Chapter Two

While the vampire female rested in his throne Kain paced the around the rubble that was all that was left of the Pillars of Nosgoth.

Ancient history...this is ancient to these people...if the Hylden are free then what happened, what went wrong...

He was going to get to the bottom of this, he didn't care who he had to threaten or kill to reach the answers he wanted; he would find out. And hopefully...this girl who seemed to carry his appearance would know something of value. She was the only one who seemed to recognise him...even if to her he was just a dream.

He picked up a slab of shattered stone from the floor and inspected it, he recognised the fragment of symbol that adorned it and realised that what he held was a piece of the Pillar of Time.

If this was indeed the future of Nosgoth then it would seem that everything he was striving to achieve was simply a waste of time and effort and all of his suffering and the suffering he had caused to others was for nothing, Raziel's damning and self sacrifice would make no difference and every move Kain had played against fate would be miscalculated and worthless.

The realisation was crushing; he would fail.

Perhaps it was time to give up and stop fighting. Perhaps he should just lay down the Soul Reaver and accept the inevitable. Maybe he could find a time streaming device and take himself to place in history where he could fade into obscurity and be forgotten, no longer hunted, no longer relied upon.

He would fail.

I will fail...

The fragment slipped out of his claws and broke into further pieces as it hit the floor.

It's over...

A soft moan echoed in the chamber as the mystery dreamer began to wake.

The girl opened her bleary eyes and surveyed the place in which she had been seated. "Hnh...How-," she had to stop to cough loudly before she could continue, "-how did I get here?" Her words were slow; she was so weak that she could barely control her own voice.

Kain didn't look at her, but did address her. "I carried you."

She looked around and spotted him. "You again...so I am still drea-"

He interrupted. "No, you are not dreaming." Although I wish you were.

"...Am I dead now? Did they finally kill me?"

"No. You are still alive, in a sense...un-dead."

"Oh." She sounded disappointed. "Then, who are you?"

In a defeated tone he replied. "No-one."

"Everyone is someone. Are you a Vetus?"

He had no idea what a 'Vetus' was but shook his head. "My name is Kain."

Her face twisted into an expression of severe confusion. "That can't be right..."

He turned to face her. "It is."

"But...you're dead...you were destroyed centuries ago, never to be resurrected again."

"Well I am terribly sorry to disappoint you."

"Disappoint? Surprise, yes. Disappoint, never."

"How is it that you recognise me when it seems that all others do not?" he ambled over to the throne, avoiding some of the larger chunks of rubble.

"How did you return?"

He leaned in close. "Are you going to answer my question or not?"

"Yes, of course...I just..." she paused and sighed. "It isn't allowed but I studied the old legends; the written ones made by the workers, not the sovereigns."

"The sovereigns? Do you mean the Hylden?"

"Yes, they were once called that, a very long time ago."

"And the workers...were they once called humans?"

"Yes. Please...will you now answer my question?"

"...?" He replayed their conversation in his head. "I...can't say."

Strangely she didn't reply...she was starting to lean forward and he barely caught her before she fell out of the throne towards the floor. She needed to feed; that much was obvious but he had no way of helping her in this regard. The muzzled fixed around her face like a scold's bridal without the tongue piece ensured that there was no way she could bite anything through the thin bars and he could not use the Soul Reaver to cut it off without slicing her head in two at the same time. As it was he had had to leave the shackles on her for similar reasons. The muzzle was fixed tight and no matter how hard he pulled at it he could not get it to break. And the strange thing about it was that there was no lock or hinges to it, no way to get it on or off...it was though it had been forged around her head and left there and there had never been any intention of removing it. The same could be said for the Glyph bedecked collar, the purpose of which was unknown.

Perhaps...he could somehow heat the metal; that way it would become softer and easier to break. He wasn't going to let her die when she was his only link to the answers he needed and the only way to keep her alive was to get her to feed.

A smithy. That was what he needed, there had to be blacksmiths in this city; the muzzle itself was proof of that. Now all he had to do was find one of the blasted things before she starved to death while trapped in a coma. He supposed that a good fire and a shaft of metal would do if he could lay his claws on them.

This was going to be another bad day, he could feel it. He supposed that he should be used to this sort of thing by now.

But as per usual nothing was going to be as simple and straightforward as it sounded. He never expected anything to be easy anymore; he had stopped expecting such straightforwardness since his resurrection. Waking up and looking at the inside of your own coffin tended to give you a more realistic perception of life.

He heard the sound of many marching feet...he recognised these feet and was not really surprised to see three armoured Hylden walk though the jammed open double doors that led from the street.

