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"The blood of a drow matron. Fresh, as the ritual demands… the final component to summon forth my master into this plane. Any last words before I complete the incantation, Illiriel?" "The blood of… you wouldn't… you didn't…" The words refused to come. Even after all I had seen that day, I refused to utter such blasphemies. Lhradrul may have become a slave of her own ambition, but even her sacrilege had to have its limits… "Oh please, you had no more love for the wretched harpy than I did." Lhradrul had emptied the contents of the vial and returned it to an unseen pocket, pausing only for a moment to fix me with a look of utter disappointment. "You always were a sympathetic weakling, Illiriel. I suppose it's fitting that you waste your last moments of existence mourning the death of a woman you despised…" Rage boiled within me like a growing inferno, consuming all thought and feeling, transforming sensation and memory alike into fuel for the roaring conflagration. As my sister resumed her demonic chant, my knees bent and feet pressed flat against the wall behind me, pushing off it to strain against the bands of force. The bonds held fast, leaving my fury to well up inside without hope of release. The alien incantation grew ever faster, the sigils flaring up so quickly that one had not faded before the next appeared. The throbbing light seemed to mirror my own raging pulse, the pace reaching a fever pitch as the words echoed louder and louder in my ears, until at last every rune in the circle was visible at one time, a furious crescendo of pulsating light and deafening sound. "Though I be damned, I will stop you!" The hammering beat of my heart synchronized with the waves of energy throbbing through the room, and for a brief instant the magical bonds became insubstantial, allowing me to push off the wall and land firmly on my feet. My blinding anger left no room to puzzle out the feat I had accomplished, spurring me forward instead in a fearless charge toward my sister. Lhradrul spun to meet me just as my body passed into the pillar of emerald radiance now shining steadily around her. The light seemed to grow brighter as my form crashed headlong into my sister's, then shimmered weakly, as if straining to contain both of us. My hands found Lhradrul's wrists, forcing them up and away from me before she could complete the deadly arcane gestures I knew to expect from her. The raw elemental energies she unleashed blasted outward, gouging clean circles in the shaft of jade incandescence in their wake as they blew pieces from the stonework of the walls and ceiling in tremendous explosions. Lhradrul's voice roared even above the echoing thunder as she spat furiously in my face, "You fool! You're going to break the ward!" I dug my feet into the ground beneath and pitched forward, pushing against my elder sister with every ounce of energy remaining in my battered body. Inch by inch she was forced backward toward the edge of the beam of light bordering her summoning circle, until at last her body began to pass through it into the raging maelstrom that had formed outside. |
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