frozen as if crystallized or petrified.
“The spellweave residue here reminds me of the place Lord Talmor and Quadain took me to get the sword from Lady Ista,” Gideon said to Ragan as they walked.
“Yes, Tar’thos is related to Lady Ista. He is the elder, and both entities choose balance and to serve the greater good,” Ragan replied. The group walked for several minutes into the valley. As they passed the strange creatures, Ragan described details about them. Gideon noticed that the creatures were all some kind of Darkspawn or some type of demon, except the few animals that they passed, like birds and insects, which also seemed to be frozen in time. Everything had a grayish hue, even the grass. Once they passed a stream, the water itself was still, although not really frozen; it only appeared crystallized.
“Tauri Ragan, what is that creature?” asked Lyndra.
Ragan looked where she indicated. “It appears to be a greater Rûhk in the process of transforming; it may have thought it could escape by flying away.”
As time passed and their field trip was nearing an end, Ragan appeared to be looking around as if he had found or sensed something he did not like. They had been moving in a surveying circuit pattern and, after a point, their group had moved back toward the edge of the Vale, back toward the town of Alende. “I would like all of you to head back to town; the path is that way,” he said, pointing. “Join up with your other classmates back at the town. I have some Tauri business to attend to. Gideon Finelen, you can stay to assist me if you want.” They all moved away, heading back to the safer area, all except Gideon. The others looked back briefly as Gideon went with Ragan deeper into the Vale.
As they walked, they heard an explosion. “I sense Anila is battling someone farther in. Let’s make haste to assist her.” Ragan could run about as fast as a horse and, with the augmentation Gideon had received, he easily kept up. As they ran, Gideon noticed that they passed areas that appeared to have impressions of where Darkspawn had stood. Gideon noticed the trees and grass had been preserved with the same type of spellweave, but he did not recognize the pattern, although the power emanated clearly enough.
Ragan stopped as he got his bearings. “In the old days, this army had more brute strength than sophisticated spellweaving ability; the more educated, present-day spellweavers could handle many of them. I now sense Tauri Osric is in another area. He too is also involved in duel arcane.”
“Why do the other Darkspawn want to resurrect the crystallized Darkspawn, then?” Gideon asked.
“As you can see, they are essentially intact warriors and any could make good breeding stock or be used as deadly soldiers if released,” Ragan replied in a teacher-like fashion. Now, follow me. Anila, even though she is a powerful archmaster spellweaver, may need my help sooner as she has been battling longer.” They both ran rapidly toward a grove of trees and saw the battleground. Evidently, Anila had summoned air and earth elementals loyal to her for support.
Gideon had brought his enchanted long sword and his enchanted katana. Both weapons were imbued with enough mystical forces to deal with most Darkspawn. Drawing upon his previous military training, both on Earth and his previous battles on Illúmaril, Gideon readied himself for a fight. Now that he was almost a journeyman spellweaver, he was able to prepare and release a spellweave to generate a salvo of fireballs. As they got closer, he sensed Anila was using mentallic forces, along with spellweaving to coordinate her attack on the Darkspawn.
Ragan moved toward a huge Darkspawn that towered over even his seven-foot height. It was a vaguely animal-like demon called a Rûhk originally brought forth by Dormas that later reproduced on Illúmaril and lived with the other Darkspawn. Ragan began a spellweave with precision and speed, as several bolts of lightning in succession stuck the demonic Rûhk creature. At about that time, Gideon released his fireball salvo at another twisted, catlike demon. Ragan moved around the thing and saw the ones responsible for the release. A few Urshkaar archmages and the Valharri High Lord Karth were working to either release the Darkspawn or to send them through a gateway portal.
Tauri Anila approached Ragan. “I noticed them after I sent my students away and prepared to attack them while they were occupied,” Anila said. “I could not attack Karth and the Urshkaar archmasters alone, so I called on several elemental allies. He has already defeated many of them.” A nimbus of energy surrounded Ragan as a blast from the Valharri High Lord Karth knocked him backward.
“Yes, together, we are strong enough to attack him.” Ragan made a gesture and symbols appeared then moved to the ground and, within moments, stone elementals pushed up from the ground and moved to defend them from the nearby Darkspawn that Gideon had injured and two others that were heading toward them.
“I have made attempts to close the gateway, but Karth is expending great amounts of energy to actively keep it open against my collapsing attempts,” Anila said.
“Even he cannot do that for long with the White Council’s teleport interdictions in effect surrounding the Vale,” Ragan responded.
“Just maintaining it is costing him tremendous effort,” Anila said. “Effort he can not relinquish to deal with me.”
A few Darkspawn and two Urshkaar archmasters moved forward to defend the gateway, now that they had dealt with most of Anila’s elementals. Ragan guided the several stone elementals he created to attack the Darkspawn.
Anila began a spellweave and concentrated on one of the Urshkaar. She released a draining effect to dampen the magic used by the Urshkaar wizards. Gideon noticed she was very quick; she had clearly honed her battle casting skills over millennia. He realized from his training that Ragan had molded a temporary construct from the earth and infused them with both earth and air elemental spirits. The stone elementals were more like moving mounds of pumice rock but were very mobile.
“Tauri meddlers,” Karth said from near the gateway, beginning an offensive spellweave drawing upon the essence and some elemental forces, as he ushered through the gateway the remaining Darkspawn he had released. An acidic blast spread like a geyser toward a few of Ragan’s elementals. He also began a type of summoning keening.
Gideon dodged a jet of the acidic spray and leapt into the air, turning to strike one of the Darkspawn with his sword, cutting a large gash in its side. The Darkspawn moved quickly to hit him, but Gideon was extremely agile and had already moved away and out of reach. Meanwhile, Ragan had set up a floating barrier that transformed the continued jets of acid to water.
Karth had succeeded in destroying or neutralizing most of Ragan’s elementals and realized that his acid type of attack was now voided. His keening had summoned eight elite Charachau warriors. Then he smiled and drew his sword. Anila had been using counter spells and was frustrating two of the Urshkaar wizards, opting to bring things to a draw with them. The last Urshkaar archmaster continued trying to release another Darkspawn. Karth moved forward and poured energy into a pure essence blast at Ragan.
The blast of pure essence struck Ragan in the chest and exploded more than twenty feet around him, yet he pushed forward. The ground and area around him was engulfed in a bluish fire for a few moments. Gideon felt the blast and was knocked back by the peripheral effects. With his mystic sight, he could see the edge of the weave of the searing energy. One the Urshkaar archmasters almost called down a swarm of fiery meteors, but Anila was able to counter it in time.
Ragan began a spellweave and conjured forth another group of elementals, this time twenty appeared. “So you want to escalate things, Karth,” Ragan said. His elementals swarmed the Charachau and Karth, keeping them all busy for the time being. Ragan realized that Karth was actually more skilled than even he was at spellweavings, but Ragan had pacts with many elementals and he called upon some of them now to even the odds.
“Finelen, strike the one Urshkaar wizard while I have him confused,” Anila said. Gideon could sense that she had used some kind of mental strike, which would not likely last long on the Urshkaar archmaster. He moved rapidly and stuck the Urshkaar in the chest, but his sword struck a barrier. Gideon then used a barrier-breach maneuver that one of his friends and mentors, Gil Gallow, had taught him and called forth