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V. The Battle of Two Cities: Athkatla


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#1 Guest_Oryx_*

Posted 12 November 2002 - 05:27 PM

V. The Battle of Two Cities: Athkatla



In Athkatla, Aerie stood with Sky and Luna in the middle of Waukeen's Promenade, making a circle and taking out opponents from all angles. Demons were swooping down from the top of the Promenade and multiverse mercenaries were running across the plaza. Any who managed to get past their powerful spells found themselves contending with previously charmed and confused tieflings, and if they got past those they were soon smashed to bits by Crom Faeyr or the girls' weapons.

Suddenly Aerie sensed a massive surge from the negative energy plane. It was emanating from the east. She saw that the girls sensed it too. "It's coming from the graveyard district!" Aerie screamed. "That can only mean one thing! We've got to get there and fast!" She hasted them and they ran quickly out of the promenade and through the slums, taking out as many foes as they could while keeping up their pace.

At last they came to the graveyard. The evil hung thick around them. On top of a large tomb in the middle of the graveyard stood Viconia. Her mace was made of a humanoid skull and femur, and her shield and armor of pure jade. Negative energy swirled around her, flowing and shaping at her every movement, pouring into the tombs and the ground. Aerie and Sky gasped at the sight of the drow priestess who had been slain by stepson and stepbrother Kan, but Luna was most surprised of all as her aunt from her dreams had come to life before her in the flesh. At Viconia's side suddenly arose a figure shrouded in a green robe. Aerie gasped again as she recognized the form of Xzar, but she shrieked out loud when she saw it was, in fact, his lich.

Viconia's thoughts poured into the mind of Luna and Luna alone. Join me, my dear, my niece. Not these air-rivvel who disdain our kind. They think themselves better than us. We must show them otherwise!

No, Luna thought back, they are good to me. Despite the fruits of evil you may have shown me, I cannot let you carry on!

Viconia and the otherworldly necromancer began summoning all manner of undead. Ghouls, ghasts, skeletal warriors, and even vampires clawed their way out of the ground and the crypts while ghosts and specters began taking shape out of the very fog. The good priestesses began turning the undead and destroying them in droves. As the Xzar lich began casting down powerful evocations upon them, they cast protections around themselves and the elemental forces rained upon them harmlessly. Aerie began casting her way through Xzar's protections as Sky and Luna continued to destroy the undead as fast as they appeared. The lich zapped back at their magical defenses and it and Viconia began casting more evocations, enchantments, and necromantics upon their enemies. The good cleric-mages raised more protections as the spells came down and then cast holy smite, fiery evocations, and false dawns back, destroying hordes of undead and damaging the lich. As Aerie took down its last defenses and the girls fired clouds of magic missiles and flame arrows at it, the wizard that was once Xzar let out a final and barely recognizable moan as its body was cremated.

As Xzar’s ashes scattered, Viconia cast a powerful earthquake into the ground. The ensuing tremors knocked down her undead servants but they also tripped and stunned Sky and Luna as well. Aerie ran at her, casting a sunray and destroying the remaining undead around them. The avariel woman lifted Crom Faeyr high and screamed. Viconia raised her mace and wailed back at her. As the strength of the mighty hammer flowed through Aerie's small body, she leapt off the ground and up onto the roof of the tomb, crashing her weapon against Viconia's as she landed. The bone mace seemed to have infusing strength too, and the good and evil archpriestesses circled around each other, smashing into each other's shields and knocking one another back with titanic strength. They swung at each other again and used their strength to brace themselves against impacts, their armor and shields ringing deafeningly with each blow.

As they fought, the avariel and drow women shot all manner of telepathic insults into each other's minds.

Fallen angel! Foul harpy! Prissy wingless wisp! Poison wretched witch! Golden goodie-goodie! Shadowy little sneak! Doe-faced deceiver! Dark-hearted temptress! Airy little fly! Dirty little roach! Pale avariel! Dull drow!

And many, many other untranslatable insults in gnomish, avariel, and drow tongues.

Viconia telepathically showed Aerie how Onyx had looked at her, not once but twice in his life, and tried to make her see the burning lust behind the critical stare.

Aerie would have none of it and showed Viconia how his every thought of her and the drow women they'd met in the Underdark had been a thought of disapproving disgust.

No, Viconia countered, you could not read his mind yet then, only later could you tap his thoughts and had to divine of his imperfect memories! I know how he hid it from himself, as so many self-righteous rivvel knights do! You see only what he made himself believe had happened, you saw not what truly raced through his mind! He desired me in that moment and disdained you!

