Elise stood alone at the southern approach to the village, Aurora's Heart blazing with trapped aurora light, and froze the earth itself.
Beneath the scorched surface, the Magma Serpents were burrowing rapidly toward Ashwick. Five of them. Then ten. More were rising from the scorched fields beyond the tree line. If they reached the houses, if they tunneled beneath the root cellar where the villagers were taking refuge, there would be nothing left but a sinkhole of bodies and ash.
"Golem." Elise's voice was as cold as the magic she wielded. "Freeze the ground."
