Or'do lunged without warning, sweeping those who remained with a devastating arc that painted the air shimmering white and glistening scarlet, rupturing gnarled flesh and spilling the toxin within. He lowered his shoulder, permitting momentum to carry him against the last standing acolyte of darkness, his strength alone splitting the man in two and scattering his tattered remains with the force of an armoured ram.

"Come at me!" He bellowed, obviously consumed by the very frenzy my own waning will had so recently thwarted. His challenge was met with sonorous moan and thin, quavering wail as the dying screamed their fury before Death muted their voices and stilled their foul hearts.

Roaring again, Or'do sprinted along the ancient stair, turning sharply and accelerating until once more flagstone relented, and a broad, circular clearing stood before us. He paused not a moment, pivoting on his heel and lunging for the creature that battered against a weathered gate, his blade cleaving its thigh then freeing its head. No sooner had its blood dampened the stones, than he was already in motion once more.

I rallied my voice to warn him, yet found that the thrill of frenzied battle had stolen my breath. Instead, I surged in after him, my blade crushing the nearest foe, and splitting a lunging hound's jutting spine, producing a horrid crack like twigs sundered underfoot. Another ascent, and we stood upon a long bridge at whose far end loomed a door of fog not unlike those that marked Lords' domains in our homeland. Crawling in low stance, two creatures -an unholy mixture of man and wolf- turned their lantern eyes upon us, and with low growl advanced.

My blade swung wide, yet it bounded aside, and lunged with ragged claws leading, and dark maw looming behind. I sensed my doom seconds before it found me: a twisting pivot wrenched me from its path, yet all the same the scalpel of its claw tore my stomach, and as life poured warm and dark over my trembling hands, I heard Or'do cry out in fury. Darkness stole my sight, and its cloak swallowed my mind.