World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part IV Read online

  “Several suns.”

  Tyr’s eyes—so very different from those of proto-dragons—narrowed further. “That long, and you haven’t succumbed. That bespeaks a strong will, although evidently not strong enough. She kept you from falling too deep into the hunger.”

  Malygos straightened. “Not happen again.”

  To Kalec’s surprise, his host spoke with the utmost certainty. The dragon could sense a change in Malygos, a change in great part the result of Ysera’s efforts to guide him back to sanity.

  Tyr did not look convinced. He raised a hand to Malygos. The hand glowed white.

  Malygos instinctively retreated. Alexstrasza hissed. Only Ysera appeared unperturbed. Even though Malygos had seen Tyr appear and disappear and knew he had amazing powers, it was another thing to have those powers focused at him. Only great restraint kept the icy-blue male from defending himself.

  “I cannot sense the taint. Either you have buried it so deep that it should never resurface, or you have purged it somehow from your body and mind entirely.” Tyr looked back at Ysera. “One must never overestimate appearances, it seems.”

  Alexstrasza’s sister betrayed no evidence that she heard Tyr’s compliment. Rather, the slighter female moved back to the ravaged corpse. She muttered something, then began to mourn it as Malygos recalled Alexstrasza mourning the remains of their actual clutch brother.

  Tyr tolerated this for a very short time. “There are other lives that can be saved. I think it best that we do what we can for those, including your missing friends.”

  “But there is still Galakrond,” Alexstrasza pointed out. “Even if he is gone now, he will always hunt us.”

  “And that is why we must hunt him instead.”

  Malygos was not alone in eyeing Tyr with some suspicion. “We hunt him? Talonixa hunted Galakrond! Speak with Talonixa, Tyr!”

  “Your point is well taken, proto-dragon. Still, this time will be different.”

  Kalec’s host cocked his head. “How?”

  Tyr reached into his cloak and removed what only Kalec recognized but even Malygos and the sisters understood was a weapon of some sort. Tyr might lack claws and sharp teeth, but he wielded the blunt-ended thing with an ease and skill that the proto-dragons could appreciate.

  As for Kalec, he had seen many a war hammer in his time, but even the sturdiest of those, used by the dwarves especially, paled in comparison to the huge weapon Tyr held, a weapon that Kalec and his host felt was of greater power than it appeared, like the hooded figure himself.

  “Because I will not stand by this time! When you face Galakrond, I will be at your side.”

  He returned the hammer to the confines of the cloak, the weapon seeming to vanish into a void rather than simply hanging at Tyr’s side. As astounding as that was to Malygos, for Kalec, the act revealed another, more urgent sight.

  Hanging next to where the hammer had vanished was none other than the artifact.

  Kalec expected to watch the cloak again obscure the bane of his existence, but to his shock, Tyr brought forth the artifact. The proto-dragons peered at the object, Malygos’s utter bafflement clearly matching that of the sisters. Various explanations ran through Malygos’s mind—an egg, a rock, a piece of star—but none approached what Kalec already knew about the insidious relic.

  Tyr held out the artifact—which looked to Kalec as if it was smaller than he recalled—toward Malygos.

  In contrast with the lavender color the blue dragon was familiar with from his own time, now the artifact glowed a faint white . . . and only in the direction of Kalec’s host. Malygos grunted, but before he could react, the glow ceased.

  Tyr turned to Ysera and Alexstrasza. Again, the artifact glowed faintly. Having already seen nothing happen to Malygos, neither sister so much as blinked.

  Kalec wanted to shout questions, but Malygos asked only one of the many the blue dragon sought the answer to. “What did you do?”

  “Try to ensure some future.”

  It was as vague a response as Kalec had expected. He would have followed up with a pointed query, but Malygos was not of the same mind. His concerns were more immediate to the overall situation.

  “We go now. We find the others.”

  Tyr hid the artifact again, leaving Kalec to fume silently. “Yes, we find them—”

  Galakrond’s roar shook the cavern, suddenly close. Heavy chunks of rock broke from the ceiling, and if not for Alexstrasza quickly covering her head with her wings, she would have been wounded. Ysera and Malygos were also pelted, but not as badly.