Aerie screamed out loud and managed to swing Crom Faeyr under Viconia's shield and into her stomach, sending the drow witch flying through the air and crashing into the gravestones below. The fair elf cast spells down after her, but the dark one brought a horde of skeletal warriors out of the ground with a flick of her wrist and their bony bodies absorbed the magics. Viconia continued to summon battalions of undead foes and Aerie struggled to destroy them as fast as they rose. At last Luna, having come to, ran around the tomb and raised her hands to aid her best friend's mother.

Viconia's thoughts pierced her mind again, disrupting her concentration. Look at how the sniveling would-be angel looks down on us so self-righteously! Her tortured past has made her bitter and she hates all of our race for their slaving ways! Think of the things I have shown you, the power you have gained in yourself and over Eryx! Look now at how I summon armies to my aid! Imagine that power at your fingertips, my dear! None would dare scorn you then! Join me and we shall bring all the hateful rivvel and the loathsome men under our deserved yoke, and laugh as they delude themselves with self-superiority no more! All would be made to see you for everything you were and would bow before the unequaled power and beauty of the dark princess Luna!

Luna was torn as she tried still to turn the undead before her. As thoughts of power lust raced through her mind, she felt the turning energy emanate from her to the risen foes, but they were not destroyed. They were brought under her control. Aerie and now Sky gawked in disbelief as the avariel-drow girl, not knowing whom to send her new servants against, bade them crash into each other and the other undead.

Viconia cackled triumphantly and began summoning and commanding many more undead towards the avariel women. Aerie and Sky turned and repulsed them but still they came, popping up all around them. At last Aerie froze time and instantly cast forth storms of fire and sunlight to destroy the undead and perhaps the drow. As time resumed, Viconia saw the energies bearing down upon them. Tearing the amulet from her neck, she raced to Luna and threw it upon the ground. It exploded into a conduit, and no sooner had Viconia grabbed Luna's hand and pulled her through than it closed again behind them as fire billowed over the ground where they had stood.

Aerie and Sky finished destroying the last of the undead and then stared at one another, zombielike themselves with disbelief.

**

Nalia and Valygar stood in the plaza of the government district, surrounded by soldiers and Cowled wizards, taking out tielfings and demons on all sides with spells and arrows. Demons and tiefling fighters crashed into the soldiers, slashing through them and getting cut apart themselves, while warrior-mages cast over their heads and into the circle of Cowled Wizards, dispelling protections and firing damaging spells in after, taking out the frail wizards but leaving the exceedingly strong and well-protected Val and Nal virtually unscathed. Finally a massive onslaught of huge spells exploded around them, destroying the soldiers, wizards, and tieflings alike as, with blinding reflexes, Valygar grabbed Nalia with one arm and pushed off his powerful legs leaping high into the air over billowing clouds of fire and wilting. He grabbed onto a high branch of a now-toppling tree with his other arm and pushed off it with the same-side leg, leaping again to the edge of the plaza and outside of the magical storm. He cradled her as he landed in a roll and popped up again with both of them unharmed. The two then heard a foreign but familiar laugh and saw two figures, one huge and one gaunt, dash into the Council of Six building.

They ran back around the storm and into the front doors. At the other end stood Sarevok and Irenicus. Sarevok drew out a heavy iron crossbow and Valygar his elven court bow, and they began firing missiles at one another as they raced to the center of the room. Irenicus and Nalia each immediately brought up a sequence of magical protections and began casting their most powerful spells.

Time stopped first for all but Irenicus. He zapped away Nalia's protections and then fired dread necromantics at each of them. As time resumed, Nalia completed her spell and time stopped again before Irenicus’s deadly spells could hit. She protected herself again, cast away Irenicus' protections and sent offensive spells at him and Sarevok, but had nothing in her own arsenal to protect Valygar. In the split instant before time resumed, she telepathically commanded him to draw Hindo's Doom.

