Chapter four ; deceit
Dusk was constantly retaining above and the evening seemed like it will never fall with only the few rays of almost set sun painting the heavens in shade and orange. Few small flames on iron staffs illuminated the terrain slightly. Naked ground was showered with chunks of white broken stone that covered it efficiently but every now and than a lake of brown earth would emerge from underneath. There was no ceiling but a tall rounded wall decorated with pillars and pieces of a giant broken statue was more than enough. It was so big that she couldn't see it while looking up the fade stars. Her naked back were pressed on a hard stone table that became the ground of her pointless struggle and she was just lying there frozen in her torture.
Like two guard dogs, Tarian and Jasmine were lying calmly on a huge rounded stone pedestal on each side of his golden seat and Adella was on a stone table placed on the gravel. She was breathing fast with her painful gaze fixed on the evening sky. Kain harmed the bride within her giving her some freedom, even the ring was off, but it still held her tight, too tight for all her efforts, shackling her to Vorador's will. As he approached she knew him to be next to her, even though she couldn't move her sight to him, but with her greatest effort she managed to sigh the words out :
" … huh… huh… plie… plies… huh… "
" Plies what ?"
"… huh… huh… set… huh… free… huh… huh… "
Vorador placed his finger beneath her chin and lightly lifting her face he brought her in a sitting position :
" Freedom, my dear, is a point of view. "
Black ring on a silver chain, repaired and restored, glittered on the half-dark and as it passed over her face her breathing got faster. Instantly she was utterly helpless and defeated once more stuffed behind an iron bride, and a smile of satisfaction and relief appeared on her face followed by calm normal breathing. She faced Vorador and gratefully spoke :
" I missed you while I was away, master. "
She kissed his green lips and a barely noticeable growl came from Tarian's direction.
" Now, my dear, "; Vorador started :" I have a special task for you. "
He presented a golden goblet decorated with rubies and she took it in her palms. She kneeled before him razing the empty cup like a sacred relic and he sliced his wrist poring his blood into it. The aroma of the vintage was too compelling for a young vampire and the bride Adella was practically driveling once the cup would come too close to her face. It took all her will not to taste it but she resisted for that was Vorador's biding.
" Kain's heart is ready to be ignited. "
Adella smiled following Vorador's feelings and begun to absorb every word in his plan.
Another busy day was over and ex-general Leiman exhaustedly walked in his living quarters. Chaos still burned within the ranks of NUC following the murder of Regent Sandra and since he was the most responsible for the presence of vampires he had to put all of his skills into keeping him self unharmed. It was he who allowed Kain and Adella to flee after Desmond was killed, he who held a position that they should be left alone and now he was being stripped of his rank like a scapegoat. NUC decided that he should stay out of the meter from now on.
The lights were off. He tried for a light switch but it didn't work. Like this day could get any worse. The light bole must have bean out… or someone was hiding in the shadows, waiting for him. He left his briefcase on the flour and calmly approached a liqueur cabinet opposite to a window displaying a sense of safety and confidence, but while he was poring a drink his hand gently came upon the hilt of his pulse gun. Someone was near the window behind him. The big square glass cork of the bottle displayed no reflection of the intruder, so it must have bean a vampire. Despite his acting, he knew that the creature can smell his true feelings and he swiftly turned pointing his weapon at it.
A big window with its curtains moved away seemed almost like an exit to a balcony. On its other side stretched a clear night and a lower half of a waxing moon peeking underneath the upper edge, slightly illuminating a silhouette of a woman. She was dressed only in black underwear and long transparent wraps on her arms that dragged on the flour.
" My god, Adella. "; he sighed relieved :" When will you people learn how to knock ?"
He begun to put his weapon down but than he stopped to wonder. This didn't seem right. She was like a different person with sensual essences flowing out of her and filling the atmosphere with desires. Her back were on the left edge of the window with her arm on the other, and her long naked legs were slowly lifting her up and down while her free palm was gliding over her neck and breasts like she was bathing in the night's essence. Even an old man had to feel her electrifying pool but instead it made him disturbed and a little frightened. Every bit of instinct he had was telling him that such a flower has poisonous thorns.
