Ascendancy of the Last - Lisa Smedman [15]
Naxil awoke, screaming.
Leliana swore. She pressed home the fight, menacing the ooze with her sword. As it drew back, she glanced anxiously at the screaming Naxil. What she saw made her shudder. Splatters of molten rock streaked his chest where the ooze had struck him, and were burning through his leather armor. Despite his magical protection, the molten rock had already charred deep ruts in the armor-and was burning down into his skin.
"Hang on, Naxil!" she cried. "Just a few moments more."
Leliana thrust at the ooze with her sword, worrying the creature and forcing it back to the crevice. Molten fire dribbled from each puncture.
Her piwafwi had been smoldering since the droplets of lava had struck it. Now the fabric ignited. Cursing, she slapped out the tiny flames. Then she smiled, as an idea struck her.
Keeping the ooze at a distance with her animated sword, she yanked off her smoldering piwafwi. She rushed the ooze, gritting out a prayer, and hurled the piwafwi onto it. As the garment landed on the ooze and burst into flame, she completed her spell.
"Eilistraee, aid me! Lend these flames the moon's chill light."
The flames dancing across the burning piwafwi turned from fire red to ice blue. The bitterly cold flames burned into the creature, punching a cold, dark hole in it. The ooze shrank back on itself and withdrew into the crevice.
The blue flames flickered out. The ooze rallied, rising again.
This time, Leliana shucked off her chain mail and cast it aside. She yanked her padded tunic over her head, hurled it onto the ooze, and repeated her prayer. Cracks radiated outward across the body of the ooze as the ice flames "burned" into it. The ooze tried to extend an appendage, but its skin cracked apart, and the limb fell to the floor. It shattered, with the chunks dulling like nearly extinguished coals.
One more time. That would finish it.
Naxil was no longer screaming.
Leliana yanked off her shirt and hurled it onto the ooze. "Eilistraee!" she shouted as her hand swept down for the third time. The flames burning the shirt turned from red to blue, and the ooze roared in anguish.
Then it exploded.
Chunks of cooling ooze flew off in all directions. One slammed into Leliana's shoulder, knocking her off her feet. Pain flared in her elbows as she struck the floor.
She rolled over as the smell of scorched hair filled her nostrils. And something more: burning flesh.
Naxil groaned. Low and deep.
She scrambled to his side. He lay face down. Leliana rolled him over, tore open his armor, and examined his chest. The burns there were so deep his flesh had been charred black; he'd need restorative magic to heal them. She tore his smoldering mask from his face and cast it aside. As she did this, she felt heat radiating from his face-it seemed to be flowing out of his nostrils and mouth. Something was happening to him. Something odd. Even those parts of his body that hadn't been directly struck by the creature were affected. Something pulsed under his skin, leaving tiny blisters that formed a tracery across his skin, like veins.
Those were his veins. They were glowing. Hot as fire.
Terrified, Leliana began a healing prayer. Before she could finish it, Naxil's veins erupted. Liquid fire oozed from the furrows, charring the surrounding flesh. More liquid fire oozed from his nostrils. A faint, sizzling noise filled the air: Naxil's eyes, cooking in their sockets.
"Eilistraee! Aid him!" Leliana cried, one hand on Naxil's forehead, the other extended to the place where the moon would be in the realms above.
Twined light and shadow swept down into the cavern, into Leliana, and on into Naxil. Eilistraee's healing energy played about the body of the grievously wounded Nightshadow like a sparkle of ice in the moonlight, halting the burning within. As his body cooled, his veins lost their fiery glow. The trickles of liquid fire coming from his nostrils crusted over and fell away, and the burns in his body closed over. He was left, however, with terrible scars-and eyes that could no longer see. That was something