James Wyatt - Dragon war

"You're coming with me, aren't you?" Gaven asked Aunn.

Aunn shook his head, unable to speak.

"Your destiny lies elsewhere," Gaven said.

"Here, at least for now," Aunn said. "I intend to stop Jorlanna and protect the queen, even if that is exactly what Nara wants and expects me to do."

"Ossa and I would welcome your help," Mauren said.

Gaven clasped his hand. "Aunn, Darraun, dwarf with the manacles." He smiled. "I owe you my life and my freedom, such as they are. Thank you, friend."

Tears sprang to Aunn's eyes and words failed him again, so he pulled Gaven close and embraced him.

"Farewell," Gaven said.

"I hope you find what you seek," Aunn said.

"I already have."

"Give Rienne my best when you see her."

"She's very fond of you, you know. I will."

"Then I'll see you when this is all over," Aunn said, releasing him.

Gaven gave him a weak smile and turned away.

Rienne started down the hill at a run, focusing all her energy toward greater speed. She heard confused shouts behind her-her troops expected orders, she realized, not their leader tearing off alone.

Well, she thought, they chose to follow me. They had better get used to me.

The droning of the insects grew louder as she approached, as did the cries of their victims. The creatures formed a black cloud that surrounded the fleeing Reachers, swirling in giant eddies and clinging to exposed skin and hair. People in the front of the group ran with their arms over their faces, heads down, blindly seeking an escape from the horror as winged monsters the size of their hands bit into skin or sawed through leather with enormous mandibles.

Rienne drew Maelstrom as she ran, though it was hard for her to imagine even her legendary blade causing much harm to the swarm. She could kill hundreds of the insects and leave the swarm undiminished. Nevertheless, she drew the blade, and she felt the energy flowing through her body focus and extend through her blade, as if it were part of her.

Then she was in the midst of it. The droning of the insects' wings surrounded her, and the creatures-as if smelling her unprotected skin-swarmed close around her. She didn't give them a chance to approach. Maelstrom sprang to life in her hand, whirling around her, slicing through chitin and diaphanous wing and forming a barrier of swirling wind.

Inspired by her presence, a few of the nearby farmers pulled out battered swords-most of them probably handed down from a parent or grandparent who fought in the Last War-and tried to imitate her example. She saw one fall to his knees, screaming in pain, his sword clattering to the ground.

"No!" Rienne screamed. "Keep running!"

The breath and energy she spent shouting lowered her defenses for a moment, and one of the insects sank its mandibles into the back of her neck. The pain was excruciating, far worse than the bite alone as venom spread up and down her neck and back. She snatched the creature and wrenched it free, causing a fresh jolt of pain as it tore flesh away in its jaws, then crushed it in her hand. Violet blood oozed between her fingers, distinctly unnatural, and revulsion welled in her gut. She fought it down and continued Maelstrom's whirling dance.

She drew a slow, deep breath as Maelstrom whirled, and the cloud of insects around her darkened, drawn into the vortex of wind she created. She held the breath, and flames burst from Maelstrom's blade, trailing along behind the steel like a banner. She let her breath out slowly and the flames formed a curtain around her, then widened inch by inch to encompass more and more of the swarming horrors.

When her breath was expended, the flames faded, but the ground around her was littered with the charred bodies of the swarm. The air was still dark with them, though, as Maelstrom's whirlwind drew them in toward its flashing blade. Rienne glanced toward the camp and saw perhaps a dozen people running clear of the swarm, almost to safety. More were still trapped within the cloud, though. For a moment she wondered whether rushing headlong into the midst of the swarm had been wise.

A burst of fire erupted in the air above her. She threw herself to the ground and rolled beneath the flames, springing to her feet as the flames died and a shower of blackened insect corpses fell to the earth. She looked around for the source of the flame and saw a dark figure standing outside the cloud, dressed in hide armor and a tattered green tabard. Kyaphar!

Another insect found its way to her arm and bit through her clothes, sending a lance of pain down to her hand. Her muscles convulsed as poison coursed through them, and Maelstrom fell to the ground. She faltered in her whirling dance, and more insects attached themselves to her flesh, wracking her body with their painful venom. She stooped to retrieve Maelstrom, but as she did an insect bit and her leg buckled beneath her, sending her sprawling. Before she could draw a breath her body was covered with writhing and biting insects, their wings still droning as they cut into her skin.

Another burst of fire erupted around her, washing over her with a strangely pleasant warmth. The insects around her shriveled and burned in the flame, but the fires only soothed her skin and eased the pain of the poison. Rienne grabbed Maelstrom's hilt and sprang back to her feet, waving her thanks in Kyaphar's direction. Maelstrom flew back into motion as Kyaphar hurled smaller bursts of fire into the diminishing remnants of the swarm.

Once again Maelstrom whirled around her until it formed a great funnel of wind-

But the Blasphemer's end lies in the void, in the maelstrom that pulls him down to darkness.

For a moment she seemed to see the Blasphemer's leering face form in the black cloud of insects before her, and the words from her dream echoed in her mind.

She was the center of a mighty storm, her own Storm Dragon even without Gaven at her side. She drew another slow breath, feeling the energy of it build inside her like an elation she could barely contain. Holding that energy in her belly, she tumbled out of the center of the storm, turned to put the mass of the cloud in front of her, and let her breath out as a tremendous blast of flame.

Blackened husks swirled in the wind like cinders over a mighty fire, their droning silenced. Rienne surveyed the plain as Maelstrom whirled around her. Insects still flew here and there, but they had lost any coherence as a swarm, and they seemed to have lost their aggressive instincts as well. Rienne let Maelstrom slow its dance, cutting through a few last insects before coming to rest at her side.

Two dozen or more survivors walked or ran in the direction of the camp, some limping, some carrying a fallen comrade, one she noticed crawling on hands and knees. Kyaphar walked among the fallen, looking for any who might still be within life's reach. The fallen, Rienne was pleased to see, were few-at a quick count, only seven, and as she looked Kyaphar stooped over one of the seven and began tending the man's wounds.

She slid Maelstrom into its sheath and fell to her knees. Blackened chitin crunched on the ground beneath her, and even the sound it made was somehow wrong-like the words of the Blasphemer that could not have been words. She gingerly lifted one of the charred husks and examined it. It looked like no insect she'd ever seen, its six thick legs more like a spider's than the wasp it superficially resembled. It bore huge mandibles that pulsed with the poison inside, and the chitin plating its body had an unnatural purplish sheen.

"The Depravation," Kyaphar said.

Rienne looked over her shoulder and saw him standing behind her, concern etched on his face. "What's that?" she asked.

"We see it sometimes in areas where the influence of the daelkyr seeps into the earth from the Realm of Madness they call home. It happens when the seals of the Gatekeepers weaken, and madness leaks through, and in places where daelkyr or their brood that dwell in the depths of Khyber make their way closer to the surface. Usually its influence is slight, subtle, and slow."