MFontana
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As the thread title suggests, I'd like a critique on the aerial battle in my series, Aethara: The King's Path that occurs in Chapter 2. The sequence is broken into three parts here. The Opening, The Assault, and the Climax. While this is a nice chunk of the chapter, it is not the complete chapter. If you'd like to read the full chapter to critique it, you can find it (here).
Please, should you reply, indicate to which part you are critiquing in the reply if you don't intend to address it paragraph by paragraph, or quote what you are referring to. It will help me to understand, and see, what you are talking about.
Thank you, in advance, for any (and all) feedback and critiques.
Please, should you reply, indicate to which part you are critiquing in the reply if you don't intend to address it paragraph by paragraph, or quote what you are referring to. It will help me to understand, and see, what you are talking about.
Thank you, in advance, for any (and all) feedback and critiques.
"By your leave, M'lord. We shall have this beast removed from your sight in short order." Rubedo offered, her silky smooth voice positively dripping with the thinly veiled fury she was so desperate to vent. As she spoke, Rubedo dipped into a deep curtsey with practiced grace, and flared out her brilliant scarlet wings before leaping into the sky to take flight.
No sooner had she taken flight, than the velvety satin of her evening gown took to glowing like a polished ruby under the sun's light. Its glow soon spread across her body, painting her flawless skin in its ruby hue, before erupting outward in a vibrant flash with a sharp flourish from the lilitu. One that left behind a deep ruby red robe, its outer layer hanging open and billowing in the wind with her every twist and twirl amidst her ascent, while the inner hugged tight to her supple curves.
"We shall not fail to bring glory to your name, M'lord. You may entrust this to us." Nigredo adds, her own delicate voice tinged with a subtle vibrato-like resonance that lingered on each prolonged syllable. Following suit, she too dipped into a graceful curtsy with practiced ease before flaring out her wings and following her sister into the air.
Amidst her ascent, Nigredo too prepared for the coming battle. The soft white of her evening gown was swallowed up in the swirling shadows of the void, and from it, those shadows seemed to grow until they had enveloped her form before taking on the shape of her robe. With an exaggerated flourish, she pulled those shadows in close, leaving the robe's outer layer once more in a pearlescent white, save for the glints of golden trimming adorning its outer layer.
Where those shadows remained, became the robe's under-layer, a soft smokey grey trimmed in polished ebony that shone like obsidian under the sun, standing in sharp contrast against her flawless porcelain skin.
Skipping over to his side, Albedo leans in and places a soft, playfully light kiss upon his cheek before whispering to him; her voice soft as silk, and her breath, light as a feather's caress, ghosts upon his skin with every word. "When all is done, please remember… we're doing this for you, M'lord. Our greatest pleasure, M'lord, is in serving your will…"
Then, with a quick backward hop, and innocently cute smile playing upon her lips, Albedo too, spread her wings and leapt skyward, joining her sisters in the air, her own deep black dress frosting over with crystals of ice that caught and sparkled in the sunlight, until it had nearly cloaked her entire body in an icy blue sheen, and if not for her brilliant opalescent wings, and its sheen, she'd have nearly vanished from sight against the clear blue skies overhead.
Finally, Brynja stepped forward, offering up only a subtle, solemn, nod. Her silence speaking more in that moment than anything she might have tried to say. The valkyrie's intent was clear to all. This was a battle. For glory. One where she was called to be Marius' sword against this terrible foe. In spite of the obvious danger, a confident smirk flashed across her face before a pair of brilliant ethereal wings of silvery light erupted from her back, phasing through the polished breastplate she wore.
Casting her gaze skyward to where her foe awaited, Brynja steeled herself, crouched down, and then with a powerful leap, she too joined the sisters in the air, her wings emitting soft pulses of light with every flicker, each one propelling her higher, and closer to glorious battle.
All remaining on the ground followed the ascent with eyes cast toward the heavens above. Fear. Hopelessness. Desperation. Powerlessness. But most of all… Fear. Colored their myriad expressions. Only one among them held firm to hope. Marius.
"Good luck…" He whispered as he stood, gaze transfixed on the five figures in the skies overhead. The stillness hanging between them as the oppressive tension before the coming storm of violence.
The three sisters; Rubedo, Albedo, and Nigredo, continued their ascent much like a graceful aerial dance, flitting in formation between one another as they circled ever-higher. Reaching her apex first, Rubedo came to a stop hovering directly before Asharthinax, but safely just outside of his reach. Soon after, flanking him on his left-hand side was Nigredo, and following suit on his right-hand side, was Albedo.
Rubedo began her chant first, slowly raising her hand skyward, fingers splayed wide. "Vael kali savat meshia set…" The words of power flowed from her lips like a river rushing ever toward its conclusion as tiny sparks began hopping between her fingers.
"...Divah saleah to vas telia…" As her invocation continued, the skies overhead darkened, caught in the grip of ever-growing, roiling storm clouds, and those fleeting sparks gathered into a rolling twin-helix rippling up along her skyward-raised hand as the pitch black storm clouds swallowed even the sun, casting the plains in their shadow.
