I am not Misty. I don't own anything that has to do with Valdemar, they don't belong to me (though I wish certain male characters did! O.o) So don't sue me, please. I'm dead broke anyways.
This has some elements that is sort of borrowed from Garth Nix's The Old Kingdom trilogy, but I didn't think it was enough that I needed to put as a crossover, although I wanted to give him a little credit. If you like fantasy, definitely check it out, its awesome!
I'm roughly basing this story directly after Owl Knight although slightly before could also work. I'm also assuming that Elspeth and Darkwind are back from Hardarn by now (I mean it's been quite a few years since The Mage Storms'n stuff so…). Don't hate me, please.
Oh yes, and this is my first story on a Misty book, or any book at all really, please remember to review and tell me what you think!
Ruin ● Resurrection
By LGR
Chapter One: The Mists of Uncertainty
--☼--
Herald-Mage Elspeth, Darkwind K'shena and Queen's Own Herald Talia listened to the Herald before them with growing disbelief, as well as dread.
"—I'm serious! Question me under truth-spell if you don't believe me! Those things were dead!" The Herald said with great ire as he caught the looks of skepticism being flashed between his three questioners. He was shaking with a suppressed desire to crawl under his bed and never leave again, as well as the need to prove to those listening to him, the truth of his words.
The Herald in question had been on a Routine Circuit as he was returning to Haven. Less than a day away from the capital by companion, he'd stopped at a Village called Hollytree to help the villagers with some sort of problem.
"Herald Gerard, could you please repeat your testimony from the point after you arrived at the village?" Talia asked as calmingly as she could while still sounding respectful.
The man sighed exhaustively but he did re-begin his tale in a slightly irritated fashion: "I had past through a village not far from Hollytree called Mason's Town earlier to get a good meal. I'd wanted a break from circuit rations, you know?"
Talia nodded understanding, as Elspeth and Darkwind continued to listen.
"Well, when I got to the inn, it was crammed full. I went to the inn keeper and asked why the inn was so crowded. He told me it was because of some business going down in Hollytree. Apparently half of the villagers had left it because of the awful things that were happening. I asked him 'what kinds of things? Why isn't the guard taking care of it?' That's when one of the guests in the inn joined the conversation. 'the guard can't do anything!' this one man told me, 'they already done all they can, I haven't heard anything from the town in a week! Something is definitely wrong out there!' Of course, what was I to say to that? By this time, Semnal (my companion, you'll remember), and I were curious as hell. We asked around some more but we did hear of anything definite, but what we did hear was damn strange!"
"What did you hear?" Elspeth asked, intrigued.
"I heard people talk of folks disappearing, old people dropping dead when it seamed like they were fine. Graves robbed, odd shapes being seen at night when everyone in the town was accounted for. An odd stench in the air for no reason, huge black birds in the air all the time, but they weren't any from around that area. Any liquid left outside frozen by morning even though it was a warm night. Supposedly their stream was frozen solid for two weeks and might still have been." He told them.
The Hawkbrother and Two heralds nodded as they contemplated the odd phenomena described. All were both confused and worried.
: Darkwind? Did any of that ring any bells? : Elspeth asked using mind-speech.
: Not a wit of it. It all would seem like coincidence or paranoia except for all of it together, and some of the things described are pretty suspicious themselves. I can understand why everyone was spooked.: Darkwind responded.
: We haven't heard anything from the city guards about this, either…:
"So, Semnal and I figure that something is up. We ride down to the city the next day—really early, it's still dark even—and there isn't a soul in sight, the town is completely abandoned. We checked as many of the houses as would have been practical, but there was no one there; no one. Not even any of the city guard. At this point Semnal and I are starting to get a little uneasy. If what the villagers said was true, than everyone was leaving; but I didn't think the city guard would have left. And what was it about what had happened that they couldn't handle? Why didn't they call anyone in or tell Haven? Something was going on.