  The rocks seemed to fall around Tyr without touching him. Still, he did not take the incident lightly. Scowling, he steered the three back from the entrance. His decision proved providential; a major section of the ceiling there crumbled a breath later. It did not bury them alive, but it meant that to escape, they would have to crawl out one at a time.

  And out there, Galakrond continued to rage.

  “Something has brought him back here!” Tyr rasped. “Your friends, perhaps!”

  Whatever the reason, Galakrond appeared determined to stay in the region. The ground shook again and again, creating more showers of rock but, thus far, no new collapses. All four—five, including Kalec—knew that their luck could not last much longer.

  Tyr started back to the entrance, only to have Malygos charge past him. The male proto-dragon thrust out his snout just enough to see what was happening.

  Galakrond chose that moment to land. The new tremor rocked the landscape. The monstrous proto-dragon’s head whipped back and forth in search of something. Kalec and his host both noted that Galakrond looked amused. Kalec had seen that expression before on such predators; the behemoth was toying with his prey, whatever it was.

  A moment later, that prey also appeared. Not at all to Malygos’s and Kalec’s surprise, it was Neltharion.

  The charcoal-gray male dived down from behind Galakrond. Neltharion unleashed another roar, aimed at the base of Galakrond’s skull. The misshapen leviathan shook from the force of the shock wave and fell forward to the ground.

  Neltharion laughed and came around to attack again.

  “He’s being led to his death,” Tyr said from beside Malygos. “I knew him to be rash but not suicidal.”

  Several of the eyes along Galakrond’s torso had been observing Neltharion the entire time. The smaller male reached the location Galakrond evidently waited for. He twisted his head around and opened his mouth to exhale.

  A thick column of sand shot down his gullet.

  A fit of coughing overtook Galakrond as he suddenly had to fight for breath. The massive proto-dragon struggled to dislodge the sand from his throat.

  Another, smaller figure dropped down just behind Neltharion. Nozdormu hissed at Galakrond, a taunt that the hacking beast failed to notice.

  “Excellent coordination!” Tyr roared. “So I was right about all of you!”

  Malygos failed to see what so cheered the two-legged being, and Kalec had to agree. Yes, the pair had outmaneuvered Galakrond, but he was hardly defeated.

  Some impulse drove Malygos out into the open. He was through the half-ruined entrance before anyone could stop him. Alexstrasza called after him, but he did not hesitate. Kalec felt Malygos’s intense sense of loyalty urge the icy-blue male into the fray.

  Snout down, Galakrond finally began dislodging chunks of solidified sand. His breathing took on a more normal rate. He started to look up again—

  Malygos exhaled. As Nozdormu had done, Malygos aimed at the gullet.

  At the last moment, Galakrond sensed him. However, in turning to face Malygos, Galakrond only gave him a choicer target. The frost hit the same eye that Neltharion had earlier attacked.

  By itself, the frost might not have slowed Galakrond, but it aggravated the injured eye. Hissing, the enormous proto-dragon shut both eyes. Of course, that did not leave him sightless; several of the extra eyes now glared at Malygos.

  Yet no sooner had those orbs fixed on Kalec�
��s host than fire assailed the shut ones. Alexstrasza soared over Malygos, the plume of flame she exhaled continuing. Her attack kept the main orbs from reopening and drew the other eyes from Malygos.

  Neltharion chose then to attack some of the extra eyes. He first roared at them, and then, when he was able to get near enough, he tore away two in successive swipes of his hind claws.

  But the reckless male failed to pay sufficient attention to some of the extra limbs. Perhaps seeing them as little other than useless growths, Neltharion let his tail come too close to one dangling leg.

  The paw seized his tail and held on with a tight grip. Neltharion tried to back away, which only brought him near another paw. The second grabbed one of his hind legs.

  Galakrond opened his eyes. Mouth widening, he turned to swallow the captured morsel.

