View Full Version : Reflections
Prologue
The fumes of strong spirits filled the air and dancing firelight revealed a jovial human camp scene. A caravan had stopped to rest for the night in a grassy clearing. The men and women were having a night to themselves, singing loudly to the heavens. All the children had been put to bed early and the troupe decided to celebrate their reaching such a hallowed region of their native continent. The sky above Tevir Woods was alight with stars and other cosmic bodies that night, shining down at the campsite. Since the younger members of the group were presumably resting in their tents, the men were free to explore baser instincts. Thighs were squeezed with growing abandon and the fire seemed to crackle with approval. Music played from roughly crafted instruments to mix with the laughter and growing moans.
The party of twenty, boasting seven able-bodied men, had been traveling for weeks to visit the Tower of Ecclesia, which now stood high above them, concealed for the moment by the gathering darkness; its silhouette had only just melted into that sea of black. They were camped at the base of the mountain that served as its pedestal, perhaps only a day’s constant upward march from their goal. Their pilgrimage was one of dual purpose. The tall, narrow edifice high above them was a beacon of grace to the acolytes of the Church of the Ethereal Sway. Many traveled far and wide simply to kneel at its doorstep and pay their respects. Yet, there was another reason for the humans’ interest now. Rumors had spread that the tower’s curator and resident priest had deemed it time to open his doors and allow entry to those he deemed worthy. This was of particular import because the Tower of Ecclesia had long been believed to house a most powerful artifact within its walls. Many with less than full allegiance to the church now sought to reach the holy tower. Curiosity and a thirst for the supremacy of their clan had forged this caravan.
Those singing and petting around the campfire spared no thought to their intentions upon reaching the Church’s construct, however. They were in the moment, caught up in the elation of having their destination in sight and mixing it with strong spirits and animal passion. They thought neither of the considerable noise they were making in these unfamiliar woods, unaware their lack of foresight had brought with it unwanted attention. From the thick brush that surrounded the well-lit clearing, a stalker’s red eyes bore witness to the humans’ lascivious interaction with a mute hunger. A cruel tongue passed over long fangs. The thrill of murder was enhanced when his prey behaved as animalistic as ever.
“Always faithful to their cruder natures,” he hissed in the cold night air, “like pigs reveling in muck. Hardly any trouble at all.”
Noting that drink was threatening to put some of his victims into wake-less stupors soon, the unseen shadow emerged from his refuge and took several steps into the clearing. It took a couple of seconds for anything to happen, but one woman quite nearby finally managed to remove her tongue from her intoxicated companion’s mouth long enough to notice their uninvited guest, scream at the top of her lungs, and faint unceremoniously on top of her mate. This provoked the others to turn and gaze upon the intruder. Standing a commanding seven feet tall, the demon’s humanoid body was covered entirely with thick, snake-like red scales that shown like rubies in the firelight. His face seemed a thing out of horror stories, menacing fanged grin on a rough visage topped by backward curving black horns. The humans seemed to struggle to move their inebriated minds from a state of lust to alertness.
“Come now,” the demon spoke with a guttural voice that chilled them to the bone more effectively than the harshest Salvic winds, “surely you can conjure the lucidity to make this sporting.”
Sobered alarmingly by the threat in this monster’s tone, the closest man’s hand reached for the dagger sheathed at his belt. Before his fingers touched hilt, the demon had raised his massive claw of a hand and manifested an orb of brilliant flame from thin air. The man had time only to gasp as the fireball raced to incinerate his homely face. The black stump of a neck left in its wake was more than enough to convince the rest of the women to join the first in screaming, though they chose to run rather than sprawl themselves at this horror's feet. The men stumbled to their feet as their assailant lifted the first unconscious woman by the hair like a rag doll, her flaccid limbs hanging sinisterly as he ran a razor-like digit horizontally across her mid-section. Crimson blood oozed from the straight line and once it spanned from one side to the other, the demon shook his comatose puppet until the gash widened itself and exposed the unfortunate female’s entrails to the night air. She would never wake.
“You'll die for that, you bastard!” one of the men shouted disgustedly, and they all rallied to charge with blades drawn and war cries splitting through the night.
The demon, unfazed, tossed the woman’s corpse aside as if she were a toy he’d quickly grown bored with and raised a solitary finger to hover before his cruelly shaped mouth in a mock call for silence.
“Hush! We don’t want to wake the children, do we?”
~We are the product of our thoughts. In time, action will always reflect inner decision.~
Some miles from where the caravan had made camp, a white elf was attempting to sleep away his exhaustion, basking in the radiant sunlight reaching Tevir woods through the treetops. His head was propped against a wide trunk and the rest of him was slumped on the ground. The dark elven muscles could relax while he slumbered, though his thoughts were proving as troubled as ever. Within his mind, a trio of voices was conversing, like unseen forces pulling him in various directions. In the blackness of the brain, they communicated more as feelings than actual words, but their intent nevertheless resonated clearly through the void. These 'voices' were the representations of each of three individual spirits ever vying for control of their shared body. Their conflict of wills led to a schizophrenia-like condition that only played itself out clearly when their physical form slept.
“Truly a mark of great desperation,” spoke Arawn's cold hiss. Such was the name taken by an alter ego produced by the white warrior’s brush with vampiric contamination. “You've never been one to heed rumors of religious institutions' power. Really clutching at straws nowadays, aren't we?” he went on, cynically.
“I would journey to the ends of existence for a snowball's chance in Fallien to have your being stripped from my body, you filth!” This enraged outburst came from Hikari Ashigaru, a spirit endowed with powers over light that had originally invaded the dark elven body.
“Oh, but you and I both know that is impossible,” the vampire retorted. “You would do better to dedicate yourself in service to me. Accept the harsh reality bestowed upon you and pledge allegiance to the superior creature.”
“You would both do better to leave me be,” uttered a third, sorrowful voice slowly; almost timidly. This was Legol Darkweaver, only of the three with birthright to their body and only of the three who was unable to remain in control for more than a few minutes at a time. “You demons torment my sleeping hours with your errant ways and further make of my body a prison. By my will, you’d both be banished!”
“Silence, child,” Arawn spat contemptuously. “The adults are talking. What you will is of little consequence. A buzzing insect would have more say.”
“His claim to power is far more valid than yours,” Hikari interjected. “You infect us with the stench of undeath and reap only labors of destruction in your turn.”
“More valid, is it?” Arawn asked rhetorically. “What of your claim, then? How would you justify your enslaving this dark elf if I did not exist? You find it so easy to possess but not so to be possessed. Hypocrisy in unbecoming of an honorable warrior."
There was silence for a moment while Hikari struggled to form a response.
“I-” he stammered, “I am seeking what is right for him as well.”
“Do not presume to conceal your intentions from me!” the vampire spat, words rushing from him now like water from a broken damn. “Pull a blanket over the naïve one’s eyes if you wish, but know that your mind is as clear to me as glass. You travel now to rid yourself of us both, not just in hopes of flushing me out. Though your quest be ill-fated, at the very least acknowledge its purpose.”
“Is this true?” came the shy voice of Legol once more.
Hikari tried to answer, but whatever mechanism they had been using to communicate seemed to be inhibiting his words now. As he struggled to voice his opinion, the blackness of their brain’s ocean was being replaced by a soft glow of orange that brightened every second. Hikari could hear, as if from far off, whispers and snatches of Legol and Arawn’s words. They were distancing themselves more and more as the orange spanned all that was. A thought came to Hikari. The orange glow must be sunlight filtering through his shut eyelids and Hikari realized he was waking. The moment he reached this conclusion, his eyes flew open and the voices were silent.
The voices were returned to the recesses of the dark elf’s mind. The yellow sun peeking through the forest’s leaves caressed Hikari’s pale face. It was far past midday by its position, so he must surely have been lying there for hours, though he felt as tired as when he first collapsed. He had been en route to the Tower of Ecclesia for five days now. He'd caught sight of the building jutting from the mountaintop in the morning sun after a night’s worth of monotonous walking when exhaustion overtook him and he made bed at the foot of a prominent tree. Standing now, he flexed his muscles to find them rejuvenated by the daylong nap. It was not they who made his lode so heavy and drained his resolve, but the constant torment of the other voices. He had not slept well for weeks and the effect was a disjointed state of being. His body was willing to push on, but his mind lagged behind.
“Soon shall I find solace,” he muttered hopefully, dark eyes climbing the mountain and resting on the structure at the top.
The Tower of Ecclesia was a magnificent, fifty-foot spire-like building of flawless white marble. It thinned towards the top, ending in a brilliant orb of some translucent material set upon the building’s tip. When the sun caught it, the sphere shown far and wide throughout Tevir, as if holding the woods under its influence. The Church of the Ethereal Sway, self-imposed religious monarch of the snow continent, had built it in hopes of spreading their authority to the more remote residents of their continent. It reminded all who passed for miles around whose land this was. It had been meant as a temple where those loyal to the Church could find peace and shelter from the heretic machinations of the outside world, before Priest Ymodos had devised another use for it. The tower was truly an awe-inspiring sight, a thing one found easy to revere.
Not idly does the Church’s hand spread its fingers, Hikari thought inwardly.
A path had once curved up the mountainside to ease travelers’ way, but time and weather had conspired to vanish any trace of it. The way was now frosty and unwelcoming, with chilling winds breathing down the mountaintop at all hours. Hikari had fallen at the abrupt edge of Tevir woods at the mountain’s feet. It was here the absent path had once begun its steady climb to the tower. Exiting the rich forest would mean sacrificing his exceptional cover from the biting wind, a prospect he had been dreading. The way ahead was riddled with only sparse caves and clumps of isolated greenery on the mountain’s face. The white warrior morosely contemplated starting off now, but the rumbling protest of his stomach bid him otherwise. His prize would have to wait for mortal necessities.
The hunger surprised him. Another side effect of Hikari’s restless sleep was a profound disorientation regarding the passage of time. Having had no thought of food a moment before, he was suddenly overcome by a ravenous appetite. At his waist clung a rabbit he had caught the night before, swinging by its strapped legs. The dark elf could think of no greater joy now than to cook and feast on this creature. He began to manically scour the ground for dry branches in hopes of building a fire and devouring his catch before sunset. The forest floor provided more than he could ask for in the way of kindling, as if it knew he would soon leave it and wished to offer a parting gift.
Such luck will not follow me much further, he brooded.
Minutes later, Hikari sat before a crackling fire eating the small mammal’s flesh with a vengeance. His teeth sunk deep into the rare meat and tore at it hungrily. The chunks of rabbit mixed with remaining trickles of blood felt like sweet ambrosia running down his throat. Nutrients spread throughout his slightly starved body, making his extremities tingle pleasantly. If he had had the presence of mind to consider it, Hikari might have found it odd that when he felt most alive and separate from Arawn was when he lost himself in the drive to satisfy bodily needs. His mind was wiped blank when he ate hungrily or satiated his accumulated lust with a local female in a passing town. It was as if these acts were such strong affirmations of life that the vampire could not stand before them. Yet, descending into a pit of gluttony would never serve Hikari as a form of freedom. He sought to rid himself of Arawn entirely.
As he ate, Hikari glanced up now and again to gaze at the tower high above, the dwelling of Priest Ymodos. He’d never heard Ymodos’ story before venturing to the northern villages of Salvar. Of course, as with any story based on people of great renown, ill-contrived rumors abounded concerning almost every detail of his life. So Hikari was not sure if the priest was a native Salvaran or in fact a reformed criminal of Concordia who had undergone a religious transformation, as some had claimed. He could be a tall, dark individual with fiery eyes or an unoffending face of compassion. The stories pulled in every direction. There was one thing all seemed to agree upon, however. Priest Ymodos was now the possessor of the Aetas Mirror.
