James Davis - Circle of Skulls

At the base of the stairs, along the south wall, sat a dusty, old chair, and in it he spied a figure sprawled across its arms. A shock of blonde hair rested across the stained cushion. He crept across the room and knelt cautiously, reaching for the pale hand of Rilyana Saerfynn. She stirred at his touch and moaned, rubbing her eyes as he stood and surveyed the large chamber. A single candle was set in a wall sconce on the north wall, but all else was cloaked in clinging darkness.

"Rilyana!" he whispered as loudly as he dared.

Her eyes fluttered open, finding him and appearing confused. She had several bruises on her arms, and dried blood covered the left side of her face.

"Wake up. You need to get out of here quickly!"

"Jinnaoth?" she mumbled and sat up, yawning lazily. "Haven't seen you since the fire at the tavern."

Jinn half spun at the sound of rough breathing in the dark, a rasping, hungry noise that set his nerves on edge. He grabbed Rilyana's arm and hauled her up, placing his sword between them and the thick shadows. He had no time to coddle privileged young women. He could feel the cloying presence of some dark power gathering in the basement.

"Get out of here!" he said, wide eyed as he searched the dark end of the chamber, trying to pierce the veil of shadows and wondering where Rilyana's brother would be hiding. "Now!"

"Oh, Jinn," she said, and she laid a hand upon his, her fingers soft on his skin. "No, I don't think so."

A shock of alarm ran through his body as he reversed his grip on the sword and turned half a breath too late. He felt a rush of hot breath on his cheek as she whispered an arcane syllable, her lips brushing against his ear as a sudden thrust of force slammed into his side. The candle became a blurry streak as he was hurled across the room and slammed against the far wall. The breath was knocked from his lungs, and he gasped like a landed fish, flopping onto his side and wincing at the pain he felt there. Candles bloomed to life across from him, haloed through the haze of fading pain as he coughed, slumped over in a dirty corner.

Silhouettes passed through the semicircle of light, one graceful and surefooted, the other hunched and leaning, the tap-tap of a wooden staff preceding each step. He shook his head and cursed, trying to sit up as the face of the archmage grew more distinct, the shadows curling away from him and Rilyana like thick smoke. As they did, Jinn noted the sprawled form on the floor before them, the battered and bruised body of Callak Saerfynn.

"We heard your battle outside, deva," Tallus said, his voice weak but mocking. "A glorious tribute of blood, I must admit, but surely you did not think to catch us unawares, eh?"

The wizard stood before a stone pedestal in the center of several concentric circles, similar to those in the archmage's tower, covered in overlapping symbols and glyphs that squirmed with power. Jinn merely glared at Tallus and rose to a crouch, pulling his sword behind him, prepared to make the wizard's once-apparent death a painful fact.

Rilyana drew close to Tallus, wrapping an arm around his waist and gently kissing his neck, her tongue darting close to his ear as she smiled cruelly at the deva.

"He doesn't seem particularly surprised to see you," she said, and she laid her head upon the archmage's shoulder.

Tallus grunted, grinning through his scraggly beard as he produced a wooden chest from beneath his robes and placed it upon the pedestal. "Only because he is a better actor than you, my dear. Had he known I was alive, he might not have wasted his time with that fool Dregg." The pedestal began to glow, the golden clasp and gilded edges of the chest flaring brightly even as the entire house groaned. "Though I must wonder, how did he find us here?"

"Perhaps you've been betrayed," Jinn muttered, lining the blade of his sword along the edge of his spine, leaning forward as he waited for Tallus to turn away once more. The wizard's confidence, though sickening, could serve Jinn's purpose.

"Oh, I've no doubt of that," the archmage replied and passed his hand over the wooden chest, chanting as the house seemed to lurch on its foundation, shaking violently. More dust fell and thorny vines crawled down through fresh cracks in the ceiling, writhing and spreading. The walls pulsed and undulated like flesh made of wood and stone, as though the entire structure were alive. "Too many would be more than willing to kill for my place in this ritual. Had I chosen to wait any longer, I might have ended up like the corpse you found in my tower."

"There's still time for that," Jinn said as the stone floor throbbed beneath his boots. An unholy energy seeped through the cracks that brought bile into Jinn's throat and twisted in his gut. The scents of the Nine Hells wafted through the room: sulfur, rot, and char.

Disoriented and nauseated, he choked and spat, sickened by the power the archmage was summoning, his heart pounding as his celestial nature was repelled by the ritual. Trying to focus on the wizard and his duplicitous lover, Jinn held on, waiting until Tallus finally turned. In a breath Jinn vaulted forward, sword drawn back as the archmage traced sigils on the chest, unaware of the impending doom at his back.

Quessahn stared out at the House of Thorne for several moments before drawing the curtains and returning to her ritual circle. A part of her feared for Jinn, just as another part wondered if she could trust his judgment, wondered if he were capable of sacrificing the lives of hundreds, possibly thousands, to satisfy his thirst for vengeance. She banished the thought, having her own work to complete. She sat, cross-legged, at the center of the design on the floor and shook her hands nervously then laid them gently upon her knees. Closing her eyes, she cleared her mind of all else but the spell prepared around her, mentally tracing each sigil and glyph, turning her mind through the arcane labyrinth of the ritual.

She whispered the runes of the outer circle, each symbol a listed name, all of them drawn from ancient texts and dark cults long dead. She called upon the power of stars and slumbering beings, many of whom were both, whose dreams were alive and whose nightmares fed upon the fabrics of the multiverse, infected by their creators' appetites for the flesh of reality itself. Invoking their essences, she worked to link the vast areas of space between one and the next, tracing her spell, her circle, in immeasurable symbols among the stars.

A dull ache settled in her bones as the pattern took shape, as if the raw magic she summoned had taken notice of her efforts and had begun to test the limits of her will. The names she uttered echoed through the outer circle, thrumming in powerful languages that were old when the world was yet young, naming themselves as she reigned in the power of the pattern. Sweat beaded on her forehead, and stars streaked through her field of vision as she shook, gritting her teeth and holding on to the magic. At length, mastering the power that flowed through and around her, she turned her attention to the inner circle.

The inner circle spun in her mind, the symbols turning as she spoke them, raising her hands and tracing them on the air. Her fingers clawed at ephemeral threads of energy, forcing them into the configurations she desired. Only one name was written within the inner circle, and she saved it for the last, holding it as it slid through her mind like a snake, its forked tongue flicking at her thoughts. It teased her and she trembled, fighting back the doubt that could destroy the spell. Infusing the ritual with her quiet fear, she turned her dread into bait for her target.

"Sathariel," she whispered, the word taking on a life of its own, drifting like smoke within the confines of the circles and tugging at her concentration, begging to be heard. It shouted itself in discordant echoes, over and over in rumbling waves that raised the hairs on her neck.