Rienne and Darraun were so focused on searching the ground below that it was actually Gaven who spotted the first real threat. “Check the sky,” he called, “four points to port!”
The sun was high in the sky, but beginning its descent behind the Starpeaks on the airship’s port side. Darraun had to cup his hands around his eyes, but Rienne spotted it immediately.
“A dragon,” she said.
“Are you sure?” Gaven shouted. “It’s not very big.”
Rienne wheeled and gave him an incredulous stare. “Not very big?” she said.
“No, he’s right,” Darraun said. “Compared to Vaskar, this one’s small, immature. No bigger than a bear.”
“If you mean one of those Eldeen bears that the druids send before them in war to tear up enemy infantry, I’ll grant you that.” Rienne gripped Maelstrom in a trembling hand.
“Yes, that’s exactly the kind of bear I mean,” Darraun said.
The dragon closed on them quickly-it had clearly seen them before Gaven spotted it. The sun gleamed dull red on its scales, and Gaven’s mind filled with the image of the Morning Zephyr in flames outside the Mournland. He had a sudden, unsettling realization.
“How do I land this thing?” he called.
“Land her?” Darraun said. “I don’t think you do. That’s why they have mooring towers.”
“Well, start looking for a mooring tower. I don’t want to be in the air when that thing breathes fire on this ship.”
“No,” Rienne said, “you should be able to do a ground landing in a ship this size. Smaller airships like this are designed to moor just about anywhere.”
“Then take a look beneath us, and tell me where to set her down.” He glanced at the onrushing dragon, now close enough that he could distinguish its horns and the predatory curve to its mouth. Rienne rushed to the starboard side and peered over the edge.
“Rocky, very steep-and trees to the east. I don’t see-”
“Oh, damn it to the Darkness!” Gaven swore. He stretched one hand to the clear blue sky, and the sun went dark, blotted out by a black thunderhead that appeared from nowhere. He jerked his hand downward, and a bolt of lightning thundered out of the sky and struck the onrushing dragon. For an instant, it hung suspended in the air, engulfed in burning light, then it plummeted downward.
Spreading its wings, the dragon pulled out of its fall and swooped back up toward the airship, sending a blistering gout of fire from its gaping maw ahead of its flight. The flames parted around the keel and licked up around the bulwarks, but it seemed that much of their energy was pulled into the ring of fire surrounding the ship, making it flare brightly for a moment, then fade back to normal.
Gaven smiled. “Looks like I was more worried about the fire than I should have been,” he said.
“Don’t get too confident,” Rienne shot back.
As if reinforcing Rienne’s warning, the airship lurched suddenly to starboard. The wheel jerked free of Gaven’s hand and started spinning wildly.
“Concentrate on the helm,” Rienne said. “Let me and Darraun handle the dragon.”
When Gaven touched the wheel again, flames leaped out from its wooden spokes and seared his hands. Gaven cried out, more in surprise than pain, and eyed the wheel warily.
“The dragon’s breath gave the elemental a taste of freedom,” Rienne explained. “You need to remind it who’s in charge.”
“Maybe riding horseback isn’t so bad after all,” Gaven grumbled as he approached the wheel again.
“You ever let a stallion think he’s in charge?”
“Good point.” Gaven seized the helm again, ignoring a new flare from the wheel. Be still! he commanded the elemental, and he felt it rebel against his control-very much like a spirited horse pulling against its reins. For an instant, the fire that formed a ring around the airship flickered and died away, letting the airship fall freely, but Gaven stretched out his will like a whip and brought both elemental and ship back under control.
Which meant that he could do nothing but watch as the dragon’s fiery breath engulfed both Rienne and Darraun where they stood on the deck. Rienne tumbled away and stood up again barely singed, but Darraun could do nothing but huddle on the deck and weather the blast’s greatest force. In the wake of its breath, the dragon swooped in and alit on the deck, stretching its wings into the air to keep its balance.
As the flames died around Darraun, wisps of smoke trailed off him, but to Gaven’s surprise he leaped toward the dragon as though he’d just been immersed in water rather than fire. As he hefted his mace, Gaven noticed a ring on Darraun’s hand that glowed red as if it had been newly forged in the inferno, and he suspected that the artificer had turned the ring into a magic ward against fire before the dragon’s onslaught.
The dragon’s enormous wings made it seem considerably larger than a bear-even an Eldeen bear. Its head whipped away from Darraun’s mace, then arched back around to bite at his shoulder even as it lifted its front claws to tear at him. It was caught off guard and off balance, though, as Rienne tumbled into it, slamming both feet into its chest. She knocked it backward, and Maelstrom was ready to cut at its neck as it yanked back. The magic blade only nicked its scaled neck, and it retreated a couple of steps to regain its balance, all four feet firmly on the deck. Its neck swept back and forth as it sized up its opponents.
At almost the last moment, Gaven remembered.
An arcane word sheathed him in cool fire that would protect him from the dragon’s breath. Then fire spewed from the creature’s mouth in a great blast that engulfed all three of them and started several small fires on the deck. Gaven took cover behind the wheel, and his fiery shield protected him from the rest of the blast. Darraun laughed it off, and again Rienne bounced clear of the worst of it-her constant movement in battle was both her strongest offense and her best defense. She proved it by leaping onto the dragon’s back and bringing Maelstrom down hard into its neck, spraying a gout of steaming blood onto the deck. The dragon thrashed and reared, throwing Rienne backward off the deck.
Darraun lunged to the prow, his panicked look telling Gaven everything he needed to know. The dragon leaped into the air, pushing away from the airship so hard that the prow bobbed downward, then spun itself in the air to plummet downward, following Rienne to the ground-out of sheer malice or perhaps blind fury. Gaven released the helm, and a gust of wind lifted him off the deck. A quick glance around showed him that Rienne was still falling, and an equally quick gesture brought a whirlwind out of the brewing storm to lift her safely out of her fall. With the merest thought, he impaled the dragon on another bolt of lightning. After Rienne’s deadly blow, the dragon had no more strength to evade or resist the blast, and its charred corpse spiraled away like an autumn leaf, dry and drained of life.
But as the airship swept past Gaven, caught in a terrible maelstrom of air dragging her to earth, he realized it would take considerably more effort to stop her fall.
CHAPTER 45
The Eye of the Storm did not simply drop out of the sky. Snared in the whirling currents of air born of Gaven’s storm, she spun in a great wheel through the air, her magical buoyancy still fighting against the downward pull. At the same time, the elemental bound within her flared to rebellion in the absence of Gaven’s control, coursing visibly through the arcane channels carved into the hull. Gaven didn’t see Darraun immediately, but after a moment spotted him clutching the wheel, struggling to control the ship as he had in Stormhome. A valiant effort, but one doomed to failure.