Viperhand - Douglas Niles [133]
At the same time, Poshtli charged out of the shadows. The drow archers let fly their missiles, and many of the black-tipped arrows struck the priest of Zaltec, propelling him backward and driving him to the floor. One struck Poshtli's shoulder, while others clattered against the stone walls of the cave.
Then the Ancestor rose from his chair. He raised his hand and started toward Halloran and Erix.
Desperately Hal dropped the spellbook at the edge of the pit and leaped to his feet. He turned toward the archers and saw them swiftly draw additional black arrows from their quivers, nocking them into the bows.
"Kirisha!" he cried, suddenly inspired. He cast his light spell directly in the faces of the nocturnal Ancient Ones. The white glow blossomed, illuminating the cavern brightly.
With cries of pain and anguish, many of the drow archers dropped their weapons or turned away from the painful blast of light. In another second, Halloran charged among them, and Helmstooth found the bodies of many of the blinded, stumbling drow.
Poshtli followed, striking a drow with his steel sword, knocking the blow of another aside. The warrior staggered, weakened from the arrow wounds he had suffered just moments before and atop the palace, and one of the dark elves saw his weakness. With a sudden lunge, the drow drove his blade toward the Nexalan.
Twisting away, Poshtli tried to stop the blow, but the black blade knocked his own sword aside. Contining the lunge, the drow stabbed the warrior in the chest. With a dull moan, Poshtli sprawled onto his back, bleeding.
Erixitl faced the Ancestor as the wizened, decrepit drow hobbled forward, coming around the deep pit of fire. The elf held a wand or some kind of weapon in his hand, a short staff with an evil-looking tip like the outspread claws of a small dragon.
Erix stood, strangely unmoving, before him as he raised the clawlike staff. He was perhaps halfway around the crater when a sudden, searing hiss filled the cave, and red light exploded in tiny beams from the claws on the Ancestor's wand. Each of these rays of light merged with the others into a heavy bolt of solid crimson energy that smashed into Erixitl with crushing force.
Her pluma token puffed upward, and the gust of wind that had sheltered her from Darien's magic swiftly swirled around Erix. But the power of the attack blew this protection aside, bashing Erix backward and flattening her to the floor. The Cloak of One Plume billowed behind her.
She lay there, moaning, as the Ancestor took another step and raised the weapon again. He had come nearly all the way around the caldron and soon would loom directly over her. Halloran started for Erixitl, not knowing what he could do. He heard the Ancestor laugh, a harsh, cruel sound.
But neither he nor the aged drow anticipated another reaction. Chitikas-coiled, motionless, and apparently unconscious throughout the battle-suddenly exploded from his coil. The wingless couatl drove like a spear toward the Ancestor.
Chitikas's fangs sought the throat of his victim, but the Ancestor barely managed to knock the snake's bead to the side. For a moment, the two of them teetered on the brink of the bubbling caldron. The snake's tail lashed around, striking the speltbook where Hal had left it. Darien, still imprisoned by hishna, screamed as the tome toppled into the Darkfyre.
Hal reached Erixitl's side, kneeling to sweep her into his arms. She sobbed against him, helplessly watching the struggle. "Chitikas!" she cried.
Then, locked in their desperate fight, the couatl and the Ancestor fell slowly, following the spellbook into the flaring caldron.
Hoxitl paused for a long, splendid moment, basking in the full scope of his triumph. Below him, the cleric of the strangers' god stared bug-eyed at his poised dagger. The Bishou's lips were flecked with spit, his tongue protruded, and the veins in his face seemed ready to burst.
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