How he came to have it was another story riddled with misinformation, but the prevailing theory was that it was a spoil of war. The Church of the Ethereal Sway’s assassin priests were known and feared by the people of Salvar, unseen fists of righteousness doing their masters’ bidding. Ymodos, it was said, was entreated to eliminate an opposing religious leader by the name of Laro Taerg who was gaining influence in the northern regions of the land. The trouble was, this cleric of the people was aided in hiding by his followers, who proved quite cunning at keeping Ymodos chasing smoke. It was several months before the priest caught sight of his quarry. The elusive Taerg and his flock were encamped in the village of Tevir, which was surrounded by a forest of the same name. Ymodos’ attack should have been swift and surgical, but his plans went afoul.
The priest had intended to kill his mark in its sleep and crept into Laro Taerg’s quarters in the dead of night. However, be it due to insane paranoia resulting from months of hiding or a commendable demonstration of prescience, the people’s prophet had grown accustomed to making others sleep in his bed while he slept beneath the mattress' frame on the floor. As such, the screams of his devout decoy had roused him instantly and hastened him to take flight into Tevir Woods while the priest still stabbed the wrong man, taking with him an ornate hand mirror many claimed had been the reason for his popular success. The Aetas Mirror was supposed to resolve any mental conflict of its bearer and provide clarity bordering on the euphoric. Doubtless this was why Taerg kept it close even in sleep.
Cursing his prey’s unconventional astuteness, Ymodos gave chase through the forest. It was agreed, for the most part, that the priest kept close at Laro Taerg’s heels right up until they reached the Tower of Ecclesia, having climbed the mountain absently caught up in their contest. Here speculation varied highly from person to person, but it was considered fact that Ymodos murdered Taerg and so acquired the Aetas Mirror. What was still a mystery was why Ymodos had seen fit to lock the tower doors and take up residence there rather than take this potent relic back to those he served. Whatever the case, it was now, nearly a decade later, that Ymodos decided to allow entrance to those he might deem worthy. So far as Hikari knew, none had lived up to this standard yet.
“Now I must follow his footsteps to the mountain’s peak,” Hikari declared, his breath hanging in the air before him. His meal was finished and he was preparing to head out. Gazing ahead as the sun was stained orange, he said, “I hope my journey won’t have to end on similar terms.”
The moment Hikari stepped out of the woods and began climbing the mountain with his cloaked back to the slowly setting sun, he knew he would always have a special place of loathing in his heart for Salvic winds. By whatever blessing the Church had conjured for the tower’s orbed tip, everywhere the resplendent sphere cast its rays on land was mercifully devoid of snow. Streams branching from the mountain hydrated the surrounding woods instead of freezing for most of the year. This did not, however, diminish the burden of cold for its pilgrims, and the wind coming down the mountain was nothing to snicker at. It bit at the bone and rattled one’s body from head to foot. Hikari trudged determinately forward, however, using his constant gait as a source of warmth. He wanted to make some progress before sundown, so the day was not wasted, and he had an hour at the most. Hikari would not dare travel the freezing mountainside by night.
It was bad enough in the woods, he considered. This wind bites with a mind of its own, picking up when least you wish it.
The white warrior saw little movement on the rocky incline but for the unceremonious squawk of what birds managed to survive the cold, their feathers thick and brown. They hung on low branches of the cluttered trees and watched him as he passed with their amber eyes. He was thirty minutes into his trek when he smelled something offensive in the air. It was the unmistakable scent of decay. Tensing, Hikari strained to hear the slightest sound of an approaching threat. Hearing nothing but the birds’ ugly song, he bent low to the ground and hastened toward the source of the smell. He reached a rare patch of dense trees and entered a minute forest, which provided some shelter from the rushing air. The smell was permeating ever more strongly. Rounding a particularly wide tree trunk, Hikari’s eyes met with the origin of the rotting odor.
Scattered everywhere among the trees were slumped corpses of soldiers of Salvar, at least a dozen and a half of them with the unmistakable features of their race, all clad in full mail armor. Some of their faces were grotesquely contorted in agony, with dead eyes looking on at some horror that was no longer there. Their wounds consisted of countless identical puncture holes two inches wide all over their armor. Frozen blood clung to the lower rim of the innumerable cavities. They were obviously much deeper than they were wide, as if the men had been jabbed incessantly by sharpened pikes. Not a single square foot of any of their mail lacked a round gash gaping ominously. From the looks of their remaining possessions and the stage of their decay, Hikari surmised they had been attacked while they ate breakfast. These men had not so much seen a battle as been subjected to utter massacre.
Most of them never reached their weapons. These poor souls had dishonorable deaths forced upon them.
It was eerily silent within the closed clump of trees as Hikari walked among the fallen, hands floating by his waist inches from the hilts of his daggers. The hard earth was stained crimson with Salvaran blood, interspersed with patches of budding grass and cobwebs. There were weapons of great value in some of their hands, ruling out robbery as the cause for the assault. Their bodies bore no signs of mutilation from the maw of some beast, so hunger hadn’t motivated it either. It was not unheard of for military companies passing through the northern territories to detour and visit the Tower of Ecclesia as a sign of good faith to the Church. These had simply settled for a meal before heading up the mountain and been promptly slain.
As Hikari knelt to examine a large cobweb with some strange liquid on it, a yell split the silence of the battleground and he cocked his head in its direction.
Hikari had only to run for a short while, weaving through trees and shrubbery, before he came upon a lone Salvaran soldier propped from his waste up against a tree trunk just at the edge of the dwarf woods ahead of him.
“Are you alright?” Hikari inquired in rapid Common.
“Meon pretos di creat vorrak,” the soldier replied laboriously, his eye begging up at Hikari.
Apparently this man knew only Salvic, and the half-vampire drow’s dominion of the tongue was rudimentary at best. He could distinguish the words “my” and “hurts” in the exclamation with a certain degree of conviction, but the gist of the message was lost. Looking apologetic, Hikari approached and saw that this soldier too had a puncture wound, though only one. It was a gash in his midsection just like those pin-cushioning his peers, piercing his side. No organs were likely too badly damaged or he would’ve been dead along with his friends hours ago, but the expanse of red below the soldier showed that he’d been bleeding out for quite some time. If he had stitched the wound soon after it was inflicted, he would have survived with a scar and a story. As things were, he was not long for this world.
“Why didn’t you at least cover it?” the drow asked, almost angry with the doomed man.
“Pera du timaanu abe. Yso creat vorrak.”
Hikari’s face softened as a new possibility occurred to him, his eyes resting on the man’s limp arms. He had not even raised a hand to Hikari.
“You can’t move your body...”
Accepting the futility of their dialogue, the man saw Hikari kneel before him and bring a drink of water to his lips from a flask at his waist. There was little else to be done but wait for the end, which would not be long by the lines of blood now dribbling from the corners of the man's mouth, diluted in the water he found difficult to swallow. Hikari looked away involuntarily. Fear gripped the man’s eyes as the elf’s deed seemed to solidify his own mortality. He was forced, in those last moments, to contemplate the terrifying uncertainty of what awaited him. The notion of a gaping void, of an indescribable unknown after death loomed monstrously in the corners of his mind, though he strived to keep it back. He had always been brave in life, proud of his name and nation, but his entire basis of ego was shattering around him as he felt his heartbeat weakening, paralyzing venom keeping him from moving his extremities. He stubbornly tried to communicate with the white-skinned drow once more.
“Iowes qor mokashe briensto Grioqwe,” he coughed, blood gushing liberally from his numb lips.
‘Grioqwe’ was ‘Salvar’, Hikari knew, but once more his limited linguistic knowledge barred any deeper appreciation of his unfortunate companion’s words. Yet instead of shaking his head in confusion, he nodded solemnly. This feigned sign of understanding seemed to pacify the man somewhat, the hint of a smile crossing his pained face. His eyes bulged suddenly with another coughing fit. Not long left now. With what seemed tremendous effort, the man pulled Hikari’s hand ever so gently toward him. He maneuvered it to the back of his neck and released it to touch the strand of unicorn hair he wore as a necklace tucked under the front of his mail, implying for the pale creature to take it.
With his last breath, he muttered, “Dreanis… merkotyu… wesaliem.”
Again, the elf nodded.
Several hours later, Hikari was trudging up a rocky incline on the mountainside, the unicorn hair strand tied around his neck as it had been around the soldiers’. The Salvaran’s last words did not make sense to him, but he resolved to discover their meaning and honor them. He repeated them under his breath as the orange ball of flame in the sky touched the horizon, preparing to dip below and disappear for another night. Hikari was in the middle of an expanse of bare rock, quite far away from any cover. He thought he saw a hole in the rock wall ahead, but he couldn’t be sure. If he was wrong, he would have to make haste to the nearest patch of trees about half a mile to his left. It was already getting cold and the wind picked up for good measure, making the drow’s cloak flutter behind him.
“This is lunacy,” he stammered through chattering teeth. “What would possess anyone to build a tower in such a place?”
Cursing the Church’s choice of locale, he made toward the hole, seeing it widen as he approached. It would indeed serve his needs. The crevice was wider than it was tall, boring into the side of the mountain. Diving in, Hikari’s ears rang with the sudden silencing of the rushing wind. He looked around at his windfall with interest. The cave was actually far deeper than Hikari had originally thought, tunneling into the crag like a serpent so he could not see beyond the first bend. Dried weeds covered everything from the boulders on the floor to the stalactite-ridden, low-hanging ceiling. It was the perfect place to while away the nighttime hours.
Not being one to explore anything in darkness, in view of Arawn’s constant threat to overthrow him in the chosen ambiance, Hikari stayed by the cave mouth and quickly began gathering the moss and plants from the ground. Sunlight was just barely filtering into the grotto when Hikari managed to form a decent teepee of kindling on an area he’d made bare, lest the whole cave around him catch fire. Standing above it, he stretched out his hands and positioned his palms to face the browned vegetation. With a crackling sonata of static energy, a single brilliant white bolt of electricity raked the air between them, setting the receptive pile ablaze. Satisfied with his creation, he sat cross-legged by the flame and looked out into the now-dark view of Tevir Woods the cave provided.
Several hours were spent seated on the cushioned earth contemplating the hopes and assumptions that motivated his journey, having to get up now and again to add fuel to the fire. All was silent but for the whistling of the wind as it passed over the cave mouth, chilling its foyer now and again with an unexpected gust that made the fire flutter and spit disconcertingly. Hikari’s dark elven eyes were surveying the trees of Tevir and glimpsing what he supposed were campfire lights dotted between the vast pattern of branches. Others were joining him in the quest for Ecclesia’s treasure. There was a nagging suspicion growing in Hikari’s mind, aided along by the echoes of Arawn’s words, that he was chasing another mirage and would be sorely disappointed when he reached the tower tomorrow.
It is irrelevant, he reassured himself. I’ll chase down every last hope for my salvation before I resign to him.
The thought of Arawn and the uses to which the vampire put their body made Hikari shiver, though out of incensed rage rather than fear or cold. Then again, there was another misgiving Arawn had seen fit to promote in his psyche. Hikari had been growing worried that what Arawn was doing to him was analogous to Hikari’s possession of Legol’s body. Perhaps they were all driven by the same inexorable will to exist as they desired, sovereigns of their own actions. If so, Hikari feared Legol to be the greatest victim in this arrangement. Hikari struggled with the uncertainty that if it came to it, preservation of his own essence might supercede Legol’s freedom.
A decision for another time, he thought evasively.
It was a little before dawn, when the air grew humid and the faint reflections of sunlight were only just playing on the treetops of Tevir, that Hikari’s sleep-deprived mind made his eyelids feel suddenly weighted down. It was as if keeping them up required an inordinate amount of effort. He knew it was not wise to sleep while the sun was still hidden, lest his fire be blown out and the vampire within him set free. Nevertheless, he could muster little resistance to the wave of fatigue that washed over him in an instant, making him yawn deeply in the cold night air and close his eyes in spite of himself. When his eyes did not open right away afterward, he negotiated that he would rest them for just a few minutes but remain vigilant otherwise; they ached so pleasurably behind his shut lids. His ears focused on the whistling wind, its varying song carrying a constantly morphing rhythm. It soon carried Hikari into a profound slumber, breathing on his body against the wall.
