Tangled webs - Elaine Cunningham [82]
"Nothing but open sea," the sailor said, and his face blanched as he understood the drow's intent.
"i'm not real happy about it myself;" she grumbled, for the gate spell required for such an escape would have challenged her even if she'd approached it fresh and rested. Still, there was something to be said for the power of desperation. And by the time the Elfmaid was ready to take the dimensional plunge, their situation would be desperate indeed.
The fingers of the drow's right hand curved around the Windwalker, and she flung her left hand toward the black curtain. Magic fire spat from her fingers, forming a fireball that tore through the darkness and beyond. There was a moment's silence, a thud of impact, then shouts from the other ship and the faint crackle-and-hiss of a fire quickly extinguished.
Again Liriel attacked, and this time came the unmistakable pop of a fireball glancing off a magical shield. Good, she thought grimly. The enemy ship's wizard was every bit as powerful as she'd suspected. She was almost certain what his next move would be, and she readied herself in preparation.
Summoning every fireball in her arsenal, Liriel braced her feet wide and set off the first small missile, much as a drow armsmaster might send out a scouting party of kobolds to test the enemy's range and resolve. She heard the magic fire strike the unseen shield, and she began to count rapidly. An answering flash exploded from the darknessher own weapon, rebounded back. The fireball, diminishing in size and power as it came, fell short of the Elfmaid and disappeared, with a weak fizzle, into the water.
A smile of triumph flashed across the drow's weary face. She now knew precisely how long she had between attack and escape. Again she stretched out her hand, and again magic fire erupted from her fingers. A barrage of fireballs spewed forth, so many that the sky was brightened as ifby festival fireworks, so quickly that it appeared as if a single line of multicolored lightning flashed from her outstretched hand.
With the last of her fireball spells gone, Liriel swayed and then dropped to the deck like an arrow-shot raven. But she struggled to her knees, both hands clasping the Windwalker and her face set in determination. Quickly she called forth the gate that would take the pirate ship several miles to the south and to safety.
Nothing.
A scream of pure, primal rage tore from the drow's throat. Never had magic refused to obey her call! Anger lent her a moment's strength; she snatched up her obsidian pendant and raised it high even as her scream ended in a shriek of prayer- a brief and fervent oath in the ancient Drow tongue, a final, desperate plea to Lloth.
Utterly spent, Liriel fell silent and watched with dull eyes as her own weapons rebounded toward the pirate ship in a colorful storm, whistling as they burst through the curtain of blackness and hurtled downward like falling stars. The illusion she had hoped to create-the destruction of the Elfmaid, her death, and those of her friendswould soon be all too real.
And then the lights and the sound were gone.
The Elfmaid was surrounded by swirling gray mists, by heavy air as dank and foul as that of a despoiled crypt. Although she'd been temporarily blinded by the fireballs, Liriel had her other senses in full measure, and she caught the familiar scent of giant fungi and a whiff of sulfur and brimstone. Faintly, as if from some unfathomable distance, came the echoes of roars too terrible to have come from mortal throats and of shrieks that spoke of torment and despair. Liriel's eldritch senses were fully aware, too, and she sensed the palpable cloud of terror and gloom that pressed heavily upon all those unfortunate enough to enter these realms. She also sensed the core of dark fire that was the heart of this fell domain, felt the frigid obsidian hand that reached out to touch her and to claim the offered prize.