As time resumed, Valygar received her thought and whipped out the katana in instants. The death magic fizzled against its protective aura as he sheathed his bow and drew out Celestial Fury too. Nalia's spells flew into Irenicus and Sarevok both, weakening them against further weapons and magic. Sarevok switched out his own crossbow for Soul Ravager and began a furious swordfight against Valygar. As the magicians prepared their next spells, the warriors danced around each other, Valygar quickly slashing and evading while Sarevok pushed in with his mighty swings. Nalia sent arcs of lightning jumping through both Sarevok and Irenicus just as the sorcerer managed to get off his spell, which slowed down Valygar. The ranger hasted himself to counteract the effect. He then locked his katanas around Sarevok's greatsword, holding their weapons together with his arms as the rest of his body flew into the air and thrust forceful kicks at Sarevok's head and chest. As Irenicus spawned a simalcrum and Nalia vanquished it with true sight, Valygar landed again and twisted around Soul Ravager, piercing Sarevok's armor with his katanas and plunging them through the great warrior's body. The enhanced Sarevok, beginning to heal already, merely sneered and impaled himself further, reaching for Valygar's neck to crush it with his bare hands. As Irenicus cast even greater strength into Sarevok, Nalia cast a maze spell upon the evil warrior and he suddenly vanished, sent to a faraway labyrinthine plane.

As Valygar dashed at Irenicus with a cheetah's speed, the sorcerer summoned a dimension door and leapt through it moments before the ranger's katanas sliced through the empty air where he had just stood. As Valygar ran back to Nalia, she tossed him a healing potion and he blew her a kiss just before gulping it down. The two then ran back out of the great hall into the warring night.

***

Onyx, Eryx and the other paladins of the Order were in the temple district, defending it from endless oncoming demons. The demons had been flying en masse to the district, drawn there by the strong auras of the Order and the temples of Lathander and Helm. Order paladins, Morningknights of Lathander, and Watchers of Helm all faced them down courageously, hacking the invaders to pieces while clerics from the temples healed them and smote and scorched the demons. Eryx and the paladins' summoned devas flew around the buildings, engaging the demons in deadly aerial duels. The bodies of numerous slain beasts choked the waterways of the district, but many a paladin or priest was struck down as well.

Suddenly, a powerful presence forced its way into Onyx's and Eryx's minds. Their thoughts filled with the idea of a great demon leader, the mightiest the race had ever seen.

"I destroyed you, Demogorgon!" Onyx shouted. "You are no more!"

Then the cavaliers' minds filled with the image of the new Prince of Demons.

It spoke to them. I am Decagorgon, spawn of Demogorgon.

"As my father destroyed yours, so I shall destroy you! Show yourself, hellspawn!" screamed Eryx, whirling around and looking for his foe, and suddenly sensing him.

Eryx pointed overhead as he sensed a conduit about to open above them. Onyx, following with his eyes and astonished at his son's superior perception, watched as a fiery gate soon formed in the sky and Decagorgon stepped through. Like Demogorgon, he was a huge dark beast with two heads like those of a baboon, and forelimbs that were thick whip-lick tentacles.

"Resist fire and electricity son, now!" shouted Onyx. They both cast resist fire upon themselves and drank potions of absorption, augmenting their existing equipment and natural resistances and becoming totally immune. As Decagorgon descended, indeed it willed a massive storm of fireballs and flamestrikes around them, incinerating surrounding knights, tieflings and demons alike. Decagorgon landed in front of them, in the middle of the bridgeway that ran across of the Order's front doors. Onyx and Eryx circled around it, moving to opposite sides, and a head and tentacle of Decagorgon turned to face each. Onyx held Carsomyr out in front of him, and Eryx assumed a fighting stance with Purifier and Foebane.

As Decagorgon screamed terrifyingly and the air above became to cackle, the cavaliers' hearts were unfazed as the Prince of Demons called lightning bolts upon them. Electricity charged the air and jumped between man, weapon, armor, beast, and building, but the two paladins were again immune.

The great beast spoke to them again. We have become the most powerful beings in all the multiverse. We are the greatest of cavalier and demon, eternal archenemies, and yet we are the same. We seek to defend our own race against the other, we seek to champion our own kind. We seek power. Yes, you know. You can feel it in your hearts. Too long have you let the weak slow you down and sap your strength. They must be cast off, enslaved, destroyed! The multiverse belongs to us! Join me, and none will stand in our path as we call upon only the greatest men and beasts the destroy the unworthy. I know that you hunger for this. I can see it in your souls. Manners and chivalry and duty will matter not when you become all-powerful! They are ruses, shackles, nothing!

"You lie!" Onyx shouted. "We crave not power over others, we only seek it to protect the innocent and beloved. It is own chosen duty to protect our countrymen and own natural duty to protect those closest to us!"

