Insurrection - Chapter Eight
#23 of Blood And Water
Blood And Water - Insurrection
Part Three: ILAEN
Chapter Eight
The grand hall that served as the reception area for the Mother Almighty's temple looked a little different as Deacon crossed into it. The murals were all the same, of course; the alter rested at the other end of the hall just as it had before. The glassless windows remained in place, and a handful of flame-filled braziers illuminated the hall.
The cadre of magi that filled said hall, of course, was entirely new.
Deacon stared them all down as the two that had led him into the temple hurried to join their fellows. He counted a dozen magi in total and felt his teeth grit. If they were all as powerful as the pair he'd faced with Ransley before, then a dozen was far too many for him to stop. Instead he steeled himself and raised his mental defenses as he stared down the central figure. Her height and the burn in the chest of her robe gave her away as the magi who'd escaped before. "Where are they?"
The figure tilted her hooded head. "Be more specific, Oswell."
Deacon allowed his teeth to grit again as his glare drifted across all of the gathered magi. A couple more shrank away from his gaze, and he felt their fear even as they tried to hide it. Perhaps they were not all so powerful as she was. Still, he didn't need to provoke a fight. He just had to delay them long enough for Ransley to find and free Bain. "The monks. Bain. You will give them to me now, or you will be destroyed where you stand."
"If you were capable, you would have done so already." The magi's head tilted back the other way. "The ferret who was with you. Ransley Cunliffe. Where is he?"
The fox frowned as he narrowed his eyes. Why did she care? "Where is Bain?" he asked again instead.
A sigh came from the shadows under the magi's hood, and she lifted one white-gloved paw to wave toward Deacon. Two of the magi at her side parted to reveal Bain just behind her, seated on the floor with his back to the wall. Sparkling blue light wrapped around his ankles and his wrists, and he looked up at Deacon with wild eyes. "Don't-!" he shouted, before his eyes rolled up into his head and he slumped back.
Deacon snarled as lightning flashed in his grip, but the magi before him waggled a single, raised finger. "Do not threaten me, Oswell," she said, and Deacon caught a brief glimpse of Vernell similarly bound beside Bain before the pair were hidden from view again. "The otter is unconscious, but alive. Cause me harm, and you will see him dead before your own life is extinguished."
It took a titanic effort for Deacon to still his paws. They shook with rage and tingled with electricity, but he forced it back as he willed the display of his powers to fade. Instead, he fought to remember Oswell and the way he spoke; that haughty, superior tone he used with everyone else. "And yet you insist on my own destruction," he pointed out as he tilted his head up. "You insist that he die as well. Pray, tell me why exactly I should give myself over to you."
A flicker of power to Deacon's side caught his attention, but he did not allow himself any outward sign of it. For a moment he thought it might have been Ransley, but the feel was of fraen_magic rather than _ulurn. "Because we seek the same thing you do," the magi answered, and Deacon could hear the smile in her voice. "The protection of this world. Allow us to do what we have come together to do."
The flicker drew into a flare, but Deacon was ready for it. Before the magi that he'd sensed could loose a ball of flame, a flick of the fox's mind sent the magi across the hall and into the opposite wall. Deacon himself didn't move an inch, but he watched all but the speaking magi recoil in surprise. "And_this_ is what you bring to bear to destroy me?" he asked as he allowed his tone to become a little more taunting. "You disappoint me. I expected your best."
"And I expected Oswell," the magi replied, even as a pair of her fellows rushed over to help up the one Deacon had tossed across the temple. "We sensed him surge to full wakefulness within you, but he is not the one in control right now, is he?" Once more, Deacon heard the smile enter her tone. "You model him well, but Oswell would not care one bit about these monks and that otter. They are useless to him, but not to you."
Deacon drew himself up tall and finally spared a glance at the magi he'd tossed. The two robed figures that stood over the magi pressed their hands to their companion's chest, and Deacon could feel the pulse of their healing magic. "So they matter to me. What can you possibly offer me to ensure their survival when you have already promised myself and Bain death? You rescind it?"
The magi shook her head. "Hardly. You will die. The otter will die. It is necessary to protect the world from Oswell. You may struggle, but you will fall. It has been decided."
