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For a moment the armoured giant looked down at his hands, clenching and unclenching them and smiling as the gauntlets began to shimmer with faint energies. I had no doubt that the ritual had indeed worked exactly as Lariel had intended it but not how Eregor had wanted. His flesh and possibly soul had been consumed ent... |
"This has just become significantly more difficult." Malulain said simply, watching the way the pair of Xivilai bowed slightly to the reincarnated Graithlan and how the expression of triumph was obvious on Lariel’s face. |
Watching their every move I stayed by Malulain’s side as he and his Rangers gravitated together. "I’m guessing that the "kill them all’ plan is still our best option?" |
He nodded. "Separating the armour now won’t do anything except maybe annoy him." All our eyes were focused on the dread figure as he stepped down from the altar. The crunch of broken marble under his boots was one of the loudest sounds in the ruins. "We can’t let him leave here." |
"I’ll take care of Lariel." My gaze was firmly fixed on the Bosmer Sorceress as she began chanting again, the sickly corrupted verse of the spell plucking at my senses as I twirled Sunchild in my hand and held it hilt first to Malulain. |
With a glance between me and the offered weapon he hesitatingly gripped it tight in a determined but somewhat inexperienced grip. "Are you going to be able to handle her on your own?" |
I shrugged and clenched my teeth at the sight of the towering figure reaching into the sky and appearing to wrench an enormous mace from the air itself. Obviously daedric in nature the Mace was sickly green and black, weeping greenish light and carved into the snarling features of a daedra and spiked. "I’ve faced wors... |
"Apparently only stabbing him in the heart will defeat him..." The handful of Rangers gripped with weapons tightly, some drawing back hard on their retrieved bows in the hope that their arrows would fly true. With Sunchild gifted to Malulain I reached up and drew the gleaming Light of Dawn, feeling its unique weight t... |
With the building laughter from the resurrected Ayleid in our ears we broke into runs at them. Arrows snapped from bowstrings, flitting through the air and slamming hard into the metal-bone armour that he wore. Each arrow staggered the towering figure but none seemed to do any lasting damage other than scour the horri... |
Dark bolts of magicka rippled through the air from the mind burning gestures of the sorceress, bursting bodies like rotten tomatoes, boiling blood in veins until it wept from pores and peeling skin from bones. Several of the Rangers died such excruciating deaths from the Mage’s foul sorcery. I saw how her eyes were bu... |
I had barely taken half a dozen steps towards Lariel and the pair of Xivilai when the armoured figure of Graithlan began casting his own spells. Blood suddenly seemed to start pounding in my veins, drowning out all the sounds of the struggle around me and rendering me deaf to all but the roaring of my body’s life-forc... |
Lariel’s expression, a haughty sneer of superiority was clearly visible through the fog and I found myself snarling under my mask. Both fangs were pushing out of my gums, the skin of my face pulling taut and the bones straining forward as the vampire made its presence felt. Her magicka was reminiscent of the Vampire M... |
The glowing blade of the Light of Dawn cut through the treacle-like darkness wafting from the gesturing sorceress and I roared on the top of my lungs. Her eyes were devoid of colour or whites, instead being consumed with blackness and corruption. At my battle cry she turned and locked onto me with her gaze almost like... |
My roar of anger announced the renewed battle as the handle of Rangers came within reach of the enormous warrior. Crunches of bone, meat and blades ripped through the air that was suddenly filled with the sounds of screams and roars of anger and pain and within the first second of the fight more than one of the Ranger... |
The Light of Dawn was grasped firmly in my hands, glowing faintly and although its radiance would not be unlocked by anything other than the blood of Vampires, its beautiful glow was more than enough to cut through the obscure corruption that floated sickly in the air. I held it rightly in both hands, blade resonating... |
With every pounding step I took, the Xivilai seemed to grow taller, their unnatural bulks radiating a pure level of power that was unmatched by any creature within Tamriel. They were unlike the Dremora that I had faced over the previous months and other than the Marknayz that I had originally fed on there would be few... |
Both of them surged towards me as I charged towards their mistress, a banshee cry of laughter rolling from my throat. In the back of my mind I was somehow trying to understand how I had been finding myself facing off against every massive creature within Nirn and Oblivion since deserting the Legion. Between the Dremor... |
