Temple Hill - Drew Karpyshyn [107]
Azlar cowered back into the shadows of the chamber walls, no longer able to hide behind his magical invisibility. Xiliath turned his attention to the medusa, who was too involved in her own rampage of destruction to have noticed Xiliath's entrance.
Xiliath focused a single eyestalk on the medusa's form, and Azlar saw her body stiffen. She spun around, clutching at her serpentine locks with her hands, oblivious to the snakes' agonized writhing as they snapped and bit at her hands. Protected by his own incantations, Azlar was able to stare directly into her tortured eyes. He recognized what he saw. A battle of wills was being waged inside the medusa's skull. Xiliath was trying to dominate her mind with the power of his magical eye.
"No!" she screamed, snapping her head back as if it had been struck. The glazed look receded from her eyes, leaving only a blazing anger. "Not again! I will not be your slave anymore!"
"Xiliath!" she screamed, the identity of the fearsome monster as obvious to her as it had been to Azlar mere moments before. "You shall pay for my suffering!"
The beholder's unflinching central eye met the gaze of the snake-haired woman. Xiliath stared directly into those flashing eyes that meant a stony fate worse than death for most mortal creatures, and to Azlar's amazement, nothing happened.
A look of surprise and then understanding flickered across the medusa's beautiful features. Her serpentine locks hissed in anger, but she refused to flee. She bent down and scooped up a long spear from where one of the panicked soldiers had dropped it on the floor. With sin-prising strength, she hurled the weapon across the cavern at the hovering sphere.
The weapon bounced harmlessly off Xiliath's leathery bide.
From the cover of the shadows, Azlar watched as the beholder slowly advanced on the medusa. Again and again, she took up weapons from the floor and threw them at the monster, trying vainly to halt his methodical, relentless advance. Her desperate throws were hurried and wild, most far from their mark. Those that struck Xiliath's hide bounced harmlessly away. A single shaft punctured the large central eye of the beast, sinking deep into the pale flesh of the orb. The beholder merely shook the weapon free and let it fall to the ground below, seemingly oblivious to the effects.
Finally, the medusa's courage broke. She turned to run, but a beam from one of the eyestalks atop Xiliath's head struck her between the shoulder blades, slamming her to the floor. A second beam engulfed her, and the writhing snakes atop the medusa's head began to smolder and burn, their agonized, hissing screams drowned out by the sizzle and pop of the snakes' own boiling blood.
Somehow, the medusa clambered to her feet, but Xiliath was right on top of her now. She dropped to her knees, the steaming blood of the snakes on her head dripping down to cover her face with dark, crimson streaks. Cowering before the beholder, the medusa clasped her hands together, begging for mercy. A single thin ray arced down from above, striking the medusa flush in the chest.
Azlar was unable to pull himself away from the scene, captivated by the terrible power of the eye tyrant's mere presence, fascinated by the vicious slaughter Xiliath had unleashed. The medusa's shriek cut through the air, piercing Azlar's eardrums. She dissolved in an explosion of light that seared Azlar's eyes-though the wizard still refused to look away.
Then the medusa was gone. Where she stood was only a smoking crater and a small pile of dust.
The graphic reality of the medusa's death snapped Azlar back to his senses. The wizard knew he had to escape the chamber. Xiliath would spare no one-even his own men would perish for having learned the secret of his true identity. Most of the panicked soldiers ran