distance between them swiftly. Mara slipped into the shadows, cloaking herself in darkness, as Quessahn drew her ritual dagger, chanting softly and backing away. Jinn held his ground, holding the construct's focus long enough for the others to prepare their magic, their rhythmic voices lost as the floor and walls shook. A massive fist, trailing wisps of purple mist, came crashing down as Jinn rolled backward, flying shards of marble stinging his skin.
Rising in a crouch, he swung his blade, the steel ringing off the eidolon's rocky arm harmlessly, though he noted a tiny crack of bleeding light where he'd struck. The second fist came soon behind the first, and he leaped forward, hacking at the statue's face. Sparks flew from the edge of his sword, leaving a miniscule fracture in its wake. The construct loosed a deafening roar as an acrid liquid seeped from the tiny wound, burning Jinn's wrist as he attempted to escape the eidolon's reach. A mere step away from clear ground, the thing's swiping claws caught his shoulder and sent him tumbling into rubble.
Pain seared through his arm, his recent wounds burning as the acidic blood of the eidolon mingled with his own. He rolled onto his back as the construct knelt over him, an artificial sneer on its face as it pinned his legs. His sword lost in the debris, he stared into the thing's hellish eyes, helpless. A spark in the fiery twin pits caught Jinn's attention, dragging him back to the first battles of his physical existence, back to the days when eidolons were yet young to the world. As the construct's other arm rose to crush him, he knew some minute part of Asmodeus was aware of his monstrous servant, and Jinn morbidly wanted, more than anything, to capture the attention of the god.
Shrieking voices heralded several bolts of scintillating light that arced through the eidolon's body, causing it to twist and writhe enough for Jinn to escape its grip.
He crawled through the rubble, snatching up his lost sword and ducking low as Mara strode toward him, her hands spread in a fan of blue flames that charged the air with arcane energy. As swiftly as she appeared, Mara dissolved into the shadows as the eidolon thrashed toward her, its fist smashing the floor where she'd stood. Seizing the moment, Jinn's arm shot out, stabbing the ancient sword into a burning rune on the construct's side. As the steel grated against stone, the statue lurched violently to its side, pulling Jinn to his feet as he fought to hang on, his sword caught in the burning sigil.
From the corner of his eye, he saw the brief blur of a dark shape rushing toward him just before the world went black. Stars danced before his eyes, and a peculiar weightlessness held him for what seemed like an eternity. Yellowed parchment fluttered around him amid clouds of swirling dust as he fought to regain his sight, shaking his head slowly and finding himself in a sitting position against the far wall. The floor shook beneath him, and flashing lights filled the tower as Mara and Quessahn hurled spell after spell at the eidolon, none of their magic injuring the thing to any lasting effect.
A glimmer of shining steel protruded from the construct's ribs, just beneath its right arm. Jinn focused on the metal splinter and forced himself to stand. He winced as the right side of his body pulsed painfully as if it were made of a single bruise. He pushed the sensation to the back of his mind. He took up a length of fallen chain, a chunk of broken rafter dangling from its end as he charged at the eidolon's back. Mara slipped away into shadow as he passed, cold fragments of darkness clinging to his cheeks as he hurled the chain at the statue's head.
He missed and rolled beneath the swiping fist of stone that quickly followed. Muttering a curse as splinters dug into his side, he caught a brief glimpse of Quessahn in front of the eidolon, tendrils of darkness spewing from her palms. The spell briefly dimmed the molten energy of the construct, causing it to shriek, a sound like hail striking a tin roof, but the magic could not hold. The fist that had sought to smash Jinn reversed its course and struck the eladrin solidly. Jinn gasped as Quessahn's body flew through the air and crashed against the wall like a corn-husk doll.
