Jenna changed tacks, raising her hands as blazing light surrounded her form. Keritanima felt the buildup of power within her, and realized she was about to do something big. The little girl, barely more than a woman, suddenly looked like some avenging Avatar at that moment, surrounded by Magelight, looking like an unstoppable force against which nothing could stand. She had bought herself enough time by killing the enemies trying to get into the city to allow herself to do something drastic, probably aimed at the reserve forces still formed up well outside the city.
Keritanima watched with slightly blurring vision, blurring in exhaustion, as the spell was woven, diving into the earth. In a moment, a lage, lumbering hulk clawed itself out of the ground, and she realized that it was another Earth Elemental. This one was by no means as large as the one Triana made, which had reached the limits of its time here and returned to where it came from-which had totally wiped out Triana and took her out of the battle-but it was still monstrous. About thirty feet tall, looking like a two-legged barrel with stumpy arms and no head. It began lumbering out towards the reserve forces, but it was much faster than the Elemental that Triana had summoned. The soldiers rushing towards the city stopped dead in their tracks and scrambled out of the way of the surprisingly mobile Elemental, which went out of its way to step on a few of the slower ones as it stomped off to harass the enemy reserves. She saw the regimented lines of the reserve troops, mostly humans, began to waver, then back away, then flee in every direction as the huge magical creation reached where they were formed up, squashing anything it could catch and causing a total panic in the enemy reserves.
Keritanima had to admit… she liked Jenna's style.
The Wizards left on that side tried in vain to counter it with magic, but their spells bounced off the great Elemental or had no effect at all, and they too ended up fleeing from its advance when their attempts to destroy it did nothing more than make it notice them.
She turned her attention woodenly to an undulating cry below, and saw a pack of Selani chasing a group of Trolls with eager enthusiasm. The Selani and the Centaurs had run wild over the invading forces. They were both impossibly fast, able to attack and the melt away before the invaders had any idea what had just happened. They moved from street to street, block to block, house to house, attacking and destroying the invaders that had, at first, been seeking refuge from the withering missle fire coming from the walls. Those slashing tactics became a grim line of defense when the walls began to be taken over, the Selani proving that they were among the best warriors in the world by devastating any who came against them. Only the animated, undead creations in the enemy army, which had no fear, proved any kind of match for the Selani, who relied on crippling blows to fell an enemy and allowing them to finish it off at their leisure. The skeletons and zombies couldn't be killed by anything other than decapitation, and the Selani had to learn that in a costly manner, counted in the number of casualties they and the Centaurs suffered before the trick of it was discovered. But after the weakness was exploited, the defending lines were stabilized, then began to push back when an element of the Knights and a large reserve force of Arakite Legions were dispatched to help the Selani and Centaurs hold the line. The Arakites, masters of various defensive tactics, formed a shield wall and held the mixed host of undead, Fae-da'Kii, and Goblinoids off long enough for the Selani and Centaurs to regroup and rejoin the fighting. That shield wall parted as the mounted Knights and Centaurs crashed into the lines with their lances leading, trampling a wide swath through their opponents, and then the hole they created was quickly filled in by the Arakites and Selani, who, Keritanima had realized, were probably fighting side by side for the first time in their histories. The Knights and Centaurs curled around and separated into two groups, then engaged the enemies from behind while the Arakites and Selani assaulted their disorganized and demoralized front ranks. When the invaders' lines were split, the two halves were quickly swarmed under by the less numerous yet much more highly trained Arakites, Knights, and Selani.
Keritanima felt the strain of leading the Circle fade from her as Ahiriya took the lead, but she was still completely exhausted, and every time Ahiriya's demands for power reached her, she found it harder and harder to answer them. Her legs began to tremble, and she nearly fell as Ahiriya moved the Circle near the shattered edge of the destroyed wall, then began to attack the battling enemies below with magic, who had tried to circle around behind Jenna and her Circle as the young lady created the Elemental that was still causing chaos in the reserves of their enemies. Keritanima felt light-headed, and found herself clinging to Azakar for support as Ahiriyra drew more and more out of her, power that she wasn't sure she was capable of supplying. "Zak," she said weakly, in a quavering voice, "Zak, have Ahiriya drop me from the circle," she asked. "I, I don't feel well."
"Kerri? Kerri, are you alright?" he asked in sudden concern, putting an arm around her shoulder.
Ahiriya began to weave again, and it put a demand on Keritanima that was just too much. She felt something inside her give, and then a sudden eruption of power snapped out of the Weave and assaulted her. In sudden panic, Keritanima let go of Azakar, falling to the floor of the wall, as she realized that the power of the Weave was flooding into her unchecked. She was too weary, too exhausted, to struggle against it, and Ahiriya's demands on her had overwhelmed her attempts to stop it from happening. The sudden inundation of power into the Circle caused all of them in it to shudder and recoil. Ahiriya gave out a strangled cry and tried to break the Circle, but the power flooding into the Circle resisted any attempt to break it. In desperation, she turned that power against itself, using it to try to forcibly sever the ties binding the Sorcerers together.
The attempt worked, at least in a way. The Circle broke violently, causing a huge backlash, and the other three Sorcerers joined to it were thrown from their feet by the power of its disruption, causing a blast of wind to issue forth from the middle of them and a shockwave of pain to lash through them. All the power that had been flowing into the Circle fed back into Keritanima, filling her beyond her capacity, dropping her into a sea of fire that burned at her insides. She let out a ragged scream and rose up on her knees, hands over her face and muzzle as Azakar and Szath scrambled to her. "Get out of here!" Ahiriya barked in fear, staring at Keritanima.
"What's going on?" Dar demanded.
"She hid how tired she was from me!" Ahiriya snapped angrily. "The damn fool! She's lost control! She's going to be Consumed!" She looked at Dar with steady eyes. "Now if you value your life, then run!"