Adding her voice to the growing invocation, Nigredo stretched her hands out in front of her, fingers spread wide and directed toward Asharthrinax. "Zelia sevas ti ko'al tesia…" At the peak of her own intonation, thick wisps of shadow began coiling around her outstretched arms before a barrage of tiny inky black bolts sprayed forth from her fingertips only to cling, harmlessly, to the elder dragon's scaly hide where they struck.
Finally joining in, Albedo finished their shared invocation, hands raised high, wrists crossed neatly overhead as wisps of crystalized air swirled around above her open palms. "Tokia ves tal profesia bel lakisa…" Her own voice tinged with a hint of mischief as she used the billowing storm clouds her sister created to conceal her own spell's effects from view.
As the three sisters began their casting, Brynja continued her ascent, stopping just shy of the brewing storm before dipping back and rolling into a graceful dive. Her right hand drawing the rune-carved broad blade hanging from her hip in time with her descent. Plummetting as a glistening shooting star against the darkness above, straight for Asharthrinax, blade poised to strike with the full force of her descent.
Together, as one, the sisters finished the invocation Rubedo had started. "Mest van Glorista velin nua Deika-regin!" Just as the invocation hit its climax; Albedo swung her arms downwards, calling forth the rain of hundreds of icy spears she had concealed in the clouds, and on its completion, Rubedo followed suit, swinging down her hand and thrusting it outstretched towards Asharthrinax.
From her outstretched hand, sprung forth the first powerful bolt of lightning. Yet that wasn't all, for from the darkened skies overhead, Rubedo ripped another violent burst of lightning, and directed it forward as well, sending it arcing through the skies to collide squarely with the center of Asharthrinax's chest, where it split, rippled, and danced across the sandy golden dragonscales covering his abdomen before dispersing into the skies around him.
Darting between the spears of ice, some longer than she was tall, and twice as thick as her body, Brynja's descent accelerated further with another sudden pulse the moment before impact, as she twisted mid-flight to swing her blade in a vicious arc where it bit deep into the thick scales of Asharthrinax's shoulder, but failed to cleave asunder the dragon's tough hide.
Even the thick, deep blue spears of glacial ice that had struck true, but shattered against Asharthrinax's innate resistances to all forms of magic. A trait shared between all Dragon-kind, but one that was quite remarkable here, for even the combined magic of the lilitu had been nearly ineffectual against his resilience.
Throughout their barrage, even amidst Brynja's frenzied assault, her sword struck, ringing out in what sounded as a single note, and glanced harmlessly off, his scales, the continued fury of the lightning storm, and sustained rain of ice and barrage of clinging shadow bolts, the Elder Dragon remained calm. Undaunted. Unimpressed. And perhaps, only slightly amused by the futility of their efforts.
No sooner had she taken flight, than the velvety satin of her evening gown took to glowing like a polished ruby under the sun's light. Its glow soon spread across her body, painting her flawless skin in its ruby hue, before erupting outward in a vibrant flash with a sharp flourish from the lilitu. One that left behind a deep ruby red robe, its outer layer hanging open and billowing in the wind with her every twist and twirl amidst her ascent, while the inner hugged tight to her supple curves.
"We shall not fail to bring glory to your name, M'lord. You may entrust this to us." Nigredo adds, her own delicate voice tinged with a subtle vibrato-like resonance that lingered on each prolonged syllable. Following suit, she too dipped into a graceful curtsy with practiced ease before flaring out her wings and following her sister into the air.
Amidst her ascent, Nigredo too prepared for the coming battle. The soft white of her evening gown was swallowed up in the swirling shadows of the void, and from it, those shadows seemed to grow until they had enveloped her form before taking on the shape of her robe. With an exaggerated flourish, she pulled those shadows in close, leaving the robe's outer layer once more in a pearlescent white, save for the glints of golden trimming adorning its outer layer.
Where those shadows remained, became the robe's under-layer, a soft smokey grey trimmed in polished ebony that shone like obsidian under the sun, standing in sharp contrast against her flawless porcelain skin.
Skipping over to his side, Albedo leans in and places a soft, playfully light kiss upon his cheek before whispering to him; her voice soft as silk, and her breath, light as a feather's caress, ghosts upon his skin with every word. "When all is done, please remember… we're doing this for you, M'lord. Our greatest pleasure, M'lord, is in serving your will…"
Then, with a quick backward hop, and innocently cute smile playing upon her lips, Albedo too, spread her wings and leapt skyward, joining her sisters in the air, her own deep black dress frosting over with crystals of ice that caught and sparkled in the sunlight, until it had nearly cloaked her entire body in an icy blue sheen, and if not for her brilliant opalescent wings, and its sheen, she'd have nearly vanished from sight against the clear blue skies overhead.
Finally, Brynja stepped forward, offering up only a subtle, solemn, nod. Her silence speaking more in that moment than anything she might have tried to say. The valkyrie's intent was clear to all. This was a battle. For glory. One where she was called to be Marius' sword against this terrible foe. In spite of the obvious danger, a confident smirk flashed across her face before a pair of brilliant ethereal wings of silvery light erupted from her back, phasing through the polished breastplate she wore.
