At first nothing but dust and tangled bodies greeted her eyes.
Then there he was, scooting across the courtyard and through the chaos like a rabbit. The materbill writhed not more than an arm's length from the kender's red and blue pouch, but Kifflewit dashed right up and grabbed it. He held up his hand and waved to Mynx.
She raised her left arm. "Throw it, Kifflewit!" she shouted.
The kender may not have heard the words, but he understood the gesture. He flung the missing diamond across the courtyard.
Mynx caught it deftly in her left hand and quickly replaced it in the figurine of the Diamond Dragon.
With Phytos shouting encouragement, she pressed the glittering artifact against the vallenwood. This time the droning and glowing far overwhelmed what they had experienced before. Mynx cast a triumphant look back at Kifflewit-just as the materbill roared one last time and died.
The last Mynx saw of him, Kifflewit Burrthistle was looking bewildered as his clothes went up in flames. "Kender!" she cried.
And then the vallenwood exploded.
Chapter 27
The explosion knocked Tarscenian off the centaur and onto his back. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the Diamond Dragon arc through the noon sunlight, shedding sparks in gold, yellow, and white.
The dragon figurine hovered in midair. Tarscenian real shy;ized that its paper-thin wings were moving, beating, and the artifact's head was twisting this way and that. Heder-ick cried out, and Tarscenian saw that the High Theocrat's gaze was on the Diamond Dragon, too.
Then the tiny ruby eyes of the diminutive steel dragon spied Tarscenian. It dived to his shoulder, its diamonds sparkling in the sun. Hederick called out in fury. Tarscen shy;ian drew his sword and once more plunged toward the High Theocrat.
Hederick was looking elsewhere now-nearly straight up, above Tarscenian. The High Theocrat's face was dis shy;torted with anger and horror. Tarscenian spun around.
The stump was gone. In its place rose Ancilla as the Presence-the vision of a woman and a dragon combined. She had the eyes of a snake and an aura of undreamed-of magical power.
The being was twice as tall as Erolydon, and the lance that flowed from her midsection was thirty feet long.
The miniature dragon on Tarscenian's shoulder gave an unmistakable cry of joy and flew toward Ancilla. Soon it was perching on her shoulder, too small to be seen from the ground, except for an occasional flash of yellow, blue, or red from one of its gemstones.
Tarscenian had nearly reached Hederick.
Several dozen guards had joined the High Theocrat on the stand. Under their combined weight, the wooden structure swayed and suddenly collapsed. Hederick dived off one end and rushed into the temple. Tarscenian could see him peering up at Ancilla from behind one of Erolydon's main doors. The Seeker priest hysterically shouted orders to his guard captains, to his goblins, to anyone who would listen.
His bowmen showered arrows on Ancilla, but the Pres shy;ence shed the projectiles like so much sand.
The Presence raised its mighty spear, described a circle with the tip, and shouted "On respayhee vallenntrayna!" Its tail lashed the air, knocking over part of the inner wall.
"On respayhee vallenntrayna. Come forth, my brethren!"
The voice of the,Presence came from everywhere. People sensed it rather than heard it with their ears.
The tops of the surrounding vallenwoods trembled and jerked. "On respayhee vallenntrayna." Leaves showered the stampeding occupants of the temple. A sudden wind sent the leaves whirling around the courtyard. "On respayhee vallenntrayna."
"Valiant mages of the White Robes, I return your powers.
Let them course for the good!"
Upon Ancilla's call, more than three dozen vallen-woods glowed at their bases. People fighting atop Eroly-don's marble walls froze, then pointed at the trees.
"I call you from your vallenwood protectors. I thank you, venerable trees, for sheltering those who would fight for the New Gods. But now these wizards are needed here!
"Carosanden tyhenimus califon!"
Then the courtyard was filled with mages. White robes swirled as thirty-nine freed spellcasters chanted and spread their magical powders and herbs. White robes flashed like sails as the mages unleashed spell after spell.
A goblin exploded near the dead materbill. Another fell, screaming, beneath a suddenly toppling wall. Freed slaves killed a hobgoblin, and the crowd another.
Her right arm dangling uselessly, Mynx pushed through the crowd to where she'd last seen Kifflewit Burrthistle. She found only a few charred pouches and the kender's tiny cloak.
There was no time to mourn the kender, however. A goblin bore down on Mynx with the promise of death in its eyes. She raised her sword in her left hand. She'd never fought left-handed, but she'd die trying.
"Cantihgnasf'ir wertnen pi!"
A bolt of blue lightning, spitting fire, shot over Mynx's head and severed the mace-swinging goblin at its midsection.
"Antin mrok mon midled alt'n."
Another bolt, green this time, arced toward Mynx; her right arm was encased in green fire. When the glow receded, the wounded arm was bandaged, the pain gone. Ancilla as Presence was just lowering her claws from cast shy;ing the spell as Mynx looked back. With her left hand, Mynx raised her swordtip to her helm and nodded. The Presence gravely nodded back. The Diamond Dragon sparkled on her shoulder.
And then suddenly the centaurs and mages had goblins and hobgoblins alike on the run. The few temple guards who survived fled with them.
Erolydon's perimeter fell into rubble.
The Presence's image flickered, so that one moment Tarscenian saw a woman, then a lizard, a snake, then a dragon, and once again a woman.
"Hederick. Face me. I am Ancilla. Face me."
A dragon stood where Ancilla had been.
Hederick remained behind the temple doors. Ancilla sighed, and leaves swirled once more around the court shy;yard. Her image flickered to that of a snake.
"Hederick, I summon you. I have the power. You no longer have the Diamond Dragon. It is back with me. I summon you!
"Cariwon velpacka om tui rentahten-Hederick."
The temple door opened. The rotund priest stood there, his robe streaked with dust. As he stepped unsteadily through the portal, Ancilla-now a woman garbed in white, but double the height of the crumbling temple- pointed a finger at the entryway. It collapsed behind him.
"Admit your pain, Hederick. Face it, welcome it. And then throw it aside. Your gods are but a figment of this pain. Embrace the Old Gods, the true gods, and you may still be saved. They may forgive, although you have done much to anger them.
She was a dragon again.
Hederick merely stretched a hand toward his sister and shrieked, "Witch!"
"The Diamond Dragon is gone from you now, little brother. It has returned to me, its rightful mistress. You cannot use its charisma to charm and snare the people any longer."
Ancilla's image took on the form of a snake, then a woman, and again a lizard. The image gestured toward
Solace with the lance.
"See how they have left you, Hederick. Even your high priest has fled to the village. Solace has no use for you anymore. Even your guards and aides desert you. Where are your goblins, your other foul creatures? My brother and sister mages slaughtered them as they stood.
Hederick moved toward the huge lizard that called itself his sister. "I am the High Theocrat of Solace," he shouted. "I will be the greatest Seeker on Krynn. There is no one who can stop me! I will be a god! And you cannot stop me, Ancilla."
Ancilla's dragon eyes glittered at the man.
"You will stop yourself, Hederick. I will not have to."
"Impossible."
"Sauveha deitista, wrapaho yt vontuela."