Fields of blue

Chapter 1-The Sacrifice

*Praise the lamb, a conduit to great power, promised liberator of the one who waits below....*

A long time ago, precisely a millennia or so, there was once a prophecy. A lamb born to be slain will aid the one who waits for his freedom and all valleys in the land of old faith will crumble.

Adeline never paid attention to those stories, it was painful for her to remember her past childhood traumas that surrounded this prophecy. Once the prophecy was told around her homeland every lamb she has ever known, just vanished. she was to young to understand of course, her and her parents moved a lot in the lands of the old faith, to darkwood all the way to even silks cradle there was never a place to rest that she could remember since her birth. It was until she reached the age of 4 her parents also disappeared, she remembered hearing loud noises that was almost unrecognizable to her now as her mother hid her in a hollow tree saying "whatever you hear and whatever you see. do not come out until we say so ok? make sure your bell does not ring...and stay as quiet as possible" that was the first and last time she ever saw her mother cry. Her parents left her there...and never came back.

She knew they didn't just abandon her, so she stay put until it was nightfall and began to grow hungry, so she disobeyed her mothers rule and left the tree to find them. It did not take long for her to find them...or at least their remains. Her mother sacrificed at a alter, long dead with a knife in her chest and her father on the ground not to far, his own head barely hanging on by the thick layers of wool and skin. She didn't remember seeing her dead parents after that, some say when a child experiences trauma they mentally block it out on instinct to protect themselves. That description is what her other father told when he explained the story of how he found her when she was just a child on her 18th birthday, several weeks ago.

Adaline wished she would have listened to her mother or her other father, as she believed she can be able to do one simple errand on her own by gathering camellia flowers from darkwood for her other father. However on her way she had gotten ambushed by many cloaked figures and now here she stands, hands bound behind her back and facing down a stone path illuminated by red torches. Adaline is here to be slaughtered like everyone else of her kind and there was nothing she could do but hopelessly plead with her captors to spare her but they don't listen to her cries, they pointed knives at her to force her to slowly walk down the stone pathway to her final destination.

She can feel her heart in her throat as she's forced to face her demise, a fate that she was born to have regardless of what she does with her short life. This isn't fair...

Adaline reaches the end and see 4 figures stand before her to watch her sacrifice, all 4 taller than any creature in the lands with crowns on their heads. The 4 bishops of the old faith...

"Before us stands the last of its kind. All others we have hunted down and put to the blade" One bishop, Heket, spoke up. Her voice had a deep and painful sounding rumble, as her throat is bandaged by a still bleeding and unhealable injury that has happened years ago.

"With this final sacrifice, the prophecy will be impossible to fulfill!" The second bishop, Kallamar, adds with a slight louder tone like he couldn't hear himself talk. The blood socked bandages where his ears once was is most likely the reason.

"The heretic who lies bound below will be condemned to eternal captivity." the third bishop, Leshy, comments with utmost confidence. He is not directly facing at Adaline like the other bishops but rather straight ahead, as the large bandages cover empty bleeding eye sockets where his eyes once was.

"And the old faith will be preserved..." the final bishop, Shamura, spoke in a soft and wise like tone, their words are also slightly slowed or had a brief pause. the bandages around their head gets more soaked in blood as they made a slight pained expression.

At the corner of Adaline's eye she can see the executioner approach with a axe in hand, the blade is 10 times bigger then her own head. This is it, this is the end for her and she never got to say goodbye or even thank her other father for raising her as his own, not even seeing her old childhood friends again like she had promised, or even saying goodbye to many other good people in her life. She will die here...and she knows it. Adaline opens her mouth to beg for her life again for one final attempt, yet nothing comes out but a chocked sob as tears ran down her face, she didn't even realize she was crying and trembling in fear till now. A hooded figure pushes Adaline to kneel as the executioner raises the axe, aiming for her thin neck to behead her. She couldn't struggle, she couldn't even try and look at anything but the ground, all she could do now, is just grit her teeth and wait for the blade to make contact with her throat...

.....

She didn't feel a thing, one moment she was looking at the bricked floor and the next, she appeared on a giant stonelike platform with a pentagram painted red on its surface. Looking around she sees nothing but fog, many chains, bones, and wooden upside down crosses stuck to the ground. She hears rattling of chains and whistling wind, yet she feels no breeze. She must be dead, right? She stands up, her legs still shaking from the adrenaline and slowly walks off the platform, the ground is solid and cold with the occasional bone crunching under her hooves as she couldn't see them through the fog. Adaline hears the struggling of chains grow louder as she approaches the one who is making them.

"Come closer. Fear not, for though you are already dead, i still have need of you" the figure beckons her to come closer, he is as tall as the four bishops with a black and red crown placed on his head, three eyes watching her very movement as she stands before him. Adaline knows who he is...Her other father spoke of him many times before, the one who waits.

"Those foolish bishops thought they could keep you from me in death. But instead they sent you straight to me" the one who waits spokes in a dark and wicked chuckle, the chains that bind him to the place he stood rattle as he moves a hand to gesture to her "i will give you life again, but at a price!" he continued, offering a blessing of returning to life...at least it seemed like a blessing at first. "All i ask is for you to start a cult in my name. Do we have a deal...?"

Adaline thought for a moment...

The bishops slaughtered her parents in cold blood when she was a child...no, her whole race, They killed her without a small hint of remorse, they made her other father to run and hide with her for years, and it was all for nothing... It made adaline so angry... she doesn't deserve this fate...She has a second chance at life and she would be a fool to refuse it.

"Yes" adaline agrees to the conditions, "Wise choice... Take the Red Crown which I once wore. With it you shall command the loyalty of Followers and strike fear into the hearts of our enemies. Return to the land of the living, start a Cult in my name, and begin recruiting Followers. Once you have done so, you will see me again. Now, GO!" the one who waits commands as he lifts his hands up, then the crown on top of his head floats up and lands on top of hers. securely placed between her small horns and fluffy wool. She never felt such power before, the anger she felt boils to the point she sees red. The ropes binding her hands snap and she felt a robe of red and white appear around her shoulders by the crowns influence.

She began to feel the warmth of fire again and opened her eyes to no longer be in the fog filled place, but right back to the hall where she was executed. the bishops are no longer there but the very hooded followers that captured her and brought her to her death... She doesn't want to do this, she honestly does not. But she will not give up her second chance at life so soon, she needs to run. The cultists draw swords and daggers to kill her again and before she could run the crown comes off her head and forms a sword into her hands... She has no choice but to fight...

*yet a sacrificial beast, take heed; for a crown cannot sit upon two brows...*