Pools of Darkness - James M Brown [19]
Now an enormous ball of light formed in the chamber. It writhed and took the shape of a seven-foot-tall, bald human with a long black beard and mustache. This visage was what Bane allowed his worshipers to see when the god felt the need for direct contact with creatures on the Prime Material Plane.
"Well?" the god-voice boomed.
The deity's glare was too much for even the diamondlike surface of the elemental. The creature burst into a billion shards. The fragments that hurled toward the god were pulverized into harmless soot. The rocky projectiles hitting the fiend ripped its flesh to shreds and sent the creature to the floor, writhing in pain, despite the protective energies that still wrapped around it.
"That's much better, my dear drooling son. I do so much like communicating with you directly. Let me tell you what has happened with my plan so far." The face softened. The pit fiend was instantly drawn in awe and adoration to the god's every word.
"All the cities of the Moonsea that I wished for my own, except yours, have been collected. They were ripped from the earth and are now in the plane of Limbo. While a few cities are still trying to resist me, their pools of darkness are transforming the human souls into my minions. In a few months, I will be able to put these cities back in their places around the Moonsea and my worshipers will fill the land to overflowing, thus increasing my power in Faerun.
"Listen!" shrieked the god. With that, the many layers of magical defenses around the fiend vanished, all except the blue spheres of protection.
"You poor excuse for an imp!" Bane's voice was ear-splitting. Now the blue spheres burst with a stone-shattering boom. Not only was the tower rocked, but the land around the massive structure reeled with the anger of the god.
"Do you want to tell me why Phlan isn't where it should be?" Each word of the god blasted the fiend harder and harder into the floor. The very stones under and around the creature sank and molded themselves to the monster's body. Its massive frame started to melt from the energy it was absorbing.
"Master! Please! Mute your righteous wrath before I perish and am unable to do your will! Latenat!" The fiend sniveled at the pain that racked its body.
The god smiled and reduced his power to a fraction of what it had been. The fiend still squirmed.
Bane's light was completely blinding. Crusty layers of flesh peeled off the arms of the fiend. It wrapped its body in its wings, which blocked the searing heat temporarily, although soon the wings would be burned husks embracing a skeletal frame.
"AAAAAAaaaaaahhhhhhhh!" The voice of the pit fiend finally convinced Bane to convert the burning light to a cool radiance. The forces blasting the creature to the floor changed, picked the fiend up, and healed it completely. Huge chunks of black rock fell from the flesh of the fiend and crashed with loud echoes to the floor. The fiend gasped as it spit out its explanation.
"I purposely shifted Phlan to a huge cavern below this tower, using the power of the pool of darkness to transport it. It will now be easier, for you in all your greatness, to shift it back again when all the souls have been pulled from Phlan. All this was done only for you, noble master. All was done to make you more powerful here in Faerun. I know what great effort you expended to pull the other cities away. Was I wrong, most noble of gods? Latenat!"
"No, my loyal toadling. I don't know yet what you intend, but the souls of Phlan must be mine at the precise moment when I gather those from all the other cities. So hurry up with your plans. Summon me again when our work is accomplished, Tanetal."
With that, the light vanished and the god was gone. The fiend groaned in relief with the disappearance of the intense pressure on its body and mind. Whatever happened, Phlan would have to surrender its human souls to the pool of darkness, or bits of the fiend would certainly be scattered over this chamber, like bits of the elemental it had summoned.
The fiend wasn't the