  Malygos and Alexstrasza tried to draw his attention again, but Galakrond cared only to devour Neltharion. Their attacks, now striking mostly the scaled hide, did little more than cause their foe to twitch slightly as his jaws neared the charcoal-gray male.

  A shadow swept over Malygos, immense enough to make him think that perhaps another Galakrond came up behind him. He started to look over his shoulder, but the shape moved so quickly that both he and Kalec had no time to ascertain what it was before it reached Galakrond.

  A thick form that Kalec initially identified as a fist as large as a full-grown proto-dragon hit Galakrond on the side of the jaw opposite from Neltharion. It hit with such force that the behemoth stumbled away from the blow.

  Only as the shape receded did both Kalec and his host catch enough of a glimpse to see that it was not a fist but the head of a hammer that had made the blow—a hammer identical to what Tyr had wielded but many times the size of the one they had seen earlier.

  And while Malygos had missed it, Kalec had noticed that there was a hand gripping the hammer, a hand also much larger than previously seen.

  But just as the hammer withdrew, Malygos’s attention was caught by Ysera, who darted dangerously close to the briefly stunned Galakrond’s jaws. However, instead of seeking the gullet, Ysera rose before Galakrond’s nostrils and exhaled.

  Galakrond grunted. He hesitated.

  The paws holding on to Neltharion seemed to lose control. He pulled away and fled from Galakrond. As he did, Alexstrasza and Ysera also turned away.

  “Flee! To the south!” Tyr called from somewhere beyond the icy-blue male’s sight. Tyr’s resounding voice well matched his titanic proportions, which made his sudden command more shocking to Malygos. All appearances were that they were at last winning.

  But as he thought that, Galakrond began to stir again.

  Kalec’s host veered away. He saw his companions, Nozdormu included, awaiting him in the south. Of Tyr there was still no sign. Malygos picked up his pace.

  Behind him, Galakrond roared. Malygos flew faster. He joined the others as they raced on.

  “Tyr?” Malygos called.

  In response, a sound that echoed like thunder rocked them from the direction of Galakrond. A second later, the leviathan roared again, but this time from farther away.

  Malygos almost halted, but Alexstrasza shook her head. “Tyr says fly south! Keep flying!”

  With much regret, he obeyed. He did not entirely understand this being called Tyr, but he recognized that the two-legged creature knew far more than he or any of the others did. Their hopes of defeating Galakrond rested greatly on Tyr.

  Tyr . . . who at this moment risked himself to help the five escape.

  And for Kalec, who was forced wherever his host went despite the fact that he would have flown in the opposite direction, it was the same Tyr who carried with him the artifact and the blue dragon’s fading hope that he would free himself of these visions with his mind intact.

  FOUR

  WITHIN THE NEXUS

  Jaina glared at the offending books. She had exhausted a repertoire of spells designed for such delicate searches, to no avail. Now the archmage considered stronger measures, her only hesitation being that Modera or someone else would certainly notice her presence then. Still, every second lost might also mean further danger to Kalec.

  She had to take the risk of discovery. Her mind made up, Jaina began casting—and then halted. Atop one bookcase sat the skull of an ancient, savage reptile that she had inherited with a number of unusual and arcane objects from her predecessor, Rhonin. While in itself it meant nothing to Jaina, it caused her mind to shift back abruptly to the huge skeleton and her encounter with Buniq. She saw again how the taunka drew the pattern. Only at this moment did Jaina ponder the fact that the taunka had had a very precise memory for a symbol like nothing she would have seen before. At the time, the archmage had chalked it up to the focused nature of Buniq’s kind, but now she wondered if it had been something more.

  Were you really a taunka? Jaina asked the distant Buniq. I shouldn’t have believed in coincidence.

  Jaina drew the symbol in the air. She then turned it about so that she looked at it as it had been drawn by the hunter.

  “What a fool I’ve been!” the archmage blurted. She bit her lip, then simply prayed that no one had heard her. She eyed the reversed symbol, seeing it anew.

