The ritual tower turned out to be in an area called the Sand Flats, at least according to the Wardens in the group. Estella supposed it was as good a name as any. Accurate, at least. The 'tower' appellation was less accurate, at least after so long to fall to ruin. It was little more than the bare bones of a structure, situated on a small jut of land on a clifftop. The only way to access it was by a bridge with a single portcullis, but as they rode closer, it became clear enough that the gate itself was wide open.
Pursing her lips, the Inquisitor shifted in her saddle, partly an attempt to give Stroud behind her a little more room. Nox was plenty strong enough for the both of them, but there were always inconveniences to riding double. “I don't think I like the look of this," she murmured, quietly enough that likely only her passenger could hear.
She could feel more than see him shake his head behind her. "There is no reason to believe they are expecting us. Better this way, so that we can at least surprise them." When they reached a spot a fair distance away, the group stopped to dismount, electing to approach on foot. Stroud slid down first, then offered Estella a hand to do the same.
Once everyone was afoot, he glanced between the lot of them. "They may not all be in there. At least some of us should stay behind to guard the way out." He exchanged a look with Nostariel, who nodded slightly.
“I'll go in with whoever intends to if you remain here, Jean-Marc." They didn't seem inclined to make anyone else's decisions or strategies, though, and waited patiently for the others to sort themselves as they would.
"I'll be in the front, thank you." Vesryn left his bardiche axe behind, taking the spear and shield and heading for the front of the group. "If there's magic to be dealt with, good to have a physical shield behind our own magical ones."
"I'll keep a lookout," Lia said, drawing an arrow from her quiver and nocking it. "Be careful in there."
With Stroud and Lia serving as the rear guard, the rest of them were free to advance over the short bridge towards the skeleton of the tower. There was a relatively steep staircase leading up to what looked like the main level, all of it exposed to empty air. Estella went up just behind Vesryn—it didn't take long to figure out that the blood magic ritual must already be in progress.
"Wait... no." The voice was still disembodied as they climbed, swiftly and quietly, but it sounded like whoever it belonged to was on the verge of panic. Estella could sense the magic thickening in the air; it tasted sour on the back of her tongue. "This is... this is wrong!"
"Come now, Warden-Commander Clarel's orders were very clear," came another voice. This one was in complete control and spoke with authority, though the arrogant edge was undeniable. The sight when Estella crested the staircase was not a pleasant one. The scent of blood hung heavily in the air, mixed with in the heat of the demons that had already been summoned and the thick taste of the fade. A number of Wardens were already slain, their bodies discarded haphazardly in the sand in a nearby corner. The Wardens who were alive, did not appear to be completely themselves. Their eyes held an unnatural red glow about them and their body language were stiff and ragged. At least, all but two. One Warden, the owner of the panicked voice, fidgeted in the center, turning to face the rest of the Wardens, and another, who stood stoically nearby.
The veil was thin, no doubt impacted by the open rift lingering in the air nearby. The confident voice from earlier appeared to belong to the man sitting on the last step of a dais at the end of the tower. He wore hooded robes, with bronze colored boots and greaves, with a single arm outfitted in armor of the same color. Though he had the hood pulled up, it was difficult to miss his bright green eyes peering out from beneath, wild and barely contained. The man rested with his elbow on his knee, using his fist to prop up his chin, appearing somewhat bored with the proceedings.
"You remember the oath you took at your joining, don't you? In war, victory. In peace, vigilance. In death..." He continued, speaking to the panicking Warden, waving his hand as he recited the Wardens' oath. He paused for a moment, a grin slipping into his features and gave enough time for other Warden to slip in behind and draw his knife across the first's throat. The blood spilled forth in a font, but none of it hit the ground at his feet. While the body went limp, the blood swirled and shifted above before streaking behind the body and landing on a spot next to the Warden who'd slit the other's throat. "Sacrifice."
