The Song of Eternity
Canto 1
Parm: The Forsaken Realm
Verse 10
The Destroyer
Saved by his remembered power,
Sent through the void to the land of the dead.
One, realizing his mistakes,
Another, trying to find the truth,
And the third, waiting for his own salvation.
Eiko was awoken by the feeling of water being splashed on her face. She blinked her eyes, finally focusing on Deklin. "What happened?" She asked him as he helped her to her feet. She looked over the marshy swampland surrounding them as he explained.
"Ashura decided to bring his tower down to try to kill us all. I grabbed you and brought us here," Deklin explained to her as she tried to remember. "You passed out in the void," he explained to her. "We are on the edge of the necromancer, Lim-Dul's swamp. I advise you to leave now, I have work to do," Deklin finished as he turned away and started to walk into the swamp.
"Wait!" Eiko shouted, causing Deklin to stop and face her. "What's the void, where are you going, and were you a mage on Gaia?" She questioned him as she tried to make sense of the situation.
"The void is the area between dimensions. We black mages of Gaia discovered how to step into it, then to leave it and appear somewhere else. I am going to kill the necromancer," he explained annoyedly.
"Why did I pass out?"
"The song is loud between worlds, you weren't expecting it."
"The song? Why are you going after Lim-Dul?" Eiko shouted exasperatedly as she stomped her foot in frustration.
"The song of the universe, of things to come. I am going to try to atone for my mistakes here by stopping him from joining Ashura's attack force on Haven. You should head north, try to warn them."
"I'm going with you, you will need help," Eiko stated as she walked toward Deklin.
"It's your choice," Deklin said gravely as he headed out into the swamp.
They made camp for the night and Deklin started a fire. Eiko found a dry rock and was sitting on it, studying the swamp while Deklin stared into the fire. "You were a mage on Gaia?" she questioned him.
"Yes," he replied, his eyes never leaving the fire.
"So what gives with you helping Ashura?"
"Amnesia and brainwashing," he replied in a disgusted tone.
"Okay," she replied, falling silent.
"You should leave this place, I may not be able to protect you," Deklin said as he stood up from the fire.
"I can take care of myself. There isn't anything in this swamp anyway," Eiko responded to the mage.
"Nothing that you've seen," the mage responded before laying down and attempting to drift off to sleep.
"Who does he think he is?" Eiko asked aloud to no one before she closed her eyes, attempting to sleep.
Deklin awoke the next morning to silence. He opened his eyes to discover that Eiko was gone. He got up quickly and scanned the area to find it empty. He walked over to where she slept and found signs of a struggle and tracks leading into the desert. He stood up and looked to where the tracks led, the crumbling castle in the distance. "Bad move," he said quietly as he was lit up by an orange glow.
"Let me go!" Eiko shouted at the skeletons that were dragging her through the halls of the castle. Finally they deposited her in a throne room and closed the door, locking her in. She pounded on the door, trying to get out, finally stopping when someone at the other end of the room cleared his throat. She turned around startled as the man spoke.
"Who are you and what are you doing in my swamp?" the man on the throne asked her.
Eiko walked until she was about ten feet from the swamp and stopped to examine the man. He had grey skin and long black hair. He was dressed in a dark blue, almost black, cloak. She finally saw his red eyes and recognized him. "You're the necromancer," she reasoned. He nodded in response. "I'm Eiko Carol. I came here by accident when I was fleeing from Ashura's tower." She stopped as she thought of Deklin. "Do you know where my friend is?"
"He is coming here as we speak. Why is he here?" The necromancer asked angrily.
"No reason, just running away, like me," Eiko lied.
"Take a look out the window and maybe you would like to answer that again," the necromancer ordered as he gestured at a window on the wall.
Eiko walked over and looked through the window, then stepped back again quickly, not believing what she saw. The swamp between where she and Deklin had slept and a mile from the castle was in flames. "He came to stop you from joining up with Ashura," Eiko conceded as she went back near the necromancer.
"He came to destroy me. Who is he?" the necromancer shouted as he glanced at a statue to his left through the corner of his eye.
"A mage from my world. Ashura had him working for him until a day ago."
"And now he is here to stop you from what you are about to do," came Deklin's voice from behind the throne as he stepped out in a puff of smoke. "You, Ashura, and the ogres will fail. I will not allow this to happen."
"You will perish here, pathetic human," the necromancer threatened as Deklin went and stood by Eiko. "You will never leave this room," he laughed as a wave of light washed over the area.
"Anti-magic aura," Deklin stated as he felt the aura weighing him down.
"But he's in here too," Eiko said as she pointed at the figure on the throne.
"It is a trick," Deklin explained as the figure laughed as disappeared. "It was an illusion. It doesn't matter, I have what I needed to find. Now we need to get out of here," he explained as he looked around for an exit.
"What did you find?" Eiko asked as she looked for another was out as well.
"This," Deklin stated as he pulled a pendant with a red gem from his pocket and placed it around his neck. As the pendant touched the one he stole from Pearl, they began to glow in unison. He removed both of them from under his shirt and held them in his hand. Suddenly, the light created a beam, spreading over to the ring Eiko received from Cid, and finally bouncing back to the statue near the throne. "What the hell?" He muttered to himself as he and Eiko walked over to the statue.
As Deklin and Eiko examined it they both began to hear the sound of undead soldiers approaching. "Deklin," Eiko whispered with a hint of fear in her voice.
"I know," he replied as he circled the statue and stopped. "This is impossible…." he whispered to no one as he examined the back of the statue.
Eiko circled back to what he was looking at and froze. "Is this him?" She questioned Deklin as they heard the footsteps come closer. "Should I try to revive him?"
"We have no choice, the guards are almost here. Do it," Deklin nodded as he ran to brace the door. As he ran over he tossed Eiko one of the pendants. "The pendants unlock out power from home, give it to him once he's up," Deklin shouted as he placed his back to the door and pushed back against the guards.
Eiko closed her eyes as she grasped the pendant in her hand, trying to use her magic to depetrify the statue. She finally got a small sphere of energy to form and start to melt away the stone as Deklin shouted for her to hurry up. The last of the stone melted away and the figure in the statue fell to all fours on the floor. Eiko handed him the pendant and shouted at him as Deklin ran towards them, leaving the broken doors behind. "There is an anti-magic aura around us now, negate it or we are going to die!"
Deklin dove and grabbed at the pair of them as a funnel of smoke expanded from his body, covering all three of them, finally dissipating as the skeletons swung their swords through it, revealing that the three of them had disappeared.