And so you seek power, Decagorgon thought to them. With the power I offer, you could do this all and more. You have destroyed all who have threatened your beloved; I offer you the chance to destroy all who might.

"We can protect them," shouted Eryx. "We always have! And we shall start by destroying you!"

I can do more, Decagorgon told them. And no, you have not. I can undo the wrongs that have come upon them. I can unmake them where you failed. Bring back what your holiest priests could not. Into Onyx's mind crept images of Gorion, alive again. And Khalid. And Dyanheir. And Aerie with beautiful wings again, with no scars or nightmares from her slavery. Eryx too saw his mother uncrippled once more. He saw also images of Luna, scorned by none and the awe of all, and her father still alive.

"You speak falsely still," roared Onyx. "Now die!" with that he raised Carsomyr and leapt at his enemy. Eryx charged too, brandishing Purifier and Foebane. Each man hacked into tentacle as they lashed up, but the demonhide was of otherworldly toughness and they could slice it not. Instead, Decagorgon knocked them both back onto the bridgestones with powerful whipping blows. They were up in moments, jumping and ducking and evading around the lashing appendages and trying to cut them. Greatsword and tentacle swung and thrust and hit, but Decagorgon was the stronger and knocked the others about with his blows.

At last Decagorgon's great tentacle snaked past Carsomyr and around Onyx's waist, quickly encircling him several times and squeezing the life out of him through his armor with unbelievable pressure. The cavalier struggled to preserve his air and his ribcage as he slashed into the foul limb with the great strength of desperation, breaking through the hide but making only shallow slices into the dense demonflesh. Eryx screamed with rage at his father's plight, flew over Decagorgon's heads and spun into a whirlwind attack as he dive-bombed. Purifier and Foebane blurred a steel tornado around him as he came down, slicing clean through the beast's tentacle. As the demon prince turned to lash out with the other one, Eryx began spinning each bastard sword around in its own hand, making two blinding circles of flashing steel. Purifier flew over and over through the arm that still hugged Onyx, cutting it apart and off his chest, and Foebane diced the demon's remaining tentacle into segments as it came at him. Onyx pushed the pieces off him and pointed Carsomyr towards what remained of his foe. Eryx swung his bastard swords behind him, prepared to swing them forward again and cleave into his enemy's defenseless body.

Decagorgon's thoughts lashed out at them again. Ah, mighty Eryx, like your father you can smell my kind coming, but beyond him or any other cavalier, you can from across the planes. You feel our conduits snaking around you, about to open. You did so as I emerged today and you have done so before. I know what fills your thoughts and dreams. You detect demons moving across planes beyond yours, you can hear their locations like unseen rats within a wall. You and I truly are the same. Ask yourself, ask your father, of your coming to be. He knows. Think - when was it? Your father and mother were soon to slay Demogorgon and as he did my father's taint crept through him and his companions - such as your mother. Demogorgon was in your first unborn thoughts, child, demonhood is in your very heart and soul. We are truly the same. You have it in you to throw down the burdens of duty which only hold you back. Seize the power, and remake the world at your will, for good or evil or whatever you may call it. Strike me down, Eryx, in dying I pass to you my power now as my father did at your beginning. Become greater than you could ever have imagined.

"It is all the illusions of the great deceivers, son!" Onyx shouted and lunged at Decagorgon, plunging Carsomyr deep into the demon's heart. Eryx flew up above his father's heard and brought Foebane and Purifier inwards with mighty slashes at Decagorgon's necks, dual-decapitating him. He felt his blood quicken as power surged through him, and powerlust consumed his heart. As he landed, Onyx turned and saw the struggle within his son.

"It is a demon's deceit, my son, let it pass." Onyx coaxed. "The day is ours, let us go home."

Eryx's mind raced over the torture his mother had endured. "Our power is not enough! Where were you when mother was enslaved? Where was almighty Onyx then!?" he asked rhetorically.

"...a boy of twelve who'd hardly left Candlekeep!!" Onyx yelled back. "No harm comes to her now! Let us be off and sheath your bastard swords!"

"Why? You made Kan a bastard, and you put off marrying mother so long I almost was too!" Eryx shot back. "And what about after you die? How will you protect people then? You were weak to stay a mere mortal, father, and I will not be weak!" With that he summoned a conduit, surprising even himself, and jumped through as it closed. Onyx leaned on Carsomyr in total disbelief.

***

A large pack of animals was running to the top of a tall but rolling mountain. As they reached the peak, they shapeshifted into druids and could barely make out the fire and noise from Athkatla to the south. With their druidic magics, they could see and hear through the eyes and ears of birds flying far in the north, and thus sense the same from Baldur’s Gate.

