V

Isiah pulled himself to his elbows, shaking and coughing in fits.  He looked around but couldn’t see much of anything.  “Miah,” he whispered.

He was near death and he knew it.  He lay flat again and reached back to take a metal vial out of a pouch fixed in his armor at the small of his back.  Pain shot through him as he rolled onto his wounded shoulder, used his teeth to pull the stopper, and drank the contents of the healing potion.  He felt the magic rush through him, stopping the bleeding and knitting up flesh.  But after the healing surge was over he could tell he was still about half strength.  It was better than dead.

He stood on unsettled legs while stretching his shoulder.  His bow lay broken a few feet from him.  Blinking his eyes as more smoke from the trees drifted through the clearing, Isiah saw the unmoving wyvern slumped against the ruins with its head shoved into the opening.  He staggered forward.  “Miah,” he called out.

Then he saw the forms of Kaspar and Caelian lying in the grass.  He started running towards them.  Kaspar was starting to move his arms and he heard Caelian groan incoherently.  They were the only two he could see.  “Miah!” he shouted frantically.  He couldn’t see her anywhere.  “Miah!”

Caelian could just turn her head.  “Isiah, stop.  Stop.”

He knelt next to her.  “Where’s Miah?”  He looked back up.  “Miah!”

Caelian grabbed at his arm.  “Hush!  We don’t know what else is out here.  Help me up.”

As they rose to stand they saw Kaspar was already standing with both swords and stalking towards the wyvern.  “She probably jumped in here.  Wyverns will follow prey anywhere.”

Isiah left Caelian on wobbly legs and ran past the fighter.  He leapt over the dead beast’s wings to get to its head.  Putting his feet in a couple of cracks in the stone he lifted himself up to look into the entrance.  As he searched, Kaspar came up next to him.  “Look at this,” said Isiah, pointing at the hole in the back of the wyvern’s head.  “Magic Missile blast.”

Kaspar smiled and coughed.  “Here, get back and I’ll get it free.”  

Isiah looked a little perplexed.  “How are you going to move this?”

Kaspar dropped his shortsword and raised his longsword over his head with both hands.  Isiah got the message and jumped clear.

Caelian had finished casting Cure Wounds on herself and walked up as Kaspar separated the wyvern’s head from its neck with three blows.  The fighter leaned back against the tower as the head dropped into the opening and the neck slid sideways trailing dark blood against the stone.   Kaspar put a hand on his bloody armor and groaned in pain.  

Caelian shushed him and brought glowing hands up to his chest.  She chanted the spell quickly and Kaspar inhaled deeply.  “Thanks, love.”

Isiah was looking down into the opening and shading his eyes.  “I see light,” he said softly.  “Coming through some kind of opening in what would have been a floor or ceiling.”  He lifted his head up to look along the length of the toppled tower.  “Whole thing’s mostly empty.  There’s another chamber in the upper part.  If she’s in there I can’t hear anything.”  He grabbed the edge of the opening.  “Let’s go.”

Isiah levered himself up to jump in feet first and Caelian tried to stop him.  “You’re still wounded.”  He smiled at her as he disappeared into the opening.

Isiah slid down the angled wall to the flat floor.  He landed on the stones and winced, bravado vanishing.  Drawing his sword, he moved to the lighted opening as the other two came up behind him.  The three of them gathered and peered into the next room.  “This isn’t good,” said Isiah and he stepped through.

They spread out and moved slowly and quietly.  Isiah spotted the opening in the floor and the light coming from down below.  He pointed.  The light was a mixture of Miah’s Light cantrip and a softer glow of torches.  They could hear voices.

With hand signals they made a plan for going down.  Isiah would lead with stealth and use the shadows if he could.  Caelian would go next since she was the most resistant to the Beheriim’s charms.  Kaspar would go last and attack hard.

Isiah exchanged his sword for his dagger and started down with well-practiced silent steps.  About halfway down he slowed and crouched.  The light and voices indicated that both Miah and Jozinferal were discussing something.  That was good and bad.  Miah was still alive but definitely charmed and out of the coming combat.  As Isiah got closer to the bottom he could see that the room opened out into a larger space.  He also saw the edges of furniture that he could probably get in behind.

It was when Isiah reached the last few steps and saw the two of them facing him, Jo with wings outstretched and Miah standing by his side like a consort, that the plan fell apart.  Isiah burst into a rage and leapt forward.  He threw his dagger and drew his sword.

The dagger sliced at Jozinferal’s leg and clattered off to the side.  The Beheriim brought up his whip and stepped forward.  He twirled his arm and the whip lashed out, glowing red.  With a flash of fire the whip scored across Isiah’s chest.  Jo brought his hand down hard and the whip wrapped around Isiah’s forearm.  The thief screamed as Hellfire burned his flesh and he staggered to his knees.

Caelian jumped down the remaining steps two at a time.  She landed at the bottom and kept charging forward, Mace of Holy Light shining brilliantly.

Jozinferal snapped his whip back behind him and took another step forward.  Then he shouted “Stop!” with a thunderous voice.

Caelian halted with jerking movements, surprise and bewilderment on her face as she couldn’t move forward or attack.

Kaspar ran into the room and dodged around Caelian.  He drove straight at Jozinferal with his longsword raised.  

The Beheriim brought up his free hand and twirled his fingers into a fist.  “Let’s discuss this like friends,” he said with a pleasant smile.

Kaspar stopped charging and lowered his swords.  He’d gotten within five feet.

