The Din of Fate - Chapter I

CHAPTER I1

Revealed2

3


The moisture of her breath unveiled its invisibility in the air of the cold night. The drizzling rain coursed down the length of her hair, only to collect in an enlarging puddle at her feet. The leather cloak she wore did little to defy the piercing wind that chilled her very bones. She felt anesthetized. She cared not. Her glaring gaze held only for their prey below. 4

The interior sentries watched the suspicious group of heavily cloaked figures saunter down the nearly-deserted pathway. Chanessa glanced behind at a team of five capes, hidden behind the shadows of gargoyle statues which rested on the sloping roof of a building a ways down. One gave her the signal to investigate. Beside Chanessa, Orcer returned the signal, looked at her, and nodded. They jumped. Their long cloaks trailed above them as they raced the teardrops that fell from heaven. With a dull thud the duo landed behind a clump of blossomed shrubbery on a dark and deserted alley of the small structure they exited and they hid behind its shadow. She could discern a few sentries from the Archive drop from balconies on the other side of the path. Clearly, they too marked this group odd.5

Chanessa motioned to Orcer. They silently passed from shadow to shadow and pursued their unaware targets from behind while the Archive team, in like manner, followed at a distance; another even further. 6

Eventually, the group made for a station of the Underpass, the wide subway of the Float; a square plank vehicle of clear marble capable of magically levitating its aloft burden and transporting it to wherever it wishes within the Underpass bounds of two-pass tunnels. The need for levitation is none, but the inhabitants of Queenia were assiduous people; time was valuable. Orcer held Chanessa back from the moonlight until the group entirely disappeared below. They cautiously strode closer to the entrance of the station. Four tall naked caryatids supported the mosaiced pyramidal canopy that dwelt over the wide staircase. As they neared, the caryatids appeared to spring to life before them, in the form of three Fays. 7

"It still amazes me how you three can remain undetected at such close distance." Chanessa sighed wistfully. 8

"Perspective and stealth; it flows in our veins." Y' elm stated, the latter dripped with pride.9

R'zux put in, "Your stray ends here; ours begin." 10

Impishly C'ryn added, "A task, it seems, solely for our gender."11

The male's bow mocked wickedly.12

The fays merged with the dark, and they slithered the decent. The low rushing of floats hit her from below, serving to heighten the dithery that prevailed. The group were at the far end of the platform, scanning their eyes in all directions, in all pretence or no, fully alert. The trio slid silently in corners to observe the queer. From all appearances, they implied the common cleric apprentices with a master. Nothing unusual they seemed, standing in the midst of the nocturnal traffic of scurrying couriers, rushing attendants, and dispatched slaves. Every wizarding House had late night businesses, and it was not rare for a single cleric to train several apprentices at once. A strange thought crossed her mind. 13

These are not clerics.14

She was trained to heed inner instincts, however peculiar they were, but Y'elm mashed the thought. Suddenly one of the group glared directly where she croutched. She remained motionless, confident in her invisibility; yet something about the look told her that her former trail of thought could be correct. Her eyes impulsively shut; remembering her mentor's woe that the eyes always betrayed position. She dared not look, but she could feel the stares boring through. Seconds passed. She dared a peek. The cloaks were discarded; they were...15

"ZOMBIES!" C'ryn shouted as she drew her height, taking a bow with it. Shouts and squeals surrounded the exposed group. An arrow was notched and just as swiftly released. Its mark found an eye socket, and the creature stumbled to the ground in withered agony. The remaining zombies revealed their grotesque forms with groans of anger at having been discovered. Stumbling from victim to victim, they lashed at the crowd with their claws and fangs in furious desperation, dispensing their infectious disease. The screams of terror haunted resounded through the station.16

Chanessa and Orcer flew the steps in retaliation of the warning, swiftly wrenching concealed weapons from beneath their cloaks and attacked, but the plague spread fast, as did the Archive sentries that entered only seconds later. Chanessa twisted a crossbow around her pillar to discharge a flaming arrow at the nearest zombie, who gradually turned into a roaring inferno. Likewise Orcer and Achlora peppered swivel-chambered crossbows loaded with torched darts at the ring of turned-zombies that surrounded them. On floats Yerwory and Warrdel danced, weaving scimitars at the heads and bodies of the zombies that foolishly attempted escape on the vehicles, while Shao-buoqao smote powerfully with his two Chinese war swords, swirling and cutting largely at reeling and flattened zombies. The fays streamed arrows from the stairway into the chests of zombies that beset the remaining crowd. The wind caught their dark cloaks and they billowed around their masters, making the trio appear as an intimidating force not to be contended with.17