Casting her gaze skyward to where her foe awaited, Brynja steeled herself, crouched down, and then with a powerful leap, she too joined the sisters in the air, her wings emitting soft pulses of light with every flicker, each one propelling her higher, and closer to glorious battle.
All remaining on the ground followed the ascent with eyes cast toward the heavens above. Fear. Hopelessness. Desperation. Powerlessness. But most of all… Fear. Colored their myriad expressions. Only one among them held firm to hope. Marius.
"Good luck…" He whispered as he stood, gaze transfixed on the five figures in the skies overhead. The stillness hanging between them as the oppressive tension before the coming storm of violence.
The three sisters; Rubedo, Albedo, and Nigredo, continued their ascent much like a graceful aerial dance, flitting in formation between one another as they circled ever-higher. Reaching her apex first, Rubedo came to a stop hovering directly before Asharthinax, but safely just outside of his reach. Soon after, flanking him on his left-hand side was Nigredo, and following suit on his right-hand side, was Albedo.
Rubedo began her chant first, slowly raising her hand skyward, fingers splayed wide. "Vael kali savat meshia set…" The words of power flowed from her lips like a river rushing ever toward its conclusion as tiny sparks began hopping between her fingers.
"...Divah saleah to vas telia…" As her invocation continued, the skies overhead darkened, caught in the grip of ever-growing, roiling storm clouds, and those fleeting sparks gathered into a rolling twin-helix rippling up along her skyward-raised hand as the pitch black storm clouds swallowed even the sun, casting the plains in their shadow.
Adding her voice to the growing invocation, Nigredo stretched her hands out in front of her, fingers spread wide and directed toward Asharthrinax. "Zelia sevas ti ko'al tesia…" At the peak of her own intonation, thick wisps of shadow began coiling around her outstretched arms before a barrage of tiny inky black bolts sprayed forth from her fingertips only to cling, harmlessly, to the elder dragon's scaly hide where they struck.
Finally joining in, Albedo finished their shared invocation, hands raised high, wrists crossed neatly overhead as wisps of crystalized air swirled around above her open palms. "Tokia ves tal profesia bel lakisa…" Her own voice tinged with a hint of mischief as she used the billowing storm clouds her sister created to conceal her own spell's effects from view.
As the three sisters began their casting, Brynja continued her ascent, stopping just shy of the brewing storm before dipping back and rolling into a graceful dive. Her right hand drawing the rune-carved broad blade hanging from her hip in time with her descent. Plummetting as a glistening shooting star against the darkness above, straight for Asharthrinax, blade poised to strike with the full force of her descent.
Together, as one, the sisters finished the invocation Rubedo had started. "Mest van Glorista velin nua Deika-regin!" Just as the invocation hit its climax; Albedo swung her arms downwards, calling forth the rain of hundreds of icy spears she had concealed in the clouds, and on its completion, Rubedo followed suit, swinging down her hand and thrusting it outstretched towards Asharthrinax.
From her outstretched hand, sprung forth the first powerful bolt of lightning. Yet that wasn't all, for from the darkened skies overhead, Rubedo ripped another violent burst of lightning, and directed it forward as well, sending it arcing through the skies to collide squarely with the center of Asharthrinax's chest, where it split, rippled, and danced across the sandy golden dragonscales covering his abdomen before dispersing into the skies around him.
Darting between the spears of ice, some longer than she was tall, and twice as thick as her body, Brynja's descent accelerated further with another sudden pulse the moment before impact, as she twisted mid-flight to swing her blade in a vicious arc where it bit deep into the thick scales of Asharthrinax's shoulder, but failed to cleave asunder the dragon's tough hide.
Even the thick, deep blue spears of glacial ice that had struck true, but shattered against Asharthrinax's innate resistances to all forms of magic. A trait shared between all Dragon-kind, but one that was quite remarkable here, for even the combined magic of the lilitu had been nearly ineffectual against his resilience.
Throughout their barrage, even amidst Brynja's frenzied assault, her sword struck, ringing out in what sounded as a single note, and glanced harmlessly off, his scales, the continued fury of the lightning storm, and sustained rain of ice and barrage of clinging shadow bolts, the Elder Dragon remained calm. Undaunted. Unimpressed. And perhaps, only slightly amused by the futility of their efforts.
Returning his attention to the skies once again, Marius follows her gaze to the desperate struggle unfolding overhead. Arcs of lightning accented by a thunderous rapport brighten the skies with each directed stroke of one of Rubedo's arms. Swirling icy mists coalesce into icy lances that shatter time and time again against dragonscale. Bolts of shadow clinging to ruby scales with no lasting effect. All further punctuated by Brynja's desperate frenzy as her sword glances off dragonscale.
As he was opening his mouth to answer Saphina's desperate plea, Asharthrinax made his first move. His first since the barrage had begun. Sweeping his massive clawed hand through the air, he swept Brynja aside like she was nothing, swatting her from the air with a single dismissive, disdainful, stroke.
