Meesei, in the time that she had been holding off the Daedra on her flank, had done as much damage as she could. She had become a veritable storm of lightning to control the area in front of her and spread as much damage as she could deep into their ranks. She had charged the ground itself with what seemed like pools of lightning to block off angles of approach, followed by powerful bursts of chain lightning into any Daedra brave enough to approach. She had chosen an offensive strategy as she felt that, against such numbers, keeping up such heavy pressure would help her last longer than a purely defensive approach. It was successful for as long as it lasted, though with less focus on her wards, she did take hits herself. Arrows did not break her armor, but spells that got through her ward had their effects. Enchantments could reduce, but did not eliminate the burns she received from both flame and lightning. 

Meesei was surprised to see Fendros approach beside her, but she did not second-guess his decision. She knew what he could do, and she trusted him to succeed where many others would fail. With a silent nod, she backed away and allowed him to take over. He was right that the others needed help, and her power could deal with a horde like none other. Although, before she could commit to another attack, she had to back away into the middle of their formation and take just a moment to heal herself. Her burns did not show through her armor, but the wounds would get worse if she did nothing to treat them.

For Ahnasha, every moment the others gave her was valuable. The power she focused through herself rivaled that of the spell she had used to command the titan. It was exhausting, both mentally and physically. Even with potions to help, the exertion of casting such powerful spells one after another was pushing her to her limits. Still, there was no option for failure here. She had to cast her spell, and it [i]had[/i] to work. 

The dark blue tendrils of conjuration energy surrounded Ahnasha, then, once they reached a critical point, she pushed them outwards. It was a reanimation spell, but not one that targetted a single body. Rather, it was a reanimation field that spread out along the ground in every direction around her. Each body it encountered gathered the energy, which swirled around and penetrated its form to give life to the dead flesh. Ahnasha did not, and indeed [i]could[/i] not discriminate on which bodies her magic resurrected, so everything from Skaafin to Dremora, from the smallest Spider Daedra to the largest Daedroth, and even some of the pack’s Elven and Lycan allies that had fallen within range of the spell, rose from where their corpses lay to rejoin the battle. 

Ahnasha could not even count how many she had reanimated, but her pack soon found themselves with a small army of the undead fighting beside them. No longer were Janius and Kaleeth taking wounds from the opportunistic Daedra surrounding them, as the very Daedra they had been killing were now rising up from within their ranks to sow chaos among them. Leaps was frightened by the sudden resurrections of the foes he had been fighting, but Lorag stayed near and calmed him to allow Ahnasha’s thralls to take over as his frontline. And Fendros, having created a wall from his ward, was no longer fighting alone. With so many thralls to command, Ahnasha could not individually control any of them, but plenty enough of them joined in alongside him on their own.

As might have been expected, there were no words that would influence Arinette’s resolve. “Your souls belong to my lord, except yours…your life is mine!” The Breton screamed as she lunged forward with unmatched, burning hatred in her eyes. Every ounce of her willpower was devoted to slaying Sabine, to the point that she did not seem to care at all if she died in the process. In life, her zeal had been focused on serving Vile, but now, she was a spirit of vengeance towards the one she blamed for her death.

Ultimately, however, Lorag’s teachings had guided Sabine well. Particularly as Arinette had charged without regard for her own safety, Sabine was able to strike her before her sword could reach her. Arinette would have gladly traded fatal blows, but Sabine’s choice of attack quite literally froze her in place. The tip of Arinette’s blade stopped just inches short of Sabine’s throat as her legs were no longer able to carry her forward. Frost quickly spread across her skin up and down her torso, near the point of impact, while the thermal shock spread far deeper across the rest of her body. She gasped and struggled for breath, but the one thing about her that did not diminish was the fury in her eyes. 

Even as her body finally started to fail, the crystal started to glow red once more as vines surged forth from the ground to try and ensnare Sabine and rend her flesh with their thorns. Using the crystal meant yet more pain and damage to Arinette’s body, but she would gladly give her last breath to spread as much pain and suffering as she could to Sabine.