kills Arianna

Arianna was back on her feet again in an instant: Her shield had bled enough of the energy from the stone to prevent it from smashing into her with lethal force, but it had bought me enough time to get out of the pile of rocks around me and away from the stadium wall. I smashed at her with more fire, and she parried each shaft deftly, congealing water out of the air into wobbling spheres that intercepted the bolts of flame and exploded into concealing steam. By the fifth or sixth bolt, I couldn't see her with my physical eyes, but I did see energies in motion behind the steam as she pulled another dark sheath of veiling energy around her, and I saw her take off into an animal-swift sprint, again circling me to attack me from behind.
No. She couldn't be trying the same thing twice.
Duels between wizards are about more than swatting each other with various forms of energy, just as boxing is about more than throwing hard punches. There is an art to it, a science to it, in which one attempts to predict the other's attack and counter it effectively. You have to imagine a counter to what the opponent might do, and have it ready to fly at an instant's notice. Similarly, you have to imagine your way around the strength of his defenses. A duel of magic is determined almost purely by the imaginations and raw power of those involved.
Arianna had obviously prepared against my favorite weapon - fire - which was only intelligent. But she had tried this backstabbing ploy on me once before, and nearly got burned doing it. A wizard of any experience would tell you that she would never have tried that one again, for fear that the enemy would exploit it even further.
Arianna was an experienced killer, but she hadn't done a lot of dueling with nothing to rely on except her magic. She'd always had the cushion of her extraordinary strength and speed to fall back upon. Hell, it would have been the smart way to kill me - come straight in, shedding attacks and maybe taking some hits to get close enough to end it decisively.
Except here, she couldn't. And she wasn't adjusting well to the handicap. Flexibility of thought is almost never a strength of the truly ancient monsters of the world.
Instead of obliging her by standing in place, as I had last time she'd tried to give me the runaround, I darted forward, into the edges of the concealing steam. I got burned, and accepted it as the price of doing business. I clenched my teeth, focusing past my pain, and tracked Arianna's energy with my Sight, waiting for my shot and hoping that she didn't have the Sight as well.
Apparently she didn't, or wasn't bothering to use it, relying upon her superior senses instead. She got into position and seemed to realize that I'd gone into the steam. She began to advance cautiously, gathering more lightning to her cupped hands. I saw the instant in which she began to spot my outline, the way she drew a breath to speak the word to unleash the lightning upon me.
"Infriga," I hissed, and threw both hands forward. "Infriga forzare!"
And the entire cloud bank of steam in the air around me congealed into needle-pointed spears of ice that flew at her as if fired from a gun.
They struck her just as she unleashed her lightning bolt, which shattered one of the spears and tore a two-foot furrow in the dirt some twenty feet to my side.
Arianna stood still for a moment, her black eyes wide with disbelief, staring down at the spears and shards of ice that had slammed deep into her flesh. She looked up at me for a second and opened her mouth.
A blob of black blood burst out and spilled down over her chin. Then she shuddered and fell, simply limp, to the ground.


Changes Chapter 45, Page 479-481