" What have you done to your self ?"; he asked wondering
At the sound of his words she separated from the window and slowly but willfully started approaching him. She was beautiful even in the shadows with her half opened puffy lips and smooth bluish skin tat seemed like it was cowered in moon dust. He backed before her approach restraining those urges, but she kept going until she backed him against the wall. A second later and her arms were around him spreading the seductive juices everywhere around, making his blood boil.
" …what are you doing… ?"; he asked trying not to succumb
" Extending the borders…"; she whispered as her naked thigh slid up his :" … of our friendship… "
It was too much. With his last strength he shoved her back, and he himself jumped away pointing his gun at her :
" I don't know what's gotten into you, but… You ! Was it you who killed regent Sandra !"
Adella hissed from the part of the room illuminated by moonlight and again begun to act like she was bathing in it :
" … master killed… the woman… "
" Kain ! Why ?"
But she had no further intention to indulge him. Instead she smiled and made a stepped closer in a most sensual manner, but he powered his gun extending his arm even more in her direction :
" Stay where you are ! I don't want to use this !"
" No, you don't… "
She was now all a shade but her eyes glittered with some inner glow and became more visible than the edge of the moon outside. One could clearly make them out on her face, big sapphire blue disks like clear mountain lakes sparkling on the stars. They were so beautiful. He was unable to resist but to sink deep into her gaze and the next moment she had him under her spell.
" … leave the toy and come to me… "; she said in a passionate breath and he returned the gun in its boots and entered her arms with a smile of satisfaction
With a strong arm she pressed him against the wall and presented a golden goblet filled with blood.
" Master commands for your death. "; she slowly pored the goblet over his head :" Come… let us find it. "
The reaver blade cut its way trough a wall of thick swamp weed and the ancient residence finally came before Kain's sight. It loomed before him just as he remembered it the first time he saw it without a dent of time upon it. Over the long centuries the building finally collapsed leaving nothing but a stone upon a stone and now it was rebuilt by its owner's powerful magic. When the sarafan ripped his heart out, Yanoss collapsed his sanctuary by his last will before his death. A powerful vampire could use his magic in such a way to even resurrect a fallen citadel from its rubble and Vorador has used it to bring a piece of Kain's memory to life. It was so inviting that it was too obvious. Vorador wanted him here but at the moment it seemed irrelevant.
The naked stone courtyard was unguarded and so far every step seemed the same as it was thousands of years ago when he first sought him out, but Kain didn't stop to notice. As he swiftly but carefully paced on he had only one thought on his mind ; to kill Vorador. Just a remembrance of the pain he caused him made his brain hurt, he enslaved his children, and he stirred the situation between vampires and humans that finally begun to show some signs of progress. Kain sharpened his claws and the soul reaver hummed in anticipation waiting for a taste of its creator's green flesh.
With a violent kick, Kain broke trough the entrance dour and observed the scenery. A large statue of his host greeted him but this time it too was completed with wings which it was stretching like a gargoyle. Except for that novelty everything was the same as he first saw it to the smallest detail. Expensive and stylish furniture filled empty rooms and corridors, golden carvings decorated columns over the walls and even the same secret passages to torture chambers and the burial ground in the basement stood untouched. But there were no Vorador's pets. His numerous children which he used to call " brides " once fatefully guarded these halls and now not even a fly would stir the deaf silence which dominated this place. A perfect tomb for ether of them.
After a wile of stumbling Kain begun to loose his patience. Vorador was masked from his senses, but his face was laughing at him from behind every wall. He could have been in every shadow or behind every turn and the longer he staid here the more did this maze seem like a giant death trap. But Kain didn't care. If Vorador was smart he will stay hiding, for Kain was so focused that he could sense it as soon as Vorador would begin to make his move.
