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.' HERE!The Lord to Come of All Deep Hell bounds into the air, tentacles become mighty wings, arms spread in welcome.QUEEN OF ME, HERE I-The bolt that shocks out of the Simbul is so fierce that it plucks her from her feet and hurls her backward.As she falls, she sends her will riding along the beam, to pierce the mind of her foe even as the bright lance of her silver fire stabs him.[In a brief glimpse across Avernus, a lone human female rises into the air like a beacon, her hair a halo of flame around her.Devils everywhere wince and roar and cringe.Distant mountains erupt in smoke and flame.]Silver fire crashes into hot darkness, roiling.*El, I am come.*I live, and love thee.I am in this devil, all of me.Mystra, but ye are magnificent![amusement] *But of course.*Nergal, roaring in torment at the fire raging in him, the Simbul ruthless in her scorching and searing, leaving him a broken as Hell that lives only because her Elminster is trapped within it, only to fade as her fire does, fade away.No, leave me not!NO, LEAVE ME NOT! FADE NOT FROM-WHAT AM I SAYING? OUT, HUMAN WORM.OUT OF MY MIND.YOU INFECT ME, YOU-GET YOU GONE![Nergal summons all of his power, a black-and-red wave, dark and swift enough to shatter even the Simbul's fury.He thrusts.Images whirl in insane chaos, brightness like shards of shattering glass, memories and tears and laughter all together, into the thing in the offal pit.A naked human retches and squirms as Hell is torn apart around him.]NOW,WITCH, IT'S YOUR TURN![Red-and-black bolts howl out of the great winged devil, cleaving the blood-red sky like reaching fingers.]Crash, stagger, bright beauty still standing.Bloody lips twist."Is that the best you can do, devil?" Slender fingers point, and fire surges forth, a little wearily now.Burst of blue-white fire, Nergal screaming.[frantic red lightning, and flight]THIS HAS GOTTEN OUT OF HAND! WHERE IS ASMODEUS? WHERE ARE THE HOSTS OF HELL? IS SHE GOING TO BE ALLOWED TO KILL US ALL?FIRES OF THE PIT, SHE CAN STRIKE AT ME THROUGH YOU![mind bolt, dark and huge, sent to slay, roaring through the vaults.][.and rebounding back through the darkness to slap down Nergal]Sobbing and convulsing, the tentacled devil rolled in darkness, his chain melting away."Sorry," said the naked, filthy man beside him.He waved stumps that were his arms."We're too closely linked now, devil, for that to work."With a sudden, furtive movement, Elminster raised one arm to touch what was tangled in his hair.He said in his mind, cold and crisp and hard, By the will ofTanthul and my need, let it be my bone shards, yonder-and let it be now.Nergal had just time to dart a look at his mind-slave before the bone fragments in him expanded into duplicates of the larger bones they'd been a part of-and the archdevil's body burst apart with a deep, wet roar.[song, mad music wild and screaming, red fire and staring, disbelieving diabolic eyes, fading to darkness.oblivion]Alone and maimed in a cavern deep in Avemus, Elminster went to his knees and sobbed bitterly.The mind that had ridden his for a seeming eternity was stilled and gone…It's a dark thing to lose any being one knows so well.[red, writhing pain, drifting back so slowly through torment, at last to the light.]"Fires take all," Nergal muttered, as weak and sick as he always was when coalescing back from tattered smoke and essence to solidity once more.He glared around blearily at the offal-choked cavern and the small, round black stone that was always there when he cheated death.More mighty contingency magic spent, wasted because of carelessness."That was a near one," he whispered, not yet strong enough to growl."I'll never reign in Hell if I go on underestimating humans.""Too true," a voice said sweedy, from behind him.Nergal, rightful Prince of Hell, whirled around as quickly as he could on rubbery limbs.He stared into the smiling face of the Witch-Queen of Aglarond, who floated less than an arm's-reach away
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