Drowning in a sea of fiery rage, the Were-cat was only dimly aware of a strange, awesome power that seemed attracted by his intense emotion, drawing nearer and nearer to him. He felt it hovering just on the edges of his awareness as he slammed his fists and shoulder into the door again, and again, and again, trying in vain to burst it from its hinges. His claws could do no better, for they could not penetrate the wood, no matter how hard he pushed. When he broke all the claws on his left paw trying to sink them into the wood, he reared back and kicked the door, but only managed to rebound from it. The door was like nothing the enraged mentality of the Were-cat had ever experienced before, a baffling invulnerable barrier whose very existence was a direct challenge to the Were-cat's strength and dominance. Roaring in impotent fury, the Were-cat reared back, sank his claws into the floor, and then drove his shoulder into the door and pushed. He pushed with all his might, not trying to break the door with a sharp blow, but with inexorable pressure. His fury-tinged vision seemed to blur, blood pounded behind his eyes, bones in his shoulder threatened to snap under the monstrous force that he exerted against the door, but still it would not budge. Deep furrows were dug into the floor from his scrabbling claws, trying to gain purchase, but still it would not budge. He threw his entire might against that door, a might that every living thing would respect if not fear, and still the door would not budge.
The strange power seemed to rush in on him then as he found himself faced with a problem that could not be conquered by brute force. It flowed into his mind, searched through it, searched, and joined with it. It sensed that which infuriated the Were-cat so, the immovable door, and it seemed to respond to his animalistic, base impulse, his utter need to break down the door, to destroy it, to show it that he was the stronger. That power joined with that will, and even in his fury, the Were-cat felt it flow through him from wherever it came from and take up the task that he could not accomplish alone.
The door, which had been invulnerable to his physical attacks, shattered like crystal when that unknown power struck it, struck it with raw, elemental force, unshaped energy, unrefined might. The power of the blow shattered the wall on the opposite side of the passage beyond the door as well, hurting the Were-cat's ears with the loudness of the detonation, and sending a cloud of choking dust billowing into the room. Broken and whole stone blocks were littered in the passage and the dusty storeroom that had been on the other side of the wall, some of them smoking as if on fire.
The power did not flee from him after accomplishing this task. It remained joined to him, joined to his fury, and it became a welcome tool to the furious Were-cat in his need to lay waste to all things. Stepping out into the hallway quickly, he saw the four fleeing figures, among them the one upon which his fury had become temporarily affixed. The power within responded to the sight of them, sending another blast of unmitigated power down the passageway, a wave of incredible force that shattered the walls, the ceiling, even the floor as it passed by, shrouding the passage in a dense fog of dust and flecks of stone. He couldn't see them anymore, and losing sight of them in the middle of that wave of destruction pleased the Were-cat, made him certain that the object of his attention had been destroyed.
Losing the focus of his rage, the Were-cat returned to wild, uncontrolled destruction, but instead of flailing about with his arms and body, he now flailed about with this strange power that had joined to him. Walls collapsed and shattered from the monstrous power unleashed by the enraged mind of the Were-cat, sending thunderclaps of detonation echoing in all directions. The floor, which was solid stone beneath neatly cut and arranged stones, buckled and heaved as the stone was exploded from within, showering the rubble in the destroyed passage with red-hot jags of shrapnel. The celing collapsed on the Were-cat, but the power joined to him shrugged off the tons and tons of jumbled debris, forcing it back up, then sending it flying with a surge of repelling force.
The passage was a rubble-choked ruin, and it pleased the Were-cat in a dark manner that destruction had been achieved. But he was still enraged, still in need of destroying to appease his unsatisfied lust for destruction. The passage was sealed, but the collapsed roof exposed another level above the current one, a new place to destroy. Picking himself up within the strange power joined with him, the Were-cat lifted off the floor and floated up towards that new area, a new thing to destroy.
Not even in the Battle of Suld had Jenna come so close to being killed.
Whatever Tarrin had done-it wasn't Sorcery!-it had come down the hall at them, shattering the walls, ceiling and floor, like an avalanche of invisible force that destroyed everything it touched. The four of them had just barely managed to reach a side passage, and they literally dove into it and huddled on the floor, hands over their heads as the shockwave or whatever it was continued on down the passageway, with only a small wave of force passing harmlessly over them. But then came a rain of stones and a cloud of choking dust as the walls and ceiling in the passage were ripped apart and collapsed, forcing Keritanima and Allia to scramble forward on all fours to get clear of the avalanche of smoking rubble that blocked off the passage. Jenna was hit on the head by a rather large rock, and after a moment of seeing stars and feeling her head swim, she recovered enough to realize where they were and what had just happened.
It wasn't Sorcery, so it had to be Druidic magic. That was bad in its own right, but at least it wasn't Sorcery. If he touched the Weave, he could bring the Tower down around them!
"He's going to bring the Tower down around our ears!" Keritanima said, mirroring Jenna's fears as they all got up and ran blindly down the passage, a passage whose walls were now shivering and buckling in a very unsettling manner, as smoky dust was shaken from the arched ceiling above.
"The All has touched his anger, and it's responding to it!" Sapphire shouted as they ran towards the stairs. "He will not stop until he either exhausts himself or the All tries to do something his power can't support! And that will kill him!"
"Neither of those are acceptable, Sapphire!" Jenna said in a commanding voice. "I'll either lose my brother or the Tower! How do we stop him?"
"It takes a Druid of greater power than him," she replied. "I can do it, but I don't want to face him in a confined space! We must lure him outside!"
"Why not?" Keritanima demanded.
"Because I don't relish the idea of being buried alive!" she answered honestly. "I have to subdue him, Wikuni, and I don't think this structure can withstand that!"
There was an ear-splitting BOOM, followed up almost immediately by a violent shaking of the earth beneath their feet. One of the walls behind them fell in, but it was hard to see or hear in the pall of dust and the loud rumbling of the shifting rubble and earth all around them. The shaking of the ground was enough to spill Jenna to the buckling floor, but Sapphire's curses were even louder than the echoing thunder of the explosion.
"What's happening?" Keritanima asked fearfully. "That wasn't Sorcery!"
"That fool!" Sapphire raged, then cursed for several seconds. "It is the Were-cat Druid, Triana! She's engaged Tarrin within the Tower walls! She'll kill us all!"
Despite his unmitigated fury, the Were-cat had never faced an opponent of such power, and it took him aback.
Her body literally glowing with an angry light, the unrecognizable Were-cat female squared off against him in the ruins of another shattered passageway, a passageway that she had destroyed in an attempt to gain his undivided attention. It had worked. Something about this female tickled at his memory. He knew that he should somehow know her, but his fury-stained mind could not reach through the haze to make the connection. He could only see her as an opponent, as an enemy, and her might challenged him in a way he could not ignore. The primal force in him demanded that he meet this challenge, defeat it, prove his superiority and establish dominance.