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By Root 1272 0

chest as it had rolled out of duur’kala of old, but freshly infused with her magic—and from the first note, it seemed that what she sang was even older than Dhakaan, that it grew out of a primal need to fight for life and to triumph over death. The sensation was dizzying, but Ekhaas poured everything she felt into the song. Long hours of training in Volaar Draal had taught her how to project her voice, but even a duur’kala’s voice couldn’t carry unaided over the battlefield. A slim thread of magic stolen from the magnificent whole amplified and tied it to the rhythm Uukam beat out on the great drum. Both song and drumbeat rose into the sky and echoed across the plain, pure as sunlight and as powerful as a storm.

The battle paused, all eyes looking up at her in amazement, elven bright and dar dark. In the elves she could see a sudden tension, an instinctive mistrust of this martial music. In the dar, though, she saw exactly what she had expected. Wonder. Longing. Awe. Rage.

She sought out Dagii. The brass half-mask of his helm was raised to her—then he thrust his sword in the air. “Attack!” he roared. “Attack!”

The battle crashed back into motion. Dagii urged his tiger at Seach Torainar, but a ripple in the currents of fighting forced the two leaders apart. Quick-thinking elves launched a volley of arrows up at Ekhaas but the angle of the hill and a fold of the earthworks offered her protection. Or perhaps the song itself deflected the arrows. Ekhaas’s voice soared.

In her mind’s eye, she saw the glories of Dhakaan portrayed in the stories and artifacts that had come down through the ages to the Kech Volaar.

Carved cities and mighty fortresses.

Vast armies sweeping enemies before them—gnolls, elves, the dread daelkyr and their foul minions. Works of staggering majesty.

The magical songs of duur’kala and the wondrous creations of daashor.

The deeds of emperors and generals and warriors—heroes of the dar.

She channeled what she saw into what she sang, and her song was the song of the Empire of Dhakaan.

The beat of Uukam’s drum became the beat played by all the drums that had survived on the battlefield. The rhythm anchored Ekhaas to the fighting soldiers of Darguun. It carried her vision into living hearts, bringing a renewed energy to the goblin who rode his leopard against a Valenar horse, to the bugbear who laid about him with a steel mace that reaped lives as a scythe reaped grain, to the hobgoblin warcaster who beat his broken staff against the bleeding head of a staggering elf wizard. Ekhaas watched the reserve regiment at the base of the hill gather itself and throw back the Valaes Tairn. She watched the fragments of Darguul companies flow together, form themselves into wedges and force their way through their enemies to reach each other. She watched the Iron Fox Company, under Dagii’s command, take a position at the heart of the swirling battle.

And Valaes Tairn died—but so did Darguuls. Slowly, in spite of the valor of the dar, the battle turned back to the favor of the elves. A newly reformed company collapsed. A rush of elven cavalry drove the reserve company back to the base of the hill and shattered their lines. Beneath the swallow-tailed banner of stars, Seach Torainar whirled his double scimitar around his head and gathered elves for a rush on the Iron Fox. Dagii shouted and roared, urging his warriors into stronger lines to meet the attack.

“Maabet!” Biiri cried from behind her. “They’re through. They’re coming—the elves are climbing!”

The beat of Uukam’s drum faltered, then faded, and Ekhaas knew he had gone to aid in whatever defense Biiri could muster.

She sang alone. Her throat was raw. Her jaw and chest ached. She knew that the veins and muscles of her neck must be standing out, straining like the rigging on a ship in a storm. She looked down on the defeat of Dagii’s army and almost—almost—the sorrow of a dirge, of the fall of Dhakaan and the beginning of the hard Desperate Times, crept into her song.

No. She wouldn’t let Darguuls die with the sounds of mourning in their ears. She wouldn