She found Jane standing over Amberly, pressing her heel down on Amberly’s broken arm as she watched the mist for Syline’s return. But as Syline came into view, she suddenly stumbled forward, the young wizard’s axe buried into her shoulder. Syline didn’t have time to think about the source of her good fortune, her teleportation spell went off before she even hit the floor.
As she arrived, she did so with all her momentum intact. Right by Jane, barrelling into her with all the speed of her flight intact, sending both sprawling away from Amberly. For a split second, Jane was left shuddering on the floor as the lightning from the spell coursed through her and sent her into a seizure, but already she was pushing herself through those tremors and back to her feet. Syline rose out of her tumble to face her, using Jane’s momentary agony to put some distance between them after yanking her axe from the vampire’s shoulder. There was a terrible wound there now, their fall had pushed it deeper into her back, and now her arm hung mostly slack. Syline didn’t dare take her eyes off her, but she gave a silent thanks to whoever was aiding her.
Jane didn’t give her any more time than that. Giving up on physical assault, she once more began an incantation, the words of the spell spilling from her lips like a waterfall. Syline, thinking on the spot, did the same. Surely, Jane’s spell would be more powerful than hers, so she needed to keep her from finishing it. Her incantation was much shorter than Jane’s, sending off dozens of arcane missiles in a storm of unerring magic. Normally, this would have pushed Syline to her limits and beyond, but right now, she barely felt the drain upon her in the slightest. Disappointment welled up in her as the vampire weaved, flipped and twirled, evading almost every one of the supposedly “perfectly accurate” bolts of magic. The ones that did hit impacted hard, bringing bloody welts across her flesh, but that didn’t stop her incantation. Jane’s willpower was too strong to falter now and Syline ran for a pillar to take cover from whatever was coming, incanting a shield as she went.
What came for her seemed like something from a wizard of legend: answering Jane’s call was a titanic, ethereal dragon, made of crackling lightning and searing blue flames. It rushed forth and tore through the pillar like paper. It was only Ioann’s seemingly limitless magic that let her survive by endlessly repeating the incantation to strengthen her shield. Even as a terrible heat leaked through and burned her lungs, she forced herself to focus on nothing but her own counter-casting. When the spell finally passed, Syline shuddered and found herself taking cover against nothing but rubble. She stepped out, holding her axe in steadier hands and taking solace in its solidity. She had to keep casting. Keep fighting. Ioann had given her everything, and no matter how astonishing Jane’s magic was, she wouldn’t let herself give in.
Jane was panting as Syline rounded the remains of the pillar. Even the vampire looked drained by such an astonishing spell. Despite that, she flashed Syline a grin.
‘See now? This is the power of a true mage. All you have going for you is stolen power, little girl. Stolen from me, stolen from him. You’re nothing but a little thief.’
Syline didn’t reply, instead appearing by Jane’s side in a flash of lightning. Electricity crackled through the vampire and she let out a scream as she pushed herself away from Syline. The little mage swung wildly at Jane, trying to take the vampire down in the moment of weakness. Jane hurried back, unsure of just how reliable her claws would be while they shook from the lightning’s touch.
‘Enough! We finish this now! I don’t care if he granted you his power. Even that has its limits.’ The vampire wiped the blood from her lips. ‘I’ll just have to push you to them and beyond.’
By the time she finished speaking Syline’s own follow up spell had already finished. Flames gathered at the axe’s edge in a burning, terribly focused line of azure. She glanced down a moment, surprised that the flame dagger had come from there and not her hand. Then, she noticed how her axe was splattered with the ink too. She looked up with a tiny smile, the next spell on her lips even as Jane, too, was chanting. Syline brought her axe up over her head and began to rush towards the vampire hoping to put her on the back foot. She hoped false bravado would ring true at that moment.
Terrified, Syline knew she was inches from disaster, that Ioann’s power would only keep her going for so long, she knew one false step would kill her. But she forced it all down beneath a shield of focus and determination. A shield of calm that would make her mother proud and most any other duellists ashamed.
She could only hope Jane would fall for her feint, for the spell on Syline’s lips was not a shield.
Jane ignored the charge, finishing her chant by the time Syline was a few paces from her. She clasped her hands together and from them burst forth a bellow of flame like a dragon’s roar. Black, heavy smoke poured from the flames as they washed over Syline like a ceaseless tide. The vampire held them there, the rush of flames filling her ears as she chanted and chanted, keeping the spell going past even her own limits. Surely, Syline’s shields could not hold up against all this punishment, she thought. When they cleared, there’d be nothing but ash left of the girl.
