Birth, Of A Sorts

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Birth, Of A Sorts

Postby Christoph » Sun Jul 24, 2005 4:53 pm

He hurried through the streets of Shallyon, fear lending swiftness to his stride. His eyes darted around the sleeping, rain drenched town, his neck rythmically craning from side to side - forward towards his destination, the Keep of Shallyon; left and right, into the shadowy deserted alleyways that seemed filled with dread and menace; and, every few steps, a quick glance behind, done almost hesitantly, as if he was afraid to lay eyes on what might be following him.

He had been running for a week now, ever since walking in on the councel room in the Diamond Palace. His horse had died the night previous; enchantments on the beast, increasing its speed and stamina, had finally taken their toll on the poor creature's nervous system, stopping the functions entirely. He was at fault in that; he had crafted the enchantment in a hurry, rushing through what should have been careful and lengthy preperations in the matter of minutes in his haste to leave the city. But then, it's hard to take the time to concentrate when your soul is struck with terror.

Terror. Long a stranger to Arturion, High Beastmaster of the Golden Empire and holder of one of nine seats on the High Councel of the University of Lib. Now, finally, it had paid Arturion a visit, and it was loathe to leave him now, having finally sunk its claws into him. Not that Arturion was a weak mans, by any means; no, rather, it was simply that he still could not even comprehend what he had walked in on seven days ago. It was unfathomable - and though he was one who had spent his life trying to fathom supposedly unfathomable concepts, the sheer insanity of this newest abberation combined with the obvious threat to his own person made his terror understandable.

Arturion had arrived a day late for the most recent councel, which undoubtably had saved his life. He had entered the halls of the Diamond Palace expecting irritation among his colleagues, who, although they all had their own faults, were noticeably more punctual than he ever was. Everything was as it should be; daily palace life in all its usual bustle and colour, the occassional student here or there, the sound of drilling soldiers in the training yards outside. The councel chamber itself stood as always, glowing sigils on the doorway indicating councel in progress.

Sighing in anticipation of the harsh looks he would recieve, Arturion had applied his amulet of office to the door, triggering the opening mechanism that allowed him in... and had then stood staring, in aghast horror at what he had unveiled, his years of training fleeing him as he stared at the corpses of eight colleagues, eight arch-magi... eight friends.

Slowly, horror turned to dread, as his mind assessed the reality of such a situation. Eight of the Empire's most powerful magi... in their councel chamber in the center of the Diamond Palace, their place of greatest power and control... protected by the chamber's enchanted defences of an age long past...

Nothing could accomplish such a task... at least not without causing much more destruction than it had. The palace had continued its daily routine unknowing of its protecting councel's fate, unsensing of the vast energies that surely would have been unleashed. No one had noticed. The deaths were all the more chilling by their surgical nature, implying a power of such reckoning that one magus could not hope to stand in its path.

A magus who, as Arcturion finally grasped his own situation, should have died along with the other eight.

Perhaps it would have been wiser to stay in the Empire's capital, but considering what good that had done the rest of the councel, Arcturion had deemed it wise to get as far away as possible, and then survey what could be done. So he had panicked, taken a horse, run for the sanctuary that his soul instinctively clung to - Shallyon, his home, where his brother ruled, and where his instincts insisted he would be safest.

Now, within the city, nearing his brother's keep in the midst of a thundering storm, he was realizing the sheer idiocy of his move - if someone had enough power to destroy the councel, they must have enough power to find out who Arcturion's relatives were. The closer he came, the more he feared that all he was achieving was spreading his own sealed fate to his brother and his keep. He stood, now, at the keep's entrance, indecisive as to what course of action to take.

Behind him, the pitch of the rain hitting the cobbles changed slightly. Where before it had been the steady rythm of water droplets splattering against stone, now it took on a more sinister beat - it became regular, a tempo of sorts, and sounded more like hail or small pebbles. Slowly, he turned his head - and again, terror froze him.

Rising from the street behind him, raining down from the sky in tiny pieces, an obsidian statue was forming itself. Four black, scaled feet grew into legs, then joined for a long and sinuous body, before sealing with a long, barbed tail and a dragon's fanged head. Serpentine and catlike at the same time, the statue slowly filled itself out... and then it moved. Its head whipped around, focusing on Arcturion, and an obsidian tongue hissed out momentariy from between its frozen glass jaws.

Arcturion fumbled to action. Fear may have ruled him as he ran, but finally faced with his unknown enemy, desperation drove him to furious action. He turned his hand slightly, activating a protective field around himself, then summoned one of his wands to hand and spoke the trigger word to freeze the monstrosity in place.

For a moment, they stared at one another, Arcturion daring to hope that the creature had been so easily contained. Then, almost leisurely, the creature stretched, rippling the energy shield binding it. It hissed again, and took a step forward. The freezing shield shattered like a popped bubble, and Arcturion couldn't help but take a step back, away from the creature, as the impossibility of what he'd just witnessed hit him.

The creature hadn't countered his spell. It hadn't dispelled his shield. It had simply ignored it... walked through it. It's very body had destroyed the magic restraining it. And if it could go through one shield, then it could...

Arcturion didn't get time for any more thoughts as the creature pounced onto him, claws tearing in and causing thousands of tiny pinpricks of agony, pinpricks which rapidly grew into full-blown fires all over his body. Sensation flew from him - all he had time for was one agonizing scream before his soul was ripped apart and his body shredded along with it.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

The creature stood over its latest victim, absorbing this newest energy into its own swirling essence. When it finished, it turned to leave - and hesitated. Something was wrong.

It stood, staring out at the world with eyes, mind, and spirit. No threat seemed immediately apparent; obviously, the dead man's final scream was bringing shouts from the keep, and men were rushing down, but none of them posed a threat to the creature, and so they were summarily ignored.

Wrong... but not outside. Inside. Within the creature. Something had... changed. It had felt changes similar to this, when it had absorbed the energy of the eight others, several journeys of the sun before now. Not this intense, however. Something was formulating within the creature's mind, something that had been building ever since it had first stood over a freshly killed corpse and sucked the escaping life force into its own. A feeling... a sense...

Men surrounded the creature, loosing arrows at him and charging forth with swords. Realizing its peril as chunks of glass started chipping off with each hit of an arrow, the creature reached out to the air surrounding it and merged, expanding, until it had transformed from obsidian to fog. It the drifted upwards into the storm, whereupon it began to ride the currents back east, towards Lib and its master. All the while, however, the thought kept growing within its mind until finally, as it hovered over Lib, preparing to rain down into its master's abode, the thought surfaced with some clarity.

I... am...
~Christoph / Rain
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Christoph
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Joined: Wed Sep 25, 2002 5:00 pm
Location: British Columbia, Canada

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