He moved. In only heartbeats, faster than Albanon could call a spell to mind, Vestagix had closed the distance between him and the three standing below. The huge talon, completely out of proportion to the rest of his body, lashed out in a wide arc.
Belen grabbed Lord Padraig and dragged him to the ground, both of them rolling out of the way of the terrible claw. Immeral stood his ground. His sword already out, he parried Vestagix’s blow. Crystal rang against steel. Vestagix’s smile didn’t falter. His left hand, the talons smaller but still sharp, raked at Immeral’s belly. The eladrin swayed back to avoid them.
In that moment, the great talon thrust past his guard. It hooked into the flesh of his shoulder. Vestagix wrenched his arm back and the talon tore through flesh and leather armor, shoulder and throat. Blood gushed out. Immeral’s free hand went to his throat as if he could stop the flow, but his sword was already sliding from his grip.
Albanon felt like he was falling, just as he had under the nightmare demon’s attack, except that this was no illusion. The force of the blow had spun Immeral around. As he sank to his knees, his eyes rose. Albanon imagined that the hunter was looking at him, that his gaping mouth struggled to form words one last time. My prince…
Beside him, Roghar bellowed in fury. “Demon!” he roared. “Face me! Bahamut’s strength will drive you back where you came from!” He rushed down the stairs in a clatter of armor.
Vestagix looked from the charging paladin to where Padraig and Belen were rising warily, then bared white teeth and sprinted toward the wall-but not toward Roghar. Before Immeral’s body had collapsed onto its face, Vestagix had disappeared under the walkway above Winterhaven’s gate. Roghar roared again and disappeared after him.
The need to act forced focus upon Albanon’s mind. “Tempest, Uldane-get some people off the wall and back down to the gate!” He didn’t wait for their response, he just followed Roghar. His mind raced along with his feet. What in the three worlds was Vestagix? They’d all seen Vestapalk take control of and speak through plague demons, but Vestagix was different. He didn’t look like any other demon and he didn’t act like he was being controlled. He acted like Vestapalk himself.
A weight settled on his shoulder and needle-sharp claws gripped his skin before he reached the bottom of the stairs. “A wizard’s place is at a distance,” Splendid shrieked in his ear. “Stay on the wall. You’ll be safe there.”
“I can’t see what’s happening on the wall,” Albanon told her, “and I can’t help Roghar if I can’t see him.” He reached the bottom of the stairs and spun toward the gate. The sound of the demon horde outside was intensified below. The thick wood of the gate shook and thundered with every misshapen body that was flung against it. Two human bodies lay before the gate: the guards who had stayed at their posts had fared no better against Vestagix than Immeral.
Roghar had caught up to the intruder though, and it appeared that Vestagix had more respect for his new, heavily armored opponent. The two circled each other like weird reflections, Roghar bright and noble, Vestagix dark and savage. It seemed to Albanon that they knew it, too. There was a hatred in Roghar’s eyes that he wasn’t used to seeing.
“You mock the shape of dragonborn and dragon alike,” said the paladin.
Vestagix sneered at him. “And you,” he said, “have angered one greater than the gods.”
Roghar growled deep in his throat and lunged. Vestagix, still sneering, caught and turned the impulsive thrust with his outsized claw-leaving himself open to a powerful and fully controlled slam from Roghar’s shield. The blow threw him against the gate and Roghar closed in, his facade of anger replaced by deadly focus. The sneer vanished from Vestagix’s face, replaced by a snarl. He pushed off from the gate, slashing at Roghar in a frenzy that drove the dragonborn back pace by pace.
Albanon clenched his teeth and drew a spell close to the surface of his mind. Sliding sideways, he tried to find an opening to cast it, but Vestagix’s whirling attack was too quick. One moment he had a clear line, the next Roghar was between them. Splendid clung tight to his shoulder. “Back away,” she begged. “You can attack from a greater distance.”
He ignored her. Roghar was beginning to look harried. Vestagix had him on the defensive and Albanon knew in his gut he wasn’t going to get his opening. He’d have to risk throwing his spell, even if it meant catching Roghar by mistake. As Vestagix turned around the paladin again, Albanon exhaled, concentrated, and released the spell with a flick of his fingers and a whispered word. Two thin blue bolts streaked at the demon-who sprang back with the same lithe quickness that had been Immeral’s doom. As he leaped, he turned and his tail snaked around Roghar’s sword hand. The flexing, splintering crystal tightened, then jerked. Roghar cursed and clutched at his wrist as both his sword and his gauntlet were wrenched away. They went clattering across the ground. Vestagix glared at Albanon, his red eyes narrowed.
“Maybe you will die first after all, wizard,” he said. Albanon felt sudden fear race through him and groped for another spell. With Vestagix’s speed, it would take only an instant for him to bound across the distance between them.
But the demon didn’t come for him. Instead he turned-and Albanon’s heart dropped as he realized that Vestagix’s leap away from his magic had brought him right beside the counterweight for the gate.
Roghar saw it, too. He charged, his shield held in front of him like moving wall. Brilliant white light burst from the symbol of Bahamut.
Too late. Vestagix seized the carefully balanced counterweight and wrenched it down. The great beam barring the gate soared up. The gate slammed open and a wave of plague demons poured into Winterhaven.
Caught right in front of the gate, Roghar was engulfed by the surge. Bahamut’s light dimmed and disappeared among crimson crystal and demonic flesh.
“Roghar!” came a scream from above. Albanon caught a glimpse of Tempest on the stairs. Flame from her rod blasted into the mob, to no visible effect. She might have been swatting at a cloud of midges. Behind her, Winterhaven’s defenders rushed down from the wall, but like Roghar’s charge, they were too late. Even as the villagers reached the ground, the horde swarmed around Vestagix, hiding him, and spread out to meet them.
Albanon put his back to the nearest wall and tried to choke down his fear and dismay. First Immeral, now Roghar? He saw the plague demons take others, too. The man who had opened the gate for them earlier that day. A woman he had seen in the inn. Thair Coalstriker crushed the skull of one bestial demon with a heavy hammer-only to have another leap over its body and slam into him. The dwarf hit the ground with the demon tearing at his chest and throat. Someone wailed in anguish, the sound rising above shouts and screams and howls.
Rage closed like a fist around Albanon’s heart. He stabbed his staff toward the demon crouched over Thair and a silvery bolt of magical force sent it sprawling. Thair didn’t rise, but Albanon knew there were others he could still fight for. He shook Splendid off his shoulder. “Find somewhere safe,” he told her, then he spread the fingers of his free hand and hissed a word. A wave of flame rolled over a trio of demons, leaving two of them rolling and shrieking as fire consumed them.
Unfortunately the third, though scorched and smoking, remained sufficiently alive to snarl and lunge at Albanon. The wizard brought a column of golden flame rushing up around it, but the damage was done. He’d drawn the attention of the demons. A pack broke free from the horde and raced for him. Albanon clenched his jaw. He blew across the palm of his hand and an icy mist streamed from it, billowing up into a thick cloud around the demons. Yelps of surprise emerged from the mist as the creatures reacted to the cold.
The cloud wouldn’t last long, but it would distract the demons. Quickly, Albanon slid along the wall, trying to get closer to one of the knots of fighting villagers. He wouldn’t last long on his own in an open melee. When the first shape came out of the fading mist, he was ready for it. Another silver bolt darted from his staff.