R. Salvatore - The Witch_s Daughter

From the distant mountainside, Bryan surveyed the dismal scene. Only on the southern bridges, where King Benador and the Warders of the White Walls stood against mere talons, was the defense holding strong. On the northernmost bridge, and riding on a huge fleet on the river north of that, Thalasi’s army was clearly winning through. And if they continued to pour across, all the efforts of King Benador and his men would surely be to no avail.

If Bryan’s hopes were weakened when he took note of the course of the battle, they were blasted away altogether whenever he glanced at the unholy sphere of Morgan Thalasi. The evil warlock’s fury did not relent; the black bolts of energy ripped up into the sky with continued power.

Clearly, some new variable had to enter the battle and claim it back for the forces of good. Bryan turned to Rhiannon, trembling and appearing so frail in her rain-soaked gown.

How could he lend her strength?

The flow of the power drenched the Black Warlock in ecstasy. “Still more!” he demanded, stamping the heel of the Staff of Death on a new patch of ground. A renewed surge exploded upward, nearly blasting the mortal body of the Black Warlock apart. But Thalasi contained it, and bent it, throwing it out to Avalon and Pallendara.

It came in the fury of a single bolt over the enchanted forest. Brielle’s weakened shield of defensive magics stood to block it, and the resulting blast dissipated the bolt to a mountain of sparks.

But gone, too, was the shield, and the next lightning bolt that descended on the witch’s domain sundered a tree.

In seconds Avalon was burning.

It came in the fury of a wall of wind beside the White Tower of Istaahl, bending the structure far to the side. The civilian onlookers in Pallendara gasped in horror as Istaahl’s gigantic conjured arms clutched at the tower like an imperiled mother holding her infant.

But the stones split apart around the enchanted limbs.

The White Tower crumbled to the ground.

“BY THE COLONNAE!” Brielle gasped as the flames ate at her forest. Thalasi’s storm continued to flash and rumble, but that singular, massive bolt had taken the bite out of its thunderous bark as surely as it had shattered Brielle’s shield.

Brielle reached down inside herself, called to the earth power that fueled her magic. Hers was the first school of magic, the guardian school wherein the energies used her as their guiding hand to fight back against that which went against the natural order of the universe.

“Ye’ve pulled it too far,” the witch moaned when she at last contacted the fabric of her strength. Harmony was the norm for the universal powers, energy all working in accord toward the perfection of natural order. But Morgan Thalasi had grasped at that harmony with his perverted claws, had pulled the heartstrings of the powers beyond their limits.

Brielle had no time to stop and contemplate the grim consequences of the Black Warlock’s actions. The battle was far from over, though neither would find the energy needed to continue to wage their destructive war across the leagues. Now the contest became more personal, a test of wills removed from the material world.

Brielle did not flinch when the specter of the Black Warlock entered the gray field surrounding her thoughts. She conjured a spectral manifestation of herself and strode calmly toward the evil one.

“All the world is mine,” Thalasi cackled at her. “Witness how the magic bends to my control.”

“Ye’re a fool,” Brielle hissed back. “What magic do ye leave in yer wake? ’Twas the Colonnae that blessed us with the powers of all the universe, but ye’ve ruined that blessing, Morgan Thalasi. Ye’ve torn the heart out o’ our power to the ruin of us all.”

“No!” Thalasi shouted back in angry denial. “I’ve stolen the harmony that gives you strength, wicked witch! And Istaahl in Pallendara is no more, buried in the ruins of his own tower. Who will stand against me when Brielle is gone? Your pitiful brother? The buffoon who plays with elves?”

Brielle offered no response. She had lived for centuries as the principal guardian of the natural world, and now that world was under siege more than it had been since the great holocaust that destroyed the original race of man. The Emerald Witch knew her duty.

“All yer grand words,” she laughed at Thalasi. “First ye must beat me!” Her mental specter walked into battle, but as she reached the manifestation of the Black Warlock, the being split into two separate entities: Morgan Thalasi as he had been before the Battle of Mountaingate, and Martin Reinheiser. They moved out to flank the surprised witch, taunting her with laughter.

“Grand?” they asked together. “Minor claims against the truth of our being.”

Then they rushed in on her. Brielle flailed at them valiantly, but within mere seconds icy hands grasped at her throat.

Istaahl climbed through the last layer of rubble, a garish sight of torn and tattered clothing and bruised and bleeding flesh. A thousand curious onlookers in Pallendara shook their heads almost as one, stunned again by the powers of their wizard. For no mortal man could possibly have survived the fall of the tower.

Istaahl started to walk the perimeter of the devastation, ignoring the curious and terrified gazes surrounding him and following his every move.

“You fool!” the White Mage scolded himself, suddenly guessing the logical continuation of the Black Warlock’s magical campaign. How long had he tarried, wallowing in his own grief? Seconds? But even seconds could be too long in such a contest. Without further delay, Istaahl launched himself into the gray nothingness of the magical plane of existence, threw himself fully and bravely into the fight against the twin beings that were the Black Warlock.

“I have you-” Thalasi and Reinheiser started to proclaim in dual-voiced unison. But then the manifestation of the White Mage leaped onto the back of the spirit of Reinheiser, tearing his hands from the throat of Brielle.

The odds had suddenly changed.

“Did ye think one o’ the Four so easily killed?” Brielle said to Thalasi. “But one of us has died indeed, Morgan Thalasi. Yerself. Centuries ago when ye forgot our purpose, when ye took it upon yerself to challenge all the goodness o’ the Colonnae.”

“Weakling,” Thalasi retorted. “All the powers of the world at your fingertips and you play nursemaid to a copse of trees. Gods we could be! The world is ours to rule.”

“Not ours!” Brielle retorted. “Never ours! Ye ignore yer place, and yer greed is suren to be the ruin o’ all the world!”

To the side, the spirits of Reinheiser and Istaahl rolled about in the fog in combat as vicious and desperate as any that had been fought on the Four Bridges. And now Thalasi sprang upon Brielle like a beast, his claws reaching out for her fair neck. But Brielle’s appearance, so innocent and beautiful, belied the strength of the woman. She accepted the Black Warlock’s attack and responded with her own, vicious and mighty.

Venerable Bellerian had been assigned to the rear of the army, directing wayward troops and relaying vital information to the battle commanders from his distant, more encompassing vantage point. But when the Ranger Lord saw his son on the northernmost bridge, facing that horrid wraith, he could not remain at his post. He was in his eighties now, not old for a man raised under the beauty of Avalon, who, by the words of Brielle, could expect to live a century and a score of years beyond that. But Bellerian’s fighting days had ended abruptly many years before. He had been bent over nearly double-he could hardly walk without the assistance of a cane-by a wound he received in the foul swamp of Blackamara, a wound so wicked that even the powers of Brielle could not fully heal it.