It’s nice here, came a vague consideration.
Hikari felt his body taken to a vast lake surrounded on all sides by the greenest of rolling hills. He was floating on the crystalline water, staring up at a brilliant sun that warmed his face. Raising his hand effortlessly, he grabbed onto a cloud in the sky above and tugged at it to lift himself up. He was suddenly standing on top of the lake, his feet floating inches from the water’s surface. Feeling this was a good thing, since he didn’t want to get wet, he began walking toward the nearest lakeshore. He was in luck. The cloud he had grabbed onto was tired of floating boringly in the sky and wanted to carry him there, which would be much faster. Hikari decided to trust the cloud, since there seemed no reason not to, and hopped aboard the cottony mass. It flew forward, indeed much faster than he’d have managed alone, speeding him to the shining shores.
“You do have the most peculiar dreams for your outward persona.”
An unwanted voice shattered the image of Hikari on his white, formless steed. He felt the lake, the shore and the sunlight all disintegrate in an instant, letting him fall into an all-too-familiar pit of black. The three conflicting wills were once more engaged in forced conference as their body slept.
“Arawn,” Hikari fumed, “never have I known one cause me greater distaste than you.”
“Did I interrupt your fantasy of cloud-travel, little elf? Please accept my most sincere apologies.”
Arawn paused.
“Though of course, you shouldn’t be dreaming at all, should you?”
A pang of guilt struck Hikari. He had fallen asleep despite the danger.
“The sun will soon make it unnecessary,” he lied bravely. The cave would not likely be hit by the sun’s light until well after dawn.
“Indeed?” Arawn replied. “You have grown bold, then, to risk your voyage for a few minutes’ sleep when you could have waited but a small while for proper caution. You wouldn’t be secretly enjoying my little escapes, would you? There's no shame in acquiescing to a great leader and tyrant.”
Hikari heard a faint clicking.
“You are truly repulsive,” Legol interjected. “You thrive in all that is base and foul in the world.”
“Maggot, your opinions’ value has been made clear to you countless times. Be the master of your silence.”
The clicking grew louder and more sporadic, an ominous feeling taking over with it.
“Do you hear that?” Hikari asked the others distractedly.
“I would make you slave of my sword if but given the chance,” Legol’s voice came in response to Arawn, sounding far off.
“The chance would hav-” the words faded.
Arawn’s retort was so distant that Hikari had trouble making it out. The clicking that now echoed off the walls around him was deafening all else out. Realizing it was not in his mind, Hikari was once more roused abruptly from sleep.
Hikari jumped to his feet in the pale light of the cave. His hands flew instinctively to yank the longbow from his back and nock an arrow on the string, pulling it back before he had taken time to aim. The small fire was still crackling beside him. Everything else seemed unchanged but for the inescapable cacophony of clicking sounds bouncing off the rock walls. They were carried to him from deeper in the tunnel, Hikari realized, beyond the first serpentine bend. By the sound of things, whatever it was would turn the final corner and meet Hikari before much longer. Growing louder by the second, he noticed the clicking came from several distinctly separate sources, leading the white warrior to conclude there was more than one creature on its way. Pointing the tip of his arrow towards the depths of the cave, he waited for one of them to show itself. His pulse quickened and he felt the sudden rush of adrenaline tense all his muscles in preparation. When he saw the first of them emerge from around the curving rock hedge, he cursed.
Adraeni…
He had been a fool not to put the signs together. The creatures known as Adraeni were dreaded white spiders native to the snow continent. Their main bodies were small and round, hanging suspended from eight legs that rose high on both sides of them to almost three feet before peaking back down to the earth. The venom-tipped anterior pairs of legs served as their primary weapons, which they were known to plunge into victims repeatedly in any assault in order to paralyze and bleed them out. Hikari’s mind flashed back to the cobwebs around the pin-cushioned Salvaran soldiers and the green ooze he had been distracted from inspecting further. Those men had been murdered while breakfasting. Adraeni were notorious for scourging the area around their hive-like cave structures every morning by sunrise as part of their territorial nature. The only reason Hikari hadn’t thought of them was because his mind stubbornly put their white menace in a snowy setting, though it was reasonable that they’d exist here too even after Ecclesia was built and the snow receded from Tevir. It was certainly cold enough for them.
There’s too many, Hikari thought worriedly, counting ten rounding the corner.
The company of spiders was mechanically heading toward the hive exit assigned to them for the morning purge when they noticed Hikari. The dark elf let fly his arrow and it struck the spider leading in one of eight eyes, skewering its brain and making it drop, still twitching. Instantly, what was a moment ago an orderly group moving in unison became a chaotic frenzy as every spider scurried in a different direction, some moving side to side spontaneously while others began walking on the roof and walls. The clicking of their legs on rock saw a sudden uproar. They employed this insect-like maneuver to confuse predators and make catching any single one of them much more difficult. Dropping the now-useless longbow, Hikari gesticulated at the closest one, which was sneaking at him from between stalactites above, and a bolt of lightning shot toward it from the drow's outstretched hand. Its fried and blackened form dropped smoking to the ground.
Eight to go and I can’t risk shocking them all.
They were closing in, only a few meters away, and the sun was not yet up to energize Hikari’s unique brand of light magic. Lightning was all well and good, but it’s unpredictable nature would not ensure Hikari’s safety if he shot a bolt too close. Elves were more conductive than spiders. Moreover, the moss clinging to the mountain's rocky innards seemed all too willing to take flame. The firelight made everything more confusing, as every spider seemed doubled by the sight of its scampering shadow. Drawing what energy he could from the fragile fire he’d built, Hikari had two elongated darts of light manifest from the flames licking the air and fly at a spider approaching from the left wall. The first merely severed a leg, but the second met with its main body and sent it tumbling to the floor. Seven were left and coming fast.
The first to reach Hikari jumped at him with venomous legs raised seeking to pierce his flesh. He lifted his vlince cloak upward as a shield. It held strong, though he could hear the scraping of several strands as the spider’s weight tugged its extended tools downward along the material. Hikari pushed in response and pinned the creature beneath his weight under the cloak. Using his free left hand, he went straight for one of the daggers at his waist and pierced the frantic body below the cloth. It stopped moving, but Hikari did not have time to react before another had stabbed a sharp appendage deep into his side. His eyes went wide as his system was flooded with paralyzing poison. He went limp immediately, sending his face crashing down to meet the hard ground. He hit a rock with his forehead and lay bleeding, facedown.
Now the stings.
Hikari was furious at himself. He should have known what to expect of the mountain’s caves the moment he saw the soldiers’ bodies. All the evidence had pointed toward Adraeni, not least the webs scattered everywhere. This mistake would be the last he ever made. In moments, he would feel dozens of spikes impale him again and again, though he'd be unable to scream. The proud and honorable white warrior of Tarn would die as prey to mindless beasts. He waited, resigned to his fate with disgust. For some reason, however, the rain of piercing agony never came. Instead, he felt himself being pulled across the moss-strewn floor by his cloak, his face scraping painfully. Three of the remaining half-dozen arachnids were dragging his body. They were taking him back to the main hive for some reason, deeper into the tunnel.
Into the darkness.
~Logic, unchecked by morals, loses all notion of empathy.~
The spiders struggled a little with their burden, his paralyzed limbs seeing fit to snag on every rock and vine as they pulled him around the first bend, shutting out the faint pre-dawn light and concealing the makeshift campfire. It was customary for them to simply bleed out their victims and leave it at that, but this being had stumbled upon their home and murdered four of their kin. Their queen would deal with him. She always liked it when they brought back feisty toys and this one was nothing if not lively. She inhabited the center of the hive, a massive being twenty times larger than her male drones sitting on a web from whence all the mountain's tunnels branched outward. Unlike the others, she had a taste for mammalian blood and relished seeing them struggle in her webbing. The drone spiders could not have known they had doomed themselves by not finishing the white drow back at the cave entrance.
A twitch from the load!
The three arachnids pulling the elf stopped suddenly, the other three who were following along did the same. The thing had moved, they’d all either seen or felt it. It was a convulsive motion, as if some inner pain they could not place tormented him. It was inconceivable. None of their victims moved for hours after a proper stinging, and certainly never mere seconds afterward. Yet, impossible as it was, the cloaked creature rose slowly to his feet from his hands and knees. His face was bloodied by the cave floor’s texture and the hole in his side was dripping profusely, but he seemed somehow unconcerned by these mundane details. The spiders were unsure what to do and began scurrying around this disturbing development, an odd arachnid ballet to the turn of events. They failed to realize they now faced a completely different and far more lethal threat.
Ah, the susceptibility of mortal beings, Arawn thought, looking at his hands and flexing fingers he had long been unable to control. The fool would have had us die a spider’s meal.
He was privy to all that had passed in Hikari’s reign. When the spiders had dragged their body beyond the firelight, Arawn had contested Hikari’s command and taken over with absurd ease, convulsing in the short struggle for power. Once on top, the vampire’s undead machinations kicked in, making the Adraeni venom useless and permitting him to stand. However, the wear and tear on his body was considerable, particularly the gash in his side. Unlike the mortal response of desiring rest to recover, Arawn always became ravenous when injured, knowing fresh blood would yield a speedy recovery. The taste of arachnids was not generally to his liking, but he wouldn’t be picky. Seeing that the creatures’ surprise would soon be replaced with aggression as they continued to scurry around him, Arawn struck first.
With inhuman quickness, he leapt at the eight-legged monster in front of him and grabbed its dual sets of legs, rolling with the inertia and standing to hold it up like a puppet from eight strings before its fellows. Each hand clasped four struggling limbs. Pulling them separate with a loud crack, they came off the main body and oozed a dark liquid from the stumps. Arawn dropped all but one, which he raised to his lips and drank deeply from. The thick blood sent bursts of energy all through the undead being, rejuvenating him. He could feel Hikari’s injuries begin to heal with the first sips. The remaining spiders wouldn’t stand for this. One jumped to stab him in the chest, but Arawn threw the pointed leg in his hand like a javelin that impaled the unfortunate beast and propelled it far from the vampire.
Too easy.
With the pressing darkness all around him, Arawn vanished from sight like a wisp of smoke blown away in a strong breeze. The four spiders left were at al loss; their prey had simply disappeared. It seemed impossibilities were its specialty. Invisible to the naked eye, Arawn’s hands moved ever so slowly to the dagger at his waist. Its twin had been dropped when Hikari was paralyzed. With small exploratory steps that clicked resoundingly, the spiders approached where the threat had been, forelimbs held high in expectation. Dagger in hand, Arawn stabbed the closest one in the center of its eye cluster, spraying foul-smelling liquid in every direction. The other three bounded at him simultaneously, but managed only to kill among themselves as they released venom wildly in the air and crashed into each other while the vampire ducked with his jab. One spider emerged alive from the flurry of scratching limbs and poison that tangled itself on the ground.
“You’ll do nicely,” Arawn hissed hungrily.
He dropped his dagger and simply reached out to grab its small, round body. Panicked, it stabbed the air at his approaching hand. The wounds that struck and should have paralyzed him were ineffective, as Arawn soon had it tightly clasped in one hand. Without a moment’s pause, he lifted it from the ground and bit down hard on what could be construed as its face, crunching through its exterior with elongated fangs. It stopped moving. All was silent in the tunnel, no more clicking. Tearing into the corpse, the vampire opened a hole in its anterior body and lapped at the liquid that oozed out, starved. His blood rushed with furvor, eager to be fed more. The smaller cuts and scratches on his white skin were healing themselves and vanishing in moments, and even the wound that had incapacitated Hikari was no longer bleeding badly.