Oh hell...

One of the Hylden addressed him and pointed an accusing claw in his direction.

"Step aside from that pet, Vetus. Lord Caucahn is not a lenient man but perhaps if you co-operated he will grant you death rather than an eternity of torture."

The second Hylden turned to the previous speaker. "Why do you bother? You know full well that no Vetus has even the slightest concept of language."

Then the third decided to pipe up. "But see...this one is dressed. Perhaps it is an escaped pet that evolved."

"It is doubtful but possible." the second speaker replied.

Kain slowly stood and drew the Reaver.

All the Hylden gasped in unison. "No, it is impossible! It has stolen the Soul Reaver as well!"

"Do you wish to run," Kain asked them, "or shall I cut you down where you stand?"

"It speaks!"

But they weren't about to stand around and make it easy for him; they fanned out and began to circle him.

They all decided to attack at the same time but instead of striking the 'Vetus' vampire down they found that their swords swiped through only air. They all looked at each other in confusion and then the second Hylden speaker roared in pain. The other two watched in shock as the serpentine blade of the Reaver burst through their comrade's chest and as he then fell forwards off the sword and lay dead in an expanding pool of his own warm blood.

Kain gave a soft chuckle of delight; nothing made him feel better than a good fight. The world could burn for all he cared as long as the bloodlust coursed through his body and mind.

For a while he toyed with the Hylden by avoiding, goading and generally insulting them to amuse himself but eventually grew bored and killed them with cold indifference. The fight had been a refreshing and welcome distraction whilst it had lasted but it was time to be serious again. He pushed aside the almost childish giddiness produced by the bloodlust and refocused his thoughts away from the blood all around him and back to the comatose vampire girl who was still in his throne.

Even though she was thin to the point of emaciation and her white skin was streaked with burns, the expression on her face did not suggest that she had suffered as much as she must have. She looked as though she was only sleeping; somewhat at peace with the world, as though when her eyes were closed the world became a more beautiful place in which she could find amity and freedom from strife. He suddenly got the feeling that he shouldn't try to wake her and that perhaps leaving her to die was the kindest thing he could do.

But he was not feeling kind. He was feeling annoyed, he was feeling stressed, he was feeling violent and he was feeling that he wanted to rip someone's arm off and beat them to death with the wet end.

He was not a happy bunny.

He wanted out of this stupid game or whatever the hell was going on. He was sick of being led around and lied to. He was tired of always having to be responsible. He, just for once, wanted to be able to kick back and relax and not have to worry about the fate of the world resting on his weary shoulders.

The world...poor, dear Nosgoth...what had become of her?

Again his sight was drawn to the girl who resembled his younger self.

He scooped her up, slung her unceremoniously over his left shoulder and stalked back out into the night.

He found that the easiest way to move around the city undisturbed and unreported was to keep to the rooftops, out of sight. No one noticed him as he jogged along apart from a few startled crows and pigeons as he whizzed by on his little mission. With perfect night vision he scrutinized every building he came past and looked for any tell tale signs that would give away the location of a smithy but it were proving hard to come by. There was not a single one to be found, not even a closed one and this did nothing to improve his frosty mood.

He dumped his load down again and then sat down heavily beside her, his head in his claws.

What the hell am I supposed to do?!

He calmed himself down. Stressed caused mistakes and he didn't need any mistakes right now.

Alright...we look at the facts...

He had no idea what time or place he was in; this was not a good start.

The Hylden were free; this did not improve matters in the slightest.

Vampires appeared to be slaves unless they were 'Wild'; this made life rather difficult.

Basically, to summarise his situation in but a few words; he was screwed.

His only link to information was the girl...now, how to get the information out of her; get the muzzle off and feed her...how do we get the muzzle off; find a blacksmith or smithy and heat it up a bit? Well that idea had been thrown out of the window, so what next?

Well...

It didn't have to be a smithy; a good hot fire and a poker should do the trick. And were did you find such items; in a house, of course. He was in a city and was surrounded by houses. Ah, things were beginning to look up.

It seemed that a little breaking and entering was in order. He picked the girl up yet again and then quietly stepped to the edge of the roof he was standing on, on the side that faced an empty alleyway.

Crouching down he could see the windows and saw that none of them were conveniently open...that would soon change.

A short fall later and he was on the ground, from there he sent out a telekinetic shot that shattered the nearest window through which he entered the house.

There were three humans in the room he jumped into, they looked at him, the man, the woman and child and they screamed before running for the door. Unfortunately they did not get much further, Kain killed them all on general principals and to prevent any further reporting, then bundled their bodies into a corner to keep them out of the way.

