Thomas Reid - The Gossamer Plain

If she wanted people, she had to settle for the ones she had hurt.

Emotional blackmail, she often thought in disgust. That's all this is. Well, Tauran, you can't make me feel sorry for pitiful wretches just by denying me any other contact!

Aliisza sighed and looked around the garden. She found herself wishing more and more frequently that the deva would return to her sanctuary. Despite all his faults and shortcomings, she craved him. In her illusory worlds, she didn't even enjoy the luxury of interaction. At least with Tauran, there had been genuine conversation.

The alu moved toward the pool. The angel had shown the half-fiend herself there, her physical body. She longed to see it again, to see the vessel that carried her child within. She longed to see the child itself.

The surface of the water showed only the night sky. The moon rippled within it, but nothing more.

No, Aliisza resolved. I will not sit here and ask. That's what they want. I can stand the solitude. It's just a matter of gutting it out. I won't give in to them. I won't!

With that, the alu turned and strode purposefully toward her quiet room. She wasn't yet ready to face the grieving martyrs again, but a little rest, a little unconscious oblivion, would do her wonders.

Tomorrow, she vowed. Tomorrow, I will laugh in their faces. Weaklings.

"You know as well as I," Zasian said, "that divination magic is notorious for unreliability. We are fortunate that the augury was as clear as it was, frankly."

Vhok examined the scroll in his hand, doubtful. "I don't like this," he said. "We have no idea what will happen. You said yourself that the magic wasn't explicit enough to guarantee no mishaps."

Zasian shrugged. "Short of calling on an ally of Bane himself for aid, we have no alternative. I could summon a creature loyal to the Black Lord, one who could enter this place and assist us, but the price for such service would be steep. The risk might be as great or greater than this," he said as he gestured at the crumpled parchment in the cambion's hands. "Regardless, it will cost us valuable time. Do you wish to wait a full day and call on a planar ally to assist us?"

Vhok frowned. "You have nothing better? Nothing more certain than this?" Vhok asked, rattling the scroll.

"Do you?" Zasian asked. "If so, bring it forth and let us be gone at once. Otherwise"-he gave Vhok a glare-"do not question me about it again. I have told you the sum total of our options. You must pick between expediency and safety."

Vhok sighed. "Very well," he said. "I've always wanted to see what was on the other side of oblivion."

The priest snorted but said nothing further.

The half-fiend examined the scroll in his hands. It had lain forgotten in his belongings for some time, given to him by Lysalis. The fey'ri sorceress had intended it for an emergency, but none had ever come up when it had seemed necessary. Over time, it had settled to the bottom of a satchel he kept with him. Only Zasian's divination reminded him that he had it.

A single spell had been scribed upon the scroll, one that created a magical retreat, in much the same way the ivory arch did. It required the use of a length of rope, easily produced from the equipment Vhok and Zasian carried with them. Under normal circumstances, the cambion could cast the spell from the scroll and open an extradimensional space, then use the rope to climb into it.

But opening one extradimensional space within another was far from ordinary. All who dealt with forces arcane knew the dangers of combining pocket dimensions. The cambion had heard enough tales of wizards, in their foolishness, tearing great rents in the fabric of the planes by doing such things. He hardly felt eager to try it himself. Nonetheless, that was precisely what Zasian's augury had suggested.

Vhok and the priest faced one another in the entryway of the palatial retreat, before the sealed doorway. The rope rested on the floor between them. Once Vhok completed the arcane words written upon the parchment, the magic would be completed and the spell cast.

"Before you begin," Zasian said, "let me imbue us with a bit of divine protection."

"To provide succor against what?" Vhok asked. "Whatever's going to happen, do you think our paltry defenses will change the outcome? Save them for when they might do us real good."

"As you wish," the priest muttered, and motioned for Vhok to proceed.

Vhok took a deep breath to steady himself and scanned the page one more time before beginning. Then, slowly and clearly, he began to read aloud, uttering each word written in the obscure language of magic. As the syllables rolled off his tongue, their counterparts vanished from the page. The ink faded to nothing bit by bit.

When the cambion completed the final phrase, he felt the power of magic slide through him from the page. He sensed it channeling outward, into the rope before him. The rope began to stir, snaking one end of itself upright into the air. The line rose higher, until its end was just above the two observers' heads. A strange crackling sensation filled the air, and Vhok felt his ears pop.

Light and sound exploded all around the half-fiend. He felt his insides churn and tumble, threatening to burst outward and engulf his skin. He lost his sense of up and down and thought he was floating in a sea of swirling color. A wind howled and buffeted him, knocking him about. He could see nothing.

Vhok opened his mouth to call to Zasian, to scream. Something flowed into him and down his throat. His eyes ached, his muscles turned to jelly, and when he thought he couldn't stand it any longer, he felt himself launched elsewhere. His body sailed through the blinding nothingness toward a tiny pinprick of darkness. That minuscule hole expanded in an instant, became a black sphere of oblivion that sucked him toward it.

Vhok did not want to be swallowed by the great black thing. Death lay inside. He tried to swim away from it, tried to claw his way in a different direction, but his efforts were futile.

The blackness engulfed him.

The cambion hit something, hard, and felt himself stick to it. Another object slammed into him, just as hard, and it stuck to him just as tightly. It stole his breath from him. He was glued to something hard, while something else adhered to him. Together, they hung above a roiling sea of fog shaded orange and gray, while a sky filled with sloshing, lapping fire surrounded them overhead. He peered down at that strange fog in terror, afraid that the object to which he was affixed would release him to fall forever.

Vhok's ears popped again, and the whole universe turned upside down.

No, Vhok realized, it righted itself. It was upside down before.

He was lying on his back upon baked and smoldering stone, staring up at a smoky gray sky lit from distant and unseen fires. Around him, a sea of lava burped gouts of gas and jets of flame. The Elemental Plane of Fire.

Thank the fell ones, Vhok thought. I never thought I'd be so happy to be here.

The half-fiend tried to sit up, then realized a great dead weight still lay atop him. He feared at first that it was Zasian, hurt or killed during the expulsion. A quick look revealed that it was Kurkle's corpse.

Of course, Vhok realized. Everything got ejected.

"Vhok!" Zasian yelled from somewhere nearby. "Vhok, are you there?"

The cambion shoved the canomorph's body off himself and stood up. "Yes!" he called, and he spun around, trying to find his companion. He discovered that he was on the Islands. In fact, it was the same chunk of solid ground where the priest had erected the wall of stone and they had disappeared into the mansion. "Where are you?" he shouted.

"On the wrong side of the hell-cursed wall!" Zasian replied. "Help me! I can't hold on much longer!"