Hiding his injury from the draenei, he roared to her. "Run for Rhonin! He's our best bet of makin' it out of here alive! Hurry! Go!"
He started after her for a few steps, then, when he was certain that she was committed to reaching the wizard—and thinking that he was the same—Rom turned.
But he did not turn soon enough. The head of a heavy ax sank into his side. The dwarf fell, his one hand trapped under his body. He felt his blood simultaneously spilling over his torso and growing cold as it sluggishly attempted to keep flowing.
A heavy clawed foot stepped on his maimed arm and although it was broken, it still very much felt the new pain as Rask purposelypressed enough to make a new, sharp break.
"Dwarf filth..." The drakonid stepped past Rom, the ax now gripped for tossing. Only a creature as powerful as Rask could throw such a large ax with accuracy.
It was time to die, Rom knew. The ghosts of Gimmel and the others who had perished in and around Grim Batol gathered in preparation of his joining their ranks.
But Rom struggled to his knees, keeping as silent as he could. Wavering, he moved behind Rask, who was aiming not at Iridi, but an unsuspecting Rhonin. There was no doubt in the dwarf's mind that the drakonid would deliver unto the unsuspecting wizard a fatal blow despite the distance.
Rom sought for the dwyar'hun, but Rask had apparently discarded the weapon right after firing the one shot. He left the wounded warrior with only one chance.
Rom threw himself under the much taller drakonid's arm, shoving Rask's arm upward. At the same time, he twisted the creature's wrist, trying to drive the sharp blade into Rask's head.
But although still strong by human standards, Rom was too weak to achieve his desperate goal. The ax head instead turned toward Rask's jaw, slicing it open.
With a hiss of rage and pain, the scaly guard shoved him away. Blood dripping from his mouth, the drakonid swung the ax at Rom. However, the swing was an awkward one, the flat instead striking against the dwarf's helmet.
Rolling away, Rom located his own ax just as Rask staggered over him. The drakonid's breathing was ragged, but he was far from slowed. He adjusted his grip on his weapon and came at the dwarf.
With a mighty roar, Rom raised his ax.
The drakonid's reach was greater than his. With a grunt, Rask chopped at the fallen warrior, the blade cutting deep into the dwarf's chest.
The dwarf cried out, aware the blow was a fatal one. Yet, instead of giving in to his death, Rom used the incredible pain toadd to the force of his own swing. With the skills of one who stood among the elite of Bronzebeard's warriors, he guided the ax expertly past Rask's guard. And with his remaining strength, severed the drakonid's head from his body.
As Rask's body tumbled to the side, Rom collapsed near the head, which even in death still wore a snarl. The roars of the fighting dragons nearly shattered the dying dwarf's ear drums. He heard a crack from above and knew that a section of the ceiling had broken loose, but was not concerned. By the time the collapse would reach him, Rom would be beyond any pain.
He suddenly noticed figures standing around him. Gimmel, his comrade from the war, stood among them, offering Rom a pipe.
The ghosts of those other dwarves whom Grim Batol had claimed welcomed into their ranks their old comrade and vanished to the great halls of the afterlife...
The two titans clashed again and again, using their spells to toss one another about the cavern. Dargonax paid no mind to the tiny creatures around them, but Zzeraku did. He saw the dwarves and the wizard and, most of all, the draenei—Iridi, he knew through their contact—struggling not only to survive, but to defeat the evil in this place, an evil akin in many ways to what he had once embraced but was now utterly revolted by.
Whereas Zzeraku had been brought here by force, they had come willingly to this place, come willing to sacrifice themselves. Zzeraku struggled to understand that willingness even as he battled Dargonax. They fought for something that meant more than their lives, something that would help others more than themselves....
That knowledge made him all the more ashamed at what he had been in the past... a twin in spirit of the grotesquerie against which he now struggled.
No! I will not be like him! She found me of worth! I will not be as this one... I will not be!
