Disclaimer: I do not own Magic: The Gathering, only my OCs.

Chapter 17-Melna

"This…this is horrible," gasped Khell. Tyr and the Keepers had just teleported near the outskirts of Melna, a large city a few hours from the settlement. Tyr had visited it in the past. It had once been a thriving urban center. Its port was a major trading center and every day, the streets would be packed with people converging to the markets, which boasted a great number of craftsmen and vendors.

Now, one would never have guessed the city could have ever been such a vibrant, lively place. The city was in ruins. Many buildings had been destroyed and the rest were in a state of considerable disrepair. Fires burned throughout the city, the black smoke billowing into the sky.

As they approached the city, they passed through pastures littered with slaughtered cattle. Tyr bent down to examine it; the animal had been disemboweled and its eyeballs had been plucked from their sockets.

"Well, this is certainly a pleasant sight," he muttered, standing up.

"Did Erik really do this?" asked Eva.

"It wasn't Erik's doing," said Khell solemnly "Chihowaido is in control and this is just the type of sick, twisted act he would perform."

The old buzzard hasn't changed a bit. This is the same thing he used to do to those who would refuse to join him.

I don't suppose you were much better?

My methods were a lot more refined. I would never have left all these corpses lying around to rot. It was much more effective to reanimate them and send them out to wreak havoc.

Yeah, much better. There's something I don't get; with your necromancy you should easily have won the war, since you could just reap the battlefields for fresh soldiers.

That worked for a while, but then they got smart and started using enchantments that caused anything killed to immediately turn to dust.

The equivalent of a 'remove from the game' effect?

Exactly. With no corpses, there was nothing to reanimate, but fortunately, there was a fresh supply of beings I could harvest for my armies against their will.

So how could you not have won?

I grew overconfident and that was my downfall. Never assume yourself to be invincible.

I'll keep that in mind.

As they entered the city, they stopped, revolted by the sight that met them: dead bodies lay everywhere, their blood splashed all over the streets and buildings. Many of the corpses had horrified expressions on their faces. Some of them had literally vaporized, leaving a scorched outline of their body on whatever surface they had died on.

Arrathir barely glanced at the horrors surrounding them. He'd become somewhat desensitized to such things, having seen his share of massacres. Eva was quite shocked by all this. Even more shocking was the fact that it had been caused by someone she knew. Charles remained emotionless, as always, but under his mask of indifference, anger was brewing. How could Chihowaido slaughter an entire city on a whim? It went against every principle of white mana!

;You forget, Cannon, that in its purest form, White can be just as destructive and 'evil' as black and is willing to do whatever it takes to uphold the law;

;This isn't upholding the law! This is madness!;

;This is a lloy's modus operandi. Chihowaido is trying to frighten Chikuro with this display of power. In his eye, the ends justify the means. As long as Chikuro is alive, Chihowaido will stop at nothing to kill him;

;Then why doesn't he just attack us now?;

;He knows the other Keepers will defend Chikuro. Since he recently awoke, Chihowaido's power is still relatively low compared to say, Arrathir's or Khell's. He is training himself through this;

;What about me? I haven't been doing much summoning or dueling. Shouldn't I be training?;

;There will be opportunities, Cannon. As it stands, you are the weakest of the Keepers. Khell is the strongest, due to his experience as a summoner and being awoken second. Arrathir, who was the first to awaken would be second, followed by Eva then Chihowaido;

;So where were you when the Keepers reigned?:

;Third. Chihowaido was the strongest, followed by Chikuro. Chiruu and Rin were about the same;

;I'd have thought you would be number one. After all, knowledge is power;

;Understand, Cannon, that Chikuro and Chihowaido actively sought to become more powerful. Ever since they met, it has been a constant competition to outdo the other. The rest of the Keepers also sought to gain power, but our quest was motivated by knowledge that would allow us to better understand, and thus aid, the Multiverse, whereas Chikuro and Chihowaido's was motivated by greed;

The group had arrived in a large plaza. A large ruined building was at the far side; its mighty oak doors had been ripped partly off their hinges. Here, the body count was the highest. Evidently, the crowds had been driven here by the enemy and then slaughtered without mercy.

"We should spread out," suggested Tyr "Search for survivors."

"Doesn't look like we'll find any," muttered Arrathir grimly.

"Someone gather the bodies and burn them," said Tyr "It is the least we can do for these people."

"I can create pyres from the wood debris and pile the bodies on them," said Khell "Eva, will you be able to light them?"

"Yes," said Eva, who was angrily looking at the death and destruction brought about by one of their own.

"Arrathir, you come with me to search for survivors," ordered Tyr "We'll search this way," he added, indicating a rubble-strewn street heading north.

"No, I'm going with Eva," said the black Keeper, possessively placing a hand on his mate's shoulder.

"We must speak…alone," said Tyr.

"I'll be fine," Eva told Arrathir, giving him a peck on the cheek "Come on, Charles," she added, heading for another street to the east.

"If you find anyone, see if they can confirm who did this," said Khell, summoning a few Woodland Elves to aid him in his grim task. The elves immediately started clearing the rubble, aided by a Craw Wurm Khell had also summoned.

"So what is it?" asked Arrathir as they left the plaza.

"I have not been entirely honest with you, Arrathir," said Tyr "I have come on behalf of your father."

Charles and Eva walked in silence through the streets of Melna. There was an uncomfortable silence between the two summoners. In fact, ever since her mating, Eva had noticed Charles seemed much more distant.

"Charles," began Eva.

"I know what you're going to say, Eva," interrupted Charles "I'm not angry at you for taking Arrathir as your mate. What is done, is done, and I cannot dwell on the past or let my emotions come in the way of our friendship."

