Sons of Ironstorm - Book 4: Griffon's Stand

Chapter 13: The Covenant Renewed

"Originally resisted by the Wielder of the Star,

The Covenant selections were made for all three Wielders;

The Star, the Earth and the Tree, for all three Sons of Ironstorm.

Only time itself will bear witness to whether it was wisdom or folly

To have entered into the attempt to bind Wielders with mortal flesh

To the elvish people before the advent of the Final Battle."

- from the person journal of King Ciradaan of Aquila

From where she hung between Tamaryn and Dezi, Shiana stirred as sudden strength flowed into her.

"Shawn?" she raised her head to say out loud, startled by her brother's sudden presence so strongly in her mind.

****

His face abruptly hard with determination, Shawn sketched a quick rune of healing and restoration on his leg before spinning the runes to create Wielder armor around himself.

"Ciradaan," he said as Patrik grimly followed his older brother's lead, the Wielder of the Earth's armor forming even as Shawn opened a sa'anish style portal with a snarl of power. <<Return to Gorgon's Dagger to aide in the defense there. Even though they are now dealing with tjor'riin, they're about to deal with a whole lot more. The Shadow isn't happy and they're going to be looking for the nearest target to take that out on. And that's the Dagger. Patrik and I go to retrieve Shiana, Larengor and my Covenant. We'll meet you back at the fortress.>>

<<Right,>> Ciradaan replied with a quick nod, not even bothering to wonder how Shawn knew the Dagger was already under attack. A thought through the Sword of Aesthegon and an elvish style portal spun into being, through which he could see the courtyard in front of the building his room was in.

<<See you both back there shortly.>> Then the white haired king stepped through and was gone, his portal quickly spinning into oblivion behind him.

"Covenant?" Patrik asked with a frown as the two Wielders made to leap through the portal Shawn had created with a thought.

"I'll explain later," the elder Wielder replied with a wry twist of his mouth. Then both were through, the portal shattering into a thousand glowing fragments behind them to leave the restored glade silent and peaceful, as it hadn't been for thousands of cycles.

****

Larengor paused to look in astonishment over his shoulder at the young human princess, now somehow standing on her own despite being virtually drained of her life force. 'Blessed Maker in the heavens, how did that happen?' he silently wondered, a hundred more questions crowding into his mind right behind. But, as the crashing of dying trees mere paces behind them roughly reminded the Master of the Voice, they didn't have the luxury of stopping to finding out just what had transpired a few shades' previous.

<<Hurry, now!>> he urged instead, waving them forward. Even if Shiana had been renewed, he doubted even she had the power to defeat what Ygdarrinor now reported were a full half dozen Wurm in close pursuit of their harried company, Wielder gift or not.

Thankfully the tjor'riin that survived the Ironstorm princess's initial attack had quickly broken off their own pursuit when they realized they were competing with the monstrous cast-offs of the ancient War of Wizards that saw magic used recklessly and wildly in an attempt to bring down the dark and evil Crimson Empire, which had ruled for a thousand cycles in blood and tyranny. It would've been nightmarish to attempt to avoid both Shadow soldiers and Wurm at the same time.