It may taste dreadful, but it gets the job done.
For a time, only the sound of Arawn making his way through the strewn spider corpses could be heard. It played dissonantly in the dark chamber, filling the cave with crunching and slurps of spilled fluids. Arawn was voracious, draining each one dry before moving on to the next. All six were exhausted of blood when he finally rose up from the ground, standing like a terrible monolith with shades of dark crimson running down his front. He felt powerful. It was not rare for him to gorge himself soon after he shook off Hikari’s dictatorial sway, but his unlikely fortune mixing with the rush of fresh blood made him feel light-headed and confident. Only minutes before dawn, when Hikari would have been able to make toward the tower and reach it without a thought to Arawn, the vampire had taken over. The mission for Ecclesia was over.
“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” Arawn’s maniacal laughter echoed and trailed off in either direction of the tunnel. He then shouted at the vacant cave at the top of his lungs, “What did I tell you? Your little quests to banish me are pointless!”
All that was left to do now was wait for sundown and the vampire could make his way down the mountain and out of this wretched region of Althanas. He chuckled at himself a bit more as he picked up his dropped dagger and sheathed it. The longbow and other blade were near the cave entrance. They’d have to wait for darker hours to be retrieved. Settling in for the day, Arawn sat on the floor and glanced at the spider bodies spread among boulders and plants. He could head down the way they had been dragging him, but something told him that he might be biting off more than he could chew by this course. Unlike Hikari, the thrill of unmatched odds was not Arawn’s main advisor. He was cold, calculating; not given to delusions of battle glory.
Perhaps if the light mage had learned something of logic, he’d have known to relate webs to spiders.
Outside the cave, the sun was just then dipping over the horizon. As the first rays hit Ecclesia Tower, a round yellow beam shot down from the orbed tip and began to grow in circumference. This would spread wide and cover all the tower’s eye could see every morning, abating the snow as the Church had meant it to do. The beam was rushing down the mountain when Arawn felt a shudder pass through him. The cleansing light could not reach him in the cave, but there was something starting to vibrate violently around his neck, gaining heat and ferocity as the ring of light approached the rock mouth outside. When Arawn realized what it must be, he rushed to remove it, eyes wide and horrified. His hands struggled against a white string and it was clear he wouldn't extricate himself in time.
~All choice carries the burden of consequence. A decision to do nothing is not free of this fact.~
A motionless cloaked figure lay facedown on the cave floor where the vampire had stood, once more following the pattern of paralysis and convulsion. Legol Darkweaver woke suddenly to a horrible pain around his neck. It was as if the skin there was on fire, protesting the thing that had been singeing it. The thing no longer vibrated violently, having lost its charge from Ecclesia’s famed power and forced the vampire to recede by the purity of its devices. Legol got to his feet in the middle of an unfamiliar cave, glancing around as he made to reach for whatever it was. Touching the thin strand, his brain recalled a memory that was not his own of removing the trinket from a dying Salvaran at the edge of a forest.
A unicorn hair tied in a loop?
The cleansing nature of Ecclesia’s magic had somehow empowered this vestige of a magical, benign creature to combat the dark force struggling within the white warrior. Legol was freed, if only for now. Looking around, he saw carcasses of spiders that had been torn asunder in haste. Another flash of unfamiliar memory showed the drow feasting on their insides hungrily. He had only to look down at his blood-soaked chest to confirm the story. The nausea built up suddenly within him and his insides gave a tight spasm of distaste. Bile filled his mouth and Legol vomited on the rock floor, a hard splashing echoed throughout the cavern. Legol could never stomach Arawn’s feedings. They were always so savage and uncontrolled.
Raising himself up and wiping his mouth, he felt a different upsurge from within. This was less of an unsettled stomach and more of Arawn making a full swing of power back to take control. Legol realized he couldn’t stay in the darkness of where he was, it gave Arawn too much leverage. He had to find light. Lacking Hikari's envious ability to manifest lightning, he was at a disadvantage. Running on a gamble, he sped down one direction of the tunnel, hoping it led to an exit. His footsteps bounced loudly off the cave walls and seemed to follow him like a ghostly army at his heels. His vision began to grow blurry as he felt his will weakening, conceding to that of the vampire.
Light!
Legol saw the cave lightening up ahead and made for the source with a burst of speed. He rounded a corner and then another to come to a dead campfire and the bodies of four more spiders, though these were thankfully uneaten. The scene was illuminated by a gaping hole that led to the outside. The light coming from the cave mouth empowered another being inside the drow. He felt this one begin to contest Arawn, fighting for every iota of control. Running from one demon he had awakened another. It was only in the rare balance of Arawn and Hikari’s struggle, when darkness meshed with light, that Legol ever had a moment’s sovereignty over what was rightfully his body. The others were alien, invaders from unnatural origins claiming power over what was not their own.
“Am I to exist forever so?” Legol asked the morning air despairingly. “Am I to be an intermediary to all my experiences, puppet to murderers and madmen?”
Legol fell to his knees and wept with profound exhaustion for all that was. He was wearied by his circumstance and saw little reason to go on. A cruel curved dagger on the floor nearby seemed to offer an escape and the drow picked it up in his pale, bloodstained hand. Perhaps this was the only answer. Still on his knees, he grabbed the hilt of the blade with both hands and pointed the tip inward at his gut. It hovered threateningly in mid-air for several seconds in silence while Legol’s demons continued to vie for rule. The drow kept willing himself to plunge it in and see the blood pour out, ending the others along with him. A chance to exert force over the powerful.
After a couple of minutes’ inaction, it was apparent Legol was not strong enough to take what he thought the only reasonable path. He was foolish to hold out, he knew, but hope ever whispered promises of far-off miraculous liberation in his ear. He would not end his life this way. Sheathing the dagger and rising to his feet, Legol stood in the middle of light and shadow, faced with a metaphorical image of the choice now before him. It was not hard for him to decide who was the lesser of two evils. As he stepped out of the cave to morning sunlight, only a single sentence escaped Legol's lips before the immediate imbalance of the struggle returned Hikari Ashigaru to his throne overlooking the battleground of the white warrior’s mind.
“Your move.”
~Freedom is enough in itself to be thankful for.~
Hikari felt the sunlight on his skin like drops of warm rain. He was back in command, standing outside the cave drenched in blood he could not recall spilling. It ran down his chin and spilled thickly onto his chest. Arawn had been eating. Turning around, still a bit hazy from taking control of their body so suddenly, Hikari saw the spiders he’d killed just inside the cave mouth, exactly where he remembered them falling. There was no sign of the one that had stung him or any of the other five. He recalled being dragged with paralyzed limbs to the edge of the darkness within the tunnel, but anything that had passed from then on was a mystery. Something told Hikari that the secret to his missing memories lay in the darkness of the cavern, but an acidic taste in his mouth told him it was best not to inspect it.
Why did I recover so quickly, though? Arawn would have known to stay in darkness.
Had something forced the vampire out? Hikari decided not to dwell on this question. He had learned a long time ago now to take his consciousness at face value and not torment himself with the countless stories his mind concocted to fill the blanks in his remembrance. Looking himself over, he found only a longbow missing from his person, which was picked up easily enough from the cave floor by the ashes of his extinct campfire. Placing it on his back on top of his shimmering cloak, the white warrior noted the gash in his side wasn’t bleeding at all anymore, though it looked very sore and red. A lot of the blood on him, whether elven or arachnid-born, was being caked by the warm sunlight, hardening and forming cracks. Hearing a river through the softened morning wind, Hikari decided a wash was in order before continuing toward the mountaintop.
He headed from the cave, hoping not to see its likes again, toward a cluster of trees off in a diagonal of his uphill climb about one and a half miles away. It was not a total deviation, so he felt it would not hurt his progress too much. The Tower of Ecclesia blinked down from high above, tempting him ever closer. He'd hoped to end Arawn for so long. The tower winked down at him like a beguiling curtain, perhaps hiding that which he sought. It would more likely be hiding nothing that would aid him, but he wouldn't know for certain until he tore it aside and brought its secrets to light.
As he trudged rythmically on rock and then sparse grass, Hikari was forced to consider his ambivalence toward the present state of things. He was conflicted between whether he should shun Arawn for his barbaric ways and general disposition or be rightly grateful to the vampire for preserving their joint body so much more effectively than he himself had managed. There was no doubt Hikari would be dead if not for his darker half. Furthermore, it was not the first time Arawn's abilities had saved them. Undead are notoriously difficult to dispatch.
“He has his rare moments of usefulness, but not enough to gain warrant for his sins.”
He spoke to himself as he walked, willing himself to believe the words. Hikari was worried. What would have been gained from dying in battle before the spiders? A part of him had reluctantly begun to question the value of honor in the face of self-preservation, rattling a fundamental truth he had always shaped his life around. He waited for it to pass without breathing and prayed the passing notion never return.
Minutes passed slowly as Hikari pulled his vlince cloak tight around himself, shielding against the wind. The sound of water ahead was growing louder by the instant as he began to make his way around tree trunks more and more frequently. They riddled the mountainside, glowing a vibrant green by the morning light. Here and there the puddles of green entailed miniature woods sprouting from the harsh earth. The Salvarans Hikari had come across were camped in such an oasis of life. Stopping his trek to climb on a large boulder, the drow saw he was headed for another small wood. A ribbon of shimmering blue fed into it from uphill. Where the river exited the clump of trees he could not discern from his position, but he preferred to enter the vegetation’s cover anyway.
If last night’s light show was any indication, there are many more on the same mission as me. It’s not wise to be seen.
Tevir Woods had given him enough free range to avoid human contact on the way here, but Hikari knew that competition would be made dense the closer he got to the tower. So he kept an ear out for anyone approaching and ran to the edge of the forest, plunging into the covering trees. The churning water became instantly louder as the tree trunks blocked out the rushing wind. Dodging between them, he came upon a stream of crystalline water that pooled in several places along its way. Each pool had a minute waterfall that cascaded to continue the running aquatic path. Some of the pools were big enough to hold twenty large men comfortably while others had a diameter of no more than a few feet.
This is an oasis indeed. Some blessings of nature are not entirely lost to this land.
Feeling exhaustion creeping through every fiber of his being, the white warrior quickly removed his cloak, boots, and weapons; placing them on the edge of one of the wider pools; and dove in headfirst. The cold water hit him like the sting of a thousand small needles all over his skin, but at the same time sent a pleasant, cleansing feeling through him too. He was washing away Arawn’s taint, feeling the blood on his cloth shirt and chin become diluted. His head broke the surface and he breathed in the morning air rapturously, running his hands over his pallid face to rid it of any clinging dirt or filth. It felt so good to clean himself that he dove under again, his blurred vision only presenting a vague shimmering all around. He was cold, but content.
When Hikari next broke the water’s surface, he heard the unmistakable sound of a bow stretching as its string was pulled.
Damn.
“Veros quian motrin jo bollak,” came a voice from behind him.
Turning slowly around in the water, Hikari saw a man on the edge of the pool by his things with an arrow pointed at his white bobbing head. He was a Salvaran, by the looks of him, and accompanied by a boy of perhaps twelve of the same race. They did not appear to be directly related. The man was bulky with a rugged face that conveyed mistrust. He was clad in unwashed leather garb stained by the remnants of countless meals and sported several scars of bygone battles on his limbs. The boy, on the other hand, looked contrastingly well kept. He was a bit paler than the man and wore linen clothes that outlined his small frame. They both stared directly at Hikari, wondering what to make of him.
“I no talk Salvar,” he attempted in crude Salvic while trying to stay afloat, his eyes on the arrow tip. “Speak Common?”