"Well, I'm glad," said Eva "I value our friendship and would hate to lose it because of what happened between Arrathir and I."

"We've already had this discussion," said Charles "That subject is closed. Let us focus on the task at hand."

Eva merely nodded, glad to have seemingly resolved the issue between them. The two Keepers advanced through the ruined streets, often having to clamber over piles of rubble or taking detours to avoid impassible obstacles. To aid in their search, Eva summoned two Spark Elementals and a Fledgling Dragon. She sent the elementals scurrying through the ruins while the dragon circled overhead. Charles summoned a few breezekeepers and sent them off as well, the creatures phasing through the rubble as they searched for life forms.

They soon came to a crossroad in the middle of which was a fountain of a winged woman holding an urn, from which reddish water poured into the basin at her feet; the water's color a grim reminder of how much blood had been split that day.

Suddenly, Eva's ears pricked up. "There's someone here," she announced, sniffing the air.

"Over there," said Charles, doing a quick mana reading of the area. He indicated a low building whose facade had been partially reduced to rubble. Amazingly, the roof hadn't collapsed.

"Hello?" said Eva, walking up to the building "Are you all right?"

There was a clatter of stones and something shot past Eva, knocking her to the ground as it took off down an alley.

"You OK?" asked Charles, helping Eva up.

"Fine," said Eva "Come on!" She took off after the figure, Charles close behind her.

"It's bloody fast," said Charles as the figure ahead of them darted into a building.

"We're faster," said Eva, leaping up through a second-floor window in time to see the figure dash up the stairs and jump out a window onto a nearby roof.

"Did you get a look at it?" asked Charles, appearing beside Eva in a flash of blue light.

"I think she's a girl. I saw she had long hair," said Eva, jumping out the window

"She sure is in a hurry to get away from us," said Charles, following Eva out the window as the figure bounded across the rooftops.

"She probably thinks we're with whoever did this," said Eva "Can't blame her: if I was in her shoes, I'd be terrified as well."

"All right, that's it," said Charles "Time to end this chase." The Keeper of Blue Mana vanished in a blue flash and reappeared in front of the figure, which ran headlong into him, falling to the ground with a small cry of pain. Charles saw that she was indeed a girl, maybe 10 years old or so. She had scraggly black hair and wore a brown tunic and torn, dirty pants. Her face was streaked with tears and dirt. Blood was splattered all over her front, arms and legs. She stared fearfully up at Charles and backed away from the Keeper, seemingly expecting him to attack at any moment.

"Hey, it's OK," said Eva, reassuringly placing her hands on the girl's shoulders. "We're not going to hurt you."

The girl turned around and looked up at Eva. Giving a small cry, she threw herself into the Keeper's arms, hugging her tightly and burying her face into Eva's body.

"See?" Eva told Charles as the girl began weeping into her dress "She's just terrified. What is your name?" she asked the sobbing girl. The girl looked up at Eva with tear-filled eyes.

"Mira," she said before returning to her crying.

"Mira? That's a pretty name," said Eva "I'm Eva and that's Charles. We're here to help you." She began stroking the girl's back, trying to comfort her. She sat down and cradled the girl in her lap. Eventually, Mira began calming down, her sobs turning into gentle whimpers.

"Mira," said Charles "Where are your parents?"

"I-I," said Mira, fresh tears welling up in her eyes. "They're dead. Momma came home and she was bleeding. She told me to run and hide. I didn't wanna leave her, but men with sword came and they…" she burst into tears and embraced Eva again.

"How sickeningly sweet," drawled a voice behind Charles. He turned to see a slim woman with short black hair and high cheekbones standing a few meters away. She dressed in a black leather bustier and a black skirt with a slit down the side. She had a whip on her waist and held a rope in the other. The end of the rope was tied around the neck of a young girl. The girl, who was much shorter than the woman, stood silently behind her, hanging her head so her blonde hair obscured her face. She wore a sleeveless white dress and had a copper bracelet on one wrist.

"Did you do this?" barked Eva, gesturing to the ruined city around them.

"It would appear someone beat us to it," said the woman "What a pity. I was so looking forward to a good slaughter, but that does not matter since our objective had been to draw you here."

"Who are you?" asked Charles.

"Oh, I am sorry," said the woman in mock apology "I am Pain and this is my slave, Pleasure," she gave the rope a sharp tug, causing the girl to fall to her knees with a small cry of pain.

"You're another of the One's cronies, aren't you?" snarled Eva.

"The One?" scoffed Pain. "We never worked for that weakling; quite the other way around in fact. We tired of his incompetence and decided to take matters into our own hands."

"Eva Pezrokov and Charles Wainscot, we challenge you to a duel," said Pleasure in a hushed, submissive voice.

"Who gave you permission to speak, slut?" hissed Pain, cuffing the girl roughly.

"Sorry, Mistress Pain," said the girl, her voice never rising above a whisper.

"As my slave," said Pain, her voice full of contempt "Said, we challenge you to a duel!"

"Is that the only reason you creeps show up?" asked Eva.

"It is somewhat of a recurring pattern," agreed Charles "A tag-team mach it is then? It has been a while since we've seen a duel."

"Yeah," agreed Eva "I've been wondering when the next one would show up. We used to have a lot more back when this started."

"Well, it was nice to have a bit of a break from them. It allowed us to sort out a few personal issues."

"True, but it is nice to be getting back into the swing of things," said Eva.

"Are you going to stand there and jabber all day or are we going to duel?" yelled Pain.

"Fine," said Charles "As Keeper of Mana, I accept your challenge. Albeit a waste of our time."

"And you think you aren't a waste of mine?" sneered Pain as her hands erupted into black flames. "Having to deal with the two weakest Keepers first, pah!"

To be continued…

Author's Note: Yeah, I'm back. Phear the author!