"Then, well… Semnal told me he thought he saw something in some of the woods near the village. We went to check it out, mostly figuring it was an animal or something. It was past dawn already but as we trotted toward the edge of the forest, a huge fog filled the town and the surrounding area, and tons of clouds came out of nowhere. Semnal and I were looking for a way out of the fog and we saw shapes in the distance.
"As the shapes came closer, we could make out that they must be people but…as they got closer…" Herald Gerard began shaking uncontrollably and his speech was short and breathy. His face became as pale as his companion.
Talia used her empathic influence to help calm him enough to finish his story and he did continue after a moment.
"We'd thought they might be the guard…" he said in a whisper, "Oh Hellsfires…were we wrong!"
"What? What did you see?"
"They might have been the guard…but they sure as hell weren't any more! They were dead, all of them, at least a hundred of them. They were corpses!"
"What did they do?" Talia asked comfortingly and came over to his bed in the Healer's Colleguim, to place a hand on his shoulder.
By this time, the Herald was nearly Hyperventilating as well as sobbing uncontrollable with uncontainable fear.
"They tackled both me and Semnal to the ground. And began to rip at us with their nails…it…they…" and the Man broke down and cried into Talia's shoulder. "They nearly Killed Semnal! They almost had him… but Semnal got up and was able to get away with me, dripping tons of blood all the way. Then we galloped full speed here…" he trailed off and looked up at Talia with pleading eyes.
"Semnal's going to be okay, right? That's what the healers tell me but, I…"
Talia smiled at him reassuringly, "Yes, it was really close, he nearly lost too much blood and the shock nearly took him, but he was able to pull through. I saw him, I know."
"Thank the Gods! Thank the gods! I was so worried, I can't bespeak him right now, and I haven't felt anything from him…" The man told them.
"Don't worry, everything will be fine." I hope.
--☼--
:Solarus?!:
Solarus looked up from her paperwork to question Hansa at the same as Sunpriest Bernardi came running through the door of her office shouting and raising a roll of parchment.
"Holiness! Holiness! Urgent news from Dawnshill!" the priest shouted with exaggerated distress.
"What is it?" she answered, her current bad mood exacerbated by the priests frivolousness.
"It came by Mage Message only moments ago!" the corpulent old man told her as he handed it to her with a shaking hand. Her cursory glance at him as she took the scroll had her wondering if his sweat was from the heat, his small jaunt of physical exercise, or actual fear.
As she considered this she wondered if the man's urgency and worry had not been exaggerated but actual. Solarus looked down and her face became a confused mess as she read.
This couldn't be true.
: It is! Kefrud bespoke me just moments ago and told me of this. Solarus, something must be done!:
Sun Lord, help us all. Kefrud was another Firecat that happened to be in the area of the incident. "Have we any Sun priest mages in the area? If so, send as many as can be spared, rouse the Sunsguard and begin an evacuation of the people. Someone write up a summery for the alliance and have the rough draft sent to me immediately!" Bernardi waddled off to do her bidding.
What is going on? 'undead' attacking priests and townsfolk, demons that cannot be vanquished by normal means?
:Solarus, Altra and Karal in Haven report similar occurrences all over Valdemar as well as in Hardarn, Rethwellin and Iftel. So far there is nothing from the Taledras, Shin'a'in, or K'leshya, but they have been placed on alert:
"Dead and Demons are attacking across the continent? What could be doing this, how is this even possible?" Solarus asked the large feline sitting on her desk.
The cat stared into the distance for a moment then jumped down to the ground and bounded into a patch of sunlight, disappearing.
Solarus glared at where he had been.
And she was still without answers.
--☼--
"Do you see anything Darkwind?"
"No, and there aren't any ley-lines out here, much less a node, especially after The Mage Storms. It couldn't have been a mage; not unless it was a blood-path mage anyways." He told his mate.
They were both in Hollytree Village searching for what Herald Gerard and his companion could possible have seen. They weren't finding anything that looked like a dead City Guardsman (or Guardswoman), much less anything that could have torn a Companion to shreds.
"I sure hope it wasn't a blood-path mage…" Elspeth confided.
