Outraged at the future Sammaster prophesied and the abominations of creation he had perpetrated unceasingly, Lathander sent a battle avatar to the field. The undead creatures forming a wall around Sammaster disintegrated in a flash of light as the full glory of the god of the dawn touched them, but the choking ash of their remains clogged the air immediately as an unearthly wind howled forth from Sammaster, forming the ash into a cloud that obscured the sky and turned the dawn light red as blood. Sammaster's dracolich steed breathed a massive gout of dragonfire upon the golden breastplate of the Morninglord, only to scream an unearthly keening wail that faded into nothing as Dawnspeaker, Lathander's mace, smote its head and disrupted its unliving existence.
Sammaster, seemingly untroubled, floated in midair where his steed had been, and in the twinkling of an eye a coruscating aura of ineffable blackness surrounded him, as if a cloak of night and death had been knit about his body.
His eyes glowed dark purple, and he gestured with his staff, and a mighty turning wheel of faintly glowing energy appeared between him and Lathander. Energy, the auras streaming out from every living and undead being on the battlefield except Lathander and Sanmaster, appeared as multicolored threads, and all of them were being sucked into the wheel, spun around, and pulled tight. Within an instant, all were taut.
Those who were there speak in what accounts remain of a sharp pain followed by a sense of anticipation, as if some huge 'thing' waited just beyond the doorways of their senses to happen. What happened next is recalled by very few, and only in dreamlike snatches, as past this point apparently only Sammaster and Lathander could move.
Lathander looked upon Sammaster and a fierce delight seemed to play behind his eyes. "Abomination," he cried, "die!" Crackling streams of lightning and golden radiance poured out from his eyes, assaulting Sammaster with deadly force. Sammaster's skeleton was visible briefly, glowing like an inner light within his corporeal form, and he convulsed suddenly in midair, dropping his staff as his fingers curled into claws. Then, with a tremendous effort, he reached up and sideways with his left hand to elsewhere and drew back a single thin sheet of metal glinting with a faint, silvery sheen. Strange symbols and glyphs crawled across its surface.
Sammaster held it up before him, as if to force Lathander to read it. "Fool!" Lathander thundered, and Dawnspeaker came down resoundingly through the metallic scroll and into Sammaster, whose body twisted in the aftershock of the blow and then, miraculously, started to straighten. The scroll shattered in all directions into a million slivers of light, but one small, dagger-shaped piece stuck in the golden plate armor above Lathander's heart, scratching his chest, and four drops of his blood fell to the ground at his feet. (After the battle these were gathered up in an amber flask by a priest of the Morninglord from the village of Hap. Today this holy relic of the Morninglord'ss church is revered as the artifact, the Blood of Lathander.) Lathander reached out with one hand and crushed the wheel of spellstuff that held all in thrall while twin globes of dull red and black flew from Sammaster'ss hands to burst against Lathander'ss breastplate ineffectually. Lathander gestured, and a hole of light was ripped through the flying ash that obscured the sun. Light brighter than any who witnessed the event ever saw before or later in their lives shot down through the hole, cloaking Sammaster from view.
Sammaster did not have time to even scream as he was instantly killed, apparently incinerated in the sun's fire. Upon investigation of the battlefield later, nothing remained of him but about two pounds of fine ash.