The blood flashed and intensified in brightness before the rift rocked back to life, spitting out a rage demon where the blood had collected only moments ago. The demon roared out in anger and furiously beat at the stones of the tower where it had been summoned. "There we are. Now, just like I showed you, go on," he encouraged, baring the whites of his teeth as his grin grew deeper. The Warden listened and held his hand out to the demon, glowing with fade energy for a moment, calming the demon. Meanwhile the man who sat upon the dais deigned to removed his own fist from the his chin and waved it, red enveloping it for a moment. That same red blossomed in the Warden's eyes and his body language too stiffened.
The Warden and demon marched to the side of the tower, allowing the man on the dais a clear view of Estella and her friends. "Ah, Inquisitor, I did not expect you to arrive so soon. Had I been given a notice, I would've tidied up the place for your arrival. Oh, and I see you brought friends," he said, finally rising to his feet, though he remained as relaxed at his words. "And Nostariel! My, it is wonderful to see you again."
“Elias." Nostariel's expression and tone were hard; her fingers curled into fists. “You have no right, no cause for this. What madness has taken you, that you think you'll ever succeed? That you would even want to?" Her eyes moved warily to the Wardens arrayed on either side of the tower floor. Despite her words, it seemed she suspected he might have already done so, at least with the unmoving members of her order still alive here.
"Madness? Me?" Pike answered, feigning insult, "Oh no, no, no. I am the sanest one here. Clearly," he said, sweeping his hand to all the other possessed Wardens and their demons. "I did not force this on them, they chose to do this to themselves. And, well... who would I be to deny the storied Order of the Grey what they desired?" he chuckled at that, a dark, hideous thing, his teeth flashing once more.
"I do not know if you have noticed it yet, my dear, but this world is sick. My... Master is simply the cure."
Vesryn had long since lowered the point of his spear towards Pike, standing firmly behind his shield, eyes peering out from behind the slits of his tallhelm. "That's quite possibly the evilest thing I've heard anyone say in months. Have you considered that you might be the sickness?"
“Your Master is making the Grey Wardens think they're dying," Estella said flatly. “You can't drive them to the brink of desperation and then blame them for making desperate choices. Undo the ritual. Now." She wasn't even sure he could. She certainly didn't have any reason to believe Pike would even consider listening to her. But... she had to at least try and resolve this the right way before letting it come to blood and death.
That thought didn't stop her from using her thumb to subtly loosen her saber in its sheath, breaking the slight lock it had when properly stowed. Expect the best, prepare for the worst.
Pike recoiled at the request, his brows furrow and his upper lip raised in incredulity. "Wow, it sounds so easy when you say it like that. Well, okay. Sure. Since you asked so nicely." He raised his hands and began to move them for a moment before abruptly stopping and appearing as if he realized something. "Oh, wait. That's right. I can't." he said with a frown and shrug, like he was disappointed in her.
"See, the binding ritual has a small little side effect. Though the Wardens believe that they will get their demon army to charge valiantly into the Deep Roads to carve out the blight itself," he said with a shrug, "They instead become my master's slaves, and once the ritual is completed, he will use them to conquer Thedas and finish off your Inquisition for good this time," Pike said. He looked at arm and then raised it, causing the other Wardens to mimic the action. "I am simply a tool of the process," he said with a self-satisfied grin.
"Well, he's not wrong," Ashton deadpanned.
“At least he understands his own triviality." Cyrus shrugged. “Come on, then. The next part is where you try to use your puppets to lay low the Inquisitor and her allies, right? Have at us." The Fade near his left hand rippled; the spatha he favored materialized in his grip, hard-edged blue.
Pike frowned, "Well, you lot are certainly sucking the fun out of this." He simply sighed and shook his head. "Fine," and with that, he jut out his fist, already surging with a red energy. The same energy began to pulse in Estella's mark. "Oh, he also taught me a few things. I'm particularly fond of this one," he goaded, the light intensifying. The air thickened around them and the nearby rift began to thrum with activity. He then turned toward the Wardens and demons and tilted his head, the resulting ring of steel punctuated by the roars of demons.
