Darkvision - Bruce R. Cordell [54]
"I'm going to feed that dwarf his rod," Kiril promised aloud. She wove the dagger around, keeping it moving and fluid, but felt foolish without seeing a target to intimidate with her blade work.
She wondered, again, if she should acquire an enchanted blade in addition to Angul. A capable sword with no agenda.
Her dagger seemed so insufficient these days.
Yeah, no more stinking debate. Next time the opportunity arose, she'd procure something-maybe a flaming sword, or a starblade like Nangulis wielded before he'd sacrificed himself…
Something blurred out of the darkness toward her. She stabbed the dagger wildly, hitting a greenish shoulder as it smashed into her gut. A massive foot slammed down on the instep of her left leg, trapping her foot. She tipped over like a felled tree and lost her grip on the dagger, which still jutted from her attacker's shoulder.
Standing over her, its right foot still pinning her left, stood a massive, demonic humanoid. It was almost twice her height! Green skin glistened under black leather armor, and a pair of short ivory horns protruded from its forehead. A jagged splinter of purplish crystal protruded from its chest. Half-dried blood slicked the armor around the wound where the crystal protruded. The crystal flashed, pulsing violet light into the rain-soaked night.
It growled and ground her trapped foot painfully into the dirt with its tremendous weight.
Her right hand fumbled at Angul's sheath. The creature kicked with its other leg, connecting with her hand as she grasped at Angul's hilt.
Angul spun across the dirt, and her hand flared with pain. The moment of connection with the Blade Cerulean enlivened her enough to wrench her foot free. But the touch had been too brief. She hadn't gotten a real grip on the hilt. If she had, no force in the world could have broken her grasp.
She scrambled forward through the enormous creature's legs and stood up behind it, weaponless. The damned starblade she'd wished for moments earlier… she shrugged.
Nausea suddenly clawed at her stomach. Something about its presence… Her energy and will to resist trickled away as if the creature were a vortex and her health were seawater. She jumped back as the monster whirled around, ebony claws scything the air. Even that small distance helped-the leaching of her strength faded, perhaps ended.
"Thormud, you bluntnub! Help me!" she screamed. The creature blocked her view of the dwarf and his summoning circle. She couldn't see what the geomancer was doing, and the dwarf did not respond. Her eyes darted left-there lay Angul, glistening with its cerulean-tinged luminosity. Thirty feet too far.
Her attacker spoke, using accented Common. "I have been instructed to make certain you never hold that weapon again." The crystal in its chest flashed and gleamed, sending disconcerting shadows across its monstrous visage.
"I'm going to rip your spine out through your mouth, you blood-baiting pimple," Kiril told the demon.
She feinted forward, but ran for her sword, a full-out sprint.
She glanced back. The creature opened its mouth and exhaled winter.
The falling rain between her and the creature froze into hail, and the water slicking her skin froze into a painful crust. The cold burned first, then numbed, and she fell, gasping. She was a half-dozen paces short of Angul.
"F-fu-blood!" she gasped. Kiril was as chilled as if she'd stood a half day unclothed in a blizzard.
The horned giant laughed and pointed an ebony-tipped claw at her. A thin black ray etched the air, but she heaved out of the way… even farther from the Blade Cerulean. Where the ray touched, the sickly sweet odor of rot bloomed.
The ground shuddered, and the booming clatter of falling rock pealed into the rain-soaked night. The ground shuddered again, and again. Boom-boom, boom-boom, boom-boom. Something very heavy rapidly approached.
Both swordswoman and demon glanced toward the geomancer and his circle. The silhouette of a humanoid creature, larger even than the horned attacker, blocked Thormud's lamplight. The moving