It was pitch black and the air held a raw stench that was jammed hard into the nostrils with every breath. Besides being an assault on the nose, the dust in the air clung to the skin, mixing with sweat to make a mud. Amazingly none of this bothered the man who tread down the hall. He walked with purpose; one hand clasping the single torch, which barely let him see a foot in front of him. He proceeded at a decent pace, not very fast but also not slow and wary. He stopped upon reaching a door to a great open room.
He waved the torch back and forth but could not get a glimpse into the room. He sighed and, using the wall as a guide, proceeded to light the torches hung about the room. Once finished, the light of the torches was barely enough to make out the floor. They burned a dim yellow that gave the room a dusty look. It was as if all the sources of light were tired, allowing darkness to nibble at their edges. It took his eye a few seconds to adjust to the level of illumination in the room.
Gazing around, he caught sight of his prize. He approached it gingerly, wincing every time his feet sent a piece of the metal bouncing across the room. Upon reaching it he gasped in anticipation.
It was something to behold. The was beautiful and horrendous at the same time. He reached out to it.
"Do not touch it."
The voice was barely audible; it was but a muted shout. He could hear the anger. The man turned around to see the golden horn jutting out of the blue helm.
"Ahh" he said, "Nightmare."
"How do you know me, mortal?"
"That is irrelevant. The question you should ask is 'what can you do for me?'" As he spoke he approached the helmet.
It asked, "What can you do for me?"
The man laughed; a smooth baritone sound that bounced about the room.
"I can do many things. You asked my question wrong. It's what can 'you' do for 'me'?"
The helmet growled. It could not move but if it could it would have tried lunging at him.
"I do nothing for any man except grant him death."
The man laughed again.
"Yes. Exactly." He walked to the center of the room, holding the helmet in one hand. Once there he lifted the gruesome helm to look it in the eye.
"Alas, poor Yorrick, I knew him well."
The man then sat the empty helm on the ground, chuckling as he took a place a few feet away.
"Who is this Yorrick?" asked Nightmare.
The man looked at the helm with surprise on his face which quickly dissolved into amusement.
"He," he said, "is a man I aim to meet with your help."
The man then began chanting in a language made of k's, u's, s's, and a's. He spoke this unlanguage while waving his arms to and fro. Next he switched to a language devoid of vowels. To this chant, he raised his hands as if he was lifting an invisible weight over and over.
The helmet and other armor pieces started joining to together while dirt from the room flowed to fill the inside of the armor. The right arm of the armor was absent only to be replaced by a giant brown three fingered claw. Once the last bit of dust was inside, the blue knight stood like a museum display, horrible to look at but essentially harmless due to its immobility.
The man examined at the terrible statue and nodded to himself. It was a dark dirty blue color with brown-golden trim. It had the shape of regular plate armor except that every angle was exaggerated to make the armor appear sharper. On the chest the golden trim made an eye with a slanted pupil.
"Now for some power." Swirling his hands in front of him, the man began wailing. It brought a cold whirlwind that chose the armor as its focal point. The eyes in the armor glowed with a red light as the wind died. When the whirlwind stopped, the azure knight could move.
The man, sweaty with effort, smiled as a large orange ugly fleshly sword formed in the knight's hands.
"Excellent, Nightmare, excellent." He moved to gather the beautiful and ugly thing he had left at the throne. "Find Siegfried and bring him to the swords. "
"Heh, heh, heh." Nightmare laugh was a harsh sound, like two rocks grating against each other. He admired his body, moving his arms and kicking his legs, "Your magics are truly amazing, wizard. To control such power you must have a powerful soul."
The man smiled at the monster, "I already know where this is go-, "he began before rolling under a wild swipe. He recovered near the doorway he originally entered in, with the prize in hand. The man held out his free hand as the creature was just beginning to turn around.
"Begone," he spoke and the blue knight vanished. The man grabbed one of the torches hung on the wall. As he turned down the hallway he said to himself "He'll do what I want." He chuckled while looking into the clouded eye of the thing he held, "He has to." The man walked merrily into the dark hall, laughing to himself the entire way.