Hakara incanted, weaving her fingers through the air, trickling powdered ruby through the air. It adhered to the magic, an inverted-rune helix hovering in the air in front of the reinforced door. The ruby glow pulsed for a moment, before flecks traced through the air towards the door, seeking out the spells woven into the wood and metal. Hakara squinted, trying to figure out the details – the essence of fire, on a simple trigger, set to detect anyone that crossed the threshold without the required enchanted token.

‘High Priestess Carissia, I believe I have identified the protective spells. It is a variant of Hrathimor’s Binding. I should be able to create a pass-token given a short period of time.’

Carissia flexed her fingers, her raiment sparking with divine power. ‘I suspected as much. But I don’t think that this is a moment for stealth. No, this is the time to strike.’

Her eyes sparked with power, burning a brilliant azure blue as her glowing fingers carved a prayer into the air, characters hanging there for a moment before vanishing. A circle of light hovered there for a moment, surrounded by incomprehensibly dense rune-script, Hakara judging it safest to retreat backwards slightly, taking cover with Parth a few steps backwards.

The spell completed, Carissia placed her palm against the centre. Thunderous force shot forward, a vastly-powerful strike that impacted against the door. Even with magical reinforcement, it crumpled like paper, the warding spell vanishing in a brief burst of flame. The column of force continued forward, smashing through the rest of the building. The stone front cracked and tilted, the ancient statues starting to fall apart.

Next to her, Pajaran prayed, a blessing cascading out from her and granting power to her companions. Hakara felt a gentle stirring of her soul, spurring her to martial vigour and power as the blessing took hold.

Carissia gestured again, motes of fire sparking into life above her. Dust started to ripple and flow, at first just the normal cascade of debris from a building falling apart, but then it started to move with purpose, a choking torrent of black-grey dust, swirling up into a humanoid shape. Its limbs were long and gnarled, arms reaching almost to its knees, fingers tipped with black claws. It was wearing a funereal shroud with a loop of grey cloth hiding its face.

It spoke, or at least a voice was heard, somehow transmitted without making an actual noise. It was like Miss Janaxia, although this voice was reminiscent of decaying, skittering things in dark corners, a thing of death and curses, rather than… whatever Miss Janaxia was.

Who disturbs my rest? Who dares to wake Falinax d’Arcineux, the slayer of the Seven Sages? I will feast on your blood and eat your soul. Come, my children! Arise, and feast!

From behind him emerged other shadowed shapes, all equally hunched and misshapen. None bore weapons or armour, but had fearsome claws, their bodies lean things of muscle and sinew, skin leathery and tough-looking.

‘You have been left to your darkness too long. Today is when you finally go to your final judgement.’ The motes of fire around Carissia blossomed and grew, then shot forward. The first one landed where Falinax was stood, but he jumped backwards in time, evading the worst of the blast. The other motes cascaded in a storm next to the first, the other creatures slower to move and getting caught in the firestorm, their bodies withering to dust and ash, amidst a torrent of screams.

Falinax hovered in the air for a moment, warped and misshapen wings somehow supporting his weight. Hakara cast her own spell, a wall of ice forming from nothing, and falling atop two more of the creatures, their bodies squashed flat beneath the weight of ice. Arrows shot upwards, puncturing through a wing, making Falinax start to spiral down.

Carissia drew her mace, using it as a spell-focus, brilliant blue light shining forth. ‘Begone from this realm, accursed thing of darkness!’ Falinax plummeted towards her, claws extended, reaching towards her to slay and rend. A protective barrier flashed into being, diverting the force of the attack, and giving her an opening. She raised and swung the mace, cleaving it through one of Falinax’s arms. The tattered, withered flesh started to fade and turn to ash as soon as it was severed, although his shoulder bubbled and seethed, already attempting to heal.

His other arm lunged forward, slashing down at Carissia and puncturing through the layers of arcane protection that warded her, managing to scratch her bare shoulder. The small wound immediately started to turn black, some dread infection wending its way through Carissia’s veins. She winced in pain as Hakara peppered Falinax with magical darts, trying to drive him off. Pajaran spoke another prayer, attempting to heal the wound Falinax had inflicted, the scratches glowing for a moment but not closing. He glanced over his shoulder, just in time for Parth to unleash a volley of arrows, sinking them into his leathery flesh.

He raised his head and howled, a spike of dread embedding itself into Hakara’s spirit, trying to instil fear into her and choke her with paralysing terror. She clenched her hand, feeling her nails digging into her flesh as she fought for control, Parth already leaping into combat with her blade, bow cast aside for the moment.