Viral the Lich shuffled in agitation as he clawed yet another victim. His spread had been sprung before it was set, yet his band of five managed to create him a batch of 50 zombies out of the lapse. However he was far from the desired location. He knew his men wouldn't last long against the armed sentries, however few in numbers they were. He had to silence them all before word of their presence spread. Yet as impossible the task, He launched a strike.18

Orcer and Achlora were now spinning around each other in a seemingly passionate embrace as many more zombies fell around them, when the dark mutterings of incantations reached Orcers?Eears. Distracted, he turned to look at a figure at the end of the platform that he had not noticed before, but recognized it immediately.19

A Lich in the Tunnels of Queenia? He was stunned, But how could it have gotten through our aegis? Even more, how could the Undeads be so foolish as to attack one of the leading capitals of the world?20

It would remain his mystery forever.21

The luxury of a fleeting thought cost him his life. Distracted as he was, he failed to see the leaping zombie and the hand of claws that descend on his face. 22

Achlora too spied the Lich, but her shock instantly turned to horror as she was knocked to the ground by Orcer, who was transforming directly in front of her. Never before had she faced anything like this. Her heart felt like it would explode, as a million memories shot through her in that instant, from the day she was introduced to her dear beloved to the day they last slept in each others' arms. She had no choice. 23

"Forgive me Orcer!"she screamed in inner pain. 24

The blazing dart she released reduced his body into flames. It was shoved aside, and Achlora found herself staring into the whites of a sniveling zombie that clawed for her. Suddenly its head disappeared, and the body fell lifelessly at her feet. It was Shao.25

"Comforting you I would be, but alas we fight." A few zombies lumbered for the fallen human, only to drop without heads or maimed limbs and torsos at the barrage of blades that stood over her. 26

"They got Orcer."Achlora said, tears streaming down her face. 27

"I know."28

With such anger that she did not know she possessed, she stood up and leveled her crossbow at an approaching zombie. Having second thoughts, she instead folded her weapon and bludgeoned it to death.29

A head rolled, then crushed under a boot. Chased by a 'V' formational threesome, he ran straightway to a pillar, leapt, and ran the length of it; vaulted, crossed blades twice above on flesh; twisted, crossed arms and dropped. Blades split shoulder blades top to bottom, swerving outward in opposites to sever a pair of forelimbs. Twain dismembered heads and bodies collapsed behind. 30

"A fine display," slitting throats, eyes, and crotches, a green goop splattered Warrdel remarked at Yerwory, "Surely a good turn deserves anotha'"31

He approached a once comely, yet now repulsively disfigured couple with a dip - under the pretense of a mock bow - beneath double pairs of thrashing limbs. Whirling counter-clockwise like a figure on skates, scimitars repeatedly slit flesh through from the trunks, creeping north, ever spinning. Green blood scattered throughout. With a last spin and a final slit through each, Warrdel jumped away as the slices that once formed a complete body slid piece by piece. 32

Yewory could only grin at his master.33

C'ryn paused with a drawn bow and surveyed the situation. The long platform was interspersed by two long rows of large, thick concrete pillars, each three meters apart. The distance covered from the opposite pillar was about the same. Tunnels spread on either side. The unfortunate victims of this station had all been turned to zombies and now twenty or so had been slaughtered. Achlora had moved in behind Chanessa, and they fought back to back near the center of the platform. Yerwory and Warrdel battled in similar fashion on the west of the platform, while Shao moved to single-handedly clash on the east. Then her attention - and naturally her bow - was drawn to the imposing figure at the end.34

It went through a few motions and created a thick black cloud that spread a ways in all directions from beneath him, and from within raised five Wights. Hooded skulls and long tattered cloaks, decaying claws that pierced from their sleeves and grappled scythes, feet that never touched the ground, with the presence of cold that chills their surroundings, these creatures announced their summons with bloodthirsty cries to their emblem - the winged skull - emblazoned on their large waistlet. The skulls that hung on the hooked chain surrounding the wraiths' waist echoed their lords' cries. 35

