The lady elf had always appeared wispy, as much immaterial as material, but suddenly she had substance. She held out her arms.
"The dragon?" Adrina asked, seeing the wealth of marks covering the lady's arms.
"How could it be otherwise? Soon it will be your legacy, as it is mine."
Tears welled up in Adrina's eyes. "I don't wish it. I don't want any of it."
Chapter 5
Lilbær and Warbær charged. The snow trolls countered, flooding out of the warren holes. Ærühn spun around and around as he lashed out, his dual blades turning in his hands with deadly precision. "For Leria. For Midsetten," he cried out as he felled one snow troll after the other.
Vilmos wielded a single curved blade, staying in the deep area he'd been led to. He couldn't see what was happening around him, but somewhere ahead he heard the bears mauling everything in their path. He told himself repeatedly, "I wish I could see in the dark. I wish this was over."
Ærühn worked his way onward. He wanted to advance as far as possible without hindering the bears. The sheer number of trolls was alarming, but he pushed trepidation aside and reached out with the steel teeth in his hands.
A startling shriek brought Vilmos out of his muddle. He smelled death in the air and the coppery taste of blood was in his mouth. He didn't know why until he saw the cudgel coming at him again from out of the darkness. He bobbed, avoiding the second blow. As he struck back, he heard the dragon's voice in his ears, "You are now Watcher of the Ice and you've ended a century storm. There's something to be said about that."
Ærühn spun and parried, his blades dancing in his hands. Trolls were coming at him from three sides now and it took concerted effort to hold them at bay. As he swung one blade left and then turned right, he struck first one troll and then another. Going down on one knee, he thrust out with both blades, catching a troll in the throat and nearly severing its head from its body.
"I am Watcher of the Ice," Vilmos told himself, drawing from the Abundance and pouring the strength he found into his limbs. He charged forward. He watched, his eyes wide as a cudgel swept past his face a finger's breadth away. He turned about, countered furiously, his blade finding fur, flesh and bone and sinking so deep he was pulled down with the felled troll. Standing, he pushed down with the heel of a boot to retrieve his weapon.
Ærühn urged Lilbær and Warbær on with a loud call. "To battle, to battle. Attack, attack. Rift and Reaver, give us strength and victory."
Blood trickled down the side of Vilmos' face from where he'd been struck. Joining Ærühn near the entrance to the deep turning, he lashed out wildly shouting, "For Leria. For Midsetten."
Ærühn grimaced as he fought, his blades moving so swiftly they were a ceaseless blur. "Calling out my sister's name in battle are you now? You must be more smitten than you know--and I thought I told you to guard the rear."
Vilmos grinned sheepishly, not that Ærühn could see such in the dark that surrounded them. He parried left, thrust right. His blade struck true. A snow troll fell. He lunged over it and attacked before the next monster coming at him could. He heard every movement of the bears now. The swipes of their massive paws. The rending of flesh with their powerful jaws.
Ærühn countered a pair of cudgels, one from ahead and one from the right. He turned, struck out. "There are too many," he shouted. "Make your way to the entrance. Return to Midsetten."
Vilmos started to reply, but was cut short by a cudgel smashing into his chest. The blow took the breath from his lungs and knocked him backward several spans. A second blow knocked the sword out of his hands. Suddenly a troll was kneeling on his chest, snarling in his face, and he was on his back. Frantically, he reached out and groped the darkness for his blade but couldn't find it.
Ærühn heard Vilmos go down. A rage filled him and he attacked madly at everything around him. "Vilmos? Vilmos?" he called out. "Answer me."
Panicked, Vilmos reached for the Abundance, blue-white lightning arced from his hands, striking the troll and throwing it off his chest as if it was a rag doll. He jumped up, his eyes glowing as lightning struck and felled trolls all around him. He walked forward, lightning striking and felling trolls as he went.
Ærühn cringed as Vilmos unleashed the magic he'd warned against, knowing it could bring every dark creature of the Ice for a thousand chains in every direction. He swung his blades, a rage still inside him as he cleaved flesh from bones.
Vilmos and Ærühn continued on, pushing their way across the main chamber of the warren. Lilbær and Warbær began to flank the trolls, moving the trolls into a narrowing box as part of a pincer attack.