Page 57 of Wizards & Weavers
What if it was slow, anyway? It was frozen, wasn’t it? Surely those layers of ice around its limbs and joints needed to be broken before it could actually —
“Fascinating,” Augustin breathed, hands on his hips as he stared up at the colossus.
And here was a second great lumbering thing that seemed to have difficulty moving. Braiden tugged the wizard’s cloak harder.
“Augustin. We need to get out of here.”
The wizard shot him an incredulous glare, then gestured at the giant. “But look at this incredible discovery we’ve made. This is the largest elemental I’ve ever seen! Talk about greater elementals, indeed. This place must be close to the source of the dungeon’s purest elemental essence. Note how the balance of elements has shifted, water combining with air instead of earth. For something to grow this huge, it must have tapped into a vein of — ”
Braiden tugged on the wizard’s cloak with all his might. This did not have the intended effect, throwing the pair of them into a heap. Braiden’s lantern slipped from his fingers and shattered as it hit the ground, the flame snuffed out as soon as it met the frost.
He shivered at the cold of the stone beneath him, but at least Augustin’s great stupid body kept him warm from the top. Still, a far too compromising position to find themselves in, especially in light of the threat still towering above them.
“What on earth is wrong with you?” Augustin barked.
“I know that you think this is some major scholarly breakthrough, and maybe it is,” Braiden said. “But that thing is massive. You’ve seen how aggressive the little ones are. How much angrier is this one going to be when — ”
Elyssandra screamed. “Look out!”
Above him, past the anger on Augustin’s face, the cavern darkened. The giant’s foot was coming down on top of them, and fast. He grabbed Augustin tight, throwing all his weight to one side, intending to roll.
But with an explosive whoosh of wind, Braiden found himself whipped upward into the air. He blinked hard, heart pounding against his chest, against Augustin’s. Gods, had the frost giant stomped on the ground so hard as to launch them straight up?
“Oh, gods,” Braiden breathed, gazing down at the cavern from high above. “Ybura preserve us. We’re flying.”
Augustin Arcosa’s cloak rippled, his hair teased by the wind as he maneuvered beyond the giant’s reach. An enormous hand lunged for them, bearing down with claws as huge and sharp as scythes. As quick as the twitch of a muscle, Augustin levitated them out of harm’s way.
The Wizard of Weathervale had definitely earned his name. Braiden would have liked to experience flying under less harrowing circumstances, but this was incredible, to feel lighter than air, to see the world from up above.
Down below, Warren was bounding in place, his staff held above his head in both hands, cheering them on. Right beside him, Elyssandra’s eyes were as big as boiled eggs, her mouth opened large enough to fit an entire Gwerenese omelette.
Braiden held tight, feeling somewhat inappropriate for essentially groping the wizard’s physique through his clothing, but feeling far more strongly about wanting to stay alive.
And there was still the messy business of making sure this deadly giant never left this cavern to devastate the rest of the dungeon, not to mention the Underborough, or Weathervale itself.
“What now?” Braiden asked, his hands much too busy with holding tight to contribute any of his own magic. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Leave it to me,” Augustin boomed heroically, his muscles tautening even more obscenely as he held Braiden closer with one arm.
Flying free with his hair in the wind, clasped in the arms of a great hero of Aidun, Braiden thought it was almost romantic. If only Augustin wasn’t practically squeezing the life out of him.
“Have at you!” Augustin cried, hurling a spell at the great elemental. The air roared as a howling vortex of magic erupted from the palm of his hand, spinning with destructive force.
Nothing happened. The swirling spell dissipated on contact with the giant’s icy form, the conjured tornado too weak to topple it, much less give it cause for concern. The creature lumbered forward, its heaving bulk emerging from the gloom, finally giving Braiden a better look at its face.
He almost screamed. The smaller elementals they’d fought only bore a rudimentary resemblance to humanoids. This thing had a far more realistic face, its angular brow lending it an expression of scowling anger, clusters of wicked icicles dripping from its chin to form a terrifying beard.
And its eyes: deep, carved hollows that reached into its proverbial skull, empty pits that showed nothing.
A storm was neither good nor evil. Wasn’t that how Augustin had explained it? This was much the same. Braiden could ascribe every sinister aspect that he wanted to this creature. In the end, it was a thing of ice, existing only to freeze, and snap, and sap the life out of the living.
“That usually works,” Augustin muttered.
Braiden would have thumped him on the chest if he didn’t think it would make the wizard drop him. He scanned the cavern instead, looking for something useful. If they couldn’t fight with their own magic, perhaps their surroundings had something to offer.
“There!” he called out, pointing at the icicles stuck to the ceiling, enormous things that might inflict a ton of damage if dropped in the right place. Right on the elemental’s head, for example.
“Excellent thinking, my weaver friend.”