Forced to watch on helplessly, his voice caught in his throat as his mouth hung open, while Brynja plummeted from the skies above, falling once more like a comet, until this time she struck not Asharthrinax with her blade, but the rather, her body struck the ground.
The impact shattered bone like glass, and cast a violent plume of dust and dirt skyward, only to leave the once proud Valkyrie laying in a broken heap at the heart of the crater her body had created. Unconscious for certain, but most likely, dead.
Without hesitation, two of the maids that had huddled closer to Marius when the fighting began broke from the group and began dashing across the plains as fast as their legs would carry them. Marius had taken note, but couldn't let himself focus on them while the fight was still raging overhead, for the remainder had kept their gazes locked on the skies as a dreadful stillness hung in the air.
Nigredo, though, was the first to make a move to break the lull, her full fury directed at the beast that had so unceremoniously cast aside her companion. She swooped in from on high, her right hand enshrouded in a deep violet light.
A desperate gambit to be sure, she risked getting close to deliver one of her most insidious hexes, only to be knocked aside with another equally disdainful stroke. Yet… in that flicker of space between desperation and certain ruin, she lashed out. Flaring her wings to halt her dive while her own right hand swept forward to take the brunt of the blow.
Nigredo's gambit paid off, for even as she was knocked aside, she had managed to roll with the impact. Even more importantly, however, she had managed to deliver her touch, and the insidious hex that it carried.
The curse took hold immediately upon her touch. Shredding through his potent resistances to magic, the violet light around her hand seeped through the up till now impervious dragonscale hide, before rippling outward like black veins crawling under his skin, only visible through the void-light seeping up through his scales.
Asharthrinax felt the deep chill seeping into his bones where she had touched him, as though life itself were being ripped away as his strength was being pulled into a fathomless void, and continued even long after she had been knocked aside.
She had touched HIM. Reached in deep and had stolen more than just strength. She had stolen a part of him. His essence. His vitality. His power. She had tainted it with that touch. Tainted his very soul. The effect, minimal as it had been, was still more than any of these bugs had managed yet, and she would feel every ounce of his fury for the violation, and her impetuous audacity.
'If we survive, there will be time to mourn.'
'If…and that is a big 'If'…'
'We have to keep pushing forward though.'
'We have to give it our all. That's the only chance…'
Marius' thoughts raced through his mind as he watched the spectacle unfold overhead, before finally finding the words that he, and the others, so desperately needed to cling to. To believe. The words he had been about to say before Brynja's fall.
"We will." He asserted, throwing up a false wall of confidence and bravado. As much for his own sake, as for those around him, before it cracked under the pressure and he finished with "...Somehow." Still clinging to that last, tiny, speck of Hope.
Reaching out his free hand, for one still lay trapped in Saphina's desperate grip, he set it upon her head and ruffled her hair in an effort to ease the young woman's mind whilst his words rang hollow indeed. For even he, in this moment, couldn't bring himself to believe them right now. Even he couldn't bring himself to believe that Asharthrinax wouldn't slaughter them all, with how easily he had dispatched one of their fiercest warriors, and sent his own faithful shadow tumbling through the air after her.
Seething from the violation of Nigredo's hex, its invasive grip permeating deeper by the moment, Asharthrinax snapped his wings in close and dove after the flailing and tumbling lilitu as she fought to right her descent. Every ounce of his ire. His rage. His fury. This singular pest would taste it all, for not even a thousand deaths would ever be enough to pay for such audacity in his presence.
At the last second before his massive jaws snapped shut around her, Nigredo tucked and rolled, just barely dropping out of reach as the heat of his breath alone reddened her once porcelain skin.
A sudden shift and twist sent his tail lashing out at her, which again she had only just barely managed to avoid, this time flaring her wings to slow her descent only enough that it sailed by just under her; before the burst of wind that followed tugged her along in its wake.
Another adjustment sent him soaring after her, claws tucked in close, neck coiled back as he snapped his head forward, unleashing a short jet of flame that licked her wings, singing the tips of their polished ebony with a charcoal grey before lunging again, his massive jaws wide, and ready to trap the petulant fiend in their crushing embrace.
His open maw filled her vision, and with her wings singed and smoking in the lingering oppressive heat of the flames, she couldn't effectively alter her momentum. She was caught. Death had come for her, and his name was Asharthrinax.
Licks of flames leapt between his teeth, and rolled along his tongue, all threatening to jump out and latch onto her robes, trapping her even further in their hungry embrace. Everything she was, was about to be consumed in flame and oppressive heat, yet even now her only thoughts were of her Lord. Marius. And the wish that she had been useful to him.
Right up until that moment, those precious inches she had stolen from Death's grasp were all she could manage, and now, her time seemed truly up until a shout ripped through the skies, followed by a violent arc of lighting blasted past, the brilliant flash blinding Asharthrinax for but a moment. A stolen moment, as he reflexively recoiled to avoid a direct strike to his eye, thus bringing his waiting maw away from Nigredo as it snapped shut with a thunderous slam that had left her dazed, slowly floating toward the earth, wings flared wide.