The sickening thump of her body on the floor ripped through his gut, the sight of her senseless and bleeding awakening something within him. An image of her flashed through his mind, her smiling face looking up at him, a sea of waving green behind her. Her lips moved in the image, but he could not hear her words over his racing pulse, thrumming through his ears as he stood. Pangs of guilt and loss joined his bloodlust, though both gave way to a rage that burned from the depths of his pounding heart. Swinging the chain once around his fist, he dashed forward as the eidolon turned to present its curving horns. He hurled the chain again, wrapping it neatly around the statue's neck.
It whipped its upper body backward, roaring a sound almost like laughter as Jinn was pulled into the air, swinging at the chain's end. Black claws reached for him, but he swung his legs forward, pulling tightly on the chain as the room spun around him. The burning eyes followed him, hellish energy and caustic blood seeping from them as he turned through the air, whipping tight as the chain caught on the statue's left shoulder. The bright edge of his stolen blade glowed in the eidolon's side, the sword stuck, a thrust away from the statue's immortal energy.
The essence of a god, he thought. A shard of divinity.
Arms burning with the strain, he pulled the chain taut again and raised his legs, whispering a prayer as the hilt of his lodged sword came into sight. With a single thrust, he kicked the blade deep, sparks flying as the steel stabbed home into the fiery heart of the eidolon, shattering the god-forged splinter that had given the statue life. Power surged from the wound, washing violently through Jinn's body as the construct shuddered, purple mist steaming through the cracks and symbols across its stony skin.
The chain slipped from Jinn's fist, and he fell away, sliding across the marble floor as the burst of divine power wracked his flesh with pain. The eidolon's body quaked, falling apart in lifeless chunks through the chamber bathed in hellish light. Jinn gasped, a brief moment of pure clarity overcoming him. All the threads of his many lives were joined, fusing together like a winding road of long years, at their end the blazing light of the Astral Sea. The path of his soul from flesh to flesh, bound in blood for millennia, burned through his thoughts, every memory as fresh as when it was first crafted, the darkness of every death just as haunting.
He saw meaning and destiny in the whole of the pattern, his eyes torn away from the minute details of the individual lives he'd lived, and an unsettling calm overcame him. Somewhere in the long and winding maze of his soul, his fate had been written, and he was loath to look upon its conclusion…
In a heartbeat the vision was gone, leaving him trembling and struggling to breathe, his skull aching as the memories faded, and he felt empty and drained. He coughed and groaned, eyes burning as they adjusted to the dim light of the chamber.
Straining to right himself, he squinted through the dust and found Quessahn's hand nearby, her eyes closed and veiled in blood.
TWELVE
NIGHTAL 22, THE YEAR OF DEEP WATER DRIFTING (1480 DR)
'Quess.'
Jinn whispered her name, gently cradling her neck and stemming the flow of blood from a cut on her forehead. Her skin was soft in his hands, pale and familiar like a recurring dream. The sight of one limp hand sliding to the floor nauseated him, the smell of her blood stinging in his nose like the scent of a fresh nightmare. He leaned close, her breath on his cheek and her pulse beneath his fingertips calming him as Mara stepped out of her clinging shadows, baring her fangs at the pile of smoking stone nearby.
'Is she dead?' Mara asked as she carefully inspected the book she'd taken from downstairs, gently turning the pages as if they would fall apart at any touch.
'No,' Jinn answered. 'But she'll need some time to-'
'Time we don't have,' Mara cut in sharply, her crimson eyes scanning page after page in quick succession. 'This spell Tallus was working on puts us all in danger, one dead eladrin is a small price to pay if need be-'
'She is alive,' Jinn insisted. 'We're not leaving her.'
'This isn't like you, Jinn,' Mara replied, closing the book slowly. 'You'd risk all the work we've done for one woman?'
'All the work I've done started with one woman,' he answered quietly, brushing Quessahn's cheek as she stirred, though he imagined for a moment that it was a different face he looked upon, silver-eyed and cursed with immortality like himself. He'd abandoned her to fight the ancient war of his lost gods and he'd lost her, his Variel.
'Kehran?' Quessahn mumbled, coughing. 'Is that you-?'