With bow still drawn taught and pointing at Hikari, the man uncomfortably tried out his poor dominion of the Common tongue.
“Yes. I learn from young time.”
So we can communicate... somewhat, Hikari thought. That’s no assurance that what he says will be something I want to hear.
“Why,” he inquired aloud, “are you pointing your weapon at me?”
“Precaution,” replied the man simply, glaring almost angrily at the drow.
Hikari could not think of a valid argument against this. Anyone with the slightest inkling of common sense in Althanas knew it was unwise to take in strangers on faith. Any unknown substance was best assumed a threat until proven otherwise, lest lowered defenses incite one's downfall. Yet, Hikari sensed something else in the man. The rotund Salvaran did not seem to regard him as a stranger he was unsure what to do with, but as an already proven danger that should be eliminated before given the chance to strike again. Just then, the boy whispered something to the man in rapid Salvic Hikari couldn’t follow. The man replied in kind. The white warrior was growing tired of floating so helplessly in the middle of the pool. Vulnerability did not suit him, and this was twice in a short span of time that he was at a disadvantage to others.
It was foolish to dive under the water when I could have stayed by the edge and washed, he chastised himself in retrospect. If I attempt the slightest magical assault now, that arrow would reach me faster than I could avoid.
“He thinks you’re a vampire,” the boy’s soft voice called in perfect Common, “because of your skin.”
Hikari spat water, irritated.
Of course he did. Why wouldn’t this man go on the same assumptions everyone else goes on when seeing a creature with too-pale skin?
“I’ve told him that you can’t be because you’re in sunlight,” the boy continued.
This was true. The sun had been hitting him directly ever since he entered the pool, filtering in through a hole in the canopy. It was ironic, Hikari knew, that he shared a body with one who shunned light while he so thrived on it. The irony grew when one considered that most people assumed him to be a vampire because of white skin he had had for years before Arawn even existed. It was a chain of false analogies and non sequiturs that was far too tiresome to explain. The short answer he was prone to giving was one he provided the boy and man now.
“I was cursed with this pallor long ago.”
Hikari’s response appeared unsatisfactory to the filthy round man, whose brow furrowed as the boy translated for him. There were always questions, but the whole explanation was too much of a bother. Hikari was done waiting for the man to decide if he was going to shoot him in the water or not. He performed a stroke that moved him horizontally with respect to the pair of humans. He was soon touching the bank of the pool and starting to get out. The man began shouting in heated Salvic for him to stand still. Hikari ignored the unintelligible diatribe and rose himself up, water trickling from the folds of his heavy clothing. Looking at the man, he began walking toward him.
“Translate this, boy,” he said as his hands curled into fists at his sides. “Tell him I don't take threats well.”
They were staring each other down with every step the dark elf took. The man’s arrow was pulled back tighter as a static crackle concentrated around Hikari’s fists, small electrics jolts manifesting around them. If the arrow flew, the light mage could simply phase through it and fry his attempted murderer now that he was out of water. But the boy made this display unnecessary, stepping between his elders and raising a palm to each as if to pray a cease to the impending violence. He stood between them as a mouse amid two great predators baring their teeth, waiting for the other to back down first. It softened the man’s heart as he lowered the bow reluctantly. Hikari did not much take this as a sign of faith, since the man probably thought the elf helpless unarmed, but nevertheless also discharged his weapon, allowing the electric pulses to fizzle and die out as he opened his hands.
“You have no reason to harm this person,” the boy exclaimed at his companion in Salvic.
“I have no reason not to harm him either,” the man responded irately. “He’s another heathen, no doubt, out to pilfer the Church’s relics.”
During this, Hikari stood back, still only grasping one out of every five words spoken by the pair. He was more patient with them, however, with no threat of immediate impalement of his skull at the tip of an arrow. Having time to take the pair in, Hikari began to notice things about them that weren’t obvious at first sight. The filthy, larger human bore a necklace of some rust-colored metal around his neck. From it hung the smallest of shimmering trinkets, which broadcast him as a devout acolyte of Salvar’s church. Hikari remained still, waiting for them to get on with it and wondering what conclusion they might come to. His mind never trailed far from the possibility that he might have to kill the religious man, and perhaps the boy if he presented a nuisance.
“That may be, but are you to judge his worth and that of all others we find along the way?” the boy went on.
A pause as the man loosened the grip on his bow and grumbled.
“You’re right. It is for Ymodos to choose who might gaze upon the mirror. It was not my place to presume.”
“Yes, but in any case, we may want to keep an eye on this one. He’s not normal.”
The man allowed an admonitory nod.
“Then it’s agreed,” the boy inferred. “We’ll ask him to join us!”
The man's eyes went wide, but he had no time to protest as the boy turned suddenly to face the tall, white drow and switched languages effortlessly.
“Would you like to have breakfast with us? We ask in apology for our rude behavior.”
Whatever Hikari had been understanding from the foreign conversation, he had not expected this to be the result. The man seemed to struggle with this too, but held his tongue once the boy had already extended the hearty invitation. Now Hikari was on the spot, confused by the sudden shift from hostility to hospitality and wondering how so much could have gotten lost in translation. The man had obviously not come to trust Hikari, it seemed more an idea of the child’s to ask for the elf’s company. Still, company was not an entirely undesirable prospect for the journey up and he could learn more of the pair as they ate. Feeling the young human’s blue eyes begging an answer, Hikari relented.
“I accept.”
For some reason, though he recalled eating rabbit earlier, Hikari’s stomach felt as if it had been drained of all its contents recently. He could not recall Legol's reaction to waking by the broken spiders. Hikari only knew one thing: he was hungry again.
The man stepped aside to allow Hikari to pick his arsenal up from the ground, grumbling something inaudible. The dark elf knelt awkwardly to grab the cloak, keeping his eyes dead on the larger human as he wrapped it around himself. The weapons were next returned to their places on his person. He then fitted on his steel-toed leather boots and stood, waiting for them to lead. Water continued to drip from his wet clothing, but he ignored the chill with gritted teeth. He refused to show more weakness, considering the severe limp he now exhibited from his brush with the adraeni. Taking his silence as a prompting to lead, the boy nodded politely and beaconed for the elf to follow him downstream with a cursory wave of his hand. As they all began walking parallel to the river’s edge, the man positioned himself beside Hikari, not trusting the white drow to walk behind nor giving him a clear shot at the boy.
Smart man, Hikari thought as he concealed a grin.
Though he had no intention of harming the boy, he still gave the man credit for being such a sharp and diligent guardian. Hikari glimpsed a broadsword hanging from the man’s belt and was quite sure the human would make use of it if he suspected any aggressive action from the drow. They walked side by side, each with a bow on their back and blades at the waist, waiting for the slightest indication of attack. Hikari towered well over the human, but they were evenly matched in stubbornness. The boy was leading the way ahead of them, skipping gaily over tree branches on the forest floor in sharp contrast to their fierce antagonism.
“Here we are!” he called back to them when he reached the camp some distance from where they’d met the drow.
Hikari let his attention waver from the man beside him as he looked upon the meager bounty their campsite had to offer. In truth, it was little more than a pair of ragged blankets on the earth and a fire with a bag beside it. Two full plates lay abandoned on the edges of the blankets. They were left there when the humans had gone to investigate whatever had made the thin river run red. Hikari had been wondering why his ears had failed to detect them when they managed to catch him off-guard so easily. It was obvious now that the great stains of blood he had washed off had given him away beyond the scope of hearing. He had Ecclesia and the mountain’s unnaturally clear waters to thank for that.
“Well, we were just starting to eat breakfast when we saw your, um, trail,” the boy said sheepishly. “Sit down and I’ll get you a plate.”
The youth began rummaging through their sack for the makings of a third ration. His keeper moved over to what was presumably his blanket but gave no sign of sitting. Instead, he looked at the white warrior straight in the eye and made a downward motion with his left hand. It was clear the Salvaran was trying to communicate his wish that Hikari should sit first. Choosing to take the higher path, the drow obliged and sat by the fire precisely between the two blankets. The man continued to stare down at Hikari for a time. The pale elf employed his crude Salvic once again.
“Blood being to spiders,” he said, believing to have gleamed a better understanding of the man’s distrust of him.
At this, the corpulent human’s shoulders seemed to relax quite a bit as he sat down with a grunt. The boy handed Hikari over a plate with stale bread and cold cheese, struggling not to giggle at the drow's pitiable linguistics. It was not the most elegant of meals, but one the drow was very grateful for. He tore at it hungrily and the humans quickly joined him. It seemed all three were unwilling to make conversation as they devoured their portions. The biting cold of the mountainside made one appreciate such undiluted pleasures as eating with an appetite. For a time, they only ever stopped eating to retrieve a cup of water from the stream that had given Hikari away. It remained clear for the rest of the breakfast.
Minutes later, the trio had consumed their respective meals and the boy had taken the plates to the river’s edge for washing. The larger human seemed unwilling to sit alone by Hikari and promptly stood, striding slowly over to the child. The young lad noticed this and chuckled to himself. It seemed this behavior was expected, despite the white warrior’s mention of the spiders. The boy finished his chore and brought the plates back to place them in the bag, his protector following silently behind. He then picked up and started folding the blankets, shaking off loose grass and dust that clung to the fibers. He seemed more than willing to perform these tasks and the older Salvaran’s eyes looked him over with an air of pained compassion. There was a dynamic here Hikari had yet to understand.
“What is your relation to this man?” he blurted at the boy with a nod toward the larger human.
The youth’s face flushed as he finished placing everything in the bag. He seemed about to respond when his grumpy custodian interrupted.
“We start off now.”
Getting the message, the drow rose up from his earthy seat and shook off the remaining droplets that ran down his clothes. Breakfast had given him time to dry considerably, though he knew the journey would still prove colder than the harshest winter in Concordia. He spared a glance at the great hole in his shirt where he’d been stung. The wound beneath looked remarkably well healed for its novelty. A probing finger told him it was best not to overestimate it, however, as shocks of intense pain radiated from where he touched. He allowed his cloak to conceal his frame and returned his eyes to the humans. Quick to learn he would not be allowed to follow behind, he started off ahead of them.
They hiked in silence for a time, chilled breath coming in rasping gasps because of the altitude. Hikari did not usually present his back to untested companions, but his lack of sleep and aching pain made him uncaring. He had tricks up his sleeve the Salvaran could hardly account for in any misguided attempt on the drow’s life. Hikari looked around and found their height presented a very different view of Tevir Woods than the base of the mountain. A carpet of green canopy unfolded as far as the eye could see. It rose and fell with the terrain and seemed more a verdant ocean than a forest, its vast waves frozen in time. The thought that it would all be blanketed in snow but for Ecclesia put the Church of the Ethereal Sway’s power in true perspective.
“I realized I haven’t asked you; what’s your name?” the boy's question was unexpected.
He had sidled over to walk beside the white warrior while his eyes wandered across the landscape, taking him by surprise. Looking back, he noticed the older human was not happy with the boy’s approach but allowed it nonetheless. His eyes were trained on the dark elf and seemed ready to judge the slightest wrong move as a form of aggression.
“I’m called Hikari Ashigaru,” he said, turning back to the boy as they walked onward.
“I’m Crio and,” the boy gestured behind them to the stern man, “that’s Pontus. He’s rather protective.”
“What is he of yours, besides constant guardian?”
“He... knew my parents,” Crio forced out quietly.
The boy’s buoyant personality seemed extinguished for a moment as they talked. Hikari did not wish to cause him discomfort, but curiosity tempted his tongue. It seemed here at last was an explanation for the odd pairing.
“What happened?”