And although he sensed just how powerful Dargonax truly was and just how much chance he really had against him, Zzeraku knew that, if only for Iridi, he would fight to the end... whichever end fate decreed.
For her...
Most of the dwarves had fled and Rhonin had managed to indicate to the raptors that they should follow. Only a few skardyn remained, but they were a threat easily contained by the wizard, who gathered them up with a single spell, then threw the lot into one of the farthest crevices. Whether they survived or not was of no interest to the wizard, only finding Vereesa and, assuming that he was alive, Krasus.
Iridi ran toward him, the draenei constantly looking over her shoulder as if expecting someone to be right behind her. Rhonin looked past the priestess and saw only the rubble of the collapsed ceiling.
"Rom..." he murmured, starting forward. The last he had seen of the dwarf had been when a drakonid had also appeared.
"He was supposed to be with me!" the draenei uttered the moment they reached one another. "He was—"
"Acting like a true dwarven warrior," Rhonin returned. "He did what he had to. There's nothing we can do...."
Iridi's expression changed abruptly, becoming very solemn. "I knew him only a short time, but I'll do my best to honor his sacrifice and follow his example...."
The wizard started to reply, only to suddenly need to grab her before another section of the chamber could fall upon them.
But although he managed to keep them from avoiding that threat, the ground now shook with absolute abandon. The tremors that Rhonin had felt a few moments before magnified a thousand times over.
Cracks spread throughout the cavern floor, hot gasses hissing out of them. The cavern became stiflingly hot.
Rhonin looked to the nearest passage, which was still too far away. A part of him thought of Vereesa, but he knew what he had to do.
He seized the draenei in his arms. "Hold tight and pray I've got the will and strength to do this one more time!-
"But Zzeraku needs me! He knows that he can't fight Dargonax alone! He is sacrificing himself for us! For me! I feel it! I must help him! I will not let his sacrifice be In vain—"
"No time for arguments! Hold tight!"
The last of the dwarves and raptors were out, not that Rhonin could have done anything for any still lingering. He shut his eyes and concentrated—
An explosion filled his ears...then almost immediately dulled.
It was dark around him, but he did not need to see well to know that the two of them were outside. In addition, the wizard could hear the dwarves as they abandoned Grim Batol without reservation. Hisses mixed among their calls gave hint of several raptors also escaping the carnage.
But even outside, the ground shook. Rhonin was too weak to risk another leap after so much spellcasting over the past hours, but he prepared himself nonetheless.
However, it was not the ground that finally erupted, but a side of Grim Batol.
And with it came Dargonax and Zzeraku.
A plume of lava shot into the pair—and through them. The immense burst of molten earth meant nothing to them. Yet, all was not clearly well with Zzeraku for some other reason. In the fiery light of the eruption, the nether dragon looked more translucent than Rhonin thought healthy, and he seemed always on the underside of the struggle.
"Zzeraku is losing," Iridi suddenly said, verifying the wizard's fears. "He has been too long a prisoner, too long drained of his essence...and I think Dargonax yet still somehow feeds..."
"That doesn't surprise me a bit!" But other matters were already on Rhonin's mind, matters that had him staring at the ravaged mount. To the draenei, he said, "Iridi, you'll be safe here with the dwa
rves. Stay with them, all right?"
"You're going after Vereesa, aren't you?"
"And after Krasus, if he still lives, but, yes, Vereesa most of all..."
The priestess nodded. "Go. I know what must be done."
He nodded his appreciation, although he also felt some guilt at focusing only on the personal in the midst of what might prove calamity for all Azeroth. Dargonax needed to be stopped, if that was at all possible.
But he had to find his wife first...
Rhonin gritted his teeth and tried to focus entirely on her. He prayed that he was close enough to be able to transport himself to the one whom he knew best of all and who knew him just as deeply. If she was alive, Rhonin would find her.
And if Vereesa was not, even Sinestra and her abomination would learn how great could be one wizard's fury... whether or not in the end all Rhonin accomplished was to get himself killed.
