“Enough of this!” Maldred was battling several of the creatures. He tugged a few free and then began gesturing. An instant later, Mugwort’s body—and all the stirges blanketing it—were engulfed in a crackling ball of flame.
The ogres nearby began plucking the stirges off themselves and throwing them on the bonfire, the insects shrieking and popping and releasing a nauseating stench. There was another burst of flame, and then another, as Maldred ignited the corpses of other fallen ogres and slaves.
Finally he tended to himself, tearing one bloated insect after another from his arms and legs, backing toward a pair of Donnag’s ogres and shouting for them to pull the last ones off his back.
Rig and Fiona were standing back to back, a ring of dead stirges at their feet. The Solamnic battled the insects without a word, one hand clenched tightly on her sword, the other reaching up to grab stirges from the air and crush them. Rig was vocal, cursing the swamp and the insects, Maldred, Dhamon, the chieftain Donnag, all the lost gods. The faster the words flew from his lips, the faster his hands moved; he had abandoned the sword, dropping it at his feet in favor of grabbing and squishing the creatures.
“Stirges, huh?” Rig said. “Damn big mosquitos, if you ask me. Fought them before?”
“Hu-uh.” Fiona, too, was busy.
“This many of them?”
A shake of her head.
“Where?”
“Once. When I was visiting the isle of Cristyne. But there were only a small number of them. We’d disturbed a nest. We got out of there fast.”
“We’re winning!” Maldred shouted from across the clearing.
Only a few dozen of the stirges remained, and soon they were dead, too. The ground was covered with black bodies, an insect carpet that crunched as the ogres and slaves trod across it to see if any of their fallen comrades survived.
Rig kicked through the mound in front of him, finding his sword and quickly retrieving it. He shook his head. It was covered with blood—his and the stirges. He scowled as Dhamon approached him, Maldred behind him.
The fires were burning out all around the clearing, but Dhamon was peering into the dense cypresses that surrounded them. “I was certain I heard a voice…”
Maldred nodded.
“I heard it right before these creatures came.”
“Yeah,” Rig said. “Soft and pretty—these… stirges… were anything but. Bet she brought the snakes, too, our mysterious lady. Doesn’t want us in the swamp. Or maybe she just doesn’t want us near Shrentak. The stirges came right after I mentioned that place.”
Dhamon’s eyes narrowed. He thought he spied something with a metallic gleam moving between the fern leaves.
“Shrentak…” The voice was feminine and breathy, the same one they’d heard before the insect onslaught.
“Shrentak would welcome you, o’ man the color of night,” the voice continued. “There are always a few empty cells.” A veil of lianas parted and the figure of a young girl glided into the clearing, her coppery hair disturbed by continuous motion. She appeared no more than five or six, yet she spoke like a much older woman, with a seductress’s voice. And in her small hand she clasped Rig’s glaive, a weapon she shouldn’t have been able to lift. The blade glimmered in the light.
“The girl…” the mariner began.
“From Fetch’s vision,” Dhamon stated.
Their eyes grew wider as a silvery-gray mist formed and encircled her free hand. Dhamon darted forward, able to take only a few steps before he found himself rooted to the spot, the stirge-covered ground shimmering around his boots and holding him fast like a vise. The silvery mist poured from her hand now, blanketing the ground like a low-hanging fog and swirling around everyone’s legs.
Twisting around, Dhamon saw that Rig and Fiona were likewise held. But Maldred was free, the mist somehow was unable to hold him. Now the big man was charging toward the child, bringing his two-handed sword from his back as he moved.
“Fool,” she said simply, gesturing again. “My mistress Sable, who waits in Shrentak, will be angry with you. She’ll order more than my little rain and earthquakes to gnaw at your kingdom.”
A streak of silver shot out like a lightning bolt from her tiny hand, grew to a diaphanous, sparkling cloud, and then draped Maldred like a net. In its misty light, the big man’s form shuddered and expanded, his ruddy skin rippling with even more muscles, and its rich color fading until it became practically white. Then it changed hue again, becoming a pale blue dotted here and there with warts and boils. His short ginger hair grew and thickened, turning stark white and flowing over his shoulders like a lion’s mane.
“What is she doing to him?” Fiona cried.
“Revealing him,” the waif replied evenly. “Chasing away his spell that paints a beautiful human form over his ugly ogre body. Revealing the son of Blöde’s Donnag—my mistress’s enemy!”
When the transformation was complete, Maldred stood more than nine feet tall, an ogre more awesome and imposing, physically, than any of those who accompanied them to the mines. His clothes were now in tatters, barely covering his massive body.
Dhamon stared dumbstruck at the creature he had considered his closest friend. There was no trace of the Maldred he knew, not even the eyes were recognizable.
Fiona and Rig were likewise astonished. The Solamnic felt faint at the sight, the shock of which was enough to drive off at least some of the magic Maldred had cast upon her. She shook her head, trying to chase away… something, she couldn’t tell what. Fiona’s memory seemed hazy. Still, a dozen thoughts rushed at her: the deceptions played upon her and Rig, the trip through the dwarven ruins, the fight in the mines. An image flashed in the back of her mind, of a bozak draconian. One with a gold collar. Had she slain him?
Dhamon shook his head in disbelief, as if the vision of the blue-skinned ogre might disappear and Maldred return in its place. He twisted his head about to face the girl again.
“You’re not revealing anything!” Dhamon spat. “You’re making us believe our friend is a creature! Just like you created the stirges and the snakes!”
“Your friend is an ogre mage,” the girl continued. “Soon to be a dead one. I will relish giving this news to my mistress personally. Sable will reward me well.” She threw back her head and laughed, a cackling sound so incongruous to her small form. Miniature silver lightning bolts arced from her fingers and danced toward Maldred, who was still held by the shimmering mist. “Very well, indeed!”
“No!” Dhamon screamed. He tugged free of his boots, which were held by the child’s magic, and raced toward the girl, drawing Wyrmsbane as he went.
The child was faster. Lightning bolts struck the ogre in the chest, skin sizzling and popping and burning. Maldred twitched, but didn’t cry out. Rather, he fought against the cloudlike spell that held him in place, gesturing and humming loudly with his own incantation.
Dhamon was nearly upon the child figure when more bolts flew, again aimed at the huge ogre. They struck their mark once more—but a heartbeat after Maldred had retaliated with his own magic.
His spell complete, a burst of flame erupted from the ogre mage’s flailing hands. It was a riot of color, green and blue, crackling wildly and shooting forward like a gout of dragon’s breath. It grew and changed color, becoming a great fiery red-orange ball that, with a near-deafening “whoosh,” engulfed the child and several of the trees around her. Despite the wetness of the swamp, the trees burned, becoming cinders in an instant.
Dhamon skidded to a stop and stared at the smoldering trunks. The girl had been vaporized and was gone. Or was she?
He turned to Maldred, face filled with anger and a dozen questions.