With a snort, shake of his head, and then irritated snarl, Ashartrhinax turned his ire, if only briefly, toward the source of that lightning. That little crimson speck hovering in his view, her hands weaving together as she prepared another spell. Pulling his neck in once more, he inhaled deeply, then snapped his head forwards toward her, maw open wide as a jet of flame erupted from within and raced towards her.
An imminent fiery death now looming before the scarlet priestess, Rubedo realized her mistake if only too late to do anything about it as the unforgiving flames rushed toward her. The heat of them searing her skin before they had even reached her, only to suddenly burst into a hissing jet of steam when they hit a patch of super-chilled misty air that rolled between Rubedo and the flames that were threatening to engulf her completely.
Thanks only to the timely intervention of her sister, Albedo, and her own quick reflexes, Rubedo had managed to avoid being caught directly by the flames and ensuing burst of steam. However, she had not managed to escape unscathed, for the jet of steam struck her left wing, scouring it to the bone, and sending her into a spiraling, frenzied, descent as she struggled to stay aloft.
Asharthrinax didn't give them so much as a moment to catch their breath, as he lashed out with a vicious claw swipe for Albedo's petite form that sent her dipping low to slip out of reach of his claw only to be caught square across the back as his tail followed, whipping through the air to slam against her spine in a harsh downward swipe.
The impact shattered her wings like glass and sent her rocketing toward the earth, dazed and helpless to correct her rapid descent, where she too, landed hard in an explosion of dirt and dust that left her laying limp and broken in a small crater.
Brynja had fallen, and there had been no signs of her rejoining the fight since. Next was Rubedo, still spiraling in her barely controlled fall, followed by Albedo, her petite frame swatted from the skies as though she were little more than an afterthought for Asharthrinax.
As he was opening his mouth to answer Saphina's desperate plea, Asharthrinax made his first move. His first since the barrage had begun. Sweeping his massive clawed hand through the air, he swept Brynja aside like she was nothing, swatting her from the air with a single dismissive, disdainful, stroke.
Forced to watch on helplessly, his voice caught in his throat as his mouth hung open, while Brynja plummeted from the skies above, falling once more like a comet, until this time she struck not Asharthrinax with her blade, but the rather, her body struck the ground.
The impact shattered bone like glass, and cast a violent plume of dust and dirt skyward, only to leave the once proud Valkyrie laying in a broken heap at the heart of the crater her body had created. Unconscious for certain, but most likely, dead.
Without hesitation, two of the maids that had huddled closer to Marius when the fighting began broke from the group and began dashing across the plains as fast as their legs would carry them. Marius had taken note, but couldn't let himself focus on them while the fight was still raging overhead, for the remainder had kept their gazes locked on the skies as a dreadful stillness hung in the air.
Nigredo, though, was the first to make a move to break the lull, her full fury directed at the beast that had so unceremoniously cast aside her companion. She swooped in from on high, her right hand enshrouded in a deep violet light.
A desperate gambit to be sure, she risked getting close to deliver one of her most insidious hexes, only to be knocked aside with another equally disdainful stroke. Yet… in that flicker of space between desperation and certain ruin, she lashed out. Flaring her wings to halt her dive while her own right hand swept forward to take the brunt of the blow.
Nigredo's gambit paid off, for even as she was knocked aside, she had managed to roll with the impact. Even more importantly, however, she had managed to deliver her touch, and the insidious hex that it carried.
The curse took hold immediately upon her touch. Shredding through his potent resistances to magic, the violet light around her hand seeped through the up till now impervious dragonscale hide, before rippling outward like black veins crawling under his skin, only visible through the void-light seeping up through his scales.
Asharthrinax felt the deep chill seeping into his bones where she had touched him, as though life itself were being ripped away as his strength was being pulled into a fathomless void, and continued even long after she had been knocked aside.
She had touched HIM. Reached in deep and had stolen more than just strength. She had stolen a part of him. His essence. His vitality. His power. She had tainted it with that touch. Tainted his very soul. The effect, minimal as it had been, was still more than any of these bugs had managed yet, and she would feel every ounce of his fury for the violation, and her impetuous audacity.
'If we survive, there will be time to mourn.'
'If…and that is a big 'If'…'
'We have to keep pushing forward though.'
'We have to give it our all. That's the only chance…'
Marius' thoughts raced through his mind as he watched the spectacle unfold overhead, before finally finding the words that he, and the others, so desperately needed to cling to. To believe. The words he had been about to say before Brynja's fall.
"We will." He asserted, throwing up a false wall of confidence and bravado. As much for his own sake, as for those around him, before it cracked under the pressure and he finished with "...Somehow." Still clinging to that last, tiny, speck of Hope.