"And who are you to decide that?" came Vernell's voice from behind the line of magi. "How clearly can you see the future? Are you chosen by the gods? Timeless Ahronni?"
Deacon frowned as he shook his head. "Who am I?" he asked before the magi could answer.
The lead magi glanced back at Vernell for a second before she turned to Deacon once more. "You are a vessel of Oswell's design. You are crafted to-"
"No." Deacon shook his head again and took a single step forward. "I am Deacon. I am unwilling and unwitting host to the parasite you call Oswell. I was built to be nothing more than a host, and yet I refuse him. I defy him. Why can you not see this? I am alive, and a person on my own merits. I am no different from you. So who," he added as he took another step forward, "are you to tell me I am not?"
Each step he took closer, Deacon could sense more and more of the opposing magi draw power to themselves. They held it restrained, but he could feel them prepare to release it if he so much as threatened them. The magi front and center however, called on no such power. She simply stared back at Deacon from beneath her cowl. "I am Master Aeola of the Ring of Fate," she said at last. "I am a daughter. A wife. A sister. A mother.
"I came into being through love. I came into being through the blending of two unique souls. I grew in the body of my mother from the seed of my father. I was born, vessel. You were made, and you dare to tell me that you are alive?" She shook her head slowly. "You? Alive? You will never know what it is to live. You are empty inside; naught but twitching meat that yearns to be filled. One day, if you are not stopped, Oswell will fill that void."
Another step forward, and Deacon could see lightning flash and flame flare across the gloved paws of the magi arrayed against him. The ground itself trembled with their unease. "And yet here I stand," he replied as he spread his arms slowly wide. "Myself. Not Oswell. I have a mind of my own. A will of my own. I command magic as you do; my spirit -- my very soul -- cannot be denied. I am as unique as you. I am not a son, a husband, a brother or a father, but if I were anyone else I could be!"
To his surprise, Aeola took a step toward him. She still held back her own power. "You are the product of a twisted, flawed experiment," she countered, and there was no missing the new edge in her voice. "What you call your spirit... your soul? That spiritual vibrancy that allows you to tap the magic around you? That power is Oswell's_spirit. That is _his power that courses through you. What you could be does not matter. What you are is an affront."
Deacon lifted both eyebrows. He kept is arms still and wide. "But as you yourself said, I am not Oswell. Oswell wouldn't care about Bain, or the monks. He would have struck you down. If all that I am is Oswell, why do I not do this? Or is it perhaps that without all of the experiences that twisted him so, I am not so monstrous as my creator?" He let his arms drop back to his side again. "Is it perhaps that I am my own person?"
"No. It is not." She reached up to tug her cowl down further over her face. "You were made for one purpose. Oswell was the sort of magi who would ensure his will came to pass. You are too dangerous to be allowed to exist."
Behind the magi, Deacon could sense Bain still bound by her powers. There was still no sign of Ransley. The ferret may well have abandoned him. "You do not want to make an enemy of me," he warned the gathered magi even as he cast his gaze across them all. "Oswell's concentrated power is mine to command now, and I have no desire to use it to harm any of you. Force me, and I will burn you all down one by one."
A few heads turned as the magi considered his words, but Aeola remained resolute. She took another step toward Deacon, and then another, and then another. She didn't stop until she stood right in front of the fox, and he began to see the contours of her muzzle through the shadow of her cowl. Her eyes glinted with repressed blue light as she stared down at the shorter fox. "After what you did to Tamil, you think we will spare you?" she asked.
Deacon held her stare. Beneath the surface, he could feel her powers bubbling up. Conflict was imminent, and there was still no sign of Ransley. "I defended myself when you attacked me," he corrected her. Deacon kept his breathing steady as he forced fear from his mind and focused. "You escaped. He did not. I would caution your companions against drawing my ire in much the same way, and I would once more demand you release your prisoners."
In the darkness under her hood, Deacon could still see the twist of her muzzle into a wordless snarl. She took a couple of steps back as she lifted both paws to the edge of that hood. "Where is Ransley Cunliffe?" she asked again, as she drew the hood back.
