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Cadderly lay on the stone floor, sucking air into his parched throat as the fires in the rooical manifestations of curtains, tapestries, carpet, and wood

Cadderly understood that this grand hallas purely the iical fields too dense to be sparked apart byfla that the properties of such extradioverned true ht be the potential, then, if he could create soic, and bring it back to his own plane? he wondered

Cadderly filed the notion far away in hishi than any hypothetical possibilities flashing around in his always questioning thoughts He forced himself to his knees and noted the wizard’s sooty footsteps on the floor, noted by their long stride and sht

A dozen yards doith several doors lining either side of the corridor, the wizard had apparently realized his obvious tracks, for they siure out which way Aballister had gone

Still kneeling, Cadderly took out his crossbow and loaded an explosive dart He laid the weapon on the floor beside him and realized, with a quiet nod of his head, that he held one advantage over Aballister, the greatest advantage of a cleric over a wizard By Cadderly’s estimation, Aballister had not been wise to break off the combat, no matter how badly Cadderly’s pillar of fla priest fell back into the song of Deneir, let it take him where it had co

He brushed a hand over his scorched cheek, closing the wound and perfectly ainst thebolt had thundered home When he took up his crossbow and stood, just a few minutes later, his wounds did not see priest wondered And what traps and wards had the clever Aballister set for him?

He moved to the nearest door, a simple, unremarkable one to his left He scanned for any obvious traps, then called upon his ic to scrutinize it more fully Unremarkable, it seemed, and from what Cadderly could tell, unlocked

He took a deep breath to steady hirabbed the knob in one hand, and slowly turned it He heard a distinctive click, a hissing sound as the door’s edge slipped past the jamb

The door flew from his hand, snapped open in the blink of an eye A fierce, sucking wind grabbed at Cadderly, pulling him to the open portal His eyes widened in fear as he caate to yet another plane - one of the lower, evil planes judging fro the unbordered region in front of hith, and held on, too, to his precious crossbow

He was stretched out fully into the new plane, feet leading the way Fearful tingles caressed his body, a sensation that evil things were near hireat; Cadderly knew that he could not hold on for long

Cadderly locked his hands in place and forced himself into a state of calic to study the ic of this area, of the door and the threshold

All of the portal area was le spot stood out to Cadderly, its eic different and o with one hand, straightened his crossbow, and drew a bead

He couldn’t be sure if this was the place of the actual gate, the specific key to the interplanar barrier, but his actions rought of desperation He put the crossbow in line and let fly His shot did not hit theexplosion encoet spot

The wind stopped Cadderly’s instincts and ic screas in and get his hands clear of the door-jah not to question those instincts, and he dove headlong for the threshold, just aheadof the suddenly swinging door

The door snapped shut, sla when he hit the corridor’s opposite wall, his legs and lower back bruised and sore He glanced back and was ahtly into place, see jamb

Aballister’s extradimensional mansion apparently protected itself frolad that Aballister’s work had been so co in soion between the known planes

Ten steps down the stone corridor two more doors loomed One was unremarkable, like the one Cadderly had just encountered, but the other was ironbound with heavy straps and showed a keyhole below the handle Cadderly searched for traps, checked around the edges for any areas that ht reveal this, too, to be a portal to another plane Nothing dangerous became apparent, so he reached down and slowly turned the handle

The door was locked

It crossed Cadderly’s mind ht be harboring yet another of his pet ht put hi worse

The flip side to that arguht be behind this door, recuperating, preparing soics

Cadderly leveled the crossbow at the lock and fired, shielding his eyes from the expected flash He used the moment to put another dart in place, and when he looked back, he found a scorch mark where both the lock and the handle had been, and the door hanging loose on its hinges

Cadderly ducked to the side and pushed the door in, crossbow ready His bow slipped down, his smile widened once more when he realized the contents of this roo you out of hiding, wizard?" the young priest muttered under his breath He pushed the door closed behind him and crossed to the beaker-covered tables Cadderly had read h he was no alcheredients he could safelypriest now had in redients he could not

Ivan and Pikel led the charge down one corridor, cut through a room to the side, and headed out a back door into another corridor Vander cah the elfto be put down No ene rush The eneres, fell all over the to run away Ivan, o The danted only to find Cadderly and Danica, or to find soht hide and recover

Through the back door of another rooh the other way He had just grabbed the door’s handle when Pikel’s club hit the thing, launching hiainst the wall Both dwarves swar with a left hook, Pikel with a right, at the same time, on opposite sides of the unfortunatethe unconscious soldier as his friends ambled past, but he put up his axe and ran after the to Cadderly, whose constant deh-skinned dwarf

"To the side!" Shayleigh cried as Vander and-i’ikd dashed across the entrance to a side passage

"Oo!" Pikel squeaked, and he and the firbolg sprinted on, a group of ene around the corner behind them

Ivan barreled into thewildly

Twenty feet ahead, Vander put down Shayleigh, ent right to work stringing an arrow The firbolg spun about beside Pikel, deterh to Ivan’s rescue The two had only taken a step or then Shayleigh cried out, The other way!"

Sure enough, enee farther down, a large force led by a contingent of ogres Shayleigh put three arrows into ires, but another took its place, running right over the ain, scored another hit, and put her next arrow to her bowstring She couldn’t hold theh Even if every shot were perfect, if every shot killed an enemy, she would surely be buried where she stood

She fired again, and then the ogre was upon her, its club up high, a victorious screae head

Vander’s forear into its coreat sword swiped across, dise the enemies farther back

Ivan chopped and spun, every swipe connecting He saw an arrimly, but that soblin’s club sla out a tooth

Dazed, but still swinging, the dwarf backpedaled and sidestepped, trying to keep his balance, knowing that to fell was to be overwhel froroan as Pikel’s club s slashed Ivan’s forehead Blinded by his own blood, he chopped out, connecting solidly He heard Pikel again, to the side, and took a sture’s club caught the yellow-bearded dwarf in the lower back, launched hih several bodies, the last being Pikel’s, and went down atop his brother

Pikel heaved Ivan over behind hiled mass in front He squeaked frantically for his brother to join his would not led to stand, to get beside his brother He realized only then that he had somehow lost his axe, realized that he could not see and could not stand Darkness engulfed his thoughts as it had his eyes, and the last thing he felt was slender but strong hands grabbing his shoulders and hauling hireeted at the dining rooroans and shrieks of the wounded Danica started forward, her first instincts telling her to run through the carnage and seek out her friends She stopped i before her

The sight of their dead comrades had put the soldiers who had accoe, and two of theht before the monk, their spears leveled, their faces firen said cal not at all surprised by the piles of dead and mutilated Trinity soldiers

One of the spear, trying to decide if the consequences of disobedience would outweigh the satisfaction of ihts perfectly, saw the boiling hatred in his eyes "Do it," she prodded, as eager to strike at hien put her hand on the man’s back Flickers of electricity arced up the wizard’s body, slipped down her ar theposition, the shoulder of his leather tunic s on end

The next tiri nervously nearby The truce holds"

The wizard nodded to Danica, who sped off around the room She quickly discerned that her friends had made their valiant stand behind the s their trail as they left the place was not difficult, since it was dotted with blood

"M’lady Dorigen!" cried ain behind the wizard and her soldiers "We have them!"

Danica’s almond eyes flickered at the painful news, and she ran back across the hall