Jozinferal smiled again.  “Thank you, Kaspar.  Now please take our cleric friend over to those chains on the wall.”

Isiah forced himself back to standing and lunged forward with his sword.  The point barely stuck into the Beheriim’s side.

Jozinferal pointed and launched a ray of fire into Isiah’s chest.  The thief dropped at his feet.

Kaspar turned and grabbed Caelian by the shoulders.  He lifted her up and started walking back to the wall.  “Kass, what are you doing?” she screamed into his face.  “Don’t do this!  Fight!”  She dropped her shield and kicked at him while they moved.

Jo turned to Miah.  “Darling, would you help by shackling Caelian to the wall?  She’ll be fine.  And then, why don’t you fix us a drink for celebration.”

Miah walked behind Kaspar.

Isiah grunted and tried to get up.  Jozinferal kicked him in the head and he dropped face first against the floor.

Kaspar held Caelian’s arms as she weakly struggled to regain her abilities after the Beheriim’s Command spell.  Miah set her quarterstaff against the wall, took the shackles, and placed them around Caelian’s wrists.  Caelian could feel her working and stopped struggling.  “We’ve lost,” she whispered to no one in particular. 

Jozinferal opened his arms wide.  “See now, no one else has to get hurt.  Wonderful.  And Kaspar, be a friend and remove the cleric’s medallion and mace.”

Caelian tried to jerk her head away but Kaspar took the sun shaped medallion from her neck and reached around to grab her mace.  

“Excellent,” continued Jozinferal.  “And I’m sure Master Isiah will join us right after he’s rested.”  He began coiling his whip while he talked.  “And you all will be right where I need you to be when I finish with this island.  Smashing success all around.”

Caelian stood straight and glared at the smug Beheriim.  “What do you mean?  Why do you need us down here?”

“Well, I need someone to take the blame when I deliver this island.  I’m rather lucky you happened along right when you did.  I mean, I tried to coax things along but you can only orchestrate so much.”  He fixed his whip to his belt and reached out as Miah approached with two chalices fashioned out of marble.  

Miah handed him a drink.  “What do you mean by ‘deliver this island’?”

“I’m going to move it through the Shattered Sea and slam it into the middle of Pillars Reach.  Should be getting along any moment now.”

“That’s impossible!” shouted Caelian.  “The sky shards needed would be unimaginable.”

“Well, yes, it hasn’t been tested yet but I’m confident it’s quite possible.  You see, I’ve in my employ a rather brilliant young wizard who’s calculated the precise distances and angles to set up the minimum amount of sky shards in order to move very large masses.  Turns out that sky shards have a harmonic attraction to each other that extends their effects if you know where to set them up.  We know where to set them up.  Very exact.  The math is… exquisite.”

Caelian couldn’t find any more words.  She just stood there staring at Jo as he took Miah’s hand.

Miah smiled and held up her chalice.  “Remarkable accomplishment, my friend.”  She downed her drink in one gulp. 

Jozinferal raised an eyebrow as she swallowed.  He followed suit with his own chalice.

And immediately the Beheriim started screaming as brilliant radiance shot out of his mouth.  Both hands went to his throat.

Miah raised one hand with an empty vial of holy water.  She raised the other to cast a cantrip that flashed a bright snap of lightning into his face. 

Caelian jumped away from the wall with the unlocked shackles falling away and grabbed her medallion and mace from Kaspar, who stood there a bit perplexed.  She raised her medallion and channeled the Force of Light through it.  Dazzling brilliance leapt out and started searing into the Beheriim’s skin.

Jozinferal had a look of both agony and fear as he reached out with a fist and cast a ray of fire at Caelian.  The blast went into the floor and she jumped over it.  She closed in and swung her mace in an uppercut that caught the Beheriim under the ribs.

Jo staggered back, tripped over the edge of the runic portal, and leapt into the air with his wings flapping furiously.  He shouted curses in the Infernal language and folded his arms in front of his chest.  With a loud snapping sound and a gout of flames, he fell back through darkness and disappeared, replaced by the heavy smell of brimstone.

Miah and Caelian stood there, both still on guard, as the smoke dissipated.  After a moment, Caelian relaxed.  “He’s gone back to Hell.”

Miah rushed to her brother’s side. 

Kaspar came up to them, the charm broken, and put a hand on Caelian’s shoulder.  “Kay, I’m so sorry.  I couldn’t...”

She smiled at him.  “Not to worry, love,” she whispered.

Isiah groaned and looked up at them.  “What did I miss?”

Caelian knelt next to him and reached out with glowing hands.  “Miah was pretending to be charmed while waiting for us to arrive.”  She glanced up at the wizard.  “Did you really have to show him the vial of holy water?  A little over the top, maybe?” 

Miah nodded and smiled playfully.

Caelian turned back to survey Isiah’s wounds as she talked.  “Then she faked chaining me up and made Jo a holy tonic.  He’s gone.  For now.”

Isiah shifted and sat back against one of the timber posts.  “Yay, we win...” he mumbled.

“No, we haven’t won yet,” said Miah.  “We’ve got to stop whatever they’re doing with the sky shards.”

Caelian stood.  Kaspar was handing her shield back to her.  “Miah, Jo is an Infernal being.  Everything he says is either a lie or a half-truth that sets up a lie.  How in Light’s Name could anyone rig up sky shards to do that?  It’s impossible.”

Right then the entire room shook and the floor buckled, cracks spreading out through the stones and walls.  Isiah looked up at the splintering timber supports.  “Or they could just bander up the whole thing.”