All Shadows Fled - Ed Greenwood [45]
Malaugrym!
The Witch of Shadowdale sent a shrieking warning through the spell web to awaken her companions as she hurled her ghostly form back across the tent. She had to reach her body! Very few of her spells were available to her in this ghostly form, when she could hold nothing solid.
One serpent-blade was arching over her own body, and the other was rearing above Sharantyr, whence it could plunge itself down into her sleeping breast, Sylune cast a curving shield of force over the lady ranger as she swept past.
Just in time! The blade came down at Sharantyr's face and was struck aside by the invisible barrier, trailing a line of white sparks.
The other serpent-thing struck at Sylune"'s body before she could slip into it, throwing its coils around her throat and wrists. The rest of its body extended toward Belkram, blade rearing back to strike.
She'd warned all three rangers to keep silence and find their blades as they awakened, and as the serpent-thing stretched over toward him, Belkram came boiling up out of his furs, hacking at the thing savagely.
Its hammer strike burst through his frantic parry and almost pinned to him to the tent floor, laying open his shoulder as he twisted desperately aside. He roared in pain. Sharantyr tried to scramble to his aid, and found herself a prisoner under the shield, but Itharr came leaping across the tent with his blade gleaming, bellowing, "Aid! An attack! Knights of Myth Drannor, to us!"
Sylune slid into her body, heedless of the strangling coil about her throat. She did not need to breathe, and so could take no harm from the crushing constriction of the Malaugrym-whose constraint prevented her from hurling spells. She gathered her will as ironlike coils tightened about her, and hauled her shield of force away from Sharantyr. She angled it up to wall herself away from the rest of the tent and shoved the Malaugrym's blade away from Belkram in the process.
The shapeshifter simply extended its body farther to strike at the Harper once more, but Itharr slashed it aside-and with her companions safe behind the shield, Sylune unleashed a spell that made steel shards burst from her body.
The Malaugrym took them all, convulsing in agony and flailing about the tent, sweeping her body off its bed and hurling Itharr to sprawl atop Sharantyr and the other serpentine Shadowmaster. Belkram sprang upon it and drove his blade home, but it writhed under him, not mortally harmed by his steel, and tried to shake him off. He sat on it, stabbing it repeatedly, so it grew fangs and bit his thigh.
Sharantyr and Itharr rolled around among the furs with the other Malaugrym, hacking and stabbing at it in a frenzy-and then the tent flap burst open and the Knights of Myth Drannor charged in.
Florin had doffed his armor for the night and wore only breeches, but his stout sword was in his hand. He dived without pause onto the serpent-thing on the beds, hacking at its blade-head with a flurry of blows, trying to sever the serpent's dark steel. Torm took one look at Sylune, who struggled upright with coils thick around her throat, and howled in fury, leaping across the tent with his dagger flashing.
Sylune kicked out one foot, trying to touch him, and Rathan saw what she was doing. He pushed past the thief and grasped Sylune's ankle firmly. What she said to him mind-to-mind he shouted aloud: "Malaugrym! Use silver on them to slay! They're shapeshifters! Use silver!"
At the door of the tent, Jhessail and Illistyl both nodded grimly. As Merith dived past them and buried his silver-bladed dagger in the Malaugrym that was battering Belkram all around the tent, they ran to where Itharr and Sharantyr were stabbing the other, and murmured spells as they slapped their hands at the blades, heedless of sharp, flashing edges.
The weapons glowed blue-white as Jhessail snatched her hand back, shaking drops of blood from it- When the glow faded, they shone silver… and the wounds they made did not close. Sharantyr and Itharr set to work chopping with frenzied speed, gasping their thanks.
Florin severed the blade-head