Unlike the daggers, swords and maces that the followers of Dagon conjured, these pair of hulking monstosties called upon a gigantic two handed sword and a double headed battleaxe that most mortals would have been unable to lift. To these two daedra the weapons looked little more than toys in their oversized fists and ... |
I narrowly dodged the downwards cut from the first, rolling out of the way as the blade buried itself into the marble underfoot. The overwhelming hunger from the trapped demon within the blade was sickeningly strong, and I could almost feel its presence trying to press itself into my mind. The mere thought that I had ... |
The sheer size of the Xivilai meant that I could easily outmanoeuvre them and ensure that they both were getting in each other’s way. I danced around them, cutting and slicing at them with the resonating edge of the Light of Dawn, forcing them to step back out of the way of the humming blade as it cut through the air ... |
I swung the Light of Dawn in vicious arcs, cutting through the air and each time only narrowly missing the gleaming flesh of the Xivilai. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought that they had been thoroughly rubbed down with oils or sweating profusely. Both of the creatures were overwhelmingly powerful, matching... |
The battleaxe wielding Xivilai stepped backwards, wrenching the massive head of the axe from the floor with a crunch of shattering marble and allowed the other to step in towards me. There was no time for me to move to dodge the next attack, and as the massive blade of the claymore cut through the air with a keening w... |
The Light of Dawn had seemed to be capable of cutting through everything, no matter the material or the thickness. During my fight against Lord Volmyr and even while the blade was still corrupted it cut marble statues and pillars in half without the slightest hindrance. Against the Vampires of Castle Glenvar it had ma... |
With a sickening crack both my arms felt as though they were wrenched out of their sockets. Pain flared from every muscle, and an involuntary whimper escaped my lips as the Light of Dawn was left buried in the unnatural substance of the Daedric Blade. |
For a heartbeat I felt the Daedric blade gripping the faintly glowing Light of Dawn even as we both continued our attacks. The Light of Dawn had sunk its entire width into the unnatural substance of the Xivilai’s greatsword, and if it had been made of a natural material the daedric blade would’ve been shattered into p... |
It was impossible to determine who was more surprised, myself or the daedra. In the space of a second the fight had changed completely, and while the attack had left me wide open the way our blades had locked together somehow wrenched the daedric weapon from its owner’s massive blue paws. The strange, inhuman look of ... |
I was in trouble and I knew it just as well as what the Daedra did. It had me by my sword hand, engulfing most of my forearm and my entire hand it its massive digits in a grip so tight that my vambrace began to buckle in the vicing pressure. Pain lanced through my entire arm lifted me up into the air as its other arm ... |
Darkness began to creep into my vision, and I found myself gasping and kicking futilely against the enormous strength of the Xivilai that held me out at arms distance. I couldn’t breathe; my throat was being slowly constricted and the hideous blue-red demon seemed to be delighting in the pain it was putting me in. Wit... |
Even other the pounding of blood in my veins I could hear Lariel’s cackle as she urged the demon to crush my throat, and time seemed to slow down once more as my body was filled with adrenaline. As it had on other occasions, when my mortal, conscious self was no longer capable the vampire took over. The depths of Glen... |
The daedra suddenly had a look of almost childlike confusion as it felt and saw the changes that suddenly filled my being. Mostly hidden behind my mask, hood and armour there was no visible signs of the raw power that surged through me and twisted my body. The Xivilai was suddenly filled with confusion, the grip aroun... |
With my right hand still trapped, I dropped my left from where it had been clawing at the Xivilai’s hand around my throat, and instead felt the leather and metal covering my chest. All fear, pain and every scrap of emotion had been lost from the Vampire taking over and instead it had been replaced by a cold, unthinkin... |
Instantly the grip around my throat and arm was gone, and the sights and sounds of the ruin rushed into my skull with a thunderclap of noise and sensation. The marble steps rushed up to meet me with an explosion of pain, but this was welcomed as I sucked in a deep lungful of air and felt the darkness slide away from m... |