Pain ricocheted from the palm of Estella's right hand up her arm and down her spine. “Nngh—" A particularly violent fluctuation in the green light brought her to her knees, her left hand gripping her wrist ineffectually. The taste at the back of her mouth was the sour one of her own bile; even keeping her breathing steady was more difficult than she could manage. Short, soft pants were about all she could muster when each new beat of her heart seemed to provoke a reaction in the rift and her mark in turn. It wasn't unlike being electrocuted, each pulse fresh pain on her raw nerves. It felt like she was being flayed along her bones, carved away from her own skeleton in chunks.
She gritted her teeth, tears streaming down her face, and doubled over, trying and failing to keep her eyes on Pike, the battle beginning around her—anything at all. She caught only flashes of any of it.
A demon charged directly for her, but was stopped short by a bright blue barrier. She could just make out the ashen skin of Asala shuffle past her to stand in front of her, keeping the shield and herself between Estella and the rest of the battle. "Cyrus?!" she heard Asala call.
“In a moment!" Her brother's voice was indistinct, but she could hear the familiar hum of his summoned weapon, and the decisive hissing impact it made when it bit deep into one of the creatures accompanying the Wardens. “Just keep them away from her!"
Vesryn charged through the barrier and smashed the rage demon across the face with his tower shield, the heavy weight of it stunning the large fire creature and leaving bits of its molten flesh dripping down the face of the bulwark. He drove his spear into it next, twisting and shoving it backwards with a grunt of effort. "Warden!" he called, glancing towards Nostariel. "Rules of engagement?" There were, after all, combatants present that were not in control of their own minds.
“If you can spare the Wardens, do. But slay who you must." Nostariel's voice was grim; perhaps she'd taken Pike at his word when he said there was no undoing what had been done. A glowing arrow moved into Estella's line of vision, hitting the ground about a dozen feet in front of her. The air around it rippled; the cluster of Grey Wardens there staggered backwards, clearly heavily disoriented. It would at least make knocking them out easier to do.
Estella didn't want this. She knew that. She didn't want it to come to this. The Inquisition didn't exist to kill or maim Grey Wardens. This wasn't supposed to be—
A fresh wave of agony tore through her arm, and she bit down too hard on her tongue. Blood rushed over her lips, warm and sticky, falling to the ground in fat drops. Her entire arm felt like it was going to fall off, like there was too much something rattling around in her body and it would detonate her like one of those horrible walking bomb spells she'd heard about.
The thought seized her and she panicked, pushing back against whatever Pike was doing as well as she could, trying to mimic the feeling of closing a rift, of letting the energy in her mark flow outwards instead of in. At first, she could find no purchase, change the flow in no way at all. Another pulse ripped through her; Estella heaved. If she'd had anything in her stomach to lose, she probably would have. Tightening her grip on her wrist, she tried again, forcing the energy out like it was magic. This time, there was a little give, a second or two where she could breathe a bit easier, gulp in deeper lungfuls of air.
Maybe. Maybe she could turn this around on him. Forcing her head up, she focused on Pike as well as she could, and tried again.
The surprise of the force managed to push Pike back a pair of steps before he redoubled his own efforts. "A feisty one, aren't you," Pike spoke, even above the din of battle. There was an increased effort in his words and his stance had changed from relaxed to bracing. "Guess I shouldn't be surprised," he hissed, gripping his armored arm with the other.
Estella shook from her head to her toes with the effort of keeping him at bay, but that alone wasn't enough to dissuade her. How many times at this point had she pushed herself far beyond what she believed her limit to be? How many times had she faced down a task she knew, knew she could not succeed at? Too many to count. Everything worth doing was a challenge for her, and most of them seemed insurmountable. But by this point, her answer to those challenges was automatic, ingrained.
She shifted her weight to put one of her legs underneath her. It held well enough, and she pushed up against it, still fighting back the foreign energy. It was good that she knew what it felt like to do it—if not for the time Cyrus had shown her what to do in the practice yard with Romulus and Asala, she wouldn't have known what to try for. Slowly, she regained her feet. Pulling in a deep breath, Estella grit her teeth and shoved. The physical motion probably wasn't necessary, but it helped her focus her intent, anyway, and intent was the heart of magic. This didn't seem that different.
