Battle of Souls

Chapter 9

Kriv:

The young acolyte clawed at his throat for breath.  The edges of his vision blurred as oxygen couldn't find it's way into his windpipe.  As the hand around his throat tightened he could barely feel his back being slammed against a wall. 

Thane could see spots of red on his gauntlets as they began to cut into the priest of death's skin.  He raised his arm and pushed the priest up the wall by his throat. 

With his free hand Thane drew the hilt of his sword from it's sheathe.  Though the blade had been broken and was now barely half the size it once was the jagged edges still gleamed with deadliness. 

Thane growled at the acolyte, "A monster, am I? A disgrace to the temple, am I? Need to be put down, do I? We'll see what you think of me up close and personal, though, won't we?" 

Thane thrust his broken blade through the young elf's ribs, barely reaching all the way through but still doing the job.  He withdrew the blade and dropped the acolyte, letting him die in a pile of snow. 

As Thane approached Sylvia near the walls of the city he had already cleaned and returned his blade to the scabbard. 

Sylvia turned to see Thane when she heard his boots crunching in the snow.  She looked up at him, smiling. Her smile soon faded though when she saw the excitement in his eyes and the red tinges on the edges of his armor.

"What did you do this time?" Sylvia demanded.  She grabbed the hilt of Thane's blade and pulled it out of it's sheathe, inspecting the blade. "You know you didn't get all of the blood off of this, right?"

Thane quickly grabbed back at his blade and returned it to it's scabbard.  He avoided eye contact as he mumbled, "Another one of those acolytes needed to... learn a lesson."

Sylvia stepped closer to him and put a hand on his cheek, pulling his gaze back to hers. "Why do you need to prove yourself to them? What did they call you this time? A killer? Because you've only proven them right if that's the case."

Thane pushed Sylvia away and hissed, "I want them to know that if they consider me a killer or a monster or whatever else they want to call me, I'll happily prove them right." 

Sylvia opened her palms and snapped her fingers, causing a pulsing ball of fire to appear over each of her hands.  She blinked and once her eyes opened they too were ablaze. 

Sylvia slammed her hands into Thane's chest, the balls of fire compressing as she prevented them from attempting to go through Thane's armor.  "Thane, do you feel that heat?"

Thane swatted her arms away from him. He averted his gaze as he whispered, "No, I still can't feel any heat."

Raising one of his gauntlets to his eyes, Thane looked through the cracks in the armor at his pale skin. "I'm just some zombie now, aren't I?"

Thane began walking up the stone steps built into side of the wall to reach the precipice where he could look out over the landscape that the mountain sat upon.  Sylvia quickly followed behind him, making sure not to trip on the ice that coated the staircases.

Sylvia reached the top step and tripped, stumbling on a patch of ice towards Thane.  She threw an arm out below her to attempt to break her fall onto the stone floor. 

Before Sylvia broke her wrist on the frozen ramparts, though, a dark armored arm appeared below her stomach and pulled her upright and out of her fall.

Looking up to her rescuer, Sylvia smirked and said, "Now I don't think a zombie could do that, could he Thane?" 

A small slightly frosted hand stopped Thane from turning his head as Sylvia kept him from avoiding her gaze.

"Thane, you're not a zombie. You're not even a simple necromancer. You're something more. You're a necromancer of the order of death, and that means that you're one of the deadliest beings out here."

Thane licked his lips and darted his eyes over to where a guard had just impaled a rat, sensing it's death from fifty yards away.  "I suppose there are a few benefits to this new state," he whispered.

Thane grinned mischievously as he felt the same guard coughing up blood.  He could tell that the mountain still hadn't quite recovered from the tuberculosis it had been hit by a few years ago. 

Turning from Sylvia, thane looked out over the frozen rock faces in surrounding the walls and the small road leading into the gates.  "Sylvia, do you know why we chose to live in a place as inhospitable as this? Why a fortress such as ours was built here of all places?" 

"No, Thane, no I don't know why this mountain was the chosen spot," Sylvia said questioningly. 

Thane dropped a rock over the side of the wall, watching as it shattered once it met the cold rocky ground.  "Centuries ago, when the races still warred and elves, humans and orcs still killed each other on sight, there was a battle at the bottom of this mountain range in the desert.

"By the end of this battle there were few survivors, and the winner isn't very well remembered, but that's not all too important.  What's important is that one of the wounded soldiers was an elven elementalist.

"This elementalist was mortally wounded, but did not want to die and have his body eaten by scavengers.  So he listened to the elements, and felt that there was a strong presence among the mountain range above him.

"He began the trek up the mountains, and finally arrived at the base of ours.  He knew the strongest elemental pull was at this summit, and so he began the climb. 

"The elf expected to find a frost exarch or some primal more of frost. When he finally reached what he had been sensing, though, he was very surprised.

"What he discovered was the element of death.  An element quite different from the others.  This element was so much more alive.

"Death spoke to him, and told him that, if he would do something for the element, he would live far longer than he should in his current state. 

"He said yes, of course, and he was tasked with building this fortress and populating it with other loyal followers of death.  What surprised him, though, was that there was no shortage of those willing to follow death and help him build the fortress.

"When he had finished, it had been two decades and he had not yet succumbed to his wounds.  But the moment the final stone was set and what you see today was created, he fell dead." 

Sylvia nodded, looking out into the distance down at the desert Thane had referred to earlier. She questioned, "That's a great history lesson, Thane, but why did you just explain our mountain's history to me?"

Thane turned his head to look back at Sylvia while still facing his body to the outer ramparts. He said, "Because the element of death is still on this mountain, and I've been the only one to speak with it and tell the tale in over four thousand years."

Before Sylvia could respond again, Thane looked back out to the desert. He proclaimed, "It told me I was to be it's prophet. When I died death said that a prophet of life would arrive from the same desert the elf did, and this time I will go with them to bring the word of the dead to the world." 

XxxxxxxXxxxxxxX