TWENTY-THREE
There was lava everywhere and although Korialstrasz had earlier used it to heal himself, as he had explained to Vereesa, there were limits to how long he could survive in it in general. He had just about reached those limits.
Where Sinestra was, the red dragon could not say. There were too many primal forces and energies around him. Grim Batol was so saturated with magic that it was impossible to ever fully comprehend the magnitude of those energies. Each time Korialstrasz had thought he knew all, the mount proved him wrong.
The heat began to take its toll on his body as he fought ever upward. More than one patch of scales was already burnt, Korialstrasz began to doubt his chances of escaping this particular menace—
But then his head burst through cooler rock and dirt, followed almost immediately thereafter by precious air, Korialstrasz let out a roar that was more a gasp for that air plus a pleading to escape the burning. The red dragon tumbled haphazardly over the top of the ruined mount, then, unable to keep his momentum, he crashed into the far side of it... and rolled down to the base.
There were two others desperately seeking their freedom from the catastrophe wrought by the black dragon. Kalec shielded both he and Vereesa as best he could, although after all his trials, the young blue was more than willing to admit he was near to being finished. Yet, visions of Anveena in his head combined with his concern for the ranger to keep him pushing on.
And then, with lava seeping around them and no good place for the weakened blue to transform, a startling figure materialized. A human wizard with red hair. Kalec knew enough from both Vereesa and his own flight's information on mortal spellcasters that this had to be Rhonin Dralg'cyfaill... although in the eyes of the great Malygos, calling him "Dragonhead" was a rather sweeping statement since, rightly or wrongly, the Aspect of Magic saw him as the most tolerable of an intolerable order.
In this and other things, Kalec had found himself much in disagreement with his lord, but at the moment he only cared that this human was the mate of this high elf and might be able to get her out.
"Vereesa!" Rhonin shouted the moment he saw her. Like Kalec and the ranger, he was, for the moment, shielded. However, his shield was even closer to collapse than the blue's. Kalec had to act fast.
"Take her with you!" he ordered, thrusting her into his arms. "Get her out of here! This passage is about to join those below in being deluged!"
"What about you?" demanded Vereesa. "What about you?"
Seeing the pair together, the young blue wondered what might have been, if the destinies of he and Anveena had been meant to be the same. That decided matters for him. He did not wait for the obviously weary human to attempt to take the high elf to safety. Kalec did it for them.
The transparent, blue orb encircled both. It was a visible variation of the shield already around him. Rhonin and Vereesa looked ready to protest, but Kalec gave them no chance.
"With your magic, you can guide this out! Go!" As an impetus, he sent the sphere on its way, assuming that the wizard was smart enough to keep it moving afterward. The orb and its occupants burrowed up through the crumbling walls.
Now at last Kalec could try what he had dared not to for fear of endangering his companion. It would require all his focus, all his remaining might...and all the faith Anveena had ever had in him.
He transformed, at the same time molding a greater shield around his expanding form. As this all happened, the blue also sought to rise up.
Kalec tore through ton after ton of hard rock and earth. He did not go directly up, but on more of a slant, for it was his desire to reach one of the vast caverns he knew pocketed that side. That was where the nether dragon had been secured and it was the blue's intention to see if the other leviathan was still imprisoned there. Kalec knew that he alone could not take on Dargonax, but with the nether dragon's aid—assuming that was possible to gain—there might be hope.
The lava continued to explode through Grim Batol. This was no natural eruption, that he knew. The mount should have been far more stable. He could only think it the work of Deathwing's consort, likely as a strike against the red dragon. Kalec wished that he could go and help—assuming that Korialstrasz still lived—but he felt Dargonax the greater threat. Sinestra did not know what she had created. Somewhere, somehow, the abomination would turn from servant to master.
The rock before him suddenly crumbled away. His snout entered a shattered cavern, but one that also was not yet flooded by lava. Grateful for that, the blue dragon burst through.
