She saw her own face then, but the eyes were not hers. Those eyes she had glimpsed only in dreams-those of her lord, the being she had just met and had known all along. The face she saw was both the beings she served-herself and Erevan-though only one of those two served her in return.
Twilight realized, then, that she had something to hold. She had so much more.
She swung and swung, building up speed back and forth until…
The force became too much for her arm and she pushed off.
A weightless heartbeat later, she slammed into the stone, her legs jarred as though by a lightning strike. Twilight suppressed a gasp of pain and toppled-forward, not backward, she made certain-onto the ledge.
There she lay, stunned, blood seeping from her mouth. Her legs hadn't liked the landing, but her tender ribs had hated it, and she spent entirely too many breaths wheezing on the stone.
Get up, you mad wench, she told herself. Get. Up.
She did.
She knelt before a painted archway, and her senses picked up the passage of heat through the stone. Gestal's door. A door for her to…
Scout first.
With a gesture, Twilight sent her shadow slipping into the archway. It needed no words-only the flicker of the elf's will-to know it was to search and return in the span of five breaths. Meanwhile, she recovered Betrayal, her boots, and glove. No sense facing Gestal unprepared.
Twilight waited ten breaths for the shadow to return, but it did not. She sneaked forward, as quietly as she could move.
It turned out to be unnecessary. As if by command, the door ground open before her, and she looked in upon a chamber of cut stone lit by roiling flames. She let her eyes shift out of darksight and into her own keen vision. In the center of the chapel burned twin charnel pits-the throats of Demogorgan, she realized-from which rose flickering orange and red flames like dancing fiends. Beside them was a tilted copper basin with something like water trickling from its edge.
It was certainly a trap, but that didn't matter. Twilight had come this far; she couldn't stop now. She stalked in slowly, keeping to the dancing shadows that flickered against the walls.
The chapel was marred with perversity. Symbols and scenes of violence and depravity plastered the smooth walls, drawn with blood and offal. Bloody bones and discarded bits of flesh, as left from a meal, lay scattered about the place, and skins of varying shades of gray-Twilight did not want to think about their origin-hung from the ceiling. The place reeked of decay, corruption, and rot.
At her feet, Twilight found several hunks of flesh she guessed had come from fiendish lizards. There were also broken stingers as of abeil, black and gray scalps that could only be grimlock in origin, and heads, some of which Twilight could barely identify, and some she almost recognized before she looked away, sickened.
A shadow moved toward her, and Twilight almost drew Betrayal before she realized it was her own. 'Where-?' she began. Then her shadow fled into her. She felt a deathly chill embrace her for just a heartbeat before it was part of her again, trailing from her feet instead of dancing freely.
A cloaked head rose from the rubbish and skins hanging about the room. 'Well met, lover,' Gestal said. His cowled eyes reflected the flames, and the snake tattoo smoldered on his demonfleshed cheek.
'Liet,' Twilight whispered. Her hand eased, slowly, toward the hilt of her rapier.
'One of us,' the demon priest said in a bemused tone.
Twilight did not respond, only extended her sword and took a step forward.
Demonic magic flared and the steel became white-hot. Twilight took three steps forward, gritting her teeth against the pain. The agony multiplied with every step, and the eldritch steel burst into flame until she could no longer hold it. With a cry, she let Betrayal clatter to the ground. Twilight pulled her hand back, wincing.
Her left hand brought up the crossbow and she grasped it in both hands to steady her aim. The quarrel streaked out and struck Gestal in the shoulder. He looked down at it, idly, and finished his second spell. Shadow blasted the crossbow from her fingers.
Now Twilight drew Davoren's stiletto, palming it under her arm as before, but Gestal finished his third spell. Every inch of her flesh ignited with abyssal pain. The thin knife clattered from her nerveless fingers, and Twilight staggered to a halt. It wasn't the binding magic, this time-Gestal wasn't so kind. Phantom pain wracked her. Her bones shivered, tearing at the inside of her flesh, and she gasped and sobbed despite herself.
With a cry, she fell to her knees, eyes staring down helplessly at her fallen sword. The flames had burned away the last of the gray film over its steel. It was a white sword now, for all the good it did her. She would not have the strength to lift it.
'To come against me alone, wounded, weak…' The demon priest grinned. Light and flame roiled in his eyes, which darted back and forth wildly. 'I had thought more highly of you.' He gestured upward. 'Stand.'
His voice carried the same compulsion Davoren had used to slay Asson, except with many times the power. Twilight's body jerked upright, grinding her broken bones, and she could not move. Tears trickled down her cheeks and she grit her teeth. Twilight found that her voice worked, with great effort.
'You'd have… killed me anyway,' she managed. She marshaled her strength of will, and attempted to slide around his enchantment, as she had before.
'How fatalistic. How like you,' he said. 'And have no fear-your mind won't slip out of this enchantment.'
Even as he said it, Twilight felt hope fading as the spell bound her mind with greater force-strength that was supple and flexible, with the adaptability of the mad. 'Come… closer…' she said. 'I… have something… to say…'
The priest took a step closer, and Twilight lashed out, clawing for his eyes.
And fell short.
Her cracked nails snapped within a thumb's breadth of his nose. Her hands twisted into claws, and Twilight strained, her teeth clenched, and veins stood out on her temples and forehead. If she could only break his will, she could free herself of his magic and gouge out his distorted features. She scratched desperately, praying, but she couldn't reach that wide stare.
Gestal hissed a single laugh. 'You amuse me.'
She let the hands fall. 'I amuse you, you disgust me,' she said, somehow finding the strength for a quip. 'A fair trade, I suppose.'
Gestal smiled-a sickening expression, because it lit flames in her heart even as it made her want to retch- which she could not do.
'I have an offer to make you.'
'No,' Twilight said.
'You have the choice, moonflower,' he said. 'The choice that is offered only to those strong enough to seize destiny in their teeth and wrestle it bleeding to the ground.'
'Like you?'
Gestal's snarl was more like that of a hyena than of a man.
'Like my master,' he corrected. 'And those who serve him well.' He stepped away from her and spread his arms wide, indicating the walls with their old bloodstains and perverse murals as though they were something grand.
'What choice?' Twilight asked. She could work through this enchantment, given time. Just keep him talking, just keep concentrating…
'I have controlled these depths for many years, seeking and searching for a companion-a powerful swordswoman, or a sorceress, perhaps, to serve my master. For the glory of Demogorgon. And now, I have found one.'
Twilight blinked and her concentration went away. Her body jerked itself erect again and she stared. 'What?'
'Join us,' Gestal said.
Hope fled Twilight along with her will, fighting the spell. So that was his play-she had thought it merely part of her dream, to lure her to death and madness. But she saw now.
And she was tempted.
'My prince is the storm and the fury, Twilight of the Fox, the bloodstained hurricane,' the demonist said in his emotionless, calm voice. 'Demogorgon offers power beyond imagining, strength of sinew and will to control and
