And after he won, the green would surely recognize just how valuable a weapon her talismans had been.
Nala needed that because the failure of her schemes in Djerad Thymar had cost her his favor. He’d granted her asylum among the giants, but hadn’t seen fit to include her in his great magical ritual or even explain what it was meant to accomplish. That had to change if she was ever to assume her rightful role as a high priestess of the Nemesis of the Gods. Indeed, if she was even to be certain of avoiding the grim fate he intended for every other Tymantheran.
Her mind reached into the globe in somewhat the same way that she might have stuck her hand through a hole. Then her companion, a giant shaman who was doing the same thing with a gray talisman, cried out.
Nala glanced around in time to see the adept flounder back against a basalt wall. Blood streaming from his mouth and his left eye, he heaved the globe away from him. It smashed against the rock face on the other side of the relatively narrow alley in which they’d taken shelter.
Nala felt a stab of outrage. She and her true acolytes had worked long and hard to make the globes. Then, perhaps because the giant’s distress alerted her, she sensed resistance in her own orb. A heartbeat earlier it had been a doorway. Now it was a trap snapping shut. She snatched her psychic presence clear before it could catch her.
“Betrayer,” the shaman mumbled. He pushed off the wall, swayed, and stumbled toward her, enormous gray hands outstretched.
“Don’t be stupid,” she said. “I didn’t ruin the talismans. The vanquisher’s wizards found a way to do it. If you’re hurt, let me help you.” She grabbed hold of one of the giant’s fingers and rattled off a healing prayer. Tiamat’s Power manifested as a glow of warmth at her core, which then streamed through the point of contact.
The giant grunted.
“Better?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, no longer sounding dazed. Although he seemed nonplussed that his menacing advance hadn’t frightened her.
“Then go find the other shamans. Warn them not to use the orbs. Or if they already did, heal them so they can fight.”
He studied her for another moment, and she in turn could see just how reluctant he still was to trust or obey any dragonborn. But at last he said, “All right.” He swiped blood from his face, turned, and loped away.
Nala headed for the other end of the passage and the shouting, crashing cacophony of battle. It was maddening that the talismans had failed-had, indeed, become a means for the enemy to cripple the adepts-but since they had, she needed to find a new way to make herself not just useful but indispensable to the defense.
The passage narrowed down to an opening narrow enough that no adult giant could squeeze through. It seemed like a good place to crouch and study the combat without being noticed.
Giants perched on the ledges and tops of the stony eminences, hurling javelins and rocks at foes who remained, for the moment, out of Nala’s view. Then motion flickered above one such elevated position, there and gone too quickly for her to see it clearly. A shaft of wood sticking straight up from the top of his bald, knobby head, a barbarian toppled and crashed to the ground. She realized a Lance Defender had swooped down and speared him.
A volley of crossbow bolts pierced several of the slain giants’ fellows and made the rest dive for cover. Then her countrymen came streaming through one of the broader passages dividing the towering stones.
By the Five Breaths, how she hated them! She’d brought them gifts that would have made them a great people, and they’d spurned them. Driven her into exile to live among savages. And now come to deprive her of even that miserable refuge.
In her heart, she begged the Dark Lady for revenge.
A long shape burst from the earth right in front of a company of Tymantheran spearmen. For an instant in the darkness, it looked like a new basalt spire suddenly rising to claim a place among the old ones. Then it swayed, opened its jaws, and roared.
The brown dragon bore ugly, half-healed wounds, yet it had come to fight the intruders anyway. Nala loved it for its courage.
It spewed hot sand, and dragonborn reeled, scorched and scraped bloody. The grit stayed in the air too, in a blinding, choking swirl. It afflicted Nala as much as anyone else, but she laughed anyway. Because she could just make out how helpless the soldiers were as the brown repeatedly struck and lifted its head, dispatching a foe with every bite.
Then white light flashed in the front rank of the foot soldiers. In the darkness, churning dust, and general confusion, Nala found it difficult to be sure, but it seemed to her that one of the soldiers vanished, and another dragonborn appeared in his place.
The newcomer was on horseback, and the horse was galloping. It only took it an instant to close the distance to the startled dragon, and then the rider’s lance plunged into the creature’s chest.
The brown jerked, then snarled and raised a clawed foot to retaliate. But at the same instant, a second lancer drove in on its flank and speared it in the base of its neck.
The wyrm thrashed, then tried to dissolve into sand. Nala could just make out its outlines softening and streaming. She surmised that it wanted to pour itself down the burrow to safety.
The first rider pulled his lance free, then stabbed repeatedly. Each attack flared with mystic power. The force, or the agony it brought, evidently hindered the brown’s ability to transform, for the process slowed, then stopped. Leaving the sacred creature sprawled lifeless on the ground.
The cloud of sand subsided, and then Nala could see Medrash and Balasar clearly. Their comrades saw them too and raised a raw-throated cheer.
Though Nala had imagined herself full of hatred before, it had been a feeble thing compared to the loathing that gripped her now. Her breath weapon burned in her throat, and she shivered with the urge to hurl herself forward and attack. But that would just be throwing her life away. Which was the last thing she truly wanted to do, considering that Tiamat had just answered all her prayers.
Instinct-or perhaps the Dark Lady’s whisper-told her that the paladin of Torm and his clan brother would prove to be pivotal figures that night, just as they and Khouryn Skulldark had been in Tymanther. And if she stalked them and waited for the right moment to strike, then she too would play a crucial role.
But how could she be sure of keeping them always in sight amid the frenzy of the battle? By the looks of it, they were already preparing to press on. For a moment, the problem perplexed her, and then she smiled at her own foolishness.
For of course she too was dragonborn, and how likely was it that anyone would notice her telltale swaying or recognize her in some other fashion, in the dark, with far more obvious dangers looming on every side? As long as she didn’t get too close to Medrash, Balasar, or any members of the Platinum Cadre, she should be fine. She discarded her robe of shimmering scales, then slipped from the notch between the stones to join the vanquisher’s troops.
As Scar carried Jhesrhi up into the sky, she watched Tchazzar blast Venzentilax with his fiery breath. The quasi mind in her staff exhorted her to find a target and conjure a blaze of her own. Soon, she told it, soon.
Tchazzar had invited her to ride him into battle, as she had when he’d rescued Gaedynn and avenged himself on the shadar-kai. But she had a hunch it would be imprudent for a fragile human to sit on his back while other dragons tried to kill him. She also wanted to fight astride her griffon in concert with the rest of the Brotherhood. Impossible as it seemed, she might not get another chance.
It was a pity the red dragon hadn’t insisted that Halonya ride him, to use her alleged clerical powers in the fray. But alas, Tymora hadn’t smiled so widely as that. Halonya was still back in camp, safe as any of them were that night and likely nursing her many grudges.