Author's Notes: This is a co-operative story from me and my boyfriend, Dave. This, the first chapter, is from his hand. Please review, if you feel kind. The next story will be from me again, and should be up soon.
THE FALL OF DUMAH
How times had changed this place. The Sanctuary of the Clans, once and always the symbol of The Empire, spoke volumes about its state; a rotting corpse that bore just enough vestiges of former glory to offer painful mockery to those who remembered its greater days.
The gatehouse, once a portal in and out of the 'Sanctuary' was now a silent lock, a stoic portcullis that denied all from the tattered remains held within; the mechanism which opened the portcullis had long since been destroyed by Kain's own claws. If one were to somehow pass the gatehouse's dilapidated, sunken shape, stepping around and over the fallen blocks of masonry that had been forced out of the structure by growing mold, and then contravened the heavy, rust-pitted darkness of the iron portcullis, then one would step out into the smaller courtyard within. One could walk with unsure feet across the moss-infected, arching walkway that dissected the shallow pools of stagnant, lifeless water, which now played host to the tarnished silver fencing that had once protected the vampires who walked this path. And finally, one might come to the still-standing, gilded double doors which led to the once-proud throneroom of the Lord of Nosgoth.
Here the rain fell, unchecked by the cracked and broken dome, and ran in rivulets through the inch-deep crannies which pitted the stone tiles surrounding the central dais. Its yellowed marble bore a mass of dust and dirt that the naked skies had angrily spat upon it, as if in defiance of the one who had ruined them so long ago. The deep, runic engravings upon the marble were now muddied and indistinct, the places once occupied by the six lieutenants of the empire marked only by twelve large rocks, placed there in deliberate mockery. Beyond the dais, the circle of surrounding pillars meekly hid six faded flags which bore turgid mockeries of the symbols of the once-proud vampire clans of the empire, while the engravings on the wall saw their bold lines and clefts rendered thick with dirt and spider webs. The pillars, once able to inspire awe in even the coldest heart, now seemed tired and defeated, no longer glad to serve in some small way a master, but weeping and fading into dust; sinking into the muck and mire which surrounded them.
And yet, there was one part of the room which seemed untouched by age and the tear of the elements. One segment of the whole which remained a proud memory of the magnificence of the passing age. The throne of the empire. Kain's throne. It stood still in its granite enormity, awaiting stoically for its lord and master to sit in straight-backed magnificence upon it. The resin, now exposed to the threatening darkness of the sky above, seemed to take on a honeyed glaze. It was as if the throne gazed smugly upon the sky, one of the first and lesser works of its maker, and was proud to look up at it, and would not deign to be diminished by its insignificant wrath. The rain which poured down ran harmlessly through the patterns and symbols which had been painstakingly etched into the surface, the grit which the droplets bore carried with them, as the throne refused to offer it sanctuary. Around it, the four claw-like appendages were tightened still as if about to grasp and crush whomever sat upon the stone seat, for the one who had seen it carved would see no peace even in his seat of power.
He passed the gatehouse with ease. He slipped in mist through the somber portcullis, and walked with firm strides across the arched walkway. He opened the double doors of his throneroom with a single, firm thrust of his clawed foot.
Kain was the only one who came here, now, the only one who could come here now. Had his eyes not been so rudely opened within the last centuries, then perhaps he would have been grieved to harbour that knowledge. But now, as then, there were larger issues prominent in the thoughts of the Lord of Nosgoth than the state of his empire.
Kain settled into his throne, resting the point of the Soul Reaver beside his foot and clasping the hilt by the tip, as if it were a walking cane, perhaps. For a time he sat, silent and motionless, staring off into the distance, his thoughts moving slowly through intricate revolutions, until a slight frown creased his regal brow. His neck arched, and turned his gaze down to his left hand, which lay across the arm of his throne. He slowly turned his hand over, petalling back his three fingers one at a time, to reveal one of the last articles of a distant and all-but forgotten age.
In his palm was a coin, dustless yet worn almost clean of detail through the passing of time and the scrape of claw on metal. It was a bronze piece, defunct even in the time in which he had found it, in his eyes a perfect symbol of the pathetic kingdom of Willendorf with its sycophantic court and weak-kneed King, the man Kain himself had witnessed brought to weeping ruin by the plight of a single human female.
