Euric dismounted his horse, boots striking the ground roughly as the five witch hunters that remained with him followed close behind. The forest around them was silent, devoid of all wildlife for the past hour of their journey.

Yet, the faint trace of druidic magic he had been following lay just ahead, he was certain of it. Just as certain was he that this was all nothing but a trap, a distraction laid to slow him down.

“It appears to be a beast’s den of some sort, Knight Commander,” one of the witch hunters addressed him, kneeling at Euric’s side and bowing his head. “How shall we proceed?”

“Our signal lies within. Prepare to enter.”

His loyal hunters moved quickly, tying their horses and readying weapons. Euric watched the entrance of the large, round tunnel calmly, a single hand resting on the pommel of his bastard sword.

Whatever beast lay inside was certain to be massive. The lack of animal life in the area, the drag marks across the ground and the way the ground level vegetation was crushed were all signs of a truly gigantic beast.

“Are you afraid?” A quiet whisper asked in his ear.

He felt no need to answer. He had never felt calmer.

“He knows you’re searching for him. He left this trap for you. Yet still you go?”

Euric started walking towards the cave entrance, the other witch hunters forgotten. They would follow, or not. It made no difference.

“Your apprentice is hunting him now. What will you do if she finds him first?”

“That is no concern of mine.”

He drew his sword as he reached the entrance, descending into the large, circular tunnel without striking a torch. His eyes adjusted unnaturally quickly, as a dull red light lit behind his pupils and the total darkness of the cave became daylight to him.

The ground under his feet rumbled, as something giant moved deeper within the cave. It had noticed him.

“You knew this was nothing but bait. That he was with the other signal. Why did you send her to the real one, and waste your own time with the fake?”

He could sense the frustration in her voice. The impatience.

“Do you no longer trust me?” He replied softly. He could hear the others following behind him now, their footsteps echoing down the tunnel “You know I see the way.”

“...”

The tunnel opened into a cavern, and at last the beast came into view. A snake larger than a house lifted its head from the ground, green eyes already fixed on Euric as he stood at the edge of a small cliff. The beast’s eyes flared, and a wave of the strongest paralyzing magic known to man washed over him.

“So it was a basilisk, after all,” Euric mused. “How… nostalgic.”

The snake struck, and Euric raised a palm. An elliptical shield of deep, cobalt blue magic appeared in front of him, and the basilisk’s jaws clamped around it with enough force to crush stone. Yet, the shield didn’t waver.

With a flick of his wrist, the shield fragmented and exploded directly into the basilisk’s open mouth. Each jagged piece of shrapnel ripped a hole through the unprotected inside of the basilisk’s throat as the monster recoiled.

“Hsssshhhhaaaa!”

A hiss of pain so loud it shook the ground escaped the beast as Euric prepared another spell. This time, he began to chant, a dozen familiar voices whispering alongside him.

A bell like ping sounded, echoing around the cavern, and Euric frowned. Without a doubt, the traces of druidic magic were coming from the basilisk itself… which shouldn’t have been possible.

He raised another shield as the basilisk’s tail whipped towards him. At the last moment the tail raised, striking not at him but the stone above his head, collapsing part of the cavern.

Learning already, are we?

Euric stepped calmly off the cliff, sliding down the nearly vertical stone wall until his boots crashed into the ground thirty feet below. The entire ledge behind him was destroyed, and the tunnel he had entered through was hidden behind six feet of rubble.

The basilisk lunged again, and this time, Euric sidestepped, raising another shield which he used to push the snake’s head to the side. It crashed into the cliffside, shaking the cavern again.

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“We’re wasting time. Every second spent here, he grows further away.”

Euric sighed.

“Very well.”

He dodged as the snake’s impossibly long body thrashed, casting shields to block when he could not avoid a crushing blow. All the while, he chanted. The incantation was long, but he spoke without hurry, or panic.

The basilisk narrowed its eyes again, and a second wave of paralyzing magic buffeted against him. He could feel the tips of his hair turn to stone, along with the trim of his armour and cloak. Normally, a single cast of such powerful magic would turn even a mighty beast to stone in a moment. Yet, the resistance to magic offered by his armour could stall the effects, even if it didn’t make him completely immune.

He blocked another tail lash with a hastily conjured shield, before shattering this one as well. The shards broke against the basilisk’s scales, leaving no visible wound.

Odd. That should have done more.

