“Good day,” he greeted them.
Meeks let out a shriek that brought them all out of their boots and flung back his cloak. The Ben Holiday disguise shimmered like a reflection in the waters of a pond disturbed by a thrown stone and began to disintegrate. Willow screamed. The wizard’s clawed hands lifted and extended, and green fire lanced wickedly toward Edgewood Dirk. But the cat had already begun to change, the small furry body growing, shimmering, and smoothing until it was as crystalline as’a diamond. The wizard fire struck it and broke apart, scattering like refracted light into the sunlit air, showering the trees and grass and scorching the earth.
Ben was racing desperately toward Willow by this time, yelling like a madman. But the sylph was already beyond his reach. Eyes frantic, she had pressed herself back against the black unicorn and seized the golden bridle that bound the fairy creature. The unicorn was stamping and rearing, crying out its own high-pitched, eerie call, and darting back and forth in small dashes. Willow clung to the beast as a frightened child would to its mother, grappling with it, being dragged along as it went — away from Ben.
“Willow!” he howled.
Meeks was still after Edgewood Dirk. The shards of flame from his first attack had barely been scattered when the wizard struck once more. Fire gathered and arced from his hands in a massive ball, rolling and tumbling through the air to explode into the cat. Dirk arched and shuddered, and the flaming ball seemed to absorb itself into the crystalline form. Then the fire exploded out again hurtling itself back toward the wizard in a shower of flairing darts. Meeks threw up his cloak like a shield, and the darts deflected everywhere. Some burned into the hide of the demon crouching behind the wizard and it roared and surged skyward with a rasp of fury.
Smoke and fire burned everywhere, and Ben stumbled on blindly through the haze. Behind him, his companions called out. Overhead, the winged demon blocked the sun, its shadow darkening the meadow like an eclipse. The black unicorn sprang forward with a scream, and Willow flung herself atop it. She might have done so out of instinct or out of need, but the result was the same — she was carried away. The unicorn darted past Ben so quickly he barely saw it. He reached for it, but he was far too slow. He had a brief glimpse of Willow’s lithe form clinging to its back, and then both disappeared into the trees.
Then the winged demon attacked. It dropped like a stone toward the meadow, diving from the empty skies, flames bursting from its maw. Ben dropped flat and covered his head. From the corner of one eye, he watched as Dirk shimmered, hunched down against the force of the fire, absorbed it, and thrust it back. Flames hammered into the demon and sent the monster catapulting back. Steam and smoke clogged the meadow air.
Meeks struck again, and Edgewood Dirk repelled the assault. The demon struck, and the cat flung the fire back once more. Ben rose, dropped, rose again, and staggered blindly through the carnage. Shouts and cries reached out to him, and visions floated through the haze before his watering eyes. His hands groped and struggled to hold something, anything — and finally fastened on the medallion.
White heat burned into his palms. For just an instant, he thought he saw the Paladin appear, a faint image somewhere in the distance, a silver, armor-clad figure astride the great white charger.
Then the vision was gone again, a vision that had been impossible in any case. No medallion, no Paladin — Ben knew that. His throat constricted and he choked as the fires of wizard and demon continued to hammer down on Edgewood Dirk and be flung back again. Flowers and grasses burned to black ash. Trees shook and their leaves wilted. The whole world seemed to be in flames.
And finally the meadow itself seemed to explode upward in one vast, heaving cough, steam and fire ripping through everything. Ben felt himself hurtled skyward like a bit of deadwood, flying in a graceless scattering of arms and legs, spinning like a pinwheel.