant—"

"There is justification to your anger, but your violence was not by your choice. I know that. Sinestra was all at fault. The incident is forgotten. As I was saying, what Anveena left in you helped preserve, then save you. That says much."

"Anveena..." Despite their situation, the blue smiled. His gaze looked to the unseen heavens.

"And, because I was near... and because she sought me to help protect you afterward...that same essence also healed me. It took all of its power to save us both and it shall never be able to do more now than remind you of her love. I sensed it earlier on, but never knew it—she—was capable of this much."

Kalec grabbed his wrist. "You talked with her—"

"She spoke to me. I have told you all she said during her brief materialization... and when I say her, I mean that which she left to protect you."

"Anveena.. . I'm glad she was able to bring you back from so near the brink. If I'd had a choice, I'd have had her take care of you before me."

The dragon mage guided them into a darkened corridor. "And that is why she had the power to do that much, I believe." He grunted. "But as ungrateful as it sounds, I would wish that she had more to give us yet, for we will sorely need it."

"But why?" asked Vereesa. "With both my unlamented cousin's stolen staff and the Demon Soul no more, this surely puts to an end Sinestra's mad dreams!"

"There are variations upon variations to that mad dream as Deathwing's foul family has shown time and again... and one of those is the reason we must hurry! Have you not thought of what happened to all that was released by the destruction of both creations? Kalec, have you?"

The blue hesitated in mid-step. "Do you mean—"

"Yes—" At that moment, there was a rumble from above. It shook the passage so much that Kalec had to quickly shield them before they would be buried under a small collapse. Krasus wasted no time on gratitude, instead remarking, "It has reached what has been waiting for it. We are too late again."

"But where did it go?" Vereesa demanded. "Where did it go?"

Yet, it was not the dragon mage who answered that, but rather, Kalec.

"It's gone to Dargonax..." he said. "It has to have gone to him...."