And it pierced that skin, slicing a deep wound into Domincus, though the cleric still lived. Hoxitl thrust his bloody hand into the wound, grasping the Bishou's heart as he had taken thousands of hearts before, ready to pull it forth and offer it to the gaping maw of the statue Zaltec.
But this time, when his hand met the Bishou's flesh, the two gods came together with a force that overwhelmed the cleric's mortal powers.
Behind and far, far above Hoxitl, unseen in the rain but heard by them all, the top of Mount Zatal exploded.
From the chronicles of Colon:
At last the gods converge, and in their meeting, they tear the world asunder.
In the temple of Qotal, I feel the powers come together. Zaltec and Helm clash as the cleric of one tears the heart from the cleric of the other. Such a sacrifice must forever change the face of the land.
And even Qotal through the harbinger of his couatl, meets Zaltec, as Chitikas gives his life to the Darkfyre. The feathered snake is a meal even hungry Zaltec cannot digest.
Below them all, but rising fast, Lolth seethes now with the passion of her vengeance. She explodes into this world through the Darkfyre, laying her punishment upon her children, the drow.
And the gaming board is swept of its pieces.
EBB AND FLOW
Gultec wandered far from the jungles of Tulom-Itzi, crossing the lands of the Payit, the Kultakans, the Pezelacs. Always he moved toward Nexal.
Sometimes he walked as a man, visiting the peoples he passed among, learning of their fear. In all these lands, he found a deep foreboding, a great and dire anticipation of terrible things to come.
Other times he soared as a bird, or skulked within the mighty jaguar body that still gave him so much pleasure. He found, in his meandering course, several deep, lush valleys where he had thought lay only desert. Much to his surprise, several of these valleys contained ripe meadows of mayz. No one had planted it there, he knew, for this was deepest wilderness. Yet he remembered this abundance of food, enough for many people, as he pressed onward through the wilds of Maztica.
His course steady, his own courage unfailing, he finally reached the shores of Nexal's lakes.
And here he witnessed the source of the True World's terror.
Halloran sensed Erixitl's arms around him, and he clung to her with all the strength of his mindless terror. Around them the world came to pieces. Chaos reigned.
He didn't wonder why they weren't burned to ashes immediately. He saw fire in the form of red, liquid rock, exploding upward and outward in a wave of certain death. But that wave washed around them, and he knew only that Erix was in his arms, that the two of them were together, and it seemed certain they would die that way.
Squeezing his eyes shut, Hal tried to block out the nightmare around them, but he could not. Still he saw glowing crimson liquid splashing, he saw the summit of the huge mountain as it crumbled and collapsed around them. Rain poured into the cavern, creating a hissing inferno of steam, shattering rock and boiling away the instant it reached the ground.
Slowly the horrors around him seemed to fade, and he knew only that he held the woman he loved. He loved her more than he had ever thought he could love, and he desperately wanted to soothe the trembling he could feel in her body.
"Are you… alive?" asked Erix some time later. He wondered at first whether he had dreamed her voice.
"I… don't know," he replied honestly. "I think so, but I don't know how."
"I do," she replied, still dreamily nuzzling her face into the hollow of his neck. "It is the will of Qotal."
Halloran looked around them at the inferno of flame and molten rock and explosive gases. For the first time, he realized that they hadn't remained immobile during the eruption. Instead, they floated with the force of the blast, riding gently in the shelter of the…
What did protect them? He noticed that they watched the fiery chaos through a spiderweb-like grid. Looking closer, he recognized a pattern of feathers and down, creating a globe only large enough to hold the two of them.
"My cloak," explained Erix, still speaking as if she were dazed. "It is truly the gift of Qotal, and so it protects us, holding the fires of Zaltec at bay." Indeed, the Cloak of One Plume encircled them both, protecting them from the inferno yet showing them the full, horrifying devastation wrought by the gods.
"Is this the god — Zaltec?" Hal asked, gesturing to the fiery maelstrom.
"It is Zaltec, and more. This I see now, from a very high place." As Erix spoke, Hal noticed that they had indeed begun to rise above the explosion, floating dreamily in their soft, transparent cocoon, overlooking the god-wracked valley of Nexal so terribly far below.
"I see Zaltec meeting Helm in the struggle for mastery, and both of them threaten to destroy each other. But more, I see a spidery presence, the dark god of the Ancient Ones-"
"Lolth!" interjected Halloran. "Spider queen of darkness! You see her, too?'
"Yes. It is her rage that causes the mountain to explode. She is furious with her children, the drow. They have foresaken her in the quest for earthly rewards, turning to the worship of Zaltec."
Erixitl turned to look at Halloran, and the expression in her eyes seemed very far away. "Erix? What's wrong? You're here, with me!" He spoke loudly, with force, and slowly her eyes focused.
"Yes, I know. Hold me." She was quiet for a long time then as they drifted through the sky.
The cocoon of pluma seemed to float like a bubble on a light spring breeze. Even through the black of the night, they could see ruin wracked upon the city below. Lava flowed into the cool waters of the lakes, erupting in mountainous pillars of steam. The rain stilt fell, but it was a black, heavy rain, and it seemed to punish those under its downpour.
Below, in Nexal, they could see many thousands of people fleeing in panic from the confines of the doomed city. They saw the causeway, hours earlier the scene of savage battle, now the avenue for countless thousands of terrified Mazticans. As the two of them watched, drifting safely overhead, a steaming wave rose from the lake. Hissing and bubbling, it swept over one of the causeways, carrying the panicked humans away.
Convulsions wracked the earth upon which the city rested, and most of its great buildings tumbled into ruins. Only the Great Pyramid stood, and as Hal and Erix drifted past, high above it, they saw long, serpentine cracks run up the sides of the structure. The three temples atop the pyramid swayed, finally crumbling.
Then the whole great edifice, mightiest of the centers of the True World, twisted and broke and finally collapsed into rubble.
The palace walls buckled and crumbled around the terrified mare. Storm reared in panic, her hooves kicking the cracked adobe. The courtyard where Poshtil had kept the horse abruptly twisted, a great section sinking away. Wild lake waters surged into the opening.
With a maddened spring, Storm hurled herself across the open water, but her leap fell short. Splashing into the turbulence, she kicked free of the tumbling stone, desperately swimming toward the open waters of the lake.
The city surged, exploded, and died, but the horse pressed forward, uncaring of the surrounding chaos. Pressing through widening canals, snorting and kicking in fear, she finally reached the deep waters of Lake Azul. Deepest of the four lakes and farthest from the exploding mountain, its waters had not yet suffered the worst effects of the convulsions.
With strong strokes, the roan struggled through the waves until she reached the far northern shore. With a toss of her water-soaked head, she scrambled onto the shore and immediately galloped toward the wilds of northern Maztica.
The surviving drow sensed the imminence of disaster and teleported from the Highcave to refuge in caverns deep within the mountain. They escaped seconds before the lair — caldron, Darkfyre, and all — dissolved in an explosive convulsion of heat and pressure.