The Battle of Mount Keythior

And she screamed. The word ripped through the blood-red flames agonizing every inch of her body, a thousand white-hot needles piercing her wings as each feather burned and withered. The word tore a hole in her scream and shredded the roar of the flames, pouring down the gullet of the dragon until it reached his heart. Gribkoan choked on his own fire and fell from the sky. Black iron claws scrambled in the air before scraping down the sides of the mountain with a horrible screech. The unearthly word of void speech torn from Elnao's lungs took her last breath with it. The sky elf collapsed, charred and ashen, and died
Death, Elnao mused, didn't feel like much. The pain went away, the weight of her hollow bones--so light, but such a burden--was gone. Some part of her objected. Wasn't she supposed to sink back into the Underworld, to rest and fall away, reunited with the elements? Shouldn't that feel like something? Falling asleep or drifting off, anything. But nothing was changing. Everything had just...stopped.
Oh. She remembered. The dragon. She'd come here to kill the dragon. The dragon wasn't dead yet, so she couldn't be either.
Death would have to wait. She could still feel something. Purpose. She seized it, cold and hard in the grip of her will, and with a grim twist she pulled herself back.
Pain. Everywhere, pain. Her flesh screamed and sizzled, still blistering from the heat. Every muscle cried out with fatigue. The first breath back felt like inhaling ice water. Not a second had passed. The Dragon still clung to the side of Mount Keythior, his scales rippling with infernal heat, hate searing from his enormous red eyes. In his silhouette she was a tiny, black and blue speck, but as Gribkoan roared and descended towards her, she sank into that silhouette, plunged through it into darkness, and emerged on the other side.
A cave! A tiny refuge in the side of the mountain. Her eyes adjusted swiftly to the utter darkness. It wasn't much, barely an alcove, but it would buy her some time. The dragon's angry roar shook the stones. Gribkoan would find her soon, and she didn't have much left. A great chunk of Gribkoan's leg was gone now, shredded to dust by her spells, but she knew she couldn't do that again. Her body trembled with the effort of opening the doorway to darkness over and over again. What little magic she had left wouldn't be enough, and though she'd outmatched Gribkoan as a sorcerer, he was still a dragon. She leaned against the cold, smooth cave wall, gasping for each painful breath.
COWARD! The dragon's voice rumbled in her chest and rocked the mountain. KEIVON COWARD! HE SENT YOU HERE TO DIE! The retort welled up in Elnao's thoughts but died upon her lips. Nobody sent me. She was here to destroy Gribkoan, not banter with him. That's the whole point. I chose to be here. Ioth doesn't make appearances on request. DOES HE KNOW, MOXT XATHI? I still don't speak draconic, asshole. DOES HE FEAR THE SECOND FALL? I KNOW THE WORDS THAT DOOMED LUMINIAS. POWERS OLDER THAN THE DAWN. HE FLED THE FIRST TIME. NOW HE SENDS A LITTLE BIRD TO DIE IN HIS PLACE. Now she could hear sniffing, could smell the sulfur of the dragon's Infernal breath. Closer and closer. Soon he'd find her. She had to think of something, but her head kept spinning and she could barely move her fingers. WHEN I REACH HIS SCHOOL, WILL HE LEAVE AGAIN? HIS PUPILS, HIS DISCIPLES, THE FRUITS OF HIS WORKS. Light--real light--flickered at the entrance to the cave. Her eyes watered. She had to do something. Anything?
WILL HE LEAVE THEM ALL BEHIND TO DIE? AS HE'S LEFT YOU?
As he's left you.
They left you.
Cold rain on her face. An icy wind around her bare arms, rustling through her feathers. Skysteel blades shining before her, stained with Aurai blood. The light fading, dying, as shadows pour from her fingers, slipped into the cracks of their armor, wrapping around their necks and pouring down their throats. Blood, human, streaming from the visors of their helmets. And behind her, a cloud--her home--shrinking from sight. Leaving her. And a voice, all that's left to her but the cold wind and the freezing rain.
It is the hunger that gnaws at the feet of creation, keeping it spiraling on itself forever. The shadows of reality.
Ica closed her eyes. The ground shook beneath her broken body. Blackiron claws ripped the stones of the mountain apart. Blood-red fire gathered in the maw of the dragon. She could feel its heat on her face as Gribkoan tore through the stones, opening the cave, closer and closer. She ignored him. Her hands went to her side and reached for a chain bound to nothing. In the sightless dark, she felt it--the pattern of a spiral, engraved into the cover of a book. Without looking she took it from its chain, parted the cover, and flipped through the pages.
Come, Ica Elnao. Let us see what lies within your shadows.
Words poured from her lips as she read, not aloud, not silently, worse than both, from the deep pages of the Book of Seosh. Words that took sounds away, poking holes in the growl of the dragon's breath, the grinding of the stones. Words that rotted the sides of the cave, crumbled the smooth walls, sucked the very oxygen from the air. As her lips moved the pain fell away. The sulfur of Gribkoan's breath dulled in her nose. The voice of the dragon muffled until she couldn't hear a word. Her mouth moved and nothing flowed, from an impossible distance, and she felt less and less and less. She felt nothing.
She was alone. Utterly alone. No ground beneath her feet, no air for her to breathe. No voices to hear. Not even the memories of faces to keep her company. She was abandoned in the Hungry Dark, exiled from reality, forever separated from it. And it would never change. She was alone, forever.
Or was she
When Elnao opened her eyes, she saw nothing. But as Gribkoan reached the wretched sorceress, his slavering jaws open to tear her flesh to pieces, he saw her. There was nothing in her eyes--not blackness, simply nothing. A hole in reality. The last thing he heard were his own screams.
MIIRIK! NEBAN DI VEHAFORLE! SVABOL TEPOHA WUX AU--
Darkness erupted from Mount Keythior like a silent volcano. The peak of the mountain cracked and shattered. Thousands of tons of earth and stone burst into the air, only to be wiped away by the shadows before they touched the ground. For a moment, the River Dwarves cowering in the valley below lost sight of the sun, its light snuffed out. The ground did not shake, the earth did not roar. One moment the mountain stood against the sky, then the top of it was gone. Like ink washed away by water, the shadows dissipated into the air, and silence fell again.
Ica Elnao lay upon the stones, looking up at the sky. There'd been a cave there before. There'd been a mountain there before. The body was covered with injuries and unresponsive. Magic reserves were depleted. She had destroyed the dragon. And the mountain.
All these thoughts drifted through her mind from far, far away. There was pain, somewhere, but it wasn't hers. There should have been satisfaction, the vicious thrill of victory, but...no.
Hours passed before she sat up, registering the unresponsive muscles as if they belonged to someone else. The Muinteoiri would be concerned, would want to hear of this. It didn't matter. The River Dwarves threatened by Gribkoan were most likely terrified. It didn't matter. She certainly required healing before she could fly or doing anything else, but it wasn't important. She was still alone. The ground beneath her stopped her from falling, but she didn't feel it. The wind blew around her but did not touch her skin. It was all empty. All her life she'd sought the power to protect those she cared about, and now that she had it, it was nothing. She had no one to protect. She never would again.
Inril Untermauler and the wardens found her, lying beneath the celestial lights, hours after the battle. She could hear them talking and asking questions but the words were empty, their intentions irrelevant. She didn't move or speak in response. She was alone forever, and whatever part of her still stirred beneath the scars of the Void wondered if she'd ever care about anything, or anyone, ever again.

Far away, in another dark cave, stones echoed upon a Pillars board.