There was a loud pop and the force Estella was pushing against suddenly and abruptly gave in. The backlash was immediate, as it threw Pike onto his back. When he rolled over to his knees, his head shot back up to glare across the battlefield, his features corrupted with a snarl. He tossed up both hands, which were immediately wrapped in the fade, and thrust forward, shooting a wave of raw force across the distance. It struck Asala's barrier hard enough to cause it to fracture, but Asala held fast regardless. Her arms trembled however and betrayed the immense labor she was under.
Another arrow struck the ground near where Pike had landed, and encased his kneeling form in ice up to the chest. Nostariel immediately returned to trying to freeze the last rage demon on her side, wielding the spell directly in her empty hand this time.
Estella was forced to turn her attention to a shade that had gotten free of one of the others, now beelining for her weakened barrier. Biting down on her lip, she drew her sword with a hand that still trembled with echoes of the damage Pike had done. Even so... she had to do her part. “You can drop the barrier, Asala." Even in her concentration, she hadn't missed that her friend was struggling. One less shield to maintain should help a fair bit.
Once it was gone, the shade increased its pace, lunging for her directly, both arms outstretched. Estella sidestepped, ducking in for its side and slashing crosswise. She darted away again before it could retaliate, drawing the knife from the sheath at her lower back. Rotating her grip on it so it lay back parallel with her forearm, she lunged and feinted, strafing sideways and crossing her first slash with another from the saber. The enchantment burned bright, sizzling the demon's blood where it touched. With a shriek, the shade tried to bat it out of the way, swiping with several wicked claws.
It caught Estella in the arm mostly by accident, but she used the hit to her own advantage as well, catching its elbow joint on the knife and forcing its arm up. The saber plunged into its armpit, and she took a hard step forward, stabbing up into its neck area with the shorter knife, then tearing both blades free.
It fell, and a quick glance around was enough to inform her that the others were finishing up as well. It looked like most, perhaps all, of the Wardens were only unconscious, but she wasn't sure how optimistic she was about that. It might be that Pike had lied about the ritual, but—
“Damn." She grimaced, the small muscles around her eyes tightening. She could feel a headache coming on.
Where Pike had been moments ago, only a few shards of ice remained.
Pursing her lips, the Inquisitor shifted in her saddle, partly an attempt to give Stroud behind her a little more room. Nox was plenty strong enough for the both of them, but there were always inconveniences to riding double. “I don't think I like the look of this," she murmured, quietly enough that likely only her passenger could hear.
She could feel more than see him shake his head behind her. "There is no reason to believe they are expecting us. Better this way, so that we can at least surprise them." When they reached a spot a fair distance away, the group stopped to dismount, electing to approach on foot. Stroud slid down first, then offered Estella a hand to do the same.
Once everyone was afoot, he glanced between the lot of them. "They may not all be in there. At least some of us should stay behind to guard the way out." He exchanged a look with Nostariel, who nodded slightly.
“I'll go in with whoever intends to if you remain here, Jean-Marc." They didn't seem inclined to make anyone else's decisions or strategies, though, and waited patiently for the others to sort themselves as they would.
"I'll be in the front, thank you." Vesryn left his bardiche axe behind, taking the spear and shield and heading for the front of the group. "If there's magic to be dealt with, good to have a physical shield behind our own magical ones."
"I'll keep a lookout," Lia said, drawing an arrow from her quiver and nocking it. "Be careful in there."
With Stroud and Lia serving as the rear guard, the rest of them were free to advance over the short bridge towards the skeleton of the tower. There was a relatively steep staircase leading up to what looked like the main level, all of it exposed to empty air. Estella went up just behind Vesryn—it didn't take long to figure out that the blood magic ritual must already be in progress.
"Wait... no." The voice was still disembodied as they climbed, swiftly and quietly, but it sounded like whoever it belonged to was on the verge of panic. Estella could sense the magic thickening in the air; it tasted sour on the back of her tongue. "This is... this is wrong!"
