A Malstrom of Fire

Prolouge

The forest was dark, the cool autumn air rife with the smell of dying leaves. Twilight had just fallen upon the burning foliage that made up the dense, fog-laden forest, streaks of reds and yellows not only adorning the land now, curling and vanishing into purples and finally into the infinite incandescent light of the sun, burning indigo itself as it sat upon the horizon as night slowly took dominance over the darkening sky. A boy, not yet upon his fifteenth year stalked between the gnarled trunks. Clad in leathers, he crept among the bushes, the cruel curve of his bow nearly hidden in the dusk. A shadow trailed upon his heels, curled about the child's wiry form as easily as the boy took breath.

The child's head darted up, a loud crack sounding several meters before him, the looming, forbidding trees encroaching on his path, he paid them no mind, easily kicking off from thier roots' slipping between the trees like the very shadow that haunted him. He soon took cover as a clearing spanned before him, scattered with overgrown stonework and underbrush, several lights orbited a girl of about his age adorned in a fine blue silken dress, and twinkling silver jewellery, lazing and pulsating in the air as she twirled in wonder, she reached out to the multicolored lights as they danced and mingled about her. As the bow crept into the clearing, the lights became frantic, blinking and flashing in hostility, as the girl raised her hands, energy glowing at her fingertips, she glared at him, then relaxed at the sound of his voice, smiling kindly.
The boy grinned, drew back his hood to reveal long Ashen hair, the bangs braided and pulled back in similar fashion to his own lips, as he grinned at the beauty before him, bowing to her slightly in formal respect, he then held out his free hand, having slung his bow before emerging into the clearing.

"Aduial, the village awaits your presence for the autumn harvest, if you would do me the honor?"

Aduial giggled, his formal actions were allways a mirthful show of the commonly rough-tempered hunter, she took his hand, then his arm as the wisps continued to flicker in outrage, keening in thier own dissatisfaction, the shadow rose up, chuckling at them as if they were small children.

"Telken, please, you need not be so formal anymore, it is unnecessary for you to impress me, though to some i would say otherwise"

The shade shrank back as she spoke, hissing curses at her as telken smiles wryly.

"It is not you i seek to impress, but the elder, your father."

Aduial let loose a deep sigh "has he yet again regailed you of his dissaproval?"

He nods once, shifting uncomfortably as she places her arms around his neck, his hands resting gently upon her waist "aye, that he has, decided that he'll not allow us to sully the magic of his family line, he forbids us to be together"

An echoing reverberation of a voice, perhaps human long ago, resounds in the clearing, the sky growing black, the couds, lazing about as they were just moments before rumbling thier fury at the intrusion "and you believe for one moment that we will allow this, Aduial?" She shade's etherial form shifting in the burgeoning twilight, it's hollow iridescent eyes beginning to solidify before them both, telken turns to regard the shade, hostility evident in his voice. "Begone from here, our people grow tired of your game. appearing from whatever corner of hell that birthed you to torment this place!" Telken's hand rests unconsciously upon the hilt of his dagger, as his low growl permeates the air, aduial places a single shaking hand upon his shoulder, her eyes wide, her scream stifled by the sight of the shade's rapidly solidifying form.

A ragged fur cloak and heavy brigantine adorn the din figure, it's gruesome grin only accentuated further by what may have been the remains of an eye, horribly disfigured and scarred shut, spanning his face across his nose and past his temple, terminating at his left chin, he is unarmed, save a belt of daggers across his broad, barrel chest, and a massive spear upon his back, from the waist dowh he wears a heavy kilt over trousers and thick boots. His grizzled black hair is complimented by his single glowing eye, staring the man in the face aduial shudders, unable to move as the color drains from her features. "T-telken"
The boy steps foreward, squaring off with the larger man, being of large stature in his own right, telken steeled himself against the man who had at least three feet on him, staring the grim figure square in the chest he lunged at the shade with his dagger.
The shade laughed, venting his mirth at the ill prepared blow, the boy's steel met only air as he was slammed back against a boulder from the force of the shade's punch, his armor cracked and torn by both impacts, telken struggles to stand, hjs ribs cracking and visibly shifting under his armor back into place, a crimson trail of blood trickling from his mouth as he shambles foreward, forcing his unwilling body to cooperate. The shade turns, eyeing the boy "you are strong... Perhaps this child will be worthy of my time after all" his form materialises directly before telken, crossing his burly arms, his spiked gauntlets glistening with scarlet liquid, telken lunges for his shoulder, the shade simply passing it to the side and swinging his meat hook towards the boy's face, telken ducks deftly, raking the underside of the shade's arm, the razor's edge sinking deep into it's flesh, before being drawn down across the heavy brigantine, and finally into the shades leg, as ichor drips from the creatures wounds it unleashes a horrific roar, it's new wounds straining open as the muscles tear further, spraying telken with it's burning blood, choking on the smell, he falls back as the shade leaps upon him, striking him repeatedly, and opening dozens of ragged bleeding wounds with every bone-crushing punch, before long, the shade takes telken by the throat, hefting his bleeding form as the boy still weakly attempts to fend off his attacker, aduial visible over the beast's shoulder, she stands unmoving, sobbing from the horror of it all, the shade grins cruelly, pulling free the dagger from his leg, and admiring it, before slowly, dragging the edge across telken's abdomen, a long, gruelling scream coming from his broken body, as his entrails slop out upon the floor several feet below him, tbe shade, bemused by this, deigns to pin telken to a nearby ash tree, burying the dagger to the hilt in his breast, before repeating the proscess three more times for good measure, the shade steps away, admiring his work, and chuckles "if your gods are kind, the wolves will take you before the cold does" the shade turns away, stalking towards aduial, and making an attempt to lift her, before she blasts him back with a blinding flash, the dazed shadow-creature growls, but in the short time it took for him to rematerialise after the blinding incandescent light, aduial had vanished into the trees.

