Mostin Ex Machina
Temenun meditated in Dream. His ancient consciousness – elevated by powerful magics and attuned to destructive urges – rapidly took stock of the changing situation. Prescient impulses crowded his mind, each seeking to assert its own augury as truth.
Sibud had fallen; the Vampire had been an arrogant fool, and the Tiger felt only contempt. To taunt vindictive sidhe-queens entailed certain risks, and departing one's own fortifications to slake an urge as base as feeding brought the consequences it deserved. Masquerading as an agent hired by herself, Ortwine had infiltrated Thond, gained news of Sibud's whereabouts, and penetrated the spirits which attended him during his glut. A dirty, ignoble assassination.
Temenun smiled. Eventually, his Naztharunes would have accomplished the same task. But the sidhe had also succeeded in instigating a bloody feud between two opposing factions within the Truzha leadership; Thond's cohesion would soon be lost. Part of Dhatri's main force – bent on Jompa, where mortals were more abundant – would have to divert to Thond and resecure it.
Yeshe had vanished, presumably departing to a hidden sanctum to recoup. As many as half of the Ushabam were destroyed, and her authority was now questionable at best. But not her power; Temenun would not underestimate that.
The Tiger considered Idyam now the greatest threat to his own supremacy; the demilich, virtually indestructible, had been quietly extending his power base. Temenun knew through his spies that Anumid had spoken with him at least three times, but Idyam played a cool courtship and patiently bided his time.
Imperceptible to the oneiric guard which the Servants of the Sun had set in defense, Temenun dreamed his way in darkness to Scir Cellod to watch events as they unfolded.
**
Choach, and the thirty Anantam who accompanied him, were entrenching quickly. They had cordoned a half-acre with walls of force and fortified their position with dimensional locks, symbols and a complex pattern of selective antimagic, overlayed by the lich himself. In unlocked areas, teleportation circles were opened; a quartet of compacted balors herded goristros through with goads of adamant. A ruddy glow illuminated the magical beachhead.
Perched on a skeletal dragon, Choach gazed across the dark of the rising plain, bending his thought north and east. Sunbursts strobed on the horizon over a low rise. He reached out with his mind to observe the main conflict, almost four miles away. Lacking adequate aerial support of his own, Prahar had pinned down the devas and griffons and forced a ground engagement.
By now, Choach knew, the nature-priest must be spent. The lich contacted Anumid.
The situation is precarious. You will need to send reinforcements if you deem victory important.
In Jashat, the Mouthpiece pondered. This might have been an ill-advised sortie, but one could hardly gainsay Visuit.
With exquisite timing, Temenun's voice purred into his mind. I am also here, Anumid. I can strike the decisive blow.
"How much?" Anumid asked aloud through gritted teeth.
Two thousand.
Anumid almost laughed. It was a preposterous sum; almost two thirds of the liquid assets of the convocations. "Even were your solution watertight, I could not persuade the cabals to invest so much."
Shvar Choryati, was Temenun's response.
The blood left Anumid's face. "I will communicate your offer."
Do not tarry in your deliberations. You have less than an hour before Nashhte sets.
Anumid swore, and commanded a dozen babau to ring the gongs and summon the remaining Anantam and as many of the Kesha-Dirghaa as could be persuaded. He sent entreaties to Naatha and Rishih to reinforce Choach with their compactees as soon as they might.
**
In the chill night air, Ortwine soared undetected above the melee, ignoring Prahar's spell of impeded flight, and gazed at the spectacle below.
The enemy's initial charge had been brutal, and backed by a magical impetus which had broken the half-ordered Temple ranks. Now three great kanistas, led by the Penitents and the Illuminated, had rallied and penetrated the Cheshnite front. Ahead of them all, the goddess Ninit rode with the five Boars, cutting a swathe through everything in her path. Magical and supernatural detonations echoed across battlefield. Devas of varying moral persuasions acted as bulwarks around which Wyrish knights rallied.
Nwm had dismantled the ritual configuration; the saints, priests and adepts who had been involved were now free to engage the enemy: a task which they undertook with predictable gusto. Lai was reordering her handmaidens with Mesikammi; the shamaness was readying another rite.
Ortwine descended behind the Cheshnite lines, and wrought a powerful glamour: what was to pass here must go undetected, for a little while at least. She reached into a soft leather pouch and withdrew a slender black taper. Igniting it with a cantrip, she held the candle as it burned rapidly.
A balor appeared in a cloud of fire and smoke. It looked around suspiciously, its true seeing unable to pinpoint Ortwine.