With her face finally exposed in the light, Deacon understood why she asked after him. While the ferret's eyes glowed with repressed ilaen energy, the similarity to Ransley's features could not be denied. They weren't as similar as Deacon's and Oswell's, but he supposed that nature was seldom so exact. "And who exactly is he to you?" he asked, though he suspected he knew the answer. No wonder he didn't want to face the magi of the Ring of Fate.
Her fur bristled, even gray with age though it was. She stared hard at the fox as he felt the temperature of the room begin to dip several degrees. "He is my son, and you will return him to me."
Deacon felt his ears twitch back as he held her stare. Of course Ransley wouldn't want to face this Ring of Fate. Not if his mother -- and presumably he himself -- was a member. Of course, the force with which she demanded him was not something the fox could miss. He could use that. "Why?" he asked. "Why, in the name of all that is sane and rational would I do that?"
"Because doing the right thing and returning him to us gives you the chance to choose your death," Aeola hissed back. "Give him back, and I will make your last moments painless. Refuse, or harm him in any way, and I promise that your end will be quite the opposite."
The fox tilted his head up as he moved forward again. Once more he felt the unease of the other magi as he approached Aeola, but they must have been waiting for her to make the first move. Neither struck at him as he stood right in the ferret's face. "Our crime is life," he growled back at her. "Life, and destroying perhaps the one magi in all the world who may have been a threat to you and whatever plans you are working toward."
She hissed again as Deacon felt her powers rise through her. "You are his legacy. You are a tool; a weapon. You must be destroyed. You, and everything else Oswell has involved in his plots. One last chance, fox. Give me Ransley."
Deacon lifted his head higher as he leaned in toward Aeola's face. "Give me Bain, and release the monks," he instead demanded.
It was the wrong answer and he knew it, but he still wasn't prepared for the speed of the ferret's strike. Her arm rose with supernatural speed and grabbed at Deacon's throat as her eyes blazed with blue light. He gasped as he felt the heat drain from his body under her touch, and his eyes went wide as he fought to focus his mind.
Fool!
Terror gripped Deacon for a moment as he continued to grow rapidly colder. That voice, so clear in his mind, had not been his own. "No..." he rasped around Aeola's grip.
Let me aid you, boy! Deep in Deacon's mind, he felt Oswell's presence surge against its prison. Electric energy flashed through his awareness. The power was not Deacon's, but it was offered freely.
He turned it down. Instead he reached up with shivering arms to clamp his paws around Aeola's wrists. Flame sparked under his grip for a moment as he tried to cut off the drain of his body's heat from the source, but those flames were snuffed by Aeola's power before they could find purchase. Deacon's breathing grew ragged.
Oswell pressed harder against his cage. This is no trick to take this body for my own! If she destroys you, she destroys me with you! Let me loose our powers! Let me guide your paw, before we are both consumed!
He could feel it, as Oswell's voice grew more insistent in the back of Deacon's mind. His right paw trembled in a way that had nothing to do with the slivers of ice that wound through his veins. It was his creator, as he attempted to manipulate the limb. But he couldn't; not while Deacon retained control. Deacon grit his teeth as he struggled as hard as he could against Aeola's grip, but it was no use. He wasn't strong enough.
Perhaps Oswell was, though. "I... I can't..." he whispered. Ice crystals began to form on the fur beneath his robe.
"Yes, you can," Aeola replied, even as Oswell continued to struggle within Deacon. "Surrender, fox. There is nothing you can do."
Yes, there is! Oswell roared back at him. Let my power forth! Allow me to direct it! I can save you! I can even save your precious whore of an otter! Let me help you!
Deacon grunted as he reached deep into himself for his natural fraen powers. They burned up inside him, but the heat was no reprieve against the glacial tide that washed over him from Aeola's touch. He couldn't trust Oswell. He couldn't let his creator have control.
Of course you cannot trust me, boy, he continued, and the voice in his mind grew more agitated as Deacon felt his body begin to numb. His fraen_powers would not hold Aeola back for much longer. _Trust the one thing you know to be true. I do not wish to die, and I will do anything to live on! He fell silent for a moment, before he added, Very well, you stubborn imbecile. Allow us both to perish. See how long Bain lives on in your absence.