This game has grown too long and Kain became annoyed. Perhaps this whole set was made just to waist time with it. But as he made a step around the next corner he was in a long corridor made in a gallery. Its walls were decorated with rich tapestries depicting moments of Kain's life. In fact every tapestry depicted a crime or a sin during his decadent rule of Nosgoth in an even worse and more beastly manner. Kain and his lieutenants stood before ruined cities, upon mountains of corpses, laughing like mad or like dark clouds of smoke from the seared buildings prayed upon women and children that fled before them in terror. Rivers of blood, screams of pain the taint of wrongs seemed like it can't ever be washed away and it all made him wonder if this was really his doing and not some exaggerated mockery. He was in every one of these images but the face seemed so distant and foreign it couldn't be true.
But it was true enough. He did burned all those cities, mixed rivers with blood and slain countless innocents in his rage and lust for power. It was all here or at least enough of it to prove a point ; he will never be redeemed.
This distasteful memorial also clearly depicted Vorador's opinion of him. There was not a trace of respect or honor in it and it was more than insulting. Vorador's opinion was a very relevant one in Kain's book. He swallowed his sour emotions while coldly walking down this gallery and at his passing tapestries would ignite and incinerate even before he would walk pass them. At the end of the corridor were a dour and the last tapestry depicting Raziel's cruel fate. He was sinking into the burning abyss with horror blazing in his eyes while Kain and the others atop of the cliff had nothing but loathing and contempt. That image Kain didn't ignite. He tossed a gaze at it and simply left it alone as he kicked the dour open and entered the last chamber.
The legendary bowel of Vorador's retreat extended before him and Vorador sat there at the end of a long dining desk just as he did the first time they've met face to face. From the ceiling of the dining room hung bodies of people hooked by their feet and being drained of blood in various goblets placed on the table. There were also three big crystal chandeliers with small candles casting insufficient light on the room. Darkness was so thick it seemed like the air was made of it and it seemed like shades were a layer of tar besmeared over walls.
" Welcome… "
" Where are they ?"; Kain swiftly interrupted with a silent but penetrating voice
" My brides ? I've left them to starve. Eventually they'll turn on each other and you have already wasted enough time here to prevent it. "
At last in perhaps an eternity fear reached Kain's awareness. Fear for Adella, Tarian and Jasmine who could kill each other in their lust and hunger. It passed the next moment as he focused on Vorador again. He learned long ago to give death to those who ask for it and Vorador has passed the initiation. If he'd let him go now he probably wouldn't get a second chance. Kain's red talon clenched the hilt of the reaver and his iron teeth glittered on the poor lights :
" Pity… "; Kain said :" I had hoped for more time. "
The next moment stretched into an hover. Vorador stood up. Kain jumped from his stand at the entrance and the reaver blazed in his claws chasing the shades away with its energy. As he flied trough the air everything was erased but the cause and Kain's face was colored only in hunger for vengeance. Vengeance for the pain, the mockery, humiliation and his progeny. It was all pored in one single jump. Vorador smiled as he watched Kain fly towards him. Somehow his eyes were too slow to follow Kain's movement rather than running late after his passing, but it seemed like he didn't care about any of it. He was willing to die now.
But as he flied half way to him, Kain's face suddenly changed in a shocking realization. The anger was extinguished replaced by a violent assault of pain and Kain crashed on the table a quarter of way left between Vorador and him. He struggled like in some kind of a seizure, still gripping the reaver and trying to back away from Vorador as fast as he could yelling trough his teeth :
" No… ugh… not now !... RAAAHHH !"
He seemed to be suppressing it and after a while he stood up again like it never happened. But Vorador was still standing with his eyes on the spot where Kain was supposed to land. He didn't move an inch like he was frozen. Something was wrong. He could have used Kain's moment of weakness but instead he did literally nothing. Kain's heart finally calmed and he observed his host more closely. Green skin begun to fade away and the creature changed to a human. It was General Leiman still in his NUC uniform, covered in blood of a powerful and intoxicating smell. Vorador's blood without doubt. It finally made some sense now ; Vorador has blinded him using his own anger against him and he couldn't see trough the simplest illusion placed upon the General, and the blood was enough to provoke him into giving a killing strike. Had it not came to him in this moment… But why ? What good would Vorador have of General's death ?
Walls started to tremble giving an obvious sign that this building has exceeded its expansion date. He grabbed the fortunate human and holding for his still aching chest, Kain teleported them out into the swamps.