I Read What?!

So last time, we got the start of a climactic confrontation. Our Villain co-protagonist/deuteragonist perhaps has chosen to act in a rather surprising way. And Pikel talked!



So we left off with Pikel battering his way into the room where Cadderly and Ivan are fighting with Barjin and company. It was pretty awesome. Tree trunk weapons are great for dwarven druids.

Danica is about to follow when Newander has some kind of epiphany.

“You spoke the truth, dear lady,” Newander said. “It was not ambivalence, but a sense of order that kept me free of the cursing mist. Now I know how I was spared, why I was spared, and in truth, it was a power far beyond my own will.”

Danica paused to consider the profound changes that had come over the man. No longer did Newander stoop in despair. His back was straight and his visage proud.

“I hear the call of Silvanus himself!” the druid declared. “His own voice, I tell you.”

Okay, but um, fight now? Pontificate later? (And indeed, Danica thinks that she would have liked to hear more of an explanation, but circumstances won't allow it.)

Danica surveys the situation, and we're told that while her heart wants her to go to Cadderly, her "warrior instincts" tell her that the best thing she can do is go kick Barjin's ass. Unfortunately, he's stronger and better armed than he looks, so her first strike isn't terribly effective. Danica's pretty quick to realize that he's wearing armor-magic of some kind, and she makes some strikes to his arm to test it. Unfortunately, it's pretty thorough. He's covered head to toe, and she realizes the armor probably goes all the way through.

She does make a nice ground feint to his groin in an attempt to disarm, but his armor is sentient and tries to bite her. Then it exhales a cone of frost at her, sending her reeling back.

-

We switch to Newander who watches through a dull haze. But he notices the important part: vestment armor and evil mace. But mostly he's doing some druidic navel gazing - not in a bad way. It's so as to shapeshift. He attacks.

-

Switch to Ivan now. He sees Pikel, yay! Mullivy doesn't, and gets a tree trunk to the rump, pinning him to the wall. Awesome. Because he's pinned the way he is, he has to squirm to try to turn around, and Ivan takes the opportunities to smack him with his axe. Eventually though their luck turns and Mullivy gets Ivan's beard on fire. Mullivy ends up slipping free and advances on Ivan. Pikel attacks Mullivy and they all end up crashing into an old empty bookshelf. Wooden. So fire.

--

Newander again, he's a wolverine! Nice! There's a reason the X-Man character uses that name. Those fuckers are vicious. Unlike the other druids, Newander still has his mind. And a plan.

Just before he reached the mark, Newander spun over suddenly and loosed a cloud of vile musk.

The disgusting spray rolled over the man, stinging his eyes, permeating his clothing, and nearly overwhelming him. He fell back as quickly as he could, trying to escape the cloud, gagging and gasping.

Huh, I feel like the love triangle in the X-Men would have ended differently if Logan could do THAT. He claws at Barjin's clothes, which hold up for now, but seem to be weakening in the stinking musk.

--

Barjin's turn as point of view character. He's not having fun. But eventually the mace reaches out to him and lets him see through its eyes. Now he's beating the shit out of Newander, even as the burrowing stops. Uh oh.

--
Pikel gets out of the flaming rubble. Mostly fine. Mullivy gets up, no longer on fire. (Basically he wasn't burning, just his clothes and the oil on him were. Presumably he's naked now. Poor guy. Zombied and naked. How undignified)

Anyway, Ivan beheads Mullivy. Now the zombie is headless. But the brothers make a good team and dismember him.
--

Cadderly gets to be viewpoint now. He's dazed and disoriented, but he sees what's going on at the altar, realizing that Newander is probably dead. He knows Danica is likely next.

Danica and Barjin start to engage. Cadderly shakes off his dizziness and aims his crossbow. But he's got his whole issue with using it as a weapon against a living person. He figures out a loophole though as he ends up shooting the explosive dart INTO the mouth of the mace. It explodes. Nice.

Actually:

There was a sharp crack, and Barjin barely managed to keep his grip on the jolted mace. For an interminable moment, nothing at all seemed to happen, but Cadderly could tell from the priest’s shocked expression that something was indeed going on within Barjin’s prized weapon.

Without warning, the top of the Screaming Maiden’s head blew off. Barjin still held the broken weapon by the handle; he seemed as if he could not let go. Multicolored sparks flared as the magical energy burst forth unbridled, showering the entire center region of the room.

“Oo!” Pikel and Ivan squealed together.

The sparks caught on Barjin’s vestments, burning little holes. The priest screamed in agony as a spark slipped through the cap’s view hole and sizzled into his eye.

Danica fell away, diving and rolling, and shielding her own eyes with a raised arm.

The spark shower went on unabated. Blue sparks erupted right into Barjin’s head, catching the side of his conical hood as he desperately lurched. Red sparks flew out in a sudden circular explosion, spinning and rising then falling over Danica, Barjin, and the altar. A small fireball popped straight up from the broken mace, exploding into the ceiling. Lighted specks of dust descended, only to be devoured by the continuing shower.

I feel like you still killed that guy, dude.

But actually no, he's still alive for now. He has to get out of his burning magic clothes though. He sees a kneeling priest, two distracted dwarves, and Danica looking away. He decides the unarmed, unarmored woman (monk!) is the easiest target. Because he's a fucking moron.

And unlike Cadderly, Danica knows how to nerve strike. And more.

Danica wasn’t finished. With a slight twist, she cupped her fingers around Barjin’s, curling her fingertips over the top of the priest’s hand. Looking Barjin straight in the eye, Danica squeezed, her grip forcing Barjin’s top knuckles back in on themselves and sending waves of excruciating pain rolling up his arm. He tried to resist, mentally telling his arm to pull away, but Danica’s assault blocked out his determined call; the unrelenting pain prevented him from taking any action against her, or any action at all. Even if his other arm had not been “killed,” he could not have responded.

He gurgled indecipherably; all the world became a blur.

She's about to kill him for good now, but she sees Cadderly's horror and instead tosses him to the dwarves, who have some fun bouncing him back and forth. Eventually Cadderly gets it together to stop them, because they need to know who Barjin is working with.

Ivan's pretty clearly enthused about the idea of interrogation. And they hoist him away.

It's pretty sad though:

Cadderly walked over and draped his arm across Danica’s shoulders. She stood quietly, looking down at the druid who had sacrificed everything for their cause. Newander’s bones continued to crackle, as his body tried to revert to its natural form in death. He got about halfway there. His calm and wise face once more became recognizable, and most of the wolverine hair disappeared, but then the transition stopped. Death had stolen the magical energy.

Aw.

Cadderly also sees the cursed bottle, still pouring out smoke. He realizes it's for him to do. A bit anticlimactically, he puts the stopper back on the bottle. Everyone passes out, except Cadderly and Barjin.

Barjin charges at Cadderly with Ivan's axe and the chapter ends.

The jump cuts in the chapter are really well done, I have to admit. I don't always like the technique, because too many cuts can be really confusing. Salvatore wisely keeps it to three main groups though: Danica/Newander/Barjin, Dwarves/Mullivy, then Cadderly. So it's not that hard to keep track and does keep the momentum going. Nice cliffhanger too.