Bellowing, the Xivilai scrabbled at its wounded right arm and I landed on my back right at its clawed feet. Through little more than instinct I had drawn my skinning dagger from its sheath and buried it to the hilt in the creature’s bicep, leaving its entire right arm almost entirely nerveless and hanging limply. It w... |
Like a mountain of muscle and daedric flesh, the towering brute suddenly fell sideways as its leg dropped out from under it. The cut had been sloppy but the sheer cutting edge of the Light of Dawn had meant that the Xivilai was now suddenly missing its leg from halfway down its shin. |
The daedra slammed into the ground like an anvil falling from the sky, only narrowly missing me as I lay drunkenly on the moss covered marble. Its bellows were now pained and terrible, ripping through my ears into my brain as it kicked its spurting stump in the air in agony. After my experiences with Dremora I didn’t ... |
Leaving the wounded Daedra where it had fallen I rolled groggily to my feet. I was still struggling to breathe from being winded on the floor, and my vision was still filled with floating black spots that seemed to taunt my eyesight with every movement. The second Xivilai was pressing home in its attack, tearing its a... |
I felt every impact of the creature’s feet as it ran towards me, and I merely stood my ground, judging my next attack and preparing myself for it. There was no fighting its immense strength and power behind its muscles, and to try to block the axe would be nothing more than folly. Instead I waited, standing fast until... |
Before it could react I had stepped lightly on the balls of my feet well within reach of the Xivilai and inside its guard. The screaming axe was lightly deflected out of the way as I had ensured that instead of trying to block it I had used the entire Light of Dawn to guide the axe away and to my right. This threw the... |
In an arc of gleaming silver, the Light of Dawn cut downwards in a strike that had once left an Orc moneylender in separate pieces from forehead to groin. The Xivilai, half the size again of a grown man grunted as the Light of Dawn cut deep into the centre of its chest. Its sternum was sliced in half, the blade contin... |
There was no cry of pain, roar of anger or snarl of hatred from the Xivilai as it felt the blade slice through bone, skin and meat. For several seconds that seemed to stretch on for hours we stood there, nose to nose as it doubled over in pain, releasing its grip on the axe where it had imbedded itself into the marble... |
I stepped back carefully, flicking the black bile-like blood from the glowing Light of Dawn as the Xivilai suddenly coughed up a wad of bubbling gore. Whether it truly realised it or not it was already dead. One of its legs buckled under it as I kicked at a bare ankle, forcing its leg to slide on marble made slippery ... |
The first had regained most of its composure and was raising itself up despite its wounded arm to try to claw its way towards me. Badly wounded and bleeding out from the severed stump of a leg, there was nothing it could do to stop me from taking a few short paces, cutting its good hand off at the wrist before spearin... |
Lariel had seen me dispatch her daedric bodyguards and was whispering dark words of power into the air, boiling and rippling it around herself with the sheer force of her mind. I could feel scratching and chittering things from the very depths of Oblivion gnawing on the edge of my senses as she drew more and more powe... |
Plucking my skinning dagger from the ground as I moved towards her, I twirled it between my fingers and grasped it by the blade that was still dripping with blue-black gore. With a snarl of rage and a flick of the wrist I hurled it between us, moving with such speed that she didn’t have time to register my actions bef... |
In a half dozen strides I leapt towards her, covering the metres between us in the space of a few seconds. The beast was lending me its strength now and the skin of my face had been pulled taut over my elongating jaw line as my fangs pushed my lips apart. The reek of corruption was a noxious aura around her being and ... |
A satisfying crunch of bone was audible as my boot lifted her from the ground, causing the fireball spell she was forming to flutter and die with an inarticulate scream wrenched from her throat. My own pain was slowly making itself felt over the adrenaline and the bloodthirst of the vampire. The flesh of my right wris... |
She screamed, her breath ragged and wheezing as I dragged her into a kneeling position with a fistful of greasy, braided hair. Bone shards had punched deep into a lung when I kicked her but there was still considerable fight in the Bosmer Sorceress. Hissing and spitting curses through a clenched jaw she dug her finger... |
Hanging slackly by her side from the dagger in her shoulder, I didn’t see the glowing magicka in her hand until she slapped it against my armoured stomach. The tingling energies coursed through my veins and I felt myself go stiff as though an electric current was being run through my spine. For a moment I lost all con... |
