Lightning Raid

Aurei desperately tries to gain one of the enchanted swords to battle the Death Knight.

38.

Lightning Raid

 

Aurei hesitated for only an instant, feeling terrible reluctance to leave Eleazar alone with the two deadly knights.   But she knew he was right; it was their only chance against the superior weaponry of the undead things.   As quickly as she dared, and still hugging the back wall, she slipped through the doorway as the two Death Knights advanced upon Eleazar.

She stumbled into the larger room, surprised for an instant to find it was completely pitch black dark, but then she remembered Eleazar’s darkness stone.   There was no way she would be able to quickly find the two remaining swords in the darkness, so in frantic frustration, she dropped to her hands and knees just outside the doorway and felt around for the object she’d heard him drop before they’d entered the room.  

Maddeningly slow moments went by as she groped through the still smoldering debris from the door, not knowing exactly the shape or size of what she was searching.

“Yesh, please help me!” She whispered, and then, underneath a hot ember, her hand closed around a small smooth rock.   She scooped it up, unsure how to determine if it was indeed the darkness stone.   There was no way to stop the magic darkness and she panicked, not knowing what to do.   Then a crazy idea came to her and in sheer desperation she threw the stone as hard as she could through the doorway into the smaller room.

Aurei heard the stone bounce off something and the startled voices from Eleazar and Thantus.   She had found it.   She hoped Eleazar would be experienced enough at fighting blind to avoid the Death Knight until she could rejoin him.  

 

Fumbling forward, a few feet later she came out of the radius effect of the darkness stone that had spilled out of the doorless smaller room.   Immediately she ran toward the sword stand she had seen earlier.

 

Halfway across the room she heard a roar from behind her and suddenly an arctic blast knocked her from her feet, throwing her forward.   The power of the gale pushed her forward, ice crystals stinging her like sand in a hurricane.   Her plate armor grew painfully cold almost at once, numbing and burning her at the same time.  The icy blizzard only lasted several seconds, but she was thrown by the force of it on her belly until she crashed into the very sword stand she had been running toward.

 

She frantically pulled herself up as the wintery onslaught ceased, breaking through a thin coating of ice that had formed upon her.   She hazarded a glance and was not surprised to find Sir Alvis, still with his frozen expression, advancing on her with his ice sword held directly in front of him.   Apparently, he had quickly felt his way through the darkness until he had found the door and escaped.   His whole body was coated in ice, the blue and white sheen of it giving him a very frightening appearance, especially with the corpse-like expression on his tortured face.   But he was not moving like a zombie, instead, he rushed at her, and she knew she had to act fast.   Aurei turned and grabbed the scabbards of the two remaining great swords and was prepared to make a dash toward the smaller room where Eleazar was battling Thantus.   But Alvis’ attack came too sudden for her to get away.   He slammed downward with the ice sword at her head, and she dropped one of the weapons she carried and parried with the scabbard of the other sword.   Upon contact the scabbard shattered as if made of ice, knocking her back against the altar.   She grabbed the grip of the great sword with both hands as Alvis reared back to strike at her again.  

As soon as her hands touch the sword grip, there was a painfully brilliant flash of light that engulfed the room in its brightness.   But somehow, though her Drow eyes were hypersensitive to light, she was able to see clearly in the intense light.   Alvis was not so fortunate, and though his face was still locked in his painful expression, he staggered backwards from the light, swinging his ice sword in front of him.

Aurei had practiced some with two-handed swords before, but had never been proficient with them.   This sword, however, seemed as light of weight as her destroyed Drow short sword.   She stood up, noticing an Elven script etched into the glowing white blade.    ‘Kala’ it read, and she knew enough Elven to know it was high Elven for ‘light’.  

Alvis renewed his attack right then, swinging his great sword quickly at her neck.   She raised the great sword and parried.   As they contacted, a blast of ice and an arc of lightning danced off the blades.    Alvis chopped down at her head and she parried again, with the same shower of ice and the crackle of lightning.   Remembering how the ice sword had been able to produce a blizzard of ice and wind at the command of its wielder, she wondered if this sword had some sort of similar power.   As Alvis again reared back to strike, she just pointed the blade at him and thought of lightning.  

Immediately there came a loud clap of thunder and a brilliant blue bolt of lightning shot from the tip of her sword and slammed into the fledgling Death Knight at point blank range.  

 

The bolt threw him across the room into some of the half-burnt crates from the earlier fire.   The pure ice that encased him seemed to insulate him from the electricity, which surprised Aurei as she thought water and lightning didn’t mix well.   But she did not pause to consider this, instead scooping up the other great sword and running toward Eleazar’s aid. 