I don't know how! Deacon thought back. I cannot-
You must first let go of her arms, fool! Oswell snapped back at him. Calm your mind. Reach out to me. Feel my power. Let it guide you.
With gritted teeth, Deacon stared past Aeola. He could only barely see Bain through the line of magi, but Oswell was right. If he was destroyed, Bain would be lost in short order. He couldn't allow that. A growl rumbled out from his chest as he dove deep into his own mind. The growl became a snarl as he felt Oswell reach out toward him. The snarl became a roar as he grasped a hold of his creator's will.
The roar became an eruption of electricity from Deacon's body. It surged through the point of contact between himself and Aeola, and her fingers tightened their grip for a moment before the force of the eruption blasted her back and off Deacon. With the magi sent a good ten feet back from Deacon and his fraen magic already at work to restore his body temperature, the fox sucked in a deep breath and glared at the arrayed Ring of Fate magi. "One last chance," he growled at them.
Their response was to attack as a unified front, but neither Deacon nor Oswell had expected any less. Deacon allowed Oswell's will to direct his motions, and their shared body turned to the side as a bolt of blue lightning burned through the spot they had just occupied. Oswell lifted a paw and wrenched it toward the ceiling as they reached out to grasp at their attacker. The magi howled as he was hurled into the top of the temple, and stone came loose around him as he tumbled back toward the ground.
Meantime, Deacon swept up his other arm to cover them from a torrent of arcane fire. It came from three of the arrayed magi, and his teeth grit as he grasped a hold of the underlying power and spread it wide around him. The flame sluiced off him like a wave off the bow of a ship, before with a snarl he launched his own bolt of flame right into the heart of the magi line.
The yelp of pain from the magi he'd struck stalled out the firestorm, but it did nothing to prevent the ground beneath Deacon from cracking open. Dust and stone rained down on him as the ground itself threatened to swallow him up. Deacon reached out to push himself up into the air with a blast of magical force as Oswell brought them about to sear another of the Ring's magi with a bolt of red lightning. A twist of the fox's paw split that bolt into two that arced out and into the target's neighbors.
Deacon cried out as Aeola finally regained her footing. Her arm glistened as water on her robes condensed rapidly into a spear of ice, and that arm thrust forward to ram the tip into the fox's stomach. The frozen tip emerged from Deacon's back covered in red, and he gasped as Aeola whipped her arm back and threw him off the ice blade and into the wall.
Oswell took control of the offense as Deacon threw all of his fraen powers into healing the wound. Pain surged through him as the hole in his guts filled with liquid flame, but he bore the brunt of it as Oswell thrust both paws forward and shoved with all of their combined might. A handful of the magi behind Aeola were launched into the stonework with bone-crushing force, but the ferret threw up her iced-over arm and only skidded back a couple of inches.
When she lowered that arm again, her counterattack came not with a shard of ice but a spear of thought. It crossed the distance between them to lance into Deacon's mind, and he shuddered for a moment as his concentration on his healing was broken. Oswell however was there to cover the attack, and he batted aside the ferret's attack fiercely enough that the wind itself billowed out around Deacon. His eyes flared with lightning as Oswell reached back out to Aeola and poured himself into her mind.
While Deacon's focus on healing their wound had taken the majority of their focus, Aeola was still staggered by the force of the mental attack. Her defenses redoubled even as Deacon paused in his healing efforts to knock her legs out from under her with a blast of force. So focused on deflecting Oswell's invasion of her mind, she could do nothing to stop the blow from launching her to the ground.
As she fell, Deacon could see Bain and Vernell. They were both free of their arcane bindings -- Aeola was obviously too busy to maintain them -- as the latter desperately tried to rouse Bain. Wake him! Oswell roared at Deacon, even as he deflected a large stone slab with a bolt of lightning. We can tap his power and destroy them all!
As Deacon restored the last of the damage from Aeola's stab wound, he cast a quick glance around the temple hall. The majority of the Ring of Fate's magi had been put off-balance. A few were dead, and Aeola herself still attempted to regain her footing. The last thing Deacon wanted to do was allow Oswell access to Ahron sorcery, but he needed the otter awake to get out of the temple.
