Except that the result was not what she had hoped. She had thought she’d mastered the magic and could command it now. But while the Drouj ranks split apart and scattered at the dragon’s approach, the Elfstone fire failed to materialize. She tried summoning it again and again, keeping up her efforts for as long as she could manage. But after only a few minutes she could feel her strength failing.

Seconds later, the few shards of Elven fire she had managed to conjure died out completely.

She experienced a rush of dismay and anger. She was too weak! She was too unpracticed! She hadn’t used the Elfstones enough to learn how to master their power, and so now she had nothing left to call upon to use against the Drouj.

Then she remembered from Mistral’s teachings that the Elfstone magic could only be used to protect against other magic, and the Drouj commanded none.

That might have been the end of things if not for the dragon. Having reached his own conclusions about what was needed, he took control. He might have been responding to her commands earlier, guided by the Elfstones, but she no longer had use of the blue light to rein him in. Screaming as if he had gone mad, he dived almost vertically toward the opening of the pass, body stretched out and wings folded close. Phryne felt her heart go straight to her throat. The dragon was attacking. She might have wanted to stop him, but there was nothing she could do now but hang on and hope.

The dragon reached the opening to the pass and breathed fire into the Trolls gathered there—a fire that was a hundred times more devastating than what Phryne had been able to conjure with the Elfstones—incinerating dozens before lifting away at the last minute to soar back into the sky. But he wasn’t finished. Flying ahead between the peaks and cliffs, he found his way down the defile to where the front ranks of the Drouj had re-formed almost on top of the Elven defensive lines and attacked a second time. Fire sprayed everywhere, making no distinction between Elf and Troll. Phryne was screaming at the dragon, trying to stop him from including the Elves in his assault. But the dragon saw only enemies, all of them trying to hurt him (or perhaps her), and he burned them all.

As the beast broke off his attack and swept skyward again, she had just a moment to glance down and see that before the dragon struck the Troll ranks had already driven the Elves from the wide spot in the pass back into the narrows so that most of those caught out in the open were Drouj.

Most, but not all.

She wondered suddenly about Tasha and Tenerife, always at the forefront of every effort.