He had kept this coin as a reminder, through all these ages. As a man of the house of Coorhagen, he had given his loyalty to the throne of Willendorf. As a vampire he had saved it and destroyed it, and both with ease. The coin had been an example to him, an example of everything his Kingdom, his Empire, would not be. But now his face crinkled into an ironic smile as history twisted beneath him to give another edge to his thoughts, for now this coin had found a meaning for both its sides. On the one side there lay his past, a litany of things he would not be and things he had no choice but to become. On the other there was his future, a snarl-inducing, melodramatic tragedy played out in the theatre of history by the arrogant puppetmasters that had made his life and destiny into their plaything.
And now, the latest scene was to be played out in this, the penultimate act of their play. The fall of Dumah.
The past centuries had been an unending string of humiliations and meek capitulations for him, as he was forced consistently into playing roles he found distasteful, all of which were a prelude to a greater plan, a slim possibility born from a moment of the purest madness. A plan to change his destiny once more, as it had been changed by another so many years ago.
It had all begun with his discovery of Moebius' chronoplast chamber, with his years of patient study of the secrets therein, with the unending thought he had put into the implications that only a fool would have missed. All of that study had dragged him irrevocably to that one, fateful day, to the beginning of this act of the play. To the destruction of his greatest lieutenant, his right hand. To the destruction of Raziel. His gaze shifted from the coin to the Soul Reaver, and he let out a cynical laugh which echoed into the night, before he leant back in his throne, pressing his back against the wet stone. So far, he had played his role to their satisfaction; about that he held no illusions.
But now, knowing that the true dawn of his plan was coming to be, that the coming scene was the last which would usher in his chance, his slim opportunity for true destiny; he faltered. It was not in his nature to do so, and he found the thoughts which caused him to pause to be distasteful in the extreme. And yet, they were undeniable in their intensity, and the purity of their being. How could he so blindly trust a device of Moebius, of his worst enemy? How could he be sure that he had not been lied to yet again, all as a bigger part of his eventual, humiliating downfall? He could not. And so he had come to a decision, a test to determine the veracity of the information he had been relying upon for so long: He would attempt to change destiny.
In the chronoplast chamber, he had witnessed the events which were to occur in the coming days. Dumah's fall was to come from the most ironic source of all, to the humans who now cowered in their well defended citadel, the very one he had wandered many a time, disguising himself as one of them with ease, enjoying their arrogant pride and belief in their newfound invincibility. It was gratifying to know that when his empire was reduced to ashes, those that might live to inherit it had learned nothing from the past, whether it be their own or that of his making. That fact alone told him that he had committed no great sins against the human sheep over the past millenium, and that Vorador, that arrogant personification of all that Kain had once thought wrong with vampirism, had been right all along. Idly, Kain wondered if Vorador would have been proud to witness the rise of the empire. One claw touched the ring of teeth and blood that hung from his left earlobe, the last evidence of Vorador's existence, and the smallest example of Kain's defiance. It, like it's one time owner, should have been lost in the now erased termagent forest long ago.
But there was also something he had not witnessed in the chronoplast chamber. He had not witnessed himself arriving to warn Dumah of the coming danger. And that was a scene he intended to insert into history's carefully choreographed play. It was time to test the mettle of his enemy.
He rose from the throne, and became aware for the first time of the intensity of the rain, as it fell from his body in a wash, having collected in the clefts of his hard skin and the folds of his cloak. The sound, so insistent, had seemed so quiet to his thought-dimmed senses. Now it pounded with child-like anger, thrashing down to pool on the broken floor of the throne room and slowly wear deeper the cracks it had already made. But it was not important. The rain, once uncomfortable to him, was of no concern now. It could harm his works, but it could not harm him. That role was reserved for another.
He returned the coin of Willendorf to its hidden pocket, and the Soul Reaver to its place on his broad and powerful back, then dissolved his form into a cloud of bats and flitted off through the shattered dome of the roof.