Crio seemed to consider his words for several seconds before replying, “We were traveling together in a large group headed to Ecclesia…”
The story Crio had to tell was enough to thaw even Hikari’s oft-frigid heart. As they walked ever upward and the wind continued to bite at their exposed flesh, the boy explained that both he and Pontus had been part of a group venturing to Ecclesia upon hearing of its reopening. At the foot of the mountain, they were attacked by a terrible creature. Crio awoke to the sound of screaming and exited his tent to find the charred bodies of their men littering the ground. The children and women who ran had fireballs hurled at their backs. None of them made it. Chancing a look at their assailant, Crio gazed upon the face of a demon the horrid likes of which he could never have imagined. It was a beast of shimmering red skin and malicious eyes that burned the soul. He didn’t recall what happened after, but he supposed he must have blacked out.
“What do you remember next?” Hikari interjected for the first time, concerned.
“Pontus shook me awake in the night,” Crio replied. “He told me he’d tried to wake others but I was the only one who rose. I was one in a pile of fallen bodies that the creature must have overlooked. It was nowhere around when I awoke.”
“Where was Pontus during the attack?”
“He’d been appointed to scout out the perimeter,” Crio gulped with a look over his shoulder at the man. “The others were taking to drink and Pontus is a very pious man, not given to such acts as the other men.”
Finally some explanation for the corpulent Salvaran’s manner. He no doubt blamed himself for having let his companions’ murderer slip by on his watch. The only soul left for him to guard was the boy, which he refused to let out of his sight lest he fail in that charge as well. If this demon was after Ymodos’ prize, that explained why Hikari hadn’t run into many others in his quest. Between red demons and swarming spiders, few had much of a chance of reaching the priest alive. The child was lucky to still draw breath and Pontus sought to keep it that way. The white warrior teetered on the verge of asking about Crio’s parents, but decided he would prefer to go without knowing the details. Their absence spoke well enough as to their fate.
“Let us stop here!” came Pontus’ rough voice suddenly.
The Salvaran had fallen behind in the last few minutes and his breath was coming amid loud wheezes. The trance of the boy’s tale seemed suddenly broken by the loud burst of Salvic and Hikari found his side paining him more than before. The constant uphill march and thin air was doing nothing to improve his wound. Not usually one to stop when his goal was so near, Hikari nonetheless conceded to the man’s wishes, as far as he understood them, and began looking around for a spot to rest. The sun was still high in the sky and they might still make Ecclesia before nightfall. There was an outcrop of boulders nearby that looked as if it might shield them from the piercing wind and Hikari signaled over to it.
Pontus nodded in approval and spoke slowly to the drow, “We get water. You get wood.”
“Did he just ask me to climb a tree while he goes swimming?” Hikari asked of Crio solemnly.
The boy doubled over with explosive laughter at the question and only managed to respond through intermittent giggles, “Go get some wood for a fire. We’ll meet you there in a few minutes.”
With that, the pair of Salvarans went off toward the nearest stream, Crio still laughing heartily at Hikari’s abysmal Salvic. Hikari wondered if, in an act of avoidance, it was common for a victim of tragedy to laugh so freely.
The scene was now devoid of the clumps of trees Hikari had found so useful at lower altitudes. The best he could do was wander from one tall trunk to the other, gathering up what dried branches had fallen. It was a tedious chore that left him zigzagging further and further away from the rock wall they had settled on. The curving terrain quickly blocked his companions and the outcrop from the drow’s sight and minutes passed in dull labor. He knelt time and again to retrieve what meager firewood the mountainside provided, stopping often to massage his aching side. It was in one such pause that he noticed something strange.
What happened to the birds? he though to himself. The ugly things were squawking incessantly when we stopped before.
A shiver ran up his spine. Hikari’s muscles tensed as he strained to hear anything other than the rushing wind in the eerily silent surroundings. Then came something different, an out of place crackling. He cocked his head toward the noise and saw an orb of fire flying through the air at him. Instinctively, he threw himself to the ground and felt the heat from it pass above him. His heart beat like a possessed drum trying to escape his chest. Hikari looked around to make out his assailant, but saw naught but the sparse tree trunks and a few boulders. He stood up and spun around, taking everything in and trying to find something out of place. Just then, a snapping twig betrayed a gargantuan ruby-colored beast stepping out from behind one of the larger rocks and sending another fireball his way.
The white warrior remained poised, though unarmed, and conjured a black cloud in the air before him. The flame was engulfed in its entirety when it came in contact with the dark mass. The demon launched two more bolts his way with sweeping arms and Hikari expanded the cloud to absorb them as well. Then it began to laugh, giving the drow time to take it in. Every inch of its skin was crafted of brilliant red scales that shimmered as it moved. It wore no clothes and presented no gender. Its face sported inch-long fangs that jutted out even when its mouth closed. Atop its head protruded a pair of curved horns that seemed made of the darkest bone. Its laugh was a thing of harsh, humorless cruelty.
“Do you find the futility of your attempts so funny?” Hikari taunted, feeling blood rush to every limb in anticipation. “I’ve got a better one for you.”
Banishing the cloud before him, the white warrior pointed with two fingers at his foe. From them there came a loud clap as a bolt of lightning split the air. It made for the red demon, aimed directly at its solar plexus. When it hit, however, it ricocheted off and made contact with a nearby bush, setting it ablaze with a loud burst. A stinging sensation told Hikari his wound was bleeding again from the exertion.
“I laugh, elf, because you’re the first to stand this long against me,” it spoke. “The fat one was squealing in seconds.”
The beast’s voice was, if anything, fouler than its laugh. It was replete with malice unlike anything Hikari had known. When he heard it, his heart skipped a beat with thoughts of Crio and Pontus, probably dead by the stream. Rage boiled within the drow and he summoned power from the depths of his being. With some effort, he sent a javelin of light soaring out of the burning bush’s dancing fire. It had as much effect as the lightning, shattering on contact with the demon’s carapace. The creature advanced, coming at Hikari with remarkable speed. The white warrior had no time to move, his injury making him slow to act.
The next moment, the red devil was lifting Hikari up by the neck with one hand. The cruel, ruby fingers closed around the drow’s windpipe and tightened, cutting off airflow. Hikari’s eyes bulged and his head swam, death mere seconds away. Everything was hazy color and motion. There was a loud ringing in his ears and he knew there was nothing that could save him. But then, the demon’s grip slackened a bit and Hikari regained some focus. There was a wrathful cry from the beast. Something was causing the demon a tremendous amount of pain. Before Hikari could do anything, he was tossed at the nearest tree by the neck with astounding force and heard a crack as skull met bark.
His eyes fluttered as he fell to the ground limply, seeing a red blur retreating from his field of vision. They were forced closed by an overwhelming pounding and all became blackness.
Sweeping waves of agony assaulted the drow’s body and hampered all clear thought. Hikari’s head was throbbing and he felt his side bleeding more than ever. The two-inch-wide gash spurted blood onto the floor, staining the cold earth a bright crimson. He tried to move his arm to halt the bleeding and felt something like lightning run up his spine from the effort. Gritting his teeth, he pressed his hand down hard on the wound and hoped destiny hadn't broken his back. Warm liquid passed between his fingers, but the outpouring was slowed considerably. Every breath was a tremendous effort. The painful state of inaction eventually gave forth to a nagging question.
What made it retreat?
Time passed. How long, Hikari couldn’t tell. He was vaguely aware that the sun was lowering in the sky and the song of birds had returned. The blood under his hand felt dry and sticky, so he ventured to remove pressure slightly. It did not gush again; a good sign. A long, steadying breath tempered Hikari’s resolve as he made to sit up. The pain was excruciating, but not unbearable. He propped his upper body on the trunk that had so violently made contact with his head before and sat sprawled on the floor. He was regaining feeling in his extremities and found that he was cold. Night would be upon him in a few hours. There was little hope for survival in such a place for one without shelter. The wind was already picking up as it had done the night before, making the white warrior shiver involuntarily.
Perhaps this was as much as I could hope for in ending Arawn, he considered morosely. We may depart this realm together with our joint body’s destruction.
The thought wasn’t much comfort. It came to him lazily from a sluggish mind. Hikari considered Legol’s place in all this, an unwitting leaf tossed about by winds far stronger than he could combat. He, too, would meet his end with his spiritual jailers. Hikari had to admit to himself, in this vulnerable moment, that Legol was the only true victim to have been usurped in their battle of wills. He felt regret that his existence depended on the subservience of another’s, moreover one so docile and innocent. A sudden gust chilled the white warrior’s face and he felt all resistance vanish from him. He was resigned to his fate.
“Hikari!”
A young, worried voice shot through the freezing landscape.
It can’t be. His head regained some clarity.
“Please, answer me!” it came again. “Where are you?”
“Here!” Hikari’s voice sounded raspy and alien.
It was far quieter than he had intended, but a rushing of footsteps affirmed that he’d made himself heard. Crio came running through the sparse vegetation, bursting out of a dense bush. His face brightened to see his pale companion, beaten and defeated though he was. Crio’s eyes glazed over with tears. Without a word, the boy lowered himself beneath the drow’s right arm and lifted him. Hikari would’ve complained at the pain if not for the absurd effort he found required for him to speak. He contented himself with pressing his free hand on the wound in his left side and breathing very slowly. Crio limp-walked the elf back toward the site they had decided upon before things had gone so horribly awry.
I owe this boy my life, Hikari thought to himself. He grimaced on every other step, but the pain seemed to rekindle the white warrior’s sense of vitality. And now he is without anyone in the world to care for him.
His thoughts were centered on his attendant. Crio brought the injured elf to the shelter of the rock wall, where the outcrop deterred the lethal wind and a fire was already crackling mightily. Hikari was laid down by the fire and the boy went to retrieve something from his bag. After some rummaging, his hands withdrew a thick roll of gauze. He then returned to the drow and began wrapping the cotton material around his midsection, pressing on the wound. The youth ignored his patient’s wincing whenever he passed over the spider's mark, knowing it was best to suffer now and recover properly from the injury. The dressing adopted a pale red coloring around where it coated the area.
He is so giving even when so much has been taken from him. If I rid myself finally of the dark scourge within me, I shall charge myself to be this boy’s guardian. The statement carried strong overtones, but felt true to the dark elf’s feelings.
It was odd for Hikari to feel such compassion from and for another being. Life had hardened his shell to an exterior of harsh cynicism, never expecting anything from others without a price in return. The one possible exception to this was his pet draconian ally, Argen. Yet, the vampiric presence within him had seen to this friend’s demise in one of its awakenings from their shared psyche. It was that unforgivable murder that had once again sparked Hikari’s fevered search for an end to the imbalance. He now hoped the Aetas Mirror could tip the scales and keep Arawn from ever resurfacing. A fool’s hope, perhaps, but one he’d chase most willingly to world’s end.
“What happened to Pontus?” Hikari asked Crio, breaking their shared silence while gazing at the dancing flames. They both had much on their minds.
“He’s…” Crio hesitated, “over there.” He pointed to a lump on the ground some thirty yards away covered by branches and leaves. “I would have moved him, but his weight was too much for me. I just hid him instead.” A sob shook the boy’s form.
Hikari looked closer at what he had thought a large animal burrow and saw evidence of intense burns even from this distance. “You were ambushed by the creature then?” He didn’t want to cause the child more pain, but he felt a need to know the details.
“I didn’t see it this time,” Crio spoke with a calming gasp. “It must have struck me from behind because all I remember was gathering water with Pontus and thinking that you must still be off getting wood as we were coming back here. Next thing, I woke up with my head throbbing and Pontus was… He was just…”
A raised hand from the drow told the boy he needn’t go further. The elf's black-on-black eyes looked on at the child with unmistakable pity. Tears ran unchecked down Crio’s youthful features. It was clear he had awoken to a charred and defeated friend, no better than the state his parents had been in. Lost alone in a dangerous land, he had sought out the drow and been relieved to find him still breathing. Just how close the boy had come to total abandon, Hikari didn’t wish to consider. The Salvaran had wits enough to survive the cold, but soon starvation or beastly threats would have claimed him. The pair was equally fortunate for the other’s continued existence.