Carissia took a deep breath, pushing forward and throwing Falinax back, before raising her mace in front of herself. It pulsed with holy power, washing out with warming sunlight and making Falinax scream again. He raised a hand to cover his eyes, Carissia taking advantage of the moment to attack. He couldn’t move fast enough to block as she battered her mace through his body, his weathered flesh proving little defence against Carissia’s divine might. Chunks of his body exploded into bone and dust, the rest crumbling to the ground.

Even with that, he still wasn’t dead, not truly. Hakara continued to assault the shattered body and conjured up a wall of ice, freezing a regenerating arm within as it tried to rejoin the body, Carissia still bathing the area in sacred light. Pajaran threw a vial of holy water at it, the thin glass shattering, the broken and warped body dissolving and melting into black ichor. Hakara called up an icestorm, hearing the howls of the other creatures as they were caught behind the ice wall, without anywhere to escape to as the hailstorm pounded away at them from beneath.

Until the sun dawned, the creature refused to truly die. It was only when the golden light of dawn rose above the horizon that the bubbling, ashen mess finally stopped writhing and trying to heal, dissolving away into dead paste, truly dead this time.

Carissia touched her wound, the scratches healing without even leaving a mark. ‘Good. Another foe that has been left too long, dragged into the sunlight and destroyed.’ She swayed for a moment, her tiredness showing. ‘Hakara, Pajaran, go and see if there is anything of use, and deal with any survivors.’

Pajaran gave a half-salute, still not quite sure how to behave around Carissia. ‘Yes, High Priestess.’

Hakara dismissed the wall of ice, revealing puddles of grease and ash on the other side, some still roughly humanoid. There was a thick reek of blood and fat, some of the creatures smeared into paste by the hailstones she had called up. It was rather distasteful, but, well, the things were vampires. And feral ones to boot, the reason the area was uninhabited.

Pajaran led the way, shield and mace at the ready, body tense, still on the watch for any attackers. She was like Stathis that way – prepared and trained, able to adapt and improvise, making Hakara feel clunky and awkward as she tried not to snag her robes on the walls.

Inside the building, it was a maze of narrow stony passages, not helped by Carissia’s initial attack demolishing much of the interior. Stone creaked above them, the supports damaged, the building probably not far from collapse. The interior showed that it had been Elven-built, from the height of their Empire, every stone imbued with magic to last through the millennia.

‘Think there’s anything here?’

Pajaran’s question jerked Hakara from her reverie, making her look around guiltily. She reached into a belt-pouch to find the vial of powdered crystal. She threw some into the air, before casting a spell. Her vision changed, anything magical now glowing.

The place was thick was background energy, the walls glowing with a pale blue sheen, with large dark areas visible where Carissia’s spell had blasted the stone to dust. Somewhere towards the back was a bright glow, an ugly red-and-black scab against the blue. Hakara started moving towards it, having to squint awkwardly to try and still see the mundane world beneath the magical glow, Pajaran helping to steer her.

She had to stoop through a small gap, finding the remnants of a library. The stone shelves were still mostly intact, but all that remained of the books were a few tattered shards of parchment. But, partially hidden beneath a ragged and tattered rug, was a sturdy wooden chest. Some spells were bound about it, but they quickly fell beneath Hakara’s dispelling of the magic. The lock itself didn’t last much longer, as Pajaran smashed it with her weapon, breaking apart the wood.

Inside was a variety of… well, rubbish, mostly. Old trinkets and tattered clothing, but beneath that was an orb, a perfect sphere of crimson crystal. Hakara could see the power in it, a deep well of vital energy, probably drained from victims and built up over decades or even longer. It had a similar feeling to Janaxia, albeit less dark. Hakara briefly wondered where she was now – she had escaped, somehow, fleeing the wrath of Stathis’ mother. Stathis herself was alive, in a fashion – her body now under careful guard, but her spirit had been taken, or destroyed.

Hakara shunted such thoughts aside, trying to focus on the issue at hand. She focused her divination spell, more carefully examining the sphere, checking if there were any protective wards or spells upon it. It contained much power, but didn’t appear to be using it for anything, simply a repository. She prodded it with a finger, ready to jump away if it should attack or protect itself, but it simply rolled a few inches before stopping. She picked it up, the thing still not reacting, uncomfortably chill to the touch, like a clammy corpse, something that should have been warm instead cold to the touch.