"Wait there for a while," the sidhe commanded, her voice issuing from somewhere close by. "I will have further instructions for you presently."
Her eyes penetrated the darkness ahead to observe Mesikammi as she invoked a massive resurrection: hundreds of corpses sprang to life again; those who had been disintegrated incarnated in pristine forms.
Ortwine raised an eyebrow; even the death knights had been afforded random living bodies. Clothed in flesh again, some rejoiced, some wept, others fled or waxed furious; their variety was utterly bewildering: strange goblins and sprites; satyrs, mephits, nymphs and sylphs; animal spirits of every conceivable type. Other spirits for which Ortwine had no names.
I have decided that I like your style, Ortwine spoke with deific benevolence into Mesikammi's mind. If you wish it, I will sponsor you.
Power is power, and I accept; although I fear I might be too fickle a priestess.
You may come to realize the absurdity of that sentiment.
Refocusing, Ortwine reached into her pouch and withdrew another candle.
*
The Ahma fought upon Narh; on his left arm he bore a light buckler lent by Ortwine. The stallion seemed to anticipate his thought even before he did, and moved with a deadly, fluid grace. Already brimming with primal energy, Narh had been infused yet further with Green power by Nwm. Sundry wards and both the Mantle and the Quickening protected Eadric still, but the ecstasy of the Benediction had passed, and the grim reality of the conflict had returned to him.
It was a confused riot: cadres of dismounted knights formed protective rings around Flamines as they worked magic; Abyssal blasts issued from death knights, penetrating the Temple ranks. Celestials moved amongst the Wyrish troops, bringing respite wherever they showed themselves; Temple Scrollbearers were evoking flame strikes and sunbursts, wasting squadrons of undead cavalry. A hundred other magical lights had been struck. Protected by Nwm's Quickening, the Templars were proving exceptionally hard to kill. The Dark Choir slew everything in its path.
Overhead, the stars winked as the fume generated by lesser magics was dispersed by the persistent breeze of Prahar's spell. Hyne winded Hemah's horn, a piercing call which echoed across the battlefield.
Striking down the enemy rapidly, the Ahma attempted to run a gauntlet of undead knights with Rede, Tarpion and Tahl in order to reach Prahar's standard; he hewed his way forwards until the press became so thick he could no longer move; the reek of the Cheshnite horses – drawn from demonic stock – was suffocating. He spoke a holy word, burning away the knights ahead and allowing him to push forward another twenty yards. Tarpion and Rede flanked him, pronouncing dicta and rendering the enemy insensible. Behind, Saint Tahl – grown ten feet tall – now fought on foot.
Prahar, also in the thick of combat but a furlong distant, uttered a profanity and struck Eadric and his company with a horrid wilting, which the Mantle deflected easily. As the Ahma fended the blows from some petty godling, he caught glimpses of Prahar's manner in battle. It made him more than a little nervous.
The undead warrior exhibited a slavering rage whilst raining down magical fire. And when any came within reach of his sword, he killed them instantly, with one stroke. Always.
Eadric cursed as he cut down his opponent, looking past him; now another gate was opening near Prahar.
The Ahma groaned as a great Ugra, hugely muscled and bearing a massive rod lurched through, smashing everything in his path. A distended gut hung over grotesque genitalia; vast horns curved down, then up, then out. Rank hair covered him. Aja, the Great Goat.
Eadric knew him as Orcus.
Matters worsened.
*
Ortwine clapped her hands. Twelve balors – suitably screened and veiled – now attended her. All were dominated.
"Your primary target – with whom I am sure you are all familiar – is Prince Orcus. Perhaps some of you may have been waiting for this opportunity for a long time. Kill Orcus. Kill Prahar. Kill Choach. Kill any other members of the Cheshnite faction. Then return here."
Ortwine waved a hand dismissively. The twelve balors teleported away.
And bring me trophies, she reminded them.
**
The Tiger dreamed his way back to Jashat; he would evoke his spell from a safe distance. Proximity to such a thing as this was never advisable. Beneath a great dome, the assembled magi were waiting for him.
Gathering his energies, Temenun reached out through Dream. Drawing on the pattern generated by the Anantam, he penetrated layers of veils, deep into ancient nightmares. His mind rested, still, within the primordial Dark. He breathed deeply.
Shvar Choryati, he whispered, and turned his thought back two hundred miles to the north.
**
The meticulous preparations for the Abyssal descent were nearing completion.
Thirteen Wizards now worked magic furiously. They conjured allies and warded themselves, haggling over access to one another's spells like children at a fig stand.