"It couldn't have been. Blood magic, any kind of blood magic, not just the evil kind, leaves a sort of magically residue on everything it touches and creates distortions on the magical plain. I can safely say there wasn't any blood-path magic done here, but…" he trailed of and squinted into the distance. It was late afternoon and the sun sunk low in the sky, giving the town a red hue for a few moments until the sun dipped below the horizon. Its presence was immediately missed as a slight steam became known around their feet, and they noticed clouds popping up above them.
"But what?"
"—but something is definitely going on here. It doesn't really feel to me like blood-path magic, but something really odd happened in this town, or rather in that forest back there." He nodded to the expanse of trees not far away.
"Why does it always have to be in a forest? Why can't these weird things ever happen in, say, a glacier?" Elspeth complained cynically.
"Lack of creativity?" Darkwind hazarded.
"Guess so."
"—what was that?" Darkwind said suddenly.
"What was wh—" she cut off her question without bothering to finish as the sound was heard again; a deafening, high-pitched wail and a reverberation that could have been a deep-toned drum. The sound of the drum became clearer and clearer as moments passed and the daylight began to fail as the suns light faded all together and the mist at their feet, spread to their wastes, and the great expanses of shadow left by the houses, grew more menacing as the twilight shifted to darkness.
: Dearheart! Are you and Darkwind hearing what I'm hearing?: Gwena asked Elspeth as she cantered up besides
: Yes, can you tell where it's coming from?: Elspeth asked while her and Darkwind were frantically trying to find the direction of the resonances.
: The North. : Gwena said in a "group-voice" so that Darkwind would be included. They all looked to the north and saw shapes coming down the hill.
This is starting to seem familiar. Elspeth thought.
: Mage light?: she asked Darkwind.
: Mage light.: he confirmed, and they both sent out orbs of mage-energy toward the unidentifiable figures in the distance. There was little to no light, and their spheres of bluish-white light didn't help the visibility. The fog was now so think that she had trouble making out Darkwind, who was less than a yard from her.
The lights made strange cascading flickers as the density of the fog changed from place to place, sometimes more or less dense; allowing more or less light. As they zoomed soundlessly toward the unknown objects, the light fell upon one and there was an ear-piercing, in-human scream.
Darkwind and Elspeth dropped their heads and covered their ears in an effort to save their hearing. "Hellfires, what was that?" Elspeth exclaimed as the sound died.
"Look!" Darkwind said pointing back up the hill.
With her regular eyes not much happened except that her mage-light inexplicably went out. But with her Mage-sight, she Saw a dark energy shoot from the thing, that had supposedly let out the scream, and envelope the flouting energy, smothering it and then leaving nothing left.
:By the gods!: Gwena mind-called in astonishment but before anyone could hazard a response, the figures surged forward with shrieks, screams and wails as the drums took up a faster beat in the distance. Darkwind took up a tapped pattern with his foot as Elspeth did the same, linking with him and Gwena to get a jump to the nearest, powerful node, all the way in Haven. As the howling crowd came forward, Darkwind almost faltered as his eyes zeroed-in on the rotting flesh of guardsmen and villagers, some little more than skeletons. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Elspeth was as pale as Gwena's bleached coat.
As one, they drank in the energy from the Heartstone in Haven and aimed a Levin-bolt at the crowd of corpses rushing towards them. For an instant, the night was alight as the power manifested itself on the physical plane and they both shaded their sight to preserve night-vision. As the image of the bolt's path faded from their eyes, they could see that it had decimated most of the small army of dead into chock or dust, and the rest weren't moving.
The drums had stopped.
As the initial adrenalin wore off, Elspeth sat on the ground, her knees quaking so much they couldn't hold her steady. "By the gods! By the gods! I didn't believe him before, but he was right! Herald Gerard was right!" she said gasping.
"We're not out of the woods yet." Darkwind said as a metallic clang rent the air.
Elspeth mumbled something about "Those gods-be-damned woods again!"
The clatter came three times in quick succession, sounding like a very large, very deep bell, and the fog parted to let through a figure of black. Only its outline could be seen for the clothing seemed of one piece.