She didn’t recognise the crafting techniques used, but could deduce a few things – multiple interlocking focus points, probably at least a dozen crystal spheres within each other, in order to create a pocket dimension where power could be stored. It was impressive to build such a thing with little obvious leakage – normally, this sort of thing would be leaking power into the surroundings, even the slightest flaw in the crystals weakening the binding. She tried to avoid thinking about how it had been filled with power, souls probably wrenched from bodies, ripped out with such force that they couldn’t even become ghosts, used simply as raw power.

There was a flare of heat, white fire bursting from nothing, the orb cracking and melting away. Hakara reflexively tried to ward herself, but the heat was so fierce and focused that the energy was consumed without blasting outwards at all. Carissia strode in, using her magic to clean dirt from her clothing, fire still flickering around her fingertips.

‘I was expecting more of a challenge, but now that has been dealt with. Another force of darkness eliminated. Sadly, no sign of Janaxia or any other Uth Tremari, it would be satisfying to deal with that snake personally. And to make her disclose what she did to Stathis.’

‘Something with her soul or essence, I believe. Her body is hale enough, but lacks any driving force. At least it is safely protected though, I doubt many forces would be capable of breaking through the amount of magical wards and protections that your mother placed around Stathis’ body.’

‘The bitch managed to transport herself away; she may be capable of other strange magics. If I’d know she was an Uth Tremari, I would have dealt with her myself! But Stathis never was as ruthless as she needed to be, she probably thought that Janaxia could be redeemed or suchlike. But one that trucks with the darkness is tainted forever. No mercy, only destruction.’

Hakara didn’t directly respond, having found that raising Janaxia at all led to harsh reactions from Carissia. Whatever she was, it seemed strange to attack Stathis so openly and suddenly, and in such a place – it would have been far easier for Janaxia to have killed Stathis somewhere in the wilderness, and then it could have been put down as simply an adventuring mishap, rather than being so obvious about it. Janaxia was overly-dramatic, but not to the point of suicide! Quite where she had gone though, was a mystery – a horned woman, especially as one as weird as Janaxia, shouldn’t be hard to find, but her portal or whatever she had opened must have transported her far enough way that she couldn’t be found. Since then, they had been travelling between various dank mausoleums, grave-pits and sanctums, Carissia burning them away with scourging light.

‘I would like some further samples. It is possible that there is some method or principle behind this all – it is unlike other curses I have seen. If you could, um, leave something behind please?’

She looked at Pajaran and Parth, hoping for some support – Parth shrugged and looked away, not wanting to get involved, as Pajaran swung her mace, flicking off grave-dust and fragments of bone. ‘Do you think you might be able to do something, Hakara? We need to get Stathis back. And I spent long enough locked up in that damn ice I don’t want her going through anything similar. I was still awake, sort of – I could sense things, other than the cold, occasional movement close by, just enough to let me know I wasn’t entirely dead, just damn close.’ She shivered. ‘So if she’s stuck anywhere, I want to help her get out, as quickly as possible. And if we get to destroy monsters and evil wizards and stuff, then that’s a bonus.’

Carissia nodded. ‘Yes. There have always been more pressing engagements in the past, but it is a relief to finally bring destruction to such foes. It is a concern that they seem to be readying themselves for something as well, but that will be dealt with in due time.’

‘Rest, ere the light falls.’ Parth’s quiet voice cut into the conversation. ‘Darkness has gone, for a period. Safe.’

Carissia looked as though she was about to argue, before Pajaran dumped her own pack onto the floor. ‘Yeah, it’s been a rough few days, and I doubt anyone will be stupid enough to come back here for a while. Hakara, you want to summon up your sanctum? Be more comfortable than the ground.’

‘Of course.’ Hakara fell into the comfortable incantations, easing open a crack between dimensions to make a bolthole, the slit glowing with azure light. She held her hand out, feeling the slight change in the air, a subtle stickiness in nothing, then peeling it open and letting Pajaran in first. She immediately plunked herself down in the corner, already pulling out some jerky and putting it in her mouth, letting her spit soften it. Parth entered, the ground beneath her bristling with moss for a moment before fading back to being soft, featureless blue. When Carissia entered, there was a spark of firelight around her eyes and hands, the soft smell of smoke wafting around the enclosed space.

‘I have set wards upon our surrounds, just in case anyone is foolish enough to attack.’ From her expression, she looked like she wanted to fight, to have something else to destroy – ever since Stathis had been cursed, then Carissia had been set on destruction, eager to fight. But even her stamina had limits, the dark circles beneath her eyes getting more and more pronounced, despite the carnage she was wrecking on her enemies.