"The Schemer Prince desires your soul." She rasped, her mouth frothy and pink as the arterial bubbles framed her sharpened teeth. "Give yourself to him..." |
The magicka continued to surge through me and I felt a deep, overwhelming presence hovering over me as she poured every last scrap of her magicka into calling upon her patron lord. In the darkness of the ruins I saw a mirage like entity forming from the flickering shadows, condensing into a form that existed only in t... |
Part of my soul opened itself up to the ethereal visage pressing through the barriers between Nirn and Oblivion, but another part rebelled. A soul portion of iron and fire, hatred and determination shook itself free of the lingering taint and threaded my muscles with surging strength. |
The growl that ripped its way from my throat left Lariel’s eyes widening in surprise as she felt me resist both her magicka and her master. Judging by the expression on her face, she could see how my face had pushed forward in the mask and my eyes had turned into blackened pools of darkness and horror. The presence ro... |
Headless from a blade of extreme sharpness, her torso spurted hot corrupted blood all over my boots as it smacked wetly to the ground. The look of surprise was frozen on her face as I held her head with a grip full of greasy dreadlocks and braids, watching as the light in her eyes died before dropping the grisly troph... |
The battle was not going overly well. My own injuries were slowing me down despite my vampiric nature and I could feel the level of exhaustion creeping up on me. While not as intense as what had occurred in Glenvar Castle I was tired from a fortnight of hunting and if was going to be honest with myself; several months... |
Ancient, and monstrously powerful, Graithlan was slaughtering the Rangers facing him with an almost contemptuous ease. Several had already fallen to the weapon, their bodies pulped beyond all recognition as the enormous weapon howled with every swing. More than one of the Rangers had been hurled through the air as bro... |
A dozen still fought on regardless, stabbing into chinks of the dread armour and managing to draw the ancient being’s blood. Malulain or one of the others had managed to scour a deep cut down the angular, bird like face, and a leg was streaked with gore bubbling from a rent in an armoured knee. Their attempts to stop ... |
Before I had managed to get more than a single step from the headless corpse, another pair of rangers had died horribly. Malulain’s casual mention of Graithlan’s powers at the campsite were proven horribly inaccurate as he wreathed a fist in glowing energies, reaching out in the direction of one of the rangers before ... |
Swirling around him, more and more wraiths were plucked from the depths of oblivion and with so much death around us there was no shortage of fallen souls for him to call upon. They rose from the ground, shrieking with unending torment as they were forced to obey his summons. Fallen bosmer and Rangers alike were rippe... |
Some of the surviving Rangers staggered away from the sight, the cries of the damned forcing them back as effectively as a pike phalanx. Others tried to continue their attacks, forcing their way through the swirling wraiths and energies as they swarmed the armoured figure. I saw with my own building horror as one of t... |
A second died just as painfully as an armoured fist grasped him by the skull. Slowed from blood loss and his accumulated injuries, the second Ranger’s head burst like a ripe melon as the skull engraved digits closed like a vice. The strangulated scream was cut off in less than a second as gore sprayed everyone in a tw... |
Cackling with a laughter as deep as a grave, Graithlan swung the limp corpse like a bludgeon, knocking some of his opponents down and forcing the others to move away. Blood was spraying through the air, streaming from between his armoured digits, dribbling down over his armour and exploding into the air like a geyser ... |
Stopping in place, the armoured wight blinked, scrunching its face tightly in sudden confusion and dropping the corpse with a wet smack. Even the restless spirits had ceased their cavorting and banshee wails and instead hovered near their master, waiting upon him like faithful hounds. For a moment, no one moved as Gra... |
For the first time in my life I felt regret at being a forester rather than a Legionary. While during my first year’s service I had been taught the rudimentary basics as a Hastatii I had gone on to more specialised training. I had thrown pilum on the odd occasions in the years since but it was a skill that I had let g... |
Out of all of us within that ancient, moss covered ruin I was by far the most surprised at the effectiveness of the throw. Malulain and his Rangers were surprised at the sudden appearance of the Light of Dawn spearing the resurrected horror in the torso, Graithlan was surprised at finding himself impaled on the weapon... |