Beneath him, unaware of how unimportant it truly was, the throne stood on, proud and arrogant; the last untarnished symbol of the empire.
THE FALL OF DUMAH
How times had changed this place. The Sanctuary of the Clans, once and always the symbol of The Empire, spoke volumes about its state; a rotting corpse that bore just enough vestiges of former glory to offer painful mockery to those who remembered its greater days.
The gatehouse, once a portal in and out of the 'Sanctuary' was now a silent lock, a stoic portcullis that denied all from the tattered remains held within; the mechanism which opened the portcullis had long since been destroyed by Kain's own claws. If one were to somehow pass the gatehouse's dilapidated, sunken shape, stepping around and over the fallen blocks of masonry that had been forced out of the structure by growing mold, and then contravened the heavy, rust-pitted darkness of the iron portcullis, then one would step out into the smaller courtyard within. One could walk with unsure feet across the moss-infected, arching walkway that dissected the shallow pools of stagnant, lifeless water, which now played host to the tarnished silver fencing that had once protected the vampires who walked this path. And finally, one might come to the still-standing, gilded double doors which led to the once-proud throneroom of the Lord of Nosgoth.
Here the rain fell, unchecked by the cracked and broken dome, and ran in rivulets through the inch-deep crannies which pitted the stone tiles surrounding the central dais. Its yellowed marble bore a mass of dust and dirt that the naked skies had angrily spat upon it, as if in defiance of the one who had ruined them so long ago. The deep, runic engravings upon the marble were now muddied and indistinct, the places once occupied by the six lieutenants of the empire marked only by twelve large rocks, placed there in deliberate mockery. Beyond the dais, the circle of surrounding pillars meekly hid six faded flags which bore turgid mockeries of the symbols of the once-proud vampire clans of the empire, while the engravings on the wall saw their bold lines and clefts rendered thick with dirt and spider webs. The pillars, once able to inspire awe in even the coldest heart, now seemed tired and defeated, no longer glad to serve in some small way a master, but weeping and fading into dust; sinking into the muck and mire which surrounded them.
And yet, there was one part of the room which seemed untouched by age and the tear of the elements. One segment of the whole which remained a proud memory of the magnificence of the passing age. The throne of the empire. Kain's throne. It stood still in its granite enormity, awaiting stoically for its lord and master to sit in straight-backed magnificence upon it. The resin, now exposed to the threatening darkness of the sky above, seemed to take on a honeyed glaze. It was as if the throne gazed smugly upon the sky, one of the first and lesser works of its maker, and was proud to look up at it, and would not deign to be diminished by its insignificant wrath. The rain which poured down ran harmlessly through the patterns and symbols which had been painstakingly etched into the surface, the grit which the droplets bore carried with them, as the throne refused to offer it sanctuary. Around it, the four claw-like appendages were tightened still as if about to grasp and crush whomever sat upon the stone seat, for the one who had seen it carved would see no peace even in his seat of power.
He passed the gatehouse with ease. He slipped in mist through the somber portcullis, and walked with firm strides across the arched walkway. He opened the double doors of his throneroom with a single, firm thrust of his clawed foot.
Kain was the only one who came here, now, the only one who could come here now. Had his eyes not been so rudely opened within the last centuries, then perhaps he would have been grieved to harbour that knowledge. But now, as then, there were larger issues prominent in the thoughts of the Lord of Nosgoth than the state of his empire.
Kain settled into his throne, resting the point of the Soul Reaver beside his foot and clasping the hilt by the tip, as if it were a walking cane, perhaps. For a time he sat, silent and motionless, staring off into the distance, his thoughts moving slowly through intricate revolutions, until a slight frown creased his regal brow. His neck arched, and turned his gaze down to his left hand, which lay across the arm of his throne. He slowly turned his hand over, petalling back his three fingers one at a time, to reveal one of the last articles of a distant and all-but forgotten age.
In his palm was a coin, dustless yet worn almost clean of detail through the passing of time and the scrape of claw on metal. It was a bronze piece, defunct even in the time in which he had found it, in his eyes a perfect symbol of the pathetic kingdom of Willendorf with its sycophantic court and weak-kneed King, the man Kain himself had witnessed brought to weeping ruin by the plight of a single human female.