Reaching out his free hand, for one still lay trapped in Saphina's desperate grip, he set it upon her head and ruffled her hair in an effort to ease the young woman's mind whilst his words rang hollow indeed. For even he, in this moment, couldn't bring himself to believe them right now. Even he couldn't bring himself to believe that Asharthrinax wouldn't slaughter them all, with how easily he had dispatched one of their fiercest warriors, and sent his own faithful shadow tumbling through the air after her.
Seething from the violation of Nigredo's hex, its invasive grip permeating deeper by the moment, Asharthrinax snapped his wings in close and dove after the flailing and tumbling lilitu as she fought to right her descent. Every ounce of his ire. His rage. His fury. This singular pest would taste it all, for not even a thousand deaths would ever be enough to pay for such audacity in his presence.
At the last second before his massive jaws snapped shut around her, Nigredo tucked and rolled, just barely dropping out of reach as the heat of his breath alone reddened her once porcelain skin.
A sudden shift and twist sent his tail lashing out at her, which again she had only just barely managed to avoid, this time flaring her wings to slow her descent only enough that it sailed by just under her; before the burst of wind that followed tugged her along in its wake.
Another adjustment sent him soaring after her, claws tucked in close, neck coiled back as he snapped his head forward, unleashing a short jet of flame that licked her wings, singing the tips of their polished ebony with a charcoal grey before lunging again, his massive jaws wide, and ready to trap the petulant fiend in their crushing embrace.
His open maw filled her vision, and with her wings singed and smoking in the lingering oppressive heat of the flames, she couldn't effectively alter her momentum. She was caught. Death had come for her, and his name was Asharthrinax.
Licks of flames leapt between his teeth, and rolled along his tongue, all threatening to jump out and latch onto her robes, trapping her even further in their hungry embrace. Everything she was, was about to be consumed in flame and oppressive heat, yet even now her only thoughts were of her Lord. Marius. And the wish that she had been useful to him.
Right up until that moment, those precious inches she had stolen from Death's grasp were all she could manage, and now, her time seemed truly up until a shout ripped through the skies, followed by a violent arc of lighting blasted past, the brilliant flash blinding Asharthrinax for but a moment. A stolen moment, as he reflexively recoiled to avoid a direct strike to his eye, thus bringing his waiting maw away from Nigredo as it snapped shut with a thunderous slam that had left her dazed, slowly floating toward the earth, wings flared wide.
With a snort, shake of his head, and then irritated snarl, Ashartrhinax turned his ire, if only briefly, toward the source of that lightning. That little crimson speck hovering in his view, her hands weaving together as she prepared another spell. Pulling his neck in once more, he inhaled deeply, then snapped his head forwards toward her, maw open wide as a jet of flame erupted from within and raced towards her.
An imminent fiery death now looming before the scarlet priestess, Rubedo realized her mistake if only too late to do anything about it as the unforgiving flames rushed toward her. The heat of them searing her skin before they had even reached her, only to suddenly burst into a hissing jet of steam when they hit a patch of super-chilled misty air that rolled between Rubedo and the flames that were threatening to engulf her completely.
Thanks only to the timely intervention of her sister, Albedo, and her own quick reflexes, Rubedo had managed to avoid being caught directly by the flames and ensuing burst of steam. However, she had not managed to escape unscathed, for the jet of steam struck her left wing, scouring it to the bone, and sending her into a spiraling, frenzied, descent as she struggled to stay aloft.
Asharthrinax didn't give them so much as a moment to catch their breath, as he lashed out with a vicious claw swipe for Albedo's petite form that sent her dipping low to slip out of reach of his claw only to be caught square across the back as his tail followed, whipping through the air to slam against her spine in a harsh downward swipe.
The impact shattered her wings like glass and sent her rocketing toward the earth, dazed and helpless to correct her rapid descent, where she too, landed hard in an explosion of dirt and dust that left her laying limp and broken in a small crater.
Brynja had fallen, and there had been no signs of her rejoining the fight since. Next was Rubedo, still spiraling in her barely controlled fall, followed by Albedo, her petite frame swatted from the skies as though she were little more than an afterthought for Asharthrinax.
All that remained, their last hope, was Nigredo, the void-touched lilitu that now had to face the full, unrestrained, fury of Asharthrinax. Claw, Tooth, and Flame, with only her own desperation to carry her through.
Marius too, felt his hope fading in the face of the elder dragon's wrath, as he too could only look on in horror as it loomed before her, claw lashing out to snatch her from the sky.
It's massive clawed hand curling around her, squeezing tight and pinning her arms to her sides, the unrelenting pressure threatening to crush her with every little breath she managed to steal.
It was then, in that brief moment, that he caught it. A subtle flicker of gold darting into the clouds overhead, and his lips curled once more into a smile.
'There… Maybe. Just maybe… we have a chance.'
'Don't give up…'
"That was amusing, but I grow weary of your pathetic attempts to delay the inevitable." Asharthrinax declared, his voice deep and booming, it thundered in a gloating victory across the plains as he tightened his grip even further on the helpless Nigredo.
Another flash. Brilliant gold, as the sun, peeking through the clouds high above.