He barely caught the glimpse of an equine magi about to loose a lightning bolt of his own, but a quick mental shove turned that imminent attack in a shower of distracted sparks. Oswell took the opportunity to seize at the unbalanced magi's neck and wrench it aside with his powers, and the horse crumpled as Deacon batted aside another fireball. "Get Bain out of here!" he shouted at Vernell.
The monk nodded, but the shout caught Aeola's attention. The ferret turned to Bain as the ice wrapped about her arm shattered, and the shards of it floated up through the air as she hissed at him. Deacon's eyes widened as he raised a paw to stall out the attack, but a torrent of new flame at his side diverted his attention. He cried out as the flame washed over him, and he forced it back by strength of will as he watched Vernell dive across Bain to shield him from Aeola's attack. The ice shards trailed steam as it lanced at Bain.
But as the otter's eyes flashed open, the shards evaporated in mid-flight. White light poured out of his eyes as he raised his arm to fend off Aeola's destroyed attack, and the ferret cried out as she was thrown back from Bain. The otter blinked as the light faded from his eyes, and he stared down at his paws in shock. "Deacon?" he called out without looking up.
"Get him out now, Vernell!" Deacon roared back as he felt Oswell whisper a warning. He whirled in time to catch a ball of electricity in his paw, and he crushed it to sparks as he thrust that fist toward the offender. The magi found the wind knocked out of her as she was knocked back by a wave of force, and the tumble of her body caused the magi behind her to hold his attack long enough to get out of her way.
Deacon swept one paw aside as he knocked that magi to the ground as well as he felt Aeola's now-familiar powers flare to life. He whirled on the ferret as she stalked toward the still-shocked Bain, and Deacon followed her at a dead run. He watched as Vernell stood with fists clenched and ready, but the twitch of her finger sent the fox into a tumble. With Bain bared before her again, ice once more raced up her arm and formed a blade that she drove down toward him.
Before Deacon could do a thing, Bain reached up to catch it.The light in his eyes flickered to life again, but it took on a slightly blueish hue as he caught the icicle in his paw. It melted the moment it touched his bare fur, and water pooled across the floor as Aeola stumbled in toward him. Oswell's laughter in the back of Deacon's mind was, for the first time, not mocking him. The fool! All she has done is awaken his Ahron powers!
Bain continued to look stunned as Deacon hurled a fireball into Aeola's back. She lurched forward over Bain as the otter finally rolled aside, and she caught herself on the wall before she reached back toward Deacon with a paw. He felt her take a hold of his body and lift him off the floor, and Deacon winced as he prepared himself to be tossed aside.
But the telekinetic throw never came. Instead, Bain roared out a, "No!" and reached up to grab Aeola's arm. He wrenched it down as Deacon found himself suddenly freed, but Bain only managed to earn a backhand from the ferret for his trouble. Deacon had barely hit the ground before he reached out to Aeola and grasped her with his own telekinetic grip.
Instead of throwing the ferret, Deacon pulled. She launched through the air toward him and twisted about as she rapidly approached the fox. She only had a moment of wide-eyed realization before Deacon's fist rose up to meet her, and she crashed into his punch and somersaulted across the room. He felt the surge of her magic soften the impact much as his own dampened the pain in his fist and arm, but Deacon didn't care.
He charged forward again and slid down beside Bain as the otter looked up in shock. "Deacon?" he asked as he scrabbled up onto his knees. "How did I-"
"Later, Bain," he replied as he turned to glance back at the Ring of Fate's magi. They were still in disarray as Aeola picked herself back up. Deacon and Oswell's strikes had only killed a couple of the enemy magi; the rest had managed to restore their wounds with their powers. "You need to go. Now, before they regroup."
Fool! Oswell protested even as Bain looked more confused. We can use that power! Keep him here!
"I'm not going anywhere!" replied the otter, even as Deacon shook his head at Oswell's thoughts. "Help me help you. How do I control this power?"
Deacon clenched his teeth as he looked around again. The magi had begun to use the break to heal any lingering wounds. In moments, they would be back to near full strength. Deacon, by contrast, could feel Oswell's annoyance sap at his already depleted energy. "Aishah said that Ahron sorcery was instinctual," he told Bain. "Maybe you can tap it to use your ilaen powers. The sort of thing that Aeola can do? You can do that and so much more. At the least, you could manipulate water and ice the same way!"
