Page 91 of The Dryad Storm

In a flash of multicolored light, the two Agolith Flame Hawks that portaled here with them burst out of the Great Tree and perch in a nearby branch, their luminous orange feathers ruffling with what seems like vast surprise over their rapid change in location.

Gwynn’s and Mavrik’s lines twine into a deeper linkage to the Forest as the hawks take wing to light on her and Mavrik’s shoulders, their lines flooding with the birds’ affection. An instant, kindred connection flashes into being, love for both birds expanding Gwynn’s heart with an emotional ache.

“Our lines...” Mavrik marvels as he absently reaches up to stroke the hawk kindred’s feathers “...they’re not what we thought they were.”

“They’reroots,” Gwynn breathlessly murmurs as their fully anchored light power flashes through the Forest. “And what you told me when we were in the Agolith... it was all true. Magically, we’reDryads.”

Urgency overtakes Mavrik’s deep-green features. “Gwynn... where are the others? Where’s Wynter? And theVerdyllion—”

An Erthia-shatteringBOOMsounds above them, breaking off his words. Alarm streaks through their lines as their hawks startle.

Gwynn and Mavrik exchange a look of dire concern before they both launch into an upward climb, Gwynn finding herself stunningly agile and strong. A stiff breeze hits her as they burst through the canopy’s top, the Northern Forest’s panoramic expanse of green spread out around them, the two translucent green dome-shields encasing it.

Gwynn’s lungs contract as a roaring tide of Shadow storm crashes against the Forest’s nested shields, the storm band’s dark, curling lightning breaking into a frenzy, all of it knifing into the Varg and Dryad shields.

“Ancient One,” Gwynn gasps, just as muffled shouts rise from the ground far beneath them. Their widened gazes meet.

“The others must be at III’s base,” Mavrik says, his tone harsh with steel-sharp purpose. “We need to pool our power with theirs and strengthen our Forest’s shielding.”

Warrior purpose firing through their magic, they climb down the Great Tree’s massive trunk with startling rapidity, Gwynn adjusting to her lithe, newly muscular body, her movements strong and assured as her green claws dig into III’s black bark.

They careen through the densest portion of the canopy, leaping from branch to branch before they drop down into the clearing surrounding III...

... and come face-to-face with a band of Dryads, a crimson-haired Icaral man, who can only be the Icaral of Prophecy, amongst them.

A stunned breath shudders through Gwynn as Yvan Guryev’s violet-fire eyes meet theirs, his pupils vertically slitted. Dark horns rise from his flame-like hair, and black wings fan out from his back.

Beside him stands the Dryad-Fae Black Witch herself, Elloren Gardner Grey, her ears pointed, her hue deepened to Forest tones, a streak of dark green slashed through her black hair, a flock of giant ravens surrounding her.

Memories of visions sent to Gwynn of Elloren the Dryad dart through her mind as she comes face-to-face with the reality that Elloren Gardner Grey is clearly no longer under Vogel’s control.

“Mavrik!” Yvan cries as all the Dryads level Forest-hewn glowing runic weapons at Mavrik and Gwynn, the distant Shadow storm band roaring against the Forest’s shielding.

“We’re on your side!” Mavrik cries, both Gwynn and Mavrik displaying their III-marked palms.

Elloren Gardner Grey’s eyes widen as she takes in their III marks before her gaze swings to Yvan’s. “This is the wandmaster who pretended to kill you?” she asks in fluent Dryadin. “The traitor to the Magedom?”

Yvan nods, his eyes pinned on Mavrik. “Now our Dryad’kinally,” he responds in the same tongue.

“They are no kin of mine!” a female Dryad with coiled hair festooned with oak branches snarls, readying a branch weapon, a growling wolverine hugging her side. She lurches threateningly toward Mavrik and Gwynn just as raptors’ cries sound out above them all.

Everyone’s eyes snap up as two points of golden light soar down from III’s crown, Gwynn’s heart and magic surging toward their kindred Agolith Flame Hawks. Both she and Mavrik hold up their forearms, the hawks landing on their arms in a rush of fiery love.

Three of the Dryads, including a fierce-looking man with branch horns, a petite, flower-tressed woman, and a lime-hued Dryad with frighteningly intense black eyes, lower their weapons, but the angry female Dryad with the staff and the two Dryads beside her—a huge branch-horned male Dryad with a bear kindred and a mushroom-haired female with a silver panther kindred—all keep their weapons leveled.

“We were with others in the Sublands,” Gwynn calls out to them all, ignoring the hostility aimed their way. “The Icaral Wynter Eirllyn amongst them.”

“Wynter?” Elloren exclaims.

“She has the Verdyllion,” Gwynn tells her as an image of the Wand of Myth flashes into being in the back of her mind, a directional tug pulling her linesdown. Gwynn’s eyes widen. “I’ve a sudden sense of the Verdyllion... in the Sublands below us.”

Mavrik gives her an intense look. “I feel the Verdyllion’s tug on our lines, as well.” He turns to Yvan. “Wynter’s brother Cael and his Second, Rhys Thorim... they were with us too,” he says. “Along with Valasca Xanthrir and Sparrow Trillium. And three Subland Elf soldiers.”

“Where are they now?” Yvan presses, urgency firing in his eyes as Vogel’s Shadow stormbooms louder against the southern edge of the Forest’s shielding.

Gwynn meets Yvan Guryev’s gaze. “I don’t know,” she shakily tells him. “Ithink most of them might still be inside III—”

A huge explosion detonates. Everyone looks up as the nested dome-shields cast over the Forest ray out forest green and emerald light. The ground rumbles beneath their feet, and horror lances through Gwynn as the Northern Forest’s shielding blasts clear out of existence.

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