But Syline had never been touched by the flames: the moment they obscured Jane’s sight of her, she had disappeared one last time in a flash of ozone. This time, there was no lightning. Syline appeared behind Jane, the sound of the flames hiding her footfalls, yet still, Jane heard her, spinning with preternatural awareness, her spell changed, a shield springing into life, it’s half-real mass ready to intercept the blade. Jane’s eyes were wide with rage and fear.
Lauralee saw the final moment. The instant where her actions would matter most. She finished reading the counterspell scroll she’d brought with her. With all the hope her dead heart could muster, she prayed for Syline’s aim to be true.
The shield fizzled like it had never been there, disappearing before the axe even made contact. Jane felt the terrible burn of the superheated edge pass through her neck.
Then nothing at all, ever again.
Syline lowered her axe. Jane’s headless corpse toppled to the ground. Syline stood, panting for several long moments as the body rolled down the stairs. It was over.
She’d won.
‘Go to your friends while you have the chance,’ Amberly felt Rion tell her. ‘I think I should have the strength to heal them, or at least… keep them alive, I’m sorry I’m so weak. I’m not much of a god, especially after all she took from me.’
Staggering to her feet, Amberly could see Syline standing over the body of the vampire. They’d won. At the very least, that gave her relief, but as things stood, many of them could still die if she didn’t save them. She felt a pressure on her crippled arm like someone held it tight, keeping it steady, and a soothing warmth spread through it. It wasn’t good as new, but it was usable. It’d have to work. She’d pour her energy into healing everyone else first, their wounds were more vital. If she had the power left over, she’d fix her arm.
One by one she ran to her friends and deep-red embers scattered from her open palms. Kat’s broken jaw was set, and the bleeding from her scalp slowed, then stopped. By the time she blinked herself back to consciousness, Amberly had moved to Ioann, healing his severed arm with scar tissue.
Rion was still so weak, and each casting drained the pair of them. By the time she healed Thelonious’ broken nose and cracked skull, she was struggling to remain conscious and the feeling of Rion’s presence with her was fading away.
Thelonious opened his eyes with a gasp, a hand coming to one of his horns. It had been broken clean off right where it began to curl forwards, blood dripping from the tip of it. He forced himself to ignore that terrible ache though, as Amberly collapsed over him. The hellblooded bodyguard caught her in one arm, propping himself on the other as her head fell to his shoulder. He looked up, wary of what he would find. When he saw Syline standing vacant over Jane’s body, a bloody axe ablaze with a blue flame in her hand, he couldn’t believe his eyes. She’d done it. That damned little bullheaded wizard had done it.
‘It’s okay, Amberly… It’s okay, we won… Syline won. The vampire’s dead.’ He let himself fall slack against the tiles and spent a few moments simply breathing. It came easy.
The fight finished, Syline’s knees began to shake. Adrenaline that had kept her mind going a mile a minute, until now, ebbed away. The feeling of Ioann’s power slowly began to fade from her, flames cooling in her breast as the world finally began to slow down. Her axe trailing embers, her robes ruined, and only her trusted satchel protecting the all-important spell-book, she ran to the sorcerer only to find him still on the ground. A smile was on his lips, the colour back in his cheeks. Syline allowed herself a sigh of relief as she saw his chest rise and fall. He was okay.
‘I knew you could do it,’ she heard Thelonious say behind her.
She turned to see him and Amberly, the hellblooded struggling to push himself up onto his elbow. Both looked a few paces from death’s door. She couldn’t think of what to say. Really, it hadn’t even sunk in that they’d won, just yet. She just gave the pair of them a dazed smile before jogging to help her sister up.
‘Let’s give her a little space,’ Amberly said, trying to stand. ‘She’s probably still in shock.’
With a groan, Thelonious pushed himself up to his feet and brought her up with him, holding her against his side to support her. Inwardly, she was glad for it. She doubted she’d have stayed on her feet without it, at that moment.
‘Soel took you back?’ he asked.
Amberly laughed and shook her head.
‘Soel is done with me and I want nothing to do with him. This was all thanks to the god Jane has held captive… Her name’s Rion. She’d been calling to me all this time. I can… I can stand.’
Thelonious let her stand on her own but kept a hand on her shoulder to steady her as she recovered herself. ‘Let’s… Come on, let’s go find her. Get her out of here and to… wherever she belongs.’
‘Will you two be alright?’ Syline asked, having returned with Kat behind her.