An arrow streaked through the air, followed by a score more from R'zux and Y'elm. The wights were thrown onto their backs like leaves in the autumn wind, yet those fallen just as wispily arose back into the air, confirming their original suspicions that their unenchanted bows would have little or no effect on their netherly foes. 36

The Lich raised a bony finger in the fays' direction.37

"Destroy!" 38

Three soared.39

The fays swiftly departed to the streets above, continuing to loose arrows in the skulls and ribcages of their chasers. As the wights ascended, their backs were greeted by a flurry of arched long-daggers. Scantily clad as they were, this move did not hold long against the chill that raised bumps on their skins, and were forced to distance. With wide sweeping arcs the hefty and intricately engraved scythes carved. The nimble fays found their weapons inadequate against the large blades that curved over and around them. 40

The couples danced toward an abandonded avenue, taking care to avoid attention. A difficult task due to the numerous inner sentries that swarmed the burg, but the fayen pride squelched a helpmeet. Frost trailed paths over earth and shrub where the wights swept, and the fays began to experience the first stages of hyperthermia.41

A scythe ducked. R'zux flipped over its passing blade, and left a trim slash in its wake. The blow would have sent any mortals' chest spewing forth a fountain, yet only remained a torn garment on a levitated frame. Twisted thrice, this time to avoid a cunning 'S' pattern created by her foes' blade; smoothly evaded. It was followed by a brisk backhand breeze, rapidly succeeded with a latish fully arched back, catching the tight top and the mounds that extended from under it. She hissed with pain. The horizontal wound yielded its oozing red substance over her abdomen, and she could feel the tendrils of ice creeping ever so leisurely into and over her now exposed lower bosoms, spreading; the worst aftereffect from the enchanted scythe. Her voice was low. 42

"Unleashed your death, have you?"43

Rising from her stretch, a tiny flask slid from between her ravishing breasts and onto the dainty palm below. With a captivating smile, the slim cork head was squashed its remainder deeper into the sparkling black liquid, emitting an audible snap. The slight fuse lit. The scythe rose. The flask was parted with a message,44

"Underestimation; it happens."45

The vase shattered its contents into the wights?Echest; a shower of crystal followed by the explosion, the force of which toppled her on all fours. 46

"Finish them." She simply stated to her companions. Y'elm executed her opponent in like fashion. C'ryn however, was determined to reserve her precious mixture. She dashed to a burning cloak - courtesy of the deceased wight - and cast it on her wight before engaging it once more, but the flame smothered. A blade fell. Crossed daggers caught the long handle while it descent, and the wight shoved. She fell heavily onto her back. A frustrated sigh escaped her lips. 47

"There must be another path to death for you!"48

The scythe replied with its tip, but C'ryn had already dived beneath the levitated corpse and her flask exploded into its back. The ear-splitting blast and the warmth that flooded her compensated for the cuts and gashes which covered her upper body. The torched cast fled away in terror.49

The wick dies, the flame flickers, A smile lit her fair countenance. R'zux and Y'elm were warming their nigh stiff limbs near littered patches of fire. 50

"Did we kill them?" Y'elm asked.51

"Hardly," R'zux returned, and motioned to another burning cloak in the street, "They were merely returned to their plane; a shame, I would so love to be its death."52

The cold grew in her chest. She restrained herself against Y'elm's concerned look. They couldn't do anything about the deviant wound till they returned to the Temple.53

"C'ryn, return to the Edifice and alert the Council; every House and barrack must be alerted. Then fly to the Gates and awaken the Immortals to intruders. Then to the Cathedral wings and warn the priests; I'll cast my virginity the Higharch is being sought."54

C'ryn tossed her white-blonde locks behind her.55

"At last, a bit of amusement amidst a score of tedium." she asserted with a cheery giggle, and dashed away. 56

The two left the scene of tempest and made their way back to the station.57

* * * * *58

The Lich remained glaring with gnashed teeth as he watched his two wights flame, trying in vain to console himself with their last deeds; the two females lying mortally wounded. Chanessa was the first who saw - or rather felt - them, as the three wights flew over their heads in pursue of the fays. It was then the two remaining wights had reaped their fellow undead (the Lich had cringed, yet was powerless to stop them once they had been roused) till a clear path to the unaware females was made, and subdued them. Yerwory and Warrdel had at the first scream dashed to their rescue just as the final blow was enact and held them off while Shao - also disbanding a fight to save - again poised near the unconscious women to slaughter the few zombies that escaped mutilation and sought them. 59