"He is untrained and unready!" Aeola shouted from across the hall. The words came through a snarl as she stalked back toward Deacon and Bain again. "He will have no control. He will sooner destroy himself and you than do me any harm!"
As she spoke, Deacon kept his eyes on Bain's. He reached down to grab at the otter's paws and squeeze them tight. "Do not listen to her, dear one," he whispered. He could feel his muzzle twitch as the muscles tried to twist into a snarl. Within him, Oswell struggled all the harder. "You can do this. You can take control of that power. I trust you. I believe in you. I know you can do it, Bain."
The sound of footsteps drew both Deacon and Bain's gaze away from each other. They looked to the Ring of Fate magi as their enemy took up positions behind Aeola once again. "Fitting, I suppose, that you are both destroyed together."
"No." Bain's eyes narrowed as he stood up and over Deacon. The fox looked up with confusion as he watched Bain's paws curl into fists. "That is my fox. If anyone's gonna destroy him, it's gonna be me. Back away."
The normally-stoic Aeola actually smiled at his words, and her chuckle echoed off the cracked stone of the temple. "You would dare speak to magi in such a manner?" she said as her tone and face suddenly lost all mirth. "You? Common, serpent-chaser filth!" Her eyes flashed bright as Deacon felt her power surge and her mind reach out to bury into Bain's.
That mental assault broke against the otter's mind as Bain stood tall before her, and her expression for a moment shifted into confusion. Her muzzle and ears twitched as she launched another mental stab, but this too crossed the distance between them to be expended harmlessly against Bain's mind. "How?" she asked, her voice filled with disbelief.
As she attacked again, Deacon felt it. It was buried deep in Bain, so deep that if he hadn't tapped it recently he might not have detected it at all. "The same way your son could not pierce his waking thoughts," Deacon replied as he stood beside the otter. "His bond to the Font of Ages protects him. He is too strong for you."
Even as Bain smiled at Deacon, Aeola snarled and thrust both paws forward. A twin pulse of azure light leaped from her grasp to soar at Bain, but the otter caught the bolts in his own paws and stared down at them in wonder. Deacon could only smile back as he glanced at Aeola. "You woke his powers, Master Aeola. The Font of Ages itself is on our side. You cannot win."
"Perhaps we should consider retreat, Master Aeola," suggested one of the magi at her back. "We are not prepared for Ahron sorcery."
"We leave now, and Oswell escapes to live again," she snarled back at the dissenter. "Oswell cannot be allowed to escape justice! He must be destroyed!"
Deacon felt a pang of sympathy that Oswell predictably seethed at. That wasn't just rage he could see in her eyes. There was pain, too. "I wear his face, but I am not Oswell," he replied, as he lowered his tone. "I wield his powers, but I am not Oswell. Your son, Ransley? He has come to understand this."
The revelation brought shock to Bain's face, but Deacon's eyes were locked on Aeola. The mention of Ransley only incensed her further. "Then why does he not stand against us? He has abandoned you to us, and this is as it should be!"
Bain stepped toward her, his paws raised non-threateningly in much the same way Deacon had approached her earlier. Aeola took a quick step back nonetheless. "Ransley is a friend, master magi," he told her, even as she scoffed at the thought. "He told me about his father... about what Oswell did to him."
"Did he?" Aeola hissed back. The air about her began to fog as it grew colder and colder. "Did he tell you how Oswell saved him for last? How he tortured Keenen to death just to see how long his ulurn powers could hold him together?" Her voice and motions grew more and more animated as she shook with her anger. "Did Ransley tell you how long his father suffered at Oswell's whims?"
"And do you know how long Bain has suffered under Oswell's whims?" Deacon snapped back at her. The anger that rose through him flowed from the splinter in his mind and influenced him, but he felt no compulsion to turn it away. "Do you know what Bain was put through? Do you know that Bain was treated to the exact same technique?"
