They threw their full might at him—or at least what remained of it. They threw both physical and magical
assaults at Deathwing, and he shrugged all off. No matter how hard they fought against him, the fact
remained that, diminished by their long-ago contributions to theDemon Soul,the other great Aspects
might as well have been infants in comparison to the black leviathan.
Nozdormu cast the sand of ages at him, threatening, at least for a moment, to steal Deathwing's very
youth. Deathwing felt the weakness spread through him, felt his bones grow stiff and his thoughts slower.
Yet, before the change could become permanent, the raw power within the chaotic dragon surged high,
burning away the sand, overwhelming the cunning spell
From Malygos came a more frontal assault, the mad creature's fury almost enabling him to match
Deathwing's power, if but for a moment. Icicles of lightning assailed Malygos's hated foe from all
directions, intense heat and numbing cold simultaneously beating at Deathwing. Yet the enchanted iron
plates embedded in the black's hide deflected nearly all of the raging storm away, readily enabling
Deathwing to suffer what little made it through.
Of all of them, though, his most cunning and dangerous foe proved to be Ysera. Initially, she stayed
back, seeming content to let her comrades waste their efforts on him. Then Deathwing noticed a
complacency in himself, a satisfaction that grew to distraction. Almost too late he realized that he had
begun to daydream. Shaking his head, he quickly dislodged the cobwebs that she had cast within his
mind—just as all three of his adversaries tried to seize him in their talons.
With several beats of his expansive wings, he pulled out of their grasp, then counterattacked. Between
his forepaws formed a vast sphere of pure energy, primal power, that he threw into their very midst.
The sphere exploded as it reached the trio, sending Ysera and the others spiraling backward.
Deathwing roared his defiance. “Fools! Throw what you can at me! The outcome will be no different! I
am power incarnate! You are nothing but shadows of the past!”
“Never underestimate what you may learn from the past, dark one. . . .”
A crimson shadow Deathwing had thought never to see aloft again filled his vision, surprising even him
for once. “Alexstrasza . . . come to avenge your consort?”
“Come to avenge my consort and my children, Deathwing, for I know all too well that this is all because
of you!”
“I?” The black behemoth gave her a toothy grin. “But even I cannot touch theDemon Soul;you and
yours saw to that!”
“But something led the orcs to a place of which only dragons knew . . . and something hinted to them of
the power of the disk!”
“Does it matter, anyway? Your day is past, Alexstrasza, while mine is about to come!”
The red dragon spread her wings wide and flashed her claws. Despite the deprivations of her captivity,
she did not look at all weak at the moment. “It is your day that is over, dark one!”
“I have faced the ravages of time, the curse of nightmares, and the mists of sorcery, thanks to the others!
What weapons do you bring?”
Alexstrasza met his sinister gaze with her own determined, unblinking orbs. “Life . . . hope . . . and what
they bring with them . . .”
Deathwing took in her words—and laughed loud. “Then you are as good as dead already!”
The two giants charged one another.
“She cannot hope to beat him,” Rhonin muttered. “None of them can, because they're all lacking what
this damned artifact took from them!”
“If there is nothing we can do, then we should leave, Rhonin.”
“I can't, Vereesa! I've got to do something for her—for all of us, actually! If they can't stop Deathwing,
who will?”
Falstad eyed theDemon Soul.“Can you do nothing with that thing?”
“No. It won't work against Deathwing in any way.”
The dwarf rubbed his hairy chin. “Pity 'tis not possible to give back the magic that thing stole! At least
then they could fight with him on even terms. . . .”
The wizard shook his head. “That can't be—” He paused, trying to think. With the broken finger, his
throbbing head, and the bruises all over his body, it took effort just to keep on his feet. Rhonin
concentrated, focusing on what the gryphon-rider had just said. “But, then again, maybe itcan!”
His companions looked at him in bewilderment. Rhonin quickly glanced around to assure himself that
they were safe from orcs for the moment, then located the hardest rock he could find.
“What are you doing?” Vereesa asked, sounding as if she wondered whether he had lost his mind.
“Returning their power to them!” He put theDemon Soulon top of another stone, then raised the first
high.
“What in blazes do you think—” was as far as Falstad managed.
Rhonin brought the rock down as hard as he could on the disk.
The rock in his hand cracked in two.
TheDemon Soulglistened, not even blemished by the assault.
“Damn! I should've known!” He looked up at the dwarf. “Can you swing that thing with great
accuracy?”
Falstad looked insulted. “It may be inferior orc work, but 'tis still a usable weapon and, as such, I can
swing it as good as any!”
“Use it on the disk! Now!”
The ranger put a concerned hand on the wizard's shoulder. “Rhonin, do you really think this will work?”
“I know the spellwork that will return it to them, a variation used by those of my order when trying to
draw from other relics, but it demands that the artifact in question be shattered, so that the forces binding
the magic within won't exist any longer! I can give back to the dragons what they lost—but only if I can
get theDemon Soulopen!”
“Is that why, then?” Falstad hefted the war-ax. “Stand back, wizard! Would you like it in two neat
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