The lightning received them all at once. The shields overhead exploded first. White fire burst across the slope. Another strike wrenched hard to the left, split threefold and then thrice more, and then shattered every single one of the nine shields that were there. The entire array vanished in a chain of detonations. The shields below burst with them, as two more bolts followed and divided. Several more tore to the right. For less than a second the convergence around Yves loosened. He cast into the opening before the first flare had even cleared. He rebuilt what broke and increased their number; shield after shield after shield. There was no economy left in his magic, and no art. This was an all or nothing; waste it to win it. Whole cascades of shard clusters burst into existence across the slope, only to be struck, consumed and replaced.
Yves forced the violence outwards by sheer multiplication, splitting the converging chains apart before they could tighten, widening the paths between them, tearing the growing beam back into separate strikes wherever he could. The crest disappeared behind a bombardment of white flares. Metal burned. Stone jumped beneath his feet. Glass flung from the slope in splintering sheets.
Midnight ran. She drove towards the rim, diving left and right through the fractions of darkness his defences brought them. Yves followed, half climbing, half running, ever casting more diversions. A shield to the left detonated before it had fully formed. He threw another four high. Seven ruptures broke towards them, converged through the array in a blinding lattice of white and shattered every barrier at once. The eighth bolt struck the slope right behind Yves. Heat punched across his back. The sheer force of the impact threw him forwards.
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