Mostin had been forced to revise his plan; yet another delay, but one insisted upon by a vocal minority led by Waide and Tozinak. They must first target the entire area in Azzagrat with the largest expulsive spell they could muster, before the Quiescence was evoked, ridding the area of chthonic nuisances before proceeding.
Mostin had been forced to reconfigure another spell, a process which took valuable time.
When he was finally ready, the Alienist consulted the web of motes again. Soneillon's significator was beginning a resonance with Rimilin; the wizard would soon bind her, as Graz'zt had indicated. Mostin felt uneasy. He hated it when demons told the truth; it made things so much more complicated.
Even as he observed, possibilities multiplied; an area of flux was causing dozens of motes to swerve along unlikely cateneries. Mostin swore profusely.
No! Not now! Why was it always now? Why couldn't it wait?
Eadric's mote suddenly careened towards him at breakneck speed, engulfing him.
Mostin snapped out of his reverie as he was struck by a desperate sending issued by Tahl.
Mostin. Help. Please.
"This is a most unfair choice," Mostin protested.
*
Scenes of battle passed across the surface of the Mirror of Urm-Nahat. A ravenous darkness, rolling across the conflict, appeared to be consuming Wyrish troops by the company.
"It's simple," Daunton sighed. "Do you know nothing of committees? We vote; and quickly. Abstentions must also abide by the majority decision. Mostin, as host, must vote last. In the event of a tie, I have the casting vote. My vote is for a return to Wyre."
"To Azzagrat," Jalael said immediately.
"No vote," Tozinak sighed. "I simply cannot. I am overwrought."
"To Azzagrat," Muthollo concurred.
"To Azzagrat," Hlioth nodded.
Mostin cocked his head. Now that was unexpected.
"No vote," said Creq. "I have a mortuary in southern Hethio, and I would be loath to see it despoiled. But I am greedy, and wish to increase my power. I am genuinely conflicted."
"I cast no vote," Mulissu waved her hand dismissively. "I do not recognize the authority of the Wyrish Collegium, and reserve the right to ignore any decisions the committee reaches."
"To Wyre," Sho said unexpectedly. Mostin wondered which sentiment moved her; an inkling suggested it might be some sense of obligation to Nwm, but he had no evidence to support the theory.
"To Wyre, also," Troap nodded. "I am a mundane sort, by nature. Which makes me wonder as to which voice Hlioth is responding."
"Now is not the time to analyze motivation." Daunton groaned.
"To Wyre," Orolde answered.
"No vote," Waide growled. "At the moment, neither choice appeals. I am hungry, and I am late to bed."
"To Azzagrat," Droom of Morne spoke. "I would hate more to see the vote so uncontested."
Mostin glared at him.
Daunton looked desperately at the Alienist.
"Wyre," Mostin nodded. "Although I feel bound to point out that the target area is not actually in Wyre, either politically or magically. Ladies and gentlemen, we are unconstrained."
"If you insist on this course of action," Hlioth sighed wearily, "you must first neutralize Choach, before he disperses his demons and becomes a further nuisance."
"An opinion or a prophecy?" Mostin asked acidly.
"Quiet your ego!" Hlioth snapped. "And for once, do as I say. I will be busy dying elsewhere. Do not mourn. I will be back ere sunrise."
"Hence, I mourn."
"After you have eliminated Choach, evacuate as many as you can," Hlioth sighed. "You cannot overcome this darkness."
**
Daunton pinpointed one of the gaps in Choach's protective net with a potent divination.
The Infernal Tower appeared, unmasked by any illusion, within the lich's rapidly deploying force. The Collegiate mages stood on a wide balcony which Mostin had caused to be projected from the tower's wall at a height of fifty feet. The Alienist smashed the lattice of antimagic protecting the Cheshnite magi with a powerful dispelling.
A barrage of disjunctions – previously prepared by the Wyrish wizards for the purpose of sealing the twenty-two chthonic gates of Azzagrat – instead rained upon Choach and the Anantam, stripping them of protections, collapsing walls of force and rendering teleportation circles inert.
Mulissu struck Choach with a Glance of Thunder; before he could teleport, she struck with another. Mostin detonated a massive sonic.
"Take out the balors, you idiots!" Mostin barked at the other wizards, who seemed to be targeting groups of demons indiscriminately.
Tozinak grew wings and hovered exitedly. "My egg has hatched! My egg has hatched!"
Mulissu collapsed unconscious, blood pouring from her nose.
Deprived of his physical form, Choach fled back to his phylactery.
Five miles away, Eadric was alerted to the presence of the wizards by a peal of distant thunder.
*
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