From the tree tops the white object plummeted, opened wide its
wings and flew into the face of the fiend. Startled, the monster
fell, rolled over and quickly slipped into the frigid waters of
the tarn.
Athena stood beside Demo. Their eyes looked in sorrow at the
prostrate body of Beowulf.
Even as they moved forward to help him he sat up, his hand
searching for and seizing the hilt of his sword. Without a word
he stood, shook his head, staggered to the brink of the tarn.
Sword clutched in hand, a look of resignation on his face, he
dove into the Demon's Lair!
For a brief moment the water was still, not even a breeze
disturbing its surface.
Without warning it erupted!
A huge shape rended its surface, fell back with a scream of
anger! The green blood blended with the dark water of the tarn.
For hours the battle continued. The once calm tarn was now an
ocean of waves and froth, and thunder sound above it. From
beneath those waters rumbles of anger rose. Sulfurous fumes
lifted from its surface, killed the trees bordering the dark
waters.
Then nought but silence!
Athena's voice was sad. "He will drive Wyrd once more into
those bonds that have so long endured. For all his heroism, for
all his strength, Beowulf cannot survive the conflict, and even
I cannot save him." She gazed, sad-eyed, at the fateful tarn.
"Yet, he shall return at last in another time, another place.
Indeed he will one day slay the Grendl, the Grendl's mother -
archfiends of another era.
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