  Had she paid more attention when first seeing it by the skeleton, Jaina would have noticed that turning it revealed a different and obvious meaning. Turned this way, the symbol was also a key.

  Or, rather, the key. Jaina cast the reversed symbol over the original tome. The archmage watched as it sank into the book.

  The lavender glow faded not only from the book in question but also from the entire collection.

  Jaina seized the thick tome and began flipping through the pages. There, where she had expected to find the information she needed, she finally found it. The archmage carefully read over the passage.

  When together, the two parts were more than the sum of their individual measure. Their power magnified. Archmage Wendol suggested that there were also other combinations that the pair could make but that the immense time since their creation had caused some of those combinations to function in error—

  Jaina shut the book. “Yes . . . that must be it.”

  Voices arose outside her chambers. Jaina quietly swore at her outbursts. She should have known that Modera would have someone listening for any sign of her return.

  But discovery mattered no longer. Jaina believed that she had what she needed. The archmage set down the book . . . and vanished.

  She materialized a few seconds later just beyond the magical boundaries of the Nexus, the humming accompanying her teleportation spell fading away even as she registered her location. Jaina frowned upon seeing where she had appeared; the archmage was far from her intended goal. She cast another spell and vanished again.

  Jaina rematerialized in the exact same location.

  Staring at the Nexus, the archmage attempted a different tack. This time, she simply tried to probe what was currently happening.

  The probe failed to breach the Nexus’s protective wards.

  Having entered the sanctum just recently, Jaina believed that Kalec had adjusted the wards to keep someone or something out. That was followed with the concern that he had wanted her specifically to be kept from entering. He had already sought to keep his troubles from her, and it could be reasonably assumed that this change in the wards had been done with that intention in mind.

  The trouble was, Jaina believed that she held Kalec’s only hope of being freed from whatever the artifact was doing to him. If he had sealed the Nexus off, it was possible he had condemned himself.

  No! I will not lose you! Jaina cast another spell, this one draping over the entire field of wards. She looked for some fault, however slight, of which she could take advantage. Unfortunately, she found none.

  The blue dragons themselves aside, few alive understood the complexities of the Nexus’s wards as well as Jaina Proudmoore did. Aware of their general matrix, Jaina sought out the key points. She did so not to
seek weaknesses but to find alterations. By understanding what had been changed, the archmage might be able to see how she could adjust it to her desire.

  But what Jaina discovered when she located the key points was not what she expected. Kalec had not made these alterations; the same energy signature she had noted in the artifact now permeated the Nexus’s defensive network.

  At first, the archmage stood daunted, but then an idea occurred to her. She re-created the symbol and, keeping it reversed as she had done with the books, incorporated it into her next probe of the key wards.

  There was resistance, but the symbol finally imposed itself on the altered wards. As it did, the artifact’s influence on that area faded.

  Encouraged, Jaina probed deeper—

  The alteration reconstructed itself, in the process rejecting her spellwork from the wards. The force with which it reversed matters struck Jaina’s mind hard.

  Gasping, the archmage fell to one knee. Her head throbbed. However, her initial frustration at this setback quickly changed to curiosity. What she had sensed was no personal purpose on the part of the artifact; it had simply restored an area that had been disrupted. There had been no malice, no intentional attack on the archmage. Once the area had been returned to its previous state, the artifact’s efforts had ceased.

  Standing, Jaina grimly smiled. She had a better idea of what she faced. Next, she had to learn its limits . . . and whether those limits were greater than her own.

  With Kalec in her thoughts, the archmage once more re-created the symbol. She then made a second, a third, and so on, until within the space of a few breaths, scores of the reversed image hovered before her.

  “Let’s see what happens now,” Jaina murmured. “Let’s see what happens when you have to readjust everything.”

  She sent her army of glowing symbols into the air. They hovered together for a moment, then spread out, circling the expanse of the Nexus and its unseen protective wards. When they reached where Jaina wanted them to be, the archmage had them pause just beyond the wards. Heightening her senses, she took one last look at how the wards were arranged, then sent a sigil hurtling toward each.