He dumped the girl into a tattered armchair, stoked up the fire in the fireplace until it roared and threw extra coals on to be sure, before taking the poker from the stand on the hearth and sticking it in the flames. He improved the heat of the fire with a few pyrokinetic blasts, making it blaze.

While the poker heated up he took an inventory of the room to see if there was anything of use to him. The humans that lived in this place had little in their possession and it seemed that this whole large room was what qualified as their house. There were two beds against one wall, the fireplace occupied another and the third held the door whilst the last had the now broken window. In the centre of the room were a couple of armchairs and that appeared to be just about it.

Soon the poker had heated up and once withdrawn from the fire it glowed red hot. That was good; he didn't want it to be white hot; that would be far too hot. He only wanted to be able to heat up the metal, not burn the poor girl behind it.

His plan worked like a charm; the heat of the poker transferred to the metal of the muzzle in strategic places and allowed him to break it with ease, although he had to be careful so the heat did not then pass into the girls head, not to mention the fact that it took quite a while for the poker kept cooling down too fast. Eventually, however, the work was done and the muzzle dropped with a clang to the bare stone floor. Without it on she seemed even more fragile than before, there were sores on her face where the muzzle had worn against her skin and he considered the fact that, perhaps, this was the first time it had ever been removed since it was placed upon her.

Now she needed to feed...but she was unconscious and close to death. He looked briefly to the corpses slumped against the wall by the door and then decided against it; she needed something stronger than that, something to restore her, not just feed her. He knew what to do, he had never considered it before and he just hoped that it would work.

He tilted her head back and opened her mouth in preparation, then he removed his left arm guard and set it aside on the floor.

Now for the blood.

He pushed the thumb claw of his right hand into his left wrist; puncturing the skin and rupturing the blood vessels below. He then quickly held his self wounded wrist against the girl's mouth, making sure that her teeth were inside the jagged gash to prevent it from healing and stopping the blood flow.

As soon as his blood touched her tongue her eyes snapped open, but only for a brief moment. They instantly closed again as her claws raised to take a firm hold of Kain's arm and hand. Her teeth bit down hard and her mouth locked tight to his skin as her instinctive and suppressed bloodlust took over and guided her; a vampire who had never before used her fangs.

Kain grimaced as pain flared up his arm and he felt his blood being drawn out of him, but as he suspected it was just what she needed.

Before his very eyes the sores and burns on her skin healed and disappeared without even the smallest of scars and her body began to fill out again where the flesh and muscle had been lost; she regained her perfect hour glass figure that had before been shrivelled down to the build of an anorexic and from the withered, tortured girl he had found chained up in the Square a strong woman emerged, and there was undeniable hard muscle beside and under her soft feminine curves...she was no sheltered flower.

She was restored to her former self, but now a new problem arose; how was he going to get her to let go? She was enjoying it all too much and was very reluctant to release him. In the end he had to tear his arm away from her, causing even further damage to his wrist, but it healed as good as new, just as she had.

Her eyes opened again and fixed on the ceiling as she took in a few deep gulps of air and licked the remaining blood from her lips. She felt strange...there was something different...she felt stronger than she ever had and there was a sensation creeping around inside her as though electricity crackled through her bones. She felt alive, she felt powerful...and she felt as though she was missing something.

"What the hell just happened?" she gasped to the world in general. "Why do I feel like this?"

"I think that you may have acquired some of my Dark Gifts." Kain observed evenly as he put his arm guard on again.

"What? I don't understand..." she glanced at the floor and then her hands flew to her face. "My muzzle!"

"Yes, I removed it. How else do you think I was able to feed you?" he thought she would have been grateful to have that great chunk of metalwork off of her head, but instead her expression was that of someone who had just witnessed the signing of their own death sentence.

"This is a bad thing!" she wailed and covered her face with her hands in despair, although was fascinated by the feel of her claws against her cheeks; she couldn't remember the last time she had felt that...if she ever had before.

"You make no sense." He said as he stood up.

"Oh, look what you've done! Such a bad thing...bad, bad thing!" she was terrified.

"I don't have time for this." He hauled her up off the armchair and forced her to stand in front of him. "I have some questions and you are going to listen to them very carefully and once you have understood them you will answer them. Have I made myself clear?" his piercing glare cut straight through her and she found herself unable to tear herself from his gaze. She did not speak but her bottom lip trembled slightly.

"Do I make myself clear?" he asked again in an even firmer tone of voice

She nodded.