It was a woman, and covering her face was a simple, ghostly white mask that covered her entire face, her eyes were glowing, white pits, not a glimpse of her true flesh could be seen.
"Mages." It said, and attacked with the same black energy that had engulfed their mage lights. Darkwind and Elspeth threw up a hurried shield to protect themselves and Gwena. The energy exploded as it met the node power. And Darkwind's hold was shaken almost to the point where he dropped the shield all together, but he recovered.
The energy poured from the dark-mage in a sea of endless black power radiating kaleidoscope colors that twisted the dimensional-plain, and causing the weather to go ballistic.
In the last few moments, the clouds had thickened immensely and lightening flickered in the clouds as wind threw them off-balance and rain began to pelt them. The black energy wasn't letting up and Darkwind began to panic.
Where was she getting this energy? With magic being the limited resource it was, he rattled his brain to think of a way out of this. Elspeth was contemplating how long they could keep out the black power. The heartstone at Haven may be the strongest right now, but that didn't mean they could keep drawing on it like this.
Elspeth spontaneously grabbed a large rock from her place on the ground and threw it prominently at the woman. To her shock, the woman didn't move, and the rock hit the mask straight on and the woman's head twisted half way around on her neck as the siphon of power stopped.
Darkwind gasped in relief as the rush of energy lifted, he let down the shield, (its outer-membrane had corroded to a point that they would have been killed if Elspeth hadn't acted when she did.) and aimed energy at the woman.
But before it reached her, her head swiveled back in place and she sliced through the energy with an energy-blade of her own. The power went to either side of her, and exploded behind them, lighting the area with a multi-colored blast, sending up debris into the air as the rain continued to pour down.
Elspeth and Darkwind had scrambled from their places and both mounted Gwena, and they dodged shots of power and deflected as many as hit them, all the while aiming as many shots of their own as they could, most were dodged by the dark-mage, who seemed to be possessed of some in-humanly, liquid motion. Others were blocked, and low powered hits were absorbed.
: Have you contacted Rolan for help?: Elspeth asked Gwena who was dodging and galloping at a mad speed just to keep them all alive; the added weight of bearing two people instead of one cut down on the great speed advantage companions had over regular horses.
: Yes, but there aren't any Herald-Mage Adepts at Palace right now! They're trying to send whoever they can wouldn't get in the way but it's going to take at least an hour or so!:
:We don't have five minutes much less an hour!: Elspeth mind-screamed.
--☼--
They'd gotten word from across the Alliance nations that this was happening everywhere, and no one could find a solution, except to pray to the Gods for help.
People were scrambling all over the place, the companions were going crazy, time was running out for Elspeth, Darkwind, and Gwena and there wasn't much any one could do. Farseers were trying focus on the area that the mage battle was occurring, but they were encountering resistance in the form of a murky, kaleidoscope-black energy that could not be penetrated. No foreseer could break through the Mists of Uncertainty. There weren't any powerful Fire-starters near the palace or anywhere else; not any strong enough to be useful.
Every moment the universe seemed to be screaming: Hurry-up! Hurry up! HURRY-UP! No one knew what to do. All were silently listening for the death bell, hoping that it wouldn't ring, and knowing that it likely would, at any minute.
One Companion, amidst the chaos, insecurity, and lamentation, lifted her head and looked towards the grove. She closed her eyes —
―Sparks scattered and died as the spells inherent in his blade reacted to the energy that ran within the Eikei. He pushed the scissor-like limbs of the Eikei demon away and slashed again at the flesh made from shadow energy. The Eikei screeched and brought it's razored limbs to bare. But he was quick enough, and by the time it's blade-like limbs slashed, he wasn't there anymore—
—And opened them. Her Chosen was out there. She'd waited years to have a Chosen of her own, and he was just beyond that membrane that separated their dimension with that of the Nether-Realm. He was there; all she had to do was go after him.
The companion reared on her hind legs with a cry of success as she galloped toward the Archway of the Grove, and leapt into the mist to find her chosen.