At first the two redheads held somewhat of a vantage over the wights, due to the lack of space, the swordsmen were more agile in close quarters. But the combat soon took them off the platform and into the tunnels. As if the fight was not difficult enough, the darkness shortly added to their plight. Desperately they tried to break a path between and around the wights, but in vain; it was getting colder, and the wights were coming to life in their dark environment. Suddenly he heard it,60

The unmistakable hum of a float, heading this way!61

In a spur of the moment, Warrdel reached for the still lashing Yerwory and pulled him into a mad dash. 62

"Would ya kindly tell me what in heaven's name are we doin'?!"63

"Just run! And try not ta trip, boy!" Warrdel bellowed back as he sheathed his swords.64

The two ran blindly as fast as they could deeper into the tunnel. With every step, their backs grew colder, and their surroundings murkier. 65

The glow of light that wandered into their eyes as they rounded another bend cascaded Warrdel in temporarily relief; but could they reach it in time? Yerwory must have thought they had gone mad; here they were in the pitch black, being chased by wights, running straight into a float! The glow grew larger. The scythes hissed as they drew nearer, ripping at the flowing cloaks. Warrdel cried to his gods for strength. The glow from the float flooded. The rider's attention lost in its hefty tome, blissfully unaware.66

"Grab it!" he commanded.67

In swift unison, they dropped under the speeding plank, grabbing hold of the northern flank of the vehicle as it flew over. The sudden alteration of velocity was sheer agony; Yerwory voiced his aching arm's protestation with a groan. The driver was assaulted by a wight-smattered embrace and instantly fell into a heart attack. With the bore lost, the float rapidly lost its haste. The recovered wights' metanoya became evident from the change in temperature. Yerwory shifted from rider under the float to its commander, and the plank continued to speed till the station was in reach. 68

Warrdel suddenly let lose the float, the instant change of weight toppled Yerwory's equilibrium, and the two landed hard on the concrete surface and struggled to recuperate their agility, but the wights proved the quicker. Warrdel could have sworn he heard a cackle from the evil predator, as if to mock their brashness. He barely managed to unsheathe his scimitars to intercept the powerful curving blade. The scythes' course deflected, at the price of his blades shivering into shards, leaving Warrdel in a disbelieving stupor at the power of the swing. Again the wight seemed to laugh, its weapon poised for the final blow. His eyes swung to that of his sprawled protege, trapped in a similar predicament; yet also caught another movement out of the corner of his eye. 69

"Even undeads retain' pride," he smirked, "Again yer downfall."70

His sudden lurch to behind a pillar resulted in a wild release of conflagrated darts from behind, most of which failed to strike its victim due to the deliverer's wounded aim, but the few that struck delivered ghastly squeals of phobia from the wraith. Chanessa's single solid shot took the other, and the shrilling wights deliquesced into oblivion, shedding their smothering cloaks as testament to their existence.71

Warrdel beamed at the females, "Good beauty sleep I see."72

"Ya, yea charmed those stiffs alright, they're quite on fire." Yerwory drawled from his sprawled spot.73

Achlora smiled weakly, then passed into slumber.74

A distant squeal brought all out of daze. The last zombie stood no more. Shao wrenched his sword from its chest and parted with the filth a heavy kick, casting the emerged weapon to the defenseless Iverni; all simultaneously turned to face the Lich. Chanessa frothed the last shard of strength within her to drag the unconscious female and herself to the world above, wishing to place as much distance as possible. Warrdel and Yerwory stood and strode to trap: Warrdel located its right, Yerwory its center, and Shao its left; weapons rose. The lich snarled its mouthful of stench at each. 75

It spoke,76

"Humans! Thinketh ye can overcome a servant of the underworld?" Its laugh assaulted more than three; the closest found breathing a chore.77

Yerwory coughed, "The servant could use a mint," he mimed with a pinched nose, "I be hearin' that the Gremlins' Wenya rival that of the Gnomes' Wenesse, or even that of the Elves' Lissuine, though I must admit, I can only imagine the mints' strength." 78

