Note: 'Tis but a wee prelude to Siblings. If I ever write another short story set in the - ekhm, universe - such as Faldorn's story, or Edwin's, or Viconia's (yes, they all have their own stories); or H'D's sonnets about Imoen, or Imoen's first meeting with Coran, or Sarevok's with Tamoko, or Sarevok's with Aran Linvail - gods, plot bunnies just swarm me right now! - I'll post it in the subsequent chapters. Quality may vary, but please do enjoy:)
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Prelude
They all believed; they all wanted to believe; they all wanted to believe that what they believed in at all mattered.
It might be an interesting experiment to see them fall.
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"Kha—Khalid! No!"
The druid, circling cautiously the man who, in a sense, brought them all here on this night, dodging his mad blows as she calmly sought an opening for her own strike; what did she believe in? Friendship and justice, he had been informed: friendship such as transcends the grave and demands that one take upon the foster child of a dead friend; and such justice as must be brought upon his killer.
Her husband—her husband, who, he had been told, wanted to believe that his feeling for her sufficed to make him adequate for her—had just been killed: how did it affect the druid? First, a scream of denial; almost instantly, a renewed sense of intent. Curious. So, the information had been correct: she was a strong woman.
An arrow passed through the large hall. It struck its target and killed it. So, the archer finally caught his prey.
The archer: what was his motive? Vengeance. Yes, vengeance; he believed that it would— What? Bring peace to his soul, perhaps; a necessary step before he might move on. He had caught his prey, and was now learning that it did not bring peace to his soul; that there was no vengeance but that for vengeance's own sake. Falling as he rose; what a beautiful paradox. There was some abstract pity in that the archer would have too little time before him to learn to appreciate it properly.
The filthy dog the archer had felled. Simplistic motives for a mundane mind: belief in its leader; in its leader's power; in its leader's skills. A desire for aimless bloodlust which its leader let it exercise freely as long as he held it on its leash. It had fallen as it had lived; not even meriting the denomination of a person.
Its two comrades still lived, the guardsman and the neophyte; both as boring as it had been. Talented or brainless, their ambitions did not stretch beyond living in luxury and purposelessly terrorising their fellows, he had been told; their fall would be as insipid as their lives.
By the morrow, both would be forgotten; of course, so would be the supposed heroes of this confrontation. There were bards partial to sagas of failures and fallen heroes; but, on the morrow in Baldur's Gate, even the bards would be perplexed.
The other wizard, the second elf—now, his was a more interesting case. Until recently, a realist, properly aware of the complete insignificance of his own existence; for some time now, however, he had been told, tentatively claiming that he might, possibly, live to see the end of the affair he was embroiled in. The irony was apposite: the world really did not care. His life was, indeed, useless. He was, indeed, doomed. He would understand it again as he fell.
Curious. He had looked up, at the rafters of the temple. Perhaps he had even seen the observers. This did not matter; his eyes would be taken even if he had not.
The Children.
The Children. Yes; it would be interesting to see them fail and fall.
First, the dwarf who was the reason of the enchanter's evolution; who believed, apparently, in the righteousness of her own cause; who believed also, apparently, that one's blood does not determine one's destiny.
She failed.
The second Child, the hidden one, was screaming; and their brother, covered head-to-toe in the blood of the druid and her husband, was laughing madly, as the dwarf disappeared in a cloud of glittering dust. She was aware of her failure; he was convinced of his victory. Wrongly, of course.
The watcher turned to the dark figure stretched lazily on the rafter next to him. "This seems to be our cue, sister."
Two elves, two men and two Children still remained alive. It was time for more… experiments.