Basilisk scales were renowned for their magical resistance. Yet, it had been a long time since his magic could be blocked so completely. Something was wrong.

“I told you it was a trap.”

Still in the middle of his incantation, he could not respond.

For the first time, the basilisk moved its entire body at once. It seemed almost as if the walls of the cavern itself were shifting, so tall were the coils of the snake that they blocked out all but the distant ceiling.

Euric grabbed hold of a nearby stalagmite as the cavern rumbled. Above, stalactites shuddered and swayed, before a horrendous cracking noise echoed through the air. Euric sheathed his sword and raised both hands, a haze of cobalt magic spreading into the air above him as dozens of stalactites the size of a grown man fell towards his head.

The magic caught each one and held them suspended in space, before he turned them to point towards the basilisk. With a flick of his wrist, he sent them hurtling through the air like arrows, so fast they blurred into grey streaks.

“Shhaaaaa!”

The basilisk screeched as its body was pierced, several of the stone spikes pinning it to the cavern wall. Euric held some traces of magic around a few of the larger stalactites, reinforcing them from fragile stone into something harder than steel.

At last, he finished his incantation.

He raised one hand, palm extended, and uttered the last word of the spell. In the air above the snake, dozens of blue sigils appeared in the air, and from them, ropes of cobalt energy shot down. They wrapped around the snake, their ends burrowing deep into the cavern floor as they constricted the monster and pinned it to the earth. Hundreds of feet of coiled muscle strained, but the bindings held fast.

Euric ripped a few more stalactites from the ceiling and sent them plunging down into the snake’s body, just because he could. As the dust settled, the basilisk remained trapped, hissing in pain though unable to open its mouth as the largest stone spike of all had gone in through the top of its mouth, through the lower jaw, and into the ground.

He walked calmly towards the beast’s head, holding its gaze as it glared at him defiantly. As its eyes burned into him, he felt a third wave of magic wash over him, and another inch of stone crept up his sleeves and the end of his cloak.

His magic ripped a stalagmite twice as tall as himself from the ground, and sent it hurtling into the beast’s eye.

“KHHHHAAAA!”

Euric sighed, brushing the fallen dust and dirt off of his shoulders. The screeching was starting to hurt his ears.

But he wasn’t done with it yet. No, there was something he needed to check first.

He conjured another shield, the deep cobalt energy forming into an ellipse in the air before him, this time more than twice as thick as the quickly cast shields he had made before. Euric poured more and more energy into the spell, reinforcing it until even an archmage would have struggled to power through it.

The shield fragmented into arrow-like slivers, tapering down to be as thin as a needle at the tip, yet six feet long from end to end. Though he knew better than to touch the edge, experience told him that every inch of the slivers was sharper than an obsidian blade.

He launched them towards the beast’s scales with every bit of force he could muster, fully expecting them to puncture not just the basilisk, but a hundred feet of solid stone on the other side.

Instead, the magical bolts shattered like glass against the scales, dissipating into dust that floated through the air until that, too, disappeared.

It was unlike any basilisk scale he had ever seen. Yet, it reminded him perfectly of that day.

“He’s learned some new tricks, it seems.”

“So it does,” Euric responded. He pulled his scarf up, setting it back into position after the brief battle had loosened it around his face. “It will not save him.”

“He’s still running. From you. From that day.”

Something wrathful and impatient reared its ugly head within him. Euric stomped it down, breathing deeply to slow his heart. The battle hadn’t made his heart race even a bit, yet the slightest hint of those old memories threatened to break his calm.

“He can not run forever. You know this as well as I.”

“How much longer must I wait?”

The basilisk writhed in pain, struggling uselessly against the ropes. Euric absentmindedly skewered the snake with another half dozen stone spikes, ignoring its cries of pain.

“I told you to trust me. I have seen it… the Fate that awaits us. Have you lost your faith, after all these years?”

“...”

Euric could hear the sounds of the other witch hunters, now, working to break through the stone debris that blocked the tunnel. They would be through in just a moment, it seemed.

He sighed, searching the roof for something fitting. After only a moment, he found something suiting his purpose.

“Fear not, even if you have lost your way, I am not so easily swayed,” he announced, reaching with his magic for a stalactite nearly twenty feet long. He plucked it from the ceiling like a child might an icicle, moving it slowly to hover over the basilisk’s head.

“You will be avenged, my love.”

Then he sent the stone spike through the basilisk’s head.