Bloodline

Mages - part 28

He looks down at the ground and starts thinking again, facing away from Tesath. "You know, I think I really needed to talk to someone, I just havent seen it up until now." "I'm glad I could help, and I'll continue helping you, especially with how nice this walk was, I love this forest now." He smiles, and turns to her, it's this moment when the mysterious figures reveal themselves, surrounding them. Zircon gets into a defensive stance as Tesath turns and sees the figures. They all wear hoods as they approach, similar to the ones the mages wore before Zircon killed them. "Would you look at that, our job just turned two times easier than we thought it would". One figure says, brandishing a dagger. Zircon looks at them in surprise as he holds his daggers close.

"No, I killed you guys! You were the mages I killed in the battlefield just then!" Tesath looks at him when he says this, and the one with the knife laughs. "It makes it all the better to cast a spell to make you think you were fighting us, and now that you killed those soldiers the way you did, most of your friends probably are having second thoughts about you, huh?" Zircon continues to look at them, the leader pointing their dagger at Tesath. "And you just so happened to bring the last Valkyrie with you in the middle of a forest where nobody would know where you went...Things couldn't have gone better if we tried!" The mages start to surround them, Zircon beginning to look angered like before. "This plan of yours, what's it for? What was the reason for trying to build mistrust in the king's army against me?" Another mage steps towards them, Zircon instantly snapping towards them. "Isnt it obvious? We knew you got your hands on one of our enhancers, and now that you used it, it revealed who you really are on the inside, which means that your military would question what you'll do with your power now that you have it." "And you hoped it would lead to me being dragged out of the fight one way or another so more mages like you could come in and destroy us in the last seige towards your kingdom..." Zircon says, the leader shaking their head. "You have it half right, we were going to destroy your army anyway, but since you're still here, we'll have to kill you."

Zircon stares at their leader, having his full attention and anger towards him. Smoke starts to build up in his hands as his form starts to change, but stops when he feels Tesath's hand on his shoulder. "We'll get through this Zircon, and we'll tell Damian and everyone else what really happened during that battle so they'll believe you." She says as he looks at her, him nodding just as his form completely changes, and he rushes to the leader, clouding the area in smoke. The mages begin to use their magic against them, trying to get to Tesath. The stone mage tries to capture her in a stone cage, but she breaks through just as Zircon breaks away from the leader and begins to fight the fire mage. The wind mage tries to blow Zircon away, but he stands his ground against the wind, getting closer to them. Tesath begins to fight against the stone mage, them blocking her spear with rocks that fly out of nowhere.

Zircon throws clouds of smoke at the two mages, them blocking or sending them in another direction with their magic. Suddenly, in the midst of blocking his smoke, the wind mage redirects a cloud, but one of Zircon's daggers flies through it, stabbing them in their hand. The mage cries in pain, the other looking to see the dagger just when Zircon rushes them, stabbing the fire mage with a dagger near their eyes, cutting one and leaving a large cut bleeding into the other. "I can't fucking see!! What's with this guy!?" The mage cries as they try to wipe the blood away from their other eye, just as Zircon amputates the other hand of the wind mage. Tesath manages to get through the stone mages defense and begins to attack them, them throwing blind attacks towards her as she gets closer with each attack. The leader stands there, watching them both with a grin on their face, holding the dagger and waiting for Zircon and Tesath to finish with the other mages.

Just as the last of the three mages fall, the leader finally steps in, holding their dagger towards Zircon. "Finally, that took longer than in the battlefield, so tell me how long you expect to last against me?" Zircon stares into them, almost staring into their soul, just as Tesath starts shining her light on him, the leader watching her. "Its amazing what kind of powers the Valkyries had, its said they were the ones who were able to control the power within them from the blood of the goddess when she gave birth to her first few children. Any who were from their bloodline had a small trace of her power before she left the king when he died, letting the kingdom prosper without them. The next king was a descendant, and was one of the few Valkyries at the time, he had a control over all things liquid based, and summoned a wall of water around the castle when it was attacked one day." Zircon begins to walk towards them, his glowing eyes empty as smoke begins to drag behind him. "With every new descendant, the less Valkyries there were due to not being able to harness the mysterious powers within them, and with the hundreds of years that passed, there have been almost no more since the last few descendants, and this girl you keep with you is one of the last few that have escaped the castle before the harvesting." Tesath looks at the mage when they say this, and stops Zircon. "What do you mean the harvesting?"

The mage looks at Tesath with a devilish grin, "The king of Fire and Storms took the castle by force as you know, but he did it because he is a Valkyrie himself, and he decided that in order to prevent any more from appearing and taking his rightful place, he scoured for any other Valkyries, and began to harvest their blood and take their powers with them, how else do you think we were able to produce those enhancers!?" They laugh, just as Zircons rage starts to build again. Tesath steps back in disgust, holding her spear to his chin. "So then what power do you have stolen from someone? You must've had some kind of ability if you know all this." They look at her, and pull out a vial. "These vials react with anything around them, and randomly react with it in a way that the user gains a random power based off that thing. So your friend here has the ability to become one with smoke, and even control it, but someone else could've had some other ability." The color-changing liquid shines in the vial, with the mage looking at Zircon and the environment around them. "Let me show you exactly-" Its at this moment Zircon throws a dagger, it hitting the mages arm as they drop the vial, the smoke left behind by him begins to cover it, it disappearing as it fades away. They look at Zircon as he changes back into his human form.

"Big mistake thinking I'll let you gain an ability during that explanation, but thank you for explaining the kings plan, now go to hell." Before they could blink, Zircon stabs them in their throat, and pushes them down onto the floor. "Well that was quite informative, I guess we should head back to the fort?" Tesath nods, but grabs the hoods of the mages. They begin to make their way back, some soldiers coming into view in the forest just before they entered the destroyed fort.