“He deserves a proper burial,” Hikari said of the boy’s last caretaker. “You misunderstand me,” he continued, noting the objection in Crio’s face, “I’m not suggesting you lift him.”
Still sitting where he’d been left by the fire, Hikari raised his left hand. Wisps of light detached from their crackling blaze and began to morph and congeal. Crio’s eyes widened at this display, obviously unaccustomed to feats of magic. His suspicions of the white-skinned drow's talents were confirmed. The yellow, brilliant wisps solidified and formed a concave surface akin to the end of a shovel. Without a word, the drow motioned the device over to Pontus’ form and began moving the earth at his side. It dug for some time until there was a hole large enough to fit three of the man. Then, the dark elf tipped Pontus over with a gentle nudge of his glowing tool, sending him into the earth with a dull thud.
Hikari’s hand stayed his glowing utensil at a gasp and movement from Crio. The young Salvaran ran across to the newly dug grave, ignoring the biting wind away from the rocky outcrop’s shelter, and leapt in. At first, Hikari thought the boy was being irrational due to grief, unwilling to let go of a fallen friend. Then he saw Crio emerge from the hole with something held fast in his palm, a pendant that had decorated the late Pontus’ neck. The boy returned to his place by the fire without a word. After a solemn nod of understanding, Hikari willed his shimmering half-shovel to cover the grave.
There was silence under the rocky wind-cover for a long while but for the crackling of the flame and the twitter of birds. The sun set into the horizon and bathed everything it touched in a red tint before blinking out and disappearing for another night. The upturned earth that marked Pontus' resting place seemed to retain its red glow long after dusk's passing.
Shadows of twilight played on their austere surroundings, extending every shrub and tree around them darkly onto the rocky earth. The green blanket of Tevir Woods became a black mass on the landscape, unseen yet impossible to miss. Crio’s eyes were fixed on the vibrant fire and his hands fumbled absentmindedly with the necklace he now wore. Hikari’s rigid position betrayed his thoughts' depth and brooding nature. He was a well-known warrior in many parts of Althanas. The Citadel and Tower of War had been the birthplace of many a legend starring him as the victor of grueling and bloody battles. People of Corone still whispered of the white warrior’s ferocity in Malice’s war on the mage guild.
And yet, he thought with some concern, this red beast, this… demon brushed off my attacks as if I were a novice of the mystic arts only just taught his first spell. How do years of training amount to nothing before this being?
He thought of the lightning and fiery spear that had bounced off the beast, not making the slightest scratch on its person. This told him his foe had to be a being of untold age. It must have mastered deep magic millennia before Hikari’s consciousness ever graced the realm of the living. He’d heard of such things, dark spirits festering in the underworld since the birth of civilization, rising only for the most imperative of tasks calling for their considerable powers. The Aetas Mirror had attracted truly formidable attention, it seemed. This was a source of some solace to the dark elf. At least there were other non-Salvarans who took the tales of Ymodos seriously.
What made him back off though?
The question nagged at him still. Hikari had been completely dominated in their encounter. Never had he felt so helpless before such a vastly superior threat. His death seemed a certainty that had been unnaturally diverted from the course of events. The demon had some unknown weakness. How it had been exploited while it held Hikari in its death grip was a mystery. The unexplained miraculous salvation left him feeling empty and confused. Another meeting with the demon would doubtless seal the fate he’d only narrowly avoided.
As the night wore on, Hikari and Crio bore witness to several other expeditions to and from Ecclesia. Once or twice, they glimpsed the light of several torches far off in the distance, bouncing to the steady gait of their bearers. At other times, they heard loud voices singing songs of worship as they climbed the sacred mountainside. Neither grown drow nor young human wished to call out their fellow adventurers, preferring to wait for Hikari’s convalescence rather than make their situation potentially worse. After some hours of rest with only rare unenthusiastic conversation between them, Hikari thought himself fit to finish the journey. It would be better if they reached the summit before dawn and the adraeni’s scouring of the land, in any case.
“Let us go,” the white warrior said as he rose, wincing slightly but with steady poise nonetheless.
A heavy silence followed the odd pair for the ensuing part of their trek. Each held a makeshift torch aloft, lit by the campfire they left extinguished behind them. The wind bit at every inch of them, but neither of them saw fit to complain. Morbid thoughts plagued their minds like a dark stratus blotting out any ray of sunshine. Crio followed his strange companion because he seemed to have no other choice. The dark elf’s side was not fully healed, but determination pushed his body to continue. All the while, their goal loomed in the distance. The tower shone like a black spire against the starry sky, it’s crystal top ever glinting down on those who sought to reach it.
“Crio, I have something to ask you,” Hikari voiced a concern he’d tucked away in a corner of his mind. Visions of a mortally wounded Salvaran soldier at the base of the mountain brought themselves to the forefront of his thoughts. “What does ‘Dreani merkotyu wesaliem’ mean?” The man's last words rolled awkwardly off his tongue.
The boy took a moment before responding, obviously stunned by the unexpected question. “Well, it roughly translates to ‘slay the white queen in revenge’. It evokes a phrase Salvaran soldiers use when swearing a vendetta.” Another pause. “Pontus said it when referring to the thing that killed him after it struck our base camp.”
Crio fell abruptly silent then, a lump in his throat preventing further speech. Hikari stopped mid-step. He’d caught the child’s cry for sympathy and said, “Crio, I wouldn’t be alive without you. I swear to care for your life as my own henceforth. As long as I breath, you shall not go without champion.”
The boy’s eyes misted over and he nodded his appreciative understanding. Taken aback by his own words, Hikari resumed his pace uphill silently, Crio following close behind with some elation. Though the words were profound and bespoke grave implication, the dark elf nevertheless felt he carried them well. It felt the right thing to do. He wondered if it might not be the subtle influences of Legol Darkweaver that had coaxed the pronouncement from his lips. Did he wish to do right having wronged another so greatly? Whatever the case, Hikari was now duty-bound to safeguard the boy and intended to stand by it. He felt renewed hope that Ecclesia might hold some method of exterminating Arawn lest he become a greater foe to the Salvaran youth than ally.
It seems that’s not the only oath I’ve sworn on this mount, he thought to himself.
He now knew what he had volunteered yesterday to give a wounded soldier a moment’s repose before the cold embrace of death. He had sworn a vendetta on the adraeni colony that had almost taken him as well. Where most might think it logical to ignore a vow made in such a situation, Hikari again felt obliged to see it through. Perhaps it was Legol’s strong sense of ethics again, guiding the mage toward a path where he did what he felt was right rather than what he preferred. Hikari found the notion did not bother him, as thoughts of Arawn’s corruption did, but filled him with a peculiar sense of gratitude. A smile crossed his face as they marched onward.
Quite suddenly, or so it seemed to Hikari, the sparse woods around them gave way to a clearing with smooth, almost polished rock underfoot. The area of stone formed a large disk about a hundred feet wide atop the mountain, Ecclesia Tower standing proud at its nexus. The sacred edifice seemed somehow taller at this distance. As the boy and drow stepped onto the stone, all wind fell silent and their clothes settled heavily on their figures. The white warrior was suddenly filled with a sense of awe for the moment. They'd entered a holy place. Here he was, a possible end to his torment within reach. The tower’s huge, wooden double doors seemed to beacon them forward.
“Shall we knock?” Crio suggested whimsically after a time standing in hushed appraisal of the Ethereal Sway’s creation.
Neither of them spoke as they walked toward the imposing tower’s entryway. Even in the darkness of midnight, the white marble building radiated an awe-inspiring sense of grandeur that begged the beholder marvel at it. Ecclesia’s rounded walls were smoothed to the point of absurd perfection, not a nick or notch to be seen. Fifty feet above Hikari, the crystal orb blinked down with every twinkling star that passed its focus. When the dark elf reached the twin ten-foot doors of solid oak, he paused for several seconds before acting. Crio did not prompt him, just as willing to delay the moment a while for the accumulated sense of anticipation. For the boy, the price of reaching the tower had been beyond measure. Then, the drow lifted a white knuckle and rapped it against the door loudly, hearing an echo in the hollow chamber beyond.
“Now we see,” he whispered under his breath.
Though Hikari’s side was still painfully sore, adrenaline flooding his system made all physical drawbacks inconsequential. He heard footsteps on stone from behind the door and felt every muscle on his body ready itself. The doors swung open with a deafening creak and there stood a figure as imposing as the tower it guarded. Long red hair cascaded from a surprisingly youthful priest Ymodos’ head. His eyes were an entrancing grey that seemed to stare miles beyond what they observed. The man wore robes of shimmering silver with brilliant light blue lining. Hikari took all this in and one more thing. Held with two hands, the priest wielded a jewel-encrusted hammer of massive proportions before him to bar entry to anyone he deemed unfit.
“Kneel, that I may judge you.” Ymodos had a deep, reverberating voice to match the sight of him.
The duo found itself unwilling, or perhaps unable, to resist this man. Both took a knee before him and awaited instruction. Without a word, Ymodos brought the hammer’s business end to hover above Hikari’s skull. Looking up at him, the dark elf did nothing as the weapon moved to uncomfortable proximity. The priest’s eyes glazed over in deep thought for several seconds. After a time, he nodded, as if he’d learned something from the exercise. Then he repeated it with the hammer floating just above Crio. The boy’s muted lips twitched uncomfortably. Once more, the agent of the church nodded after a while with a look of satisfaction. Then, he spoke to them once more.
“One of you has come to Ecclesia for a pure and noble goal. You seek to use the artifact of Aetas and gleam what you may from its legendary powers of insight.” His voice then dropped several octaves. “The other, I fear, has a hidden presence within. It is a being of violence and darkness, unworthy of entry. Not only would it attempt to take the relic, but the ends to which it would be utilized ill befit the duties of the church. This one must be exterminated for the sake of all living. The other is freed of my grasp.”
A shiver ran up Hikari’s spine. He feared the priest had, by his mystic workings, found Arawn tucked away in the white warrior’s psyche. Ymodos raised his mighty hammer high above his head and the elf prepared for the blow. He shut his eyes, waiting for the bone-crushing smash to come down. He couldn't move to avoid it. However, it never came. Instead, he heard a crunching sound and opened his eyes to see Crio fallen several feet from where he’d been kneeling. His jaw had been broken by the priest’s sidelong assault and gushed blood all over the smooth rock ground. The boy was spitting up red-stained teeth as Ymodos advanced for a second strike. Enraged, the drow made to get up and found it well within his power to do so. It had been he Ymodos had released from magical restraint.
There must be a mistake! Hikari thought wildly.
Not sparing a moment, Hikari lunged at the priest’s back as he made to strike the defenseless child yet again. Ymodos was just raising his weapon when the white warrior’s shoulder caught him in the middle of the spine and sent them both tumbling to the ground. Crio looked as surprised as the drow felt, eyes wide as he spat out more and more blood. The left side of his jaw hung grotesquely from the bruised pulp that had been his cheek. Hikari and Ymodos wrestled on the stone floor, rage coursing through the dark elf's veins. He caught an elbow to the gut that took the wind out of him, but retaliated with a fist that met the priest square in the eye. A sudden smash of the hammer upon the ground shook the earth and split them apart, allowing them both time to get up.
This is no man of the church, Hikari fumed as his hands found the hilts of his mythril daggers. The boy was helpless and offered no provocation. No excuse exists for such actions.
“You know not what you defend,” came the priest’s guttural tones.
“You know not what you attacked!”