"Come now, Warden-Commander Clarel's orders were very clear," came another voice. This one was in complete control and spoke with authority, though the arrogant edge was undeniable. The sight when Estella crested the staircase was not a pleasant one. The scent of blood hung heavily in the air, mixed with in the heat of the demons that had already been summoned and the thick taste of the fade. A number of Wardens were already slain, their bodies discarded haphazardly in the sand in a nearby corner. The Wardens who were alive, did not appear to be completely themselves. Their eyes held an unnatural red glow about them and their body language were stiff and ragged. At least, all but two. One Warden, the owner of the panicked voice, fidgeted in the center, turning to face the rest of the Wardens, and another, who stood stoically nearby.
The veil was thin, no doubt impacted by the open rift lingering in the air nearby. The confident voice from earlier appeared to belong to the man sitting on the last step of a dais at the end of the tower. He wore hooded robes, with bronze colored boots and greaves, with a single arm outfitted in armor of the same color. Though he had the hood pulled up, it was difficult to miss his bright green eyes peering out from beneath, wild and barely contained. The man rested with his elbow on his knee, using his fist to prop up his chin, appearing somewhat bored with the proceedings.
"You remember the oath you took at your joining, don't you? In war, victory. In peace, vigilance. In death..." He continued, speaking to the panicking Warden, waving his hand as he recited the Wardens' oath. He paused for a moment, a grin slipping into his features and gave enough time for other Warden to slip in behind and draw his knife across the first's throat. The blood spilled forth in a font, but none of it hit the ground at his feet. While the body went limp, the blood swirled and shifted above before streaking behind the body and landing on a spot next to the Warden who'd slit the other's throat. "Sacrifice."
The blood flashed and intensified in brightness before the rift rocked back to life, spitting out a rage demon where the blood had collected only moments ago. The demon roared out in anger and furiously beat at the stones of the tower where it had been summoned. "There we are. Now, just like I showed you, go on," he encouraged, baring the whites of his teeth as his grin grew deeper. The Warden listened and held his hand out to the demon, glowing with fade energy for a moment, calming the demon. Meanwhile the man who sat upon the dais deigned to removed his own fist from the his chin and waved it, red enveloping it for a moment. That same red blossomed in the Warden's eyes and his body language too stiffened.
The Warden and demon marched to the side of the tower, allowing the man on the dais a clear view of Estella and her friends. "Ah, Inquisitor, I did not expect you to arrive so soon. Had I been given a notice, I would've tidied up the place for your arrival. Oh, and I see you brought friends," he said, finally rising to his feet, though he remained as relaxed at his words. "And Nostariel! My, it is wonderful to see you again."
“Elias." Nostariel's expression and tone were hard; her fingers curled into fists. “You have no right, no cause for this. What madness has taken you, that you think you'll ever succeed? That you would even want to?" Her eyes moved warily to the Wardens arrayed on either side of the tower floor. Despite her words, it seemed she suspected he might have already done so, at least with the unmoving members of her order still alive here.
"Madness? Me?" Pike answered, feigning insult, "Oh no, no, no. I am the sanest one here. Clearly," he said, sweeping his hand to all the other possessed Wardens and their demons. "I did not force this on them, they chose to do this to themselves. And, well... who would I be to deny the storied Order of the Grey what they desired?" he chuckled at that, a dark, hideous thing, his teeth flashing once more.
"I do not know if you have noticed it yet, my dear, but this world is sick. My... Master is simply the cure."
Vesryn had long since lowered the point of his spear towards Pike, standing firmly behind his shield, eyes peering out from behind the slits of his tallhelm. "That's quite possibly the evilest thing I've heard anyone say in months. Have you considered that you might be the sickness?"
“Your Master is making the Grey Wardens think they're dying," Estella said flatly. “You can't drive them to the brink of desperation and then blame them for making desperate choices. Undo the ritual. Now." She wasn't even sure he could. She certainly didn't have any reason to believe Pike would even consider listening to her. But... she had to at least try and resolve this the right way before letting it come to blood and death.
That thought didn't stop her from using her thumb to subtly loosen her saber in its sheath, breaking the slight lock it had when properly stowed. Expect the best, prepare for the worst.
