Death.
I need to escape!
"I got you!"
Huh?
Yoid was before him, pulling his form off the walls. How? No. "Where is Catelyn?" Tone weak.
"I found a path, she's waiting," Yoid said.
A path? rrin thought. He found a path. That's nice.
"You're stuck!" Yoid rasped, a parodic expression different from his normality.
I know I am….rrin heightened his ocular senses, observed the spear—a hand-held; he knew that. Though further perception proved tiring due to self-weakness.
I need to stop that spear—rrin.
Yoid groaned.
That spear will kill both and him, rrin surged the limited force, saw the flooding of the grey world. Symbols blurred, distant colors, voices, knowledge. A sure distraction, fortunately, focus triumphed. He gazed up. I will just break the symbols used to make it. That should give us so ti.
An untested thing, yes, but…hope.
Then.
Sothing exploded before him—a mash of violent colors, shapes, letters, all changing, all moving. Incomprehensible. Dangerous. He tore away from the unseen world, emptied warm bile on Yoid.
The man was stunned. "What?"
"Get away!" rrin managed. "Go away!" He knew now. That spear was sothing else. He could see it. Yes, he was weak, but that was different. That power was beyond him.
"You need to leave!"
"Shut it!" Yoid reburted. "How will anyone survive if you die?"
"Save Catelyn!"
"Do it yourself!"
ntation churned, but returned with nothing. No escape. No hope. How was he to protect the witnesses from that? Whatever that was. "Please go…" He held the tears, the spear above brightening like a lamp charged with unknown intensity.
It ca!
Swiftly, the spear descended. Please go! rrin prayed for a miracle. To save one—anyone. Yoid scread, clenched. "AHHH!"
The stone crater cracked, and rrin was expelled. Surprised. Yet, ti was a luxury. "You did?"
"Let's go!" Yoid said, standing, a white light raying across his face. The spear!
rrin pushed him, the lance cutting past and smashing into the near wall. The wind wailed in accordance, tossing them. He t the floor, rolled, and took to his feet. Ahead, Yoid had done the sa. Truly expert motions.
"Lead!" rrin said, and Yoid dashed through a deliberate pathway of pillars on both sides. He followed, but heard the explosion and flashes of light. The spear power.
Encumbered by the pain, his rapidity was halved, enough nevertheless. Yoid, advanced, turned to a corner, rrin followed and found a deprecated tunnel, sided with shattered mirrors, burnt tables, and statues.
An ancient hallway.
This disgorged them into a vast space, one rrin gawked at. Catelyn reached his perception, perspiring. Cloth drenched. Indeed, he noted the sudden heat rise. Strange, but if they were deeper underground, not so much.
Sohow, she moved to him, said, "Are you okay?"
Yoid interrupted. "We need to go, those stone things will be coming soon."
"Do you know them?" Catelyn said.
Yoid frowned. "Yes."
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They can't be doing this now! rrin said, "We need to go!" Then a mont of wider scanning of the place.
A vaster space, walls high as mountains, hollow. There was no land except a stone bridge connecting the sides. The bisections were of crude stone, rough, charred black as though subject to intense fire. Too severe.
Was this place sothing of a stratovolcano?
Downward was an eerie darkness, though a faint redness was beneath, flickering. That, he believed, could be old fire. The stone bridge, however, despite the scars, appeared strong enough. Different, when overlapped with the more modern halls prior.
And this was no ti for waiting.
He expanded the other force, light spewing out from him.
Catelyn gasped. "Are you mad? What if they find us?"
What a stupid question! "Since when have beasts needed light to find anything?"
"Those aren't beasts."
"All things are beasts to soone," Yoid said in llowed tones—bizarre, but a normality for him.
"Let's go!" rrin said, knew the urgency as the bridge was long enough to require minutes before full crossings.
We need to be fast!
Obviously.
Yoid stepped forward, touched the stone bridge, looked over, and said, "That's a long drop!"
"What point is there in saying what is known?" Catelyn said, "Also, how did you find th—"
"Let's go!" Yoid ran, Catelyn cursed and followed. rrin remained, watching the dark ovate hole that admitted their entry. They won't follow, right? He ant to break the door.
Would that stop them?
"AHHH!" He scread.
No ti!
