Absolution

No. I slam my forehead into the stone ground. No. Slam. I can't be caught up here. Slam. I have a job to do. Slam. I pull up my head and let the ensuing dizziness drive away the crippling despair. I push myself off the ground, and quick cast several Lesser Heals to seal the gushing wound on my forehead, and the blood trickling down the torn wound on my back. I'll grieve later. Now, I have work to do. If I don't, people will die...the image of my mother hanging on that golden pole penetrates my mind like a maggot through rotting flesh, and I drive it away by squeezing my eyes shut and shaking it out of my head.

I pick up the blade on the ground beside me and stumble forward. Another round of healing cures this round of dizziness. I can sense the presence of dozens of gathered Efrans outside. My grip tightens on the blade's handle. My fault? Surely. But that fault didn't lie with just me. These....bastards are equally responsible. I grit my teeth and step forward. They were the ones who brought her here. They were the ones who killed her. I reach my hand in my pocket and grab hold of the wand

"You that bind the All, guard me against those that would cause me harm."

I wince as the shell of aether pushes through my skin and sets around my body, and step to the door. The pain drives my ardor further. I lift my leg and kick the impaled body of the ratman in its chest. The spike breaks off at the base, and both the body and the remainder of the spike still stuck within it comes tumbling backward out of the doorway.

An arrow whistles as it flies at me as soon as I step out of the door. The arrow bounces off of my shield spell, and clatters to the ground. Why? Why did they take her? Why couldn't I be there? I grit my teeth and draw my wand. Rage burning through my body is as hot as ash.

"Bombard my enemies, O' thou servants of Gob, the magnomious."

I send the mana up the side of the church. Another arrow bounces off of me, and those on the ground rush toward me as I push the mana further up the wall toward the stone roof. A line of spikes erupting from the ground catches the first line of attackers in the stomach, and the others maneuver around them.

"I allow the breath of the salamanders to flow through me."

I can't use djinn's volley or any wind spells for protection at the moment, as the wind mana would mix badly with the earth mana I'm still pushing up the edge of the church, and had now begun to wrap around the third floor and the steepled roof. The fire and the earth mana begins to mix within my heart, and soon the fire bolt forming at the edge of my wand takes the form of a coalesced orb of orange lava hovering in front of me. The mana wrapping around the roof of the chapel has also begun to scorch the gray stones. I let the ball of lava loose into the middle of the pack. It collides against the face of an approaching ratman. It screams as the lava sticks to its face over its eyes like a glowing orange mask. It claws desperately until its fingers are bone, and then falls to the ground. The lava drips off of its nose and into the mouth of the creature, and it stops screaming.

Information flows through my head. A new spell? Good.

"From thou children of earth and flame, that dwell within the cavernous underneath, I call upon thy to lend your blood."

Another ball of lava forms in front of me. I let it off; aimed at the center of mass of a rather large dogman, about twice the size of the average one. He wears chain mail over his body and a chain mail hood that covered his ears. The ball of molten lava collides against the pit of his stomach, and the metal immediately begins to heat up and bore a hole into his stomach, he collapses to the ground, clutching his stomach as its contents begin to spill on the ground. Another arrow bounces off my shield, and it cracks and shatters, another row of earthen spikes catch the charging mass, and kill another five.

By the time my shield fell, my mana was done wrapping around the top floor of the chapel. I motion with my wand and the top rips off and flies at my command. The roof crashes into the approaching group, and tears up the ground, as it leaves half of the approaching Efrans with red smears in the dust, and comes to a stop as it crashes into the building that the archers were gathered on the roof of. Two of them lose their footing and fall; one's head smashes against the edge of the roof, scattering its skull and brains along the gray stone, and the other tries to break its fall with its arms. The arms snap and he buckles into the ground. The others manage to hold, or so they thought. As they were beginning to ready their next volley, the building itself groans in protest, tilted, and collapses into the wreckage like a felled tree.

What Efrans remain paused for a moment at the sheer destruction I had wrought. Tens had died, and dozens more will follow. The rage seeping into my blood and thrumming through my veins held at bay, the shackles of sorrow and grief as assuredly as the pain throbbing in my shoulder from the still open wound. I aim my wand at the mass of still-stunned Efrans.

"I call upon Zeus; lord of Olympus, to lend me a bolt so that I might smite my enemy."

A bolt of bright blue lightning shatters the air between me and them, followed by the deafening bellow of thunder. The bolt collides with the center of the mass. The ratman it struck, and the three other Efrans surrounding it seize in place and fall to the ground a twitching mess.

"A volley, o' djinn."

Arrows of wind and flame collide against the group, killing three instantly, and leaving another three, rolling on the ground. The remainder begins to run. As they pass by the discarded chapel's roof, five horizontal spikes jut out of the wall. All five spikes ram into the same creature; a passing by Ratman who's torn asunder at the force. Most of those running next to him are tossed to the side, skitter to their feet, and continue their retreat, save for the one directly next to him; the top of whose head was currently dangling off the point of one of the stone awls.

The sudden erection of a wall in front of them, causes most of the retreating mass to come to a temporary stop. A few scamper off to the sides and manage to slip away. Five more closely gathered pikes of stone jut out of the ground to their left, blocking in the retreating horde all the more and killing the few that the spikes manage to hit. They begin to back out, but another five spikes jut out of the destroyed roof blocking them in entirely. About five of the retreating horde managed to escape. That's okay. Let them run. Let them call for reinforcements. Bring them all to me, so that I might be sated.

I climb up the side of the room, and a couple of the Efrans try to do the same. I end that fantasy for them with a swift kick to send them reeling back down into the writhing mass. I hold my wand over their stone cage; only wishing for their death, and their pain. Perhaps, just perhaps, it would absolve my unfilial sins.

"From thou children of earth and flame, that dwell within the cavernous underneath, I call upon thy to lend your blood."

As soon as it forms to its limit, I let it loose over their heads. Their burning flesh cast choking black smoke skyward. I cast another Lava Orb over the panicking mass. Then another. And another, until every single head within the stone cage is covered in conjured molten stone, and I do not move from my perch watching over them until that glowing orange was a deep black, and the screaming had stopped.