Pike recoiled at the request, his brows furrow and his upper lip raised in incredulity. "Wow, it sounds so easy when you say it like that. Well, okay. Sure. Since you asked so nicely." He raised his hands and began to move them for a moment before abruptly stopping and appearing as if he realized something. "Oh, wait. That's right. I can't." he said with a frown and shrug, like he was disappointed in her.
"See, the binding ritual has a small little side effect. Though the Wardens believe that they will get their demon army to charge valiantly into the Deep Roads to carve out the blight itself," he said with a shrug, "They instead become my master's slaves, and once the ritual is completed, he will use them to conquer Thedas and finish off your Inquisition for good this time," Pike said. He looked at arm and then raised it, causing the other Wardens to mimic the action. "I am simply a tool of the process," he said with a self-satisfied grin.
"Well, he's not wrong," Ashton deadpanned.
“At least he understands his own triviality." Cyrus shrugged. “Come on, then. The next part is where you try to use your puppets to lay low the Inquisitor and her allies, right? Have at us." The Fade near his left hand rippled; the spatha he favored materialized in his grip, hard-edged blue.
Pike frowned, "Well, you lot are certainly sucking the fun out of this." He simply sighed and shook his head. "Fine," and with that, he jut out his fist, already surging with a red energy. The same energy began to pulse in Estella's mark. "Oh, he also taught me a few things. I'm particularly fond of this one," he goaded, the light intensifying. The air thickened around them and the nearby rift began to thrum with activity. He then turned toward the Wardens and demons and tilted his head, the resulting ring of steel punctuated by the roars of demons.
Pain ricocheted from the palm of Estella's right hand up her arm and down her spine. “Nngh—" A particularly violent fluctuation in the green light brought her to her knees, her left hand gripping her wrist ineffectually. The taste at the back of her mouth was the sour one of her own bile; even keeping her breathing steady was more difficult than she could manage. Short, soft pants were about all she could muster when each new beat of her heart seemed to provoke a reaction in the rift and her mark in turn. It wasn't unlike being electrocuted, each pulse fresh pain on her raw nerves. It felt like she was being flayed along her bones, carved away from her own skeleton in chunks.
She gritted her teeth, tears streaming down her face, and doubled over, trying and failing to keep her eyes on Pike, the battle beginning around her—anything at all. She caught only flashes of any of it.
A demon charged directly for her, but was stopped short by a bright blue barrier. She could just make out the ashen skin of Asala shuffle past her to stand in front of her, keeping the shield and herself between Estella and the rest of the battle. "Cyrus?!" she heard Asala call.
“In a moment!" Her brother's voice was indistinct, but she could hear the familiar hum of his summoned weapon, and the decisive hissing impact it made when it bit deep into one of the creatures accompanying the Wardens. “Just keep them away from her!"
Vesryn charged through the barrier and smashed the rage demon across the face with his tower shield, the heavy weight of it stunning the large fire creature and leaving bits of its molten flesh dripping down the face of the bulwark. He drove his spear into it next, twisting and shoving it backwards with a grunt of effort. "Warden!" he called, glancing towards Nostariel. "Rules of engagement?" There were, after all, combatants present that were not in control of their own minds.
“If you can spare the Wardens, do. But slay who you must." Nostariel's voice was grim; perhaps she'd taken Pike at his word when he said there was no undoing what had been done. A glowing arrow moved into Estella's line of vision, hitting the ground about a dozen feet in front of her. The air around it rippled; the cluster of Grey Wardens there staggered backwards, clearly heavily disoriented. It would at least make knocking them out easier to do.
Estella didn't want this. She knew that. She didn't want it to come to this. The Inquisition didn't exist to kill or maim Grey Wardens. This wasn't supposed to be—
A fresh wave of agony tore through her arm, and she bit down too hard on her tongue. Blood rushed over her lips, warm and sticky, falling to the ground in fat drops. Her entire arm felt like it was going to fall off, like there was too much something rattling around in her body and it would detonate her like one of those horrible walking bomb spells she'd heard about.