Night falls as telken weaves in and out of delirious consciousness, the chilling air causing him to shiver incessantly, his gaping wound, covered now by flies has thankfully been dulled as the loss of blood began to take effect, after prizing one of the daggers from his body, he coughs in what may have been an attempt at laughter, hardly able to breathe, to think, he cast his new blade about to fend off the scavangers. His eyes dart up aa he skewers a vulture upon the dagger, grabbing it's neck with his other arm, he vengefully tears out the little beast's throat with his teeth, spitting out the foul blood and dropoing the bird, he heaves against the tree, freeing his left leg and opposing side from the tree, the last dagger coming free as his weight bears down on it, he falls, still impaled into the writhing, stinking mass of entrails and blood upon the floor, crawling with insects and flies, along with other small animals, he lays there, attempting again to rise, he only serves to pull out one of the blades impaling him, his vision darkening rapidly, as he collapses again.

Clanking and jingling assaults his stiffening form, unaware of the source, and indeed the shocked cries of his saviours, they load the boy into thier wagon, armored heavily in mail, the closed helmets of the men and women gave away nothing, a priestess, clad in black voluminous robes and segmented plate, looks apon the child with sorrow in her eyes, toutching his wound, she recoils violently "ash akun amalu Esskur" she hisses, her fingertips burned as though from a flame, her flesh still sizzling she takes a small pinch of iridescent dust from her belt pouch, sprinkling it over him, it hangs in the air as she chants an incantation, weaving her hands over telken, "volur, menjal balur, Umbal akalur shothal"
The twinkling dust falls upon his ragged, broken body, his dying flesh burning away, Telken awoke, his flesh burning as vigor flowed once more through him, he bolts up, roaring in anguish as his muscles crumble to ash, his bone blistering as the priestess frowns, recoiling as the shock at her mistake dawning only seconds before telken's hand finds her throwt, strangling her scream before it was borne, the disturbing smell of burning flesh and rotting meat fills the small wagon. Telken, gripping the priestess' throat slams her head into the side of the wagon, a concussive ecplosion rippling outwards as his eyes fill black, silver, irises, appearing like an eclipsed star staring back at her, he regards her intently, enraged, as his flesh slowly mends within the darkness "what have you done to me witch?" He growls, the guttural sound echoing through his broadened chest. The priestess croaks response calmly, her eyes covered by a black blindfold "you are Born anew child" his eyes regard her with icy intent, despite himself he drops her roughly to the floor. "That shade gutted me... I was hanging from that tree for at least an hour... How am i alive?" The priestess chuckles to herself "you are strong, child, far stronger than the creature that wounded you" telken scoffs, noting a clean though cruel scar upon his gut "you cannot even see witch, you know not of what you speak" she hisses "krestell sees all, you know nothing of strength! you know nothing of your blood" she hissed, stroking Telken's frowning visage, he unleashed a guttural roar that shook the wagon, sending his fist into Krestell's face, and cracking the hard oak of the wagon's broadside. Krestell was nowhere to be seen, untill telken felt his muscles violently contort and peel apart, shredding his flesh as his shoulders were wrenched from thier sockets, the priestess stoodd behind him, a spell inscribed onto his back she chants, a cruel grin upon her face, as telken falls to the ground, groaning, blood oozing from his wounds as his body regenerates again. She clasps heavy shackles to his wrists and ankles, a muzzle to his mouth, the fury in his eyes unspressed, he growled his hatred at the woman, before she placed a hand upon his left eye, a searing pain emenating from it as her fingers tore at his flesh, scooping the eye from it's socket, Telken howled in pain, misery quickly following as he watched as krestell heated an iron rod, holding his head back with little effort, she pressed the red hot cherry of metal into his eye socket.