Grym Prophet (Song of the Aura, Book Three) (21 page)

Wanderwillow stepped back, unsure of what Sheolus was doing.

A single spark leaped from the old sorcerer's hands towards the Aura, who swung his smoking fist to block it.

The entire slag hill where the two enemies stood ignited in a massive explosion that sent a sheet of fire thirty feet into the sky. A concussive quake rippled outwards in all directions as the energy gathered in Wanderwillow's hand was released prematurely.

Gribly swayed, but did not fall, his Stone Striding saw to that, but behind him Elia screamed as the initial swell of the heaving land took her by surprise. “Gribly, help!” she called. Without thinking, he spun around and slammed both palms into the tortured earth, willing it to flatten and become immobile.
Shield,
he thought frantically,
I have to make a shield!

They were an island of calm in the midst of chaos. With less than a second to act, Gribly threw his arms back, Striding swathes of dirt and rock in the same direction. Then he bounded back into a handspring, Striding with his feet as he did. The combined effect was to throw up a roughly spherical shield of solid earth to guard from debris. By the time it had formed over them, Gribly was already crouched on the ground again, fingers dug as deep into the dirt as he could force them. He could only hope his Striding was strong enough to hold the ground steady when the quake hit.

Just like battling the Sea Demon,
he thought absently.
It seems so long ago…

Then the shock-wave smashed into his defenses like a hammer onto a nail. The impact that should have cracked the earth beneath his feet and thrown the three frail heroes skyward was absorbed by his earth-sensitive powers and channeled into his body instead.

“Ga-a-a-a-ah!” He gasped involuntarily as the force of the quake struck his hands and shot up his arms, vibrating his entire body with unthinkable magnitude. His back and neck rippled in a whiplash motion that almost tore his hands from the ground as he tried to stay still. Through the jolt of pain he managed to harden the ground around his fingers, and he stayed on.

One second, and then it was over. The makeshift dome of earth was silent.

Gribly slipped forward awkwardly onto the solid earth, shaking and twitching uncontrollably. Energy bounded about in sweet but sickening waves all through his bones and flesh, tugging at his brain like a restless animal wanting to play, only this animal would tear him apart on the inside if he did not let it out.

With sudden alarm the young prophet understood that he had just gathered the force of an attack into himself, much as Wanderwillow had done to the archdemon's fire!

I've got to let it out,
he realized, struggling to stand before the energy ripped itself from him. Elia was still nearby, lying on her side with her head in her hands, moaning and possibly very hurt. He couldn't unleash the restrained energy with Stone Striding here, or she'd be obliterated, along with the still-unconscious Lauro.
How did Wanderwillow hold it in??? It's going to kill me if I don't do something NOW!

Bursting through the wall of his earth-shell blindly, Gribly stumbled again and fell to his knees.

“Idiot boy,”
hissed a too-familiar voice of thousands behind him. A plume of smoke like the one the Pit Strider had used to disappear all those weeks ago burst from the ground, and the sorcerer Sheolus stepped from it, eyes aflame again.
“Playing right into my hand!”

“BACK!” Gribly shouted, whirling around on his hands and lashing out at the archdemon with both feet. The absorbed energy surged out of him in a single, violent current as his feet made contact with the sorcerer's face.

Sheolus's jaw cracked as it was displaced, but his head moved not an inch. Rusty-gold colored blood seeped from a small wound at his wrinkled chin, but that was all.

Gribly landed nimbly and sprung backwards in a somersault, despite the sudden exhaustion he felt as the unnatural energy left his body. “Back!” he called again, now hoarse and frightened. All that power, and barely a blasted dent! How could he ever hope to fight this hellspawn?

“You cannot...”
chuckled Sheolus, apparently reading his thoughts. One arm lifted slowly until it was perpendicular from his body, then halted.
“Give up your soul, prophet!”

My soul?

“Never!” he yelled.

Sheolus closed his outstretched hand, and the ground around Gribly erupted in tentacles of earth that clutched him and threw him savagely to the ground. Struggle as he might, there was no escaping their grip, and he could not move enough to Stone Stride back at the sorcerer.

Blackness rushed in on his vision as the earthy tentacles hardened to stone and squeezed the life out of him. The thief's last thought before consciousness fled him was hoping against hope that Elia would somehow escape before the demon-man was finished with him.

Chapter Seventeen: The Wrong Hero

“Elia?” Lauro's voice was feeble, but he was alive! The Sea Strider took his face in her hands.

“I'm here, Lauro. You're going to be fine, now that I've-”

“BACK!”
shouted an adolescent voice through the crack in the dirt sphere.

“Gribly!” Lauro's eyes snapped open and he tried to rise, but a violent wheeze sent him sprawling on his back again. “You- you have to help him,” he grunted, obviously still suffering immensely.

