Mika's shattered barrier sent shards whizzing through the air in every direction. The pieces sizzled and hissed, reduced to smoke and wisps as they vaporized in mid-air. Shouts of alarm rose from the mage's four remaining comrades, but it was too late. Vica's power, fully materialized as a slicing, twisting tornado around her body, burst past the remaining pieces of the magical shield. Mika was dead before she hit the ground. Savage lacerations tore open gashes across her exposed flesh from head to toe, shredding her robes. Like Ewen, beneath the robe, she wore resistant wyrm scale leathers that covered the trunk of her body and her legs. Her vulnerable face, throat, and raised forearms were not so lucky, however, and failed to turn aside Vica's power.
The vicious spattering of her blood
