The Fading Dream_ Thorn of Breland - Keith Baker [101]
“You’re unarmed,” he said as Thorn swept aside a stroke that would have torn open her throat. “Tiring. One mistake will end it all. Just one mistake.”
He was trying to plant doubts in her mind because in that place those doubts would become truth. She’d already learned the trick, and despite the danger, she hadn’t given up hope. Drix needed her. Breland needed her. Walking the halls, she’d imagined those beasts she’d seen in the kennels unleashed on Sharn, imagined her brother, Nandon, fighting for his life against the terrors she’d seen. No. She’d walked strange paths to get there, and if she fell, it wasn’t going to be because of doubt.
The thought gave her renewed vigor. She was learning the rhythms of Doresh’s attacks and letting his confidence grow. But he was wrong. She wasn’t unarmed.
For a moment, she let her guard falter, leaving the barest opening. Doresh struck. The edge of his blade cut across her, but Thorn was already moving. She twisted her left arm around the eladrin’s sword arm, sliding forward to trap his blade. Then, summoning all the strength of the dragon, she slammed her knee up against him.
The warlord’s sword flew from his grasp, and he staggered back across the room. But it was Thorn’s turn to press the attack. She charged forward, a thought bringing the myrnaxe from her glove. He blocked her first stroke with his scepter, the darkwood holding against the blow, but the force of it kept him off balance. She switched her grip, thrusting with the silver spearhead, and he fell back, staying just ahead of her. Just as she was about to sink the blade into his heart, he gestured with his scepter. She felt the ward wrapping around her, but she knew what to do. She drew on the power of the Quiet Stone, letting the warmth flow up and around her, and walked through the mystic bonds.
While he couldn’t hold her, the spell had bought Doresh a moment to recover. He raised his scepter again. At his throat, the Stone of Dreams burned with a brilliant light.
“Enough!” he roared and Thorn could feel the power building in the air. “I am Shan Lian Doresh, the lord of nightmares! To face me is to face your deepest terrors! Let us see what you fear!”
She sent him crashing to the floor with a single blow of the flat of the axe. A moment later she was pinning him down, her knee on his chest and the haft of the axe pressed against his throat. “Nice speech,” she said. “But I think this Quiet Stone keeps my fears concealed. Just in case—” She reached down and tore the silver brooch from around his neck. “I think I’d better hold on to this.”
Doresh screamed, and as he did, the room around them faded. There was a crack as fractures snaked down the grand windows. The nightmares in the sky outside the tower fell suddenly silent, and the hammers of the smiths stopped ringing. Patches of rot spread across a tapestry on the wall, and Shan Doresh himself seemed to shrivel within his armor. He went limp beneath her, his tortured cry coming to an abrupt end. His scepter crumbled away, and Thorn heard his sword shatter.
Thorn stared down at the fallen warlord. Even with his threadbare cloak, he’d held a sense of majesty and might. After she removed the Stone of Dreams, he was just an ancient scarecrow clad in tarnished armor.
“Finish me, then,” he said. “Claim your prize. Let there be an end to it.”
“I don’t think so,” Thorn told him. “I was given a job. I’m taking my friend. I’m taking these stones and yours with them. I’ll let the Council of the Silver Tree decide your fate.”
Doresh didn’t move as Thorn slowly stood. She wasn’t certain if he had the strength to stand on his own. She turned to Drix. Around her, the trappings of the chamber continued to decay. Yet it seemed the ward holding Drix was still in place.
Then Doresh was upon her.
He’d lost none of his speed, and there was no time to escape. One bony hand wrapped tightly around her own, trying to wrest the Stone of Dreams from her grasp. The other pressed against the back of her neck, and agony flowed through her. Thorn couldn’t concentrate on the Quiet Stone;