“But you-” Elia began.

“Now.” The prince was whispering, but his whisper was an order. She leaped up without another word, twisting around and stepping quickly towards the open crack in the dome's wall. A slithery, malicious voice was speaking words she couldn't hear.

“Never!” yelled Gribly in response. For a single moment she saw him, crouched and ready to fight against the dark-cloaked fiend who stood not three feet in front of Elia with his back turned.

Then the sphere exploded and hard earth rained down upon Elia in heavy chunks. The ground softened like sand, and she felt her feet sinking in- but there was nothing she could do. Stumbling back, she threw up her arms across her body and face, vainly attempting to shield herself from the avalanche; rocks and turf pummeled her again and again until she dropped to the ground in a bloodied heap.

A second later it was over. She raised her head, coughing on dust and filth, hoping against hope that Gribly had somehow won.

No such luck. Her friend was trapped by a multitude of rocky loops and mounds that had leaped out of the ground like living things. His head lolled to one side against a large arm of stone, and blood dripped down his face. His eyes were closed and there was no breathing that she could see. The dark demon-man stalked towards him... and there was something in his hand.

“No!!!!” Elia screamed at the top of her lungs, striving to get up and attack him with her bare hands if necessary. But searing pain filled her arms and legs, and she realized that they were stuck fast in the hardened ground. “No...” she moaned, tears streaming down her eyes as the hopelessness of her situation dawned on her.

“What are you...”
rasped the demon-man, almost to himself, and his red-gold eyes narrowed. His hand reached for her, and across the open space Elia felt a mental agony so acute she felt sure she would go insane.

Something streaked across her blood-blurred vision: a golden-green that burned her eyes, yet felt more soothing than a healing draft. The pain in her head vanished, and she shook her head to clear it. The sight in front of her was mind-shattering.

Wanderwillow, burnt and blackened, oozing golden blood from every part of his willowy body, had tackled the demon-man,
Sheolus
, she suddenly recalled, to the ground, and now both were locked in a deadly wrestling match. Lightning discharged from their bodies in a ceaseless concert of blinding flashes, so bright that the rest of the otherworldly wasteland looked dark as night.

CRASH! CRACKLE! CRASH!
The bedlam was loud enough to shatter glass, but her hands were unable to move to cover her ears and stifle the noise. Gasping in pain, she tried to wrench them free from the hardened ground, but they were immovable. Next she tried her legs, with the same result, and found besides that part of her side was stuck as well.

Again she tried to break free. Again she failed. The pain in her trapped limbs intensified with each failure, but she refused to give up.
I can't stop... I can't leave Gribly... I have to get him out of here!

So she forced herself to keep trying, as the two mortal enemies clashed over and over again nearby, wreaking havoc on the surrounding terrain in their fury.

BOOM!
went the clouds overhead, as lightning was pulled from the sky and into the battling phantoms below. At the same time, Elia managed to rip one hand free of the earth. Her shrieks were drowned out by the battle, as she pressed her bloody, injured hand to her side, trying vainly to dull the pain.

The darkness became laced with freezing rain and hailstones. She dropped her head to the wet stone beneath her and began to weep.

“Elia!” a voice howled, and the next moment Lauro hit the ground beside her. “Use... the water,” he murmured tiredly; it seemed he had used his last reserves of energy to make it through the mayhem to her. “Water...” he repeated again, barely audible over the sounds of combat and storm.

Water?

Water!

It couldn't help her get free, but water could
heal
her!

Elia turned her face to the sky, ignoring the pounding hail and stinging rain, and lifted her injured hand.

Be whole,
she thought, and gasped as the rainwater flowed together as one with the water in her body, pulling and stretching her flesh until it had knitted her hand back together.

“Save them,” Lauro mumbled, then rolled over limply, unconscious again.

FLASH!
The lightning streaking in all directions arced higher than ever, and Elia watched in horror as Sheolus flung a weakened, beaten Wanderwillow into the air, then summoned a second blast to slam him into ground mercilessly.

“Nympharch!” she screamed, but her voice was drowned out. Her vision was blurred with tears and blood, but she saw no signs of the Aura rising. The demon-man turned and began stalking towards Gribly again, limping this time.

He's forgotten about me...
she realized.
He's going to kill Gribly, or worse!

“NO!” she screamed, tearing at the earth that restrained her as hard as she could.

With a sickening squelch, the ground cracked and her body came free. Blood ran down her legs, hand and side; her garment ripped away where it had been submerged in the ground, but she staggered to her feet and tottered forward under the torrential deluge that perpetually issued from the sky.

With every step her wounds healed a little as water seeped into them, but in seconds she saw it would not be enough. Finally she ignored her pain and focused every ounce of energy towards running.