"Lofty nursling!"79

Its rejoinder flew as a churning staff, long and toothed. Yerwory bobbed wildly in rapid succession while frisking hind; the other two moved in. 80

"The servant must work on capping his furor," he taunted between grazes, strides retrograde, and rotations of torso, "I can recommend a fabulous tome called 'The Artifice of Control for Half-Wits' by a Giant consultant by the name of Ujerel Hulkfeet who prides on writin?Eabout subjects that are incomprehensible to his low intellige....begging yer pardon, but I really must die."81

He dropped to the floor, exposing his scimitars as he passed. Warrdel placed a pillar between himself and the army of knives that flew from the Asian's fingers. Just as the Lich sighted the spinning metals directed at him, Yerwory rolled into its legs, toppling it from the ground. The Lich's spinning form was a picture of dark hypnosis mingled with the skill only a master would possess as it caught each knife, dagger, and steel with his staff in perfect precision while performing intricate flips, twists, and revolutions with its robes and staff flowing around its owner in a picturesque scene of destruction. 82

Thirty thrown, 83

Thirty caught. 84

The staff hid behind its master as if modest of its strut, and the Lich landed at the foot of the stairway. Knives littered like flakes of snow along the path between. Metallic-silver shone the gaping skull that tipped the staff.85

It glowed a toxic green.86

The fallen blades replicated, 87

Collected,88

Orbited the Lich in five rings,89

"Savor thy blades."90

They launched their ascending fury. 91

Shao and Warrdel welcomed the returning knives with gushing slashes and rushed steps at the conjurer. Alas the cursed blades were a force of their own, and the humans were compelled to dismiss their surroundings and merge their backs in a gavotte, struggling to dismiss their numerous foes. The boy had plunged from the storm, caroming off a column before propelled his slender self directly at the menacing Lich, switching at the last moment into a stunning serenade of intricate cuts and gashes. Moving in flawless synchronization with his body, the staff sliced in arcs and twirled wide as they blocked and met the scimitars evenly, deflecting the swipe to its neck and the thrust to its torso with perfect counters, and executed a similar series of double attack routines. Staff's upper tore at the head, the lower swung low reverse, both whipped repeatedly when the Lich impelled. Yerwory emerged from the attack, showing only one long scrape along his neck; but the press slipped his step to a knee. A crashing blow webbed the ground where the boy had been only seconds before, but now was not, only now his blades drove from west. The Lich kicked to the air, thwarting a lunge, contacting its staff with a rising blade, and the upper again splintering ground where the lad's body appeared no more, only a snigger.92

"Yea tired, froth?"93

"Frolicking maiden!" 94

"Fermentin' rot! Renew yer demise!"95

He went in with a linear dual-impale, his scimitars side by side and only an inch apart. The Lich wasted them both with a sweeping lower staff parry smoothly replaced by an upper staff wheel to the incoming pate. The momentum of the slapped blades fused with the boy's back roll and he swayed precautiously on the edge. The sway ended with the painful lunge of the staff-tip to his groin, and he tumbled from the platform twice a length. His head broke hard on the earth, but he lashed its equal on the descending Lich, struggling viciously to replace his feet. However, the momentum of gravity was stronger, and the blunted staff-end pierced through his meat. Crimson doused. His eyes widened in anger and pain. He wanted to punish his oppressor, to see the foul beast suffer and agonize his equal in a foolish error, but no. The thought lingered long till the final shred of existence passed from him eyes. The undead decided he was time pressed. 96

"Farewell, mortal." 97

A small porcelain globe extracted from his robes and smashed on the corpse at his feet. It fizzled into a bright-green haze thread with lustrous rays of flashing lightning. The thick, blinding smoke billowed about the caster till it engulfed it in whole and its beyond. The cursed lifted from the knives, and the smoke parted shortly.98

The Lich did not reappear. 99

The station teemed with still moving dissembled zombie remains.100

Knife after another echoed loudly onto the platform just as the two fays were heard from the stairway. 101

"And where were yea?" Warrdel called in a mock-annoyed way.102

"Don't give us that," R'zux returned, "We had to take it up here or you'll be fighting with frozen limbs. I expect a word of th...."103

"Weasel it! And where are the ladies?"104

A moment passed before the fays descended with their arms loaded; both wore a dark visage.105