The clouds had parted, if only slightly to reveal a shimmering golden light once more, deep within lie the silhouette of a woman, long braid whipping in the wind that rushed furiously around her. Wings of light at her back shining brighter still within the golden light of the sun.
Her lips, curled into a victorious smirk, right hand cast high overhead, fingers splayed wide as her voice cut through the winds to reach all those below. "I agree… It's time to go all out…"
The woman, Brynja, they realized, had somehow survived, and as she continued speaking, all eyes were cast upward on her. Including those of the two maids standing in the crater where she had landed. One holding a simple knotted helix staff topped with a brilliant polished moonstone, a bright and cheerful expression painted on her face.
The other had already begun running in the direction of where Albedo had landed, pausing only to look up and watch the display with an unfaltering, unblinking, stare.
"Releasing Divinity." The words; cold, almost mechanical, sound in the heavens, drowning out the thundering of the residual storm as another golden pulse of energy erupts from her body, casting aside those darkened storm clouds with true divine light as all below her witness the advent of a lesser Goddess. A Valkyrie in more than just name.
"Manifesting Divine Phantasm." She continued undaunted, as the pulsing golden light coalesced, gathering and focusing into the space above her open hand.
Realizing the impending danger, Asharthrinax cast Nigredo aside and rushed in his ascent toward where Brynja hovered high above, the first hints of desperation beginning to show in his otherwise contemptuous arrogance.
"Fell Beast of Ruin; Thine end is at hand!"
Brynja continues her invocation, pouring everything she has into manifesting her divine lance; Valgriõr. The golden pulses of divine light gathering above her outstretched hand begin taking on the shape of a longspear formed from radiant golden light.
"By my Divine Authority, I cast thee into the depths of Niflheim!"
She shouts at the top of her lungs, her words thundering with the rapidly escalating power she is calling down from the heavens and claiming as her own. Radiant pulses of golden light continue erupting from her body before layering themselves onto the heavenly spear now resting in her grasp.
Understanding dawns, and Asharthrinax braces to evade the coming strike, for he knows now that he'll not climb to her height in time to stop the first strike of her lance. Choosing instead, to retaliate after avoiding it, he hovers steady, flaring his wings at what he believes to be a safe distance.
In his tunnel-vision focus on Brynja; Asharthrinax remained oblivious to the whispered chant flowing from the weakened, injured, and weary, Nigredo's lips, as she hovered steady, out of reach, and out of sight.
"Now; Strike True! VALGRIÕR!!" Brynja shouted, hurling the spear of light downward at the Elder Dragon with all the strength and fury she could muster in her present state.
His lips curled into a furious snarl, Asharthrinax pulled his wings in tight and prepared to roll out of the spear's reach before resuming his merciless counter-attack, only to find his wings held fast to his body. Viscous, inky black tendrils of shadow snaking out around them and the rest of his body that held fast.
"Shadow Binding"
The remaining lilitu muttered weakly, pouring all of her remaining mana into the spell as she fought to restrain their foe's movement with Brynja's lance arcing through the air like a falling star.
The tendrils, anchored to those lingering bits of shadowy ichor still clinging tight to Asharthrinax's scales did their part, but couldn't restrain their monstrous foe completely. Or forever.
On the ground, those who remained land-bound watched in awe as the struggle overhead continued. Watched with the hope ignited by the light of Brynja's spear as it neared its mark.
In the moment just before the spear could pierce his heart, Asharthrinax managed to free himself from the pesky shadows, flaring his wings wide to snap them free of the shadowed ichor, enough to twist his body and avoid a direct hit to his torso.
"Too late…" Nigredo muttered under her breath as she let her hands fall to her sides, the spell's magic fading soon after, as the spear, formed of divine radiance, slammed into Asharthrinax's left shoulder.
The force of the impact resounded like thunder across the plains, drowned out only by the agonized roar that erupted from Asharthrinax's throat as holy spear blasted through hardened dragonscale like parchment. Continuing unabated, Brynja's spear, Valgriõr tore through muscle and sinew and erupted from the back of his shoulder before slamming into his left wing.
Again, the spear tore asunder his scales and shattered the bone of his left wing before exploding out the back in a shower of golden sparks of light.
Blood sprayed like a geyser from the gaping hole in Asharthrinax's shoulder and arced through the skies, as he fell, left wing whipping uselessly in the air despite his efforts to right himself and control his forced descent.
All eyes remained locked on the dragon's fall. All, save Marius, whose gaze remained focused on the smaller humanoid figure following Asharthrinax's descent. Brynja. For she too, had fallen, ethereal light of her wings having faded away like the light of the spear that wounded Asharthrinax so.
Marius too, felt his hope fading in the face of the elder dragon's wrath, as he too could only look on in horror as it loomed before her, claw lashing out to snatch her from the sky.
It's massive clawed hand curling around her, squeezing tight and pinning her arms to her sides, the unrelenting pressure threatening to crush her with every little breath she managed to steal.
It was then, in that brief moment, that he caught it. A subtle flicker of gold darting into the clouds overhead, and his lips curled once more into a smile.