The druids began casting together. Massive clouds formed over each city, ready to strike down with great bolts of lightning, pour out acidic rain, billow down as fogs of fire, or even shapeshift into plagues of insects and diseases.

Then Jaheira began seeing through eyes and ears within the cities. Many buildings were already on fire. Devilish tielfings were running through the streets, casting fireballs into buildings and setting them alight, and slashing down soldiers and civilians alike. Demons were tearing apart homes and people with single swipes. Jaheira could see as them all. Hear, smell and even feel as they did. The tieflings and demons were diminishing in number as the mightiest warriors, priests and wizards stood their ground and slew them. The invaders would soon be annihilated, but the damage and death left in their wake would be great, indeed it already was.

Jaheira bit into her lip, trying to hold back tears as she continued to lead the casting. The clouds were beginning to tingle with static charge, heat up and ignite, or condense into insects or acid. Jaheira then sensed her old companions Onyx and Valygar and Ajantis, roaring like lions as they stood their ground in front of discovered pockets of civilians and cleaved through oncoming enemies. She could feel within their hearts the desire to protect. Jaheira then sensed her old companions Imoen and Aerie and Nalia, blasting away enemies, using ice and water evocations to put out fires, and casting abjurative and healing spells to shield and restore the wounded. She could feel within their hearts the desire to preserve. At last Jaheira could hold back no longer and let the tears flow down her cheeks. She then began to move her hands and alter her casting.

Manipulating the forming magic of the other druids, she redirected the lightning, fire, acid, and plagues. The static equalized, the fires went out, the acid neutralized, and the plagues died. All of them became water droplets instead. Tears flowed down Jaheira’s cheeks onto the ground and out of her clouds onto the cities. Every fire was soon put out. Jaheira began casting healing magics into the clouds, and the rain fell to the cities, healing the humanoid defenders and harming the demonic invaders. The final demon, the very one that had coaxed and deceived Jaheira, looked around and screamed in rage, the deceiver deceived. It was then cleaved in two by Carsomyr as it reeled from the surprise, and its halves dissolved as they fell into the holy waterway outside the Order. The surviving defenders looked about, saw the enemy was vanquished, and led the fortressed civilians out into the healing rain.

The archdruids had been helpless as Jaheira manipulated their magic and drew it from them. They collapsed as the great spell finished, exhausted and overextended. The strong Jaheira dropped into a kneel, regaining her strength first, and then ran off. Scimitars and pack tight on her back, she ran and ran, crying bittersweet tears. Crying tears for the unsteady but sweet feelings of goodness in her heart, for the unsteady and bitter questions of balance in her head. Crying tears for seeing, for the first time in twenty years, into the minds and new memories of her former adventuring companions. Companions who had all been so close to her but from whom she had grown apart. Companions who still thought of her and wished well for her. Companions who still missed her very much.

***

Defenders and civilians went about the aftermath. The Tears of Jaheira, as they would become known, had infused them with a mood of kindness as well as healing them, and for a rare moment in the history of the City of Coin, its citizens went about helping lost and injured strangers as they sought out their own loved ones.

The Athkatla heroes converged in the middle of the burnt and battered bridge district. Panting, they exchanged news of damages and losses, new and old archenemies they had encountered, and the running off of Luna and Eryx.

A column of light appeared amongst them and in it stood Solar. "You have fought well, brave companions, but all is not over," she sang. "A demon and thus unable to seize the throne of Kan for himself, Decagorgon searched for one who could in the name of chaos and evil. He brought forth your vanquished foes Sarevok, Viconia and Irenicus to corrupt Eryx and Luna in their dreams, and now in the flesh. Though Decagorgon had to face Eryx himself today and died in trying to control him, he influenced and empowered the youth in dying and may yet succeed an evil martyr of his greater goal. Irenicus, now free of Decagorgon's geas, is taking it upon himself to finish his work, for what vile reasons of his own I know not. He is showing Eryx the path to the throne, which lies through Kan. It is fated not, Onyx, which one of your sons shall win."

"Nothing is fated between mortals," bellowed Onyx, plunging Carsomyr into the cobblestones, "take me now to Irenicus, who must be stopped." His companions nodded and cheered in support as he resheathed the holy avenger.

"Very well, noble heroes, to Irenicus's twisted pocket plane we will now go."




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