One war. Two Sisters. One end.
There is no running from it. Fate shall have its way as both daughters of Stormband take to the field of battle. Each with one goal - vengeance.
Approximately 130k words.
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One of the greatest gifts a Seer can give is to take things away. Such as the pain of another and place it upon themselves and to relieve their suffering. We are ultimately well qualified to hold on to one's grief. But I warn those who attempt this that some suffering may be too great to contain. Even for us.
Halani Sasori, Seer of Denang
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"We could sure use those reinforcements you promised." The impressive spear the cleric once held had since transformed into a less unwieldy sword of light.
Moments ago, she'd released her white dragon to fight on its own. While it had proven adept at combat with a rider, Daphney was not well trained in such tactics and believed it would fare better without her being a hinderance.
Overhead, her white-scaled ally issued a gut piercing shriek while clashing with a red and black simultaneously. The three combatants twisted midair in a flurry of claw and teeth—fire and ice. The white avoided the flames of the Imperial dragons, snaking in and out of the columns of fire. But its chilled breath caught the wing of the red, disrupting its ability to maintain flight, and sent the enemy spiraling hard to the ground.
Wielding her new weapon with the deftness of a military veteran, Dapheny pierced a mummified soldier in ancient elven armor. Its body burning as she slayed with remorse one who would have once been her ally under different circumstances. It and its fellow fiendish animations might have been long dead, but they still knew how to put up a vicious fight. Perhaps even more so than when they lived and possessed a concern for their own wellbeing and something to live for.
While swatting aside an attack from another of the undead hordes with her shield of the same divine energy as her sword, Daphney did not revel in killing the already dead. She would have preferred instead they had been left to slumber for eternity than be called upon again and against their will.
"She'll be here," Anthony tried to ease Daphney's concern as he cut down an Imperial soldier of the much more alive variety. The undead seemed drawn more to the cleric than to him. And the few he'd tried to assist with taking out didn't seem as affected by his sword of common steel.
Chaos reigned upon the mountain while forces from each side forming one singular living mass trying to consume itself. Perhaps if she had been able to observe it from above on the back of her dragon, Daphney might have seen some semblance of order as bodies brandishing weapons and seeking superiority over the battleground slammed into each other with the violent push and pull of war.
As it was, however, all she saw was the dwindling numbers of her own forces. And such prompted her to give a dire assessment of the situation. "I don't know how much more of this we can take."
In the sky above, five elves riding on green dragons took down a red, but only barely. And the Imperial dragon conquered two of them in the process; one via fire and the other with piercing talons. Knowing she could not help them, Daphney hoped the riders survived their nearly simultaneous falls, fearing that the loss of even one soldier at this point would cause their lines to collapse.
"We have to hold out." Anthony's plea had its own hint of desperation behind it. "Maybe you should be healing the injured instead of fighting?"
Daphney slayed another ghastly construct, it's partially decayed body crackling and burning as she cleaved it in half. "I'd never be able to keep up," she admitted sorrowfully. And then she took down an apparition of more black mist than substance. "I'm doing more good this way. These undead are not easy to dispatch by normal weapons."
"You need to get to Lady Noranda and take her out." Anthony pointed to their nemesis, who had found a place atop the carcass of a black dragon to survey and command the battlefield. The Red Witch was weaving an assortment of unholy spells and raising the dead as fast as they fell. All while hope was quickly fading for the coalition of elves and rebels.
"I'm trying to." Daphney lunged for another opponent. "Sort of been my plan all along, believe it or not. The problem is—" She killed a red-eyed shade in mid-sentence. "There's this throng of enemies between us preventing that."
A guttural roar washed across the land with devastation akin to a tsunami. It was unlike anything the cleric had ever heard, and the force of it alone carried the power of a fear that could never have been imagined until it was experienced. The moment it struck, some soldiers on both sides of the conflict began to flee. Others, those with heartier constitutions, stood their ground. Even if only shakily so.
Eyes lifting skyward, fearing the worst as she dared to take her sight off the battle raging around her, Daphney was relieved to see ripples forming in the air and Fairyways opening up above the mountain. Through them came a horde of monstrous, dragon-like beasts. But these were more fearsome in appearance and layered in thick dull gray scales. Some with wingspans fully twice that of any other dragon, save Daphney's white.
Of the beasts call archeons, Daphney had only heard rumors and tales. And she never expected Reane's plan to work. Now, baring witness to their fearsome majesty firsthand, she understood their imposing prowess and how no words ever spoken could have done them true justice.
The gray-scaled beasts decimated several of the airborne ranks of red and black dragons ridden by the Imperial riders and taken off guard by the sudden appearance of the long-awaited reinforcements. With the force of their jagged and crooked toothed maws, the archeons downed their smaller opponents out of midair. They swooped upon the battlefield, ripping gashes in the enemy lines while leaving the defending forces mostly unharmed. There was, unfortunately, some collateral damage as they attacked in a reckless force of nature.
"About time," Daphney sighed her relief. "Nothing like waiting until the last moment. I just hope it's enough."
Downing yet another zombie soldier Lady Noranda had summoned into her service, the cleric shifted her tactics. Witnessing the effects of the fearsome new arrivals on her own troops, she took her sword and thrust its tip down into the rock of the mountain at her feet. Giving up the weapon in a flash of brilliant golden light, she put a calming aura over the soldiers supporting their side of the battle, both elven and rebel alike. It fell upon them and immediately protected them from the sheer horror the ancient beasts exuded as they descended on the bloody struggle.
