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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 1897583" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 281Separated by a wall of force, the divided companions confronted a pair of terrible foes.  The fiendish warrior rushed forward, bringing his axe around in a wide arc designed to take Beorna’s head from her shoulders.  The templar stood her ground and shifted her body to take the hit on her armor.  The adamantine plate held even against the magical sharpness of the evil fighter’s blade, but she felt the force of the impact nonetheless, a hard wedge of pain driving through her body.  The man—an orc, Beorna realized, as she saw the sinister features through the slit of his helm—was incredibly strong, and unlike her, not affected by magical exhaustion.  What was worse, the blow had landed a foot from where she’d expected it; that and the faint shimmering around the warrior’s body spoke of a magical ward about him, a displacement that would make it difficult to score a telling hit in return. Arun’s muscles seemed intent on defying him as he started to the templar’s aid, but a reassuring warmth suddenly flowed through him, dispelling his weariness.  Zenna’s whispered voice sounded close to his ear, “I will assist her... you must defeat the naga!  Its magic is the greater threat!”Arun nodded, and reluctantly turned away from Beorna to charge the undead creature.  It too was clearly protected by magical defenses; a glowing translucent shield hovered in the air before it, and its position also seemed to shift slightly as it moved, betraying the presence of another displacement spell.  None of that stopped Arun, of course, and he rushed boldly at the bone naga.  His sword clove the air in a wide arc, tearing through the shield, and although it struck empty air as it hit the apparent location of the creature, an instant later it slammed into hard bone.  The naga keened, a terrible, high-pitched sound that seemed loud enough to shatter glass.  Arun tried to follow-up his advantage with another assault, but the naga spoke the words of a spell, and a glowing hand of force, five feet across, appeared between them.  The forceful hand immediately thrust the dwarf backward, driving him back ten feet despite his efforts to brace himself against its pressure.  Dannel grimaced in frustration as he could only watch his friends engage the naga and the fiendish warrior.  “We have to find a way through, to help them!” he said.  Hodge grunted as a full-strength blow from his axe glanced harmlessly off of the wall of force.  “If yer have any ideas, I’d love to ‘ear ‘em!” he shouted.  Mole had run along the entire length of the wall, looking for the slightest gap anywhere, from the floor to the ceiling.  “There’s no way through!” she said.  Dannel turned to Shensen, but the druid seemed to have withdrawn from them, lost in the casting-trance of a spell.  Finally the vacant, distant look in her eyes faded, and she gestured to the ground at her feet, which seemed to rumble ominously.  A figure rose up out of the hard stone, a roughly humanoid form that continued to grow until its head touched the ceiling fifteen feet above.  As the others looked on in amazement, Shensen spoke to it in a harsh, gravelly language, pointing toward the far end of the room and the battle there.   The elemental turned, and sank back into the floor at the base of the wall of force.“Shensen...” Dannel began. “I know,” she said, rushing to the point where her summoned ally had disappeared.  “Be ready...”  She knelt and touched the stone, running her hand along it in a long swath that paralleled the perfect smoothness of the wall of force.  She touched her necklace, and spoke words in a tongue similar to that she’d used with the elemental, Dannel thought.  Once more the stone obeyed her call.  The floor where she had touched buckled, twisting outward on both sides of the wall.  Dannel saw what she was doing, and even as the opening appeared beneath the wall he was running toward it, his bow at the ready. Mole, naturally, beat him to it, and darted through to the other side.  Beorna grunted in frustration as her blows glanced harmlessly of off the heavy black plates of her foe’s armor.  Her divine power had left her, the blessings of Helm but temporary in their duration, and with her strength drained, her attacks felt feeble and ineffective.  The warrior, on the other hand, seemed possessed of an inexhaustible fortitude, and as he lifted his axe for another assault, Beorna braced herself for some more pain.  But before he could strike, the warrior hesitated.  “We are not your enemy, brave warrior,” Beorna heard from behind him, a familiar voice from over his shoulder.  “The wizard and the naga have both betrayed you... they are your true foes.”The warrior turned as Zenna became visible.  The templar acknowledged the gutsiness of the ploy; if the spell failed, there was nothing stopping him from chopping her into two with that cleaver of his.  But even though she could not see his face, Beorna saw the axe come down, and knew that the charm had been successful.  Zenna reached up and drew back her cowl, revealing her own features twisted into a ferocious, demonic leer, her flesh a bright red, her horns and teeth ebon mirrors to the features of the fiendish warrior.  “I am one of you!” she hissed.  “Use your strength to destroy your true foes!” The warrior turned to his ally, and with a terrible roar rushed at the naga, his axe raised in challenge.  The naga turned from Arun to face the charge, and as its first stroke passed through air, fooled by its displacement, the undead creature cast another spell.  The warrior’s axe came down again, and he looked around, confused, as the naga’s dispel returned him to his senses.  “Well, at least he lost his wards,” Zenna began, reaching out to restore Beorna.  But before she could touch the templar, a green flash filled her vision, and her body exploded into a haze of pain.  She felt as though every part of her body was trying to come apart, and as the green glow brightened, she could feel her death clasp down tightly around her.</blockquote>

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