This is how the world will end, men and women crawling on their knees whilst the blood of their young awash upon their pale dead faces. His mother has come to me again, calling herself Sofia not Wuitfuake, her appearance much more like an elf than the demon. The same harsh tones she has given me on our past encounters, she foretold of an ancient army blessed by death who will come and destroy us. I awake from nothingness the sun has yet to arise, her fingers rosy red yet to cradle the sky. I cannot move, I do not wish to move the cold will surround me and this is the only place to be warm. Birds tweet around, birdsong imminent.
“To dance with death is to know one’s own hell.” She comes in uninvited once again,
“Do you have anything better to do than annoy me?” The reaper laughs,
“It’s fun to wind you up, mage.” I stare at the fold of the tent and do not stare at her,
“How about I let the legion defile you?”
“I don’t think you’d do that… would you?”
“Well if you do not leave I shall destroy your pretty little face.” She bows to me and leaves. I stand with the blanket around me, going to collect my glasses from the table to place them upon my face. A glass of water left out from last night stands still upon the round table, a diary found from the corpse of a young hunter girl rests there as well. I sit on the hard wooden chair and peer into the gentle-written book; her words are those of a scholar, philosophises from days long gone but yet ended in this girl of fourteen’s diary. Who or what had told her of these,
“The world was created in six days; the seventh is that of heresy, it is a lie, told to keep us in line. Human’s ruled the lands before any other being, the ones who came before, the ones who spoke of a utopia crafted at the hands of elves, with the technology of the dwarves and the unspeakable knowledge of the Kalhin tribes. The lizard-men helped make this city, they wanted it to hold all of their knowledge and the ones who came before wished to destroy their works, so no one would know of the heresy that lay inside of the tomes.” I spoke to this girl once, her mind was addled her voice polite and gentle, her hair fair and her eyes two separate colours, one brown… the other a dark drake scaled green. No one knows of this, no one shall know of this. I take a deep drink of the water, tepid but nevermind.
“The city of Dis is that of great power. To hold the means to finding this great city is the same power as a god, hubris? Yes, but even the gods couldn’t see this place, the demons of Hades blessed the utopia with their immortal flames and only the wicked stay, only the demons of old, demons of new and the devil reside their, where the snow always falls, always lies upon blood-stained soil. The cold breeze lingers around where the flames have died and steal thyself into the caverns underground, thou shalt know what lies beneath, where the dead souls of the wicked are tormented.” She talks of the Underworld; there are maps in the book. Helixian apparently is the ancient Madermic name for it but nonetheless I have no time to read this, I must gather clothes and prepare for a meeting with the king. I stand and find fresh underwear, then place my robes over the top. Athene at my hip and today I shall bring the staff of the slain Proditor. I walk from the tent and into the freezing cold, it seems like it could snow which would cost us the lives of many, having little warmth and food to preserve over winter. I continue to walk through, the people here are scared, they fear that the legion will attack us, they fear what happened to the elves will come hammering down upon us, with more power and more death. I step into the king’s tent, his daughter and her attendants stand with him: him with his walking stick and her with nothing but her servants.
