Open Chronicles The Sun Bears Down On Alliria

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Raphael aimed his wrist at the third flame but was far too late. The tentacle shot forth into the spine of the witch, and his eyes widened in horror at the sight. For a moment too long, Raphael was enamored by what was happening to her. And this beast they faced was as much an opportunist as any bandit or thief.

The thing of it was, Raphael knew from the onset how absolutely pointless his presence here was. He was a casualty waiting to happen, and Elle had seen it, too. Even with his reveal of the creature and the potential to shock the turtle once it reached the maw, would it actually do anything?

If there was anything he’d done today, it was just further anger the beast that hunted her. He was part of no prophecy nor legend. He was not some grand hero intended for greatness. All he was to the thing they fought, was in the way. And it made haste to deal with that.

Raphael hadn’t even seen it coming. The tentacle that wrapped around his ankle had came when he wasn’t looking for it. When he was concerned about Elle. The next part felt like it took years, even to Elle and any other onlookers, not even a second had passed.

The tentacle flung Raphael towards the Falwood. He almost made it passed four trees, but his wide open arm connected with the fourth tree, sending him spiraling back to the ground and clean breaking his left arm.

He tried to yell in pain but the wind had been stolen from him. It came out only as an exasperated whisper as the mage’s head throbbed next to his heart, and he held his now shattered arm in grief.
 
Unbeknownst to Elle, the living flame had begun to feast on her spirit, the latent magical energy which resided within her. She was still commanding the elemental, an act of concentration which required all of her attention, as it took step after thundering step towards the maw of the unspeakable itself. The tentacle which had connected continued to pulse with a grotesque bulging, as if it were pumping magic like water out of the witch's body.

That was the catch, though--Elle herself was less a reservoir of magic herself, but instead a conduit for other magics to take place. That was the patron's design: to use her flesh and blood as a living focus to work great and terrible magics, and by evoking the lake spirit, Elle had simply reversed the process by allowing magic to work through her. In essence, the living flame wasn't borrowing from Elle's own spirit, but rather the very spirit of the lake itself. Evil or no, there were great magics buried in the most common places, and this lake in particular housed a particularly strong reservoir of energy, thus allowing for the conjuring of the elemental, but now also causing a feedback effect as the energy of the lake was siphoned into the flame, an effect similar to one drinking the fluid from a cut hemlock, dousing one's life as a fire might be doused by water.

So with each passing moment, as Elle's skin started to burn ever so slightly in an imperfect circle near the location of the puncture, the creature grew weaker, ingesting the toxic energy. As this was happening, the elemental had finally reached the opening in the ground and, unsure what would happen, Elle commanded it with a pushing motion of her arms to take the plunge and throw itself into the maw. There was a great rumbling as this happened, as the giant body of water collided with the flame, creating a giant mass of steam and causing the earth to shake violently. The creature shrieked a bloodcurdling cry as its very life essence began to be doused, poisoned both inside and from without by the power of the water, which ended when, finally, a great amount of fiery steam erupted from the hole in the ground like a geyser, the creature unleashing one last wail until finally, its life force was extinguished.

The tentacle in Elle's back slipped out, its foul purpose no longer possessing the will to continue. Her lower back was burned in an imperfect circle, yet the flesh immediately scarred over, which Elle would only notice the next time she decided to bathe. Her trance was broken at last, causing her to gasp as she regained consciousness of her own body. There would be time later to ruminate on what had happened, but for now, she wandered out of the water tentatively, gathering her bigger robe into a ball, which she carried in one arm before stepping away from the shore, walking towards the hole in the ground itself now that the steam had subsided.

Inside, there was no trace of the terrible evil itself. Instead, the ground itself was black, as if scarred by the touch of the living flame. It was far too deep to investigate, but, it seemed for now that the entity had been destroyed, and it dawned on her that the ambient temperature had begun to feel bearable again, indicating that the great horror had been responsible for the weather, in addition to the devastation it had caused the very ground itself.

At last, she remembered the reckless mage who had helped her, and she turned away from the scarred land to look around. Had he been consumed by the flame? Had something worse occurred? She felt a twinge of sadness, feeling responsible that someone like that had come to her aid and now, perhaps, he had died because of her.

"Raphael?" she asked against the sudden quiet, with a meek voice. Then, a little louder she called, though in her heart she suspected there would be no answer, as tears welled in her eyes.

"RAPHAEL!!"

