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[Lazybones]

Chapter 72


Jaron looked on in horror as the wight delivered a crushing blow to Elevaren. The warlock’s body sagged under the full weight of the undead monstrosity, whose claws continued to tighten around the eladrin’s neck.

Jaron forced himself to his feet, and took up his small sword, knowing it was already too late but intent on doing his best to avenge his friend.

But even as he started forward back toward the desperate melee, he saw Elevaren’s eyes open. The glow in those eyes was more than a reflection of the adjacent firepots set at the corners of the plinth; Jaron could see a deep radiance therein, a trail of colors that swirled in a mysterious pattern that nearly sucked him in despite the desperate intensity of their circumstances. He could only watch as the eladrin lifted a hand, which began to glow with a soft, healthy light. The wight snarled, but before it could counter a bright flare of multicolored energy erupted that engulfed both the warlock and his enemy. Jaron staggered back, lifting an arm to protect himself from that radiance. It only lasted a second, but it took him a few more heartbeats before he could see clearly once more, and still longer before he understood what was before him.

Both Elevaren and the wight were gone, vanished without a trace.

“Hiyaaaa!” yelled Beetle, as he sprang up at Kalarel, a tiny knife flashing in his right fist as he tried to find a vulnerability in the cleric’s heavy armor. Droplets of blood flashed as the tip of the blade clipped the priest’s jaw, but the edge failed to cut deep enough to find an artery, and the wound was ultimately only superficial. Kalarel, reacting swiftly, caught the halfling with one arm and hurled him over his shoulder, in the direction of the portal. Beetle only flew a few feet, landing on the back edge of the rune circle, but it was enough to put him in reach of the probing tendrils of shadow-stuff coming out of the arch. “Aaaaaya!” Beetle yelled, ducking as one of the dark claws tore through the air just over his head, and then it was all he could do to leap away before the entity could grab him, all thoughts of attack abandoned as he fled back to the relative security of the center of the chamber.

Kalarel turned back toward Mara, but the fighter had not moved; she had succumbed to the negative energies of the priest’s weapon, and now she lay unconscious and helpless before him.

“So, it’s down to you and me,” he said, as Devrem stepped forward to confront him.

The priest was in dire shape. He’d defeated Kalarel’s skeleton warrior, but the attacks he’d absorbed—from the wight, the enemy cleric, and the undead guardian—had taken their toll. Devrem favored his right side, where the skeleton’s sword had struck repeatedly, hurting him even through his armor, and his face was pale, his expression haggard. But the fire burning in the cleric’s eyes remained undimmed.

“This ends here,” the servant of the Raven Queen said, presenting his staff before him like a judge’s rod.

Kalarel raised his arms; the dark power coming through the archway flanked him like a fell aura. “It is too late for you!” he yelled triumphantly. “The Shadow comes upon your world!”

Devrem lunged forward, but his enemy was expecting him; he parried the thrust of the staff almost effortlessly, the flaring divine magic coming from its tip streaking harmlessly over the evil priest’s shoulder. In turn, his own blow cracked solidly into Devrem’s ribs, driving the air from his body, and knocking him back a step. Devrem staggered and nearly fell, agony written upon his face. But he refused to fall, drawing upon some last desperate reserve of strength as he pulled himself back up to face his foe.

“The powers of darkness demand a sacrifice,” Kalarel said. “Your final conscious realization will be that your death helped open the barrier between your realm and that of Shadow.” The evil cleric lowered his rod and lifted his hand; black tendrils that were an echo of the power flowing from the portal flared around his fingers.

Devrem suddenly lurched forward, surprising Kalarel with the suddenness of his attack. The evil cleric threw out his hand and unleashed the surge of necromantic power he’d been holding, but Devrem came blasting through the dark wave to collide solidly into the enemy priest, his shoulder crashing into Kalarel’s chest. The two men, tangled up together, were driven backwards by the inertia of Devrem’s charge. Black fire flared around them, and tongues of shadow-stuff tore through Devrem’s body, the tendrils leaving gray streaks of dead flesh as they cut across the cleric’s scalp. Kalarel slammed his fist into Devrem’s back, but his other hand, holding his rod, was trapped between their bodies. Devrem started to falter, and it was clear from one look at his face that he was dying; the fire blazing in his eyes had been replaced by an empty look. With a snarl, Kalarel started to tear free, bringing up his rod to put a final end to it, but to his surprise Devrem suddenly half dove, half fell forward, locking his arms around the other man’s hips. His weight took Kalarel off-balance, and both men fell over backwards, tumbling into the the black portal.

There was a sudden cacophonous pulse, a roar that was like the blast of a hurricane, only contained in a frozen moment of time that vanished abruptly with a faint tearing sensation. Then everything seemed to shatter, and everything in the chamber collapsed into blackness.