Page 16 (1/2)
Wistala felt her fringe rise "Don’t speak of last chances to a dragonelle with jaw and lion-dashed forward
She washed the wall in flah the wall of fire as though it were nothing but a winter on Pain only onhood But it’s well-singed"
She edged back She could make one last stand at the ood tunnel to defend and he would be contending with verticals He’d be fighting her and his oeight
Wistala wondered why he didn’t roar Male dragons, in her liht, especially when in pain DharSii conserved his breath, struck, struck again She’d never felt such power in a blow before It re He struck, not biting, but stabbing forith nose-tip and tail-point, and with each strike she heard her own scale breaking
He battered her He never closed, never caht allow her to claw or bite She ed to latch on to his crest, but came aith a bloody sii and a torn-out clahen he recoiled
"Yield!" he said, his voice oddly calm "Cry settled! Cry, curse it all, cry!"
"Never!" shewhat in the six skies "cry settled" was supposed tohis snout the appearance of being bent a little If she weren’t so battered and bruised, she hed
Her tail felt eht to the brink of the pit--
She batted one of the cauldrons filled with hot oil with her tail It broke loose from its chains and sent a shower of oil toward him The oil hissed as it struck on his flank and he scra a chance, she rushed forward, slipping as she passed over the spilled oil, hardly hot any the cool stone
They reared up, grappling, biting and snapping Wistala had always counted herself strong, and for a moment she bent hiht have cooled, but the footing was treacherous DharSii lunged She heard his hot panting in her ear, felt his breath beating at her neck as they strained, his griff locked in hers Her tail sought purchase but found only empty air--
Then she was over
She fell with a shriek Just as she heard DharSii gasp sohtened wail overwhels, a natural instinct, but while the chash for that She heard so and realized one as broken, whipping wildly as she spun down--but the other was open, turning her fall into a crazy spin, like those spinning one-winged seeds those tall trees dropped in Hypatia’s northern forests
She bounced off the wall, or a projection, and continued her fall, so open
It was theshe fell It felt like an eternity, a day, but it couldn’t have been more than a few moments, for when she finally struck she could still see a circle of light above, not quite a star but far smaller than the ularity, one of the oil-pots, or DharSii?
She’d landed on soy slap shocked her; she felt wet, clinging wet, all around
Stunned for aup at that far-off circle of light, a wet, rotting smell like a barrel-full of last year’s sater, alternately revolting and coon would have s on herwater
Of all the dragons in the world to appear here--she couldn’t have been ht AuRon Of course, there weren’t h when she first uncased her wings Would the hot oil scar hi, before judging her injuries to deteron she’d just fought
She chuckled like Rainfall aonlike noise, but the laughter of elves infected all who heard it into imitation
She cleared herli stabbed, a fast, deep, twisting spear that bored right up through her shoulderwas le It also hurt when she breathed on her left side, though whether that was related to her wing or not she couldn’t say Rainfall had done some sketches of her muscles once, just for his own satisfaction, and co nubs