Hikari leapt forward again with weapons drawn. Ymodos held his gargantuan hammer in front of him and swung it with incalculable force. Just when it was about to meet the cloaked drow, Hikari burst into brilliant white light and passed through both hammer and man like so much vapor through a porous screen. The priest stood stunned for a moment quite taken aback by his opponent’s unique ability. It gave Hikari all the time he needed. Having phased successfully, he readopted his usual form and found himself back to back with his target. Not bothering to aim, he jabbed both his curved daggers backward with arms outstretched and met with the satisfying resistance of human flesh. The blades were firmly imbedded on either side of the man’s lower back.
“Stop, for your sake as well,” Ymodos forced out with some effort, standing strong despite the devastating injury.
“No,” Hikari hissed.
Still not looking behind to see his victim, the white warrior sent dual bolts of electric current surging through his blades. The energy passed from his white hands to the mythril and flowed into the unfortunate priest. Ymodos let out a scream of agony that only began to explain the pain he was in. It hushed all other noise near the tower and shook the very ground they stood on. Unsatisfied, Hikari kept it going far past the point of punishment and well into the realm of vengeance. When it seemed the man’s lungs could not bear to utter sound any longer, he took out the daggers and heard a thump as the man collapsed onto his own hammer.
All seemed muted in the aftermath of the battle. Ymodos lay on the ground a pile of silver robes. Unconscious or dead, he no longer presented a threat to anyone. The smell of burnt flesh permeated the scene as blood trickled from the daggers in Hikari’s hands. He felt at first elated at his victory, then dazed and confused. Whatever he’d been expecting to find at the end of his journey to Ecclesia, it was certainly not a priest who saw fit to attack an unarmed boy. The thought brought a foul taste to the dark elf's mouth and made him look around. Crio was nowhere in sight, but the doors to the tower stood ajar and an interrupted scarlet trail on the ground led inward. Hikari followed it, stumbling a bit with the weight of all it had taken to get here. For the moment, concern for a legendary mirror was set aside for the wellbeing of his charge.
Let him be well.
Fatigue was momentarily forgotten as the full majesty of Ecclesia bore down upon the elf. He had limped heavily to the doorway and now leaned against its tall, oak frame. The inside of the spire was hollow with torch brackets spiraling hypnotically to its far-off acme five stories above. There was no telling how they were kept lit. Hikari saw the curved walls to be an expansive mosaic scene of Salvar’s tundra in all the destructive splendor of a terrible blizzard. Trees bowed to the illusory wind’s will and only a small patch of green directly opposite the door seemed unaffected by the climate. Here, the image was calm and soothing, symbolizing the peace that came with the Church’s protection.
“Magnificent, isn’t it?”
The voice shook Hikari and returned the memory of his injuries to him in full force, making him buckle to his knees upon the solid gold floor. Crio stood in the center of the circular hall, gazing up at the great creative expression with arms wide to take it all in. There was some sort of pool beyond him, but Hikari couldn’t make much more of it out. The tower seemed bare but for the torches and a rolled up blanket in a small alcove where the priest slept. The elf’s first instinct was relief to see Crio standing, seemingly not terribly affected by the large amount of blood loss. Yet, his voice hid a tone Hikari thought uncharacteristic. Was it triumph?
The bloodied face seemed too cheerful for the wounds it had sustained. Crio walked over to his fallen companion and raised a canteen from his waist for the elf to drink. When their eyes met, Crio’s gaze was calculating, but Hikari drank down the liquid thankfully. It seemed to soothe much of the pain in his muscles more than he’d expected. Every gulp seemed to abate just a little more of the pain. He resigned to the relief and drank deeply. The boy’s eyes glowed as he saw this.
“Are you alright?” the elf ventured when he was satisfied, raising a hand slowly to the child’s painfully smashed jaw. “I thought the worst when I saw the trail of blood.”
“Well enough,” Crio said quickly. “There’s more than enough blood to spare in this meat sack before it’s wasted.”
Again came the strangeness in the boy’s voice. It was as if he’d been given some wonderful news that he had yet to share with the elf. Then, Hikari noticed a vague familiarity in the drink’s relaxing sensation. Where the pain had been pushed back, he now felt his muscles growing numb. A devious agent was spreading through his system and taking away all control. He had felt the same upon the mountain, in a cave used by the adraeni. Their venom’s workings were unmistakable. The elf made an attempt to stand but collapsed on the floor, eyes forced to look upward into Crio’s face of unashamed victory.
“Wh-,” the drow struggled, “why?” Even his lips worked against him now.
The boy walked away from the unthreatening warrior as if he had nothing to fear from him no. He made his way over to the pool and only called one thing over his shoulder.
“You should have listened to the priest.”
Hikari was at a loss. He should’ve listened to the priest? Then what was this boy? Such a change had come upon him. Crio had seemed so sincere and simple in his company. The elf refused to believe it was all a lie. Not even a virtuoso actor could wear a mask so well. There had to be deeper currents running through it all. All this the drow considered as his body twitched from side to side on the golden floor. He was not completely immobilized as before, but the taming effect was much the same. He could only just glimpse Crio walking around the pool he’d seen before near the green patch in the mosaic. Concern beyond his years etched the youth’s face as he looked upon its surface. The rhythmic pace of his feet circling the pool set a melancholy tempo to the scene.
“You’re… Who are you?” the elf managed through unresponsive lips. “Just… a boy…”
“People are so easily manipulated by a face of innocence,” Crio stopped his gate and turned to look at Hikari. “You could infiltrate the most secure halls of a paranoid king with but a sad story and a young face. Mortals are weak before appeals on your sentiment.”
Hikari tried to speak again but found his throat protesting the act. He coughed violently instead and shook in place on the ground.
“Don’t try to speak much more,” came Crio’s voice sinisterly. “The adraeni venom I put in the water may have been diluted, but it will still achieve full paralysis soon.”
The boy would not explain further, though dozens of questions still burned in the dark elf’s mind. Had all Crio shared with him been a lie? He had known nothing of the child and took much of his stories’ truthfulness for granted. The Salvaran made his way over to Hikari, momentarily shifting attention from the pool. Hikari’s attempts to struggle were so feeble now that he barely rocked from side to side. A muffled gargle was all that escaped him. Crio came so close that his face was inches from the elf’s burning gaze.
“I almost forgot,” he said as he stole a dagger from Hikari’s waste.
The blade was brought between them and flickered in the torchlight. Hikari thought he might soon feel the cool metal along his skin as Crio lowered his aim to the drow’s neck. Hikari swallowed hard. The blow didn’t come, however. Instead, the white warrior heard a snapping sound and saw single, shimmering white strand of unicorn hair being lifted up by the boy’s free hand. He looked on it as something that had wronged him somehow and tossed both hair and dagger aside with a look of disgust. He then raised himself from the ground and delivered a swift kick to Hikari square in the face, knocking his head back. Blood gushed freely from the elf’s nostrils and he could do nothing to stem the tide.
“Your trinket won’t save you twice, white elf.”
Crio walked back to the pool then, leaving Hikari a bloodied mess. The human was so effortlessly violent. Feeling the onset of despair that accompanied general paralysis, the light mage knew his choices were few. There remained a way to escape his predicament, but it went against much of his better judgment. The door had closed behind him and now nothing illuminated the scene but the spiraling torches of Ecclesia. The beast within him begged to be unleashed and Hikari could almost hear a mantra in the back of his mind willing him on. He felt his ability to do anything would soon leave him and resolved to take the only path left.
A shapeless black cloud emanated from his constricted hands and flew at the lowest torch. Its dancing flames were encompassed by the cloud and extinguished with a soft hiss. The mass appeared spurred on by this and leapt on to the next closest torch, creeping silently along the round walls before dousing its light as well. It continued further, higher and higher, until the tower was dimmed down to a few remaining candles high above. Only blurred shapes could be made out in the darkened chamber. Just as the cloud made to swallow the last of the flickering lights, Crio called out annoyed.
“You waste my time.”
We shall see, Hikari professed silently and eliminated the last deterrent holding the vampire back.
~There are times to let the monster out of its cage.~
Darkness swept upon the pair in the tower like a heavy wave crashing on the shore. It washed over all they could see and was absolute, unwavering. Not a crack in Ecclesia’s construction let in a solitary beam of light to pierce its domain. Something boiled within the dark elf in the black, freed to take back control from the light mage’s grasp. Hikari could no longer do anything to restrain it. Arawn felt his presence rush through every inch of their shared physical being. He regained power over nerves, muscles and senses; quickly and decisively. A flash of elation and he was back at the helm.
All that gave away the sudden coup in the white warrior’s mind was a slight twitch of the cloaked form on the ground. The venom ceased to do its work as undeath contaminated the elven body. The vampire was subtle, cunning. Though he was free to act, he took in what he could while hardly moving so as to maintain the element of surprise. He sniffed the air in the tower by raising his head a few inches and took from it far more than the mage had registered. The other being in the dark had a very distinct scent that Arawn knew all too well. It was not something a mere elf could not have hoped to recognize, like a coded message for the few who knew its meaning.
Demon! Hikari was right to leave this to me. Arawn put aside feelings of victory for the moment.
“I saw no reason to dispatch you immediately since you worked so hard to get here,” Crio said as he walked slowly over to Arawn, still thinking his quarry immobilized. “If you’re in such a rush, however, I’d be glad to cut your visit short.”
When the boy reached him, the ground began to shake. The vampire could sense the vibrations coming from the human youth. His limbs began to grow, expanding farther than any child’s. Had there been light, Arawn would have seen the boy’s skin appear to liquefy and bubble red hot until the once soft pink epidermis was replaced with brilliant ruby scales. Horns sprouted from his head and curved back atop a jagged and menacing face. The shaking finally dissipated as the transformation ended and there stood a seven-foot terror by the elf’s fallen body.
As it had done in their last encounter, the demon summoned a ball of flame in its hand. The orb pierced the darkness only partially, forming a glowing aura on the scene. The red titan looked down at his prey and grinned. Here was someone worth destroying, a pleasant detour from mundane townsfolk and travelers. He sent the fiery mass into the air and had it split into a dozen tinier orbs that sped in every direction. They each met with an extinguished torch and once again set them ablaze. The tower’s grandiose interior was resplendent once more. The demon wished to see what he was about to do.
Arawn’s skin instantly began to protest the light, issuing a faint sound like water simmering on a low fire. At the same time, ghostly white smoke rose from the vampire’s equally pale skin. Knowing this aversion wouldn’t go unnoticed for long, Arawn suddenly sprung into action. He leapt from the floor with uncommon grace and brought a claw up to rake the demon’s chest. It struck with supernatural force and caused a great scraping sound of metal on glass to pierce the tower. The demon took several steps back, surprised by what he had thought no longer a threat. Arawn too backed away, eyes on the five parallel scratches on his opponents’ torso. They were shallow, but a small amount of dark liquid escaped them and began rippling down.
“You’re not Hikari,” the demon blurted as he saw the white smoke billowing from this new foe. It seemed confused more than afraid, perhaps even a little pleased.
“Demon blood,” Arawn hissed as he raised his bloodied hand to his mouth. He licked the elongated nails and took the drink in tenderly, savoring the unusual taste. “It’s such a rare delicacy to come by.”
“Ah, a vampire,” now the demon’s rumbling voice could scarcely mask his glee. “So our pale friend was hiding his own secrets. What fun. Tell me, blood drinker, do you promise better performance than your counterpart? He didn’t fare too well against me at all.”
“I’ve already done him one better,” the vampire finished the last drop on his hand . “The first hit is mine.”
“I’ll have to settle for the last one,” the demon retorted.
Arawn ignored its taunt. The demon blood was potent, many times stronger than that of mortals. It overtook him like a drug, giving all his surroundings an odd sense of unreality. Bruising and aches all along his body mended themselves. He conjured a shadowy dome five feet wide to hover above his head and block direct light from hitting his skin. The hissing sound stopped abruptly, as did the white vapor trails. The game was set and the players had but to take their turns. Arawn spread his arms wide without a word, inviting his opponent to test him.
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