He had kept this coin as a reminder, through all these ages. As a man of the house of Coorhagen, he had given his loyalty to the throne of Willendorf. As a vampire he had saved it and destroyed it, and both with ease. The coin had been an example to him, an example of everything his Kingdom, his Empire, would not be. But now his face crinkled into an ironic smile as history twisted beneath him to give another edge to his thoughts, for now this coin had found a meaning for both its sides. On the one side there lay his past, a litany of things he would not be and things he had no choice but to become. On the other there was his future, a snarl-inducing, melodramatic tragedy played out in the theatre of history by the arrogant puppetmasters that had made his life and destiny into their plaything.
And now, the latest scene was to be played out in this, the penultimate act of their play. The fall of Dumah.
The past centuries had been an unending string of humiliations and meek capitulations for him, as he was forced consistently into playing roles he found distasteful, all of which were a prelude to a greater plan, a slim possibility born from a moment of the purest madness. A plan to change his destiny once more, as it had been changed by another so many years ago.
It had all begun with his discovery of Moebius' chronoplast chamber, with his years of patient study of the secrets therein, with the unending thought he had put into the implications that only a fool would have missed. All of that study had dragged him irrevocably to that one, fateful day, to the beginning of this act of the play. To the destruction of his greatest lieutenant, his right hand. To the destruction of Raziel. His gaze shifted from the coin to the Soul Reaver, and he let out a cynical laugh which echoed into the night, before he leant back in his throne, pressing his back against the wet stone. So far, he had played his role to their satisfaction; about that he held no illusions.
But now, knowing that the true dawn of his plan was coming to be, that the coming scene was the last which would usher in his chance, his slim opportunity for true destiny; he faltered. It was not in his nature to do so, and he found the thoughts which caused him to pause to be distasteful in the extreme. And yet, they were undeniable in their intensity, and the purity of their being. How could he so blindly trust a device of Moebius, of his worst enemy? How could he be sure that he had not been lied to yet again, all as a bigger part of his eventual, humiliating downfall? He could not. And so he had come to a decision, a test to determine the veracity of the information he had been relying upon for so long: He would attempt to change destiny.
In the chronoplast chamber, he had witnessed the events which were to occur in the coming days. Dumah's fall was to come from the most ironic source of all, to the humans who now cowered in their well defended citadel, the very one he had wandered many a time, disguising himself as one of them with ease, enjoying their arrogant pride and belief in their newfound invincibility. It was gratifying to know that when his empire was reduced to ashes, those that might live to inherit it had learned nothing from the past, whether it be their own or that of his making. That fact alone told him that he had committed no great sins against the human sheep over the past millenium, and that Vorador, that arrogant personification of all that Kain had once thought wrong with vampirism, had been right all along. Idly, Kain wondered if Vorador would have been proud to witness the rise of the empire. One claw touched the ring of teeth and blood that hung from his left earlobe, the last evidence of Vorador's existence, and the smallest example of Kain's defiance. It, like it's one time owner, should have been lost in the now erased termagent forest long ago.
But there was also something he had not witnessed in the chronoplast chamber. He had not witnessed himself arriving to warn Dumah of the coming danger. And that was a scene he intended to insert into history's carefully choreographed play. It was time to test the mettle of his enemy.
He rose from the throne, and became aware for the first time of the intensity of the rain, as it fell from his body in a wash, having collected in the clefts of his hard skin and the folds of his cloak. The sound, so insistent, had seemed so quiet to his thought-dimmed senses. Now it pounded with child-like anger, thrashing down to pool on the broken floor of the throne room and slowly wear deeper the cracks it had already made. But it was not important. The rain, once uncomfortable to him, was of no concern now. It could harm his works, but it could not harm him. That role was reserved for another.
He returned the coin of Willendorf to its hidden pocket, and the Soul Reaver to its place on his broad and powerful back, then dissolved his form into a cloud of bats and flitted off through the shattered dome of the roof.
Beneath him, unaware of how unimportant it truly was, the throne stood on, proud and arrogant; the last untarnished symbol of the empire.