Raphael Thrice
 
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The pain was so intense, and his arm felt more like rope than flesh. There was a ringing in his senses that blocked out the fact that the fight was over. As far as he was aware, it wasn't. And Elle was in danger. Even through his own personal physical trauma all he could note was that the witch, a much more powerful mage than he, was in danger.

Beneath his exterior of philandering antics and lack of proper conversation, Raphael really did want to help people. Erase that part of him that was snobbish and thought itself better than others. That's why he'd left. That's why he was here right now.

So, this dumb electromancer stood up. He pushed up off a nearby branch with his good arm and even though the jagged points of the stick punctured his palm and made him bleed; he stood up. Then, he walked towards Elle. Whose voice he could hear calling his own name.
 
She looked around for a few moments in vain to find Raphael, who had seemingly vanished. Calling out for him hadn't helped, either, and she began to resign quietly to the thought that he had perished while she had been under the trance to control the lake elemental. She was overcome with an undeniable sorrow at the thought of it, that the stranger who had helped her face the living flame was now simply gone, disappeared, with no way for Elle to even honor him other than reverent memories.

Not that the honor of a witch counts for much, she thought, bittersweetly.

Thankfully, this wouldn't last, as eventually she saw Raphael emerge from the tree line nearby. With a smile, she hastened to see him again, although when she neared him she noticed that something was wrong--his arm didn't seem to be working well. Still, for the moment she was mostly elated at the news of his survival, and made it known.

"Raphael, you're alive!" she exclaimed. "I thought the living flame had taken you. How glad I am to see you alive again!" she said, moving forward to suddenly embrace him, her arms around his back and her head momentarily planted in his chest. In a moment, she would relinquish him, finally noticing the problem.

"By the moon, your arm!.." she cried out. "What happened?! I was in a trance and lost all waking awareness..."

Raphael Thrice
 
It was hard for him to remember exactly what it was that had happened. He was so dazed from the impact that it barely registered as important. The monstrosity seemed to be gone, and he knew that it had done this to him. He’d just been thrown aside like an unimportant sack so it felt pointless to try to recall how the attack had gone.

“It attacked me… It threw me through the woods…”

His voice no longer held by his dumb bravado. Raphael sounded humbled by the experience, and in a tremendous amount of pain. His heart was beating so hard against his brain it begin to be akin to a migraine.

What did click was what he’d tried to prevent. The tentacle that had reached Elle has she fought back against that nightmare. Raphael had come so close to saving her from whatever it had done. She seemed fine. Yet, he knew there was no way that what had occurred was at all a good thing.

”Elle. You were struck, too. It pierced your flesh. It grew -cough- white…” Raphael knelt on one knee before her. The pain was too much has he gripped his useless arm.
 
Elle shook her head as Raphael mentioned the wound she had sustained. She didn't feel she had time to explain the intricacies of the magic that had occurred, especially not with his arm in such a state.

"I'm fine," she said. "You're the one with a broken arm. Here," she said, reaching into the folds of her robe and revealing a flask with a blue liquid inside. "Drink this. It should heal your arm up nicely. Might do more than that, too."

She handed the flask to him expectantly, then waited for him to drink it as she folded her arms. It was a healing potion, no doubt, that would heal his wounds, but might have some side effects a few days from now, especially on things on the body that grow—hair, nails, and so on. A small price to pay to instantaneously fix a broken arm, she thought, caring little whether he would mind those side effects.

She would have to explain what happened, she suspected, but not yet. Not on his terms. After all, she wasn't entirely sure what had happened yet herself, and what's more... she would have to explain her whole sob story to him. And she wasn't quite sure she was ready to do that yet, either, even if he did deserve it.
 
Couldn't imagine she'd try to poison him. Either way, it didn't matter much to the battered mage. He wanted relief and he wanted it now. She'd proven herself an incredible caster, he doubted very much this was a lie. And so, he took the flask with his good arm and downed the azure ale.

Raphael expected the process of his arm healing to be an excruciating one. An experience of shattered bone reconnecting via violent jerking and twisting. A witch's potion just held that sort of air about it. To his surprise, that isn't what occurred. It acted more like a regeneration.

Ethereal and temporary strands of magic wove themselves around his fractured appendage. They worked as a bridge for his bones to find their way back home. As there was no sign of pain, he let out a deep sigh.

"You're one hell of a mage, you know that?" He said with a tired chuckle.
 
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