"Good, now, firstly; do you have a name?" he supposed he should start small rather than jumping straight in at the deep end.

"I..." she paused, just as Jor had when he had been asked the same question.

"Well how does your 'owner' address you?" he spat out the word 'owner' as though it left a filthy taste in his mouth and practically pronounced the inverted commas.

"Lord Caucahn simply calls me Pet," she said, "but my name is Khila."

Kain felt strangely relieved knowing that she believed herself to be an individual and not just a mindless slave like Jor and the other vampires he had seen. Now for the real question...though it was more of a request...and he was beginning to dread how she would reply, what she would tell him. He wondered if he was really prepared for the truth. He plunged on before he could change his mind. "Alright...I want you to relay to me the history of Nosgoth, from how my empire fell to this present day."

"You mean...you really do not know?"

"Would I ask if I did?"

She flinched at her own stupidity. "I suppose not." She sat down again and clasped her hands neatly in her lap. "Well...from everything I have been able to piece together, I have as yet been unable to pin point exactly how long ago the age of your empire ended but I think I know what happened even without the when."

"Go ahead." He told her, crossing his arm across his chest and steeling his mind in preparation. He just hoped that he could take it.

Khila took a deep breath and began a shortened version of what she had read. "This comes from tales written by humans, vampires and Hylden so I don't know how much of it is false or biased, but it should be quite accurate even though I don't fully understand it myself. For reasons unknown by any man or creature but yourself, you left Nosgoth through a time streaming device but by doing so you not only left the land behind; you abandoned it and left it undefended. This was all the Hylden needed. During the time of the Sarafan Lord there were a good many Hylden in the world-"

"Until I destroyed the gate and killed them all." Kain interrupted with a hint of smugness.

"Yes...well...the Hylden, unlike vampires, are not sterile and still reproduce in the conventional sense, and they did. Many of these children where born out of the exile (although I have no idea what that is supposed to mean) and thus their ties were to Nosgoth and not the demon dimension where their parents drew their power. When the gate was destroyed all the Hylden died but for those that were Nosgoth-born who fled into hiding. Some months from that time they discovered an abandoned time streaming chamber not unlike the one that you were said to have used yourself much later and they set about exploring Nosgoth's time lines to see how they could use the device to their advantage. They found your abandoned empire and invaded. The vampires fought bravely but eventually they fell as the humans joined the Hylden's side and improved their numbers. The Hylden claimed Nosgoth then enslaved the humans and what was left of the vampires. Once that was completed a small retrieval party was sent to lure you back to your empire whereupon you were ambushed by a force of the Hylden's finest warriors and magic users. Many of them inevitably fell before you and the Soul Reaver but there were simply far too many of them for you to defend yourself against at one time and you were eventually captured." She paused. "Are you sure that you wish me to continue, sir?" she asked him. She was so used to servitude that the 'sir' just slipped into her sentence.

Something deep inside him begged him to tell her to end it but he was determined to gut it out and hear it through to the conclusion. "Yes."

"As you wish...after being captured you were brought before the Pillars and publicly executed; beheaded by the Soul Reaver which had been taken from you." She saw his expression. "I'm sorry." She added quietly.

"Don't stop." Kain told her. "I want to know it all."

"Upon your death it was said that the Pillar of Balance turned black as jet and split in half, then the world you see now was built and for many millennia Hylden, humans and vampires have lived as we have. The Hylden are the sovereigns; the rulers and the aristocracy. The humans are the workers and the vampires...we are pets and toys for the sovereigns amusement. Uh...would you like to sit down for a moment?" she asked kindly. "Kain...sir?" she rose slowly from her seat and nervously waved a hand in front of his face. He was staring fixedly at a point on the floor near his feet with empty, glazed eyes and an expression devoid of all emotion - it was as though his 'self' had ceased to be, leaving his body behind as a silent and still testament to his shock and utter disbelief.

"Are you alright, sir?"

For a long moment he did nothing, but then his head turned to her once more with the same familiar, perpetual scowl that had served him so well over the years; it was the expression that his face just seemed to relax into. "I am fine." He said, although wasn't sure if it was Khila or himself that he as trying to reassure.

She looked down forlornly at her muzzle nestled in the scraps that made up the rug on the floor and picked it up, turning it over in her claws. "By removing this, did you mean to save me?"

"I needed to revive and wake you to gain information from you." He admitted.

She looked at the clock on the mantle piece over the fire that was slowly ticking its ever present and oh so depressing rhythm of time as the seconds passed. "I hope then that you have gained all that you need from me."

"Why is that?"

"I will be dead in five minutes." She said simply.

To be continued......