A powerful black radiance washed over him. Kalec roared, then crashed against one side of the cavern. His limbs froze. He could not move at all.
"Well, not the fool I was expecting!" Sinestra crowed from somewhere in the darkness. "But you will do..."
Her claws wrapped around his legs and she carried him away with her.
Zzeraku was dying. Iridi could both see and sense that. She knew that a nether dragon's essence was finite and, after so much torture, there was not much left. He surely recognized his imminent doom, but not in the least did Zzeraku appear eager to escape it.
And it was not because of pride or simply that Dargonax had to be stopped. No, as Iridi had discerned earlier, It had to be because the nether dragon hoped to somehow save the others—save her— from death.
But I can’t let that happen! I won’t let him sacrifice himself for me or anyone! the draenei desperately thought. Thus it was that she slipped around the dwarves and even the raptors—who were clearly headed back to the ridge that took its name from them—and wended her way to a spot where she could observe the two giant combatants as closely as possible. Iridi had no idea whether or not her plan would work, only that surely if Dargonax could feed on the staff's power, then so could Zzeraku.
Summoning the staff, she pointed the larger crystal at the nether dragon. The priestess recalled all her training in the area of inward focus; she could have no distraction. All her concentration had to be on this moment.
And on preventing Zzeraku from giving his life for her.
Eyes fixed on the crystal, she channeled the power of the naaru's gift into the great beast... and prayed.
A great rush of energy filled Zzeraku. With it came wonder at this miracle, wonder and then understanding. He knew the source and knew exactly what it was costing the draenei.
And the fact that she was willing to give of herself again to save him filled Zzeraku with something else he had never truly experienced... pride in not only what he was, but what he had become. Nether dragons had no true past, no true legacy upon which to draw; they were, he had discovered from another, the product of the warped eggs of the very same black dragonflight from which Dargonax had also been created.
The only difference was that, unlike Dargonax, Zzeraku now rejected any such tie. He was not destined to be evil; his fate was his choice, whether it be life or death.
Glowing bright, the nether dragon summoned his magic again. A new and more turbulent storm of lightning bolts assailed the Devourer, who withdrew in surprise.
Zzeraku laughed...and dove f
orward in pursuit.
The two titans swooped over the burning mount like a pair of huge carrion crows fighting over the dead of a battlefield. Dargonax dropped down upon the nether dragon, but the two once again passed through one another.
Iridi felt that Zzeraku was still not strong enough to defeat Sinestra's creation. The draenei dropped down on one knee in order to preserve her strength as she forced the staff to give of itself—and her—even more.
As the new burst of energy filled him, Zzeraku roared to the draenei, "You must not do more! Go! This one is mine now to fight!"
But Dargonax, peering down at the priestess, roared back to the nether dragon, "Fear not for your little pet! She and the power she wields will make me a fine meal soon enough...."
Iridi knew that most dragons were highly intelligent, but Dargonax had a cunning far in advance of his meager life. All about the twilight dragon was more than should have been possible. Sinestra had accelerated both his physical and mental growth beyond any measure. How deadly would Dargonax be if allowed to live even a year?
That fear made her all the more determined. The priestess looked into herself for that tiny part that in almost any mortal creature always held back. Yet, for the sake of Zzeraku, Iridi could no longer permit that.
And so she gave that part of her, too. Through the staff, all that she was helped feed the nether dragon yet more.
Zzeraku swelled again. More fearsome than ever, the nether dragon beat his wings, creating with both them and his magic a gale force wind that buffeted Dargonax. The twilight dragon reverted to ethereal and yet still Zzeraku's wings battered at him, for in that wind was also the powerful energies that the staff—and Iridi— provided.
On one of Dargonax's wings, a spark of light burst into being. A second materialized on his lower right leg and a third on his torso. Each time, the twilight dragon groaned.
It's working! Although Iridi felt as weak as death, her heart leapt. Zzeraku was moments from destroying Dargonax.
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