You roll over the parapet, dagger in hand, creep up behind Malureon, and plunge the blade to the hilt in the magician’s back. Malureon stumbles with a cry, and his stroke goes amiss, his knife clanging off the altar instead of plunging into Lady Miranda’s chest. Black slime wells from the wound in Malureon’s back, your dagger crumbling into ash, and you jerk your hand free before the smoking ooze can touch your skin.
And before you can do anything else, Malureon’s shadow boils from floor and wraps itself around you. It lifts you into the air, its coils holding you immobile, and struggle as you might you cannot break free. Malureon straightens up, coughing, while the wound on his back closes and his shadow holds you immobile.
“You,” says Malureon, blinking his mercury-colored eyes in surprise. “The thief Coriolus planned to frame for his crime.” The magician’s lip twitches. “He was so concerned about escaping the Prince’s wrath. Little did he know that he and the Prince would have burned with all Cintarra.” He shakes his head. “It has been centuries since anyone wounded me. You are valorous, for human vermin, and such valor should be repaid. So you shall have a quicker death than the rest of this filthy city.”
The shadow ripples, and you realize that he is simply going to throw you off the Tower and continue his spell to raise the Great Dragon.
Then silver light falls over the Tower, and you see a griffin descending in a battle dive. Ankylon rides the griffin’s back, his sword ablaze with silver flame, and another shiver – perhaps fear? – goes through the shadow holding you in place. The griffin plummets towards Malureon, and you see Ankylon draw back his sword for the kill.
But Malureon is faster. His shadow coils like a spring and throws you into Ankylon. You crash into Ankylon with bone-jarring force, knocking the elven High Captain from the saddle of his griffin. The griffin squawks and circles away in confusion. Ankylon tumbles over the battlements and vanishes, his sword clanging against the floor next to Malureon. You almost follow Ankylon over the edge, but you seize a battlement and hang on, clawing for purchase. The wind tugs at your cloak, and you feel yourself losing your grip, emptiness yawning up beneath you…
“Still alive?” murmurs Malureon. He shakes his head, and his shadow rises up behind him like a serpent ready to strike. “You humans. How you struggle to protect your meaningless, useless little lives. As if the pathetic thirty or forty years of life you still possess have any value or purpose.”
He crooks his finger, and his shadow swoops towards you.
And then it stops.
You hear someone singing.
You turn your head, and see Sidorna’s griffin perched on the far side of the Tower’s crown. Sidorna sings, her voice ringing over the Tower, and you recognize the song. It is an ancient elven aria, the lament of an elven woman whose husband and sons went off to war against the Dark Powers, and never returned. Grief and despair and unutterable longing fill the song, brought to life by Sidorna’s powerful voice, and even as you struggle to get a better grip on the battlement, you feel a brief wave of sorrow.
But the song strikes Malureon like a thunderbolt.
Malureon stares at her, his hands clenching, and for a moment hideous anguish fills his face, pain without limit, without end. A dozen expressions flicker over his black-veined face, grief and despair and perhaps even a hint of regret.
And then they all vanish beneath volcanic rage.
He screams his fury, and the thunder overhead echoes him. He throws out his hands, and his shadow leaps across the Tower’s crown to wrap around Sidorna, dragging her from the griffin, which flees with a shriek of terror. Sidorna struggles, and you see her face turn red and then purple as the shadow wraps around her throat, choking her.
“You dare!” screams Malureon. “You dare to defile that song with your filthy lips! Human maggot! You will suffer for this, you suffer, suffer, suffer…”
His ranting dissolves into an incoherent howl of rage, and Sidorna’s eyes roll up into her head. But all of Malureon’s attention is bent upon Sidorna, and the magician seems to have forgotten you in his fury.
You heave yourself over the battlements, and your eye falls upon Ankylon’s sword, the blade still burning with silver flame.
