Laurana began to edge backward, still holding the sword, still keeping it steady, though her tired arm muscles quivered with the strain. Step by step, she moved back to the wall where she had placed the dragonlance to have it ready within reach. She groped behind her with her right hand, feeling for the lance, for she did not dare take her eyes off Beryl. At first, Laurana could not find the lance, and fear seized her. Then her fingers touched the metal, warm in the sunshine. Her hand closed over it, and she sighed deeply.
Below Dumat was shrieking for those holding the ropes to pull hard. The elves and Knights who had been manning the ballistae and wielding the slings dropped their weapons and leaped to grab hold of the ropes, adding their weight to those already pulling. Slowly but inexorably, they began to drag the enmeshed dragon closer to the ground.
Laurana drew a deep breath, summoned all her strength. Silently speaking the name of Sturm, she sought inside herself for the courage and the will and the resolve that had been with him on the tower when death dived at him. Her one fear was that Beryl would attack her instantly upon being freed of the spell and breathe the deadly gas on her before Laurana could slay the dragon. If Beryl did that, if Laurana died before she could achieve her mission, the elves on the ground would die before they had accomplished their goal, for Beryl would breathe her poison on them, and they would fall where they stood.
Laurana had never felt so alone. There was no one to help her. Not Sturm, not Tanis, not the Marshal. Not the gods.
Yet at the end, we are all of us alone, she reminded herself. Those I have loved held my hand on the long journey, but when we came to the final parting, I released them, and they walked forward, leaving me behind. Now, it is my turn to walk forward. To walk alone.
Laurana lifted the sword with the Lost Star and flung it over the parapet. The spell was broken. Beryl’s eyes blinked, then blazed with fury. Beryl had two objectives. The first was to free herself from the infuriating snare. The second was to kill the elf who had tricked her, catching her in a magical trap that a hatchling might have had wit enough to avoid. Beryl could deal with one or the other. She was about to kill the elf, when a particularly violent pull of the ropes jerked her downward. She heard laughter. The laughter came not from below her, not from the elves. The laughter came from the sky above.
Two of her minions, both reds, both dragons she had secretly suspected of plotting against her, wheeled among the clouds far, far above, and they were laughing. Beryl knew immediately the reds were laughing at her, watching and enjoying her humiliation.
She had never trusted them, these native dragons. She knew quite well they served her out of fear, not out of loyalty. Ascribing to them motives of treachery best suited to herself, Beryl concluded irrationally that the red dragons were in league with the elves. The reds were biding their time, waiting for her to become thoroughly ensnared, then they would close in for the kill.
Beryl dismissed Laurana from consideration. A lone elf—what harm could she do compared to two treacherous red dragons?
As Medan had said, Beryl was a coward at heart. She had never been trapped like this, rendered helpless, and she was terrified. She must free herself from this net, must return to the skies. Only there, where she could wheel and dive and use her enormous weight and strength to her advantage, would she be safe from her foes. Once in the heavens, she could destroy these wretched elves with a single breath. Once in the heavens, she could deal with her traitor servants.
Anger burned inside her. Beryl struggled to rid herself of the entangling ropes that hampered her flight. Heaving her shoulders, she lifted her wings and thrashed her tail, attempting to snap the ropes. She clawed at them with her sharp talons and turned her head to snap at them with her teeth. She had thought to break the puny ropes easily, but she had not counted on the strength of the magic or the will of those who had twined their love for their people and their homeland into the ropes.
A few strands broke, but most held. Her wild lashing and gyrations caused some elves to lose their grips. Some were dragged off rooftops or slammed into buildings.
Beryl cast a glance at the red dragons, saw that they had flown closer. Fear evolved into panic. Maddened, Beryl sucked in a huge breath, intending to destroy these insects who had so humbled her. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a flash of silver. . . . Laurana watched in awe and terror as Beryl fought frantically to free herself. The dragon’s head thrashed wildly. She shrieked curses and snapped at the ropes with her teeth. Appalled by the ferocity of the beast’s rage, Laurana could not move. She stood trembling, clutching the lance in sweating hands. Her glance slid to the doorway that led to the arched alcove beyond, led to safety.
Beryl drew in a huge breath, drew it into lungs that would breathe out death on Laurana’s people. Seizing the dragonlance with both hands, Laurana cried Quisalan elevas! to Tanis and Sturm and those who had gone before her. “Our loves-bond eternal.” Aiming the lance at Beryl’s lashing head, Laurana lunged at the dragon.
The dragonlance gleamed silver in the light of the strange sun. Putting all the strength of her body and soul and heart into her effort, Laurana plunged the dragonlance into Beryl’s skull.
Blood spurted out in a great torrent, splashing over Laurana. Though her hands were wet and slippery with the dragon’s blood, she held desperately to the lance, shoving it deeper into the dragon’s head, as deep as it would go.
Pain—burning, flaring pain—exploded in Beryl’s brain, as if someone had bored a hole through the bone, let in the blazing sun to set her soul on fire. Beryl gagged on her own poison breath. Attempting to free herself from the horrible pain, she jerked her head.
The dragon’s sudden, spasmodic movement lifted Laurana off the balcony. She hung suspended in the air, perilously close to the edge. Her hands lost their hold on the lance, and she fell to the balcony’s floor, landing on her back. Bone snapped, pain flashed, but then, strangely, she could feel nothing. She tried to stand, but her limbs would not obey her brain’s command. Unable to move, she stared into the dragon’s gaping jaws.
Beryl’s pain did not end. It grew worse. Half blinded by the blood that poured into her eyes, yet she could still see her attacker. She tried to breathe death on the elf woman, but the dragon failed, choked on her own poison.
Consumed by fear, maddened by pain, thinking only to avenge herself on the elf that had done her such terrible harm, Beryl brought her massive head crashing down on the Tower of the Sun.
The shadow of death fell over Laurana. She looked away from death, looked into the sun.
The strange sun, hanging in the sky. It seemed forlorn, bewildered . . . as though it were lost.
. . . a lost star . . .
Laurana closed her eyes against the darkening shadow.
“Our loves-bond . . .”
Hanging onto one of the ropes, pulling with all his strength, Dumat was not able to see what had happened on the tower, but he knew by Beryl’s fearful shriek and the fact that they were not all dead of poison gas that Laurana must have dealt a blow to the creature. Dragon’s blood and saliva splashed on him and around him, a hideous shower. The dragon was hurt. Now was the time to take advantage of her weakness.
“Pull, damn you! Pull!” Dumat yelled hoarsely, his voice rasping, almost gone. “She’s not finished! Not by a long shot!”
Elves and humans who felt their strength ebbing in the battle with the dragon rallied and flung themselves with renewed energy on the ropes. Blood, running from their hands where the skin had been peeled off, stained the ropes. The pain of the raw nerves was intense, and some cried out even as they continued to tug, while others gritted their teeth and pulled.