The thought seized her and she panicked, pushing back against whatever Pike was doing as well as she could, trying to mimic the feeling of closing a rift, of letting the energy in her mark flow outwards instead of in. At first, she could find no purchase, change the flow in no way at all. Another pulse ripped through her; Estella heaved. If she'd had anything in her stomach to lose, she probably would have. Tightening her grip on her wrist, she tried again, forcing the energy out like it was magic. This time, there was a little give, a second or two where she could breathe a bit easier, gulp in deeper lungfuls of air.
Maybe. Maybe she could turn this around on him. Forcing her head up, she focused on Pike as well as she could, and tried again.
The surprise of the force managed to push Pike back a pair of steps before he redoubled his own efforts. "A feisty one, aren't you," Pike spoke, even above the din of battle. There was an increased effort in his words and his stance had changed from relaxed to bracing. "Guess I shouldn't be surprised," he hissed, gripping his armored arm with the other.
Estella shook from her head to her toes with the effort of keeping him at bay, but that alone wasn't enough to dissuade her. How many times at this point had she pushed herself far beyond what she believed her limit to be? How many times had she faced down a task she knew, knew she could not succeed at? Too many to count. Everything worth doing was a challenge for her, and most of them seemed insurmountable. But by this point, her answer to those challenges was automatic, ingrained.
She shifted her weight to put one of her legs underneath her. It held well enough, and she pushed up against it, still fighting back the foreign energy. It was good that she knew what it felt like to do it—if not for the time Cyrus had shown her what to do in the practice yard with Romulus and Asala, she wouldn't have known what to try for. Slowly, she regained her feet. Pulling in a deep breath, Estella grit her teeth and shoved. The physical motion probably wasn't necessary, but it helped her focus her intent, anyway, and intent was the heart of magic. This didn't seem that different.
There was a loud pop and the force Estella was pushing against suddenly and abruptly gave in. The backlash was immediate, as it threw Pike onto his back. When he rolled over to his knees, his head shot back up to glare across the battlefield, his features corrupted with a snarl. He tossed up both hands, which were immediately wrapped in the fade, and thrust forward, shooting a wave of raw force across the distance. It struck Asala's barrier hard enough to cause it to fracture, but Asala held fast regardless. Her arms trembled however and betrayed the immense labor she was under.
Another arrow struck the ground near where Pike had landed, and encased his kneeling form in ice up to the chest. Nostariel immediately returned to trying to freeze the last rage demon on her side, wielding the spell directly in her empty hand this time.
Estella was forced to turn her attention to a shade that had gotten free of one of the others, now beelining for her weakened barrier. Biting down on her lip, she drew her sword with a hand that still trembled with echoes of the damage Pike had done. Even so... she had to do her part. “You can drop the barrier, Asala." Even in her concentration, she hadn't missed that her friend was struggling. One less shield to maintain should help a fair bit.
Once it was gone, the shade increased its pace, lunging for her directly, both arms outstretched. Estella sidestepped, ducking in for its side and slashing crosswise. She darted away again before it could retaliate, drawing the knife from the sheath at her lower back. Rotating her grip on it so it lay back parallel with her forearm, she lunged and feinted, strafing sideways and crossing her first slash with another from the saber. The enchantment burned bright, sizzling the demon's blood where it touched. With a shriek, the shade tried to bat it out of the way, swiping with several wicked claws.
It caught Estella in the arm mostly by accident, but she used the hit to her own advantage as well, catching its elbow joint on the knife and forcing its arm up. The saber plunged into its armpit, and she took a hard step forward, stabbing up into its neck area with the shorter knife, then tearing both blades free.
It fell, and a quick glance around was enough to inform her that the others were finishing up as well. It looked like most, perhaps all, of the Wardens were only unconscious, but she wasn't sure how optimistic she was about that. It might be that Pike had lied about the ritual, but—
“Damn." She grimaced, the small muscles around her eyes tightening. She could feel a headache coming on.
Where Pike had been moments ago, only a few shards of ice remained.