The peerless edge had punched through the archaic plate with as much ease as it did most things forged in the physical world, but it was far from a killing blow. Blood slowly pulsed from around the hilt, dripping down the lower portion of his breastplate and turning into a flood as he reached up with a brain speckled ... |
"Tami Alata?" The ancient being muttered as he gazed upon the gleaming edge of the unique weapon. Lights danced and twinkled in the deep blue edge like the stars in the night sky, matching the cold gaze of the Ayleid wielding it as he directed the force of his hatred upon me. |
I was completely unarmed and now the centre of attention of the towering figure as he began to move towards me, ignoring the dozen felled rangers scattered about. The gesture he made was obvious in its intent and the horde of spirits twitched and rolled like a tsunami as he directed them at me with a roar. |
The clank of metal and the choking exclamation of pain stopped him in mid breath and I couldn’t keep the smile off my face as several centimetres of metal erupted from his mouth. Teeth shattered outwards, a flood of gore rushing out from between his lips as the blood coated length of Sunchild punched through from the ... |
Both the Light of Dawn and the corrupted mace clattered to the ground as the bone encrusted figure reached up with a trembling hand, feeling the metallic blade jutting from his face like a tongue. He was twitching and coughing blood, the terrible wound shredding the back of his throat and drowning him even as his body... |
With the second death of their master, the tortured souls of the deceased vanished like smoke in the wind, faded into the darkness without a trace of their existence. In a handful of moments their unnatural aura, baleful glows and shrieks had vanished, dissipating into nothingness as they returned to Oblivion and Aeth... |
"May your souls find peace." Malulain muttered, falling onto one knee as he finally let himself feel the pain and exhaustion from the fight. Being knocked down by the corpse of one of his Rangers had left him with a shattered wrist, and he was holding it tenderly as limped over to him and the other survivors. |
"I thought you said that only stabbing him in the heart would kill him?" |
He looked up at me and grimly smiled through the pain at my sarcasm. At some point during the fight his hood had been wrenched from his head and a jagged cut ran through his scalp that came close to slicing his ear off. "Have you ever met someone that walked off a knife to the skull?" |
The collection of grim laughs echoed from the handful of survivors as they picked themselves up and began moving about to tend to the wounded. Those few of Eregor’s clan that had managed to survive their injuries were quickly finished off with economincal stabs to the throat or heart, and the wounded rangers were bein... |
"It’s over." I said simply, watching with some distaste as the body within the armour was already withering, decaying and turning to a slimy dust that poured from the gaps in the armour. Soon the dread armour would return to their original state as ancient relics containing nothing more than a baleful influence. |
"It is." Malulain walked over to me, shrugging off the attentions of one of his Rangers trying to bind his arm with a shortsword and a torn strip of a cloak. He watched me carefully as I retrieved Sunchild from the ashen remains of the skulled helm, wiping it clean on the clothes of a nearby corpse before sheathing it... |
"They are fine swords." He said simply, gesturing with his good hand at Sunchild specifically. "You have my thanks for its use." |
"What do we do now?" I asked softly, motioning towards the bodies strewn around us and the ugly collection of armour at our feet. |
The look of pain that filled Malulain’s face was powerful and unable to be hidden to anyone. "We must leave the bodies where they fall." He said simply, looking at the remaining Rangers who shared his look of anguish. "There will be no feasting on the dead, nor can provide the funeral rights that they so deserve with ... |
"What about the armour? We can’t just leave it here." |
There was a nod from the leader of the Rangers. "Just as the Green will claim the fallen, we will call upon it to guard the artefacts. Perhaps it shall do a better job than what we have." |
My look of confusion was either ignored or unnoticed as he turned around to the few that still survived. Two thirds of the Rangers that had followed Eregor’s clan were growing cold in the ruins, and none who were left were unscathed. Most had minor or superficial wounds, but there were some who would not live to see t... |
"Meneleb, Dirnil. Collect the pieces and take them to Wylweneth." |
The tattooed features of Malulain gave me a weary smile as the two Rangers he had chosen came over and bundled the pieces of the armour into their arms. Carefully, and with an obvious distaste for being so close, let alone touching such foul artefacts they turned and began carrying them towards the forest where we cam... |
