with wisps of smoke coming forth from its great nostrils. Three sets of eyes went wide with surprise and horror, three mouths dropped open in simple awe at the most magnificent beast.
"Welcome, thieves!"
"Not so..." Juraviel started to say, gasping and stuttering through each word. But he stopped his sentence and started his legs, leaping aside as a great foreleg came swatting down at him, smashing into the gems and coins where he had been standing, rending the very stone of the floor!
Cazzira leaped in near to that foreleg and whipped her wooden club about hard, smacking it against the scaly limb.
She might as well have smashed it against the side of a rocky mountain.
"Run away!" Belli'mar Juraviel cried, and all three scattered, diving about the treasure mounds, using them for cover from the beast. The dragon thrashed its tail, sending a fountain of coins, gems, and trinkets flying about the room, showering poor Brynn, who went tumbling down over a smaller pile of spears and other weapons.
She hit hard and turned about, fearing that the wurm was upon her.
But the dragon had gone the other way, in pursuit of Cazzira. The Doc'alfar cut around one pile of coins; the dragon lowered its head and plowed right through.
Apparently anticipating the move, Cazzira came right back out the way scaling another nearby pile and rolling right over the top, the other side.
' t\'? bellowed the dragon, and its voice boomed off the rock and?s if it W0uld sunder the very stones that supported the chamber. Tie work for my meal, that I might enjoy it all the more!" 3 her worst nightmares, Brynn Dharielle had never imagined anything as rful and monstrous as the dragon. It seemed as if it could kill her with done, and every time it spouted a word, a bit of flame came out 'it! All that Brynn could think of was running away, diving back down * pit and rushing back across the fiery lake. Despite the plight of her two companions, the young ranger actually started on that very course - until something else caught her eye A specter hovered by the pile of weapons over which she had just tripped, the ghost of a man, a To-gai-ru.
"Emhem Dal," she whispered, though she had no idea of how she knew the ghost's identity.
The specter lifted a translucent arm, pointing to the side, and Brynn felt a command, one that she could not ignore. Pushing away the continuing thunder of the dread wurm, the shouts of Juraviel and Cazzira, the screech-ing of dragon claws on stone, Brynn rushed out to the side, toward a mound of assorted treasures, following the specter's command. She reached the pile and began digging, having no idea of what she might be looking to find, for she had not taken the moment to consider any of this.
She just dug and dug, tossing aside goblets and jewelry, strangely shaped coins stamped with a dwarven face, and even a helm and short sword. And then another sword...
Brynn almost threw that second one, until she felt a wave of compre-hension as her hand closed about its fashioned golden hilt, beautiful in design. It was formed into a sculpture of an elf dancing, her arms out-stretched as she twirled, forming the crosspiece, and her head, fashioned of a light red ruby, serving as the joint between the slender blade and the pommel.
I he blade was no less magnificent, razor thin and with delicate carvings tinning the length of the flat sides. It wobbled as Brynn flicked her wrist, it despite that, the woman could sense its immense strength.
Understanding the truth of the sword, a ranger sword, Brynn looked back to the ghost. . but the specter was gone.
: came out of her trance then, and abruptly, seeing Juraviel flying over ? mound, his bow in hand, launching a series of arrows back at the pur-ring dragon.
sucked in her breath as Juraviel approached another treasure > thinking that it would stop him and that serpentine neck would catch up to him!
clever elf dropped right before he got there, and the lunging dragon snapped over him as he fell, colliding with the mound and sending a shower of coins and gems flying about the chamber.
"Run away!" Juraviel cried again. ?To each your own, and find a way out!"
"No escape!" the dragon promised.
"Not for me, perhaps," Brynn said under her breath, and with a howl she charged forward, rushing past the surprised Juraviel as he continued his flight,