Silence shrouded thick as the smoke. A few blinked tears from their eyes. The fays gently placed the remains on the ground. 106

"Chanessa was....a stunning warrior, and a wonderful person." Fluid obscured Shao's vision. R'zux tearfully nodded her assent. "Achlora was..." He turned and walked. 107

"...was too young ta die." The redhead ended. He too walked away, and then stopped dead. "And so be Yerwory..." he sank to his knees; the mangled corpse of his apprentice lay below him. His pride and joy, the son that was never his, the lad he trained from boyhood, "...for it ta end like this..."108

His raged cries sounded long and clear through the hollowed tunnels. R'zux rushed and buried her face in his back. Her arms flooded with comfort and he wept all the bitterly. Together they mourned.109

A presence neared Shao. She alone knew of his secret desire.110

"Blaming yourself?" Y'elm asked.111

"A minor understatement, that is." He spat sarcastically.112

"You think you could have saved her?"113

"I could have, I know."114

"Did you tell her?"115

He remained silent.116

Y'elm pressed, "Did you tell her?"117

Long silence, then, "No."118

"Why?"119

"Another was her love."120

"Why did that stop you?"121

He looked at her in high surprise.122

She continued, "Why must one's proclamation of love be deterred by another? Why must one receive only one love in life, and never know there was another? Why are we afraid to express our feelings? Why do we fear rejection, when it may not even be there? And if there was, why must we fear the hurt, when it will only show us how it feels to be rejected, and help us excel in a kinder interaction with others?" she shortened the distance between them, "Why are we afraid to love, when it would only help to bring out the humanity inside us? Why are we afraid to lose, when it would only increase the value of which we lost??E123

He could not reply. 124

Her soft hand caressed the tears off his face, "I'm sorry you had to learn the hard way. Such difficulties in life are not a threat; they are there for our mature. But it is up to each one to decide what they are going to do with their adversities; whether to harden their hearts," their lips neared, "Or to rise above."125

Shao was at loss for words. The warm comfort of her soft lips on his cascaded his being with incredible emotions. She could always lighten his heart, and bring soothing to his troubled mind; that's why he cared for her so. 126

As their lips divorced, so did her final word. "Humans were created to learn from their mistakes, and the mistakes of others."127

She strode back to the still-sobbing couple and placed her hands on their shoulders. 128

"Come, let us away from this smoke and report to the Edifice, and these wounds."129

Gently lifting them to their feet, they slowly trekked to the exit. Warrdel glanced over his shoulder to see the Asian still in meditation. They paused to watch him remove three long-stemmed sticks of incense from his robe and light them. They knew the custom of his kind to honor the memory of the deceased with fragrance; yet one did wonder how much smoke emanated from a small sphere, and why it seemed to spread through the whole station, or why the flame from the flint combined with the smoke so smoothly. One wondered, yet did not know; until too late.130

The station exploded. 131

* * * * * *132

Miles away, Viral sensed the eruption, and smiled. How foolish these mortals. The float he stole carried him to another station, where he spread the disease. He ordered the zombies to ascend, attack and kill; then he instructed a band to follow him to repeat the procedure at yet another station, where dozens more will convert. He would release three zombies at every station, thus spreading the plague throughout the inner city. Soon he reunited with the Lich bulk that he broke through the sewage system with, and received word that their orders now were to inflict and spread, then post at stations to await command. There were rumors of gathering Bone Dragons and Shadow Dragons at the east, and Wraiths at their command. 133

The Lich sneered, The assembly has begun. Even now our infantry are marching to the south Gate. "The Elytron be ours!" he spewed. Yes, the elytron, the shell that grapples the Relic of Supremacy! Soon we will be the undisputed masters of the world! "Queenia will not stand long!" 134

* * * * * *135

Perched high in one of the topmost steeple of the many-spired tower of the majestic Cathedral that overlooked the vast burg of Queenia sat the chamber, from whence it watched in silent contemplation. 136

I am being sought.137

It laughed.138

Hardly surprising, but it seems my wait may soon be ended.139

For the being, it was content to sit and wait. It need not seek.140

Danger will seek me.141

142

One thousand years has been long.143

Too long, and now a good millennium has passed without a victim!144

But it knew, somewhere in the farthest corners of its power, its victim was waiting.145