"Come Kaius. You have seen much tonight and are one of the few to have seen our secrets." Gesturing with his good hand, he bid me to follow as the rest collected their wounded and began leaving the ruins. "You have earned the right to see one more." |
Feeling the stabbing pain in my knee, and the increasing pressure from the swelling on several spots on my body I carefully made my way through the death filled ruins to where the forest thickened. The surviving Rangers stood in a rough semicircle, carrying their comrades and assisting those whose injuries were more s... |
"We are one with the Green." Malulain said softly by my side as I stood behind the group. The two carrying the pieces of armour had approached the last surviving member of Malulain’s inner circle; the unarmed Ranger clad in Vines. "And as we strive to follow Y’ffre’s teachings and protect the Green, the Green also pro... |
With the Ranger carrying the armour by her sides, the unarmed ranger began chanting, swaying in time with the wordless notes that rolled forth from her tongue. |
"Wylweneth is a Ranger Druid." He offered as an explanation as the others slowly joined in. Even those suffering injuries added their voices despite the pain. It rolled up and into the night, filtering through the trees and I found myself struck dumb at the sound. It was unlike anything I had heard before, somehow con... |
It tightened my chest and pricked at my eyes with emotion as Malulain joined in. It was a song of the Bosmer, a song for their families, for their comrades and for their countrymen long fallen to darkness. In wordless chords they sung the funeral lament of those who had died but I was shocked when I heard something jo... |
Striding with a sinewy grace, creaking and groaning the spindly figures separated themselves from the forest’s edge and moved towards the Ranger Druid with her outstretched arms. There were five of them, each similar in height to the collection of Bosmer surrounding me but one of their number towered over the rest. Ev... |
The branchwraiths moved with all the grace of leaves shifting in the morning breeze, following their towering matron as they moved in perfect harmony. Muscles of rolling creepers twisted and swayed under a skin of leathery bark, and eyes made of flawless amber gazed unblinkingly upon the collection of mer standing bef... |
"The forests will safeguard the armour." Malulain said, breaking the spell the song and the sight of the Spriggans had over me. With a briefest of nods from the oak-like matron, the smaller spriggans stepped forward and wrapped the pieces of armour up in their root-like hands, the finger-vines slithering over them and... |
Staring at the towering matron as her smaller kin turned with their unholy items I couldn’t help but agree. The song continued, the Rangers raising their voices in time with the rolling breeze and I could only watch, fascinated as the spriggans sung as well, their wooden calls haunting as they returned to the forests ... |
Silence returned to the land but I found myself wondering whether the song had truly ceased or whether it merely continued on regardless whether I heard it or not. The Rangers with their duty fulfilled and their dead mourned as best as they could, began to move silently away. Most of their number glanced in my directi... |
Standing by my side, I could feel Malulain’s anguish at the death and long journey back to Valenwood that awaited him and his brethren. But there was a strength within him, a pride of completing such a task and succeeding despite the odds that had been arrayed against them. |
"We now return to Valenwood," there was a distinct twinge of happiness in his voice at the prospect of returning home after so long. "You too will return as we walk separate paths from here. Know that you have won my respect, and the respect of brothers and sisters." |
Fumbling with some difficulty with his good hand, he managed to unbuckle a small sheath from his side and held it out to me. "The use of a sword calls for the payment in kind. You fought by our sides tonight without thought of reward or thanks. For that, you can count me and my clan as friends and allies." |
Carefully, I took the dagger and the sheath from his hand and saw how the dagger was beautifully fashioned the same as the other Rangers from a single length of bone. What I also noticed was this was far more heavily detailed than the others I had seen that night. |
"If the time comes that you need to call upon myself or the Circles, take that dagger to Falinesti and show it to the druid circle. No matter where you are in Tamriel we will come to you aid." With a brief glance back at the death filled ruins his gaze hardened into a mask of determination. "In these dark days we all ... |
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