"He pulled me open," Bain added. His voice, by contrast, remained steady and calm as he took another step forward. "Ripped open my chest and drowned me in my own blood. And then, just as I was about to die, he pulled magic out of me and used it to keep me alive... just on the very edge of death." The otter's voice began to tremble. "And he _taunted_me. He laughed at me. So even if Ransley didn't tell me exactly what happened... he didn't have to."
Deacon could feel the other magi begin to doubt their position. Their powers began to relax as Bain spoke, and they started to look amongst themselves even as Aeola seethed. "Bain suffers even now," he growled. "He is going to die and I cannot save him. Oswell took him from his home. Oswell killed him over and over and over again, each time just to learn more about him. To make him stronger for the next time."
"And the fox you keep calling Oswell is the one who rose to stop him, more to protect me than to save himself," Bain added. "You keep looking at him like he's a monster... you keep seeing Oswell's face in the place of his own."
Aeola continued to shake as she pointed at Bain. "And what do you see?" she snarled.
Bain turned to look at Deacon, and he smiled. But in that moment, with the otter distracted, Aeola struck. Ice sheathed her arm once more before she launched it like a great spear at Bain, and steam rose off it as it flew toward his chest.
Deacon, not so distracted, was prepared for the surge of her magic. Electricity raced up his arms as one bolt shattered the spear well before it could reach Bain. The second, however, missed Aeola. The barest nudge from Oswell sent the bolt off-course, and instead of taking out the threat it burned a neat, blackened hole in the head of a magi behind her.
Horror filled Deacon as his eyes went wide, and he felt Oswell's smug satisfaction as the eyes of the magi turned hard. Where moments ago they had seemed ready to let Deacon and Bain go, now fear and hate burned in on their faces. "I-" he began.
But it was no use. Lined up as they were, they raised their arms as a unified force as they unleashed their power together. Flame was suffused with electricity as it flooded the air. Stone and ice crept up over Deacon and Bain's footpaws. Deacon barely raised his arms and pushed back against it with every ounce of aerun and fraen power he could muster, but he could barely hold back the tide of energy.
Beside him, he could feel Bain desperately try to aid him. One of the otter's paws grabbed at his shoulder as the other pressed forward into the flood of fire and electricity, and a shell of white light bloomed before them. It soaked up the majority of the unified magi's force, and gave Deacon just enough room to push it back.
The cold ice and stone that coiled around their legs however did not relent so. As Aeola launched frosty blue bolts of energy into Bain's barrier, both the otter and the fox found themselves stuck in place. Deacon struggled for a moment against it as he glanced at Bain, and he could barely hear the otter's grunt of exertion over the roar of the Ring of Fate's combined assault. "You have to hold on!" he yelled to Bain.
"There's too many!" Bain shouted back. In spite of his words, that wispy white barrier that pulsed against the incoming waves of energy glowed brighter as Bain clenched his jaw. The same light wicked off his arms and thrummed through his entire body, but the otter was too focused on their protection to lend Deacon any strength.
The fox was forced to dig as deep as he could and tap whatever reservoirs of energy he had left. He growled low as he reached out with all he could muster, felt where the other magi were in the temple, and pushed as hard as he could.
Before them, the air rippled as it was blasted outward by Deacon's will. It shattered Bain's erected barrier as the otter sagged forward, and it forced the incoming torrent of arcane energy to billow out around it. He felt for a moment the fear of the magi before they quickly pushed back against it, but they were too late to avoid being blown back by the telekinetic wave.
All but Aeola. She stood tall, arms raised to fend off the attack as she resisted the blow. Her response came as a shriek as she grabbed a hold of both Deacon and the exhausted Bain with her mind, and her arms flicked up as she broke the of the ice and stone about their legs and hurled them into the ceiling.
There was no time to divert himself or Bain from the impact, so Deacon squeezed his eyes shut and braced himself for it as best he could. It still came with jarring force; stars exploded across his eyes as his head impacted the ceiling. Only the curve of it saved his skull from being broken by the blow, but he still hit with such force that he didn't even remember when he hit the ground.
What he was aware of, however, was the paw that rose up from deep inside him. Dazed and exhausted by the fight, Deacon knew he could not resist it. He pushed back with what futile effort he could as he felt Oswell begin to-