Apostles of Doom

Tal Gor focused on the link to the portal, tracing it through the summoning stone, which was also what he had used to connect to Lord Tommus, so it was not particularly difficult. Imagining his staff as a slingshot, he spun it in a circle around his head with the thread-like link attached, imagining it wind up. Using his Eagle Sight, he focused on the fireball, imagining it was really a rabbit. He began speaking a chant he knew for summoning fire and then released the thread-like link, imagining it as a tethered arrow.

The link connected with the fireball, and suddenly it was coming straight at him!

Concentrate on imagining it being sucked into the portal, returning it to its birthplace! Elongating, shrinking in size to fit through your stone! Lord Tommus instructed.

The fireball began to stretch along the link, now arcing more like a bolt towards Tal Gor’s raised staff.

Lord Tommus grinned at him and instructed,Imagine you have a net on your staff and you are going to catch the fireball in the net. I don’t want you to let it go to the portal. I want you to catch it in your staff. If you need to, let the staff reel to compensate for momentum. The Lord of Doom said this urgently but confidently, as if had trained hundreds of shamans to do this before. Which, Tal Gor reflected, he probably had.

The fireball or bolt came roaring in; the heat was incredible! It was smaller in size, but seemed all the more intense, a blue-hot heat. It struck his stone, his magic net. Tal Gor had to draw mana from the mana pool to contain the fire. He changed his chanting to one for controlling fire, guiding it. It was a chant he’d never had much luck with before, but now was the time to try.

The staff was gyrating with the momentum of the fireball, now about eight inches in diameter, as it swirled, trapped around the summoning stone. He had to hold the staff with both hands for fear it would be ripped from his hands.

What do I do now? Tal Gor asked Lord Tommus in near panic.

The same thing you did to launch the thread, but this time I want you to pitch it back to the wizard, and really toss it! Channel the fire from the elemental portal to add to the flame; make it bigger, stronger. Feed the fire from the portal, Lord Tommus said.

I’m not sure how! Tal Gor cried out mentally. He was starting to panic.

Allow me. This is something I learned with Vaselle. Suddenly Tal Gor felt an immense presence, reassuring and confident, rock-solid, ancient and powerful, engulfing him, filling him. He felt confidence flood him as he swung the staff with one hand in a great arc, willing the Fire from the elemental portal to stream through his stone and into the fireball, now appearing as a large circle of fire, his staff, a spoke of a wheel, and from the spoke more and more Fire came to feed the burning ring of fire!

It grew higher, stronger, now a giant ring above his head, traced by the motion of his staff. His Eagle Sight focused on the wizard, who was staring at him in shock and, perhaps, awe. As their eyes met over the considerable distance, the wizard suddenly turned pale and began making all sorts of gestures and mouthing words.

Tal Gor felt his mouth twist into a smile of its own accord. He realized he was practically screaming his fire control chant at the top of his lungs. With a last surge, he swung the staff towards the wizard and released the Fire. The ring of fire went spinning through the air like a discus of flame, ten feet and then twenty in diameter. The air between him and the alfar surrounding the wizard shimmered, a shield to deflect the wheel of flames. It broke upon the shimmering air into lashes of flame that rained down upon the alvar, scorching and burning them and their mounts! Hippogriffs with flaming wings began quick spiral descents to land, their riders desperately trying to pat out the flames on both themselves and their mounts.

The wizard, slightly scorched but mostly intact, shook his head, staring at Tal Gor. He started mouthing another spell and making wide gestures. Tal Gor was suddenly frightened that the wizard was about to launch some new, non-fire based spell. He glanced to his right at sudden movement.

Lord Tommus, who was now once more beside him, no longer inside him, grinned. You won!