She almost made it to the doorway of the smaller room before Sir Alvis’ tortured form could recover enough to send another wintery blast toward her.   The wind threw her into the room, but she kept her footing and rushed on in.   Her first surprise was that she could see at all upon entering the room.   Apparently Eleazar had recovered his darkness stone, or else something had happened to it.   But what she saw when she entered the room caused her to stop for a second.

She was alarmed to find the whole room was on fire.   The crates, the floor, even the walls and ceiling were ablaze and the smoke was already pulling all the oxygen out of the air.   At the other end of the room, through the black smoke, she could make out the orange glow of the Death Knight, his entire suit of armor and his sword now bright orange.   Eleazar was against the back wall, desperately trying to fend off attacks, but upon each contact with the super-heated sword, his blade grew warmer and warmer.  

 

Aurei was aware that the sword of light she carried was radiating bright light and that radiance now was spreading to her own plate armor - though the blinding light did not bother her sensitive eyes in the least, probably due to some sort of protection given by the sword.  As she raced across the burning room, she pointed the tip of the sword at the Death Knight and thought of lightning.   There was a loud crack of thunder and a bolt shot out, slamming into Thantus, who had yet to notice her approach.   The bolt hit him and seemed to engulf him in electricity, but he did not seem affected in any other way.   It did get his attention, however, and he spun around to consider her.

 

“Fool!”  He growled, “You are not the only one who has resistance to magic.”   He raised his fire sword to throw an inferno at her, but Eleazar rose up and slammed his sword down on the Death Knight’s helm.   The blow knocked the undead creature down, but the half-Drow knight’s sword turned white hot at contact, and he dropped it to the ground as it burned his fingers.   Thantus already was on his knees, the sword of fire still in his grasp.

“Laz!”  Aurei yelled, choking in the smoke of the room, as she threw the other great sword to him, as Thantus regained his feet.

Eleazar grasped the grip of the sword with both hands, flipping the scabbard off as he quickly raised the blade to parry the Death Knight’s attack.

As soon as the scabbard cleared the tip of the blade, there came a howling roar from the sword Eleazar bore.   It was glossy black - all of it- and had a long wicked appearance about it, totally unlike the other three Swords of the Opposites.   On its blade in a silver glowing script was etched the Elven word ‘Loome’ which she knew meant ‘darkness’.   The howling wind seemed to come from the very tip of the blade, which had blackness around it.   Aurei felt as if the dark sphere was tugging at her and at everything in the room, pulling everything toward the darkness.

Even the flames seemed to be pulled toward the tip of the black sword, and the smoke in the room flowed into the blackness at the tip and simply disappeared as if going up a chimney. A terrible dread of the sword came over her, but she moved forward as Thantus, who also seemed to pause a moment, brought his fire sword down onto the dark blade.

 

There was no clang of metal upon contact, and the Death Knight’s sword seemed to lose some of its heat for an instant.   Eleazar seemed to be covered in shadow, but swung the sword at the chest of Thantus, who parried with the fire sword, again with no sound as the two sword blades met.

Thantus brought the glowing hot sword down at Eleazar’s head, and this time the tip of the dark sword caught the blow of the Death Knight’s sword.   There was a dull whistling sound, and then suddenly the Death Knight’s sword was gone, sucked into the void at the tip of the dark sword.

For a moment he stood there dumbfounded at the loss, and Eleazar seemed equally as shocked.   It was Aurei who knew it was time to strike, before Thantus remembered the (hopefully) more mundane sword he still had strapped to his back.

She swung the light sword with all of her might and caught the Death Knight in the middle of his back plate.   There came a brilliant flash of light upon contact and again lightning engulfed him to no effect.   She brought the large sword around again to strike him before he had time to react, but at that moment Alvis reached the doorway and sent a gale of ice and wind into the room.   They all were thrown toward the back wall, along with debris and burning crates.   Aurei narrowly missed the tip of the dark sword as she crashed into Eleazar and they both were carried into the burning wall.  

But only for an instant, for with a loud crack, the fire-weakened wall exploded outward, causing the deck to give way as well, and sent everything sliding out into the middle of the air.

 

Reviews

[Erin Winter]

This is great! You used real science. Pure water doesn't conduct electricity, it's the particles in it that causes the conduction! Is the armor was pure ice, it would, scientifically, have no effect!

[Eddie Davis]

Thanks, Erin, I try to use as much science as is possible for a fantasy book. I actually learned about pure water and electricity while researching for this chapter.

[Erin Winter]

I think you're my new hero. *she says as tears fill her eyes because an author used science.*