The
creature that fed on my memories, a bastellus, the lich boasted, finished
feeding on me again. Each night was worse than the one before, and now I was
down to almost no magic. All of the advanced learning was gone. Only the most
basic lessons from Windy remained. I wouldn't surrender those memories, though.
I couldn't.
On
the table to my left, Windy lay dead, her neck snapped and vacant eyes staring
at me. Two nights ago—or was it three?—Windy had told the lich what he had
wanted to know on promise to release me and remove the curse from Rina. Of
course the creature had reneged. Rina's entire arm was now skeletal, and spread
into her chest so that her shoulder and ribs were nothing more than white bone.
The
lich stopped by every few hours for its own amusement, watching as we suffered,
that horrible, magically projected sound serving as its voice and laugh.
I
drifted in and out of nightmare-filled sleep; I tried to force myself to stay
awake, but without food, I had no way to fight off the fatigue. Each time I
drifted into sleep, the creature came back to inspire more horrible nightmares
and feed off my life essence. I didn't have much left. My mind was scoured of
nearly all memory of magic. I had lost a good part of my time away from home
with my friends. I clung to only a couple memories of Virgil and Faenoth each,
a bare handful of Windy as most of them were linked to my experiences with
magic. I fought the creature with everything I had left to preserve memories of
Markun, Alistair, and my family. And Rina.
My
eyes slipped closed once more, and I felt myself pulled down into troubled
sleep.
The
nightmare started right away, taunting me this time with Rina restored to
health and I free of this place, making our escape, only to stumble onto the
lich's true lair, where Markun and Alistair lay dead, their corpses beginning
to rise in undeath.
My
eyes snapped open, and I blinked at the brightness of holy light; fire light,
at that. I made out the shape of a familiar dwarf even as Alistair swung
Markun's warhammer against my shackles, shattering them.
This
didn't have the feel of the nightmare, but I had seen such episodes play out
too many times before to fully trust it, but I had nothing left to lose.
"Rina,"
I mumbled.
"We're
tending to her," Alistair said as he struck again. The force of the blow
rattled hard against my wrist, causing a deep pain that could only be the
shattering of bone.
I
wanted to scream in pain, but couldn't muster anything more than whimper.
"Dinnae
worry, lad, I can fix tha," Markun assured.
I
felt pain in my ankles, next, but not as severe, then Alistair was carrying me,
running through the lich's halls.