Everywhere the hailstones struck, tiny cracks appeared in the crystalline walls. Rainwater seeped through these cracks, trickled like tears down the walls.
One particularly loud crash came from the vicinity of the chambers of Goldmoon, founder and mistress of the Citadel. The mystics heard the sound of breaking glass and ran in fear to see if the elderly woman was safe. To their astonishment, they found the door to her rooms locked. They beat upon it, called upon her to let them inside.
A voice, low and awful to hear, a voice that was Goldmoon’s beloved voice and yet was not, ordered them to leave her in peace, to go about their duties. Others needed their aid, she said.
She did not. Baffled, uneasy, most did as they were told. Those who lingered behind reported hearing the sound of sobbing, heartbroken and despairing.
“She, too, has lost her power,” said those outside her door.
Thinking that they understood, they left her alone.
When morning finally came and the sun rose to shine a lurid red in the sky, people stood about in dazed horror, looking upon the destruction wrought during the terrible night. The mystics went to Goldmoon’s chamber to ask for her counsel, but no answer came. The door to Goldmoon’s chamber remained closed and barred.
The storm also swept through Qualinesti, another elven kingdom, but one that was separated from its cousins by distance that could be measured both in hundreds of miles and in ancient hatred and distrust. In Qualinesti, whirling winds uprooted giant trees and flung them about like the slender sticks used in Quin Thalasi, a popular elven game. The storm shook the fabled Tower of the Speaker of the Sun on its foundation, sent the beautiful stained glass of its storied windows raining down upon the floor. Rising water flooded the lower chambers of the newly constructed fortress of the Dark Knights at Newport, forcing them to do what an enemy army could not—abandon their posts.
The storm woke even the great dragons, slumbering, bloated and fat, in their lairs that were rich with tribute. The storm shook the Peak of Malys, lair of Malystryx, the enormous red dragon who now fashioned herself the Queen of Ansalon, soon to become Goddess of Ansalon, if she had her way. The rain formed rushing rivers that invaded Malys’s volcanic home. Rainwater flowed into the lava pools, creating enormous clouds of a noxious-smelling steam that filled the corridors and halls. Wet, half-blind, choking in the fumes, Malys roared her indignation and flew from lair to lair, trying to find one that was dry enough for her to return to sleep.
Finally she was driven to seek the lower levels of her mountain home. Malys was an ancient dragon with a malevolent wisdom. She sensed something unnatural about this storm, and it made her uneasy. Grumbling and muttering to herself, she entered the Chamber of the Totem. Here, on an outcropping of black rock, Malys had piled the skulls of all the lesser dragons she had consumed when she first came to the world. Silver skulls and gold, red skulls and blue stood one atop the other, a monument to her greatness. Malys was comforted by the sight of the skulls.
Each brought a memory of a battle won, a foe defeated and devoured. The rain could not penetrate this far down in her mountain home. She could not hear the wind howl. The flashes of lightning did not disturb her slumbers.
Malys gazed upon the empty eyes of the skulls with pleasure, and perhaps she dozed, because suddenly it seemed to her that the eyes of skulls were alive and they were watching her. She snorted, reared her head. She stared closely at the skulls, at the eyes. The lava pool at the heart of the mountain cast a lurid light upon the skulls, sent shadows winking and blinking in the empty eye sockets. Berating herself for an overactive imagination, Malys coiled her body comfortably around the totem and fell asleep.
Another of the great dragons, a Green known grandiosely as Beryllinthranox was also not able to sleep through the storm.
Beryl’s lair was formed of living trees—ironwoods and redwoods—and enormous, twining vines. The vines and branches of the trees were so thickly interwoven that no raindrop had ever managed to wriggle its way through. But the rain that fell from the roiling black clouds of this storm seemed to make it a personal mission to find a way to penetrate the leaves. Once one had managed to sneak inside, it opened the way for thousands of its fellows. Beryl woke in surprise at the unaccustomed feel of water splashing on her nose. One of the great redwoods that formed a pillar of her lair was struck by a lightning bolt. The tree burst into flames, flames that spread quickly, feeding on rainwater as if it were lamp oil.
Beryl’s roar of alarm brought her minions scrambling to douse the flames. Dragons, Reds and Blues who had joined Beryl rather than be consumed by her, dared the flames to pluck out the burning trees and cast them into the sea. Draconians pulled down blazing vines, smothered the flames with dirt and mud. Hostages and prisoners were put to work fighting the fires. Many died doing so, but eventually Beryl’s lair was saved. She was in a terrible humor for days afterward, however, convincing herself that the storm had been an attack waged magically by her cousin Malys. Beryl meant to rule someday in Malys’s stead. Using her magic to rebuild—a magical power that had lately been dwindling, something else Beryl blamed on Malys—the Green nursed her wrongs and plotted revenge.
Khellendros the Blue (he had abandoned the name Skie for this more magnificent title, which meant Storm over Ansalon), was one of the few of the dragons native to Krynn to have emerged from the Dragon Purge. He was now ruler of Solamnia and all its environs. He was overseer of Schallsea and the Citadel of Light, which he allowed to remain because—according to him—he found it amusing to watch the petty humans struggle futilely against the growing darkness. In truth, the real reason he permitted the citadel to thrive in safety was the citadel’s guardian, a silver dragon named Mirror. Mirror and Skie were longtime foes and now, in their mutual detestation of the new, great dragons from afar who had killed so many of their brethren, they had become not friends, but not quite enemies either.
Khellendros was bothered by the storm far more than either of the great dragons, although—strangely enough—the storm did not do his lair much damage. He paced restively about his enormous cave high in the Vingaard mountains, watched the lightning warriors strike viciously at the ramparts of the High Clerist’s Tower, and he thought he heard a voice in the wind, a voice that sang of death. Khellendros did not sleep but watched the storm to its end.
The storm lost none of its power as it roared down upon the ancient elven kingdom of Silvanesti. The elves had erected a magical shield over their kingdom, a shield that had thus far kept the marauding dragons from conquering their lands, a shield that also kept out all other races. The elves had finally succeeded in their historic goal of isolating themselves from the troubles of the rest of the world. But the shield did not keep out the thunder and rain, wind and lightning.
Trees burned, houses were torn apart by the fierce winds.
The Than-thalas River flooded, sending those who lived on its banks scrambling to reach higher ground. Water seeped into the palace garden, the Garden of Astarin, where grew the magical tree that was, many believed, responsible for keeping the shield in place. The tree’s magic kept it safe. Indeed, when the storm was ended, the soil around the tree was found to be bone dry.
Everything else in the garden was drowned or washed away.
The elf gardeners and Woodshapers, who bore for their plants and flowers, ornamental trees, herbs, and rose bushes the same love they bore their own children, were heartbroken, devastated to view the destruction.