'There… Maybe. Just maybe… we have a chance.'
'Don't give up…'
"That was amusing, but I grow weary of your pathetic attempts to delay the inevitable." Asharthrinax declared, his voice deep and booming, it thundered in a gloating victory across the plains as he tightened his grip even further on the helpless Nigredo.
Another flash. Brilliant gold, as the sun, peeking through the clouds high above.
The clouds had parted, if only slightly to reveal a shimmering golden light once more, deep within lie the silhouette of a woman, long braid whipping in the wind that rushed furiously around her. Wings of light at her back shining brighter still within the golden light of the sun.
Her lips, curled into a victorious smirk, right hand cast high overhead, fingers splayed wide as her voice cut through the winds to reach all those below. "I agree… It's time to go all out…"
The woman, Brynja, they realized, had somehow survived, and as she continued speaking, all eyes were cast upward on her. Including those of the two maids standing in the crater where she had landed. One holding a simple knotted helix staff topped with a brilliant polished moonstone, a bright and cheerful expression painted on her face.
The other had already begun running in the direction of where Albedo had landed, pausing only to look up and watch the display with an unfaltering, unblinking, stare.
"Releasing Divinity." The words; cold, almost mechanical, sound in the heavens, drowning out the thundering of the residual storm as another golden pulse of energy erupts from her body, casting aside those darkened storm clouds with true divine light as all below her witness the advent of a lesser Goddess. A Valkyrie in more than just name.
"Manifesting Divine Phantasm." She continued undaunted, as the pulsing golden light coalesced, gathering and focusing into the space above her open hand.
Realizing the impending danger, Asharthrinax cast Nigredo aside and rushed in his ascent toward where Brynja hovered high above, the first hints of desperation beginning to show in his otherwise contemptuous arrogance.
"Fell Beast of Ruin; Thine end is at hand!"
Brynja continues her invocation, pouring everything she has into manifesting her divine lance; Valgriõr. The golden pulses of divine light gathering above her outstretched hand begin taking on the shape of a longspear formed from radiant golden light.
"By my Divine Authority, I cast thee into the depths of Niflheim!"
She shouts at the top of her lungs, her words thundering with the rapidly escalating power she is calling down from the heavens and claiming as her own. Radiant pulses of golden light continue erupting from her body before layering themselves onto the heavenly spear now resting in her grasp.
Understanding dawns, and Asharthrinax braces to evade the coming strike, for he knows now that he'll not climb to her height in time to stop the first strike of her lance. Choosing instead, to retaliate after avoiding it, he hovers steady, flaring his wings at what he believes to be a safe distance.
In his tunnel-vision focus on Brynja; Asharthrinax remained oblivious to the whispered chant flowing from the weakened, injured, and weary, Nigredo's lips, as she hovered steady, out of reach, and out of sight.
"Now; Strike True! VALGRIÕR!!" Brynja shouted, hurling the spear of light downward at the Elder Dragon with all the strength and fury she could muster in her present state.
His lips curled into a furious snarl, Asharthrinax pulled his wings in tight and prepared to roll out of the spear's reach before resuming his merciless counter-attack, only to find his wings held fast to his body. Viscous, inky black tendrils of shadow snaking out around them and the rest of his body that held fast.
"Shadow Binding"
The remaining lilitu muttered weakly, pouring all of her remaining mana into the spell as she fought to restrain their foe's movement with Brynja's lance arcing through the air like a falling star.
The tendrils, anchored to those lingering bits of shadowy ichor still clinging tight to Asharthrinax's scales did their part, but couldn't restrain their monstrous foe completely. Or forever.
On the ground, those who remained land-bound watched in awe as the struggle overhead continued. Watched with the hope ignited by the light of Brynja's spear as it neared its mark.
In the moment just before the spear could pierce his heart, Asharthrinax managed to free himself from the pesky shadows, flaring his wings wide to snap them free of the shadowed ichor, enough to twist his body and avoid a direct hit to his torso.
"Too late…" Nigredo muttered under her breath as she let her hands fall to her sides, the spell's magic fading soon after, as the spear, formed of divine radiance, slammed into Asharthrinax's left shoulder.
The force of the impact resounded like thunder across the plains, drowned out only by the agonized roar that erupted from Asharthrinax's throat as holy spear blasted through hardened dragonscale like parchment. Continuing unabated, Brynja's spear, Valgriõr tore through muscle and sinew and erupted from the back of his shoulder before slamming into his left wing.
Again, the spear tore asunder his scales and shattered the bone of his left wing before exploding out the back in a shower of golden sparks of light.
Blood sprayed like a geyser from the gaping hole in Asharthrinax's shoulder and arced through the skies, as he fell, left wing whipping uselessly in the air despite his efforts to right himself and control his forced descent.
All eyes remained locked on the dragon's fall. All, save Marius, whose gaze remained focused on the smaller humanoid figure following Asharthrinax's descent. Brynja. For she too, had fallen, ethereal light of her wings having faded away like the light of the spear that wounded Asharthrinax so.
