Chapter 18: Elf Attack

I'm still processing what that might mean when Fleur's hands begin to glow.

"I can't keep this contained any longer," she says to no one in particular, her tears returning, making tracks down her narrow cheeks. "I must let it return to the place it belongs."

Graldor's face pales, Vosh lurching forward, both looking frightened enough by her statement and illuminated hands my own terror ratchets upwards. But neither has time to stop her, the elf's head falling back, her voice lifting in song that feels like a knife blade to my heart while light bursts from her in a rush of rustling leaves.

The glowing amber of the shield spell she absorbed turns green then a sickly gray before plunging toward the floor, cascading in leaf shapes toward the roots curving into the stone. They land softly, almost like fluffy snowflakes, drawn immediately inside with faint popping sounds, as if the tree roots suck them down, thirsty for more. Fleur sags as the last of the magic of the guardian tree's power leaves her, sinking to her knees in the middle of the floor.

"Fleur," Vosh's deep voice echoes with regret while he bends and lifts her into his hands, her slim form draped over his thick fingers. "These aren't the elves you think they are."

Graldor turns his back to us as the sound of sighing echoes from the six tunnel entrances, the dead trees now seeming to flex, their roots and branches moving ever so slightly. Enough I know I'm not imagining their wakefulness, their return to life, and there's nothing peaceful or kind or welcoming about this eld grove deep underground.

"I'm sorry," she whispers. "I had no choice."

I believe her, the oppression of this place only increasing and I wonder then how much weight she bore from the moment we entered, she of elvish blood. But it's clear as one of the trees wavers and a tall, slender form emerges, Vosh is right. These elves are nothing like the wood folk from whom Fleur hails.

If anything, the dark gray skin and black eyes of the ghostly figure tells of another branch of her race far less welcoming. When he bows his head to us, slim hands folded before the black robe he wears, faintly transparent but growing more substantial by the moment, I understand completely the overbearing pressure I've been feeling. Not just a cemetery grove, not just elves. But dark elves, born to chaos and hate and twisted by the magic they bear, the resting place of foul drow.

"Our thanks, fair one," his ghost speaks, for I have no doubt it's a spirit before us despite his continuing increase in visible substance. The whispering voices I've been hearing grow in volume, chatter now, excited and with purpose. Though there's no joy in that purpose, I'm positive of it. "You have freed us at long last and our time to rise has come as we knew it would."

Fleur turns in Vosh's hands, one hand extending outward to the drow. "You tricked me," she says, sorrow in her voice.

"You answered the call of your blood," he says with a smile cruel enough to hurt. "Now pay the price for your kindness."

There's no further warning, no hint of any kind of threat aside from the continuing pressure of the despair that's been leaning so heavily on me. And then we're surrounded and being charged by more souls like his, drow appearing out of the floor in a rush of ghostly attack, from the ceiling, bursting from the walls.

My sword is of no use, I'm sure of that, but when I swing anyway, the blade in my hand in an automatic sweep of protection, the dark elf who hurtles toward me flinches and swerves, flying through the air and away again. The one that bursts from the floor at my feet cries out when my blade passes through him, though when his spirit parts before the metal it reforms again as he flees.

"They can't bear steel," I say, positive I've shouted that information, though in my head it feels more like I've whispered it. The others are already fighting, Fleur now on the floor in the middle of our group, only the weapons of metal we bear keeping the diving, swooping, charging figures of the drow ghosts at bay.

Something strikes me from behind and I stagger forward, falling to one knee, feeling my arm quiver and the breath leave my body a moment. Darkness floods my vision and I choke on my lack of air, clawing at my throat as something passes through me. I manage to swipe at the drow ghost and send her flying, shrieking her fury at my defense, but when I struggle to rise, I see the HW number on my embed has dropped by three points.

Graldor grunts beside me, almost topples over, recovers as I slash at the drow attacking him. There are so many, coming from all angles, it's impossible to defend completely. We might hold them off for a time, but I know my strength fades with each hit and that it's very likely Fleur was right from the beginning.

We won't be leaving this place alive.

The next time I fall, it's to both knees, my body flung forward as two drow attack from both sides, pulling through me and out again. I'm jerked face down, cheek impacting a tree root, stars sparking in my vision as my embed shivers.

"Webb!" I feel Vosh's big hand lift me, but he stumbles as he does, opening himself to attack in his attempt to save me and I'm dropped again, hitting harder this time. My arm sweeps out in front of me, trying to protect my face from the impending impact, and my sword strikes a tree, severing the root from the trunk.

Someone howls, a sound like I've never heard before, mournful and full of fury. Gasping, I push myself up to my knees and realize the attack has paused if only for a moment. The drow gather by the ceiling, their ghostly forms clouded by darkness, swirling like a vortex. And then they dive again, but too late.

I know their weakness now.

My sword cuts into the bark of the tree nearest me, the tip hitting stone but the blade embedding in the flesh of the eld oak. I don't have to tell my friends what to do next.

They're already attacking the embedded forest as I am. The drow screams make my head ache, their swirling forms above us spinning faster and faster while I grimly hack apart the tree before me.

My blade finally severs the trunk, the top withering into ash in a slithering second, the tree that was dissolving and falling into a sad heap on the floor. The roots retreat while one of the drow explodes into tiny shards of mist before vanishing.

Another and another fall before us, the trees having no protection and the drow helpless to stop us, their power destroyed by our new knowledge. A few attempt to attack, but it's a weak effort that carries none of the strength they once used against us. My embed shivers once when I feel a drow slither through me, but I grimly carry on, knowing the only solution is the one that ends with the trees destroyed.

More and more of the spirits rupture, mist bursting into fragments that puff away to nothing. I finally look up, sweating and panting, my body aching from the effort, to find most of the trees in the space are gone, the floor now littered with ash, a few roots retreating and disappearing into the stone walls as if drawn away.

I'm not the only one who has stopped, though it's Fleur who is the surprising enthusiast, her short sword cutting away at the last tree, the final drow-our original greeter-swirling around her, weeping tears of black sludge down his narrow, ghostly face.

Save us. Barely a whisper now.

Her face set, she arches her back, sword held in both hands, and drives the point deep into the trunk of the last tree. I expect it to dissolve as the others had. None of us are prepared when it screams.

Fleur doesn't relent, grim expression making her look as ghostly as the drow that attacked, though I am forced to cover my ears with my hands, dropping my sword, my head feeling as though it might crack open from the sound. The others are in no better shape while the elf continues her slow and inexorable push, the blade in her hands sinking deeper and deeper, as if in slow motion, far into the trunk of the last tree.

When it finally dies, when the drow that circles explodes outward, the slithering ash cascades over Fleur, the sudden silence almost a blow in itself. I find I'm on my knees again, my hands shaking, something wet on my lip. When I touch my face, I pull back to find blood on my fingers from a nosebleed.

Fleur sways, her sword still in her hands, turning slowly to look at all of us. She appears translucent, as if she's used up everything she has in her attack, swaying slightly, elegantly, with the grace I expect from one of her kind, before she slowly topples to the floor.

***