Demonstorm

'Let's hope it doesn't come to that,' said Denser.

The Raven watched the increasing desperation of the Al-Arynaar mages. Hirad's heart thumped in his chest. He felt the adrenalin wash away his aches, hiding them from his body while he prepared for battle. He took a long look at Rebraal. The elf was clearly hampered by his injuries. He stood left-side-on and held his right arm across his chest. He was pale and sweating.

'Leave the line, Rebraal,' said Hirad. 'You aren't fit to fight.'

'I'll be the judge,' said Rebraal. 'I do not desert my friends or my people while I can stand.'

'You aren't in the rainforest now, Rebraal,' said Hirad. 'We need you for later.'

'Think there's going to be a later, do you?' he asked. 'Listen to the noise. Look out through the holes. We need everyone fighting just to survive for whatever help The Unknown thinks is coming. The Al-Arynaar must see me here in the front line.'

'Be ready,' said The Unknown.

He indicated a buckling area of wall behind the raft of injured. The Raven began to move. The WardLock cracked and protested. Plaster burst from the binding. Timbers groaned and splintered. The tear would be at least six yards wide and there weren't enough mages to keep ForceCones in place.

'Not too close,' warned Hirad. 'It's time to complete those spells.'

Al-Arynaar moved up on either flank, covering the route to the injured. To Hirad's right, Thraun snarled. His yellow-tinged eyes were wide but the set of his body calm and composed. Beside him the Xeteskian, Suarav, gripped his sword tight in his right hand. He was determined but in the shake of his body was the memory of the horrors he had suffered to get to this new place of danger. His soul would not be easily taken.

The investiture failed. The stone and timber of the playhouse wall

burst in, tumbling across the gangway and sweeping aside benches. Balcony boxes fell across an area of thirty yards. Dust and debus billowed towards them where they stood at the edge of the standing room, clouding around the edges of the ForceCones. Karron bellowed and squawked. They charged in, reavers behind them.

'Spells away!' roared The Unknown. 'Raven, let's use what we learned on board ship. Suarav, take our lead. Steady. Steady.'

Pheone's ForceCone blazed overhead, slapping into the reavers flying in behind the karron. Deep blue FlameOrbs leapt from Denser and Sharyr's fingers, arcing over The Raven and dropping into the pack still outside the playhouse. Hirad felt the heat when they passed, saw the detonations and heard the screams. Mana fire splattered across the defenceless karron. It had the desired effect. Those in front of the fire clustered in.

'Casting,' muttered Erienne.

The air dried out all around them. Dust dropped from the sky, clearing the scene dramatically. The One casting, otherwise invisible, struck the karron in the front rank and over a wide arc in front of The Raven. These lesser demons, far more reliant than their better-evolved reaver brethren on the density of mana, sensed the linkage to their life force shorn from them.

Hirad sensed panic spreading through the karron but another set of FlameOrbs from Denser focused their attention once more. They came on again urged on by the reavers but vulnerable with Erienne's casting settling on them.

'Ready, Raven!' The Unknown's mace tip tapped rhythmically on the floor of the playhouse. The first karron reached the standing-room floor. 'Stepping up, let's take them.'

The Unknown double-tapped his mace. At the left-hand side of the line, Ark took a pace forwards and left. He thundered his mace through in an upward curve, following up with a downward slash with his blade. The karron was Icnocked backwards, its stomach opened up, spewing its internal organs to the ground. The Raven all followed suit in order, a heartbeat apart. Blows catching karron on limbs, heads and torsos. The ferocity of the attack stopped the demons in their tracks, confusing them with its direction.

Suarav hadn't followed the move and had gone straight forwards, many Al-Arynaar likewise. But the space it left between him and

Thraun was bait the karron in front of it could not resist. It stepped forward and flailed its limbs outwards.

'Thraun, go.'

Ahead of The Unknown's order, Thraun had ducked and moved right, coming up under the karron's strikes and crushing its skull with a massive overhead strike. The creature collapsed and Thraun paced forwards and right again, leading die line this time. Suarav had anticipated too and moved with him. His blow was caught by the karron ahead but still the demon was pushed back. The Raven's line drove hard, maces aiming at gut and chin, beating a space in front of them.

'Down,' ordered Denser.

They dropped to their haunches, Thraun dragging Suarav with him. IceWind wailed into the space. Simultaneously, Sharyr dropped more FlameOrbs outside the playhouse. The elven flanks moved up left and right, forcing the karron into an ever tighter area. Abruptly, the lesser demons broke and fled into the teeth of screams of rage from the reavers.

'Hold!' bellowed The Unknown.

Outside, the demons massed again. Strike-strain bunched and clouded. Karron jostled and reformed. Reavers landed and began to run.

'Plenty more work to do, Raven. Good start but they might not fall for that again.'

The Unknown tapped his mace once more and The Raven paused for breath.

Flanked by guards and with Vuldaroq next to him, Dystran watched. He tried to take it all in but didn't really believe what he saw. Tried to understand and follow the speed of strikes. It was all but impossible, a fact that the demons were finding out in far more brutal fashion.

Auum and Evunn stood back to back and about a yard apart. Stances slightly crouched and feet planted at shoulder width, they fought with an effortless grace that was simply breathtaking. Dystran couldn't see exactly how they tackled the enemies that came at them on the ground and in the air. They barely seemed to look. But their strikes were efficient and unerringly accurate. He focused on Auum

as the reavers flew in. Not in great numbers. Perhaps fifteen and accompanied by dozens of the tiny strike- strain. Karron grouped and moved up but did not attack.

Auum had logged his immediate targets. The first approached on foot, three others in the air around it. Auum dropped and swept its feet from under it, bouncing back and striking out and left with his knife hand at his next target, dragging the point deep into wing membrane. The demon flittered clear. Auum ignored it. The next had whipped out its tail. Auum caught it in front of his face, looped it around his wrist and dragged the reaver from the sky. It bounced onto the ground. The TaiGethen dropped onto its chest and drove his knife up under its arm.

Never stopping, he rose and turned, sweeping his right foot high over the head of Evunn, scattering the strike-strain that dived on him. His momentum carried him round and he planted his foot before delivering an extraordinary series of strikes that Dystran couldn't follow. The first downed demon had got to its haunches in time to catch a boot in its face, sending it sprawling. Auum's arms were a blur. Dystran could see the flash of his knife in the sunlight. He saw reavers beaten aside, he saw them die in spasm and he saw strike-strain flung far and wide. He saw Auum block the odd strike and deliver a riposte before he had any right to be balanced. His limb speed was simply awesome. As if it was being directed from elsewhere.

Seven reaver bodies lay on the ground around the two TaiGethen. The others gathered and dived straight down. The elves waited. Without a word, they dived left and right in concert, cartwheeling back onto their feet and running back into the space they'd vacated. The reavers had landed hard and were in some disarray. The TaiGethen ploughed into them. Evunn took the lead, his punches designed to cripple temporarily. His knife sheered wing membrane, his fists and fingers crushed throat and thumped into chest, nose and temple, his feet denied them balance.

Behind him came Auum, sliding into their prone forms, knives in both hands driving home. His body was a shadow across the courtyard. And where he went, demons died. Fifteen reavers were downed and strike-strain littered the ground before the karron attacked too.

Auum and Evunn stood to face them, bowed fractionally and walked calmly back towards the tower complex. The two elves strode past Dystran without saying a word. Their bodies were covered in small cuts. Evunn had a long gash down one arm and Auum's left leg was dripping blood.

Dystran ordered the doors closed. Heavily invested with protection, they would stand massive bombardment