He turned and tailed them, heard then the distant hard footsteps. They were coming! Faster. There was always the chance he could hasten the pace with the wind, as before, but now, the totality of his force was weaker. Far drained. Whatever he saw when he peered into the spear, that had fatigued most of it.
Everything rested now on sheer physicality.
So all they could do was run.
Run, Run, Run.
Wind whistling, clothes tight on flesh, sweat caused. He panted, breath following those established ashman patterns. Now was the ti for silence, as much as manageable. Total quiet could not be truly achieved.
Catelyn's huffs bood into him—so loud. Yoid, contrastingly, moved with a certain spryness. None ashman, yet eerily almost. Unsure, rrin noted a certain mitic air to them.
Did he copy my moves? He thought, A genius?
Catelyn had once proposed that specific humans, non-casters, could achieve spectacular results. Geniuses. Was he one? There was every chance for that. Now did not provide the indulgence for deeper ntation. His awareness was stretched outward, absorbing flash knowledge from the walls and curves.
Sothing was odd about the cavernous mountain.
The burned redness of the walls, the charred curves, steep angles—those had the makings of a volcano. Yet, the aftermath minerals ford, none were present. The precious tals—copper, zinc. Nothing.
That was perplexing.
Frightening even.
What was it?
He jumped over a cracked section of the stone bridge—steam was twisting up, flowing. Odd. Beyond it, his mind still focused on that. Steam. Why?
He glanced to the side, saw the fog flowing. This startled. Moreover, he puffed. Hot. Throat burning with a sudden, enflad intensity. Dry. mory caused the unconscious moistening of the tongue, which too burned, steaming away.
Sothing was off!
He knew that!
What was it?
Left too was consud by the abrupt mist—missed within, he observed were the flowing black. Smoke. He gasped. That was the sure markings of fire, burning. He scanned, sweat flicking off with each turn. Where was sothing burning?
Below?
But why? It wasn't burning before. It was milder, not this.
Also…
Catelyn ahead was lurching, steps cutting into themselves. Her breath echoing with a weak strain, like one who struggled for simple breathing. He knew then the cause.
The heat. The burning was draining the air. Why?
He passed his eyes over the walls, nothing.
A thought: What if the statues were doing this?
Based on the prior casting failure, the probability of their casting might be an elevated thing. That could be the cause.
"Keep moving!" He exerted to say, turned, and heightened the ocular prowess past the enshrouding fog, the crossed distances, far further, to the point of origin. There, on that oval door.
He stunned.
Eyes observed. Countless eyes, all in threes, watching —their forms obscured by the darkness, a thing he now realized as abnormal. Casted, surely. However, that was not the ice in his awareness, no, it was the other.
None of them moved.
Why?
They waited at the boundary of the stone bridge, silent like true statues. Sentinels of non-motion.
"Why aren't you moving?" He muttered.
A voice—a soft baritone. "TA—-MIR"
rrin whirled, saw Yoid wide-eyed, mouth agape. He mouthed sothing.
What was it?
The sound pierced through the nighing fog, loud. "There's a TALEMIR!"
"Huh!"
The air burned with a bitter tang, sharp. A certain scent curled into his nostrils—acidic, yellow, and wrong. It stung the back of his throat like scorched eggs left to rot. Beneath was sothing older, like the breath of buried stone, now exhaled into the open.
He winced.
It was the sll of sothing ancient, sothing that had never known the light but knew how to seethe.
He turned.
The first was the painful blaze, flesh stung with recursive pains. The second was the color of red—bright red. Blaze flickering across his face. The third was the scene. A towering figure, a giant that dwarfed even Ron.
A red thing, muscular, ablaze, clothed with that infernal fire, bellowing the dark smoke of it. It was large, eyes a wide fury of madness, ignited. It stood with bent knees, claws like tal, its head as though a multi-speared crown had been fitted into the flesh, burning.
An Isavra of living fire.
A burning rav'zul.
rrin was frozen before that power, saw the movent of its large hands, a sword held within it. That blade, if it could be called one, was several tis his true size. Dark tal, writhe in fla.
It rose and ca down towards him!
It would end him!
Death before awareness registered the event.
I need to move!
I need to move now!
He could not—fear rotted.
Please, Almighty, I need to move now!
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